Scream For Me

Chapter Four

Atlanta , Monday, January 29, 12:15 p.m.

Dr. Felicity Berg looked up at Daniel through her goggles. She was standing on the other side of the autopsy table, bending over what remained of their Jane Doe. “You want the good news or the bad news first?”

Daniel had watched in silence as Felicity had taken Jane Doe apart with deliberate care. He’d watched her do autopsies more than a dozen times, but he never failed to wonder how she kept her hands so steady. “The bad news, I guess.”

The mask covering her face moved and he imagined her wry smile. He’d always liked Felicity Berg, even though she was called “The Iceberg” by most of the men. He’d never seen her as cold, just… careful. There was a difference, as Daniel well knew.

“I can’t definitively identify her. She was about twenty. She had no blood alcohol, and doesn’t have any obvious diseases or defects. Cause of death was asphyxia.”

“And the blows to her face? Where they pre- or postmortem?”

“Post. As was this bruising around her mouth.” She pointed to four fingertip-sized bruises.

Daniel frowned. “Wouldn’t those bruises be from the hand that killed her?”

Her brows lifted. “That’s what he wanted you to think. Remember the fibers I pointed out in her lungs and in the lining of her cheeks?”

“Cotton,” Daniel said. “From the handkerchief he shoved in her mouth.”

“Exactly. I’m guessing he didn’t want any of his own DNA in her teeth in the event she bit him. There are bruises on her nose that were put there before she was dead, you just can’t see them because of the beating. But after she was dead, somebody’s fingers were pressed to the side of her mouth. The distance between the finger bruises indicates it was a man’s hand, small in size. He went to considerable trouble to make this happen, Daniel. He was careful when hitting her face to leave this area around her mouth untouched. It’s almost like he wanted the finger bruises to show.”

“I wonder if Alicia Tremaine had finger bruising around her mouth.”

“That’s for you to find out. I can tell you this woman’s last meal was Italian, with sausage, pasta, and some kind of hard cheese.”

“Only about a million Italian restaurants in the city,” he said glumly.

She picked up the woman’s left hand. “She has thick calluses on her fingertips.”

Daniel leaned closer to see. “She played a musical instrument. Violin maybe?”

“Or something in the string family, something with a bow, I think. The other hand is soft, no calluses, so it’s probably not a harp or a guitar.”

“Was that the good news?”

Her eyes glinted in mild amusement. “No. The good news is that even if I can’t tell you who she was, I think I can tell you where she’d been twenty-four hours before she was killed. Come here, to this side of the table.” Felicity ran a black light wand over the victim’s hand, revealing the remnants of a fluorescent stamp.

He looked up and met Felicity’s satisfied eyes. “She’d been to Fun-N-Sun,” he said. The amusement park stamped the hands of anyone leaving and planning to return the same day. “They get thousands of visitors every day, but maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Felicity placed the woman’s arm at her side with gentle care and respect, elevating her in Daniel’s regard. “Or maybe someone will finally miss her,” she said quietly.

“Dr. Berg?” One of her assistant’s came into the room, carrying a sheet of paper. “This woman’s urine tox came back positive for flunitrazepam, one hundred micrograms.”

Daniel frowned. “Rohypnol? He used a date-rape drug? That’s not a lethal dose, is it?”

“That’s not even enough to knock her out. It’s barely enough to show up on the test. Jackie, can you run the test again? If I get called before a grand jury, I’m going to want a verification of your results. No offense.”

Unperturbed, Jackie nodded. “None taken. I’ll do it right now.”

“He wanted us to find the drug, but he didn’t want her completely incapacitated,” Daniel mused. “He wanted her awake and aware.”

“And he knows his pharmacology. It wouldn’t have been simple to achieve that low level of flunitrazepam. Again, he went to some trouble.”

“So the presence of Rohypnol is one more thing I need to check on the murder of Alicia Tremaine. I need to get that police report.” And so far, Dutton Sheriff Frank Loomis still hadn’t called him back. So much for professional courtesy. Daniel was going to Dutton to get that report in person. “Thanks, Felicity. As always, it’s been fun.”

“Daniel.” Felicity had stepped back from the body and was pulling off her mask. “I wanted to tell you that I was sorry to hear about your parents.”

Daniel drew a breath. “Thank you.”

