“I don’t know yet. Lamar said she’d taken a group of kids from Lee Middle School.”
“She was a teacher?” Chase asked.
“No, a volunteer. Seems Janet was ordered to do community service after a little diva-brawl with another cellist in the orchestra last year.”
Chase snorted a surprised laugh. “Cellists brawling? What, did they cross bows?”
Daniel rolled his eyes at the lame joke. “I haven’t had enough sleep for that to be funny. The other cellist accused Janet of damaging her cello so that Janet could get the first chair. The two women had an out-and-out catfight, pulling hair and scratching each other. The other cellist charged Janet with assault and property damage. Apparently they caught Janet on tape messing with the cello, so she pleaded out. Her brother Michael said the volunteer work had made an impact. This group of kids was important to her.”
“They went to an amusement park on a school day?” Ed asked skeptically.
“Lamar said it was her reward to kids with straight As and the principal approved it.”
“It’s a four-hour drive from the amusement park back to Atlanta,” Chase said. “If she called Lamar at eight under duress, her killer had her by then. We need to find out what time she and the kids left the park. We could have a nice, tight window of opportunity.”
“I called the school, but nobody was there yet. I’ll head out there when we’re done.”
“Hopefully you’ll get more than we got at her apartment,” Ed said glumly. “We took prints, checked her voicemail and computer. So far, nothing pops.”
“We’re assuming she called Lamar under duress,” Chase said. “What if she was two-timing him? What if she was meeting some other guy for the weekend?”
“I’ve got a request for her LUDs,” Daniel said. “I’ll see if she called anyone else. But speaking of LUDs, we got the warrant for Jim Woolf’s. I should have them soon.”
“Woolf was there last night, at the Bowies’ house,” Ed mused. “How did he know?”
“He said he followed the line of cars up the hill,” Daniel said, and Ed sat up straighter.
“Speaking of cars, Janet Bowie drives a BMW Z-4 and it’s not in the parking garage under her apartment or at the Bowies’ house in Dutton.”
“She didn’t get those kids down to Fun-N-Sun in a Z,” Chase said. “It’s a two-seater.”
“I’ll ask the principal. Maybe a parent drove. None of the kids would be old enough.”
“Chase?” Leigh opened the door. “You’ve got a call from Sheriff Thomas in Volusia.”
“Tell him I’ll call him back.”
She frowned. “He said it was urgent. Danny, here’s your fax—it’s Woolf’s LUDs.”
Daniel scanned the LUDs as Chase took his phone call. “Jim Woolf got a call at six Sunday morning on his home line.” He flipped pages. “He got a call two minutes earlier from the same number on his office phone. And . . . he got another call from that same number . . . Oh, hell.” He looked up with a frown. “This morning at six.”
“Fuck,” Ed muttered.
“Fuck is right,” Chase said, hanging up the phone.
Daniel sighed. “Where?”
“Tylersville. One girl, brown blanket, with a key tied to her toe.”
“You were right, Ed,” Daniel murmured, wondering if this could be Bailey. The possibility of breaking the news to Alex made him sick, but the reality of their situation made him sicker. “Gentlemen, we’ve got ourselves a serial killer.”
Tuesday, January 30, 8:00 a.m.
She heard the scraping again. Bailey blinked, the pain in her head nearly unbearable. He’d been brutal last night when he’d taken her away, but she’d held on. She hadn’t told him anything, but at this point she wasn’t sure it would matter if she did. He was enjoying the torture. He laughed at her pain. He was an animal. A monster.
She tried to focus on the scraping. It was rhythmic, like the tick of a clock. Time was passing. How long had she been here? Who had Hope?
Please, I don’t care if he kills me now, just let my baby be all right.
She closed her eyes and the scraping faded. Everything faded.
Volusia, Georgia, Tuesday, January 30, 9:30 a.m.
“Who found her?” Daniel asked Sheriff Thomas.
