Wren squeezed her eyes shut. “No,” she said. “No, no, no.”
“For what it’s worth,” said Reilly. “I respect the guy. He had my back when I went after Colt Baldwin. He, uh, he… well, we might not have gotten out of there without him. But the guy he’s…”
“Creepy?” said Wren. “He said you called him that.”
“I know you don’t want to think your boyfriend is—”
“He’s not my boyfriend!” She nearly screamed it.
Reilly flinched. “Okay.”
Wren rubbed her forehead. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right,” said Reilly.
“He was with me,” said Wren. “The night that Oliver was killed, he was with me.”
It was quiet again.
Wren had almost used this alibi for Hawk before, back with Jenny Smith, but she’d known that it was possible that Hawk could have gotten out of bed with her, while she was sleeping, without waking her. Maybe not likely, but possible, so she hadn’t fessed up to the alibi. Also, she’d been embarrassed to admit she was sleeping with Hawk, but now that ship had sailed, and Reilly knew.
“Okay,” said Reilly finally. “Okay. He’s got an alibi. Fine.”
Now it was quiet again, and the silence was uncomfortable and weighty. She rested her head against the window and shut her eyes.
“This is the reason you wanted it out of our laps, though, right?” said Reilly. “Even with that alibi, you knew that it looked like he might have—”
“No.” She turned to him.
“Did you tell Hawk about the crime scenes?” said Reilly. “Did you tell him what Major did? How he arranged the bodies?”
“Major probably told him,” she said.
“True,” said Reilly. “Look, you have to admit, he ticks all the boxes. He had a motive. He knew how to arrange the body. He wouldn’t have any qualms about—”
“About murder? That’s what you think of him?” she said. “Because he’s not like that. He’s not violent. He has nightmares…” Even as she was saying it, it all sounded flimsy.
“Okay,” said Reilly. “Okay, I’ll drop it. We’ll look elsewhere.”
“If Hawk had killed someone, I would know,” she said. “I’m a profiler, Reilly. I would be able to tell.”
“Sure.” Reilly nodded vigorously. “Of course you would. I had to bring it up, but now that we’ve talked it out, it’s fine. We won’t talk about it anymore.”
“Okay,” she said, going back to the window.
“Okay,” he said.
* * *
“Oh, come in,” said Alice Campbell, opening her door wide into her kitchen, where the smell of something baking was wafting out. “I’m so glad you came by. No one’s been by to talk to me about Oliver, no one at all.”
Reilly and Wren stepped into the kitchen.
Alice ran a rag over the round, wooden table in the corner. “Sit down, please.”
Wren hesitated, and then sat.
Reilly sat down too.
Alice washed out the rag, wrung it out, and hung it over the faucet in the kitchen sink. Then she joined them. “Listen, this might sound a bit odd, Wren—er, Ms. Delacroix—but I wonder if you would mind staying a little after we talk. I have something I want to tell you.”
Wren’s mouth felt dry. So, then Oliver hadn’t told his mother that he’d broken the news of his father to Wren? Of course he wouldn’t have told his mother that he’d suffocated her and thrown her in a well. That was exactly the kind of thing you kept from your mom. Well, Wren guessed, anyway. With her own mother, it was a different story, she supposed.
“Would that be okay?” said Alice.
“Uh, yeah,” said Wren. “Sure.”
“Excellent.” Alice smiled at them. “Um, how can I help you? Anything I can do to help, let me know.”
“Well,” said Reilly, “we’re at square one with this, I’ll be honest with you. We’re working with several possible scenarios for why this happened to your son. In several of them, he’s a target only because of he’s his father’s son. In others, however, he could have been a victim for personal reasons. Is there anyone you can think of who hated your son?”
“No,” said Alice. “Really, no. I have thought this through, and I can’t think of anyone. My daughter and I stayed up last night, just trying to put the pieces together, and we didn’t get anywhere.”
“So, he didn’t have any enemies?” said Reilly.
“None,” said Alice.
