Adele whistled, shaking her head.
“Maybe the tourist angle is right,” said Leoni. He looked up at her now, and she could see his bloodshot eyes from his lack of sleep.
“You look horrible,” she said.
“And you look lovely as always.”
“You should really get some rest.”
“Can’t,” Leoni said, closing the screen and clicking the laptop shut.
“Can’t?”
“Our flight is already booked. Tracked the owner of the website. Mr. Von Ziegler himself.”
“Yeah, where’s he out of?”
“Austria. Our flight leaves within the hour. Ready to go?”
“Hang on, Austria?”
“Yes. Ready?”
Adele sighed. And she had thought she was unstoppable when she caught a scent. Also, Leoni was no use to her half asleep. “I’m fine,” she said. “How about you?”
He waved away the worry. “Me too. Did you enjoy those drinks last night?”
Adele gave a chagrined sigh. “I may have overdone it a little.”
Leoni patted her on the hand, and then she noticed his bag was already on the bed, packed. “I’m good to go,” he said. “I’ll be waiting at the curb. Do you need help with anything?”
Adele shook her head and said, “Maybe you’re right about the tourist angle.” She gestured toward the computer. “Certainly damning comments from someone who has interior photographs of the locations. Doesn’t seem at all broken up about the deaths of the tourists.”
“But? You’re speaking like there’s a but.”
“I still don’t think tourism is the right angle.”
“You don’t want to at least check it out?”
Adele paused for a moment, considering the flight, feeling like she was being tugged around like a puppy with a collar. Then again, no bodies had dropped in the night. No further deaths. Which meant the killer would inevitably strike now. He was on a rampage, and he wouldn’t stop. Especially given the new riddle.
If they were wrong this time, there would be no third chances. And this game was counted in corpses.
Adele felt a bit of her usual fire return, and she gritted her teeth, turning and marching back toward the slightly open door. “I’ll meet you in the parking lot. I get the window seat on the plane.”
“Done!” he called after her.
Adele hurried over to her room, tapping her hands against her thigh, and wondering if perhaps she should keep Ms. Jayne apprised. The Interpol correspondent had been clear about tracking the tourist angle even though Adele had felt this was a mistake.
Were her instincts off? She felt something else was going on here. But maybe her gut wasn’t serving her as well as it used to. Maybe the cowardice of running from Paris, hiding in Germany, fleeing her obligations was finally catching up with her.
She hated the thought, but maybe she’d abandoned her position.
Adele packed what items she had brought with these troubling thoughts leeching into her mind.
Whatever the case, this Austrian author had means and motive, and it was up to her to find out if he also had opportunity.
Killers were all the same after all. Just different degrees of selfish narcissists. Different degrees of cold-hearted and often broken malevolence.
She felt her phone buzz and glanced down. Another message. This one from John Renee. She felt her pulse skip. For a moment, she stared at the text. But then, fingers trembling, she clicked the screen dark without reading the message, and stowed her phone in her pocket. The message would have to wait. The killer in Paris was John’s job. Adele had her own killer to catch. And by the looks of things, he was hiding in Austria. Just a short plane flight away.
CHAPTER TWENTY
The airplane was nearly empty this time, and Adele could hear her own thoughts whirring in her mind. Did it make sense the killer would be in Austria now? The website had damming evidence. As she sat in first-class, her elbow jutting toward where Leoni was scanning his laptop screen again, she also flicked through her phone to the stored webpage. The author of the guidebook, Days Away, clearly had no love lost for the murder victims.
The air-conditioning was turned off above her. The small service light was also dim. She breathed a soft sigh in the nearly empty plane, grateful for the momentary respite to catch her breath. The flight to Austria wouldn’t take long, but Adele knew she needed to focus. The rantings of a crazed author against tourists was one thing, but the riddle seemed another piece of writing altogether. It wasn’t that authors couldn’t also pen riddles.
But there was something measured to the riddle. Something playful, even taunting. Something shouting Catch me if you can!
Could she?
Adele closed her eyes, feeling the sandpaper sensation again from earlier, wishing she’d drunk a little less the night before. As she did, leaning back, trying to get comfortable, she realized she was asking the wrong question. It wasn’t a matter of could. Her ability wasn’t in question.
But sometimes, even the most able ships passed in the night. It didn’t matter the guns, the sails, the reinforced hull—if a ship missed its target in the mist, then no manner of upgrades or preparation or even skill would matter.
In order to catch a murderer, Adele had to find him first. She was getting closer… she could feel it. But would their paths cross? Would Mr. Von Ziegler even be home? Or was he out now, while the agents hunting him returned to his home instead of solving his riddle? What if Mr. Von Ziegler was already stalking his next victim?
Adele kept her eyes closed, shivering at the thought. She needed to sleep, but, more importantly, she needed to solve this. She brought back to mind the words in the newest riddle, mulling them over and allowing them to cycle, one after the other, leaving no stone unturned.
…My heart is cast in stone.
Stone. The most important word at the end of the sentence. Stone. She had it… she knew she was close… It was a word on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn’t quite find it. It remained out of reach, even as she rested on the plane, her body limp in the seat, but her mind abuzz.
***
It seemed fitting to Adele that an unstable travel expert in Austria lived in a tree house.
“You’re joking,” Leoni said, his neck craned back as he peered up at the structure built across two thick oaks.
Adele shook her head. “This is the address.”
She glanced along the trail they’d come down in the local police cruiser that had been sent to pick them up from the Vienna International Airport. In the distance, against a backdrop of low mountains, the air was pristine and clear. Adele could feel it cool as she inhaled the fresh breeze.
The muddy trail behind them, where the Austrian officer awaited their return in the car, was mostly obscured by overgrowth, with patches of grass threatening to strangle it. No other vehicles as far as Adele could see. But the house—what looked to be a trailer home hoisted in the branches—had no visible approach.
She craned her neck back, feeling the eyes of the Austrian policeman peering out at her from his vehicle. One country to the next, moving around Europe like a child playing hopscotch. Adele was beginning to resent the killer on the move.