“I wanted to go to the funeral, but…” A self-deprecating smile bent her lips. “I got to the church, but I couldn’t go inside. Funerals make me queasy. Believe it or not.”

He smiled at her. “I believe you, Felicity. And I thank you for trying.”

She nodded briskly. “I had Malcolm request the autopsy report on Alicia Tremaine after Miss Fallon left. When we get it, I’ll let you know.”

“Again, I appreciate it.” And as he walked away, he felt her watch him go.

Atlanta , Monday, January 29, 1:15 p.m.

When Daniel got back to his office, Luke was sitting in one of his chairs, a laptop in his lap and his feet up on Daniel’s desk. He looked up, studied Daniel’s face, then shrugged. “You’re making it damn hard for me to lie to my mama, Daniel. I can tell her you’re all right all I want, but those dark circles under your eyes tell a different tale.”

Daniel hung his jacket behind his door. “Don’t you have a job?”

“Hey, I’m working.” Luke held up the laptop. “I’m running a diagnostic on the chief’s machine. It’s been running ‘buggy.’ ” He quirked the air with his fingers, a smile on his face, but Daniel heard the tension in his friend’s voice.

He sat at his desk and did some studying of his own. There were no dark circles under Luke’s eyes, but within them was a bleakness few got to see. “Bad day?”

Luke’s smile disappeared, and closing his eyes, he swallowed audibly. “Yeah.” The single word was harsh and filled with a pain few truly understood. Luke was on the GBI’s task force against Internet crime, and for the last year he’d been focused on crime involving children. Daniel thought he’d rather watch a thousand autopsies than look at the obscenities Luke was forced to view every day. Luke drew a breath and opened his eyes, control restored even if serenity was not.

Daniel wondered if any cop ever got to serenity.

“I needed a break,” Luke said simply, and Daniel nodded.

“I just came from the morgue. My Jane Doe went to Fun-N-Sun on Thursday and plays the violin.”

“Well, the violin might narrow it down some. I brought you something.” Luke pulled a thick stack of papers from his computer bag. “I ran a deeper search on Alicia Tremaine and came up with all these articles. She had a twin sister.”

“I know,” Daniel said wryly. “Too bad you didn’t tell me before she walked in here this morning and scared the ever-livin’ shit outta me.”

Luke’s dark brows shot up. “She was here? Alexandra Tremaine?”

“She calls herself Fallon now. Alex Fallon. She’s an ER nurse from Cincinnati.”

“So she lived then,” Luke said thoughtfully and Daniel frowned.

“What do you mean?”

Luke handed the stack of papers over the table. “Well, the story didn’t stop with Alicia’s murder. The day Alicia’s body was found, Kathy Tremaine, that’s their mother, shot herself in the head. She was apparently discovered by her daughter Alexandra, who then took all the pills the doctor had prescribed for the mother, who was hysterical after having to identify her daughter’s body.”

Daniel thought of Jane Doe on the table at the morgue and of a mother having to identify her child looking like that. Still, suicide was the coward’s way out… and for Alex to have discovered her that way. “My God,” he murmured.

“Kathy Tremaine’s sister had come down from Ohio because of Alicia and discovered them both. Her name was Kim Fallon.”

“Alex said she’d been adopted by her aunt and uncle, so that makes sense.”

“There’s more in the stack, obits and articles about the trial of Gary Fulmore, the man they charged with the murder. But there was no other mention of Alexandra after the article on Fulmore’s arrest. I guess Kim Fallon took her to Ohio after that.”

Daniel leafed through the pages. “Did you see mention of a Bailey Crighton?”

“Craig Crighton, yes, but not Bailey. Craig was the man Kathy Tremaine was living with at the time of her death. Why?”

“That’s why Alex Fallon came to see me today. Her stepsister Bailey went missing Thursday night and she thought she was the Arcadia woman.”

Luke whistled softly. “Well, that had to have been a shock.”

Daniel thought of the fists she’d squeezed nearly bloodless, and the way her hand felt in his. “I imagine it was, but she held herself together well.”

“I was actually talking about it being a shock for you.” Luke swung his feet off the desk and stood up. “I’ve got to be getting back now. Break’s over.”

Daniel narrowed his eyes. “You gonna be okay?”

Luke nodded. “Sure.” But there was little conviction in his voice. “I’ll see you later.”

