A Heart of Deception Part 9

 Holly Everten was lying lifeless on the cool cement that had befriended her for an indefinite amount of time. more...

 Holly and Darrell settled into Rex Fields, a dry, warm, southern town near Oklahoma and Louisiana border. more....

 Several years had passed by ever so quickly. more...

 Holly drove the rental wooden station wagon to the local shop, aptly named Valerian Feed Store after all the bright red flowers growing in the area. more...

 Several days ebbed and flowed by. Holly went about to clean the garage that had sorely been ignored. more...

 Darrell was crouched over the hard, cold, steel table in the Rex Field’s Police Department interrogation room. more...

 De Luco’s dusty maroon car wound its way around the twists and turns of FM 414 in Chantry. more...

 De Luco slammed the stack of phone records on the metal table Darrell was leaning on. more...

    A full month had passed. The results of the DNA found on the bloody buttoned up shirt with 'GF' marked on the collar were in. Not many identifying articles belonging to Garrett Fleischer were found at the Everten home, other than the possible shirt. Most of the personal property recovered from the Everten house were circumstantial- a shaver with a trace of moist blood, toothbrushes that didn't seem to belong to Holly or Darrell, male underwear that were clearly too small for Darrell, and a few pairs of jeans that were also too short for Darrell had been logged into evidence. The trace amount of blood on the shaver had not been enough to get DNA evidence. The toothbrush had not been used in a while, so the DNA found on it was inconclusive. The underwear was bleached clean. The shirt seemed to be the smoking gun. It was concluded that the person who had worn it and bled on it was related to Darrell but not to Holly. It also was belonging to a male.

     The TCIC check Millen did precluded that Darrell's dad Garrett had been released from prison free and clear approximately two years ago. He had done hard time for just over 30 years for a slew of armed robberies, indecency with a child, lewd conduct on an elderly person, and several public intoxication misdemeanors. The DNA on the shirt was an 85% match to Garrett. A more convincing percentage match could not be reached because the sample had been tainted with other fluids likely from Darrell or another person. It was not enough to validate without a doubt that Garrett was in the Everten home recently.

    De Luco held a press conference in front of the Caddo Parish Courthouse. There were Christmas lights dripping winter wonderland enchantment all around him. Snow lightly dusted De Luco's wool jacket before it melted in the mild weather.

     "As you all know, we have been looking for Holly Everten for some time. She has been missing since September 19th, about seven weeks now. We have not given up hope yet. We appreciate the support of the community. We are investigating leads every day that may answer everyone's questions. Please be patient. If you know something, and have not come forward, we encourage you to speak to one of our fine officers. Have a wonderful holiday to all of you. God Bless you during this joyous season, even under these somber circumstances." De Luco promptly left the podium he spoke from and dashed to his old Lincoln to warm himself up.

      "Hello, Millen?" De Luco answered his phone.

      "I have bad news boss." Millen said with a foreboding tone. "Even after we searched the Cartwright home and brought everything to the lab, there was not sign that Holly had been there. Blythe is staying there now. She moved in a few days ago, but isn't talking to us."

       "Is that it?" De Luco feared.

       "No, seems that Miles went back to his native country. He is in Durban, South Africa. He had this planned for months it appears." Millen explained.

       "Damn it!" De Luco cursed. "I need you to bring Blythe in." De Luco slammed the phone on the receiver without waiting for Millen's response.

       "I ain't go nothing to talk about to you people!" Blythe shrieked as she was hauled off into the Rex Field's police department early the next morning.

       "Where's Holly?" De Luco almost lunged at Blythe.

       Blythe spitted in De Luco's face. As he wiped off his face with his sleeve, she retorted, "You assholes ain't gonna get me to talk. All of you can go to hell. He's mine and that's that and it ain't go nothing to do with that whore."

       "Whore? Who's the whore?" De Luco challenged.

       "That one you lookin' for. That girl you got all over the place. You damn people don't even know what you doin'!" Blythe's wild facial expression exploded to a sinister grin.

       "How so? Tell us what you know about her disappearance Blythe!" De Luco seethed.

       "Let it go, boss, we are going to get Dr. Abendroth to check her out." Millen tried to calm De Luco down.

       "Who's that? You gonna get somebody to crawl in my head and make me say shit I didn't do? You people can go to hell!" Blythe was delirious.

       "Get her in the cage!" De Luco raged as he pointed to the holding cell.

