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“She didn’t,” Ruth said. “She’s nineteen-years-old, Chav. She doesn’t always tell me where she’s off to.”
My stomach sank. “I think you better come over to the police station.”
“Why?”
Damn it. I didn’t know what to say. There was no logical reason for the killers to take two people. The murders had been organized, ritualistic. Two victims wouldn’t follow the pattern. “Jo Jo Corman’s been taken. We could use your help.”
I heard her gasp. “You don’t think…”
“I really don’t, but just in case, you should be here.”
“I’m on my way.” She hung up without another word.
Twenty minutes later, most of the town and many of the Jubilee attendees crowded the courthouse lawn. They were divided up into groups and given sections of land to scour. Ruth and Ed had both come, along with their son Taylor, Tyler’s twin, and their next oldest Dakota, to join the search. They stood near Brady—all of them huddled for comfort in a way that made my heart break.
Dominic approached our group, which made Billy Bob squeeze my fingers until I thought my nails would pop off. “Ease up, Doc.”
“I don’t like him.”
“I get that, but he’s really a nice guy.” Absently, I put my hand in my pocket to touch the star I’d lifted from the deputy’s desk.
“Uh huh,’’ he said, looking wholly unconvinced.
“Chavvah.” Dominic flashed me a smile then frowned at Billy Bob. “Dr. Smith.”
“Tartan,” Billy Bob said.
“Ow.” I pinched the top of his hand with my free one until he eased up on his hold. “Do you know where Hans Fisk is? Is he off with the Lowry brothers?”
Dominic’s cheeks dented as if he were chewing on the inside. Finally, he said, “I saw Hans and Bethany Hilliard earlier.”
“Together?”
He shrugged. “It was probably politics. It got pretty heated.”
Could Bethany and Hans be in on the killings together? After all, he’d left the restaurant before me yesterday. He would have had time to get into the restaurant ahead of me. “Hmmm. How early?”
Jo Jo had been gone before Brady had gotten up, and he’d called Sunny around eight.
“I’m not sure. A couple of hours ago maybe.”
“And you,” I asked. “Where were you this morning?”
“Am I a suspect, Chavvah?”
I hadn’t seriously considered Dom a suspect, but his reluctance to answer the question made me suspicious.
Billy Bob had been quiet up until then. “Everyone we don’t know is a suspect, Tartan. You could be one of the killers as easy as anyone.”
“Now, Doc. He was still at the restaurant when I got nabbed yesterday.”
He turned his dark gaze on me with swift rebuke. “There are two of them, Chav. You don’t think one of them could have been out in the public while the other did the dirty work.”
Ouch. I hated to admit it, but my knight in shining gray fur had a point. Only, I wasn’t going to let anyone treat me like a damsel in distress.
“Is Sunny going to join the search?” Dominic asked just as casually as I had posed my question.
My hackles rose. “What do you want with Sunny?”
