Chapter 23
DAX
“ A ny word?” Beck asks me.
I’ve been pacing the living room of our house for the past twenty minutes, trying to reach Olivia’s and Carlos’s phones. I get no answer. They both go straight to voicemail.
“We were supposed to meet back here an hour ago,” I say, shaking my head. “This isn’t right; something’s happened.”
Luke comes downstairs from his room dressed in basketball shorts and a t-shirt, both hanging loosely over his wiry frame. His sleepy eyes scan us from head to toe as he asks, “What’s going on?”
“Nothing, kiddo. Please go back to bed. Everything is okay,” Leo tells him.
But Luke can see his dad is restless, pacing around the living room and scratching his beard as he tries to think of a way forward.
“Dad, what happened?” Luke insists. The kid picks up on our moods quicker than we can control them. “Where’s Olivia? ”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out,” I tell him. “Go on upstairs, kiddo. Let us handle this. We’ll all laugh about it at breakfast tomorrow morning.”
“But Uncle Dax?—”
“Please, Luke. It’s late,” Leo says. “I’ll let you know as soon as we do what’s going on, okay? Please.”
Luke gives him a long, sullen look. His concern is understandable.
The kid has survived hell, and he cares deeply for the people in his life—Olivia included.
If we’re worried about her, he’ll be worrying about her, too.
With a heavy sigh, he mutters, “Fine,” and reluctantly goes back to his room while I try calling Olivia again.
“Fuck,” I hiss as I realize that I still can’t get through to her.
“We need to figure out where they went,” Beck says, checking his phone. “Carlos said he was going to take the I-22 into town after he sent us that update about Marcus’s fingerprint.”
Leo scoffs. “We have to assume that Marcus might’ve been on to them.”
“He’s been here for months,” I say. “Why attack now? What’s his endgame? Fucking hell, there’s a lot that doesn’t make sense here.”
“I agree, but we need a systematic approach,” Beck replies. “As tempted as I am to lose my fucking marbles about it, Carlos and Olivia are missing.”
Ten minutes later, we burst through the doors of the sheriff’s department. Some of his deputies are hard at work, going over the arson case files again now that they have the updated intel from Carlos .
“Deputy Wilkes,” I say to Carlos’s partner. “Any sign of him or Olivia yet?”
“No, and we haven’t found his car either,” he says with a deep frown as we shake hands. “And given that they were in his personal vehicle, which isn’t GPS tagged like our department issued cruisers, we’re going to have to canvas in and around Ember Ridge until we find them.”
Beck points at one of the computers in the sprawling bullpen. “Can you ping their cell phones?”
“Only up to the nearest cell tower,” Wilkes replies. “There’s a lot of them around our district. The signal could’ve bounced off any one of them.”
“Worth a shot,” I suggest.
Wilkes passes the order down to another deputy, then turns the investigation board around for us to see. Marcus Bennett’s photo is now taped at the top. He’s their main suspect. The more I look at his face, the clearer my memory of seeing him at that warehouse fire.
“Look familiar?” Wilkes asks me.
“I can’t say with the utmost certainty. He was too far away at the time. But if you compare all the prints you collected from the warehouse and the other fires, you might get lucky and confirm that he was at all four.”
“Son of a bitch,” the deputy growls. “He puts all of us to shame, smearing the badge like that.”
“Carlos and Olivia were driving back into town. According to their last communication, they were leaving Wendell’s Diner up on the I-22 and heading over to our house. It’s been over an hour since they last checked in. ”
The sound of rushed heels clicking make us turn around in time to see Jocelyn come into the bullpen, a beige overcoat thrown over her loosely buttoned shirt and blue pencil skirt. Judging by her attire and tired eyes, she was still in her office when she got the call.
“I just heard,” she says, giving me a worried look. “Have you found them yet?”
“No,” I reply. “What exactly are you doing here?”
“The serial arsonist is still my case,” Jocelyn scoffs, dumping her purse on the desk closest to her, then taking her coat off. “And Carlos is still someone I care about.” She pauses and looks at Wilkes. “Deputy, I understand you released my suspect earlier?”
“We had no reason to hold him anymore,” Wilkes explains. “The sheriff told us to let Benson go.”
Jocelyn throws her hands up in dramatic exasperation. “Fucking great! Who’s to say he didn’t go after Carlos right after you cut him loose!”
“Because Benson is currently at the Golden Ox, getting drunk,” Wilkes shoots back. “He’s the first guy we checked when Dax told us he couldn’t reach Carlos anymore, ma’am.”
“What do we know so far?” she asks. “You said Carlos had another suspect.”
“Yeah,” Wilkes replies and points at the investigation board. “Marcus Bennett.”
The color drains straight out of Jocelyn’s face as she stares at Marcus’s photo for what feels like forever. Time actually seems to slow down and even stand still as her chest rises and drops with each tortured breath. Her lips part slowly, her eyes as round as saucers.
“No fucking way,” she whispers.
In that moment, I pick up on something: a ripple just beneath the surface, a twitch in her cheek, a subtle tremor above her eyelid.
“Marcus Bennett, Devon County Sheriff,” I say. “The same guy who was so eager to have Olivia arrested and shipped back to him.”
“It doesn’t make any sense,” Jocelyn gasps.
“You sound genuinely distraught,” Leo says, noticing her body language the same as I did. ‘What’s going on, Jocelyn?”
