Ryan’s insides twisted. “For as long as you need me.”
She glanced around the room.
“We’ll all be here,” Garret assured her.
“You couldn’t kick us out,” Fiona added.
“Okay, then.” Kennedy let Maureen lead her to the first floor bathroom.
“She’s totally broken,” Ryan said once they were out of earshot.
“You’re not much better,” Nolan said, studying his brother. He and the whole family knew how tight Ryan and Shane had been. “We’re all here for you, too.”
“And for each other,” Colin added. He raked a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair. “There’s a wake and a funeral to plan. I don’t want the whole burden to fall on your mother.”
“I’ll help Mom,” Fiona said. “And I’m sure the FBI will have some input, too.”
“Garret and I know a few of Shane’s friends,” Nolan told them. “We can get a list together. What about Caitlin’s friends? How do you want to handle them? She’s Shane’s wife. We have to give her the respect she deserves. I know both her parents are gone, and she has no other family, but there must be someone we should contact.”
Fiona frowned and shook her head. “I’m not sure we should go that route, at least not yet. We don’t know where Caitlin is or even if she’s alive. The FBI might prefer we keep things quiet. I’m just speculating, but let’s see what they say before we open that door.”
“I agree,” Colin said. “We’ll take our cues from law enforcement. Somehow we’ll find the right way to honor Shane.”
Ryan swallowed hard. “No matter how this plays out, poor Kennedy has to face the gruesome finality. A wake. A funeral. No mother standing beside her. How much more can she take?”
No one replied.
In fact, the whole family stopped talking altogether as they heard Maureen and Kennedy’s voices emerging from the now-open bathroom doorway.
“Let’s go to the living room.” Fiona was already heading for the door. “That way we’ll be waiting for her. These plans can wait for tomorrow.”
Ryan stayed for hours, as did his siblings. At Ryan’s urging, Claire had joined them, meeting Kennedy and speaking to her in that gentle way Claire had. That had distracted Kennedy for a while, partly because she was curious about Ryan’s girlfriend, and mostly because Claire was Claire. Not only did she temporarily stop Kennedy’s tears, she even got her to eat half a sandwich and drink a glass of milk.
But, eventually, the novelty wore off and the nightmare slammed back to the forefront of Kennedy’s mind.
She pushed away her plate and dissolved back into tears, this time pressing her face into Ryan’s shoulder and drenching his shirt with her tears. “Daddy’s dead, Ryan,” she whimpered. “Oh my God, Daddy’s dead.” She raised her face to his. “And where’s Mommy? Where did she go? Did that horrible killer take her?”
Ryan hugged her tightly. “We don’t have facts yet, sunshine. But we will. I promise you that. I’ll make sure of it.”
And he meant it. He was going to solve the whole puzzle—not only if Caitlin was alive and where she was, but who had killed Shane. He’d bring this to FI, get them to take this on as their number one priority case.
No matter how good the FBI was, Forensic Instincts was better.
The smell of the sea air wafted through the slightly-open window of the motel room. It went unnoticed by the room’s sole occupant, who was busy opening their MacBook. The occupant started a terminal session, and proceeded to log in from one computer to another, the connection zigzagging halfway around the world to hide their tracks. When they arrived at the final destination, they opened the log file showing GPS tracking coordinates. There had been no changes in a couple of hours. The target had remained exactly where she was suspected to be.
The viewer logged out of all the remote computers and closed the lid of the Macbook.
4
Ryan’s apartment
Park Slope, New York
Saturday, 5:30 am
Ryan stirred, rolling onto his back on the bed, and folding his arms beneath his head as the first pale rays of dawn peeked through his windows.
He hadn’t slept a wink. How could he when all he could see was Shane’s lifeless body, all he could hear were Kennedy’s wrenching sobs?
