He Kills Me, He Kills Me Not (12 page)

Amanda leaned forward and used the pink tissue paper to brush off the black granite headstone that marked the two graves. Then she filled the two vases with carnations. Normally she spoke out loud, telling her parents what she’d done the previous week. Or, on the rare occasions when she had news about Heather, telling them about her sister.

She shivered in spite of the heat. There was nothing about this past week she wanted to share. And with a police officer only a few feet away, she wasn’t comfortable speaking out loud. Instead, she sat on the thick grass between the graves and allowed herself a few moments of silence to quietly remember them.

Growing up in Florida had been fun. Her dad’s nine-to-five desk job at an insurance company didn’t buy a lot of extras, but it paid the bills, kept a roof over their heads. Mom stayed home to raise her two daughters, taking them to the beach every chance they got. Weekends were for cookouts on the back deck, or sometimes they’d go to a neighbor’s house and enjoy their pool.

Amanda smiled again as she remembered how excited her father was when he got a promotion and a bonus. Heather was a senior in college. Amanda had already graduated and started her career as a computer programmer. For the first time since her parents’ honeymoon twenty-four years earlier, her parents could afford to go on a real vacation. They’d been so excited about their upcoming trip to Italy.

Amanda’s smile dimmed. The plane crash had not only taken her parents’ lives, it had driven a wedge between her and her sister. It didn’t help that Amanda was the one who’d suggested the trip in the first place. And then there was John, Heather’s husband.

Shaking her head, Amanda pushed away the unpleasant thoughts. The policeman leaning against a tree a short distance away was trying not to be obvious about watching her. But the disapproving look on his face, and the way he kept glancing around, told her he didn’t like her being here out in the open.

She didn’t either, but sometimes responsibility outweighed other considerations. She sighed and pressed a kiss against the cold headstone. “I love you, Mom and Dad,” she whispered.

After climbing to her feet, she brushed off her jeans and carried the last of the carnations to Dana’s tombstone only a few graves away. Amanda replaced the dried up carnations from her last visit with fresh ones. Keeping her voice low, she told Dana what she told her every week. “I’m so sorry, Dana. Please forgive me.”

C
hannel Ten anchorwoman, Tiffany Adams, stared down at the fresh flowers on Dana Branson’s grave. She waved her cameraman over. “Get a shot of this. Did you see anyone by this grave?”

“Nah, no one’s been over here since we got here.”

She stepped back so he could get a shot of the flowers. Looking around the cemetery, she didn’t see anyone who might have placed them on the grave. The only person she saw was the flower vendor, Mr. Reynolds. She’d spoken to him on Sunday after the O’Donnell murder and had asked him if he knew who put flowers on Dana Branson’s grave. He’d claimed he didn’t know, but the flowers today were far too fresh for him not to have seen who put them there.

“Look in that trash can,” she said, pointing to a garbage can near a tree. “See if someone left the packaging from the flowers in there.”

He lowered the camera from his shoulder and gave her an arch look. “You want me to dig through the trash?”

She narrowed her eyes. “I want you to dig up a story. Now.”

His shoulders slumped and he mumbled beneath his breath. Tiffany didn’t care what he said as long as he did what she told him. A minute later he ran back with some tissue paper in his hand.

“Jackpot,” he grinned, holding the pink paper up in the air. “It’s got that flower vendor’s logo on it.” He pointed to Reynolds’ flower stand.

A slow smile spread across Tiffany’s face. “Call the station. See what they can find out about our flower vendor. I need leverage.”

“T
his is one royally screwed up perv,” Pierce said.

Logan raised a brow. “Is that the FBI’s official assessment?”

“Hell, yes.” He stepped past one of the technicians who was dusting the boxcar for prints. “He went to enormous trouble to make this torture chamber.”

Bile rose in the back of Logan’s throat as he took in the black, dried blood that had sprayed across the walls and formed sticky pools on the floor. There were small holes drilled into the sides of the abandoned railroad car to allow ventilation, but even partially shadowed beneath the huge branches of an oak tree as it was, the temperatures inside had to be close to a hundred degrees.

“I’m surprised Carolyn O’Donnell didn’t bake to death in this hell hole,” he said.

One of the techs pointed to some of the holes drilled higher up near the top of the car. “There’s a hose hooked up to that hole. The other end is hooked to a generator outside, and a small air-conditioning unit. We think he used that to keep the temperature more bearable, at least while he was here.”

The tech stepped around Logan and began dusting the next section of the wall for prints.

“Let’s get out of here,” Logan said. “We’re just in the way.”

He and Pierce stepped out of the steel tomb, their shoes kicking up dust as they crossed the dirt, away from the hive of activity. The Feds were examining every inch of the forty-foot steel shell while Logan’s detectives walked the grid outside searching for evidence.

Officer Karen Bingham was taking the witness’s statement. She was sitting on a fallen log beside a white male about twenty years of age. Dressed in camouflage shorts, he wore a white t-shirt that boasted a picture of a marijuana plant.

Logan glanced around as he and Pierce strode toward Karen. “Where’s Riley?”

“He’s directing your men in the grid search,” Pierce said.

Logan spotted Riley then, about fifty feet away, walking with one of the other detectives around the abandoned boxcar, pointing to various spots in the dried-out grass and dirt as he spoke to the man beside him. Logan didn’t know why Riley felt he needed to walk the grid. There were more than enough techs doing that already.

“Chief,” Karen called out, capturing his attention. “This is Gerald Mason. He’s the hiker who found the boxcar.”

