CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Tuesday, June 20
6:51 p.m.
Maggie opened the door, her breath stalling in her throat at the sight of Vic standing under her eave. He’d found time to change into a different pair of jeans and a black henley shirt that hugged his chest and shoulders. Apparently she was right on target in her jeans and tank top, because the look he gave her as his eyes swept over her from boots to head made her entire body perk up and take notice. “You look good, Maggie.”
“Do you—” Her voice broke, and she had to clear her throat. “Do you want to come in?”
“Yes. But I won’t.” He gave a half smile. “I promised you a date, and if I come in, leaving is going to be the last thing on either of our minds.”
It struck her that Vic had been driving this thing between them from the start. She’d been a more than willing passenger, but she’d been passive to a criminal degree. No longer. Maggie took a step back, and then another, painfully aware of the way he watched her every move. “You know, I’m not really hungry.”
Vic’s fists clenched. “Maggie, you’re playing havoc with my control.”
“Don’t you ever get tired of being in control of everything?” She reached her arms over her head and pulled her shirt off, leaving her in jeans and her bra. “We don’t need a date, Vic. Even with seven years of distance between us, I know you. A couple hours’ worth of small talk isn’t going to make a difference when you’ve seen me at my worst. If you still want me after that, then I don’t want to waste any more time.”
He stepped into the house and kicked the door shut behind him. “I’ll always want you, Maggie.” Vic stalked toward her, his long striding eating up the distance so fast her heart lodged in her throat. “Always. Endlessly.” And then he was on her, his hands sliding around her waist and jerking her against his body, his mouth taking hers as if it had been his all along.
This time, Maggie didn’t wait for him to drive things. She traced the seam of his lips with her tongue, delving inside when he opened for her. Vic tasted like the peppermints he liked to eat when he was thinking hard on a case. She slid her hands down his chest and back up again. He was so damn big. Big and strong and careful with her in spite of it.
She wanted . . .
Him.
She wanted him.
She broke the kiss long enough to peel his shirt off and let loose a laugh when he undid the back of her bra with a smooth move. “You learned that in high school, didn’t you?”
“Guilty.” His voice went deeper. “Never been so grateful for the girl who took pity on me and showed me how it was done.” Vic lifted her effortlessly, pinning her against the wall, kissing his way down her neck to her breasts without missing a beat. “You are so damn beautiful.” His whiskers rasped over her skin, making her shiver.
She arched her back in a silent offering that he took full advantage of. It was like a fever dream she never wanted to wake up from. Vic was here, his hands on her body, his mouth tracing tantalizing patterns from one nipple to the other. The temptation to close her eyes was almost too much, but she didn’t want to miss a thing.
Not when the one thing she’d always wanted—and always denied herself—was finally within her grasp.
There was nothing standing between them now. They had no reason to stop.
Vic lifted her higher, the wall sliding along her bare back, and licked a line from her belly button to the top of her jeans. “How likely are we to actually knock a hole in your wall?”
She choked. “Pretty likely.”
“Thought so.” He let her slide back down his body until their hips lined up. “Where’s your bed?”
“Door at the end of the hall.” Maggie laughed when he started in that direction. “You can let me down. I’m more than capable of walking.”
“You won’t be when I get through with you.”
She blinked. “You know, the times I pictured what it would be like to go to bed with you never included you being this . . .” She picked and discarded several word choices before settling on “possessive.”
The grin he gave her was the personification of said word. “You’ve spent a lot of time thinking about us.”
“Well . . . yeah.” There was no point in denying it. She clung to him as he walked them to the bed. “Don’t try to say you haven’t.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.” He laid her on the bed and settled his weight between her thighs. “I’ve spent more nights than I can count thinking about what it would mean to have you like this. To be with you like this.”
He moved away long enough to peel her jeans off and strip her out of her underwear and bra. Maggie propped herself up on her elbows and watched, his movements no less sexy for their efficiency. The body he revealed was one she’d pictured time and time again, but her imagination hadn’t done it justice. In normal cases, Vic was in the gym during his downtime because the physical activity helped him put things together. Apparently that was a habit he still had, because his body was cut. “Jeez, Vic.”