Daniel lifted the papers. “Thanks, Luke.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Ripples, Daniel thought as he watched him go. They changed the lives of the victims and their families. And sometimes they change us. Usually they change us. With a sigh he turned to his own computer to look up the number for Fun-N-Sun. He had a victim to identify.

Dutton, Monday, January 29, 1:00 p.m.

“Here’s all the stuff.” Alex dumped it on the sofa in her hotel room. “Play-Doh, Legos, Mr. Potato Head, more crayons, paper, and more coloring books.”

Meredith was sitting next to Hope at the little dinette table. “And the Barbie head?”

“In the bag, but they were out of Barbies. You got Princess Fiona from Shrek.”

“But she has hair we can cut? I’m thinking since Bailey was a hairdresser they might have played that way together.”

“Yep. I checked. And I got Hope some clothes. Man, kids’ clothes are expensive.”

“Get used to it, Auntie.”

“You moved her from the desk in the bedroom.”

“Had to. Wasn’t room for both of us to color in there and I needed a change in scenery.” Meredith chose a blue crayon from a pile. “Hope, I’m picking periwinkle this time. Periwinkle sounds like a happy color, like it’s winking at me.”

Meredith continued to chatter as she colored and Alex could see this had been going on for some time while she’d been gone. There was a stack of pages with ragged edges that Meredith had torn from Hope’s coloring book. All were colored with blue.

“Can we talk while you color?”

Meredith smiled. “Sure. Or you can sit down and color with us. Hope and I don’t mind, do we, Hope?”

Hope didn’t appear to even hear her. Alex dragged the chair from the bedroom desk up to the dinette and sat down, meeting Meredith’s eyes over Hope’s head. “Anything?”

“Nope,” Meredith said cheerfully. “There are no magic wands, Alex.”

Hope’s hand stopped abruptly, still clutching the red crayon in her small fist. She kept her eyes on the coloring book, but she’d gone completely still. Alex opened her mouth, but Meredith shot her a warning glance and Alex remained silent.

“At least not in that sack from the store,” Meredith went on. “I like magic wands.” Hope didn’t move a muscle. “When I was little, I used to pretend celery stalks were magic wands. My mom would get so mad when she’d go to make a salad and all the celery was gone.” Meredith chuckled and kept coloring with her periwinkle. “She’d fuss, but she’d play with me. Celery was cheap, she’d say, but playtime was precious.”

Alex swallowed hard. “My mom used to say that, too. ‘Playtime is precious.’ ”

“Probably because our moms were sisters. Did your mom say that, too, Hope?”

Slowly, Hope’s crayon began to move again, then faster, until she colored with the same focus as before. Alex wanted to sigh, but Meredith was smiling.

“Baby steps,” she murmured. “Sometimes the best therapy’s just in being there, Alex.” She tore a page from her coloring book. “Try it. It’s really very relaxing.”

Alex drew a deep breath, steadying herself. “You did that for me. Sat with me, when I first came to live with you. Every day after school and all that summer. You’d just come into my room and read a book. You never said a word.”

“I didn’t know what to say,” Meredith said. “But you were sad and you seemed happier when I sat with you. Then one day you said, ‘Hi.’ It was days later before you said any more and weeks before you were carrying on any conversation at all.”

“I think you saved my life,” Alex murmured. “You and Kim and Steve.” The Fallons had been her salvation. “I miss them.” Her aunt and uncle had died the year before when Steve’s little plane had crashed into an Ohio cornfield.

Meredith’s hand faltered and her throat worked as she swallowed hard. “I miss them, too.” She rested her cheek on Hope’s pretty curls for a brief moment. “That’s a very nice caterpillar, Hope. I’m going to use the periwinkle on the butterfly.” She chattered on for another few minutes, then casually turned the topic. “I would love to see some butterflies. Did you find a park where we can take Hope, Alex?”

“Yes, there’s a park not too far from the elementary school. I picked up one of those real estate booklets when I was out. There’s a furnished house near the park that we might rent for a while.” Until I find Bailey, she added silently.

Meredith nodded. “Got it. Oh, and you know what? When we go to the park we can play Simon Says.” Her auburn brows lifted meaningfully. “I found instructions online. You’ll find them fascinating. I left the page open on my laptop. It’s in the bedroom.”

