THORN:Hunt.I didn’t hunt anybody. My sparrows weren’t prey, and they deserve to be spoken about with more respect.
HALLIWELL:Respect? You want to lecture me about respect, you sick son of a bitch? You slaughtered six innocent women. Seven, if we count Sarah, and guess what, Gabriel—Idocount Sarah. That firearm did not go off by “accident.” You pulled the trigger. You killed your wife. Intentionally.
THORN:No. I didn’t.
HALLIWELL:And you killed the others. Thewomen—do you get that, Gabriel? They werewomen.Human beings.Not your little birds or your little playthings. You abducted them, you tortured them, you raped them—
THORN:I didn’t torture or rape anybody—
HALLIWELL:—and then you put a knife in their hearts and watched them die. And now you’resitting here, smiling, telling us how much you loved them, how you cared for them.
THORN:That is the truth.
HALLIWELL:You don’t kill the things you love.
THORN:Could I please get that glass of water now?
[recording stopped 9:42 PM]
[recording started 10:14 PM]
HALLIWELL:Let’s talk about your last victim. Leah Devereaux. How well did you know her?
THORN:Not well. She was close with my sister-in-law and her husband.
HALLIWELL:The Shipleys.
THORN:Yes. But Sarah and I didn’t socialize with many people. And as I’ve already stated, my wife and her sister were estranged.
HALLIWELL:Then why?
THORN:Why what?
HALLIWELL:Why did you target Leah?
THORN:Did you know, Sheriff, that the light doesn’t love everyone? Some subjects, no matter how beautiful, sit in the light like a shadow. Flat and unwilling to reflect any of it back. Leah? The lightdancedon her. It danced! It skipped down the planes of her face and rested there, like it couldn’t help itself.
HALLIWELL:No more of your cryptic bullshit, Gabriel. Stop smiling. Look at me, damn it. Stop smiling.
twenty-two
Nothing Will Bring Her Back
Jasmine follows through on her threat. She’s back on the case. With a vengeance.
After cheerleading practice on Thursday, she cancels her plans with Nikki and Gillian and announces we’re spending the night coming up with a solid location list.
Now we’re in our room, and she taps the screen, pulling up a map of Starling and its outskirts. “The lake or the woods,” she says, all business, “aka two massive areas that we’ll never be able to search completely. But that old lumberyard, the one outside of town? What if they’rethere?”
My heart skips a beat. I remember the lumberyard. My father used to go there all the time. He was friendly with the guy who ran the place. One of the only townspeople he could tolerate.
“You’ve read up on the case, right?” She’s oblivious to my racing thoughts.
“Some,” I say with a shrug.
“So I’m sure you heard the lumberman theory.”
“Something about the bodies being thrown into a wood chipper?”
