by Tori Scott
She unfolded the paper, her movements sure and methodical. Her index finger smoothed over the creases as she read the names.
Rand pulled a legal pad from his desk and selected a sharp pencil from the Dallas Stars cup that served as his pen and pencil holder. "Start with the first name on the list. We'll go through them one by one."
"This is going to take all night," she muttered under her breath. "Okay, the first one is Max Lucas. He was released from prison a few days ago. I sent him up several years ago for child pornography, kidnapping, and manslaughter. Two of the children died before police found where he'd been holding them."
Rand wrote the information down and looked up when she didn't offer anything further. "How in the hell did he get out so soon?"
"Anne had to offer him a deal to get him to tell the police where the kids were. She didn't know they were dead at the time. She tried to break the deal when they were found, but he had a high-priced lawyer who pretty much shredded the evidence in court."
"Anything else? Why did he make the list?"
"He made some wild threats during the sentencing. Threatened me and Anne. I didn't think much of it at the time, but Anne was murdered a few days ago, and then someone invaded my house and left the dummy. Both things happened just after Lucas was released from prison."
"Well, hell. Why didn't you tell me this sooner? Any idea where he is now?"
Maddie leaned forward and laced her hands together, resting them on top of the desk. "I don't know. Detective Thacker is trying to track him down."
Rand made a note to call Thacker in the morning. "Tell me about him. I want to know everything."
"I don't know what you're looking for. What good is this going to do?"
He set the pencil on the desk and rested his chin in his hands. "I want to know how you ended up with his case, and why he threatened you."
"Max's girlfriend was my hairdresser. She was chatting about the remodeling they were doing on their house and mentioned something that triggered a memory of a tip that had come in to the police department. Anne had told me about it because I was so worried about Brandy while all these girls were disappearing."
"So you were responsible for his capture, as well as sending him to prison?"
"Yes. Anne prosecuted the case and managed to humiliate him in front of his family and the community in the process."
"Okay, what about the next one?"
"Mark Reilly. He's a petty thief and con man. Targeted the elderly and fleeced them out of their life savings with real estate scams. He also wasn't above lifting things from their houses while he was making his presentations. He lost a lot of money when he was convicted, and I ordered him to pay back every penny he'd swindled. He wasn't too happy about that. I thought he was still in prison."
Rand made a notation to check on the man's whereabouts. "He may be. I'll find out."
Two hours later, they were down to the last name on the list. Maddie frowned as she looked at it, and he saw her shudder as her mouth curled in distaste.
"What is it? Why does the name Greg Matthews bother you?"
"I didn't try this case. But I'm the one who turned him in, and I'm supposed to testify against him at his trial next month."
"What did he do?" Rand made a note on his legal pad to check this one out as carefully as he planned to check out Lucas.
Maddie took a deep breath and wiped her palms on her shorts. "He was a teacher at Brandy's school. One of her friends was in the man's math class. I found out he'd sexually assaulted Caroline several times during the school year when he was supposedly tutoring her."
"Where is he now?"
"In jail. And I know he was there the night Anne was killed. I checked. So we can cross him off the list."
Rand shook his head. "I'm not eliminating anyone as a suspect unless I find out they're dead."
"How could he have anything to do with this? He's behind bars. He's not a threat. We need to concentrate on the ones that are." Her hands twisted together before she realized what she was doing and made a visible effort to relax.
Her words made sense, but her actions told him she was more worried about the man than she was willing to admit. Probably because of her daughter. Any man who would rape a child was capable of anything, as far as Rand was concerned.
They had twelve potential suspects. Except for the ones who were still locked up, any one of those twelve could be on their way to Greendale. How could he keep Maddie and her daughter safe from a psychopath when he had no idea who he was supposed to protect her from?
He couldn't watch Maddie and Brandy every second by himself. Even if he put all of his deputies on the job, it would be nearly impossible for them to carry on their normal duties and protect Maddie and Brandy at the same time.
Too bad he couldn't deputize the whole town.
