He Kills Me, He Kills Me Not (11 page)

“Amanda?”

“Yes?” she said, still unable to look him in the eyes.

“I had a wonderful time, too.”

Surprise had her meeting his gaze again. He was smiling and she couldn’t help but smile back. He raised his hand as if to touch her face, and she stiffened before she could stop herself. His smile turned sad and he lowered his hand.

Amanda died a little bit inside, wishing she could take back her automatic reaction. He’d touched her at the station, put his arms around her after she’d seen those horrible pictures. She hadn’t flinched then. Why had she flinched now?

“Thanks for coming to the station today,” he said, smiling that sad smile. “And thank you for having dinner with me. If you have any trouble accessing the station’s computer system from home, let me know. Or if you just want to talk, my offer of a shoulder is always open.”

Before she could respond, he turned away. She shut the kitchen door, set the alarm, and trudged into her living room. Collapsing onto the couch, she wondered what would have happened if she’d let him touch her. Did he really have feelings for her apart from his desire to know more about her abduction? Would he have run his thumb across her lower lip the way he’d run his thumb over the cloth napkin that day in her kitchen? Would he have slid his hand behind her neck and pulled her forward for a kiss?

For the past few years she’d convinced herself she didn’t need anyone else, didn’t need to feel the touch of another human being. All she needed was to be safe. But meeting Logan had reawakened a part of her she’d forgotten ever existed.

She rose from the couch and paced back and forth in front of the fireplace. Her entire body shook and her hands fisted at her sides. She couldn’t think straight, couldn’t focus with so many thoughts and emotions pulsing through her.

A nameless, faceless killer had stolen so much from her, far more than she’d realized until now. She’d thought she’d won with her little victories. She continued to wear her hair long just to prove the killer’s obsession with her long hair hadn’t forced her to cut it. She’d learned self-defense, how to shoot a gun, how to use knives. Her home was safe, secure—a place where no one could hurt her.

Lies. They were all pathetic lies. She’d lied to herself, told herself she was in control, but all along the killer was in control. He was the one with the power. He’d destroyed her life, made her cower in fear, and forced her to give up everything and everyone that mattered. Somehow, she had to make a change. She couldn’t let him win anymore.

She stopped pacing and hurried back into the kitchen where she’d left her purse. The yellow sticky note with her user ID and password beckoned her like a beacon of hope. She grabbed the Post-it and hurried back to her computer.

No more lies, no more excuses. It was time to take her life back. It was time to catch a killer.

Chapter Six

“T
hey have temps for this, you know.” Pierce flicked a ball of dust and hair from his suit jacket in disgust. “I still don’t see why we have to search through this nasty warehouse ourselves, especially before breakfast.” He shed his jacket and laid it over a partially shredded leather chair that used to decorate the city hall lobby.

Logan decided not to tell him the chair wasn’t shredded from age. It had been shredded by rats. He exchanged a grin with Riley and tossed another box marked “Miscellaneous” onto the growing stack in the middle of the concrete floor. Both men were enjoying seeing the city-slicker Fed acclimate himself to a rural town and all its charms.

“Just be glad we didn’t stumble across any gator nests this close to the swamp.” Logan tossed another box, enjoying the alarmed look that flashed across Pierce’s face. “Besides, every cent of my budget is going to this case right now. I’m not going to waste precious resources hiring a temp for something that will only take a couple of hours. And I sure as hell am not pulling your team or mine from the investigation for this.”

Riley grunted as he tried to move one of the heavier boxes marked “City Hall.” Pierce helped him, and together they heaved the box back several feet.

“Chief.” Riley motioned toward the stack of smaller boxes that were now revealed. “I think we’re in the right spot. These boxes are labeled “Police Archives.”

Logan straightened and wiped sweat from his forehead. “Do they have any categories? Dates?”

“Nope.”

“We’ll have to look through all of them then. How many boxes total?”

“Four here.” Riley braced a hand against the concrete wall and leaned around the boxes to see the others stacked behind them. “At least ten more over here with the same label.”

Pierce threw up his hands. “Haven’t you people ever heard of computers? Or Sharpies to write meaningful labels on the boxes? Your filing system sucks.”

Logan laughed as he helped Riley lift the desired boxes and start a new stack next to one of the old, discarded conference tables they’d set up when they arrived. “I agree. But we’re still going to look through all of these boxes.”

In spite of his complaining, Pierce dove in, helping stack all the boxes by the table. Then he pulled up a rusty metal chair and, after dusting it off, sat down to start sorting through the contents of each box. He squinted in the dim light from the grimy windows as he tried to read the label on a thick file. “Remind me again exactly what we’re looking for?”

Logan sobered, his grin fading. “Any missing person, abduction or murder case file within the past decade. Shadow Falls is the only place our perp has struck twice that we know of. I’m hoping to find some earlier case that will lead us to a suspect. Maybe he grew up here and that’s why he returned. I’m particularly interested in the Northwood case.”

Riley dropped a thick file on the table. “Northwood? When was that?”

“Ten years ago, almost to the day.”

“Ten years . . . ten years,” Riley mumbled as he tore into another box.

“What’s so special about the Northwood case?” Pierce asked. He added another folder to the small stack.

“Anna Northwood was murdered in a motel room a couple of miles from here. I was involved in that case.”

Riley paused and looked up at him. “Was she abducted first?”

“No.”