Alex stood up, her heart tripping. “I’ll go check.” She’d called Meredith right back after Captain-Reverend Beardsley had driven away, and relayed the conversation, especially the line, “I’ll see you in hell, Simon.” Apparently Meredith had done some searching while Alex had bought out the toy section of the local Wal-Mart so that Meredith could do play therapy with Hope.

Alex clicked the page Meredith had been reading and sucked in a startled breath as her memories began to fall into place. Simon Vartanian.

Vartanian. Daniel’s name had been naggingly familiar, but she’d been too worried about Bailey to dwell on it at the time. Then, waiting to view that woman’s body… he’d held her hand and she’d felt an awareness that had heated her from the inside out. But there had been more. A closeness, a kinship, a… comfort, as if she’d known him before. Maybe she had.

Vartanian. She remembered the family now, vaguely. They’d been rich. The dad was important. He’d been a judge. She remembered Simon, also vaguely. He’d been a big, hulking, frightening boy. Simon had been in Wade’s class at school.

She sat down to read the article, immediately engrossed in a story so evil… Simon Vartanian had died just one week ago after murdering his parents and a lot of other people. Simon had been killed in Philadelphia by a detective named Vito Ciccotelli.

Simon was survived by his sister Susannah Vartanian. I remember her. She’d been a cultured girl in expensive clothes. Susannah had been her age, but had gone to the expensive private school. She was now an ADA in New York.

Alex released the breath she held in a slow hiss. Simon was also survived by his brother, Daniel Vartanian, a special agent with the GBI. Alex replayed in her mind the moment they’d met, the utter shock on Daniel’s face. He’d known about Alicia and Alex had attributed his shock to that only. But now… I’ll see you in hell, Simon.

She pressed her knuckles into her lips, staring at the picture of Simon Vartanian on Meredith’s screen. There was some small resemblance between the brothers. Both had the same body type, tall and broad, and they shared the same piercing look around the eyes. But Simon had a harsh look to him while Daniel had looked… sad. Weary and very sad. His parents had been murdered, so that explained the sadness, but what explained his shock at seeing her face? What did Daniel Vartanian know?

I’ll see you in hell. What had Simon done? Alex could read what he’d done recently-and it had been inhuman. But what did he do back then?

And what had Wade done? I know what he did to me… but what did he do with Simon? What was Wade’s connection to Simon Vartanian? And what did it have to do with Bailey? And Alicia? And what about the poor woman they’d found in the ditch yesterday evening, killed just like Alicia? Could Wade have…?

Alex’s pulse began to pound in her ears and it was suddenly as if all the air were sucked from the room. Calm. Focus on the quiet. Slowly she began to breathe again, to think rationally again. Alicia’s murderer was rotting in jail, where he belonged. And Wade… no. Not murder. No. Whatever it was, she knew it wasn’t that.

What she did know was that she was meeting Special Agent Daniel Vartanian tonight and he would tell her what he knew. Until then, she had things to do.

Atlanta , Monday, January 29, 2:15 p.m.

Daniel looked up from his computer when Ed Randall came into his office looking generally disgusted. “Hey, Ed, what do you know?”

“That this guy was careful. We haven’t found so much as a hair so far. We took mud from around the entrance to the storm sewer and we’re checking it in the lab now. If he came down from the road by the storm sewer, maybe he dropped something.”

“What about the brown blanket?” Daniel asked.

“The labels have both been cut away,” Ed said. “We’re trying to match the fabric to manufacturers. We might get lucky and trace it to a point of purchase. Are we any closer to an ID on the victim?”

“Yeah, actually. Felicity also found a stamp on the victim’s hand from Fun-N-Sun.”

“So you get a trip to the amusement park and I get to play in the mud. No fair.”

Daniel smiled. “I don’t think I need to go down to the park. I spent most of the afternoon on the phone with their security. They were able to patch me into their network so that I could view their security tapes from my desk.”

Ed looked impressed. “Ain’t technology grand. And?”

“And we found a woman standing in line at the Italian food kiosk. The victim had eaten pasta as her last meal. She was wearing a sweatshirt saying Cellists Do It With Strings Attached-the victim has calluses on her fingertips. The park is going through their receipts to see if she paid for her lunch with a credit card. I’m waiting for them to call back. Cross your fingers.”

“I will. We did find one thing of interest.” Ed put a small jar on Daniel’s desk. “We found hair and skin in the bark of one of the trees about fifty feet back from the ditch.”

