“Kane?”
“I don’t know. As a kid, he did what he wanted because he knew he could get out of it. He had a temper, many had witnessed it, but it was more like showing who he was. That’s a far cry from murder.”
“Not if someone is pushed enough,” he said.
“I don’t disagree with that.”
“And if it was someone in this area, I think we’d see more evidence of crime and there isn’t anything. What happened to your sister was horrible. I’ve checked databanks for anything even close. Nothing.”
“I know,” he said. “I’ve done it all too. But someone doesn’t like me being here and I’m positive it has to do with more than disrupting business activities.”
“You might be right,” Logan said. “I’ve closed all my cold cases but that one. It never sat well with me and if I can do anything to help, I’m here a few more months. I trust you’ll keep that between us.”
He held his hand out to shake. “Thanks.”
And when Rory got back in his car and saw the text from Clay that he had something, he knew he was getting close.
26
GET THIS REACTION
“Why did you make us wait all day?” Gale asked after work on Monday.
She felt as if she was missing out on everything.
First Rory went to talk with Detective Miller and filled her brothers in. Not her. No. Heaven forbid they include the little woman in all of this until now.
Then to find out that Clay had something to report.
“Because I wasn’t going to say it more than once,” Clay said, “and everyone was busy today.”
She plopped her ass down at the kitchen table in Clay’s ranch. Meredith had just left to go to the barn for something, leaving the four of them alone.
“What did you find out?” Rory asked.
“It could be nothing, but it could be something,” Clay said. “Those pictures on your sister’s phone. I’ve been looking them over. Nothing stood out, but then we got the pictures from your break-in. It was the footprints.”
“What about them?” Gale said.
“Rene was taking pictures of the old cabin. Not just the cabin itself, but the surroundings. Bushes, trees, rocks,” Clay said.
“She liked to capture as much as she could when she drew something,” he said.
“There were several footprints in those pictures.”
“So?” Gale said. “It could be anyone’s unless you tell me the tread is the same fifteen years later. People don’t wear the same shoes that long.”
“Women might not,” Ford said, “but men do. I’m not saying that is the case, but it is the spacing of the stride. Same size foot too.”
“No way,” she said. “You can tell that?”
“There is a lot technology can tell now,” Rory said. “But how were you able to, Clay?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Clay said.
Her brother had a lot of contacts that no one asked too many questions of. If it was enough to have it looked at in a more official capacity, then Ford would take that next step.
“We’d had some rain the day before you were broken into, so most prints, or other prints were gone. It’s hard to tell if this is the same person who left the letters. And it’s size eleven, the same stride. Like a fast walk. Not run, but not a calm stroll either.”
