The Evidence Room by Harvey Cameron

Author:Harvey, Cameron [Harvey, Cameron]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781250031143
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2015-06-02T07:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Royce Beaumont, the attorney whom Luna Riley had recommended, worked out of an office above a kiddie playland called Baboon Jack’s.

Aurora stood in the blistering heat next to a man in a frog costume who was chain smoking on the front steps.

“Excuse me,” she said. “Do I go around back to get to Royce Beaumont’s office?”

The frog man shrugged off the felt green hood of his costume and glanced up at her with mild interest. “Only way out is through,” he said, pointing to the kiddie park. “They just got done with the glitter ponies carnival. Watch your step.”

“Thanks.” The guy wasn’t kidding. Inside, glitter and streamers surrounded one traumatized-looking pony standing in the middle of the room. Aurora made her way down the main hallway to the staircase at the back. On all sides, children shrieked and darted among arcade games and pits filled with brightly colored plastic balls. In the corner, a pink stereo blared a tune that sounded like it was being played at twice the normal speed. Everything shimmered with glitter. She wondered if she had ever come here as a kid.

Aurora wound her way up the back steps to an office door and pressed a buzzer. It was amazing that anyone could hear with the insistent thump of the music below, but miraculously someone pulled the door open.

A woman in her forties with feathered bangs and cat’s eye glasses smiled at Aurora and beckoned her inside. “Aurora Atchison. I can’t believe it’s you.” Aurora was getting used to the stares she got around town, but this was something more.

“I have an appointment with Mr. Beaumont.”

The woman took both of Aurora’s hands in her own. “Oh, sugar. You’re just as pretty as your mama. You don’t remember me, do you? Miss Pearline?”

She was too young to have been one of Raylene’s friends, not much older than Aurora. A childhood playmate? Aurora smiled. “I’m so sorry, I don’t remember.”

“Well of course you don’t! Oh honey, I prayed for you so many times. I’m the one that found you that night your mama went to be with the Lord. At Margie Belle’s.”

This was the woman who had called the police. Her rescuer. Aurora reached back into her memory of that night, but there was only Doc Mason and the morgue, and before that a terrible blank space. This woman could not have been more than a teenager that night; she must have been terrified. Aurora squeezed her hands.

“Thank you,” she said, the words painfully inadequate. “For what you did, for helping me that night.”

“Oh, honey,” Pearline began, but she was interrupted by the screech of the phone. She tottered back around the desk.

“Mr. Beaumont’s just finishing up a conference call.” She pointed to a shiny leather couch. “Y’all make yourself comfortable. This phone’s been ringing off the damn hook all day!”

Aurora took a seat by the window next to an older woman reading the newspaper. Above the bayou, clouds were beginning to gather in gray spirals. From here, the mini-mart and boat dock were barely visible through the fog.

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