A motive would be nice.
“The oldest body in the woods,” Lucy breathed out. “Have they been able to determine COD?”
“Not yet.”
“What if . . . ?” Lucy squinted up at the sun, some of the puzzle pieces so tantalizingly close yet so far away at the same time. “What if the oldest body was the serial killer’s first victim? Or one of their first. Kate Martinez witnessed something she wasn’t supposed to. Ran with her family, but the killer found her.”
“That would explain the weapon choice. Guns are easier for less experienced people,” Vaughn said, easily following Lucy’s logic. “They create distance.”
Most people didn’t understand that. They didn’t grasp the fact that a knife required intimacy, dedication. A gun, you could just pull the trigger. A knife, you had to sink into a victim’s body.
“Or,” Vaughn continued when Lucy didn’t say anything further, “Eliza is a copycat killer. And we’re dealing with two murderers here instead of one.”
“But how would she have even known about Kate’s murder? The verse?” Lucy asked. “Those weren’t in the newspaper articles about the death. Hell, they weren’t even noted in the police file.”
“If you knew what to look for, you could see it in the photographs,” Vaughn pointed out.
“But how would Eliza even have access to the file?”
Hicks. The obvious answer hung in the silence between them.
“Okay, okay,” Lucy said slowly. “What’s going on here? Eliza somehow stumbles upon information about a girl who worked at her ranch while Eliza was a kid? Then she thought, Hey that sounds like a fun idea?”
They both knew that theory was absurd and Vaughn didn’t even validate it with a response.
“Okay, more likely the killer is someone in the Knox Hollow community,” Lucy said. “And Eliza knows who it is but is scared to go to . . .”
Hicks. Again with Hicks.
“The local law enforcement,” Vaughn finished dryly, knowing exactly what Lucy was hesitating to say out loud. “Even if she didn’t have access to the file, which she still might have, you’re mentioned in the articles about Martinez’s death.”
“She wanted me to connect the killings.” She asked for me? “But how did she even know what happened to Noah? How did she know where the knife was buried?”
Vaughn didn’t have the answers, of course. But asking the questions helped Lucy collect her thoughts.
“Noah is the wrong piece,” she finally said, quietly, to herself more than to Vaughn. “The rest makes sense. It lines up with how a serial killer operates. Refining their methods. Maybe even narrowing down on victim type. If Molly Thomas turns out to be the last victim, then we are seeing a pattern of young women start to emerge.”
“But Noah blows it all up,” Vaughn said. “Not only is the victim completely different from the emerging pattern, the killer has fallen back on old methods, like using the verse.”
“Are there any cases that have presented like that before?” Lucy asked. She knew her history, the famous cases, the nonfamous ones. She had a solid grasp of the psychology involved in serial murders, understood theories on escalation and methodology. But she was far from an expert.
“Nothing comes to mind,” Vaughn said, sounding reluctant to admit she might not have an encyclopedic knowledge of the topic.
In the end, it didn’t matter what the norm was. This particular serial killer had reverted. What Lucy needed to do was figure out why.
Lucy blew out a breath. “I need coffee.”
Vaughn hummed sympathetically. “I’ll work on getting you more information on the Martinez case.”
“Thanks,” Lucy said as she hung up and continued toward the sheriff’s office, her thoughts disorganized. She could already see Zoey waiting outside for her, just her silhouette at this distance. The woman lifted her hand in greeting when Lucy neared.
Part of her wanted to tell Zoey about the Martinez case, but something held her back.
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Zoey. Despite her protestations to the contrary, Zoey actually seemed like a decent cop. Maybe not a standout, but certainly smart enough to keep up.
Still, Lucy hesitated, thinking of their conversation on the way back from Peggy’s. She’d walked away from that with the distinct impression that Deputy Zoey Grant had secrets. Lucy had already seen how that turned out with the sheriff.
“No new developments, then?” Zoey asked as she unlocked the building, casual, like she had been this entire case. Lucy was probably being paranoid.
“Nothing.” Lucy let her real exhaustion show, scrubbing a hand over her face. “Feels like I’m spinning my wheels here.”
They crossed through the small bullpen to Zoey’s office. There was no one else in the building, not that Lucy was surprised. It was far too early on a Sunday for most people to be up and about.
Lucy’s phone vibrated once in her pocket—a message, not a call—and she unlocked the screen, thumbing open her inbox as they settled into Zoey’s office.
When a surprised “Huh” slipped out at the sender’s name, Zoey looked over from where she’d been studying the whiteboard.
“What?”
Lucy tapped into the email itself. “The coroner actually sent me something I asked for.”
Zoey’s nose wrinkled. “Jackson? What did you want?”
“A list,” Lucy said absently. “Of all the kids from Knox Hollow who have died when he’s been coroner.”
The message itself was curt, but there was a spreadsheet attached. Lucy opened that to find too many names listed in harsh black and white. The scone Annie Tate had shoved into her hands as she’d passed the kitchen that morning turned to lead in her stomach.
“I’m shocked,” Zoey commented. “Jackson usually fights tooth and nail against us. I would have put money on him conveniently ‘forgetting’ you had wanted something from him.”
“That was my guess, too.” She would have gotten a warrant if he’d stalled long enough, but she was thankful she didn’t have to.
Lucy pushed to her feet, crossing to the whiteboard and creating a new column next to Eliza’s and Noah’s names.
“There’s a lot of them,” she told Zoey, who had come to stand at her shoulder. She handed over the phone. “Can you tell me the ones who aren’t connected to the Church first?”
Because whatever this was, Lucy was fairly certain it was tied up in that group.
“I’ll try.” Zoey took the phone gingerly, cradling it as if the names needed her to be careful.
Eliminating the non-Church kids turned out to be the easy part. There were only a handful on there, much like what would have been expected in a town the size of Knox Hollow. There had been two drownings, a kid who had broken his neck falling from his horse, a hunting accident, and then four who had died of cancer. That last category was perhaps a little higher than Lucy would have guessed, but in rural areas without easy access to specialists or high-tech equipment, it wasn’t that shocking.
The rest of the names were from the Church, the vast majority of them infants. It was something like out of the old West, where pregnancy and labor were a very real, fatal threat. And these were only the actual deaths. Lucy couldn’t imagine how many women probably had suffered through major complications.