by Kay Hooper
“Maybe Reese was right,” Bishop said. “Maybe she isn’t okay enough to be in the field.”
Miranda smiled faintly. “I can’t believe I’m saying this about Reese, but that’s his heart talking, not his head. It’s his nature to do his best to protect someone he loves. If you’ll remember, we had something of the same problem.”
“Had?” He sighed. “At least we learned to trust each other and the connection we have. Hollis is still struggling with that.”
“Of course she is. Ever since that first horrific assault she’s been forced to . . . adjust . . . almost constantly. Surviving a monster’s brutal attack when it should have killed her. Eyes she wasn’t born with looking back at her from a mirror. No longer being an artist. Being a medium. Seeing auras. Being able to heal herself and others. Channeling energy. Channeling dark energy. Facing evil time and time again. Facing her own demons.”
“And now Reese.”
Miranda nodded. “And now Reese. It’s good that he’s a very patient man. She’s been fighting for control of her life for years while too many things happened to her; it won’t be easy for her to surrender that control once she feels she has it.”
Bishop wondered why he hadn’t been able to put that so simply and succinctly to DeMarco earlier. “Is that what she’ll have to do?”
“It’s what we all have to do, you know that. We don’t master love, it masters us.” She smiled. “I’m pretty sure you’re the one who told me that, in an earlier life.”
Half under his breath, Bishop said, “I’m surprised I was able to say anything that made sense at the time.”
“We were both struggling. We both had cause. Lots of demons from the past between us, never mind a case with one of the worst serial killers either of us had ever hunted. But we found our way eventually. So will Hollis and Reese.”
“In Clarity. I’m sure of that much. Somehow it all gets resolved in Clarity.”
“Then it was right to send them. No matter what else you feel, that’s a certainty, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.” But he was frowning again.
“Something else come into focus?” she asked.
Bishop shook his head slowly. “Just that sense of dread I can’t shrug off.”
“Since they arrived in Clarity or before?”
He considered briefly. “Before they left here I just knew they needed to go there. To investigate that case. Especially Hollis. That she has to discover something there, something she needs.”
“And now that they’re in Clarity?”
“The dread. Foreboding. Almost holding my breath, because I know something’s going to happen. Something bad. I just don’t know what, or when.” He met his wife’s intent gaze. “That isn’t how your precognition works, so it isn’t how mine works.”
“We get hunches. Flashes of knowledge. It isn’t all visions.”
“Yeah, but it’s never been like this. Never been so . . . elusive. I reach, and it vanishes like smoke through my fingers.”
“Then maybe it is coming from Hollis,” Miranda said. “Something she’s not even consciously aware of herself. Something like that has happened before. When Nell went home to settle her family’s estate. She had a connection there, to that case and what was happening, that you became aware of, even though she wasn’t aware of it.”
Nell Gallagher was unique even among a unit of unique agents, her psychic ability one they had never found in any other person. She could, quite literally, see into time. Which had not really given her any edge at all in hunting a killer who had been able to, in a very real sense, see into her.
He nodded slowly. “Which, if true, means that Hollis has seen or heard or sensed something that, subconsciously, she knows is a threat to her or someone else on the team. And even if they’re buried, her instincts are warning her of danger. I’m betting she feels uneasy and isn’t sure why.”
“And probably doubting her abilities as a team leader since this is her first time, so that may be where she believes her uneasiness is coming from,” Miranda pointed out. “So even if you knew what it really is, you couldn’t tell her. It’s something she has to figure out—and face—without our interference.”
“Who made that a rule?”
“You did. At the time, it was about our visions. But the truth is that we both know better than to believe we should always step in and do something to influence events. Or a member of the team. Once committed to an investigation, once the team is there, on the scene, it has to play out the way it plays out. We both know that.”
“Some things have to happen just the way they happen.”
“Yes,” Miranda said. “They do.”
—
MAL LOOKED AT the agents steadily. “I’ve been a cop long enough to know that we’re all waiting for the other shoe to drop, pun intended.” He didn’t smile. “Our instinct is to work the case now, without taking time to rest. But unless you guys can pull a rabbit out of your hats and figure out who our killer is tonight, I’m recommending we all get some rest as well as a good meal. I have a feeling we’ll be pulling plenty of all-nighters, and it’s already been a very rough week.”
Hollis had just about decided he was right when a female deputy appeared in the open doorway, her arrival a distraction more because of what she carried than anything else.
A little dog, his paws scrabbling rather comically in the air as he frantically tried to get somewhere.
To the sheriff, as it turned out.
“Emma—” He accepted the dog, not so much displeased as resigned.
“Sorry, Mal, but we’ve tried everybody and Felix just won’t settle with any of us.” Deputy Emma Fletcher had introduced herself to the agents when they’d first arrived in town, assigning another deputy to lead the way for them to the Cross house since she’d been holding down the fort at the station. She was a petite, brown-eyed blonde who looked about as unlikely to be any kind of cop as Kirby did.
