She turned to face him, her dark eyes weighed with a sadness that could break your heart. He remembered that penetrating gaze all too well.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“You find her.” There was a quiver in her voice. “After all this time you find her, and you can’t pick up the phone?”
Craig shook his head. “We don’t know it’s her.”
“It’s in the newspaper.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s true. We just don’t know yet.”
“You say you don’t know, but it’s possible.”
Craig swallowed, then nodded.
“Did you even stop for a moment to think about how I’d feel?”
“I—” He stopped himself. Every feeble excuse he could think of would ring hollow, because it was. “I’m sorry, Summer.”
“Don’t tell me what you know in your head. Tell me what you know in your heart. Can you look me in the eye and tell me you know it isn’t her?”
Words with the force of a punch to the gut, able to knock the wind out of him. He stood with his mouth open, unable to respond.
Unchecked tears trickled down her cheeks. “Where is she? Have your people cut her into a million pieces to learn nothing they didn’t know before they put her on that table? Tell me, Nolan. Where’s my sister?”
“Summer, we really don’t know—”
His skin smarted from the force of the blow, and he felt the blood rush out of his nose as he reached for her arms.
“We don’t know if it’s her. Whatever I think…it doesn’t matter. We just don’t know.” Summer pulled against him, but he managed to keep hold of her. “They aren’t done yet.”
“And he’s killed again. You got the wrong man and you hide behind your procedure and your lies and you don’t tell me you might have found my sister.”
He’d killed again? Craig didn’t know what Summer was talking about, but he needed to find a newspaper and figure out what the hell was going on. Had Mac leaked the apparent link to the Missing Killer cases, casting doubt on Hobbs’s guilt?
As far as he knew, Mac hadn’t even reviewed the files, and Craig hadn’t left his notes in the office, so how would he know about what Craig had learned from the coroner?
When Yeager had told him to keep it quiet, he’d been relieved but hadn’t been able to put his finger on why until now. All the families of the victims, the families of the girls who’d never been found—even the ones they’d told they were certain hadn’t been taken by the Missing Killer—they’d all want answers.
Answers he didn’t have yet. Answers he might not ever have for them.
Summer’s body shook with the sobs and she lowered her head, her dark hair falling in front of her face. Craig let go of her, put his arms around her and held her while she cried.
For a moment Craig stared at the copies of clippings in the folder, then squeezed his eyes shut. Was he really looking at what he thought he was looking at?
He opened his eyes, sat down on the bed and skimmed the first article, then the second.
Every case he’d worked on since the Missing Killer investigation was chronicled, as well as when he’d been shot and the story about the death of his partner, Lori.
The articles also told the fragmented story of Tain and Ashlyn and all the cases they’d worked since leaving Nighthawk Crossing. As Craig flipped through the clippings, skimming the headlines, he stopped at one article.
RCMP Constable Assaulted.
He knew the words by heart, but he read it again, and when he neared the end he picked it up, as though through the slip of paper he could reach out and offer the comfort he’d never given Ashlyn after she was attacked.
There was something stuck to the back of the paper. A note above stated, This is how we found it, and below there was a smaller clipping.
Assaulted constable released from hospital with undisclosed injuries.
The paper slipped from his hand, back into the stack, and he closed the folder.
Craig stepped into the bathroom as he peeled off his shirt and tossed it on the floor. He ran the water and ignored the glimpse of his reflection in the mirror as he reached for a washcloth. When he was finished, he turned the tap off and braced his arms against the vanity, gaze lowered.
“You’ve looked better.”
He turned before his brain connected the voice with a name, and when he saw her standing in his motel room, door open behind her, he groaned. “What the hell are you doing here, Emma?”
“Is that any way to greet an old friend?”
He thought back to the last time he’d seen her, before she’d disappeared to print the exclusive he’d handed her. She’d called a few times, but he hadn’t answered.
“Friends don’t lay blame for failed manhunts without facts.”
“If you hadn’t had blinders on from the beginning, maybe you would have seen the bigger picture.”
He took a step toward her. “You’ve got some nerve, showing up after all these months, throwing that in my face. You wanted something and you used me to get it, and the minute you had what you wanted you were gone.”
“Don’t tell me you missed me, Craig.”
He clenched his teeth as he walked around her and crossed the room to the side of the bed near the door. Craig grabbed the shirt he’d draped over the chair.
“You forgot this.”
As he slid his arms into the shirt and reached for the buttons he turned around. His coat was dangling from her hand.
The coat he’d left in his office, after he’d talked to Summer.
Summer had told him she’d hung up the phone after the reporter had called, and then picked it up again to book the first flight she could get.
Somehow, he’d reassured Summer, persuaded her that he’d let her know as soon as they had any information. Summer had put her trust in Craig Nolan a year and a half before, believing he’d find her sister, and this time she had no one else to turn to for answers. She had to take the risk that he’d let her down for a second time in as many years.
He’d given her his card and taken down her number, never once thinking to ask for the name of the journalist who’d tracked her down to her home in Nanaimo and asked how she felt about the police finding her sister after all this time.
