sudden image of him leaning closer. Meeting him partway…
But then his mouth broke into another faint smile. “As you wish, ma’am. Sorry I got in the way. I’ll make sure I don’t make the same mistake again.” He sauntered away and disappeared into the night.
She rolled up her window and stared after him, then focused on the tavern, where lights pulsed at the windows and the muffled music seemed to shake the roof. This bar wasn’t the only possibility. There were other places like this, that some of the victims had frequented before their deaths. Even so, their propensity for seeking out the wild side on Saturday nights might not have had any connection at all to the killer.
He could be a convenience store clerk.
A ski bum, hanging around the area for the winter.
A teacher or cowhand or anyone else.
He could be someone she knew well…and there were just twenty days left until the next full moon.
She had an entire county to cover. A county filled with some of the most rugged terrain in this hemisphere, where there were endless places to hide. God, help me find this guy. And please, help me do it before another innocent woman dies.
SIX
M egan pulled into her long, curving driveway at two in the morning, feeling as if she’d downed an overload of caffeine. Her thoughts raced back through the evening, over and over.
Had she missed anything at the Halfway House Tavern?
Skimmed past the killer’s face without any sense of the evil that lurked behind a casual smile or offhand glance?
All the way home, she’d checked her rearview mirror hoping to see the twin pinpricks of light signifying that someone was following her. A couple times, she’d thought she saw exactly that—but then the lights turned off onto some side road and disappeared.
She had to be the only woman on the planet who was disappointed that she hadn’t picked up a stalker.
Turning off the ignition, she speed-dialed Ewan and told him she’d come up dry, though he’d need to start monitoring that tavern far more closely for bar license violations and the potential for drunk drivers.
She stepped out of her truck and surveyed the chain-link fenced yard for any motion, anything out of place. Tall pine trees crowded close to the rustic, single-story cabin, filtering the moonlight and casting dark shadows despite the single security light over the garage out in back.
The air was still, hushed, as if holding its breath and waiting for something to happen. The silence and eerie isolation of the place pressed in on her as she let herself through the gate and walked to the front door. She unlocked it, then reached inside the door to flip on the porch and interior lights and stood in the open doorway to survey the great room.
Everything was as it had been when she left.
The bright red-and-blue patchwork quilts were still draped over the backs of the sofa and loveseat arranged in front of the stone fireplace. The comfy pair of overstuffed chairs were still in place in the opposite corner, facing the television she rarely had time to watch. And her beloved, original paintings of the Tetons still hung on the walls, done by a local artist she adored.
She breathed a sigh of relief, laughing off her momentary doubts. And then she froze.
Behind her, she heard the distant low growl of a motor.
The fading crunch of tires on gravel.
She spun around and stared into the darkness, then raced outside back to her truck.
Even on the darkest cloudy nights, the glow of headlights passing on the highway were masked by the curves of the quarter-mile driveway snaking through the dense pine forest. Only the loudest of the timber company trucks hauling massive logs could be heard at her cabin.
Yet she’d heard this vehicle, plain as day.
Whoever was out there hadn’t just been passing on the highway. He’d been closer. In her driveway . Yet hadn’t come on up to the cabin, as an acquaintance would do.
It had sounded as though the vehicle was
But then his mouth broke into another faint smile. “As you wish, ma’am. Sorry I got in the way. I’ll make sure I don’t make the same mistake again.” He sauntered away and disappeared into the night.
She rolled up her window and stared after him, then focused on the tavern, where lights pulsed at the windows and the muffled music seemed to shake the roof. This bar wasn’t the only possibility. There were other places like this, that some of the victims had frequented before their deaths. Even so, their propensity for seeking out the wild side on Saturday nights might not have had any connection at all to the killer.
He could be a convenience store clerk.
A ski bum, hanging around the area for the winter.
A teacher or cowhand or anyone else.
He could be someone she knew well…and there were just twenty days left until the next full moon.
She had an entire county to cover. A county filled with some of the most rugged terrain in this hemisphere, where there were endless places to hide. God, help me find this guy. And please, help me do it before another innocent woman dies.
SIX
M egan pulled into her long, curving driveway at two in the morning, feeling as if she’d downed an overload of caffeine. Her thoughts raced back through the evening, over and over.
Had she missed anything at the Halfway House Tavern?
Skimmed past the killer’s face without any sense of the evil that lurked behind a casual smile or offhand glance?
All the way home, she’d checked her rearview mirror hoping to see the twin pinpricks of light signifying that someone was following her. A couple times, she’d thought she saw exactly that—but then the lights turned off onto some side road and disappeared.
She had to be the only woman on the planet who was disappointed that she hadn’t picked up a stalker.
Turning off the ignition, she speed-dialed Ewan and told him she’d come up dry, though he’d need to start monitoring that tavern far more closely for bar license violations and the potential for drunk drivers.
She stepped out of her truck and surveyed the chain-link fenced yard for any motion, anything out of place. Tall pine trees crowded close to the rustic, single-story cabin, filtering the moonlight and casting dark shadows despite the single security light over the garage out in back.
The air was still, hushed, as if holding its breath and waiting for something to happen. The silence and eerie isolation of the place pressed in on her as she let herself through the gate and walked to the front door. She unlocked it, then reached inside the door to flip on the porch and interior lights and stood in the open doorway to survey the great room.
Everything was as it had been when she left.
The bright red-and-blue patchwork quilts were still draped over the backs of the sofa and loveseat arranged in front of the stone fireplace. The comfy pair of overstuffed chairs were still in place in the opposite corner, facing the television she rarely had time to watch. And her beloved, original paintings of the Tetons still hung on the walls, done by a local artist she adored.
She breathed a sigh of relief, laughing off her momentary doubts. And then she froze.
Behind her, she heard the distant low growl of a motor.
The fading crunch of tires on gravel.
She spun around and stared into the darkness, then raced outside back to her truck.
Even on the darkest cloudy nights, the glow of headlights passing on the highway were masked by the curves of the quarter-mile driveway snaking through the dense pine forest. Only the loudest of the timber company trucks hauling massive logs could be heard at her cabin.
Yet she’d heard this vehicle, plain as day.
Whoever was out there hadn’t just been passing on the highway. He’d been closer. In her driveway . Yet hadn’t come on up to the cabin, as an acquaintance would do.
It had sounded as though the vehicle was
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