He stopped, his hands on the button of his jeans. “Second thoughts?”
“No. God, no.” She sat up fully. “I’m just admiring the goods.”
His eyes darkened. “You’re not the only one.” He left his jeans on and took the single step that brought him to the edge of the bed. “Fuck, Maggie.” He leaned down and ran his hand from her throat, between her breasts, and over her stomach, stopping just short of where she already ached for him. “I don’t have words to describe your body.”
She followed his hand as he did another circuit, stroking her in a way that would be almost innocent if not for the fact she was naked and the look in his eyes was consuming her. Her body was her body. She knew she was supposed to hate it because she wasn’t a size six or under, but her body was strong and tough and had never failed her. She could hike a dozen miles in a day without failing. She could climb and rappel and carry someone for a not-inconsiderable distance.
The one guy she’d been with in her failed dating experiment hadn’t liked that she could break him “in half” if she wanted to.
Vic was looking at her like he wanted to push them both to their physical limits, until they were so exhausted they couldn’t move.
She wasn’t sure her crappy little place wouldn’t be rubble around them by the time they were finished, but she grabbed his hand and pressed it between her thighs. “Stop teasing me.”
“I’m just getting started.” He went to his knees at the edge of the bed, hauling her a few precious inches closer, so that it was only his grip keeping her from sliding to the ground. His breath ghosted across her sensitive skin, followed by his whiskers scraping over her inner thighs. She tensed, holding her breath.
He didn’t make her wait this time. His mouth found her, his tongue delving and exploring until she was sure the top of her head would explode. “Vic.”
His growl vibrated against her clit, but he didn’t pick up his pace or stop that slow, torturous exploration that pushed her, second by second, closer to the edge. She gripped her sheets on either side of her hips, trying to arch against his mouth, but he held her immobile.
So close . . .
He lifted his head. “Not yet, Maggie.”
She cried out at the loss. “Please. Don’t leave me like this.” But he was already moving, slipping off his jeans and grabbing something out of the pocket. She heard the crinkle of what had damn well better be a condom wrapper seconds before he slipped an arm under the small of her back, crawling onto the bed and taking her with him.
“When you come, it’s going to be with me inside you.” He kissed her. She could taste herself on his lips, and with his mouth exploring hers the same way he’d explored the other part of her body, she completely forgave him for leaving her teetering on the brink.
She forgot why she’d been frustrated the second he guided his cock to her entrance. Vic braced his hands on either side of her head and lifted himself enough to see her eyes. “You sure about this?”
“Yes.” She didn’t wait for him to ask again—because he was going to. Instead, she looped her leg around his waist and arched up, sheathing him deep inside her. He went still, his forehead resting against hers. She found herself holding her breath again. Now was the time when he’d say something about this being a mistake, about her pushing them too hard.
But he didn’t say a single thing.
Vic kissed her, long and deep. And then he moved. Each stroke was a long, sensuous slide, his big body pinning her in place so all she could do was take it.
Her climax rolled over her in a wave. She cried out his name as she came, and buried her face in his neck. Maggie was vaguely aware of his pumping becoming faster, harder, but she just clung to him, trying to remember how to breathe.
Vic came with a curse, driving into her one last time. She kissed his neck—the only part of him she could reach without moving. “Damn, Vic.”
He pulled out of her and tucked her so that her back was against his chest. She had a moment of confusion, but then his hand was between her thighs again. “I’ve waited seven years for this. Once isn’t going to be enough.”
She spread her legs wider and looped one over his so that she was completely open to him. It was easier to focus on what he was doing to her physically than to deal with his words. “Randy bastard, aren’t you?”
He laughed hoarsely. “I might not be twenty-five anymore, but I’m nowhere near done with you, Maggie.”
Wednesday, June 21
5:38 a.m.
