All the Colors of the Dark — Chapter 52

52

The newspapers waded through the life of Eli Aaron but found near nothing at all. The devastation from the fire was total. Likely an assumed name; they found no record of his birth, of his life.

The cops worked the theory that he’d found the abandoned house in the woodland and claimed it. Squatting and fixing it up, making it his own.

They also worked the theory he was dead, though rumors ran that there had been sightings and near misses; a clinic in Woodward where a man stumbled in with severe burns before discharging himself; a carjacking in Buchanan County where the description fit. What little was not destroyed by the fire was finecombed. They found charred press clippings about missing girls from as far as Oklahoma City. A hundred photos salvageable.

One clear enough. Callie Montrose.

Cops went to each school Eli Aaron had visited, talked to a thousand kids who said much the same, that they didn’t remember him. That he left no impression at all.

On the third day the dogs singled out a spot eight miles from the house, where they found the first girl buried in a grave so deep they hit an aquifer that slowed them.

The press pushed until Nix spoke choice words about fortitude, and the dedication the Monta Clare PD had shown, and the bravery of a young girl who led them to that woodland. He mentioned faith and heart, forbearance and extracting positives from tragedy. The reuniting of a mother and her fearless son. And then he confirmed that yes, they had now found the remains of three of the missing females, and that their families would be able to lay them to rest. They would continue the search for Callie. They did

not know how many, if any, more victims were out there. There were no follow-up questions, just a settling of facts that left those there witness to tears in the big cop’s eyes.

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