“Finally,” Rachel said, pointing to Haylee Johnson, “we all saw how Ms. Johnson attacked FBI Special Agent Laurel Snow. It was brutal, and you might ask me what that has to do with Captain Rivers. Snow and Rivers have been in an intimate relationship for months.”
Laurel lowered her chin. “Since that’s true, we can’t sue her for slander. But I would like to know who she’s using as her source.”
Rachel stared directly at the camera. “Is that the impetus that pushed Captain Rivers over the edge? Allegedly, of course. We’re just drawing comparisons between victims here. I am not accusing Captain Rivers of anything, though I have heard that he has been taken off the case by his superiors. One has to wonder, what do they know that we don’t?”
Rachel shifted in her seat and pressed her hands onto her plexiglass table.
“In an effort to be fully transparent, I must let you know that Captain Rivers and I were once engaged many years ago when we lived in Portland. He had a very tough missing persons case there and lost a child. Bydrowning. The same cause of death as these current victims.”
Her eyes widened. “I have to tell you, he changed afterward. He lost the light of humanity in his eyes. He broke our relationship off and moved up here to live alone in the woods with his dog.” Her shoulders slumped, perfectly conveying concern, dejection, and bewilderment.
Even Laurel could read those expressions on the woman’s face. “She’s really full of crap, isn’t she?”
“Aptly put,” Huck muttered. “This is going to screw up the entire case.”
Rachel shook her head sadly. “I have to wonder if it wouldn’t have been better if everybody had just left Captain Rivers alone to live on the mountain with his dog. Would these women still be alive?”
The screen cut to a commercial.
Huck scraped both hands down his face. “This will go viral within hours. I’m sure an article is already being written for the online version. Do you think we’ll see this in theTimber City Gazettein print later today?”
Laurel looked at the clock. “It’s after midnight, and I bet they’ve already gone to print, so it’s too late to hit the print deadline. My guess is that we’ll see an expanded article Saturday morning.”
“Great,” Huck said. “How soon do you suppose I get charged with murder?”
Laurel pressed the mute button on the remote. “If we’re lucky, not for a while.”
“When was the last time we were fucking lucky?”
* * *
Abigail watched Jason Abbott slump from his seat and nearly fall forward into the fire. Standing, she stood and planted her gloved hand on his head, pushing him back into the darkness. “Oh, Jason. You always thought you were so smart.”
She gingerly removed the vial from beneath the wristband on her right arm. She hadn’t used the drug until his final glass of wine. “As if I would put something in a glass that you could switch with me.” She tossed the vial into the fire and then poured more of the accelerant on it. The journals were gone, and now so was the plastic. She threw her glass in and then looked at the wine bottle. She’d have to take that home with her.
Humming softly, she walked back to her car and placed the wine bottle in her dark backpack before opening her trunk and lugging the portable generator over to the battered cream-colored truck Abbott had been using.
“See, Jason?” she asked quietly. “You just bought a generator.” She shoved it across the truck bed. “Which explains why you have so much gasoline in the back of your truck.”
She returned to the borrowed Cadillac and removed containers of gasoline, going back and forth until she had emptied the large trunk. She shut the tailgate of his truck. She let the fire burn because why not?
Keeping an eye on him, she walked past the fire and entered the dilapidated cabin to find the guns and the phones used by the two officers who’d been shot. She jogged out and placed them in his truck. A quick search of the cabin revealed nothing else of interest, so, from the Caddie she fetched the sniper rifle she’d used and placed the weapon on the floor of the passenger side.
Finally, she returned to Jason. He was slumped over, and she smoothed back his hair with her gloved hand. “It’s really too bad. You are quite handsome.”
His dark hair was thick, and his handsome face angled. Grunting, she grabbed him by the lapels and dragged him over to his truck. It took her several tries, but she managed to push him inside and shove him over to the passenger side.
The sedative she’d given him would work for hours.
Then she looked back and used a branch to brush away the marks of his dragging heels. More thunder rolled in the distance. There was a hell of a storm on its way; it would eradicate any remaining evidence. Yet, it behooved a girl to be careful. She looked out into the night at Snowblood Peak across the way. It was rather fitting.
Jumping into the truck, she pushed Jason over, then moved the seat closer to the steering wheel. “It’s quite convenient of you to have found refuge here in the mountains,” she said congenially, driving down the barely there dirt road and then taking a sharp left up toward Widow’s Peak. The moonlight shone down as the clouds raced across the sky. It would be completely dark soon.
She didn’t much care.
Reaching Widow’s Peak, she parked as close to the edge as she could, making sure the truck was perched on flat land. A small ledge protruded below her, and then the cliff dropped off to the river below. Parking the truck, she nimbly jumped out.
She drew the small recorder from inside her jacket and scrolled through until she found what she needed. Jason had been quite cooperative this evening. She placed one of the officers’ phones in her pocket and then turned on the one she believed had been owned by Officer Jill Jordan to key in a number she knew well.