“Not at work? Not an ex? Not an old rival from high school?”
“Nothing like that,” said Alice. “Oliver isn’t currently employed. He’s been staying home to help out his younger sister, Emmaline. She was diagnosed with leukemia, and she’s needed care. I’ve been working, and Oliver volunteered to help Emmaline full time. So, there’s no one at work. As for exes, there’s only one that I’m aware of, from college. Oliver hasn’t seen her in years, and she lives across the country. And he was very well-liked in high school. But I don’t know. Maybe I’m not the person to ask.”
“Who would be?” said Reilly.
“Possibly his best friend, Mack,” said Alice. “Oh, his first name is really Alexander, but he goes by Mack. Mack Upton.”
Reilly scribbled down the name. “Well, if you think of anything else, you’ll give us a call, right?” He fished out a card and slid it across the table to her.
“Of course.” Alice took the card and studied it.
Reilly got up from the table.
Wren got up too, hoping that Alice would somehow forget that she needed to talk to Wren to tell her about Adrian Campbell. She didn’t know what to do. Should she lie about Oliver having told her about her father?
Yes, of course she should. There was no point in smearing a dead man’s memory with what he’d done. Let it be. Oliver wasn’t going to be contradicting her anytime soon. No one would ever know.
But Alice reached out for her. “Oh, Wren.” She swallowed. “Ms. Delacroix.”
“Right,” said Wren, and sat back down.
Reilly shot her a questioning look.
She waved him out the door. Then she turned her attention to Alice.
“Listen, this might not be easy for you to hear,” said Alice, “and it’s certainly not something I like to dwell on, because it’s all so very painful for me. But I feel that you need to know. And, frankly, I need your help. With Oliver gone and Adrian gone, all I have left is Emmaline, and I can’t lose her.” She licked her lips.
“Yeah,” said Wren, her stomach twisting into knots. “That must be really hard.”
Alice’s eyes filled with tears. “You have no idea.” She took a breath. “But I must say, one thing I have learned is that the human spirit is capable of handling things far worse than one might imagine it can. And when things get worse, you tend to find that you can handle it, if you must.”
Wren only nodded. What should she say to that?
“I don’t mean to shock you entirely,” said Alice. “You have the last name Delacroix, so you have been brought up thinking that one man is your father—”
“I know Hayes Delacroix isn’t my biological father,” said Wren.
“Oh,” said Alice. “Yes, well, so you’re aware of that. That’s good.”
Wren swallowed. “I, uh, am aware that your late husband…” She let the sentence trail off. “That he was one of my mother’s many affairs.”
“You are?” said Alice. “Oh, well, then, perhaps this will be easier than I thought.”
“You think it’s possible that Adrian Campbell was my father, and that I might be a match for Emmaline for a transplant?” said Wren.
“Yes,” said Alice. “How did you know?”
“I just put it together,” said Wren. “Because of what you said about leukemia. It’s bone marrow she needs?”
“Yes,” said Alice.
“If I’m a match, of course I’ll be a donor,” said Wren.
Alice smiled, and tears spilled out of her eyes. “Thank y
ou so much, Wren.”
“Of course.”
“I’m sorry that I never approached you before—”
“It’s understandable why you wouldn’t,” said Wren. “It must all be very painful for you. I’m sorry, for whatever it’s worth. I’m sorry about everything.” And then she knew she had to get out of there, because she was beginning to feel like she might start crying too, and she knew that she couldn’t do that. She shook Alice’s hand, said her goodbyes, and fled.
* * *
“Hawk?” said Reilly, completely surprised to see the other man in his office. “You looking for Wren? Because she’s off getting coffee.” Reilly was pretty sure Wren just wanted some time to herself, actually, but he hadn’t argued. She hadn’t offered to get him anything from the Daily Bean, and he hadn’t asked.
He figured that talking with Alice Campbell hadn’t been easy for her, considering everything that had happened with Oliver.
But who was Oliver Campbell?