Daniel looked at the headline Corchran had faxed that morning. “The reporter?”

“That’s what we’re thinking. If you find this Jim Woolf person, we can put him at the scene before we got there.”

“How did he get away without being seen?”

“My team was there till after eleven last night and back again this morning. Between eleven and six we had a unit patrolling. We found shoeprints along the road about a quarter mile from here. I think the reporter waited until we were all gone, climbed down and stayed low until he got a quarter mile away, then caught a ride.”

“There’s no cover along the road. He must have slithered on his belly to get away.”

Ed’s jaw tightened. “Slithered is about right. Guy’s a snake. He gave away everything we’ve got in that article. I heard you went to school with him.”

Ed sounded slightly accusatory, as if Daniel were to blame for Jim Woolf’s behavior. “I was a V and he was a W, so he always sat in back of me. He seemed nice enough then. But as Chase so astutely observed, he appears to have changed. I guess I’m about to go see how much.” He pointed to his computer screen. “I was just checking him out. He was an accountant until his dad died a year ago and left him the Review. Jim’s pretty new at this reporter stuff. Maybe he can be persuaded to talk.”

“You got a flute?” Ed asked sourly.

“Why?”

“Isn’t that what those snake charmers use?”

Daniel grimaced at the image. “I hate snakes almost as much as reporters.”

Ed broke into a good-natured grin. “Then you’re going to have a fun afternoon.”

Dutton, Monday, January 29, 2:15 p.m.

“It’s a thousand a month,” the realtor said, a gleam in her eye as if she sensed a done deal. In her mid-fifties, Delia Anderson had a bouffant-do that dynamite couldn’t budge. “First and last month’s rent payable on signing.”

Alex looked around at the bungalow. It was homey, had two bedrooms and a real kitchen-and was less than a block from a really nice park where Hope could play. If they were ever able to get her to drop the crayons. “Furnishings all stay?”

Delia nodded. “Including the organ.” It was one of the older models that synthesized every instrument in the orchestra. “You can move in tomorrow.”

“Tonight.” Alex met the woman’s eagle eyes. “I need to move in tonight.”

Delia smiled cagily. “I think that can be arranged.”

“Does it have an alarm?”

“I suppose not.” Delia looked unhappy. “No, it doesn’t have an alarm.”

Alex frowned, thinking of Vartanian’s caution before she’d left the morgue viewing room. She wasn’t a big fan of guns, but fear was a great motivator. She’d tried to buy a gun in the sporting goods department of the store where she’d bought all the toys for Hope’s play therapy, but the clerk told her that she couldn’t buy a gun in Georgia if she wasn’t a resident. She could prove residency with a Georgia driver’s license. She could get a driver’s license with a rental contract. So let’s get this done.

Still, she was practical. “If it doesn’t have an alarm, then can I have a dog?” A dog was a better deterrent to an attacker. She lifted a brow. “An alarm will cost the owners money. I’d pay an extra security deposit if I got a dog.”

Delia bit at her lip. “Maybe a little dog. I’ll check with the owners.”

Alex swallowed her smile. “You do that. If I can have a dog, I’ll sign right now.”

Delia took her cell phone outside and two minutes later she was back, as was her cagey smile. “Darlin’, we have a deal and you have a house.”

Dutton, Monday, January 29, 4:15 p.m.

Daniel felt like he was channeling Clint Eastwood as he walked Dutton’s Main Street. As he passed, conversations stilled and people stared. All he was missing was the poncho and the eerie music. Last week he’d been to the funeral home, the cemetery, and his parents’ home out past the city limits. With the exception of the funeral and the graveside, he’d managed to stay out of the public eye.

But not now. He met the eyes of each staring person. Most of them he knew. All of them had aged. It had been a long time since he’d been back. Eleven years since he’d fought with his father over the pictures and left Dutton for good, but he’d left in spirit the day he’d left for college, seven years before that. He’d changed a lot in those years.

Dutton’s Main Street, however, had not. He walked past the curious eyes peering from the windows of the bakery, the florist, the barbershop. Three old men sat outside the barbershop on a bench. Three old men had always sat outside on that bench, ever since Daniel could remember. When one went on to the Great Beyond, another took his place. Daniel had always wondered if there was some kind of formal waiting list for the bench, as there was for box seats at Braves’ games.

