“Yes.” Sara spared him the details. “The exhumation I told you about is tied to their cases.”
“Oh no, don’t tell me they let that fella out of prison?”
“Daryl Nesbitt, and no, he’s still in prison. But there is evidence that possibly exonerates him. At least as far as the attack and murder are concerned.”
“Evidence? Well, that’s—” Brock went silent. He looked around his office as if the books and piles of papers could explain how this happened. “You know I don’t like to be contrary, Sara, but it seems to me Jeffrey caught that Daryl fella dead to rights. No one in town was surprised it was a Nesbitt. Daddy always said those Dew-Lollies killing each other over a chicken bone is what kept our doors open during the economic downturn. I just can’t see how Jeffrey could’ve been wrong on this one.”
“He was,” Sara said, which felt like a betrayal but was still the truth. “The GBI has uncovered new information that indicates the killer might still be active.”
“Active?” The color had left his face. “There are more victims?”
“Yes.”
In the silence, Sara could hear the pumps working outside.
“Are you sure it’s not somebody who’s trying to look like the bad guy?” Brock shook his head, dismissing the possibility. “That’s a pretty bad guy, Sara. I feel sick about this. What did we miss?”
“That’s why I’m here.”
“Of course. You’ll need my coroner’s report. I’ve got your autopsy notes, and the labs, and—” He went to his desk. He found a ring of keys in the drawer. “Everything’s at the U-Store. Unit 522. I just got back from a meeting, so I need to be here. We can both go tonight after work or you can go now on your own.”
“I’d like to go now.” Sara watched him slide the small padlock key off the ring. “We’re chasing down leads as fast as we can.”
“I can’t see what we missed. It all lined up to Daryl Nesbitt. And then there was all that stuff with the hammer.” Brock shook his head, clearly coming up with the same non-answer as Sara. “You said there’s evidence that exonerates him?”
“Yes.”
“What—of course you can’t tell me. I’m sorry I even asked.” He freed the key. “Can you let me know what happens? I mean, as much as you can say. I know you’ve got to keep this quiet for now, but good Lord, more women murdered. Plus poor Leslie Truong. That’s a serial killer, Sara.”
Sara took the key. The metal felt clammy from his hand. “We’ll find him this time.”
“I pray that you do, but I’m glad Jeffrey didn’t have to hear about this,” Brock said. “You know how much he loved our little town. It would’ve killed him all over again to know that he got this one wrong.”
Sara bit her lip to fight back an unexpected flood of tears.
Brock looked mortified. “Oh, gosh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t think about—”
“It’s okay.” Sara had to get out of here before the dam broke open. “I’ll let you know what we find out.”
“Let me walk you back to the—”
“I’ve got it. Thank you. I’ll call for dinner soon, okay?”
“Sure, but—”
Sara left his office before he could finish the sentence.
She kept her head down as she walked through the warehouse, mouth open because she couldn’t breathe through her nose. She ran into some employees leaving the breakroom. All of the offices off the corridor were filled with workers who looked up as she passed. In the lobby the receptionist wished her a good morning, but Sara was beyond good mornings.
She let out a string of curses as she tripped down the stairs. She should’ve asked Brock if he knew where Delilah or Tommi Humphrey were living. The only place better than a church for picking up gossip was the local funeral home. The Brock Family Funeral Home had serviced the tri-county area for two generations. Either Brock or his mother were always up on the local news.
She stopped in her tracks, but only for a moment.
The thought of going back inside was a non-starter. Instead, Sara made a beeline for her car. She rolled down all the windows to let in the fresh air. She still had to breathe through her mouth. A sharp pain made her loosen her grip on the padlock key. She was squeezing it so tightly that the metal had dug a groove into her palm.
Brock had likely chosen the U-Store for the same reason as Sara. It was the only facility in Grant County that offered climate-controlled storage. Otherwise, Jeffrey’s police files and Sara’s medical examiner reports would’ve rotted in the humidity or crumbled in the heat. She could not send Tessa back to the facility for a second time. Not because Tessa would refuse, but because there was a chain of custody protocol to follow. Sara would have to go herself, which meant driving to Grant County, which brought up the same guilt she had struggled with yesterday.
She considered calling Will to tell him where she was going, but Find My app aside, their relationship was predicated on trust. She did not have to report her movements to him, and he would be puzzled if she tried.
So why did this feel like cheating? Because the U-Store was located on Mercer Avenue, directly across from the Heartsdale Memory Gardens, where Jeffrey was buried?
The location of the building was not within Sara’s control. What she needed to do in the immediate was to study the information from Leslie Truong’s autopsy. There could be a clue inside the pages, something they had all overlooked, that helped find the killer.
Sara took the path of least resistance, texting Amanda—
Heading to Grant County to retrieve Brock’s files. Still working on locating Humphrey. Back at HQ ASAP.
She started the engine. She pulled out of the space.
For the first time in her life, Sara dreaded the thought of going home.
Grant County—Thursday
18
Jeffrey flipped on the lights as he walked through the station. As usual, he was the first person in the building. He turned on the air conditioning. He started the coffee. He opened the blinds in his office. He sat at his desk.
The clock on his computer told him it was 5:33 a.m. Sara had worked through the night. She would be finished with Leslie Truong’s autopsy by now. Brock had assisted her. Frank had acted as a third witness. Normally, Jeffrey would’ve taken that job, but he’d spent the last twelve hours talking to potential witnesses, re-canvassing Rebecca Caterino’s dorm, interviewing Leslie Truong’s roommates, interrogating the college staff, combing the woods for evidence and offering Bonita Truong, Leslie’s mother, a shoulder to cry on.
None of it had made a damn bit of difference. He was in exactly the same position he’d been in this time yesterday morning, except now he had a dead college student on his hands.
Jeffrey rolled out the topographic map of the forest onto his desk. The bird’s-eye view afforded him a better understanding of the terrain. The dips and valleys. The rolling hills. The lakes and streams. The paper was still damp from spreading it across the hood of his car. He had used a ruler and different colors of Sharpies to draw lines across the woods. Red traced the possible path that Beckey Caterino had taken on her run. Blue followed the most likely trail that Leslie Truong had walked back to campus after finding Beckey’s body. The rain had washed away both scenes, but he’d still ordered a thorough search of the two-mile stretch.
Leslie had been found in dense overgrowth approximately thirty yards from the main trail that wound its way from the campus to the north side of the lake. Jeffrey didn’t know if she had walked there on her own or been carried there by her killer. All he knew for certain was that her lower body would’ve been paralyzed. She had probably been drugged. He didn’t want to consider what Leslie had thought as she lay in what would become her final resting place. Jeffrey wasn’t a praying man, but if he was, he’d pray to God that she had been completely unconscious.
A blue X marked the spot where Leslie had lain. The contour lines on the map swirled closer together, indicating a valley that had been imperceptible when Jeffrey was standing in the physical location. Campus security cameras verified that the killer had not approached from the college side. IHOP was around one and a half miles away from the scene. The closest access point to Leslie’s body was the fire road Frank had mentioned.
Jeffrey had used a dotted green line to suggest the killer’s possible trek from Leslie’s body back to the unpaved, one-lane road. Again, the contour lines showed a lower elevation where the perpetrator had most likely parked his vehicle out of sight. There were no tire prints. No footprints. The rain had flooded the roadtop into a muddy slick.