Chosen to Die by Lisa Jackson

woman would have enough sense to call out. Unless she was injured, couldn’t reach the phone.
    Or had been abducted by a deranged human being.
    Selena tucked in her shoulders, physically fending that idea off. Pescoli had sounded irritated on the message she’d left, ready to wring her ex-husband’s neck. But that wasn’t a news flash. Regan and Lucky had suffered a bad marriage and, as she’d always said, “a badder divorce.”
    Alvarez didn’t leave a message, just kept driving along the plowed county road where the snow was covered in gravel and had packed hard over the pavement. To access the side roads, a vehicle had to burst through the icy berm that had been left in the wake of the plows.
    Fir and pine trees, needles laden with ice and snow, stood guard as she located the private lane leading to Pescoli’s cabin. Snow nearly obliterated the tire ruts; no car, truck, or SUV had come or gone in a long while.
    She navigated the winding lane, laying fresh tracks through the trees and across a small bridge before the cabin came into view. Pescoli’s son’s truck was parked to one side, snow piled high, but the garage door was down and the only lights that glowed through the windows were the colored strands of a Christmas tree.
    Alvarez parked near Jeremy’s truck, grabbed a tissue and swiped at her nose, then climbed outside and broke a path in the snow to the front door. On the porch, she knocked and waited. But the house was quiet. No sounds of voices, or a television, or their yapping little terrier came from within. In fact, the place seemed ethereally silent as night slid through the surrounding thickets.
    She hit the doorbell and knocked again, but got no response. “Pescoli?” she yelled. “It’s Alvarez!” Her voice bounced back at her, echoing through the deep canyons surrounding this isolated little house. On the porch she walked from one window to the next, shading her eyes against the reflection on the glass, noting that the house was empty, not a light on aside from the soft glow of the Christmas tree. Even the television was dark. She spied dishes on the counter and an open pizza box on a small table, but no signs of life. Nor evidence of foul play.
    She walked around all sides of the cabin that hung on the side of a hill. On the backside, where the hill sloped, she peered into a window to Jeremy’s room, but it, too, was dark.
    No one was inside.
    Once she’d looked through all the windows of the house, she backtracked to the garage, found a small window, and standing on her tiptoes peered inside. Empty.
    The whole family was gone.
    A bad feeling followed Alvarez as she looked around for places someone would hide a key. Nothing under the mat or in the pots near the front door. She checked under the eaves and on the window casings.
    Nada.
    She’s a cop. It wouldn’t be near the door.
    Alvarez retraced her steps to the garage and searched, but found nothing, then circumvented the house again and stopped at the far side near the back of the fireplace where she noticed a vent. Unlikely.
    “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”
    She pulled the glove off with her teeth, then searched the vent and felt a bit of metal hanging inside. “Eureka,” she muttered. Within seconds, she’d taken it to the back door and walked into the kitchen where the smells of pepperoni and cheese still lingered.
    “Pescoli?” she called, slowly making her way through the small house. A living room with an attached dining area and the kitchen were empty. The Christmas tree leaned precariously in the corner near the mantel, a few scattered packages beneath its decorated limbs. Magazines and yesterday’s newspaper, with a bold headline about the Star-Crossed Killer, were scattered over a battered coffee table and well-used couch. The bathroom, choked with hair and skin products, was bone dry, no moisture clinging to the mirror or beads of water in the tub/shower combo. Regan’s daughter’s room was a mess. CDs,