He was surprised when one of the old men stood up. He couldn’t recall ever having seen any of the old men stand up before. But this one stood and leaned on his cane, watching Daniel approach. “Daniel Vartanian.”

Daniel recognized the voice instantly and was a little amused to find himself standing straighter as he stopped in front of his old high school English teacher. “Mr. Grant.”

One side of the old man’s bushy white mustache lifted. “So you do remember.”

Daniel met the old man’s eyes. “ ‘Death, be not proud, though some have called thee mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so.’ ” Odd that that would be the first quotation to enter his mind. Daniel thought about the woman lying in the morgue, unidentified and as yet unreported as missing. Or maybe not so odd.

The other side of Grant’s mustache lifted and he bobbed his white head in salute. “John Donne. One of your favorites, as I recall.”

“Not so much anymore. I guess I’ve seen too much death.”

“I suspect you have at that, Daniel. We’re all sorry about your parents.”

“Thank you. It’s been a difficult time for all of us.”

“I was at the funeral and the grave. Susannah looked pale.”

Daniel swallowed. That his sister had. She’d had good reason. “She’ll hold up.”

“Of course she will. Your parents raised good stock.” Grant winced when he realized what he’d said. “Hell. You know what I meant.”

To his surprise, Daniel found his lips curving. “I know what you meant, sir.”

“That Simon was always bad news.” Grant leaned forward and dropped his voice, although Daniel knew every eye in town was watching them. “I read what you did, Daniel. It took courage. Good for you, son. I was proud of you.”

Daniel’s smile faded and he swallowed again, this time as his eyes stung. “Thank you.” He cleared his voice. “You got a seat on the barbershop bench, I see.”

Grant nodded. “Only had to wait for old Jeff Orwell to pass.” He scowled. “Old man held on for two long years, just because he knew I was waiting.”

Daniel shook his head. “The nerve of some people.”

Grant smiled. “It’s good to see you, Daniel. You were one of my best students.”

“You were always one of my favorite teachers. You and Miss Agreen.” He lifted his brows. “You two still an item?”

Grant coughed until Daniel thought he’d have to do CPR. “You knew about that?”

“Everybody did, Mr. Grant. I always thought you knew we knew and didn’t care.”

Grant drew a deep breath. “People think their secrets are so damn safe,” he murmured, so quietly Daniel almost didn’t hear. “People are fools.” Then he whispered under his breath, “Don’t be a fool, son.” Then he looked up, his smile reappearing, and he rocked back on his cane. “Good to see you. Don’t be a stranger, Daniel Vartanian.”

Daniel studied his old teacher’s eyes, but there was no hint of what had seemed a dire warning just a few seconds before. “I’ll try. Take care, Mr. Grant. Give the next guy on the waiting list for the barbershop bench a very long wait.”

“That I will.”

Daniel walked on to the office of the Dutton Review, the real reason for his visit. The Review sat across the street from the police station, which would be Daniel’s next stop. The inside of the newspaper office was stuffy and packed floor to ceiling with boxes. A small space had been carved out for a desk, a computer, and a phone. At the desk sat a plump man with a pair of glasses resting on his balding head.

Four large bandages covered his left forearm, looking like sergeant’s stripes, and an angry red welt peeked from his shirt collar. It looked as if the man had tangled with something and lost. Perhaps a tree. Hello, Daniel thought.

The man looked up and Daniel recognized the boy who’d sat behind him from kindergarten through high school. Jim Woolf’s mouth curved in something just shy of a sneer. “Well. If it isn’t the man himself. Special Agent Daniel Vartanian. In the flesh.”

“Jim. How are you?”

“Better today than you are, I suspect, although I have to say I’m flattered. I thought you’d send a flunkie to do your dirty work, but here you are, back in little old Dutton.”

Daniel sat on the edge of Woolf’s desk. “You didn’t return my phone calls, Jim.”

Jim’s fingers resting lightly on his rounded stomach. “I didn’t have anything to say.”

“A newspaperman with nothing to say. That has to be a first.”

“I’m not telling you what you want to know, Daniel.”

Daniel abandoned the polite path. “Then I’ll arrest you for impeding an investigation.”

Jim flinched. “Wow. You pulled off the gloves there, real fast.”

