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“Nickolas Sleigh.”
“Nick? Aggie’s Nick?” Jonathon’s expression had gone from confused to angry. “Nick is the Nursery Rhyme Killer?”
“No.”
“But you said the DNA matched Nick. Stop beating around the bush and just tell us what you found,” Jonathon growled.
“It was a familial match.”
“Nick’s parents are dead, his only relative is his brother,” Jonathon said.
“His brother who just showed up in town right when these murders started,” Allina said softly. Could it be true? Could Luke Sleigh be the killer? She knew Nick, she hadn’t always liked some of the things he’d done, but she knew he was basically a good guy. She couldn’t imagine his brother being a serial killer.
“Clara said that Aggie told her that Luke came back because he felt bad he didn’t come to the wedding and wanted to start building a relationship with his brother,” Jonathon told them. “I can't see him murdering people, especially a baby.”
“Then how did his DNA get on the baby blanket?” she asked quietly. She didn’t want to believe that the brother of someone she knew reasonably well was a killer, but more than anything she wanted to end this before anyone else died.
“I don’t know. But this, I just can't believe that. Are you sure, Kane?”
“I’m sure that the DNA found on the baby’s blanket is a familial match to Nick, that’s it. I did find something else.”
“What?” she asked.
“The killer also left behind Timmy’s pacifier, it had a nice clear print on it. We can compare a set of prints from Luke Sleigh with what I found. If they match, that’s further confirmation that he was there.”
“There has to be another explanation for how Luke’s DNA got on there.” Jonathon didn’t look pleased with this progression in the case.
“Like what? I'm all ears, I don’t want the killer to turn out to be Nick’s brother either, but at the moment that seems to be what the forensics are suggesting.”
“Maybe he ran into her somewhere, or he knows her,” her partner suggested.
“Are you saying you think there’s a possibility Luke could be the baby’s father?” That could certainly be the case. Every family member and friend they had spoken with said that Megan had gone into a bit of a downward spiral after the end of a three-year relationship and taken to sleeping with men she didn’t know and met at bars. Timmy’s father could be anyone. Including Luke Sleigh.
“I'm not suggesting that, but I suppose it’s theoretically possible and it should be easy enough to prove one way or the other. Kane, can you run a DNA test on Timmy and the sample you found on the blanket?” Jonathon asked.
“Sure.” Kane nodded. “I’ll do that now and let you know the results.”
The door swung closed behind Kane then immediately swung back open, and Tracey entered.
“You got a cause of death for us on Timmy Hunter?” Allina asked.
“Yes. He died from hypothermia. My guess would be the baby was still alive when he dumped Megan’s body, and he simply put him in the basket and left him there.”
“He didn’t just leave him,” Jonathon corrected. “He took the baby’s clothes off and left him naked in a basket outdoors in winter.”
Allina could feel the anger crackling off her partner, and she was just as angry. What kind of monster left a helpless baby in the snow?
“He always intended for Timmy to die, if he didn’t, he wouldn’t have left the rhyme. If he wanted to leave him for someone to find there were a number of places he could have dropped him off. He chose the park because it was quiet, and he could stage his scene uninterrupted. He wanted to kill both mother and son.”
“Why leave him to die of hypothermia though?” she wondered aloud. “The rhyme has the baby falling from a tree, he could have dropped him from a height to make it fit more closely with the rhyme, but he didn’t.”
“Maybe something interrupted him,” Tracey suggested.
“He could have seen someone and panicked, left before he was finished,” Jonathon agreed.
“He’d already killed Megan before he brought her there. Same with Zoe, he killed her somewhere else then transported the body to leave her in a location where she would be found. So why not kill Timmy wherever he had them stashed?” she asked.
“Maybe he didn’t have any trees there,” Jonathon said.
