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I pulled up the chair next to her and sat down. “And he never agreed with you.”
Rose put the magazine down and adjusted her glasses. “He said that those kids were perfect victims,” she told me, reluctantly. “Old enough to have left home by their own choice. They were on the outs with their families, or they’d told everyone they were going on a trip, so no one expected them to come home. Hitchhiking on a remote road, sometimes at night. Robbie said it was the perfect setup for someone who’s hunting.”
Hunting. It made sense, except that you’d have to drive Atticus Line every night for years, looking for a hitchhiker. Who did that? Wouldn’t they be noticed?
And as Eddie had said, if a man is hunting, why wouldn’t he bring a knife or a gun? He’d strangled them or bludgeoned them with rocks. Max Shandler had supposedly used the knife he kept in his car in case of an accident. I was no cop, but that sounded impulsive to me. Like Max—if it had been Max—had seen Rhonda Jean hitching, and had suddenly decided she was going to die.
And then each victim had been left, forgotten. Like Eddie said, the death was the point.
I looked at Rose. She was pretending to read her magazine, like she didn’t care about this conversation. “I heard a rumor,” I said. “I heard that the Coldlake Falls PD know exactly who the killer is, but they’ve covered it up all these years. Did Robbie ever say anything about that?”
Rose snapped the magazine shut. “Beatrice Snell,” she said, angrily. “And her crazy sister.”
That surprised me. “Um, maybe.”
“I worked with her at the grocery store.” Rose sniffed. “It’s hard to shut that girl up and get a word in edgewise. UFOs, Roswell, the CIA giving people drugs—I never got a minute’s peace. Beatrice is morbid, but Gracie is the really crazy one. I’m not surprised they got their hands on you somehow. They’re going to get in real trouble one of these days, talking like they do.”
“Who does Gracie think the killer is? She had a theory she wasn’t telling us.”
“Probably because she doesn’t trust you enough, and she knows she’ll get in trouble if she repeats it too often. She thinks the killer is Detective Quentin.”
My jaw dropped open. “Holy shit.”
Rose looked like she smelled something bad. “I don’t like swearing. I had to remind Robbie all the time. I don’t care what you say outside my house, but leave your swears at the front door, under the mat.”
“It fits,” I said, ignoring her lecture. “He might be old enough. He’s in good shape. No one would suspect him.” Gracie, in her way, was kind of a genius. “It would explain why the murders haven’t been solved. It would also explain why he showed up at the hospital so fast at three o’clock in the morning, already dressed.”
“Wasn’t Beam there, too?” Rose asked.
I didn’t reply. I wasn’t in the mood for holes in the theory. “So the police have covered up the fact that one of their own is a killer. Maybe they needed someone to blame this time, so they framed Max Shandler. They could have put Rhonda Jean’s backpack in his truck, planted the knife they say they found.”
“Quentin isn’t a murderer,” Rose said. “Robbie was Coldlake PD. He would never have taken part in a cover-up like that—never. He would have died first.”
The bedroom door opened and Eddie came out, dressed in jeans and a tee. “Mrs.Jones,” he said, greeting Rose. Rose pressed her lips together and nodded at my husband without speaking. Eddie ducked his gaze away, embarrassed, and opened the fridge. Honestly.
“Mrs.Jones, would you like us to make dinner?” Eddie asked, still staring into the fridge. “I see hot dogs in here. I could barbecue them.”
“That grill out back hasn’t been used since Robbie died,” Rose said. “Two years.”
“Then I’ll clean it up and get it going for you.”
An hour later, we were finishing our meal and stacking the dishes. I was rinsing plates in the sink when I felt the light touch of a hand on my shoulder. “What is it?” I asked Eddie, not lifting my head.
“What is what?” Eddie asked. He was standing at the kitchen table five feet away, crumpling the used napkins.
My hands went still. I stood there, wondering what had just happened. Wondering who had touched me. Wondering why.
Eddie frowned at me. “April? Are you okay?”
Why?
My hands dropped to the counter. My stomach twisted. Cold sweat started on my back, but it wasn’t the same cold I’d felt on Atticus Line, the icy breath in the hot, sweltering air. This was a different cold, the cold of pure dread. The cold of fear blooming inside me.
Something bad is about to happen.
Was it a thought, or a voice?
“April?” Eddie said again.
