But his silence sent a message.
“Stand aside,” Vaughn said, his voice raised. “I’m getting my son out of here.”
“Enough,” Giovanni said. “You don’t raise your voice in this house, and you don’t make demands here.”
“You have no right to tell me what to?—”
“I have every right,” Giovanni said.
Silence followed, thick and unyielding.
“Dad, I know what I’m doing,” Logan said. “I need to stay.”
Vaughn looked from Giovanni to Logan, then back again.
“This isn’t over,” Vaughn said.
“No,” I said. “It isn’t.”
Vaughn jerked around and raced past us, heading for the front door.
Giovanni followed.
And I stood there, thoughts swirling around in my head.
One moment, I started to believe Vaughn was involved in Audrey’s death somehow. The next, I wondered if he might be protecting someone—Tilly perhaps.
And that possibility unsettled me more than any other.
30
I arrived at the Ashfords’ house around noon. The kitchen light was aglow as I pulled into the driveway, and it wasn’t long before Rosemary peeked through the blinds and then met me at the front door.
“Good to see you,” she said. “Come in.”
I stepped inside, and Rosemary led me straight to the kitchen. She offered me a cup of coffee, which I accepted, and I took a seat beside her.
“How’s the case going?” she asked. “Are you getting anywhere?”
“I am, and that’s why I’m here,” I said. “I have a few questions. You grew up around here, right?”
“Dustin and I both did.”
“When I was here the other day, I told you about Anne, the young woman who went missing.”
“I remember. What about her?”
“I think Audrey may have been investigating Anne’s disappearance before she died,” I said. “Anne would have been a little older than you when she went missing.”
“Funny, I don’t remember hearing anything about it.”
“Did she ever ask you anything about your former classmates at school?” I asked.
“Not about my classmates, no. But she did ask me if she could look through our yearbooks.”
“When?”
Rosemary moved a hand to her hip. “Oh, let’s see now, it would have been a couple of weeks before she died, if I remember right.”
