police? I was going under the assumption that she could have been protected until the arrest and trial of the murderer. There didn’t seem to be a good reason not to come forward and tell what she’d seen.
I came back to the idea that perhaps the two crimes had nothing in common. Sheila had said that my theory might be wrong. However, Siever had complained bitterly that I’d talked to one of the Gillespies. Mrs. Gillespie had hung up rather than admit that the two crimes might have some points in common. Adam Gillespie had lied to me about his dog and going out. There was a lot of suspicious behaviors for two unrelated events.
So I was back to wondering, what had made Susan leave her family, her town, her state to move across the country and stay away indefinitely? The only reason was that she had a reason why staying in Ohio would be bad for her, not just minor girl drama, but a crisis sufficiently dire that my mother had gone along with it. My mother’s approval meant it had to be big. She’d sacrificed the life of her husband, the company of one son, and the warping of the second son.
I remembered what Sheila had told me. The passage of time would highlight certain aspects of the case and those aspects might lead the way to a solution. I thought about the Frias family first, remembering the visit to the Mr. Frias’ new home. He’d definitely gone downhill since the murder. His wife had provided them with an income, and they’d had a baby on the way. Would he have killed her to allow himself the time to invent and dream? It seemed like a draconian way to achieve that. An abortion would have kept his income without the baby. I wondered if they believed in abortion or if murder would have been his only option. It certainly seemed contradictory to feel that killing an unborn child was wrong, but feeling that killing your spouse was okay.
So I thought about the Gillespies and what had become of them. Adam looked like he was a successful profession. Gwen had found a job that allowed her to enjoy her passions of working with animals and gossip. The parents had moved to a remote island off the coast of Mexico. I wondered if there was extradition from Mexico. A quick search showed that Mexico did have an extradition treaty with the US, so the move proved nothing. If they had been guilty, then the parents would be brought back. If I had their number, I was sure that the police and FBI would be able to find them as well. I wasn’t sure what the move had provided anyone in terms of the murder.
I would put it down to a blithe move, but Mrs. Gillespie had hung up on me. I was suspicious of anyone who would just hang up quickly without trying to find out what was going on. She hadn’t even asked about my family or made any small talk. It seemed guilty. However, I kept coming back to the fact that if they had truly run away to Mexico, they could easily be extradited and returned to the States to face a trial of murder. Had they both been involved in the murder, or had one of them confessed to the other, knowing that their spouse would not have to testify against them in court? Had running away together made them closer or just turned to its own prison?
I was getting nowhere with the Gillespies, so I came back to the missing pieces of the police report. I wondered why Sheila hadn’t called me. It wasn’t like her to go so long without calling, especially as she’d been encouraging me to follow up with Susan’s disappearance. I’d not wanted to learn her fate for so long. I’d let the police file for Susan sit fallow on my dining room table for months before opening it. However, now that I was on the trail, she’d been incredibly helpful in making things happen. I decided to give her another hour before I called her. I didn’t want to push, but I wanted the number for Robert Jones, so that I could iron out the last detail.
I went back to the file and considered the things that had been removed from the file. In
I came back to the idea that perhaps the two crimes had nothing in common. Sheila had said that my theory might be wrong. However, Siever had complained bitterly that I’d talked to one of the Gillespies. Mrs. Gillespie had hung up rather than admit that the two crimes might have some points in common. Adam Gillespie had lied to me about his dog and going out. There was a lot of suspicious behaviors for two unrelated events.
So I was back to wondering, what had made Susan leave her family, her town, her state to move across the country and stay away indefinitely? The only reason was that she had a reason why staying in Ohio would be bad for her, not just minor girl drama, but a crisis sufficiently dire that my mother had gone along with it. My mother’s approval meant it had to be big. She’d sacrificed the life of her husband, the company of one son, and the warping of the second son.
I remembered what Sheila had told me. The passage of time would highlight certain aspects of the case and those aspects might lead the way to a solution. I thought about the Frias family first, remembering the visit to the Mr. Frias’ new home. He’d definitely gone downhill since the murder. His wife had provided them with an income, and they’d had a baby on the way. Would he have killed her to allow himself the time to invent and dream? It seemed like a draconian way to achieve that. An abortion would have kept his income without the baby. I wondered if they believed in abortion or if murder would have been his only option. It certainly seemed contradictory to feel that killing an unborn child was wrong, but feeling that killing your spouse was okay.
So I thought about the Gillespies and what had become of them. Adam looked like he was a successful profession. Gwen had found a job that allowed her to enjoy her passions of working with animals and gossip. The parents had moved to a remote island off the coast of Mexico. I wondered if there was extradition from Mexico. A quick search showed that Mexico did have an extradition treaty with the US, so the move proved nothing. If they had been guilty, then the parents would be brought back. If I had their number, I was sure that the police and FBI would be able to find them as well. I wasn’t sure what the move had provided anyone in terms of the murder.
I would put it down to a blithe move, but Mrs. Gillespie had hung up on me. I was suspicious of anyone who would just hang up quickly without trying to find out what was going on. She hadn’t even asked about my family or made any small talk. It seemed guilty. However, I kept coming back to the fact that if they had truly run away to Mexico, they could easily be extradited and returned to the States to face a trial of murder. Had they both been involved in the murder, or had one of them confessed to the other, knowing that their spouse would not have to testify against them in court? Had running away together made them closer or just turned to its own prison?
I was getting nowhere with the Gillespies, so I came back to the missing pieces of the police report. I wondered why Sheila hadn’t called me. It wasn’t like her to go so long without calling, especially as she’d been encouraging me to follow up with Susan’s disappearance. I’d not wanted to learn her fate for so long. I’d let the police file for Susan sit fallow on my dining room table for months before opening it. However, now that I was on the trail, she’d been incredibly helpful in making things happen. I decided to give her another hour before I called her. I didn’t want to push, but I wanted the number for Robert Jones, so that I could iron out the last detail.
I went back to the file and considered the things that had been removed from the file. In
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