She probably got carded when buying anything alcoholic as well, unless it was here in town where most everyone likely knew her.
Mal tried a last protest. “Joe—”
“Definitely not Joe. Neither one of them was happy with the other, and it was probably worse because Joe was still so upset. He isn’t the type to love a dog just because it belonged to his dead wife. I’m betting he won’t want to keep the dog, Mal. So somebody else is going to have to take him.”
“Then I hope you know somebody who will, because with the hours I work it wouldn’t be fair for me to keep a dog.” He didn’t have to add that a little Yorkie with a little red bow holding his bangs in a topknot out of his eyes was hardly the sort of dog a sheriff would have.
“I’ll ask around. In the meantime, I think you’re stuck with him—unless you want me to roust one of the vets so they can put him in a cage at their clinic.”
He frowned at his lead deputy. “You’re deliberately making that sound awful.”
“Am I?” Her brown eyes were very bright, not quite laughing.
“Yes, dammit. I’ll look out for him until you find somebody else. But do find somebody, Emma, because I really don’t need a dog in my life at the moment. Especially one used to riding around in a big purse.” The sheriff looked at the agents and briefly explained about Felix and his usual mode of transportation.
Hollis, watching the little Yorkie snuggle into the crook of the sheriff’s arm, returning her gaze with bright button eyes, half laughed under her breath. “I know enough about dogs to know this one has made his choice.”
“God, I hope not,” Mal said, again sounding more resigned than upset about it. “Unless he likes cold leftover pizza, I’ll have to stop at a store on the way home and get dog food. Damn.” He frowned, visibly changing gears, and said to his deputy, “Joe isn’t still here.” It wasn’t quite a question.
“No, one of Perla’s si
sters and her husband came and got him, said he’d be staying with them.” Emma sobered considerably, adding, “They were still in shock. I know you didn’t offer too many details when you notified her parents right after finding her, but I think word of how Perla was killed has already started spreading. Not a whiff of suspicion toward Joe, far as I can tell. He’s been in tears since you found Perla. I mean, literally, the whole time. I’ve never seen anybody cry so much or look so lost and pitiful. Her family is already closing ranks around him.”
“Why does that not surprise me.” He sighed.
Emma looked at the agents and said, “I was pretty sure you guys would want to talk to Joe at some point, but trust me when I say he wasn’t making sense at all tonight. If he wasn’t crying—and I mean sobbing—he was pretty much catatonic, with tears dripping off his chin.” She frowned slightly.
“What?” Mal asked.
“Nothing, nothing. I just hope they rehydrate him.”
Everybody kept a straight face except Kirby, who giggled and then looked guilty about it, covering her mouth with her fingers like a little girl.
Emma looked around and cleared her throat. “Well, anyway. I figured you wouldn’t talk to him tonight.”
“We can wait until tomorrow,” Hollis said, hoping she was right about that. Then it was her turn to frown as she looked at the sheriff, distracted once more from the idea of calling it a night. “Still no luck in finding the password for Mrs. Cross’s cell phone?”
“Far as I know. Why?”
“If they haven’t already, tell them to try Felix,” Hollis suggested.
Before the sheriff could respond, Emma said, “You know, I bet that’s it. I’ll tell them.”
As the lead deputy vanished from the doorway, Hollis continued to frown at the sheriff. “You said Mr. Cross waited at home for his wife, convinced she’d come home or call him.”
“Yeah. Until he came here to report her missing.”
“Did he get home before dark?”
Slowly, Mal said, “It was dark by the time he got here, but . . . I’m really not positive whether he got home at his usual time. Didn’t think to ask him, to be honest. With everything that’s happened, the priority in my mind was to search that house.”
Hollis nodded gravely. “Something told you she was there, didn’t it?”
“Yeah. A sick feeling in my gut. I started feeling it not long after Clara Adams drove her car into a streetlight pole a few weeks ago in the middle of July.”
SEVEN
There was a long silence, and then Hollis said, still grave, “I believe all good cops develop instincts about crimes. And most of us tend to have some kind of physical reaction to them.”
“Yeah,” the sheriff said, nevertheless looking a bit self-conscious.
Hollis looked at him, then held up one hand almost as though offering the near-universal sign for Okay! But the thumbnail she displayed was clearly ragged. “I chew. Not on all my nails, just the thumbnails. When something’s bugging me. When the instincts kick in, or the training, or whatever it is. Usually not aware of what I’m doing unless and until somebody points it out.” She didn’t look at her partner.
“I pace,” Cullen offered.
Kirby frowned at him, then at Hollis. “I don’t think I have those instincts yet.” She sounded so earnest it was almost funny.
Almost.
Mal looked at the remaining fed. “What about you?”
With a faint smile, DeMarco shook his head just once.
“He’s right,” Hollis said wryly. “Plenty of instincts, but no tell. At all. Don’t ever play poker with him.”
“Noted,” the sheriff murmured with a smile, clearly no longer feeling self-conscious.