“How the hell did you get in my office?”
“It’s not like you keep it locked.”
“The same can’t be said for my motel room.”
Emma sighed and tossed his coat down on the bed. “Look, Craig, I know you’re upset—”
“Don’t you stop to think for a second about what you’re doing? You call up the family of a missing woman, and I have to tell her we haven’t even ID’d the body yet. She comes all this way thinking we have answers, and she could end up leaving with nothing.”
“So you don’t have an ID?”
“I’m done talking to you.”
Emma straightened up. “You need more than one half-assed partner who climbs inside a bottle every night of the week. I can hurt you or help you. That’s your call. I’ll get my story one way or another.”
Craig spun around and grabbed the back of the chair, squeezing his eyes shut as he yelled, “What the hell is wrong with you? You can’t stop long enough to imagine what it’s like to get a call from some reporter asking how you feel about the cops finding your sister’s body after all this time?” He turned to face her. “Or because you lost your sister it’s okay for you to put everyone else through hell?”
Emma’s mouth dropped open. “You sonofabitch.” She turned and started marching toward the door.
“Get out! Just get the hell out,” he shouted as she slammed the door shut behind her.
Craig pressed his hands against his temples for a moment as he took in the sight of his coat on the bed, next to the opened folder, the clippings scattering haphazardly, not like he’d left them.
When Yeager found out about this…
He grabbed the book off the nightstand and flung it ac
ross the room.
Fuck.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The tires squealed as Craig wove around the car blocking the intersection. A look in his rearview mirror revealed the one-finger salute the driver was giving him.
Guy was lucky Craig had better things to do than turn around.
Every time the rage reached out from behind his eyes he saw red, then black. He tightened his grip on the steering wheel.
Think, think, think. If he wasn’t at work, where would…
Of course. He smacked the steering wheel, glanced in his side mirror, then turned down the next street.
Despite the risks he took drinking when he should be on duty, Mac was smart enough to park in the back alley behind the bars he frequented.
He turned down the alley. If he hadn’t been seeing blind when he’d sped away from the motel he might have had the presence of mind to figure out where Mac would be sooner, but the timing couldn’t have been better. As he pulled over and stopped the Rodeo he watched Mac saunter through the parking lot, fumbling with his keys.
Mac leaned more than the tower of Pisa.
“You bastard.” Craig spat the words as he walked up behind him.
Mac turned slowly, stumbling as he moved and reaching out to balance himself as he wobbled.
Craig grabbed him by the collar and shoved Mac against his car, then let go of him. “You goddamn sonofabitch!” He swung with his right fist, then his left.
The hazy sheen of alcohol burned off Mac’s eyes after the blows and he shoved Craig. His movements were still sloppy, but he hit hard in the stomach, enough to knock Craig back. Mac didn’t wait for him to catch his breath or find his footing; he plunged at Craig headfirst.
Craig jumped to the side, and Mac tried to pull up too late. He cracked his head against the Dumpster and staggered back, blood oozing down his face.
There were shouts in the distance, followed by the sound of a heavy door slamming shut.
Mac roared as he came after Craig and jumped on top of him. Craig felt the jarring blow of the hood of the car impacting with his back, between his shoulders, and raised his arms to shield his head as Mac swore at him and swung wildly. Some of the blows hit the car and others hit Craig.
A door creaked. Pounding against metal. Footsteps on pavement.
He pulled his leg to the side and braced himself as he swung his foot down against Mac’s back. Mac yelped as he fell forward, into Craig, and then slid down onto his knees.
Craig felt hands on him then, pulling him away from the car, away from Mac. Their words were muffled, their faces a blur.
Nothing coming into focus until the sound of a siren, followed by the feeling of being pushed face-first against a car and the officer calling out, “Gun.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Yeager had always looked rigid before, but when Craig saw her talking to the uniformed officers on scene, she looked like someone had stuck a metal rod up her backside, her no-nonsense expression coupled with raised shoulders and a back so straight she was a chiropractor’s nightmare.
The more they talked, the taller she got.
They’d left him sitting in his Rodeo, on the front passenger seat with the door open and an ice pack pressed against his jaw.
The ice was doing more to help his hands at the moment. He lowered the pack and switched it to his left hand, already bruised and swollen. The dried blood on his knuckles worked like a glue on the gashes and he felt the protest when he tried to straighten his fingers.
Someone shut the back door to the ambulance and knocked on it before walking around to the passenger side door. The officers who’d been getting the third degree from Yeager were getting into their cars. One cast a glance in Craig’s direction and shook his head. The ambulance parked on the other side of them was crawling along the alley, lights flashing off the buildings silently. On cue the crowds began to disperse, one group heading into the back door of the bar, another cluster walking behind the ambulance toward the apartment building that shared the alley, a few others coming toward Craig, down the other alley that led to the nearby shops.
Yeager marched across the parking lot and overtook the stragglers walking down the alley. They slowed, staring openly at Yeager and Craig until she turned and glared at them. Their pace quickened, and once they’d passed, Yeager turned back to Craig.