CHAPTER FOUR
Maddie glanced at her watch. Six forty-five. She'd nearly forgotten about meeting Ellie for dinner. She called Linda to check on Brandy, and Linda assured her the girls were just fine and hitting it off. Maddie promised to pick Brandy up by nine, then drove up to the restaurant on the Interstate. When she'd lived in Greendale, the place was just an old gas station. But they'd added on a small store and a lean to for the catfish place.
Almost every table was full when she stepped inside, but Ellie was already seated at a table by the window. She stood and gave Maddie a perfume-infused hug. Ellie had always been a hugger, while Maddie preferred to keep a little distance. But she and Ellie had been best friends all through high school, so Maddie hugged her back.
"Here," Ellie said, grabbing Maddie's hand. "Let's get our food, then we can talk."
The food was laid out buffet style, with catfish, fried shrimp, boiled shrimp, boiled crawdads, baked potatoes and French fries, and a variety of salads and desserts.
"It's all you can eat, so just get whatever you want." Ellie piled her plate high with fish and shrimp, then added a healthy--or unhealthy, depending on your point of view--serving of crawdads.
Maddie shuddered. She loved fish, but she drew the line at crawdads. The waitress brought them tall glasses of sweet iced tea and a basket of fresh yeast rolls. She shouldn't be hungry, but Maddie's stomach growled at the smell of those rolls. She took a bite of the catfish. She'd forgotten just how good it was. She could remember her mother frying up catfish her dad and brother had brought home from the lake.
"Hey, Maddie! Back to the present, girl. Isn't this just the best food ever?" Ellie peeled a piece of boiled shrimp, dragged it through the bowl of horseradish sauce and popped it into her mouth. "Mmmm, heaven."
Maddie did the same, the sauce nearly setting her mouth on fire. She gulped down half of the tea. "Wow, that's hot."
Ellie giggle. "Girl, you've been gone too long. You've forgotten how to eat real food. Now, tell me everything. I want to know why you were here one day and gone the next, and why you never came back. And tell me about your daughter. She's Rand's kid, right?"
Maddie choked on her tea. "Shhh." She looked around, but no one paid any attention to them. The noise level was so high, she doubted anyone would hear her if she yelled. "How did you know?"
Ellie looked puzzled. "How could I not? She looks just like him, and she's the right age. Are you telling me he doesn't know?"
Maddie shook her head. "No one does. Well, except you. And I need you to keep that quiet for right now, okay? At least until I have a chance to tell Rand."
"Oh, sure, honey. But you'd better do that sooner rather than later, because I'm sure I'm not the only one who can see the resemblance."
Ellie was right. Anyone who knew their history would realize Brandy belonged to Rand. "So why hasn't Rand figured it out on his own? Does he think I ran away and got pregnant by the first guy I met?"
Ellie propped her arms on the table and leaned forward. "Honey, that's exactly what he thinks."
Maddie groaned. "This just gets more and more complicated. But I'm telling him tomorrow. I'm taking Brandy ou
t to the ranch, and I'm not leaving until he knows the truth."
Ellie nodded. "Truth is good."
They caught up on their lives over the past few years while pigging out on catfish. Maddie had missed this so much. While she and Anne had been friends, they hadn't had a past in common so there was no remembering old times, no gossiping about people they'd known their entire lives, no speculating about what had happened to this person or that one.
"Hey, whatever happened to Susie Campbell?" Maddie asked Ellie. They'd all run together in high school, the three musketeers of Greendale High. "I haven't seen or heard from her since graduation."
Ellie's face paled. "You didn't hear?"
"Hear what? I haven't heard a thing about anyone in this town since I left."
"The story made the national news, Maddie. How did you miss it? Susie was murdered, right after you left."
Maddie breath caught in her throat. Murdered? "Here in Greendale?" What had the town been through? First Rand's parents, then Susie? No wonder no one seemed glad to see her. Her boyfriend's parents, then her best friend.
And what they both had in common was Maddie.
