The Words She Whispered
“Chloe,” Sarah said softly. “The warden said you spoke to your father today. Can you tell me what you said to him?”
Chloe didn’t look up. Instead, her hand began to move across the paper with a sudden, frantic energy.
Sarah watched, her breath catching as the drawing took shape. It was the Cole family living room on the night of the murder — a woman lying on the floor beside a shattered glass coffee table.
Standing over her was a tall, broad-shouldered man in a dark button-down shirt. And hidden behind a curtain in the hallway was a tiny stick-figure girl, her eyes drawn wide with terror.
But it was the shirt that made Sarah’s heart hammer. Chloe had shaded it with a careful pattern of vertical stripes — a style Gavin Cole had never worn.
Gavin was a mechanic, a blue-collar man who wore plain, heavy canvas work shirts.