Logan shook the hiker’s hand and introduced Pierce. “Mr. Mason, we appreciate you calling the police when you found the boxcar. I’m sure you already answered a lot of questions from Officer Bingham, but would you mind telling Special Agent Buchanan and me what happened?”

The young man looked over at Karen as if asking permission. She nodded and smiled reassuringly. His neck bobbed as he swallowed. “I used to hike through these woods when I was a kid. I’m home on break and—”

“You’re a college student?” Pierce asked.

“Yeah. FSU.”

Logan exchanged a glance with Pierce. Mason was from the same campus as Carolyn O’Donnell, Florida State University. “Go on, Mr. Mason. Tell us how you found the boxcar.”

“It’s been here forever, even when I was little. The railroad left a couple of them in this field and another field a little ways from here when they pulled out years ago. Anyway, I wanted to get away from the house—away from all the relatives, you know?”

Logan nodded encouragingly and wondered when the kid would get to the point.

“I hiked up here and then I remember that old car. I thought it’d be fun to look inside, maybe see if any of my old army men or matchbox cars were in there.” He shuddered and shut his eyes.

“Was the door open or shut when you got here?” Pierce asked.

“Shut. But it wasn’t locked. I just opened it and . . .” He shuddered again, making a gagging noise in his throat.

Logan stepped back, out of gagging range. “Thank you, Mr. Mason. Be sure to give Officer Bingham your addresses both at school and home, and any phone numbers where she can reach you if we have more questions.”

“O . . . okay.”

Pierce and Logan moved away to stand beneath a towering oak tree where they could keep an eye on the agents and detectives working the scene. The doors to the boxcar were propped open and several men were inside processing the evidence. One of the techs wasn’t dressed like the others. When he turned, Logan realized who he was.

“What the hell is he doing?”

Pierce gave Logan a surprised glance. “Who?”

“Riley. He’s in the boxcar. I specifically told him he didn’t need to go inside, that the techs are busy in there. I don’t want him contaminating anything.”

“What are you worried about? He knows what he’s doing.”

Logan crossed his arms over his chest.

“Spill it, Logan. Something’s bothering you.”

“It’s crazy.”

“I’m used to crazy.”

“Okay, but let’s get out of this hot sun. Besides, I don’t want anyone else to hear this.” He led the way to his Mustang parked under a shade tree fifty yards back. He sat behind the wheel and started the engine, turning the air-conditioner to full blast as Pierce got in beside him.

Logan watched Riley through the windshield. “Riley was a rookie cop when Dana and Amanda were abducted. He wasn’t a detective then, but he was on the force, a newbie. In a town like this we only get half a dozen murders a year, usually domestic disputes. What are the odds that a rookie cop would forget about a case as memorable as the Branson case? What are the odds that every detail wouldn’t be burned into his brain?”

“He did remember the case. He and Clayton are the ones who told you about it.”

“Only after Carolyn O’Donnell was found murdered.”

Pierce watched Riley through the windshield, too. “Didn’t you say he was at a conference when she was abducted, in Alabama? And he’d only returned the morning she was found dead?”

“Yes, but he knew about the abduction. I called him when she went missing. He’s my lead detective. I wanted to pick his brain, see what suggestions he might have for trying to find her. It didn’t occur to him to tell me about the earlier case until
after
O’Donnell was killed. Three days later.”

“Which means?”

“Which means, maybe he didn’t want her found alive.”

Pierce stared at him as if he thought he’d gone crazy. “Are you suggesting your lead detective is the killer?”

“I’m not suggesting anything. I’m just thinking out loud. Things aren’t adding up.”

“What things?”

Logan drummed his fingers on the steering wheel.

“Come on, Logan. You’ve got my attention. Spill.”

Logan already regretted mentioning his suspicions. He didn’t want to put a stain on Riley’s reputation, not if he was innocent. But if there was even a chance Riley could be involved, he had to look into it.

Pierce was watching him expectantly. Logan blew out a frustrated breath. “First of all,” he said, holding up one finger, “He meets the general description Amanda gave of the killer. Second,” he ticked off another finger, “He didn’t notice the trail of footprints leading from the O’Donnell crime scene into the woods until I pointed it out.”

“Half the male population of this town meets the general description Amanda gave. And Riley was waiting for the medical examiner. You told me that.”

Logan ignored the interruption and continued. “Third, he didn’t mention the Branson case when Carolyn was abducted. Fourth, by walking through the grid and inside the boxcar, he’s given himself a perfect alibi if we find any trace leading back to him.”

“Go on.”

Logan dropped his hand. “That’s it. I don’t have anything else. Just my gut.”

Pierce sat silently for several moments, considering. “From what you told me about your gut this morning, about when you stopped that white van because you thought something was off, I’m inclined to trust your instincts. I’ll call the field office in Birmingham, have them check out the conference alibi, make sure Riley was really there. Do you want to send any of your men to Alabama?”

“No. I don’t want Riley or anyone else to hear about this, especially without any evidence. I don’t want to hurt his career or his reputation if I’m wrong. Can someone out of your Jacksonville office run a quiet investigation into Riley’s background? See where he was at the time of the other murders during the past four years?”

“You bet. In the meantime, we could put a tail on him.”

“It wouldn’t work,” Logan said. “I may have been born here but I moved away for over a decade. To my men, I’m still an outsider until I prove myself. Riley’s one of them, a local. None of them could keep this a secret from him.”