“Is that why he went down?” I ask. “He ran out of fuel?”
Shawn shakes his head. “According to the case files, he had plenty of fuel. Nearly a full tank, in fact.”
“Then he stopped somewhere else, right?”
“These say that he stopped once between the two locations. Same place every trip. There and back.” He points to another marker on the map, roughly halfway between the two points. The whole time, I can feel his eyes on me, waiting for me to draw the parallel.
“Then how did he still have nearly a full tank of fuel?”
“Exactly. There arenootherstops recorded on that particular trip. He should have been close to needing a refuel. Not completely full.”
“But that doesn’t make sense.”
“No,” he agrees. “It doesn’t. Unless these aren’t the real flight logs. It’s entirely possible he was lying about where he was going.”
I study the map, my stomach churning. Lying? More lies? Who was I married to? “That’s sloppy, right? If someone is going to file false flight plans, then why wouldn’t they cover every base?”
“Unless he wanted to leave a trail if anything were to happen to him,” Shawn offers.
The thought brings tears to my eyes, so I rapidly blink them away. “You think he knew he was in danger?”
“I think it’s a possibility.” Shawn’s phone dings, so he reaches in to pull it out of his pocket. Once he reads the screen, he grins. “We might be able to find out where he was really going.” After shoving his phone back into his pocket, he crosses over toward the door and pulls it open.
“You owe mebig,” a woman says as she strolls into his house with a laptop bag over her shoulder. She looks to be in her early twenties, and her black hair is cut bluntly at her shoulders, with a matching blunt cut on thick bangs that are dyed a bright red.
There’s a hoop in her nose, and her eyes are painted smoky black. Wearing black jeans with holes in them and a baggy t-shirt with the word “Salty” across it, she doesn’t fit the bill of someone who works at the police department with Shawn.
So who is she?
“As you told me when I asked for the favor in the first place,” Shawn replies. “Jemma, this is Beckett Wallace. Beckett, Jemma.”
Jemma beams at me, her brown gaze studying me as she offers me her hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“You, too,” I reply.
Jemma releases my hand and sets her laptop down on top of the kitchen table before taking a seat, clearly comfortable in his space.
Is this a girlfriend?
Even as it makes no sense, jealousy curdles in my stomach.No. We’re investigating the murder of my husband. I will not be jealous if the detective has a girlfriend. Even if that detective is handsome, kind, and the only man to make me feel anything in years.
“What did you find?” Shawn asks as he stands right behind her chair, arms crossed.
“It took some digging, but once I managed to narrow down the shadows cast from the trees, as well as the types of trees and a lot of other really boring things you don’t care about, I managed to get a hit off your picture.”
As I move to stand beside Shawn, I look over her shoulder at her computer.
“This was taken at a private airstrip south of Seattle. Andnotthe one your guy had logged as his ending journey.”
“What do you mean?” Ice floods my veins. So hewaslying to me. From suspecting it moments ago to the confirmation now, betrayal churns my stomach. Where was he going?
“You said he was stopping at Echo Valley Airstrip, right?” she asks.
I nod.
“Well, this picture was taken at Velocity Ridge Airfield. It’s so private that you have to know a member of their aviation club to be given the coordinates. You show up unannounced? No one ever hears from you again.”
“But I’m guessing you have the coordinates.”