Thomas’s jaw tightened. “Brothers, fourteen and sixteen. The sixteen-year-old called it in on his cell phone. All the kids cut through here on their way to school.”
“Then he wanted her to be found again.” Daniel looked around the heavily treed area. “On the last scene we had a reporter hiding up a tree taking pictures. Can you have your deputies walk through the trees and check?”
“We’ve been here since the kid called it in. No reporters could have gotten through.”
“If he’s the same guy, he was here before the kids found her.”
Thomas’s eyes narrowed. “This sicko is
feeding
him?”
“We think so,” Daniel said, and Thomas’s mouth twisted in distaste.
“I’ll go with them, make sure they don’t disturb anything you guys might need later.”
Daniel watched Thomas motion a couple of his deputies to the tree-line, then turned to Felicity Berg as she climbed from the ditch.
“Same, Daniel,” she said, peeling off her gloves. “Time of death was between nine and eleven last night. She was put here some time before four this morning.”
“The dew,” Daniel said. “The blanket was wet. Sexual assault?”
“Yes. And her face was broken the same way as Janet Bowie’s. Same bruising around her mouth. I think I’ll find it’s postmortem when I get her into exam. Oh, and the key? It was tied on super-tight. If she’d been alive it would have cut off all circulation to her toe. He wanted you to find that key.”
“Did she have track marks on her arms, Felicity?”
“No. Nor a lamb tattoo on her ankle. Tell Miss Fallon this isn’t her stepsister, either.”
Daniel breathed out a sigh of relief. “Thank you.”
Felicity drew herself straighter as the techs brought the body over the edge. “I’ll take her in now and see if we can’t find out who she is.”
As the ME vehicles drove away, Daniel heard a shout and turned in time to see Sheriff Thomas and one of his deputies pull Jim Woolf out of a tree, none too gently.
“Woolf,” Daniel called when Thomas had dragged him closer. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“My job,” Woolf snapped.
The deputy held up Woolf’s camera. “He was snappin’ away.”
Woolf glared. “I was outside the crime scene and on public land. You can’t take my camera or my pictures without a court order. I gave you the other pictures to be nice.”
“You gave me the other pictures because you’d already used them,” Daniel corrected. “Jim, think about it from my point of view. You get a phone call at six a.m. on Sunday and then again at six a.m. today from the same caller. Both days you show up at a homicide scene before we do. I might think you had something to do with this.”
“I didn’t,” Woolf gritted.
“Then prove your good intentions. Download that memory card onto one of our computers. You walk away with your pictures and I’m reasonably pacified.”
Woolf shook his head, angry. “Whatever. Let’s get this done so I can get to work.”
“Took the words right outta my mouth,” Daniel said mildly. “Let me get my laptop.”
Dutton, Tuesday, January 30, 10:00 a.m.
Meredith closed the front door behind her, shivering in her running clothes. “It’s got to be twenty degrees colder this morning than yesterday.”
Alex held up her hand, her eyes fixed to the TV. The sound was muted and she’d moved Hope’s chair so that the child couldn’t see the screen. “Sshh.”
“What’s happened?” Meredith asked urgently.
Alex worked very hard to keep the fear from her voice. “Breaking news.”
Meredith swallowed. “Another?”
“Yeah. No details yet, and no pictures.”
“Vartanian would have called you already,” Meredith said softly.
As if cued, Alex’s cell phone rang and her heart dropped to her gut as she checked the caller ID. “It’s him. Daniel?” she asked, unable to control the tremble in her voice.
“It’s not Bailey,” he said without preamble.
Relief shuddered through her. “Thank you.”
“It’s okay. I take it you’d heard already.”
“The news didn’t give any real information. Just that there’s another.”
“That’s about all I know, too.”
“Just like . . . ?”
“Just like,” he confirmed quietly. Alex could hear the slam of a car door and his engine starting. “I don’t want you going out alone. Please.”
A shiver shook her, unpleasant and unwelcome. “I have places to go today, things to do. People to talk to. I won’t get another chance until Meredith can come back.”
