I narrowed my eyes, peering through the trees. I had no clue if we were close to where the earbuds had been found, but if Shannon had indeed been nabbed while jogging, it was probably from a spot like this one, with no houses nearby. Surely Shannon would have tried to break free. She might have even made it a few yards into the woods before he caught up with her again and dragged her back to his vehicle.
The shoot went better than I’d anticipated, in large part because Keith was so easy to work with. I recapped the case, describing what had transpired from the moment Shannon was reported missing and ending with the revelation about Amy and Page. When we were finished, I reviewed a few minutes of video with him and was relieved to see I didn’t look like I was speaking on a hostage tape.
“I’m sure Dodson will love this,” Keith volunteered.
“You won’t just put up the raw footage, will you?”
“No, no. I’ll create a timeline and intersperse pieces of what we shot with other material, like snippets from the press conference and photos of Shannon. I’m gonna work like crazy to have it up later today.”
I gave him a hand loading his equipment back into the SUV and then jumped into the passenger seat. My toes were damp and cold from standing in wet brush, but I was relieved to be done.
Keith dropped me off at the Breezy Point, where I noticed that the white Camry was still in its spot, though it now had a black Beemer cozied up next to it. Since management seemed to be spacing out guests in the nearly empty motel, I wondered if the jogger might have an afternoon visitor.
Back in my room, I stripped off my boots and set them to dry by the heating unit. I helped myself to the second slice of pizza, which I’d left congealing on the dresser, and began reviewing my notes in my composition book from earlier this morning. Something seemed to be tugging my attention back to them.
As I reread what I’d scribbled down, I realized what wascalling to me: a comment Kelly had made about all the recent deaths in her family—her father, her cousin, and now Shannon. J.J., I recalled, had mentioned the cousin, too. A guy named Destin, whom Shannon apparently had been very close to. I probably should have checked him out earlier.
I dragged my laptop to the center of the desk and typed “Destin,” “Lake George,” and “obituary” into the search bar. Within seconds, I found a link to an obituary for Destin Michaels, who had died last year, at the age of thirty-three. That would make his birth date right around Shannon’s, and they’d probably bonded as kids, particularly if Shannon had never felt close to Kelly.
There was no cause of death listed. That could reflect the family’s desire for privacy, but it could also be a red flag, an indication that the reason was not one they wanted to broadcast to the world.
It didn’t take me long to unearth the truth, though. It was in thePost Star’s coverage, topped with the headline: “Police Investigating Apparent Drug Overdose Death in Lake George.” Destin Michaels had died from an overdose of the prescription painkiller oxycodone, which was the generic name for OxyContin. The fourth such death so far that year, the paper pointed out.
For the next three seconds, I thought I finally had the link between Shannon and the two campers. Kayla had stressed that Amy didn’t do drugs because she’d lost a friend to an Oxy overdose—maybe that friend had beenDestin.I quickly realized how totally dumb I was being. Amy’s friend had died more than ten years ago.
And yet therewasa link of sorts, and one probably worth noting—as links so often were. My old buddy Buddy always adhered to what he liked to call “Einstein’s Law of Two or More.” If something turned up at least twice in the universe, it was begging for your attention and you were a fool not to take note.
This was the second time drugs had come up, the third if I counted what I’d read last night about the busts on Route 149. Maybe, despite everything Kayla believed, Amy and Pagehadbeen caught up in the drug world, and it was there that they’d crossed paths with their killer. A serious user. Or dealer. One who also happened to be a psychopathic murderer.
But then how did any of that tie in with Shannon? She was a mom of two who had little in common with young single women like Amy and Page, at least on the surface. I couldn’t picture her ever setting foot in a shit hole like Muller’s.
But, of course, over the past couple of decades, countless ordinary people had become addicted to painkillers and now bought them illegally or moved on to heroin. It was possible that Shannon had been prescribed painkillers for an injury, perhaps a running-related one, and had become dependent without either Cody or J.J. being aware. That could have led her on a search for illegal drugs, which in turn placed her into contact with the person who had killed Amy and Page.
I didn’t have a hint of evidence, of course, so for now I tucked the idea into my back pocket.
Though it was a little early to write my post, I went aheadanyway, since I had the time and I could always update it if news broke later. I wished I had more to say, but right now things were in a state of limbo. With any luck, the forensic examination of the three bodies would soon produce compelling evidence and law enforcement would begin to close in on the killer.
And that would mean I’d have plenty of reason to stick around Lake George.
I wasn’t ready to leave, I realized. Yeah, I was kind of sick of antlers and birch bark and recycling the same clothes, but I loved being a daily reporter again, chasing leads and seeing what surprises might be waiting at the end. Finding the bodies had shaken me, but it had been gratifying to know that I had played a role in the discovery, that Shannon’s family at least knew her fate and wouldn’t have to spend the rest of their lives haunted by uncertainty. It even gave me a weird satisfaction to know that the killer had chosen me to share with.
There was one more reason I didn’t want to pack up and leave. I still felt a burning need to know who had killed the three women. I glanced up at the flyer with Shannon’s photo hanging above my desk. It had started to curl inward on both sides, almost obscuring her face. I snapped off a few pieces of tape and used them to make it hang straight again.
Just as I started to close my laptop, I spotted an email from Jessie. She would definitely be driving south on the Northway tomorrow and was hoping we were still on for lunch. “You bet,” I wrote back, and suggested a restaurant with an outdoor deck I’d spotted in the village.
It was 6:20 and finally time to leave for Alice’s. I threwon my jacket and punched my feet into the slightly shrunken boots by the heater. I was looking forward to dinner, and I even caught myself humming as I slammed the unit door shut. Both the Camry and Beemer were gone from their spaces, but no sooner had I noted that fact than the Camry pulled into the parking lot and jerked to a stop. Two seconds later the blond jogger emerged from the car, dressed in jeans and a fitted brown leather coat. This time she caught sight of me and drew back in surprise. She definitely recognized me and seemed startled to find me twenty feet away from her.
“Hello again,” I called out.
She assessed me warily. “You’re staying at this motel?”
“Yes, I’ve been here all along.” I took a couple of steps in her direction. “I’m sorry if I startled you the other day. I’m a reporter who’s been covering the Shannon Blaine case—the woman I mentioned to you—and you looked like her from the back. It threw me.”
Her shoulders relaxed. “I heard about that woman later,” she said. “It’s horrible.”
“My name’s Bailey Weggins, by the way. After I realized you weren’t Shannon, I worried about you being out on that road alone. I even stopped by the motel you said you were staying at to make sure you made it back okay, but the owner said he didn’t have any guests fitting your description.”
“The Lake Shore? I was there. But my friend checked us in, and the owner hadn’t seen me yet, I guess.”