The kind of man who could do what he’d done to Wren, that kind of man had a darkness within him. He didn’t buy that Oliver had no enemies at all. Of course, he still wasn’t sold on the idea that the killing of Oliver had been personal. It was likely the work of a copycat serial killer. But if Wren didn’t give him a profile to work with soon, he wasn’t sure how they were going to look for that killer.
He didn’t want to push Wren, though. Not now. Not after everything she’d gone through.
“No, I’m here to see you,” said Hawk. “The other woman, Maliah? She told me to wait in here for you.”
“Okay,” said Reilly. “Well, what can I do for you?”
“I’m, um, just fishing around,” said Hawk. “I don’t know if this is even possible. I know that you used discretionary funds to hire Wren as an expert. I don’t know, maybe you don’t have any other funds, maybe they’re all spoken for.”
“You’re asking for money?”
“I’m asking for a job,” said Hawk. “Nothing permanent, just thought maybe you could use the help. I hear that there’s another murder—”
“You hear that from Wren?”
“Well, I know she went out to see the body,” said Hawk. “But, no, I haven’t talked to her about it. She’s been busy.”
“So, you know who was killed?” said Reilly.
“No,” said Hawk.
“Oliver Campbell,” said Reilly.
Hawk gave him a sharp look. “You’re kidding.”
“Would I joke about this?”
Hawk folded his arms over his chest. “Well, that’s very, very coincidental.”
“Isn’t it though.” Reilly gave him a hard look.
Hawk straightened. “Oh.” He nodded slowly. “Of course. I should have guessed that. No wonder she’s avoiding me. She thinks I did it. You do too.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
The two men gazed at each other, and the words hung in the air.
“I had to ask,” said Reilly.
“No, I get it,” said Hawk. “I was angry with the man. He hurt Wren, and she wouldn’t go through the proper channels to get justice…” He furrowed his brow, going very quiet suddenly.
“What?”
“Nothing,” said Hawk. “I just, I had heard the murder was associated with the FCL, that there was more of the imagery that was present in the murders that Major committed. I thought maybe you might need some extra help with the cult angle. I thought maybe I could be of use in that way. That’s all. But this is sounding… different.”
“Why’d you trail off like that?” said Reilly.
“Nothing.” Hawk shifted on his feet, looking nervous. “Maybe I’d better go. This wasn’t a good idea. After the thing with Baldwin, I was thinking maybe I wanted to get into law enforcement, and I thought this would be a good way to get my feet wet. But I didn’t think it through. I’ll just get out of your hair.” He turned toward the door.
Reilly hurried around him and got between Hawk and the door. Reilly shut the door and stood in front of it. “I don’t think so. Why’d you trail off? You were thinking about something.”
Hawk’s shoulders slumped. “It was an idiotic thought. I don’t know why I thought it. Wren’s not her mother. She doesn’t care about vengeance. She would never…” He shook his head.
“Never what?”
“Really, let’s drop this,” said Hawk. “You going to move away from the door, Detective?”
“Vivian didn’t kill people herself,” said Reilly. “If she wanted vengeance, she got someone to carry it out for her.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? Now, you’re not just accusing me, you’re accusing Wren? Really?”
“I’m not accusing anyone,” said Reilly. “You’re the one who brought Wren up.”
“Because you forced me to. I would never say anything to hurt her. I would never betray her.”
Reilly swallowed. Betray her? That was an interesting choice of words, wasn’t it? He stared Hawk down.
Hawk broke eye contact and looked at the floor.
Reilly moved away from the door.
“I can leave?” said Hawk.
“You can leave,” said Reilly.
Hawk shuffled out of the office, looking pathetic and beaten.
Reilly didn’t buy it. He’d seen the man talk another man into turning a gun on himself. Just the kind of smooth-talking man who could convince Oliver Campbell to go for a walk in the woods.
Or convince ten-year-old girls to come have ice cream with him?
But no.
Major Hill had confessed to those crimes. That case was solved.
