“Did she, now?” Lily said. “I guess it’s time for Drill Sergeant Mom to take over. You can come with me, Private Chloe.”
“Wait a sec.” Nikki picked up her daughter and kissed her curls. “Look, honey, Mommy’s got to go to work. I’ll see you later.”
“You’re with me,” Lily said, taking the girl from Nikki. “Let’s go slay the dragon.”
“What dragon?” Chloe asked.
“Phee.”
“I heard that,” Ophelia yelled from their shared bedroom.
“Ah,” Lily said, “Sleeping Beauty awakens.”
“You’re mixing up your fairy tales,” Nikki pointed out.
“Am I? Does it matter?” Lily said, then to Chloe: “It’s really late. Let’s forget pancakes, okay? Mickeys maybe tomorrow. Today we’re gonna make waffles.”
When Chloe squirmed and seemed about to protest, Lily added, “I’ll let you press the button on the toaster.” And as she carried her niece back to the kitchen, where she retrieved a box of frozen waffles from the freezer, she threw over her shoulder to Nikki, “Looks like another Eggo morning. Now, you, go.”
“Okay. Later.” Nikki scooped up her oversize bag and laptop from the table, then heard Lily say, “Oh, wait a sec. Who’s going to tell Mom about Mavis?”
Nikki had her hand on the door handle. “I was hoping that you—?”
“Nuh-uh-uh. Not me. I already did my duty this week. And she’s probably heard the news already, but someone’s going to have to deal with the fallout, and it ain’t gonna be me.”
“I have to—” Nikki started to argue, but saw Lily’s warning look. “Okay. Fine.”
“Good. Now, go!” Lily insisted. “I’ve got this.” She headed for the base of the stairs again. “Phee!!! I’m not kidding! Get up. Now!”
Nikki’s phone buzzed, and Arlo, speeding in from the family room, caught up with her. “Not now,” she told the dog, watching his head droop a bit. “Later.”
In her car, she eyed the screen, hoping the caller was Pierce with more news, but it was just Tom Fink again. She let the call go to voice mail, then listened to the message. He was just asking for more information, so she figured she’d call him later.
Maybe.
“Let Metzger fill you in,” she said to the empty car. “He’s your damned crime reporter.” She had a lot to do today, interviews to conduct.
But first she had to visit her mother.
“Brace yourself,” she warned, because dealing with Charlene Gillette was never easy.
“Aside from the numbers, the stones are nearly identical,” Sol said over the noise from the outer hallway, where the buzz of conversation, punctuated with laughter, drifted in over the click of computer keys. “But they’re being tested in the lab, along with the blood coloring them. They’re also matching the shell casing retrieved off the stairs to the bullet found in the ceiling, checking Mavis Greenlee’s DNA, along with all the rest.”
Reed leaned back in his desk chair. He’d figured as much, and he was still trying to find some connection between Billy Huber and Mavis Greenlee. The homicides were linked by the etched rocks, but that was all he had so far. The two victims were as socially distant as they were geographically, and on first glance, they’d never met nor had any mutual acquaintances; nor, for that matter, had they known each other even existed.
But they had both been murdered by the same killer.
Why?
Reed drummed his fingers on his desk as he glanced again at the data on Mavis’s background, all visible on his computer. She’d been born Mavis Crawford, had attended private schools, married right out of college, was divorced twelve years later, then married again within the year. That union had crumbled after seven years. And then there was her latest husband, Archer.
“Have you checked with the Tybee Island police?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Sol said from her desk. “I spoke to Officer Montero, who checked with the patrol. From the looks of it, someone is there. More lights on than usual, though the garage doors were shut, so if Archer’s car was there, it wasn’t seen.”
She was looking at her computer screen and sipping some kind of tea. “What’ve you come up with?”
“So far, no connection to Huber. Still hunting for a will, but most likely everything is held jointly with her husband.”