“Did the killer leave a rose at the scene?”

“No.”

The room grew silent and Logan sighed beneath the weight of Riley and Pierce’s stares. “I know that case is most likely not related to our current case, but while we’re here I’d like to get that folder to look through it and see if anything was missed the first time around. I was a rookie back then, made a stupid mistake, and because of me the suspect got away.”

Riley let out a low whistle. “Man, that sucks.”

“Yeah, it does.” Logan pulled one of the folders toward him and flipped it open.

“What kind of rookie mistake?” Pierce asked. He sat with both elbows on the table, no longer interested in the files or boxes.

Logan’s gut churned. He didn’t want to talk about this, but he wanted that folder, and it would be a lot faster finding it with Riley and Pierce’s help than by himself. Looking for other similar cases wasn’t exactly a ruse, but it was close.

“I pulled over a white van on a routine traffic stop. I’d probably remember that van to this day even if there hadn’t been a murder. It had writing all over the back doors, quotes from scriptures twisted into different meanings. The one I remember most was, “Do unto others before they do unto you.”

Riley stumbled and dropped the box he was carrying. “I’m okay,” he called out as he reached down to retrieve the box.

“You were saying?” Pierce urged.

“I pulled the van over because it didn’t have a license plate. It had a piece of cardboard in the tag holder that read “lost tag.” I was walking up to the driver’s door when a call came in about a murder, two blocks away. I waved the driver off before I even got to his door, and went to the scene.”

Pierce studied him for a moment. “Let me guess. The killer was the one driving the van.”

Logan nodded stiffly. “I had a bad feeling about that van. My internal radar was going nuts from the minute I saw those twisted scriptures and the black curtains in the back windows. I knew in my gut something was wrong. He’d been driving too carefully, like he had something to hide. But even if I hadn’t been suspicious, I should have radioed back to the murder scene to see if there was a description of a getaway vehicle. Standard procedure. If I’d followed the rules I would have known I’d just pulled the suspect over.”

“How certain are you the killer was driving the van?” Pierce asked. “Maybe someone saw the van near the hotel when the body was discovered and assumed—”

“There was a witness. A maid at the motel saw a man run from the room. She was too far away to give a good description of him, but she saw him get into a white van that matched the same description as the one I’d pulled over, right down to the scriptures.”

The quiet in the room was palpable. Logan glanced over at Riley. He was standing next to a stack of boxes with a thoughtful expression on his face. Before Logan could ask what that expression meant, his cell phone rang.

He answered and listened quietly to Officer Karen Bingham, his hand clenching into a fist as she reported what had been found.

“We’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” Logan said. He flipped his phone shut and shoved his chair back from the table. Pierce and Riley looked at him expectantly.

“They’ve found the primary scene where Carolyn O’Donnell was killed.”

B
efore evil had invaded her world and changed her life forever, Amanda used to visit the cemetery once a week and leave a dozen roses on her parents’ graves. It took two years of therapy and a philandering brother-in-law to give her the courage to move back to Shadow Falls and resume her weekly visits.

But she’d never brought roses again.

Instead, she brought pink carnations. She’d read somewhere that pink carnations meant you missed someone and that you would never forget them. That seemed appropriate. And since the number seven was supposed to be lucky, she always placed seven carnations on her mother’s grave, seven on her father’s.

And seven on Dana’s.

Knowing the killer was back, Amanda had debated not coming to the cemetery for her weekly visit. But her parents had devoted themselves to her and her sister, Heather. If it weren’t for the plane crash that had unexpectedly taken their lives, Amanda had no doubt they would have continued to support her and help her. The least she could do was put fresh flowers on their graves.

And she owed far more than that to Dana.

Besides, she should be safe. The two plain-clothed policemen who normally sat outside her house had followed her here. One of them was getting out of his car to keep watch over her as she walked through the cemetery. She gave him a small wave to let him know she appreciated his protection. Then she walked up the slight hill to Mr. Reynolds’ flower cart where she always bought her flowers.

The vendor smiled and reached down for the pink carnations already wrapped in tissue paper, waiting for her. “Your usual order, Ms. Jones.” He handed the flowers to her and took her money.

The name “Jones” gave her pause and she realized she’d grown used to “Stockton” again in the past few days, since the policemen always used that name.

“Thank you, Mr. Reynolds,” she murmured. Another group of mourners was approaching the flower cart so she hurried past them, keeping her head bent. Usually she chatted with Mr. Reynolds. He was always nice to her and lived in her neighborhood, but he understood her shyness about her scar. She was sure he wouldn’t hold it against her that she hadn’t stayed to talk today.

The sound of crunching gravel startled her, but it was just one of the undercover policemen keeping pace about twenty feet away.

She turned down a dirt path between the graves and stopped under an oak tree with delicate fingers of Spanish moss dripping down. Her mother had loved oak trees, which was why Amanda had chosen this spot when she buried her parents. The shade was nice, too, lowering the stifling temperatures by several degrees. Still, it was so hot outside today that her lungs felt like they were sticking together every time she breathed. Her policeman shadow wasn’t faring any better in the heat. He stopped under another tree, loosening his tie as he took advantage of the shade.

The hot breeze did little to help, but it did bring out the scent of freshly mown grass. Combined with the sweet, delicate scent of the carnations, it reminded Amanda of better times, summers spent with her mom, dad, and little sister.