For months, Rivers had worried the case would collapse into uncertainty.
Now the facts pointed toward a far more definite explanation.
Jaden had encountered illegal hunters.
He had become a perceived threat to their operation.
And Liam had shot him rather than risk exposure.
What followed was a calculated attempt to conceal the killing.
The Mother Who Never Stopped Looking That afternoon,
Detective Rivers drove to see Alice Glenn. He had visited her before.
To discuss the missing-person search.
To explain the discovery of the orange tent.
To deliver the devastating findings from the medical examination.
Each conversation had taken something from her.
This time, he carried different news.
Alice opened the door before he had finished knocking.
She looked thinner than she had in June.
Her hair was tied loosely behind her head.
She wore the same pale cardigan Rivers remembered from their first meeting.
“Did something happen?” she asked. Rivers nodded. “We’ve made arrests.”
Alice gripped the doorframe. “Arrests?” “Two brothers.
Liam and Mark Garrett.” She stared at him.
Then asked the question he knew would come. “Why?”
Rivers had spent months searching for that answer.
Yet speaking it aloud felt almost unbearable.
“They were hunting illegally. Jaden apparently encountered them.
One of the brothers believed he might have photographed their activity.”
Alice blinked. “That’s it?” Rivers lowered his eyes.
“That’s what the evidence indicates.” She looked toward the living room.
On a small shelf stood a photograph of Jaden wearing his graduation gown.
Beside it was an empty space.
The watch she had given him had once rested there.
She whispered: “They killed him because he had a camera?”
Rivers didn’t soften the answer. “Yes.” Alice slowly sat down.
For a long time, she did not speak. Then she began asking questions.
“Was he afraid?” “Did he know what was happening?”
“Did he say anything?” Rivers could not answer everything.
Mark’s confession described an encounter that had escalated rapidly.
The medical findings indicated Jaden likely lost consciousness very quickly.
But no report could reconstruct every second of his final moments.
Rivers told her only what the evidence could support. Alice listened.
Finally, she covered her face. “I kept thinking he was cold.”
The detective looked at her. “Every night,” she whispered.
“I thought about him being out there without food. Without water.
I wondered if he was calling for me.” Her voice cracked.
“And all that time…” She couldn’t finish.
Rivers remained seated across from her.
There are moments when reassurance becomes meaningless.
No words could return her son. No arrest could undo what happened.
And no explanation could make such a senseless killing understandable.
After several minutes, Alice lowered her hands.
“Did he have his notebook?” Rivers nodded.
“We recovered one from his car.” “Did he write about me?”
“Not in the pages relevant to the investigation.”
Alice gave a small, broken smile. “He was always writing about deer.”
Then she began to cry. Not loudly. Not dramatically.
Just the exhausted crying of a mother who had spent half
a year carrying questions no parent should ever have to ask.
Justice Could Not Restore Everything As the case moved toward prosecution,
the evidence helped establish the roles of the two brothers.
Liam was charged with the murder of Jaden Glenn.
Mark faced charges arising from his involvement in concealing the crime.