Vic woke early, as he often did, but that was the only thing normal about the current situation. He rolled over and watched Maggie sleep for a few minutes. Her hair was a tangle over the pillow, and her face was completely relaxed for the first time since he’d met her. He ran a hand over her arm, tugging the sheet down as he did.
“Coffee.” Maggie spoke without opening her eyes.
“I thought you were asleep.”
“I am asleep, and I will be until coffee.” She smiled and burrowed deeper beneath the sheet, looking too damn cute for words.
Vic rolled out of bed and padded down the hall to the kitchen. It took a little riffling through the cupboards to find where she kept everything, but since the space was small, he had a pot of coffee going before too long. The laws of the universe meant that balance must be had, so he made the coffee strong because there was no possibility that shit wouldn’t hit the fan.
He had a cup in each hand and had just reached the doorway when a phone went off. “Mine or yours?”
“Mine.” She reached for her nightstand, her eyes still closed, and dragged the phone to her ear. “Yeah? Wyatt?” She sat up, instantly alert, and shoved her hair out of her face. “When did they find him? Any sign of the others?” She listened, nodding. “Okay, we’ll be there in fifteen. Yeah.” Her gaze met Vic’s, and there was nothing but bad news there. “I’ll call Agent Sutherland.”
As if on cue, his phone started ringing. He set the coffee on the dresser so he could answer. “Sutherland.”
“Where are you? I just went to your hotel room, and you didn’t answer.”
It would just figure that Tucker actually sought him out the one time he wasn’t readily available. “I’m out. What’s going on?”
“They found another body. Too early to tell more than the bare facts, but basic description matches Joshua Conlon. Guess that means we can knock him off the suspect list, too.”
“Guess so.” Vic pointed to the coffee cup when Maggie started to stand. She shot him a look but accepted it and took a long sip despite its temperature. “You get anything more since we talked last?”
“No. I think you’re onto something with one of the hikers being the unsub. Everyone I talked to yesterday who graduated with them said what we already know—they were friends, Joshua Conlon had a temper, but no one had the kind of lasting problem with another that would spawn something like that.” There was traffic in the background. “Unless something changed and you want me to be the one to check out the crime scene, I’ll head into the local Feds’ office and get started on the financials of the hikers left alive.”
“I’m going back in.”
“Thought so. I’ll handle the morgue this afternoon once the body is recovered.”
That made sense. There was a decent chance that going in for the body would end up like the last time, with several days spent hiking through the park in search of more evidence. The investigation couldn’t be put on hold because he wasn’t there to micromanage. It still took more effort than it should have for him to say, “You deal with things on this end and we’ll meet in the middle once I get back.”
“Watch your back in there.”
“Will do.” He hung up. It had taken nearly a year, but it was starting to feel like he and Tucker were hitting their stride. Probably took so long because we’re both old, stubborn bastards.
Maggie set her cup down. “Guessing you just got the same call I did.”
“New body, probably Joshua Conlon, though we’ll have to see him to know for sure.” Unless a bear got to him. “I didn’t get details about his exact location.”
“I did.” She stood and stretched, giving him the view of a lifetime. If it weren’t for the pressing nature of their calls, he’d tell the whole world to go to hell and take her back to bed for another twenty-four hours or so. It wasn’t an option. It might not be an option again before this case ran its course.
Vic met her at the corner of the mattress and pulled her into his arms. “Promise me something.”
“We really don’t have time for this.” But she leaned into him all the same.
All they’d ever had was borrowed time. He sifted his fingers through her hair, tilting her head back so she looked him in the eyes. “I’m not going to insult you by telling you to be careful.”
“Good.”
He tugged gently on her hair. “If you have a shot at this guy, take it.”
Maggie’s eyes went wide. “You can’t be saying what I think you’re saying.”
He didn’t even know what he was trying to accomplish with this, but the thought of her falling victim to their hunter made him sick to his stomach. “I don’t mean murder the unsub in cold blood—but if it’s you or him, don’t hesitate. I just found you again. I don’t want to lose you.”
