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I fucking hate leaving Delilah behind, but it’s got to be done.
By the time Bowden finally comes waddling up to the crime scene, still in his pajama top over his uniform slacks, Janelle’s got her bundled into a change of clothes and whisked away to The Rookery.
At least I know she’s safe with someone.
Henri and I leave the others to keep working the crime scene while we head back to the station to log evidence, handing it over to a pale, shaken Mallory.
I put in a quick call to Raleigh.
We need more than a coroner this time. A few forensics people would be nice, whoever can get that body down without damaging the evidence, plus a few more spare officers, too.
Before we left, Grant said he wanted eyes on the crime scene at all times.
I don’t blame him, but there’s just not enough of us here to do that.
The air was suffocating as I read Delilah’s testimony from Micah’s scratch pad on the drive back—and it stays thick as mud in my mind while Henri drags me over to Grant’s desk and the computer we all steal for our workstation.
“So, after that tip about the pig’s blood,” Henri says, clicking through files and chewing at one corner of his mouth in concentration, “I called Rick down at the butcher’s shop. Asked for his security tapes for the last week. Y’all put me on graveyard shift like the pig fuckers you are, and I figured I could do something to pass the time. That’s how I found this.”
He opens a video file.
The media player window shows us a high angled, grainy shot in washed-out color, looking down on the neat, clean, folksy interior of the town’s butcher shop.
A few people wait in line in front of the register, while a few more browse the big glass displays with red cuts of fresh meat, ground sausage, sweetmeats, you name it.
“See there?” Henri taps the screen over the second guy in line.
I squint closer.
I recognize the build immediately.
He’s tall, lanky, wearing a hoodie and sunglasses.
As he turns a little, looking warily over his shoulder, I glimpse his profile, his mouth, the nervous angles of his face.
“That’s him,” I mutter grimly. “Roger Strunk.”
“Mm-hmm. And look what he’s buying.”
Strunk’s turn at the register comes next. He says something I can’t hear, but jolly old Rick smiles behind the counter and comes back with a large waxed paper carton with a plastic lid.
Through the plastic, I see red liquid washing up the sides, staining the interior of the cup.
“Goddamn.” Cursing, I sit back in my chair. “Pig’s blood.” I glance at the timestamp. “Four days ago? The timeline adds up then.”
Henri nods, pausing the video. “We also know he was alive four days ago, though the corpse is fresh enough that I could’ve guessed that. No decay or bloating. No smell. It looks like your second theory was right, mon ami.”
The implications almost knock me down.
“Yeah. We’ve got two stalkers after Delilah—and one didn’t like the competition.” That sits real fucking uneasy with me. If I had a choice I’d have her under guard in a safe house twenty-four seven. “You know our next steps, don’t you, Henri?”
His eyes narrow. “We don’t have a warrant yet, Lieutenant. We don’t even have probable cause. Just because they’ve got butchering facilities doesn’t mean anything. It’s circumstantial. Same logic makes Rick a suspect, too.”
“We’ll find our probable cause,” I snarl. “Let’s get the fuck out there and keep an eye on the Jacobins.”
Not seeing Delilah for over twenty-four hours eats a hole in me like a cigarette burn.
But Micah promised me she was fine when he volunteered for tonight’s stakeout.
She’s holding up bravely, doing everything she could to help the investigation by scouring her memory for details when he dropped by to check on her this afternoon.
I wish it was me.
I wish it was me checking up on her, comforting her, dragging her into my arms.
Offering an apology.
I was wrong.
I’m not one hundred percent sure of that even now, but it’s slowly settling in bone deep.
Maybe I was right about Montero Arrendell killing my sister, but there was something totally different going on with this case.
I let my own bullshit cloud my judgment. I missed the warning signs.
I almost got Delilah killed.
Hell, she’s been terrorized thanks to my blind spots.
I owe her an apology for that.
But she doesn’t want to see me. Even my texts go unanswered.
I try calling once.
Of course, she doesn’t pick up.
Fuck it.
I’m not heaping more stress on her when she’s already upset and dealing with coming home to a dead body for the second time.
So I’ll do the next best thing.
Find out who the fuck has been stalking her and lock him up in the deepest damned hole on Earth.
I slouch behind the wheel of my patrol car, watching for any movements through the trees. It was a bitch for Micah and me to maneuver this damn thing off-road in the woods.