Ellie didn't seem to notice Maddie's preoccupation. "No, not here. Up around Lindale somewhere. At first the cops thought she'd killed herself. They found her hanging from a tree. But since she'd had her tongue cut out, they abandoned that theory pretty quick."
Maddie's stomach rolled. It was exactly like Anne's murder. But this one had happened years ago, several hundred miles from Montgomery county.
Ellie went on. "Yep, we had ourselves a serial killer. Killed a girl every year at the end of May or first part of June, like clockwork. Then suddenly, five years ago, the murders stopped. Papers never said he was caught, so I figure he got tired of it, or he moved on somewhere else since they'd 'a killed him on the spot if they'd a caught him. Wouldn't 'a bothered with a trial."
Maddie grabbed a notebook from her purse and started writing.
"What 'cha doing?" Ellie tried to read upside down, but gave up.
"Taking notes. Listen. If anything happens to me, make sure Rand gets this." She ripped the sheet from the notebook and handed it to Ellie. "The reason I'm here is because someone killed my best friend back in Oklahoma, in exactly the same way. Then he started threatening Brandy. I came home to be safe, but I may have stumbled back into his comfort zone."
Maddie pushed her chair back and dropped a few bills on the table for a tip. "I have to go pick up my daughter. Walk out with me?"
Ellie grabbed her purse and followed Maddie out the door. "What's going on? You think someone's going to kill you?"
Maddie nodded. "And you need to be careful. He's already killed two of my best friends. You're the only one I have left."
Except for Rand.
"Well," Ellie said with a toss of her head, "thank God I'm a blonde."
***
By the time Maddie collected Brandy and returned to the motel, she was close to the boiling point. If she ever got her hands on this wacko, she wouldn't let go until he was sentenced to life in prison without parole. She had no sympathy for men who hurt women, no matter what the reason. Whether they beat them up or killed them in cold blood. It was one of the things that made her so popular with the D.A.'s office. They knew if they could present the evidence, she would hand down a tough sentence.
The press loved to hate her. She'd been given many colorful nicknames over the last few years, most of them less than complimentary. Castrating Cooper was the one most often used when the story broke about the math teacher. Mad Maddie was the press favorite during the trial for the con man who targeted senior citizens.
The names never bothered her, but Brandy had suffered taunts from kids at school who parroted what their parents said at home. And now her daughter had been uprooted from her home, driven away from her friends, and learned things Maddie had hoped to keep from her until she was older. All because of one man on a power kick.
She almost wished she'd get the chance to meet this guy alone, just the two of them. She'd teach him not to mess with Maddie Cooper.
"What was the sigh for, Mom?" Brandy asked as they pulled into the motel parking lot.
"Nothing, honey. Just thinking foolish thoughts." Maddie wrapped an arm around her daughter's shoulders as they walked to the door. "Would you like to go to the movie tomorrow night?"
"I don't think so. Could you take me to the skating rink up in Grand Saline, though? Linda's granddaughter, Missy, is going and invited me to go with her."
"As long as you don't expect me to skate, sure. I'll just sit and watch. I guess this means you had a good time at Linda's?"
"Yeah, Missy's cool. She has her own horse, did you know that? And she said I could ride it anytime I want."
"We'll see." Maddie pushed the door open and did a quick visual check of the room before she let her daughter enter. Everything seemed to be as she left it. Domino lay curled in the middle of the bed, deigning only to open one eye in a sleepy glare.
She let Brandy precede her through the door and carefully closed and locked it behind them. She'd just settled on the bed to watch the evening news when the telephone rang. With her heart pounding, she picked up the receiver.
"Maddie? Are you okay? You sound scared. What's going on?"
She placed a hand over her chest in a futile attempt to slow her racing heart. "Matt? Why are you calling?"
"I have some bad news for you."
Oh, God, no. No more. Whatever she'd done to deserve punishment, surely she'd paid her debt by now. "What's happened?"