“I’m trying really hard to be charmed by your overprotectiveness instead of annoyed.” She pushed up on her toes to kiss him. “I’m not going to sacrifice myself, but we’re going out there to look at this body and find these kids. That’s it. Whatever you think in your worst-case scenario, he’s not going to show himself. The unsub is on a mission—and the search-and-rescue people might be a pain to get around, but I don’t think he’ll go after them unless he’s forced to.”
That was the problem, though. It might not take much for the unsub to feel threatened. They had more people out in the park than he was used to, and that was a threat in the making. All it would take was for one of the pairs of people to stumble on him, and they might have more victims on their hands. There wasn’t anything else to do. He’d warned Wyatt, and short of trying to radio every person individually . . . But even that wouldn’t make a difference, because they couldn’t anticipate where the unsub would strike next.
Except . . .
“You’ve got that look in your eye. What are you thinking?”
He pressed a quick kiss to Maggie’s forehead. “I need to make a call. Can you be ready in fifteen?”
“Yes.” She grabbed her cup of coffee and headed for the bathroom.
Vic spent half a second considering joining her in the shower before he set it aside. He called Tucker, already speaking the second his partner answered. “I think there’s a link to the order of deaths.”
Tucker was silent for half a beat. “If we set aside the murders in the other two parks—say they’re practice and only connected because of opportunity—that leaves us with the four victims in Glacier. They all went to high school together, and even if they didn’t necessarily move in the same circles, that school isn’t big enough to pretend that they never ran into one another. Especially when you take into account that Bill Haglund and the Conlon twins were cousins. Doesn’t mean they were close, but it means that they interacted on some level.”
“Take the Haglunds out of it for now. I think they were first because they stumbled onto the unsub’s camp—or permanent structure, if he has one.” Vic paced into the kitchen and refilled his coffee mug. “Focusing on the other two—Lauren and Joshua. Something triggered the unsub, and that something is linked to the order of the deaths. I’m sure of it.”
“Okay, I’ll play.”
“Ruth Garcia said that Josh and Lauren are together now—and that they were both dating other people in high school.”
“Lauren with Ethan and Josh with Ashleigh.”
“If I heard the undertones correctly, their relationship might have started before the other two ended.”
“You really think someone is pissed off enough about that that they’re going to start killing people five years later?” Tucker took a deep breath. “What am I saying? People have been killed for less. You thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Ethan Conlon is looking pretty damn good for this.”
Wednesday, June 21
9:17 a.m.
Maggie had never felt so conflicted in her life. On one hand, she’d just spent a glorious night with Vic. Having him touch her like that, make love to her while whispering things in her ears that she hadn’t allowed herself to dream, was beyond . . . just beyond. Her body ached with what he’d done to her, and she cherished the feeling.
Because they wouldn’t have the opportunity to do it again anytime soon.
She noted the markings the SAR people had left on the path and veered left, maneuvering over a fallen tree as she led Vic downhill to where the body had been found. Four. Four bodies in less than week was like something out of a nightmare. As much as she’d always wanted a chance to explore the what-if that had been left open-ended with Vic all those years ago, she hadn’t wanted it at the expense of anyone’s life.
Rationally, one had nothing to do with the other. The unsub still would be murdering these people even if it was a different FBI agent assigned to the case, or if she was working at a different park. Knowing that didn’t help ease the irrational guilt wrapping itself around her throat.
“You’ve been quiet.”
She didn’t look over her shoulder, even though Vic’s voice was close and she could feel him at her back. “Lots to think about.”
“Regrets?”
It was just like him to sum up so much with a single word. She’d set the tone last night, and now he was giving her a way out. It made her lo—
No. No time for dancing along that line of insanity.
Maggie shook her head, still not looking at him. “No. I wish that different circumstances had brought you here, and I don’t even know what to think of the future, but I don’t regret last night at all.”
She wasn’t sure, but he might have exhaled in relief. “We can talk about the future after we catch this guy.”