“When I reassigned you, you took it well.”
Craig shifted the ice back to his right hand.
“I knew you wouldn’t want the case, but I gave it to you anyway. And you never complained.”
He risked a glance at her face. Anger etched in stone was what he expected, but there was a softness in her eyes he didn’t anticipate, as though she was begging him to cooperate.
“MacDougall was a pain in the ass. Openly arguing. I know he wasn’t showing up, and I know you covered for him.” She glanced to her left—the bar Mac had come out of—and sighed. “And I know he’d been drinking on shift.”
There was silence for a moment, but he didn’t look back up. “What I don’t know is why you assaulted him.”
Mac’s words: Who’s gonna believe that when the reporter’s a woman you’re known to be tight with, Nolan?
The look on Emma Fenton’s face when he’d kicked her out of his motel room flashed through his mind.
Mac: Feisty little thing too. I mean, from what I hear.
Craig lifted the ice pack back up to his jaw and looked at Yeager, returning her steady stare. Tough as she was he thought he saw a flicker in her eyes—disappointment, sadness, maybe regret—but as soon as he thought he saw it, it was gone, perhaps nothing more than the trickery of sunlight as the clouds broke for a moment, then closed in over them again.
The softness, if it had ever really been there, was gone.
“Have it your way, Nolan. You’re suspended, pending an investigation into this incident.” She paused. “And if MacDougall decides to file charges this silent tough-guy crap won’t help you.”
Yeager turned around and started to walk to her car, the one lone police vehicle that remained in the alley, before she stopped and looked back.
“And Nolan? Don’t leave town.”
He sat, half in and half out of the vehicle, and watched her get in her car and drive away.
CHAPTER TWENTY
“I used to think I’d like to spend some time here in the summer. With the mountains and the lake it’s so pretty, and there’s waterskiing, tubing, Jet Skiing…”
“Looking for Ogopogo.”
“Said with the scorn of a disbeliever.”
Tain shook his head. “Just a gimmick to sell key chains and stuffed monsters to tourists.”
“Wait.” Ashlyn held up her hands, her mouth wide with the feigned look of sudden revelation. “Isn’t that what some people say about the RCMP?”
“It’s obviously not the same thing. We’re for selling stuffed moose and bears in little red serge coats.”
For what seemed like the first time in days, a smile lit Ashlyn’s face, one that seemed to reach her eyes. She’d been quiet ever since he’d told her what Sims had learned, and they’d spent the drive into the mountains in silence.
“So what changed your mind?” Tain asked.
“Hmmm?” She glanced at him as she stopped the car for a red light, brow furrowed.
“About spending time here in the summer?”
The lines vanished as her face lengthened. “Too close.”
He nodded. It wasn’t an explanation that needed more words for him to understand.
She followed the directions to the hospital. Ashlyn had parked the car and was halfway out of the vehicle before she stopped.
“We haven’t checked in,” he said.
Ashlyn climbed back into her seat and groaned. “They’ve got a big case, the manhunt. I haven’t been reading the papers and I know we’ve missed the briefings, but I still overheard something about it at the station.”
“Ever since we found Millie in the Dumpster, I
’ve been avoiding the news.”
“This could take a while.”
“It’s the right thing to do.”
She looked at him with her eyebrows raised into an Are you kidding me? expression but didn’t argue with him.
He pulled out the map and guided her through the turns, somehow managing to muddle up a detour around an accident that had one road closed. It wasn’t until they were a few blocks and one last turn away that Tain set the book down.
“Oh my God.”
Just as quickly as Ashlyn had said the words, she’d clamped her hand over her mouth but it was too late. Tain looked past her and followed her gaze to the woman walking out of the coroner’s office, toward the sidewalk.
First Millie, followed by the newspaper clippings—something he realized he hadn’t even told Steve about—then the link to Nighthawk Crossing.
And now Summer Young.
Tain closed his eyes for what felt like a second, and when he opened them they were parked outside the RCMP station.
Checking in should have been a formality, perhaps more time-consuming than usual because of the manhunt, but straightforward nonetheless. When Tain had checked in with Steve to tell him they were leaving, Steve had assured him he’d call ahead to let Kelowna know they were coming.
“Yeah, someone called about that.” The reception area was in chaos and the person behind the counter mumbled the words while changing extensions on the phone as they riffled through a stack of message slips that was thicker than a paperback novel. “Kelowna R…They haven’t answered yet?…I can try…Just a moment.” Identified only as ‘Joe’ by his nametag, the man glanced at them. “Sergeant said to go ahead, but come back before you leave town. She wants to talk to you, but she’s in the middle of something right now…”
Joe shrugged as he punched another button and started talking.
Tain and Ashlyn left the station in silence and returned to the hospital.
“What was Sims able to tell us?” Ashlyn asked.
“Just that she’d been admitted here about nine weeks ago.”
Lullaby for the Nameless (Nolan, Hart & Tain Thrillers) Page 18