“I spent the morning in the morgue watching that woman autopsied. Tends to suck the joy right out of a man’s day. Ever seen an autopsy, Jim?”

Jim’s jaw squared. “No. But I’m still not telling you what you want to know.”

“Okay. Get your coat.”

Jim sat up straight. “You’re bluffing.”

“No, I’m not. Someone clued you in to that crime scene before the cops arrived. No telling how long you had to poke around that body. No telling what you touched. What you took.” Daniel met Jim’s eyes. “Maybe you even put her there.”

Jim turned red. “I had nothing to do with that and you know it.”

“I know nothing. I wasn’t there. You, on the other hand, were.”

“You don’t know that I was. Maybe I got the pictures from somebody else.”

Daniel leaned across the desk and pointed to the Band-Aids on the man’s forearm. “You left part of yourself behind, Jim. Crime scene guys found your skin in the bark of that tree.” Jim paled a little. “Now I can take you in and get a warrant for a DNA sample or you can tell me how you knew to be up that tree yesterday afternoon.”

“I can’t. Beyond the constitutional aspects, if I tell you, I’ll never get another tip.”

“So you got a tip.”

Jim sighed. “Daniel… If I knew I wouldn’t tell you, but I don’t know who it was.”

“An anonymous tip. Convenient.”

“It’s the truth. The call came through on my home phone, but the number was blocked. I didn’t know what I’d see when I got there.”

“Was the caller male or female?”

Jim shook his head. “No. Not gonna tell you that.”

Daniel considered. He’d already gotten more than he thought he would. “Then tell me when you arrived and what you did see.”

Jim tilted his head. “What’s in it for me?”

“An interview, exclusive. You might even sell to one of the big guys in Atlanta.”

Jim’s eyes lit up and Daniel knew he’d plucked the right chord. “All right. It’s not complicated. I got the call yesterday at noon. I got there at about one, climbed the tree, and waited. About two the bikers came through. A half hour later Officer Larkin showed up. He took one look at the body, climbed back up the bank to the road, and threw up. Pretty soon you state boys showed up. After everybody left I climbed down and went home.”

“Once you climbed down, how exactly did you get home?”

Jim’s lips thinned. “My wife. Marianne.”

Daniel blinked. “Marianne? Marianne Murphy? You married Marianne Murphy?”

Jim looked smug. “Yes.”

Marianne Murphy had been the girl voted most likely to do… everybody. “Well.” Daniel cleared his throat, not wanting to visualize Jim Woolf with the buxom and very generous Marianne Murphy. “How did you get there?”

“She dropped me off, too.”

“I’ll want to talk to her. To confirm the times. And I want the pictures you took while you were sitting there. All of them.”

Glaring, Jim popped his memory card from his camera and tossed it. Daniel caught it with one hand and slipped it into his pocket as he stood up. “I’ll be in touch.”

Jim followed him to the door. “When?”

“When I know something.” Daniel opened the door, then stopped, his hand still on the doorknob. And stared.

Behind him he heard Jim’s soft gasp. “Oh my God. That’s…”

Alex Fallon. She stood at the bottom of the police station stairs, a satchel over one shoulder. She still wore her black suit. Her shoulders abruptly stiffened and she turned slowly until she met his eyes. For a long moment they stared at each other across Main Street. She didn’t smile. In fact, even from this distance Daniel could see her full lips go thin. She was angry.

Daniel crossed the street, his eyes never breaking away from hers. When he stood before her she lifted her chin, as she’d done that morning. “Agent Vartanian.”

His mouth went dry. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“I’m here to see the sheriff about filing a missing person report on Bailey.” She looked over his shoulder. “Who are you?”

Jim Woolf stepped around him. “Jim Woolf, Dutton Review. Did I hear you say you were filing a missing person report? Perhaps I can be of assistance. We can print a photograph of Bailey, did you say? Bailey Crighton is missing?”

Daniel looked down at Jim and frowned. “Go away.”

But Alex tilted her head. “Give me your card. I may wish to talk with you.”

Again smug, Jim gave her a card. “Any time, Miss Tremaine.”

Alex flinched as if he’d struck her. “Fallon. My name is Alex Fallon.”

“Any time, Miss Fallon.” Jim gave Daniel a salute and was gone.

Something had changed and Daniel didn’t like it. “I’m going to the station, too. Can I carry your bag?”