Beck watches her like a hawk, quietly standing beside the deputy in charge of pinging all the cell towers in our district. Jocelyn turns to face me, her brows perfectly contoured and pulled into a deep frown.
“What do you mean?” she asks.
“I feel like there’s something you’re not telling us.”
“A member of law enforcement turns out to be a deadly serial arsonist, and I’m not allowed to be shocked?” Jocelyn throws me a scowl. “Pardon me, Dax.”
“You were in touch with the guy, weren’t you?” Beck intervenes.
Jocelyn shakes her head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You were damn determined to have Olivia arrested and sent back to Devon,” he says. “I was there when you threatened her with getting Marcus Bennett involved if Carlos wouldn’t do as you asked.”
“This is ridiculous. Where’s the connection? Fill in the gaps for me, will you?” she retorts, raising her chin in defiance.
The more Jocelyn counters our questioning, the clearer it becomes that she’s involved somehow, consciously or unconsciously. I’m starting to believe that she might’ve had a hand in whatever went down tonight.
“We’re basing our suspicion on the fingerprint match that we have,” Wilkes says.
“And what does that tell you?” Jocelyn asks.
I cross my arms and take a few steps toward her. “It tells us that Marcus Bennett put that incendiary device together, and that he is likely to blame for the other three arson fire, as well, which is why Benson was set free.”
“Chances are, by morning, we’ll be able to fully verify his alibi for the first fire, as well. His ex-wife is flying in from Tampa tonight,” Wilkes adds.
Jocelyn nods slowly. “And what’s Marcus Bennett’s motive? He’s a highly regarded sheriff out of New York state. It just doesn’t add up.”
“Are you defending him?” Beck asks, raising a curious eyebrow.
“No, I’m asking the questions I know I’ll be getting from his defense lawyer and union rep when this goes to trial!
” Jocelyn says and exhales sharply. She raises her hands in defeat.
“You know what? I’ll be in the break room.
I can’t deal with all of you right now. Let me know once you have a lead on Carlos. ”
Jocelyn grabs her coat and bag and saunters out of the bullpen, the sound of her heels clicking like a haunting echo of my past mistakes.
Beck, however, is nowhere near satisfied with her reaction. “She’s holding something back,” he says, drawing curious looks from the sheriff’s deputies.
“What are you talking about?” Wilkes replies.
“It’s kind of a long story,” Leo mumbles. No matter how we put it, it will still come off as weird, complicated, and nowhere near enough to provide Jocelyn with motive for what, I don’t yet know. “We’re missing a few pieces at the moment.”
“At least give me the Cliff’s Notes version, so I know what the hell I’m dealing with,” Wilkes insists, growing increasingly aggravated.
“I’ve got a missing deputy and a woman who just happens to be your girlfriend, and four unresolved arson fires with a total of eight people killed. Throw me a bone here.”
“At first glance,” I cut in, “it looks like Marcus Bennett has been in town from when Olivia arrived. The first arson happened the week she got here. They have a romantic history. Marcus Bennett may have a stellar reputation in law enforcement, but only on the surface. Olivia ran away from Devon because her life was in danger.”
Wilkes lowers his gaze, lips pressed together in a thin, angry line. “Let me guess?—”
I cut him off. “She has proof of corruption, bribery, fraud, racketeering, and a slew of additional felonies committed by Marcus Bennett. Also, he was, or better said, still is, obsessed with her. We can’t quite figure out why he started the fires, though.”
“He could be a psycho coming into his own,” Beck mutters. “Or he could be trying to keep all of us busy with the fires while he works out the perfect angle to come after Olivia.”
“No wonder Carlos was so reluctant about shipping her back to Devon,” Wilkes replies. “I gave him such a hard time over that. But he and I go way back, so I let him have his way there.”
“And we can’t thank you enough for that,” I tell him. “We don’t think Olivia would still be alive otherwise.”
Leo groans with frustration, running a hand through his short, curly hair. “This pisses me off. What was the whole point of the fires?”
He isn’t satisfied with Beck’s theories and, frankly, neither am I. Marcus has been playing the long game, and I have a feeling that he might’ve swooped in like the predator that he is to?—
“Got it,” the deputy says from behind the computer. “A cell tower ping. I’m sending you the coordinates now. The last signal was shortly after Carlos’s last text message to Dax’s phone. They were traveling along a stretch of the I-22.”
I give Wilkes a long look. “Let us come with you, Deputy. We’re invested.”
“Hell, I’m not gonna say no,” he replies. “You’re his close friends. And that’s your lady with him. Besides, I trust you three more than our ADA, for what it’s worth.”
“Do you think you can hold off on telling her about the lead?” Beck asks. “It isn’t as if she can do anything to help us at this point.”
Wilkes thinks about it for a moment. “I’ll call her when we find Carlos. It’s the best I can do. I don’t want to ruffle the prosecution’s feathers.”
“Fair enough, Deputy Wilkes,” I say. “It’s greatly appreciated.”
My pulse pounds as we follow him out of the building. By the time I’m back behind the wheel, trailing his cruiser through the south side of Ember Ridge, anxiety rises in my throat like a ball of liquid fire.
One quick glance at Beck sitting next to me, and Leo in the back seat, and I can tell they’re just as worried, just as nervous, as I am.
We are all aware that our worst-case scenario regarding Olivia might be coming true.
The woman we love, the mother of our unborn children, is missing.
And Marcus’s presence in town is no coincidence.