And this stuff about Wren that Hawk had brought up, that was bullshit. Hawk was manipulating him.
Manipulating him to take down Wren? No, that didn’t make sense. Reilly had seen firsthand how worried Hawk had been about Wren. He truly would never do anything to hurt Wren, not knowingly. So… what did that mean?
Reilly thought of Wren’s eagerly drinking in a dead body. The way she looked at a crime scene in delighted interest.
He felt queasy.
And then he got on the phone and scheduled a visit to the local jail to see Major Hill.
CHAPTER THREE
“What the hell?” Wren said. They were standing in Reilly’s office the next day. “Why are we going to see Major?”
“I don’t know, just dotting some I’s. Crossing some T’s.”
“How does that help us do that?” she said.
“We have to talk to him,” said Reilly. “If this isn’t a copycat, we need to know that. It’s possible that Major didn’t commit any of the crimes—”
“He confessed.”
“False confessions happen, Delacroix.”
She clenched her hands into fists and released them.
“Look, why are you so against doing this?” he said.
“I’m not,” she said.
He gave her a long, hard look. “Why didn’t you want to press charges against Oliver?”
Her lips parted. “What is this, Reilly?”
“Just answer the question.”
“Not because I wanted to kill him myself,” she said. “I told you why. Come on. You saw what Chief Thomas was like. They hate me in Cardinal Falls. They’d never take it seriously. It wasn’t worth it. It just wasn’t.”
He surveyed her.
She pulled out a chair in front of his desk and sank into it. “Okay, look, I probably would have eventually caved and pressed charges, because I couldn’t have let him get away with it. But it would have been hell, and I wasn’t ready yet.”
He scratched his jaw.
“Come on, Reilly, if you really suspect me, suspend me from the case or something.”
“I should anyway,” said Reilly. “You have personal beef with Oliver. And he’s your brother. And he’s dead. It’s all highly irregular for you to be investigating this.”
“I know,” she said. “I can sit it out if you want.”
“No
, I need you there when we’re talking to Major,” he said. “And this case involves the Fellowship. I need your expertise. I need you, Delacroix, so you’re not sitting this out.”
“Damn it,” she said.
He cocked his head to one side. “We can stop for coffee on the way.”
“We just got coffee.”
“So? Can you have too much coffee?”
“Good point,” she said, getting up.
“So, like, if it’s a copycat, what’s the profile look like?” said Reilly.
“Mmm, we need to know the places this crime scene diverges from the original crime scenes,” she said.
“It doesn’t,” said Reilly. “Other than the fact that Adrian’s not a little girl.”
“He was drugged?”
“Same sedative given the girls. Not in ice cream, though. Looks like it was in a soda.”
“And then suffocated?” she said.
“Yep.”
“Exactly the same,” she said, shaking her head.
“This is why we have to talk to Major.”
“Right,” she muttered. “Let’s go.”
* * *
“Wren!” said Major, when he was brought into the interview room where Reilly and Wren were waiting. It was a small room with a gray table in the middle and beige walls. Major tried to reach out for Wren, but the officer bringing him in stopped him. He cuffed Major to the table and told him to behave. Then, giving Reilly a salute, the officer left the room.
Major smiled a wide smile. “Wren, I’m so glad you’re here.”
“Well,” said Wren, “it’s not a social visit, I’m afraid. We want to talk to you about the girls you, um, saved from having to live out without their pairings.”
“That’s the thing,” said Major. “I was confused before. I said that I killed those girls, but I didn’t do it.”
Wren felt the bottom go out of her stomach. “What do you mean?”
“Hawk did it,” said Major. “It was always Hawk.”
Wren swallowed hard.
Reilly leaned in. “Have you been hearing stories from outside the jail?”
“What?” said Major. “No.”
“About other murders happening while you’re locked up?”
“There are?” Major’s eyes lit up. “Well, see, that proves it. It’s not me. I knew Hawk wouldn’t be able to stop. He said he would, but I knew he’d keep going, and—”
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