"Your house was broken into. I'm so sorry. I know I was supposed to watch it, but I had to leave for the day, and when I got back the kitchen door had been jimmied open."
Maddie rubbed her aching forehead with a shaking hand. "It's not your fault, Matt. You can't watch the house twenty-four hours a day. Was anything taken?"
"I'm not sure. The television and stereo are still here, but they're smashed. The place is a mess. Stuff's been tossed, your sofa is a total loss. Your desk is ruined. I tried to clean up a little, but--"
"Matt," she interrupted. "Did you clean up before or after the police got there?"
"Well, I tried to clean up the worst of it, but then Detective Thacker drove up before I could finish. He got a little upset, but I was only trying to help."
Maddie bit back a curse. Matt had a heart of gold, but sometimes he was a little dense. "He's upset because you compromised any evidence he might have found, Matt. When a crime occurs, you need to stay out of the way until the police have done their job."
"Now you're mad at me, too."
"No," she lied. "I'm not mad. I know you were trying to help. But next time, call the Detective first. And stay out of the way until he tells you it's okay."
"Sure, whatever you say. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know, so you wouldn't worry. It's mostly cleaned up now."
Maddie thanked him and hung up. Then she tossed the covers back and climbed off the bed.
"What is it, Mom?" Brandy tore her attention away from the television. Under normal conditions, nothing registered when she was watching one of her favorite shows.
Maddie parted the curtains and looked out over the nearly deserted parking lot as she decided how to tell her daughter about the latest problem. Sometimes she wondered if she expected too much of a thirteen-year-old. But it had been just the two of them for so long, and they'd shared everything--sometimes more like sisters than mother and daughter.
"Mom? You're scaring me." Brandy turned off the television with the remote control and the silence stretched for a long moment.
"It's nothing, really. Someone broke into the house and trashed it. Matt said it was a mess. But it's not the mess that bothers me. It sounds like he was looking for something, maybe clues to where we might be. But that doesn't make sense, either. He already knows where we are."
Brandy's eyes widened as she stared at her mother. "You…you mean someone could be on their way here right n
ow?"
Maddie moved to sit beside Brandy on the bed and put an arm around her shoulders. "We always knew it was a possibility. That's why we came to Greendale. A stranger will stand out here. We'll know if anyone new comes to town. And Rand is very dedicated to his job. He'll keep us safe."
Brandy looked up into Maddie's eyes, her expression troubled. "I hope you're right, Mom."
Of course I am. I'm always right, remember? Now, let's get some sleep, and tomorrow we'll see about moving into that house." She headed for the bathroom to brush her teeth, but Brandy's next question stopped her in her tracks.
"Mom, who will take care of me if anything happens to you?"
***
By ten-thirty the next morning, Rand had made arrangements for a town meeting. Linda had been on the phone since the moment she arrived at work, alerting the members of the Chamber of Commerce, the Lions Club, the Rotary Club, and the Quilting Guild. Cody and another deputy were on the streets, quietly alerting as many of the residents as they could.
Rand had walked into his office at seven to a call from Detective Thacker about the break-in at Maddie's home. The detective wanted to know if Rand had any idea what the intruder might have been looking for. Rand had honestly told him no, but it seemed the stalker hadn't given up on the idea of harassing Maddie.
All the more reason for tonight's meeting. He was going to need help--and lots of it--to keep Maddie and Brandy safe.
As he stood at the window overlooking the square, he could survey most of the center of town. He saw Cody talking to Doc, and the emphatic shake of Doc's head. Cody's frustrated gestures. Doc's crossed arms and belligerent stance.
This was going to be harder than he'd thought. Most of the older residents still remembered his parents' murder with vivid clarity. There was a festering wound of resentment that had never been lanced. And Maddie had run, bringing the focus of the blame unwittingly against herself. Maybe if she'd stayed, had stood her ground with her head held high, the blame would have centered solely on her father, where it belonged. But when Jacob Cooper died in jail before the trial, there had been no closure for the people of the town. Or for him.