Which implied that there might actually be a future for them. She gritted her teeth, angry at herself for being so damn selfish. They were less than a mile from a man who had died cold and alone and probably terrified out of his mind—and she was preoccupied with her love life. She finally stopped and looked at Vic. He wore serviceable clothing, the same way he had the entire time he’d been in Montana, and looked at home in his pack and jacket.
She wanted to kiss him.
It was totally inappropriate.
Maggie scrubbed a hand over her face. “Right. We’ll talk once the case is closed.” She had to focus. It wasn’t like her to let bullshit get in the way of her job, but then, nothing about Vic was bullshit—or simple.
“Maggie.” He waited for her to look at him. “Make no mistake. There will be a future between us—unless you tell me that’s not what you want. We’ve already wasted too much time dicking around. I’m not interested in wasting more.”
It sure as hell sounded like he’d just declared his intentions. She opened her mouth, but he beat her to it. “Is that what you want?”
Maggie looked around. “I thought you wanted to have that conversation after the case was over? We’re in the middle of it—literally.”
“I changed my mind.” He shrugged, not looking the least bit repentant. “We can talk details later. You know where I’m at with us. Give me the same courtesy.”
She didn’t know how he could talk so calmly when it felt like her heart was trying to beat its way out of her chest. She wanted so many things. She always had. Maggie had never been shy about shooting for the stars when she was younger, but after her career in the FBI blew up in her face, she’d gotten gun-shy. She couldn’t help it. She’d overestimated her abilities there, and it was always in the back of her mind that she might do the same and get someone else killed.
And here Vic stood so calmly, asking her to put her heart and soul on the line and have faith that it wouldn’t backfire in her face.
She wanted to turn and flee into the woods. To leave all this behind and maybe spend the rest of her life without talking to another person that she’d potentially disappoint. It was crazy and irrational and at least she was able to recognize that.
So she straightened her spine and took a leap of faith. “I want you, Vic. I don’t know what a future would even look like, but I want to try.”
“Good.” There was that almost-silent exhale again, and it was definitely relief—as if he’d been holding his breath while waiting for her answer.
It struck Maggie that, as scared as she was, Vic had to be feeling something similar. They’d both been burned in the past in different ways, and that kind of pain left its mark.
Maybe it was a good thing that we had seven years to try to figure shit out separately before we ran into each other again.
She managed a smile. “Glad we got that sorted. What do you say we go track down a psycho hunter so we can get around to ironing out the rest of the details?”
“Sounds good to me.”
She laughed, which was totally out of line considering the scene they were on their way to view. “Let’s go, then.” She turned and followed the directions Wyatt had given her during the debriefing. The body had been found in Kipp Creek, wedged between two large rocks. There were the expected two arrows sprouting from his chest, but that was the most that Wyatt knew. Since the body had just been found a few hours ago, the SAR folks had taken their pictures and were waiting for Vic and Maggie to get there before they figured out the best way to extract him.
The trees were so close that she had to slide through them sideways at some points, the underbrush overgrown to a degree that it almost required a machete. The place was primed for a fire. It had been a few decades since one hit this spot with any degree of severity, and the underbrush was out of control.
She heard voices before she saw anyone and used the sound to guide her to where two people stood next to the creek. David gave a weak smile when he saw her. He looked like he was about to pass out on the spot, but he squared his shoulders and nodded, silently telling her that he could handle it. If he didn’t secure a full-time job in this park after handling this mess, she’d be really surprised. Most people would have faltered by now, but he was still plodding forward.
The other man was Brent Holland, one of the Flathead County SAR guys, who’d been on countless searches with Maggie since she’d started as a park ranger. He was a couple of inches shorter than she was, and slight, but her first season as a park ranger, he’d run her into the ground half a dozen times.
She could keep up now.
“Maggie Gaines. Long time, no see.” He made a face. “Wish it could be in better circumstances.”
“Yeah, well, we all wish for better circumstances.”
“How about you let me take you out to drink ourselves stupid and banish this experience from the good old memory banks?” He gave her a winning smile that she’d seen work on quite a few women.