More conversational than anything else, DeMarco said, “Getting back to the matter at hand, our latest murder, I think those limbs could have been sharpened earlier, even days ago. Probably were. From what I could see, you’d have had to look out the attic window or else stand directly under that tree and look up to see anything suspicious. Especially since he didn’t leave any branch tips or wood chips as evidence of what he’d done.”
“Agreed.” Hollis was looking at her partner now, shifting gears as smoothly and easily as he did. “But it still leaves an awfully tight time frame, even assuming Mr. Cross did get home after dark. It couldn’t have been long after dark, not given when she was found.”
Mal said, “If the killer had that tree all . . . pruned and ready beforehand, he wouldn’t have needed much time to kill her.” His frown deepened. “Depending on how he actually did it. And I still can’t see how he did.”
“A very unanswered question,” Hollis said, frowning herself. “But if the pattern holds, he would have sent that text at three o’clock this afternoon, presumably while she was still up in the attic.” Parenthetically, she added, “Although I didn’t notice any evidence she’d been working up there, possibly excepting the unusually clean floor.”
Mal frowned. “No, neither did I. And now that I think about it, cleaning out an attic wouldn’t likely make Perla’s list of fun things to do on her day off. Especially cleaning the floor.”
“A chore that had to be done?” DeMarco suggested.
“I’d say she was a lot more likely to call in a cleaning crew if that’s what she wanted. Or an insurance appraiser to see if there was anything valuable up there.”
Hollis glanced at Kirby and said, “Make a note, will you, please? We need to check out all possibilities, especially if Mrs. Cross had company—of any kind—in that attic at any point during the day. Or prior to today. Maybe other days off.”
“You’re thinking maybe a lover?” Mal asked.
“If she was so unhappy in her marriage, maybe. And either her killer knew . . .”
“Or he was the lover?”
“It’s possible, Mal.”
“Jesus, that’s a cold-blooded thought. Though it would explain how he could have been up there with her without even the need to use any kind of force to keep her silent while Joe was searching the rest of the house for her.”
Hollis nodded. “The doc really does need to go back to the house and search the attic tomorrow. I’d also suggest she at least spot-check the whole place with luminol. Somebody used bleach up there, and you don’t need bleach to clean away dust. If Mrs. Cross was killed the way it looked, impaled on those branches, there probably won’t be blood inside the attic. But we don’t know that for sure.”
DeMarco added, “Until we know it for sure.”
His partner nodded again. “And if she was meeting a lover, today or any other day, there could have been something with his DNA there. And maybe he didn’t get it all, even with the bleach. Mal, with your permission, I’d like Cullen to go with Jill.” She paused, then added, “There may be evidence of a behavior up there we missed before, especially since none of us really looked over the attic.”
“Okay. I’ll check with Jill and see what time she can go. I don’t think she was planning to do the actual autopsy on Perla until early tomorrow. She’s been putting in some long hours, her and Sam. He’s her assistant. So I’d guess tomorrow afternoon would probably be best for her. For both of them.”
Hollis was highly conscious of the ticking clock in her head but nodded. “Sooner the better, Mal.”
“Copy that.”
Remembering what had been said about Perla Cross’s habits, Hollis said, “Didn’t you say you found her cell phone downstairs?”
“Joe found it on the kitchen island.” Mal paused, then added, “And he was surprised by that, since she virtually always had the phone with her.”
Cullen spoke up to offer, “The killer could have left it there.”
“After he killed her?” Hollis was still frowning. “He hasn’t done anything like that so far. Just the opposite, in fact, since all the other victims’ phon
es were destroyed when they were killed. Then again, this is also the first time it’s very clearly, very obviously murder. And given that, given how far off-script he went in other ways, we have to wonder if he even bothered to warn her. Or if he even bothered to wait for dark to kill her.”
It was Cullen who spoke up again to say, “I’d say the text matters more than the time of death. The text is the only thing we’ve found connecting all the victims.”
Hollis was looking at the sheriff. “Mal, did the doc estimate time of death?”
He nodded slowly. “She said she’d know for sure after the post, but her estimate was that Perla died sometime between six and eight o’clock tonight.”
“And Mr. Cross came here to report his wife missing when?”
“He was here a little after seven. Probably left the house right at seven to get here when he did—unless he stopped along the way to look for Perla and just didn’t tell me about that. He said he made a lot of calls, to her work, her friends. Didn’t say anything about talking to anyone in person.”
“What time did he usually get home from work?”
“Usually around five thirty, I think. The garage where he works closes at five, so that sounds about right. After sundown but before it got really dark. We get more twilight hours than most places, since the mountains to the east and west are the highest in this part of the Appalachians. Joe said he checked the house right away because it wasn’t like her not to answer when he called out.”
“But he didn’t search the attic?”
“No, just opened the door, saw the lights were out, and knew she wouldn’t be up there in the dark.”
“Not alone, at any rate.”
“Yeah. Said he called out her name anyway and didn’t hear a sound in response.”