His Other Truth (A Stella Fall Psychological Suspense Thriller—Book 6)

PROLOGUE As he walked up the stairs to the front door of the Taylor residence, Steve Todd punched his gloved fist into the opposite hand, whistling through numb lips. It was a freezing January morning, but at least it wasn’t snowing, wasn’t raining, and in fact the sun was even peeking through the clouds. That meant he could check the Taylor yard off on the maintenance list that always got shorter through the winter months. He glanced back at the truck idling in the driveway, the exhaust pluming steam into the early morning air. Cocooned in the warmth of the passenger seat, his crew, a.k.a. his son Walter, was in his usual pose, head bowed over his phone. Fingers flying over the keyboard. The youth of today. He was a good enough kid, but didn’t want to join his father in the landscaping business. He said it was boring. Boring it might be, but maintaining the yards of the wealthy folk in the coastal towns of Connecticut was good business. Steve had clients in areas from Bridgeport to Stamford and many in between. This particular home was in Bridgeport. The Taylors. He’d had a lot of work from them. Redesigned their entire backyard in the years they’d been living here—but Mrs. Taylor was fussy. She was one of those clients who liked to spell everything out. So Steve wasn’t allowed to get started without a briefing. He knocked on the front door and waited. The couple would be up and about by now. They both got off to an early start, which was why he’d gotten here before seven a.m. Both were always rushing out to the office, or meetings, or work conferences. Steve had picked up that they could afford this plush home with its large grounds as a result of their own efforts. Way too many folk in this part of the world seemed to have family money, something that always puzzled Steve, because he, too, was a self-made man who’d grown his business from scratch. He liked knowing he was independent of any family obligations, and could put bread on the table through a hard and honest day’s work. He stamped his feet again, hoping his client would hustle to the door because it was not getting any warmer out here. Maybe he should call. Perhaps Mrs. Taylor was upstairs or around the back, or even already at work, in which case he could hopefully be briefed via a phone call. Steve dialed her number. It rang twice. Three times. As it did, he realized he could hear it from inside the house. Mrs. Taylor’s phone was ringing faintly. It was definitely her phone. The sound had started just after he’d called it, and he recognized the loud, distinctive trill of the ringtone. “Okay,” he said, confused. “Now what?” Steve didn’t know what strange impulse made him try the front door, something he’d never done in the history of his work so far. Barging into someone’s home was wrong. It was in fact a surefire way for a landscaper to lose the contract. People didn’t appreciate it, particularly in this area where privacy was like a right to most people. But there was something about that insistent, unanswered ringing that was prickling his senses. And the Taylors were punctual people. They weren’t clients who ran late or forgot about appointments. He turned the handle and, to his shock, the door opened. Worriedly, he peered into the hallway, with the family room beyond, and the tiled corridor leading to the bedrooms. It all looked in order. Nothing out of place. There hadn’t been a fire or a flood or any obvious emergency. The ringing was louder. It was coming from all the way down the corridor and Steve imagined for a moment that the sound was luring him inside. “Mrs. Taylor?” he called loudly. Nothing in reply. No quick footsteps. No shout of “I’ll be there in a sec!” Where was she? Had she and her husband had some other crisis and rushed out, and if so, why was her phone inside? Should he go down the corridor and take a look? “Uh-uh.” He stepped back and closed the door firmly, with hands that were strangely damp. Spooky and strange as this whole situation was, he couldn’t just walk into a client’s house. He was there to care for their yard. If they came back and found him wandering around inside, he’d be in a shed load of trouble. But why were they not home? Scenarios spun through his mind. The less appealing ones were unfortunately top of mind. Had there been a burglary, had the couple fought, had something worse happened? Perhaps he could look through a window, Steve decided, cutting off his imaginings as they veered toward the gruesome. A window might give him a clue. He was still vaguely uncomfortable with it, but that way at least he’d be able to check if anything was wrong without walking inside their home. Leaving the front door, he headed around the outside of the house. This was the family room. It had a French door and the curtains were closed. This next room he wasn’t sure about. One of the spare bedrooms, perhaps. If he recalled correctly, the following window was the one in the hall just before the master suite. The main bedroom was higher than the rest of the home, built to accommodate the slope of the land, with a balcony at the far end which looked out onto a formal garden and pond that needed tending year-round. All the windows beyond this one were above head height, so this was the only possibility. The curtains were closed but there was a small gap through which Steve peered, his mouth feeling very dry, his spine prickling with uneasiness that he was having to do such a thing. He hoped beyond hope that there was a reason for this silence and stillness, the unlocked front door and the ringing phone. Through the tiny gap in the curtains, he could see the colorful splash of a wine-red rug at the bottom of the short staircase leading up to the master suite doorway. That was it. Just a rug. Nothing else in sight, and nothing untoward. He shrugged, deciding that he’d have to try and call them later. They wouldn’t want him to start without a briefing. But, as Steve turned away, he rethought what he’d seen. There had been no rug there last week, he realized, his stomach clenching so violently it was painful. He’d washed the window glass after trimming the grass nearby and he’d only noticed the smooth white tiles. Plus, that rug had been a strange shape. He’d noticed rounded, irregular edges. Now feeling sick, he returned to the window and this time he craned his neck all the way to the side, trying to see as much as possible of the home’s interior. He gasped in horror as he saw what he’d missed the first time. It was a foot. A bare foot, jutting into his vision just far enough for him to make out the stark whiteness of the flesh and the strange, darker streaks on the skin. A cry escaped his mouth, horror and disbelief crowding his mind. This couldn’t be! Surely it couldn’t be? A foot, jutting out into a pool of blood? “Mrs. Taylor? Mr. Taylor?” he shouted loudly through the window, but there was still no response and no movement. “What the hell?” Steve whispered as the puzzle pieces fitted together in his astounded brain. He didn’t know who the foot belonged to, couldn’t tell, but it must be one of the Taylors lying there. Where was the spouse, or had something happened to both of them? What catastrophe had played out in this pristine home? Should he go back inside? Perhaps he could help? As he hesitated, a voice in the back of his mind told him that would be a very, very bad idea. That what awaited him in there was not just a simple household accident, but something much worse. He feared it was a crime scene. And the first rule of being around a crime scene, as Steve had learned from the police years ago after stumbling upon a minor incident, was: don’t go inside. Don’t approach the scene, don’t walk in it, don’t move anything, don’t touch. Leave it to the investigators, or you open up a world of trouble for yourself. He decided it would be wise to heed that advice right now. Feeling sick with dread, he dialed 911 with fingers so unsteady it took him three tries. Then, as the call connected, his nerve broke. He turned and rushed back toward the warmth and safety of his truck. “There’s been—there’s been—something’s gone very wrong inside this house!” he gasped to the operator as he stumbled along the path. “I think there must have been a—a death. Or a terrible accident. Please, get here as soon as you can!”