“How about not?” she responded automatically, pointedly not looking at David when he snorted. Brent was one of those guys who flirted as naturally as breathing, and when he was stressed, old habits were dialed up to eleven. “Brent, this is Agent Sutherland. He’s here investigating the deaths.”
“Not doing much of a job of it, is he?” Brent smiled as if he hadn’t just insulted Vic. “Kidding. Just kidding.”
She bit back a retort, mostly because if she wasn’t intimately acquainted with Vic, she might be feeling the same. Having murders in the park offended her on a personal level, and the rest of the staff had to be feeling the same. A certain number of deaths were normal in places like the Grand Canyon or even Grand Teton, but Glacier wasn’t those places. They prided themselves on the sheer number of visitors the park had without racking up hundreds of injuries or more than one or two deaths a year.
They weren’t going to have that this year.
Brent looked between them, his brow furrowed. “The media get ahold of this yet?”
“They’re going to.” Vic chose that moment to break his silence, though she had a feeling he’d taken the man’s measure in the few seconds they’d spent talking. He stopped next to her. “It’s amazing that it’s been kept as quiet as it has.”
Brent shrugged. “Murder might be good for the asshole reporters, but it’s bad for business across the board. Most people recognize that.”
Maggie wasn’t sure she agreed. All it took was one mauling from a surprised grizzly, and it seemed like everyone and their dog descended on the park to get statements and petition for the removal of the bears once and for all. The media didn’t care that Glacier was one of the last bastions for the grizzly population in the United States. All they wanted was a good story and an interview to support it.
“The body?”
Brent seemed to realize that he was sitting here gabbing when he should be working, because he straightened, and his joking demeanor fell away. “Yeah, sorry. I was surprised to see Maggie, and it got me all discombobulated.”
“Flatterer.” She shook her head. “Wyatt was scarce on the details. David, fill us in?”
“Sure thing.” He shot a look at Brent as he walked past the man and then picked his way down to the creek. It was a decent-size creek at this time of year, the snowmelt turning the water treacherous and running up the risk of slipping, drowning, and hypothermia even if a person managed to get out. Their victim hadn’t had the chance.
“We are part of the group fanning out between the Continental Divide and Flattop Mountain. Trying to cover as much ground between the trail and the ridge while another team takes the other side. Spent most of last night tucked into a shelter that we threw up last minute in a close stand of trees, and started out at dawn. Found him a little over four hours ago. No way was he alive, but we checked all the same.”
She saw what he meant when the body came into view. Some dead bodies looked like they could be sleeping until a person noticed certain details. This guy wasn’t one of them. She recognized his face from the group of hikers and mentally matched his name to the one in the file Vic had compiled. “Joshua Conlon.”
Vic nodded. “No need for dental records on this one.” Not with his face more or less intact.
The same couldn’t be said for the rest of him.
Wednesday, June 21
9:45 a.m.
Vic moved past David and Maggie and crouched as close to the body as he could get without wading into the water. The two arrows sticking out of the victim’s chest were to be expected. He leaned closer. The water had washed away most of the blood—and there had been a significant amount, judging from the shredded front of the man’s shirt. He drew out a pair of gloves he’d stashed in his pocket and yanked one on. It took some balancing to be able to shift the shirt to the side, but he found what he’d suspected. “He was stabbed.” He counted a dozen easily recognizable wounds, but the pattern was so frenetic, there might be double that. “The unsub is changing his MO.”
“Or maybe he’s getting to the victims he really cares about.” Maggie sank down next to him, her gaze on the dead body. “Think about it. He’s escalating, and if you’re right and he’s purposefully picking the order of his victims within the group, that means he’s working his way up to a grand finale, so to speak.”
They’d have to wait for the autopsy to be sure, but Vic thought the stab wounds had happened while the victim was still alive, rather than postmortem like the field dressing. “Didn’t mind getting his hands dirty with this one, did he?”
“Which makes you wonder what sets Joshua Conlon apart from the others.”
“Explosive temper. One of the few in the group who seemed almost universally disliked.”
