There’s no way I can go to the police for anything, but I’m sure Ren and Hayato have posed as the authorities before. We can rent costumes. I can get creative.
Mrs. Codd relents. While she doesn’t try to shut the door, she also doesn’t open it any farther. “Look, I didn’t do anything illegal, all right. Gina wanted to go.”
“Gina wanted to go where?” J steps into the door.
I resist the urge to pull her back and keep a close eye on Mrs. Codd in case she makes any sudden movements.
“With the Porters.” The old woman licks her cracked lips, eyes darting both ways. “She was spending so much time over there. She said they hired her as the dog walker, but it don’t take twelve hours to walk no dog.”
J glances over her shoulder and gives me a pointed look with eyebrows raised. To Mrs. Codd, she whispers, “Are you saying Gina was… sleeping with the Porters?”
“What? No.” Mrs. Codd reels back.
“Then why?”
Mrs. Codd’s eyes flit to me.
I fold my arms over my chest, trying to look as imposing and intimidating as I can.
It works because she shudders and starts singing like a canary. “It was about six months after Kelly disappeared. Gina came home one day saying she was leaving town with the Porters. That they were her new parents now and she didn’t want nothing to do with us. She said if anyone asked anything, I should tell them that we only had one daughter.”
“So, you let a teenager leave with a family whose daughter went missing six months before?” J’s tone holds an undercurrent of accusation.
“You don’t understand. Gina wasscary. Since she was a little girl, she could get people to do what she wanted before they even realized it was her doing.”
“What do you mean?”
“One time when she was twelve, she asked me and her father to buy her a whole new wardrobe for junior high. I said no. We couldn’t afford it. And then our trailer happened to burn down.” She gestures to the addition on the back. “And all of Gina’s clothes burned with it.”
J steps back, her mouth forming a perfect “o.” I’m beside her in the blink of an eye, at the ready in case she faints. I don’t like this. Any of this. Her watch isn’t beeping, but if I don’t wrap this up, it’s only a matter of time.
“When’s the last time you heard from Gina?” I demand.
Mrs. Codd glances at the ceiling. “It was about a year after she left with the Porters. I got a call from a psychiatric hospital.It was Gina. She said the Porters stuck her in the nut house, and they were claiming she was a psychopath. She wanted me to come and get her.”
“Did you?” I ask.
Mrs. Codd gives me a blank look. “Of course I did. She’s my daughter. No matter what, she’ll always be my blood.”
Something chirps, and I assume it’s J’s watch, so I close my hand around her shoulder and nudge her back.
I don’t blame J for being unnerved. Mrs. Codd is an extremely strange woman. Even I can sense it. My body is tensing like it does when an attacker is behind me during a sparring fight.
“Thanks for your time, Mrs. Codd.” I steer J toward the car that’s still idling on the street.
“I’d be careful if I were you!” Mrs. Codd yells at our back.
J freezes like someone has a gun on her.
I stop and peer over my shoulder.
Mrs. Codd has the door open wide and is standing in the doorway, backlit by orange light, legs spread apart like a soldier. Her eyes are harder than bullets.
“Gina don’t like when people get too close to the truth about her.”
That’s not a friendly word of advice. It’s a threat.
I get J into the car first.