The way she searched his face made Daniel uncomfortable. “No thank you.” She started up the stairs, leaving him to follow.

He could see her hunch one shoulder from the weight of her bag, but it didn’t seem to affect the sway of her slim hips as she hurried. Daniel thought her bag was a far safer thing on which to focus. He caught up to her easily. “You’re about to topple over. What are you carrying in here? Bricks?”

“A gun and lots of bullets. If you must know.”

She started up the stairs again, but Daniel grabbed her arm and pulled her around to face him. “Excuse me?”

Her whiskey eyes were cool. “You said I might be in danger. I took you seriously. I have a child to protect.”

Her stepsister’s daughter. Hope. “How did you buy a gun? You’re not a resident.”

“I am now. You want to see my new driver’s license?”

“You got a driver’s license? How did you do that? You don’t live here.”

“I do now. You want to see my rental contract?”

Bowled over, he blinked. “You rented an apartment?”

“A house.” She really was staying a while.

“In Dutton?”

She nodded. “I’m not leaving until Bailey’s found, and Hope can’t live in a hotel.”

“I see. Are we still meeting at seven?”

“That was my plan. Now if you don’t mind, I still have a lot to do before then.” She’d run up a few more stairs before he called her name.

“Alex.” He waited until she stopped and turned again.

“Yes, Agent Vartanian? What is it?”

He ignored the ice in her voice. “Alex. You can’t take a gun into the police station. Even in Dutton. It’s a government building.”

Her shoulders sagged and her frosty expression melted away, leaving exhaustion and vulnerability in its place. She was afraid and doing her damndest to hide it. “I forgot. I should have come here first. I wanted to get my driver’s license before the DMV closed. But I can’t leave a gun in the car. Somebody might steal it.” A ghost of a smile flitted across her unpainted lips, tugging at his heart. “Even in Dutton.”

“You look tired. I’m going to see the sheriff. I’ll ask him about Bailey. Go back to your house and get some sleep. I’ll meet you at seven in front of the GBI building.” He eyed her satchel. “And for God’s sake, make sure the safety is on on that thing and you put it in a lockbox so Hope can’t get to it.”

“I bought a lockbox.” She lifted her chin, a gesture he was coming to anticipate. “I’ve coded enough children in the ER who’ve played with guns. I won’t put my niece in any more danger. Please call me if Loomis refuses to file Bailey as a missing person.”

“He won’t refuse,” Daniel said grimly, “but give me your cell phone number anyway.” She did, and he committed it to memory as she started back down the stairs, her steps weary. When she got to the street she looked back up at him.

“Seven o’clock, Agent Vartanian.”

Somehow the way she said it made it seem more like a threat than the confirmation of a meeting. “Seven o’clock. And don’t forget to change your suit.”

Dutton, Monday, January 29, 4:55 p.m.

Mack pulled the earpiece from his ear. How the plot thickened, he thought as he watched Daniel Vartanian watch Alexandra Tremaine drive away. Oh, wait. Alex Fallon. She’d changed her name.

It had been a surprise to hear she’d come back. That was one of the good things about a small town. No sooner had she stepped into Delia Anderson’s real estate office than the word began to spread. Alexandra Tremaine is back. The sister who lived.

Her stepsister Bailey Crighton was missing. He had a good idea where Bailey might have been taken. And why. But that was not his business at the moment. Should it become important, he’d act. Until then, he’d watch and listen.

Alex Tremaine was back. And Daniel Vartanian was interested. This, too, he’d watch. It could be useful later. He smiled. What a kick-off that would have been, to kill the identical twin and leave her in the same exact place. I wish I’d thought of it. But he’d kicked it off with a target of his own choosing. She’d deserved everything she got, but Alex Tremaine would have been a most excellent first victim. Now it was too late.

For a first victim. His brows lifted as he considered it. But what about his last? It would make quite the grand finale. It would complete the circle. He’d consider it.

For now, he had work to do. Another lovely with whom to deal. He already had her picked out. Very soon the cops would find another body in a ditch and the pillars of the community would find another skeleton dumped on their doorstep. He had it on good authority that they’d all been practically pissing themselves all day. Who would break? Who would tell? Who would tear their idyllic little world asunder?

He chuckled, just picturing it. Pretty soon the first two he’d targeted would get their letters. He was starting to enjoy himself.