Maggie sighed. “If he hadn’t turned up dead, my money was on him being the unsub. Though that doesn’t really line up with him killing Lauren first. I would have thought he’d work his way up to her since they were together.”
“Together, but on the rocks. She dated Ethan back in high school and then switched him out for his twin. That’s got to piss a guy off,” Vic mused.
“Sure. But why wait this long? And if this has to do with some kind of fixation on her, why kill her first?”
“Following that line of thought, why save Ashleigh and Madison for last? For all accounts, Ashleigh and he haven’t spoken since they were teenagers, and they weren’t particularly close then.”
“I think we might have to face the fact that using the male pronoun when we talk about the unsub might be dead wrong. Both Madison and Ashleigh have just as much motivation to kill Lauren and Joshua as Ethan does. Well, maybe not Madison, but it could just be that we haven’t dug deep enough yet to find it.” Maggie shook her head, her expression of frustration mirroring his. “We don’t have enough information.”
“You two are fucking creepy, you know that?”
Vic turned to find Brent watching them, his face pale beneath his tan. “It’s normal for murder to bother you. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
“I’m fine.”
He didn’t look fine, but Vic chose not to mention it. Pride was a funny thing, and as much as the “creepy” comment irritated him, they had an investigation to run. He looked at the creek. It wasn’t large, as such things went. It was possible that the water had shifted the body a bit, but it wouldn’t have moved him far. The dense trees made a shot tricky, but their hunter had already proved himself more than capable of making difficult shots. Still . . . “Even if it wasn’t night when he made that shot, it was in the rain.”
Maggie followed his gaze. “High ground helps. Lost hikers tend to find water and follow it. Not always helpful in the park, because the Continental Divide means water runs in two different ways—three, technically—so it can confuse the issue. But the end result is that they’re on lower ground than the area around it, which makes it easier to stalk them, and it’s an easier shot. Unsub could have followed for as long as he wanted without being seen, if he was careful.”
Why wait? He exhaled in frustration. They didn’t know if he’d waited, and for all the talk of careful stalking, there had been nothing careful about the way this victim was stabbed to death. “The arrows slowed him down, weakened him.”
“Easy picking for the unsub to swoop in with a knife.” Maggie frowned. “Kind of like Lauren, when you think about it.” She must have caught David’s shocked expression, because she held up her hands. “I’m not saying he lured a bear there to finish the job. There are so many factors there that can’t be accounted for, and this guy is too careful. I’m just saying that maybe it gave him an idea.”
Vic tried to picture it. The hunt, the thrill beating through the unsub’s blood, the surge of victory knowing his arrows struck true. Was there fear seeing the bear go after the girl? No . . . not fear. Not after the initial surprise. “It’s the right way of things, nature taking its course. I bet he sees grizzlies as equal predators, or predators as equal in a general whole.”
“That’s pretty sick,” Brent muttered.
Maggie glared. “Either be helpful or go get the stretcher ready. You’re distracting.”
David jumped into action. “We’ll get the stretcher. Come on, Brent.” He ushered the other man away, shooting a silent apology over his shoulder at them.
Maggie waited for them to move beyond eavesdropping range before she lowered her voice. “This stabbing wasn’t about drawing in another predator. He wanted this kill for himself.”
“Yes.” It was personal, similar to Bill Haglund, but even more so, which stood up to his theory that Bill Haglund had done something to piss off the unsub but hadn’t figured into the original plan. Vic sat back on his heels. “It’s not normal for a woman to kill like this.” When Maggie shot him a look, he amended, “You know what I mean—the hunting is hypermasculine.”
“Traditionally, sure. But all the murders up to this point have been from a distance. The unsub field-dresses them, but it’s postmortem. There’s an emotional distance there that lends itself to the theory that the unsub is a woman.” Maggie shrugged. “Or at least doesn’t present evidence to the contrary.”
“The unsub didn’t field-dress Joshua,” Vic said.
