“I’m going to need a description of the blonde.Which bar?”
“I didn’t look at the name.”A shrug.“Grey will know.It was his idea.”
Huh.Grey’s idea.Grey had conveniently been the only housemate missing on the day of the murder, plus he’d known they’d be searching the area near Burr Hill.He’d gone to Georgetown, the same as Ruby, and he’d hung out with her and her friend Tina on occasion.Tina, who’d since disappeared.Her moonlight flit hadn’t rung alarm bells at the time because for Celtina Ulrich, taking off in the middle of the night was normal.She camped in her car to watch a meteor shower in Voyageurs National Park.She drove to the beach and slept on the sand dunes.She headed to a music festival, talked her way through security, and partied backstage with the bands.In some ways, she’d been like Ruby—both were pretty, outgoing, and easy to get along with.But Ruby hadn’t shared Tina’s reckless streak.
“Yeah, I need to have a chat with Grey.”
“Tell me we’re going to get to the bottom of this?”
“We are.And speaking of the bottom of things, we found Amie’s car.”
“Where?”
“In a lake near Burr Hill, alongside a sunken boat, a rusty lawn chair, and a fifty-gallon drum that may or may not contain a body.”
Thank fuck for underwater drones.Even with a drysuit, diving in near-freezing water wasn’t one of Jez’s favourite activities.The car had rolled down a slope, dropped over an underwater shelf, and come to rest twenty feet beneath the surface.For now, that was where it would stay.The state police didn’t have a state-of-the-art drone, or an unlimited budget, or more than a dozen brain cells between them.Rimer had been keeping a low profile since the episode in the forest.She’d released a statement saying Justin was no longer a person of interest with regard to Amie’s murder, but beyond that?Zip.
Which was also what they had on the blond guy.He still hadn’t been identified.His prints weren’t in the system, ditto for his DNA, and he had no obvious identifying marks.No tattoos, no scars, no surgical implants.Dental records might confirm ID if they found a name, but those were held by individual dentists—there was no searchable national database.The team’s next path would be genetic genealogy, and Priest knew a guy who knew a gal who might be able to help, but that would take time.
“A body?”Justin asked.“Are you joking?”
“Anything’s possible.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose.“Are the cops going to winch the car out?”
“So they can find your underwear in the glove compartment?I hope not.”
“But I wasn’t in— Oh.”
“Exactly.”
“Do you think Jessie and I are still in danger?”
“They won’t come at you again, not right now.If they do try, it’ll be in a year or two when your guard is down, but we’ll find them before that.”
Justin stared out the window, watching the crew of specialists installing the new security cameras.Echo had designed the system, and once the team was done here, they’d move on to Norquist Construction’s office.After learning of Amie’s fate, the staff there had begun coming and going in pairs when they weren’t speaking with the grief therapist Justin had hired.
“How?How will we find them when we have nothing to go on?”
Wait for them to come at Serafina.
“We have leads—your blonde hookup and the dead guy in the morgue,” Jez said.“It would’ve helped if Jessalyn hadn’t shot him in the face.Doesn’t she know she should aim for centre mass?”
Justin just stared at her.
“Okay, we’ll add firearms training to the to-do list.”
Along with working out how a third party could have gotten into Blackstone House to kill Ruby, and what the hell had motivated her murder.And they needed to do all that before the next national-security-related crisis sent the Choir off on another job.A regular murder wasn’t a point team priority.The Bugs—more officially known as Point Team Alpha—were already bitching about blood in their helicopter after Jez scrambled them to provide support following the shooting.
“She doesn’t want to learn to kill people better,” Justin said.“She just wants to make cooking videos and walk her dog without having to worry about being kidnapped.”
“Proper gun control will help with that.”
“So will moving to Abu Dhabi,” he muttered.
“They won’t need to kidnap her there; they’ll just wait for her to drown in her own sweat.”
The UAE was hotter than Vegas, and then there was the fucking humidity…
