Excerpt of Finding Jessica by Parker Riggs

In the wooded countryside surrounding the town of Haven, New Hampshire, in a log house along the shore of Two Isle Lake, a red miniature dachshund sat on the back of a couch looking out a window. His owner, Rose Chandler, sat in soft lamplight trying to read a book. It was a futile effort. She hadn’t turned a page in over twenty minutes. Instead, she listened to her own breathing, the ticking of the clock on the fireplace mantel, the sound of the icemaker clicking in the kitchen. Emily and Rocky and the kids had been over earlier to grill the last of the freezer’s venison. And, she was pretty sure, to keep her mind off what day it was. Without Jasper, Jake and Janie jumping on sofas, begging to swim in the lake, playing wiffle ball out front and eating a whole bag of roasting marshmallows, the house felt deathly quiet.

The day was a milestone, but nothing to celebrate. Cameron’s death had happened on a summer morning one year ago on the country road leading to Tibber’s Basin, the kind of road you make plans to drive along in the fall because the trees are bursting with color. But that morning, the road was deadly; that morning Cameron’s motorcycle hurdled down an embankment, his body thrown to the ground, tumbling almost a quarter mile to Lover’s Ravine. The emergency response team told her he died instantly. She wanted to believe them, had tried to use this news to soothe herself, but for the past year while she kept her PI business going and Cameron’s gallery chock full of the best artists, she’d secretly felt like she was drowning, struggling to the surface, wishing she could wake up from this terrible dream.

From his perch on the back of the couch, Cosmo watched restlessly out the window. A white ray of moonlight split the night and illuminated the lake. Cosmo didn’t understand why Cameron never returned home. Confused and nervous, he moved over to Rose’s side and licked her hand. She scratched his ears. “Don’t worry,” she said, finally. “Everything’s all right.” Saying those words aloud, she realized that at some point she had started to cross a threshold into acceptance. Tomorrow dawn would break, life would go on, it really was all right. She leaned back and closed her eyes.

When the phone rang, Cosmo leapt off the couch, and Rose grabbed her cell off the table.

“Is this Rose Chandler of Chandler Investigations?”

Rose looked at her watch. It was almost midnight. “Who’s this?”

“Marcie Payne. Barrington Bigelow’s agent?” the woman’s accent was pure New York. “He hired Chandler Investigations to find some godforsaken girlfriend he’s been mooning about since he was practically a child?”

“Yes,” said Rose. “I’m well aware of that, we’ve been on the case. But it’s strictly confidential, even if you are his agent –”

“And I can’t get in touch with your PI, Hal,” the woman interrupted her, “who was supposed to be setting up his rental for him, and Big is totally lost and can’t find the place and this Hal is not picking up his phone –”

“Hal’s probably sleeping,” Rose said. And how dare you wake him up? “But I could talk to him if he’s lost. Does he have a GPS? The address should be on there.”

“Of course he has GPS,” the woman snapped. “It’s Barrington Bigelow.”

“Yes, I know,” Rose said. “I’ve already been on the phone with him quite a bit.”

“Right,” the woman said. “Big tells me you own the investigation business and you’re the owner of the gallery where he wants to show his photographs,” the woman plowed on, not waiting for Rose to answer. “Barrington is not a photographer, understand, he’s a painter. He shows at the major museums and all the best galleries in Europe and why in the world he wants to sell his photographs at a little gallery in the middle of nowhere, no offense intended, is beyond me.”

“No offense taken.” Rose rubbed her eyes. This woman was exhausting. “Actually I was also wondering why he’d want to sell his work in Haven,” she said.

“Hold on,” Marcie told her. “There he is.” She clicked off. Rose closed her eyes and felt her lids sting. She’d been thinking how weird it would be to have Barrington Bigelow’s work in Mountain Arts. Stepping up as the dealer after Cameron died hadn’t changed the gallery’s excellent reputation, but they showed regional artists, none were represented by agents in New York.

“He’s fine,” Marcie said brusquely when she clicked back on. “He’s in the driveway. He’ll see you in the morning to talk about the investigation,” she said. “And those photographs for your gallery.” Before Rose could say anything more, Marcie clicked off.

As she carried Cosmo to bed and tucked him in beside her, Rose tried to ignore the pain in her left shoulder, the remnant of an old bullet wound that had been flaring up all day, a symptom of stress. It would keep her up all night unless she took something for it, so she rolled over for the little bottle of ibuprofen on her bedside table and swallowed one without water.

Lying back in the dark, she could just make out one of Cameron’s paintings above the dresser, the lake on a summer day, thick clouds reflected in the water, trees full and lush along the shoreline. She remembered how much Cameron loved Barrington Bigelow’s work. Early in their marriage, when her own appreciation of art was still in its infancy, he’d dragged her to the Currier Museum of Art to see a special exhibition of his paintings. She was struck by the artist’s range, there was something both cataclysmic and melancholic about his work, as though he’d stood on a precipice and seen how the world ended, and had come back to show it through his paintbrush. She was looking forward to meeting him in person.