“No, he or she didn’t. If our theory about one of the missing hikers being responsible is correct, there are only three options left—and two of them are women.”
Which prompted the question—why? Vic turned again to look at the surrounding area. “I think time of death is going to be our answer.” Too many kills in such a short time, too much to jam into a limited agenda. The clock started ticking the second the hikers scattered. It was only a matter of time before SAR found the survivors, one by one. The unsub had to get to them first or miss the opportunity altogether. “Sloppy,” he murmured.
“How do you figure?”
“If the hikers hadn’t scattered, he wouldn’t be pressed right now. Leaving Bill Haglund’s body at Fifty Mountain pretty much guaranteed that he’d be putting himself on a tight timeline. There’s a difference between a challenge and the nearly impossible situation he’s in now.”
“Unless . . .” She bit her bottom lip, but then charged on. “This is going to sound paranoid in the extreme, but what if he planned on it? What if he’s . . . herding them? He would have had to do something like that if he’s going after them in a particular order.” She stood and waved to indicate the area. “Even in the rain, this is a prime spot for an ambush. If he had some way of guaranteeing at least one of them would head this way, then all he had to do was sit up there and wait.” She narrowed her eyes. “In those conditions, range is going to be a little limited, and it’d be nearly impossible to cover up all traces with the wet ground. I bet if we search that ridge across the way, we’ll find where he was.”
“Let’s do it.” He raised his voice. “Brent. David. If you can handle extracting the body, we’re going to do some investigating.”
“Fucking finally.”
Vic ignored that. “Lead the way, Maggie.”
They started at the farthest point she’d estimated for range and worked their way along the ridge, searching for any sign of human disturbance. Fifteen minutes later, Vic saw it. “Here.” He pointed to the turned-up earth. It wasn’t much in the grand scheme of things, the slight imprint of a heel that wasn’t distinct enough for even the best tech to get an accurate reading on shoe size. But it was enough to be out of place. He stood and frowned. “Trees are in the way.”
“Only if you’re six foot four.” She stepped in front of him and raised her arms as if she was holding a bow. “I have a perfect view of the creek and the guys.”
Vic bent a little to bring his head even with hers. There was a perfect shot. “So either a shorter guy or he knelt.”
“Wouldn’t want to kneel in that weather, but you can’t rule it out. He’ll have gear to keep the wet out.” Her mouth thinned. “Better than what our victim had.”
“What’s next?”
“What do you mean?”
“Let’s try out your theory. Logic has Joshua coming from that direction.” He pointed upstream, north to where Fifty Mountain was. “So if he was guided here, I want to see how the unsub did it.”
“Okay.” She didn’t hesitate, starting north, picking her way through the trees.
Vic followed in silence, doing his best to monitor the area around them. His gut instinct said the unsub had moved on to the next target, but he wasn’t going to risk both himself and Maggie by assuming that there was no chance of them stumbling onto danger. Stranger things had happened.
He judged they’d been walking well over an hour before she stopped abruptly. “See that?”
“Where?” He followed where she pointed. “Fallen trees.”
“Newly cut trees,” she corrected. Maggie picked up her pace, and they worked their way to the trees. Sure enough, they’d been felled. They weren’t uniform enough to provide a path, but if someone wasn’t paying attention, it would create a funnel leading them south. Maggie propped her hands on her hips. “Downhill. You can see the creek from here, just barely. Might as well have hung a sign saying This Way.”
“You were right.”
She touched the nearest tree. “Hard to say when these went down, but if I had any guess, it wasn’t in the last week or so. In reality, it could be longer.”
A whole lot of planning had gone into this spree of killings. They’d known that. For all the random things like the bear attack and the frenzy of the stabbing, this was an organized killer. This had likely been years in the making, which threw out their theory of the triggering event starting around the first killing. “What the hell did these people do to piss this guy off so thoroughly?”
“As much as I hate the whole woman-scorned thing—or man scorned, for that matter—there’s something to be said for taking your revenge cold.”
Vic looked at the downed trees again. “If this is revenge, it’s ice.”