He made an impatient noise. “Fine. Just stay in public and don’t park your car anywhere secluded. Better yet, let a valet do your parking and don’t go to Bailey’s house by yourself. And . . . call me a few times so I know you’re okay. Okay?”
“Okay,” she murmured, then cleared her throat when Meredith gave her a knowing look. “Will Loomis search Bailey’s house now that she’s been declared missing?”
“I’m headed into Dutton to see Frank Loomis right now. I’ll check for you.”
“Thank you. And, Daniel, if you can’t make it tonight, I’ll understand.”
“I’ll do my best. Gotta make some more calls. Bye.”
And he was gone. Carefully Alex closed her phone. “Bye,” she murmured.
Meredith sat down next to Hope, then tilted her head, looking from Alex’s picture to Hope’s. “You all have similar technique. You both stay inside the lines.”
Alex rolled her eyes. “Yes, I am a control freak.”
“Yes, but you color a pretty picture.” Meredith hugged the little girl’s shoulders. “Your aunt Alex needs to have fun. Make sure you guys play while I’m gone.”
Hope’s chin jerked up and her gray eyes widened in panic.
Meredith just smoothed her thumb over Hope’s cheek. “I’ll be back. I promise.”
Hope’s lower lip trembled, breaking Alex’s heart. “I won’t leave you alone, honey,” she murmured. “While Meredith is gone, I’m sticking to you like glue.
I
promise.”
Hope swallowed, then dropped her eyes back to her coloring.
Alex leaned back in her chair. “Well.”
Meredith laid her cheek on Hope’s curls. “You’re safe, Hope.” She met Alex’s eyes. “Keep telling her that. She needs to hear it. She needs to believe it.”
Me, too
. But Alex nodded firmly. “I will. Now, I’ve got lots of stuff to do today. My first stop is the county courthouse. I’ve got to apply for a license to carry the . . . thing.”
“How long does that take to get?”
“The website said a few weeks.”
“And until then?” Meredith asked meaningfully.
Alex looked at Hope’s coloring book.
All that red.
“I can keep it in my trunk legally.”
Meredith sucked in her cheeks. “You know a half-truth’s the same as a lie.”
Alex lifted her chin. “You gonna call a cop?”
Meredith rolled her eyes. “You know I’m not. But you will, because you promised Vartanian you would. And you’ll call me right after you call him.”
“Every few hours.” She pushed back from the table and headed to the bedroom.
“I have to leave here at five to make my flight,” Meredith called behind her.
“I’ll be back by then.” She had only seven and a half hours to apply for a concealed-weapons permit and then to talk to anybody who knew Bailey’s habits, her friends. Her enemies. It would have to be enough.
Tuesday, January 30, 11:00 a.m.
“Hello.”
It was just a dream.
Wasn’t it?
“Hello.”
Bailey lifted her head a fraction of an inch, reeling when the room twisted around her. It wasn’t a dream. It was a whisper and it came from the other side of the wall. She forced herself to her hands and knees, gagging when the nausea hit her like a brick. But nothing came up, because she’d been given nothing to eat. Or drink.
How long? How long had she been here?
“Hello.” The whisper came through the wall again.
It was real.
Bailey crawled to the wall and collapsed on her face, watching as the floor moved, just a little. A teaspoonful. Gritting her teeth, she brushed at the dirt.
And touched something solid. A finger. She sucked in a breath as the finger wiggled and pulled back through the hole, taking some of the dirt from her side with it.
“Hello,” she whispered back. The finger reappeared and she touched it, a sob heaving up from her chest.
“Don’t cry,” he whispered. “He’ll hear you. Who are you?”
“Bailey.”
“Bailey Crighton?”
Bailey stopped breathing. “You know me?”
“I’m Reverend Beardsley.”
Wade’s letter
. The letter that had contained the key
he’d
demanded every time he took her from this cell. Every time he . . . “Why are you here?”