Janessa Morgan, mother of Laura Morgan, tries to keep her composure as she speaks about her daughter over the phone. “When I saw Laura’s photo on TV, I thought I was losing my mind.” This past March, at the time of Laura’s suicide, she had been nineteen years old. “She was a free spirit. She wasn’t a runaway like any of those other kids. She left Boulder in search of adventure, said she wanted to see California. She’d been saving up her money to get out of town, and when she graduated from high school, I told her to be careful and sent her on her way. She was a straight-A student, a really good girl. She wrote me a few letters, but not once did she mention [Halcomb]. A few weeks after her letters stopped, I contacted the police, but they told me she was an adult. They weren’t going to go searching for a girl who was ‘on vacation.’ ” That vacation began in the summer of 1980, only weeks after fiery-haired Laura had graduated as valedictorian of her class. At the time of her death, Janessa Morgan hadn’t heard from her daughter in nearly two years.

Other than Laura Morgan’s mother, none of the families of Halcomb’s brood would come forward to comment.

One parent, however, did not need to speak with The Seattle Times to shed light on just how cunning Jeffrey Halcomb was. Washington congressman Terrance Snow (R) lost his only daughter, Audra, on that fateful March afternoon. While Halcomb refuses to reveal any information about why he or his followers had been staying at Congressman Snow’s beachside home, police are confident that they had been residing there for at least a few months. While Halcomb may have lost his congregation in Veldt, it’s clear that he was actively seeking members to share in his own faith-based views, and Audra Snow—a pretty and affluent young socialite—gave up everything under Halcomb’s sway.

The Jeffrey Halcomb trial will be lengthy, with the prosecution seeking a charge of ten counts of first-degree murder. “It’s one thing to convince some people to follow you,” Ellison says. “It’s another to kill a baby the way he did. I hope he gets what he deserves.”

17

WHEN LUCAS ARRIVED back in Pier Pointe, Mark had parked his car in the driveway beside the U-Haul truck. The scent of freshly baked cherry pie hit him as soon as he stepped through the door. It should have been comforting, but it only made him feel more edgy. The fruity chemical scent of Selma’s air freshener still coated the back of his throat.

Selma and Mark were in the kitchen. Jeanie, on the other hand, was nowhere in sight. Lucas stalked across the living room, trying to shake off the thwarting feeling of defeat, but it was tough. His foul mood was poisoning him from the inside out, tainting his blood, making him grit his teeth. All he wanted to do right then was throw himself into his desk chair and sit in a dark and quiet room. He didn’t want to talk, to deal with anyone. Why Mark felt the need to drive down to the house when Selma was already there was baffling. Like the guy had nothing to do but drive back and forth between Seattle and Pier Pointe. Like he had all the money in the world to burn on gas. Like Lucas really wanted to stare at Mark and his pretty girlfriend because it wasn’t a cruel reminder of the things he’d lost. Christ, he thought. I don’t need this right now. He wanted to tell them to go.

But rather than kicking his best friend out, he forced a smile when Selma peeked out of the kitchen with a look of surprise.

“You’re home early,” she said. “Everything go okay?”

Lucas stepped over to the breakfast table, then slouched in his seat. Mark raised an inquisitive eyebrow at him from across the room. He was leaning against the counter, a plate full of cherry pie balanced in his left hand, a fork in his right. Lucas tossed his messenger bag onto the chair next to him and pushed his fingers through his hair.

“Want a slice?” Selma asked.

No, he didn’t. The mere scent of it was cloying.

“Sure.” He ignored the knot in his stomach, tried to push the fact that he was totally screwed out of his mind. “Where’s Jeanie?”

Selma handed him a plate. “Upstairs. We took the truck to the grocery store to pick up a few things, and she looked just about ready to fall asleep in the cereal aisle. I don’t think she slept.”

Lucas slid his plate of pie onto the table, untouched. “She woke me up last night,” he murmured. “Thought she was dying.”

“Dying?” Selma looked alarmed.

“Obviously an overexaggeration on her part. She thought she had a brain aneurysm.”

Mark snorted through his nose, then took another bite of his pie.

“She’s got this . . . thing,” Lucas said, waving a hand over his head.

“A WebMD thing,” Mark clarified.

Selma’s expression only grew more concerned.

“You guys should have taken her to the hospital,” she said, giving Mark a stern look. Mark blinked, suddenly caught in her crosshairs. “What if something had happened? She could have gone to sleep and never woken up.”

“She’s fine,” Mark insisted. “Alive and well.”

“Right.” Selma rolled her eyes. “And she’s not fine. I hardly even recognized her this morning. How long has she been dressing like that?”

“A few months,” Lucas said. “Six at the most.”

“Do you think that’s something to be concerned about?”

“Oh my God.” Mark slid his plate onto the kitchen counter and pushed off.

“What?” Selma frowned at them both.

“You sound like my grandmother, that’s what—a stereotypical old-world Italian.”

“I’m not trying to suggest that she’s into something she shouldn’t be into,” Selma said, focusing her attention on Lucas, trying her best to ignore Mark’s disparaging comparison. “But we saw you guys not that long ago. Last summer, right? It’s just such a drastic change and a little disconcerting. I just have this feeling.”

“Of what?” Lucas asked.

“I guess it’s just this sense of . . . almost fear?”

“Fear. Huh.” He peered down at his pie. If Jeanie was afraid, they were in the same boat, because Lucas was terrified. This whole thing—the house, Washington—was supposed to make everything better. But then a guy sitting in a prison cell snapped his fingers and everything was worse. Snap. Here’s hope for the future. Snap. Never mind.

“I heard about you and Caroline.”

Selma’s voice suddenly grated on his nerves. His aggravation began to bubble again, threatening to spill over in an ugly, angry tirade that neither she nor Mark deserved. So what? he thought. You heard about me and Caroline. So fucking what? That was the thing with friends; the moment a major disaster struck, they didn’t know when to keep their mouths shut. They always wanted to help, always wanted to talk it out.

“Great.” He continued to peer at the table, trying to keep his frustration in check.

“I don’t mean to pry, Lou, you know that,” Selma said. “I just thought that maybe . . .”

“Maybe it’s my fault, right?” His gaze darted up to her face. Selma blanched at the razor edge in his voice.

“It’s not your fault,” Mark cut in. “She wasn’t saying that.” He gave his girlfriend a hard glance.

“I wasn’t saying that,” Selma verified. “Lou, I swear.”

“Hey, it’s fine.” Lucas lifted a single shoulder and let it slump a second later. “Why shouldn’t it be my fault, right? I screwed up my kid. I screwed up my marriage. I screwed up my fucking life. We don’t need to beat around the bush.” He smirked, shook his head. “After all, we’re all friends here.”

The kitchen went silent.

Lucas stared down at his hands, imagining that both Mark and Selma had vanished, leaving him to stew in his own pissed-off misery.