       A couple of weeks later Dr. Abendroth quietly closed her file as she sat and prayed in the solitude of her office. It had been a grueling 14 days of perpetual bantering with Blythe on her perception of Holly's disappearance, which clashed, with the facts of reality. Stress was definitely setting in and making a lasting home in her heart. She wanted to find Holly more than anyone did. Being an adult orphan herself, she could identify with Holly. She tried not to have any emotion going into her mental health practice, but sometimes her humanity took over.

       "Amerigo?" Dr. Abendroth naturally spoke softly.

       "Do you have anything to help us with this case?" De Luco admired his wife's diamond necklace for the last time before wrapping it in Christmas paper.

       "Yes, yes, I believe I do." Dr. Abendroth kicked one of her pointy heels off and rubbed her sore ankle. "Blythe's pregnancy test was negative. She was also thoroughly examined, and oddly, she does not manifest any physical signs of having sexual intercourse recently. She has some scarring in her perineum but it points to a relationship she may had when she was much younger, like say, as a teenager. She has symptomology of delusions of grandeur, which explains why she believes Darrell has a mutual relationship with her. I have concluded she has paranoid schizophrenia, early onset. Blythe may have had trauma as a child, perhaps from her father or an older male figure that she grew up with. I would not hold it past her dad or her brother to have had sexual relations with her. She talks about her brother Miles as if he is her guide to every decision to make and feeling she is to have. It is very unhealthy to say the least. It's a bit like being enamored but without the normal love part."

       "Are you saying she lusts after her own brother?" De Lugo wanted to get ill.

       "Not exactly. She is very enmeshed or dependent on him for everything yet she expresses at the same time that she wants to be independent of him. She has a raging conflict within her mind between the two. She wants him to appreciate her for trying to be independent but he seems to ignore her for whatever reason. I would have loved to have spoken with him to better understand this dynamic duo." Dr. Abendroth stopped rubbing her sore heel.

       "Without the ability to extradite him and having poor diplomatic relations with Durban, we will never know." De Luco was clearly upset by this.

       "Well, you should know that Blythe is a cutter." Dr. Abendroth placed her pointy shoe back on.

       "I heard Millen mention that her arms were very bloody and injured. We have been looking into the possibility of her planting blood all over the Everten house."

       "What do you mean?" Dr. Abendroth looked out the bay window.

       "According to Dr. Fielding, the vet that saw Holly's dog soon before she disappeared, Holly had made mention of a bloody dog collar and the dog's blood in the house. Millen said the only thing that she noted in the house was a hammer discarded behind the garage. It had light colored tuffs of hair on it and some blood. We tested it and it came back to the canine hair but Blythe's DNA. We concluded that Blythe might have planted the blood on the hammer to look like something had happened to the dog. Dr. Fielding said the dog didn't die of injuries, it died of poisoning."

       "That's strange." Dr. Abendroth loosened her hair bun and swished her soft red curls to her shoulders.

       "What's more, we went through the Cartwright house one more time after Blythe was committed to St. Genevieve's and found lots and lots of rodent poisoning in one of the barns behind the house. That poison could have been used on the dog, but without the dog's body, we will never know for sure."

       "Blythe seemed very preoccupied by getting out of the hospital so that she could return to Darrell's house. Did she ever live there?" Dr. Abendroth scratched her head.

       "No, but she has lived many different places. She seems to flop everywhere. She most recently has lived with her aunt Delta who grew up in Mississippi and a cousin in Tennessee-we are still gathering those facts. She has a decent relationship with her dad Branson-or so we thought. He is in rehab for a drinking problem. He was doing financially well in the tobacco industry until his drinking got to him. Did she say anything about her mom?" De Luco sighed.

       "No, but she mentioned Miles' mom. She lives in Durban still. I have a feeling Blythe's mom didn't pay much attention to her so she had to resort to extreme measures for attention, like the self injury." Dr. Abendroth reclined in her chair.

       "I would like you to help me with Darrell, doctor. He has been mostly reclusive since Holly went missing. He lost his job as an EMT. He hasn't cooperated with law enforcement much." De Luco looked at clock as it neared the 10 o'clock hour. It was dark in his office, and he knew Candace would be angry again that he was home late. Still, it was important he solved this case soon, for his sanity's sake at least.

       "I hope it's not you that needs help." Dr. Abendroth teased. "I'll run by and speak with him. It's 1333 Predence Strand Cove, right?"

       "Yes, yes. That is right. There are a lot of twists and turns in the road, but you can't miss the purple shutters and the yellow roof." De Luco gathered his belongings and locked the door, the sign with Shakespeare's quote clanging against the glass.

       "I have an opening tomorrow. Should not be a problem detective. I should have Blythe discharged from observation and assessment and on her way home soon." With that, Dr. Abendroth executed the call.