Page 101 of The Lost Heiress

Chapter Forty

Present

There was a woman coming up from the gardens. She had on running shorts and a T-shirt, her short salt-and-pepper hair tied back at the nape of her neck. Detective Church watched her from the top of the terrace as she ascended the steps. She had AirPods in, so she didn’t notice him until she was almost to the top and just a few feet away.

“Detective Church,” she said pleasantly enough, though she looked slightly puzzled to see him. Her forehead was sweaty, and she was out of breath.

“Mrs. Towers,” he said.

“Please,” she said, “you can call me Elena.”

“Elena,” he said.

“Are you looking for my husband?” she asked. “I believe he’s up at the house.”

“Actually, I was looking for you.”

“Me?” Elena asked, sounding surprised.

“I’ve been looking for you for quite a long time, actually,” Church said. “Or, should I say, I’ve been looking for Ana Rojas.”

He heard her breathing alter, but her face remained unchanged. He pulled a picture from inside the breast pocket of his jacket.

“This is you, is it not, sitting there next to Ransom, at table two?” Church said, holding the picture out to her.

Elena looked but didn’t move to take the photo from him.

“Would you like to sit down?” she asked. She raised a hand to shield her eyes from the bright sun and squinted at him. It was a hot and sunny day. “I’m parched, and if I don’t get out of this heat, I think I might pass out.”

“Lead the way,” Church said.

They settled at a table under a shaded part of the terrace. A maid brought them a giant pitcher of lemonade and two tall glasses full of ice.

“Did you grow up around here, Detective?” Elena asked as she poured him a glass.

“Not far,” Church said. “Just south, in Morro Bay.”

“Ah, so you’re familiar with the house, then?” Elena asked. “Of that feeling of looking up at it from a distance?”

Church nodded. “When I was a boy, I used to think that King Arthur and his knights lived here, in this castle on the hill.”

Elena chuckled. She poured a glass of lemonade for herself and took a sip, settled back into her chair. “I can tell you it’s a completely different experience from the inside,” Elena said. “There are leaky faucets and creaky stairs; sometimes, the toilets run. This house is just a house, however big it may be. And the people in it are just people. Skin and bone. Flawed, just like anybody else.”

“Did you know Ana Rojas?” Church asked. “The real Ana Rojas, I mean?”

“No, not really,” Elena said, setting down her glass. “She was a friend of a friend.”

“So she was aware you were impersonating her that summer, that you had taken her identity?”

“She was more than aware, Detective,” Elena said. “It was her idea.”

Church leaned forward in his seat. “What do you mean?” he asked.

“Well, it’s a funny story, really,” Elena said. “Ana applied for this caretaker job as a summer gig, but when she got the request for the interview, she didn’t want to go. She’d met a boy; he was in a band. Young love, you know?” Elena said, waving her hand, as if all this were obvious. “She wanted to spend the summer traveling with him, but her mother didn’t approve. Ana still lived at home, you see. They were a very Catholic family. So she came up with this idea to cover her absence, that someone else would go in her place. My friend told me about her predicament, and I volunteered. I needed a job that paid well. We struck up a deal. And the rest, as they say, is history.”

Elena took a sip of her drink.

“And when did Mr. Towers come to learn the truth?” Church asked.