Chapter 34
Kale was the last to return from the search. He parked on the street and trudged toward the front entrance.
“Mr. Conner!”
Three reporters, cameramen on their heels, rushed toward him.
He glared at each one. “Don’t even think about it.”
As he pushed past them, headed for the door, one shouted at his back, “How does it feel to know your sister could be the next victim?”
Kale whipped around, charged up to the guy, and decked him. Shouts accompanied the crowd’s withdrawal.
“Come on, Kale.”
Two deputies dragged him inside.
“What’d you come that way for?” Charles Collins asked. “You knew they were out there.”
Kale glared at the deputy, shook loose of the man’s hold. “Leave me alone.”
“Sure, man.”
Both deputies backed off.
Kale headed for the chief’s office. Every damned body in his path stopped and stared. He didn’t want to hear their words of sympathy. He didn’t want anything but to find his sister. In the chief’s office, the mayor and the fed were waiting.
The grim expression on the chief’s as well as the mayor’s face brought him up short.
“What?” He braced. Knew it was bad. Had they found . . . No. He refused to believe that.
“Sit down, Kale,” the chief suggested.
“Tell me, damn it,” Kale snapped. It was all he could do not to grab the man and shake the hell out of him.
The fed closed the door.
Kale cut him a lethal look.
“Mr. Conner, you need to sit down.” When Kale didn’t do as he ordered, he added, “Now.”
Defeat drained the fight out of him. Kale dropped into the nearest chair. He hadn’t had the heart to call his parents before he came here. Because he’d come up empty-handed. They were counting on him to find her.
And he’d failed.
Goddamn it!
“Kale,” the mayor began, “Marta Hanover is with your mother, and her husband is with your father.”
Kale’s heart sank into his boots. He blinked to hold back the tears. “What the hell is it you’re telling me?” He looked from the mayor to the chief and back.
Agent August propped himself on the corner of the chief’s desk since all the chairs were taken. “At five this evening, a dozen roses were delivered to your parents’ home, Mr. Conner.”
Hours in the cold hadn’t numbed him, but that revelation numbed Kale to the marrow of his bones.
“We now believe there is a connection between this delivery and those that came to the . . . others.”
The wetness that tracked down Kale’s face was the one thing he could feel. Hot, it burned his skin. “Where did they come from?” He didn’t ask what the card said, because he knew. Deepest regrets . . .
“A florist in Bangor. Two days ago, someone left the order in an envelope on the counter, cash enclosed. Unfortunately, the envelope was discarded.”
So they couldn’t figure out who left it. They couldn’t do anything. Kale refused to accept it. “No one saw anyone? No store surveillance? None in the stores nearby maybe caught an entrance or exit?”
“I’m sorry,” August said. “There’s nothing. Except . . .” The man’s gaze bored in Kale’s. “Since the order was left to deliver the roses to your parents’ home two days ago, we know that your sister was on his list already.”
Kale’s heart stumbled.
His sister was going to die.
Soon.
Agony twisted his insides as his mind replayed what he’d seen the morning when he and the chief had found Valerie Gerard.
“As if that isn’t bad enough,” the chief said, his voice lacking any emotion, “Rachel Appleton went and hung herself this morning. She waited until after the boys left for school. Her husband came home for lunch and found her.”
Jesus Christ. Kale wanted to scream at God. To demand why he was allowing this to happen.
The door flew open and Sarah burst in.
Deputy Brighton was close behind. “I’m sorry, Chief, I couldn’t stop her.”
Kale couldn’t look at Sarah. He knew what he would see.
Pity. Certainty.
“It’s all right, Karen.” The chief shook his head. “Just close the door.”
Karen did as the chief asked.
Sarah jerked off one of the boots she wore. “Check this against the boot imprint you found at the Appleton murder scene.” She yanked off the other one. “They belong to Lynda Pope. She takes the beta-blocker found in Alicia Appleton’s tox screen.”
“How did you come by these?” August picked up the first boot she’d shed. Studied it, though his face said he’d rather not touch it.
“Doesn’t matter,” Sarah insisted. “Just do it.” She was out of breath as if she’d run a long way.
For the first time since she’d entered the room, she looked at Kale. He couldn’t meet her gaze.
While August inspected the boot, the chief said, “Ms. Newton, we have four others here in Youngstown who are currently taking that drug and who knew the girls. We’re aware that Mrs. Pope is one of them.
The others are Reverend Mahaney and Marta Hanover, Geneva Williams and Loretta Steele.
Each of those persons has an airtight alibi for the times the victims went missing.
Not to mention one of those five wouldn’t be physically capable of carrying out the abduction. ”
“You’ve talked to Lynda Pope?” Sarah demanded.
“I talked to her half an hour ago. She’d just arrived home from the search.”
Sarah shook her head. “I left her house not more than half an hour ago.”
August nodded. “When we arrived, she mentioned that her husband was taking you back to the gym.” He tapped the boot. “By the way, these aren’t a size eight.”
“You saw me wearing it, didn’t you?” she argued. “You know that sizes can vary.”
Kale couldn’t take this anymore. He had to do something.
He was on his feet without any idea how he’d gotten there. “I’ve got to get back out there.”
“Now just a minute, son.” The chief pushed out of his chair and came around to where Kale stood. “The snow’s started falling hard again, and the temperature has dropped to well under thirty degrees. You can’t go back out there. The best thing you can do is get home and see to your folks.”
All the emotions that had drained from Kale suddenly erupted anew. “Are you out of your mind, Chief? I have to find my sister. This bastard is going to . . .” He couldn’t say it. Couldn’t make his lips form the words.
“Check the boot,” Sarah demanded. “I don’t give a shit what kind of alibi she has. Check the damned boot.”
Kale couldn’t listen to any more of this. He jerked the door open and walked out.
Those same faces, faces he knew, stared at him as he strode to the rear entrance. Voices spoke to him but he didn’t listen. He just kept walking.
He had to do something.
He couldn’t just go home without his sister.
He pushed out the back door, stormed across the parking lot.
“Kale!”
He didn’t slow.
“Kale, damn it, stop!”
Sarah grabbed at his left arm, dragged him to a stop.
“Listen to me.”
He glared at her. Shook off her touch.
“There’s something . . .” She shook her head.
“Something about the Popes. I can’t explain it.
I wasn’t even sure what or who it was that kept giving me this feeling until today.
Matilda said . . .” Sarah shook her head when he would have butted in, urged him with her eyes to listen.
“You have to trust me. I know what I’m talking about.
And I’m telling you it’s one of them or maybe both. ”
He almost left her standing there. But the determination on her face, in her voice, made him hesitate.
The boots . . . his gaze dropped to her feet. She stood there, the snow halfway up to her knees.
Then he remembered she’d pulled the boots off in the chief’s office.
She was barefoot except for her socks.
His gaze connected with hers. “You’re crazy, Sarah Newton.”
“Right now my shrink would probably agree with you.”
She was going to get frostbite.
Before his one functioning brain cell kicked in, he acted on instinct.
He scooped her up and headed for his Jeep.
At the moment, no one but Sarah seemed to have narrowed down a probable suspect. The others just kept looking for reasons to rule out suspects. That left Kale with one choice.
Conduct his own investigation.
He wasn’t a cop.
He didn’t need a search warrant.
Or an invitation.