AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She slid her phone off the counter and began to key in a text message. “Let me check with Jade to see if she needs anything. You go on up.”
“Nah, I’ll let the dogs out one more time. Who knows? Maybe I’ll catch a glimpse of Scott.”
“If so, make my case about haunting Birk until he comes around to our way of thinking.”
Lucien chuckled as he called to the dogs. As soon as he opened the French door, Stella and Poppy scampered into the night until they found a place to pee.
A stiff breeze whistled through the orchard. A few fallen leaves churned on the ground. It was the only sound in the yard as the dried debris tumbled toward the guest house before lodging up against the outside wall.
No lights on in the cottage, Lucien mused. It meant Jade had gone to bed. He thought back to Birk’s outburst and wondered if that relationship had any chance of surviving.
He hurried up the dogs, but a movement under the lemon trees caught his eye. He squinted to bring the figure into focus. Was it the ghostly Scott? He couldn’t make out the image, but it appeared more human than ghost.
“Who’s out there?” Lucien yelled.
That got Stella’s attention. The ordinarily quiet greyhound began to growl, then bark. Poppy followed suit in her yappy voice.
The clamor alerted the lone figure.
Lucien saw him take off, heading toward the beach. Before he could stop Stella, the greyhound darted through the orchard, moving at top speed.
Lucien dashed after Stella with Poppy at his heels. Stella kept gaining on the human target. She reached the dunes and rounded through the beachgrass. But with a healthy head start, the man had disappeared into the darkness.
Winded, Lucien called out, “Come on back, girl. He’s gone. Come on now.”
Stella trotted toward him but kept turning her head, looking back over her shoulder. The greyhound’s eyes fixated on something shiny in the tall grass. But it was Poppy who plopped down next to a ten-inch knife, the blade glistening in the moonlight.
“What’s going on here?” Brogan asked, out of breath. “I heard the commotion and saw you guys take off running.” Her eyes landed on Poppy. She scooped up the Bichon, then focused on the knife. “Where did that come from?”
“Looks like our late-night visitor left it behind.”
“We had a late-night visitor?”
Lucien bent to retrieve the knife, grasping the tip so as not to destroy fingerprint evidence. “Yeah. Young, probably under thirty, athletic. He certainly outran Stella and me. The question is, what was he doing here, spying on us, hiding in the orchard, and why did he feel the need to bring a butcher knife with him?”
“I don’t like the sound of that. Besides, it looks more like a dagger than something you’d use to carve up a turkey. I knew detective work had an element of danger, but looking at the size of that thing makes me realize we might be dealing with a psycho. What on earth did he intend to do with it?”
“I don’t even want to consider the possibilities. Let’s get back to the house and check the security cams. We’re not doing any good standing here in the dark.”
Apprehensive, Brogan scanned the beach, her eyes darting from the water to the shoreline. Squeezing Poppy a little tighter, she reached out to Stella with her free hand. Bringing the greyhound closer into her body, she rubbed behind the dog’s ears. “You’re such a good girl looking out for us, aren’t you, baby?”
Stella whined and buried her nose against Brogan. They followed Lucien past the orchard and made their way into the house. Once inside, Brogan turned the lock on the doors.
“We should mention this to Jade just so she’s aware we had a stranger hanging around,” Lucien suggested.
“Don’t worry. I will. First thing tomorrow, I’m getting together with Jade and Kelly to review everything we have. We’ll do a deep dive into our top suspects, even if we need to travel. If our visitor thinks he can scare us into quitting this case, he’s in for a major disappointment.”
12
Exhumations were usually quiet, unassuming affairs—unless they occurred in a high-profile case or, in this instance, a small town. Two happening in one day was almost unheard of, considered sacrilege even.
Yet, by six-thirty this Monday morning, Brent had sectioned off two separate areas of the cemetery to ensure privacy. The exhumation team, wearing protective clothing, had set up screens around Gidget’s and Vera’s gravesites to protect them from public viewing. This extra measure allowed the transfer of caskets to their new shells used for transport to the morgue.
While Brent made sure the workers treated the adjacent burial plots respectfully, Colt and Eastlyn were tasked with shooing away any nosy onlookers who got too close.
But there were vantage points where prying eyes with lawn chairs could set up and use binoculars to get a look from a distance. They wouldn’t see much. Brent made sure of that. He did allow Lucien to show up for Jane Doe.
“Brogan declined, I take it,” Brent said when he saw Lucien there by himself.
