That she knew from experience.
* * *
Lucy and Nate drove directly to the Youngs’ house from Bandera. It was exactly 1.3 miles from the Albright house using surface streets, but the neighborhoods were filled with ranch homes on large, unfenced properties. It would be easy to cut through open space or use dirt trails that zigzagged through the area. The trek would be closer to half a mile as the crow flies.
They knocked on the door and a very pregnant woman answered. “Hello?”
“Jill Young?”
“Yes?”
Lucy and Nate identified themselves and showed their badges. “Do you have a minute?”
“Of course. What’s this about?”
“The Albright family.”
Her face fell and she opened the door for them to enter.
She waddled over to a chair and sat down. “Sorry, my feet are swollen and I can’t wait to pop. This little gal was a surprise and trust me—it’s a lot harder to be pregnant at forty than it was when I was in my twenties.”
“When are you due?” Lucy asked.
“Christmas Day, but my doctor is thinking about inducing two weeks early. We’ll make the decision at my next appointment provided the baby is on track.”
Lucy didn’t want to distress a pregnant woman, but she couldn’t lie about the situation, either.
“Family has been notified, and it’ll be released to the media tonight, so I regret to inform you that the Albright family has been found dead. They died within weeks of their disappearance.”
“Dear Lord, I’m so sorry,” she said. “That’s awful—I just knew something bad had happened to them. People don’t just disappear like that.”
“You spoke to the police shortly after they went missing and said that Ricky had left your house at six that Friday evening. It’s very possible that you and your children were the last to see him alive. However—and this hasn’t been released, other than to the family—his is the only body we haven’t found.”
Jill put her hand to her mouth and closed her eyes. “How am I going to tell the kids?”
Lucy didn’t envy her.
“What happened?” Jill continued. “Did they have an accident? The police said they left the country. I have family in Mexico. Sure, parts are dangerous, but Glen and Denise wouldn’t go to those areas.”
“Their bodies were found locally. About ten miles from their home as the crow flies.”
“I don’t understand. What happened?” she repeated.
“They were murdered.”
She closed her eyes again, took a deep breath. Opened them. “How can I help?”
“Did Ricky say anything to you that day? Anything you remember that sounded strange at the time, or in hindsight?”
“It was three years ago, I don’t remember anything specific. If I had, I would have told the police when they first came to talk to us.”
“I’m sure you would have, and we have their notes, but anything you can tell us about Ricky and his family would help us.”
Jill said, “I want to help, but I don’t know what to say, really. Ricky was here all the time. He, Joe, and Ginny were inseparable, and he was a good kid. Very polite, smart. Joe—my son—he would much prefer to play than do homework. Ricky was a good student, he more than anyone could get Joe to focus for thirty minutes to finish whatever project they were doing, then they would play. The three of them—they’d been friends since first grade, when we moved here. They rode their bikes to school together, and he was here almost every afternoon. If Ricky had a fault, it was being late. Time was more a suggestion to him.” She smiled sadly at the memory. “Half the time his mom or dad would be calling over here for him because he forgot a dentist appointment or it was past dinner. All I really remember about that day was that it was six and I called out to the tree house that it was six and did Ricky want to stay for dinner. He ran in, said he couldn’t, that he was late getting home. I told him to go ahead and I’d call his parents and tell them he was on the way.”
“Who did you speak to?”
“No one. I called the house phone, no one answered, and I left a message on their answering machine.”
“And you’re certain it was six in the evening.”
“Yes—a few minutes after six, in fact. JJ, my husband, owns an auto repair shop in town and he’d opened a second storefront in Boerne, which is thirty minutes from here. Thursdays and Fridays—at least back then—he worked extra hours to get the new place off the ground. He would always call me when he was leaving so I’d know when to expect him, and I looked at the clock. It was after six on the microwave. I saw Ricky’s backpack on the kitchen table and realized he was still here. Called him, he rushed in, grabbed his backpack, and ran off. Not more than five minutes after I called him out of the tree house.”
That was consistent with the report from three years ago, so Chavez’s theory that the timing was fluid and they didn’t remember exactly when Ricky left was not correct. While it had been three years, the family had been interviewed shortly after the Albrights went missing, so likely they remembered the details.
“Did you know the family well?” Lucy said.
“I talked to Denise often, but always about the kids. Sleepovers and that sort of thing. I’ve of course met Glen and Ricky’s older sisters, and Becky babysat on occasion—she was the younger girl, but much more responsible, in my opinion. I never thought twice about leaving the kids with her.”
“Did you socialize outside of the kids?”
She shook her head. “Other than Ricky, we didn’t have a lot in common. I’m a stay-at-home mom but do a lot of volunteer work, mostly through our church or the VA. I wanted a large family, but we had trouble conceiving, and the pregnancy with the twins was very difficult. I didn’t think I would be able to have more kids, and so when this girl came along I was surprised. A happy surprise.” She rubbed her stomach.
“That doesn’t really answer my question,” Lucy said.
“We didn’t have a lot in common,” she repeated. “Nothing. I always had the feeling Denise looked down on me for not going to college and choosing to stay home. Early in our marriage we moved a lot—JJ was in the Army, so we lived on base wherever he was stationed. The twins were born at Fort Buchanan, in Puerto Rico. That was the fourth base we lived on. When they were three, we moved to Fort Hood. He was deployed for eighteen months, and then shortly after chose not to reenlist, and we moved here. He’d given the Army twelve years and felt it was time for a new chapter.
“I take classes here and there when I’m interested in something, but I never felt I needed to spend the money on an advanced education when all I really wanted was to make a nice home for my family and help people through my church. I don’t think Denise respected my choices. So no, we didn’t socialize.”
“We were hoping that we could talk to Joe and Ginny. Ricky might have said something to them about what was going on with his family.”
“The police told us that Denise embezzled money from one of her clients and left the country. Are you saying that didn’t happen?”