Macy squinted at her computer and tried to figure out exactly what she was looking at. After days of sitting in her study, staring at the wall, at her notes, at her computer screen, her eyes were blurry and her brain was on overload, and she no longer trusted her ability to tell fact from fiction.
She typed her question into the message box: What is this?
Within seconds, Huntsman363 responded: That’s Bruce Kehler’s signature. Want to know where I found it?
She did and she didn’t. Every time Bruce’s name came up, it was a painful reminder of Beck walking away from her and never looking back. It had been a week since they’d parted ways on her front porch. She’d reached out a couple of times to check in, but Beck hadn’t returned any of her texts. She’d even gone next level amateur detective aka stalker, and gone by Beck’s apartment, but her Jeep hadn’t been there, even late at night. Could she have moved on already?
No, Beck didn’t seem like the kind of person who got involved lightly, and she’d probably take some time for herself before moving on. Would that time give her a different perspective?
Macy wondered when she’d become such an optimist, holding out hope she and Beck could reconnect, put their differences behind them, and find a way forward. Other women had come and gone, and she’d forgotten them quickly, but Beck had been different.
She turned her focus back to the computer, reread Huntsman363’s question, and typed, Sure.
A larger photo appeared in the thread. It was a lined page with a bunch of signatures, including the one he’d just shown her. She scanned the entire page and froze when she reached a typed line at the bottom. Vincent and Sons Funeral Home, Madison, NJ. She traced her finger along the photo, reading the other names on the page. Bruce’s was the only one she recognized, but there was something about the context she couldn’t shake. She pulled her laptop toward her and typed the name of the funeral home in the search bar and while it churned out results, she turned back to her conversation with Huntsman363, who she was now beginning to view with suspicion.
My curiosity is definitely piqued. Tell me more?
She hit send and turned back to the laptop, selecting the link for the funeral home’s website. A few clicks later, she found their virtual guestbook, and she stared at it for a moment before typing in a name.
Do you really want me to tell you everything? Isn’t it more fun to find these things out on your own?
She glanced at the message out of the corner of her eye while still watching the funeral home website which was agonizingly slow. Huntsman363 was taunting her. But why? Sure, sometimes wackos made it onto Unfrozen, but they usually showed their crazy within a few posts and were banned from the site. He’d been fairly neutral on all of their interactions up until now, but something had changed.
She started to type a reply to him, but the funeral home page stopped loading at that point and the results of her search appeared on the screen. Cathy Paxton, 71, survived by her husband, Wayne Paxton. There was more—the usual stuff contained in most obituaries. She skipped it and scrolled down to the guestbook for Cathy. The virtual signatures and sympathy notes were all in the same perfect cursive, but a few pages in, she started seeing what looked like scanned pages of the in-person guestbook. She kept clicking until she landed on a photo that was an exact copy of the one Huntsman363 had sent. Bruce Kehler’s name was the third one from the top.
What did it mean? Had Bruce Kehler attended the funeral for Wayne’s wife, and if so, why? Her brain started firing in a dozen different directions, starting with why Huntsman363 had sent her this information in the first place.
Normally, I would rather do my own research, but I might be out of my depth here. Help a girl out?
She waited, hoping her appeal to his ego would buy her some insight. She didn’t have to wait long.
Don’t be shy, Macy. I know you know who I am. Beck gave you everything you need to know. How is she by the way?
She shoved her chair back and stood, whipping her head around the room as if she could spot someone watching her. But the blinds were shut, and the door was locked and she was completely alone. She walked the room anyway, looking for any sign she was being surveilled. Satisfied she was secure, she returned to her computer and read the message again. I know you know who I am. Beck gave you everything you need.
Bruce had been at Wayne’s wife’s funeral. Had they been friends? Had Bruce cozied up to Wayne because he was the reporter covering the Parks and Rec Killer? It would be exactly the kind of sick and twisted thing a serial killer would do.
How is she by the way?
Macy’s heart raced and she went cold. Was Beck in danger?
If Beck was in danger, it was because of her. Because of the fact she’d told Claire Hanlon she thought Bruce was the killer and Claire had incorrectly assumed Beck had led her to that conclusion. She needed to set the record straight. She should call Claire. Wait, what good would that do? Claire wasn’t about to believe anything she said. Claire was a good cop, but Bruce had been her mentor, and for all she knew, Claire still harbored loyalty toward him. She may have even told Bruce everything she’d said about him. No, what she needed to do was get in touch with Beck. Beck who was never home and wouldn’t return her calls.
She looked at the clock. It was five a.m. Surely, Beck would be home at this time of the morning. She looked at her computer and contemplated whether she should respond to Huntsman363’s last message, before deciding against it. Let him wonder where she’d gone.
She made it to Beck’s apartment in record time. She didn’t spot her Jeep in the parking lot, but she decided to go ahead and knock on her door. She knocked lightly at first, stopping to text her, before she resumed, this time much harder.
“What’s going on?”
She looked up to see one of Beck’s neighbors poking his head out his door. “Sorry. I’m looking for your neighbor. Do you know her?”
“Sure, but she’s not here. She hasn’t been here all week.”
Macy glanced at her phone, but Beck hadn’t responded to her 911 text. “Do you happen to know where she’s staying? I’m a friend.” She smiled to make her seem like the kind of person someone would want to be friends with instead of an insane person who tried to beat down people’s doors at o’dark thirty.
“Don’t have a clue. Sorry.”
The guy shut the door quickly as if afraid she’d ask more questions. She looked at her phone again and resent the text to Beck with a few extra exclamation points, while she decided what to do next. It was dark and Beck could be anywhere. She hadn’t been here all week. Maybe she’d gone out of town? Which would be good right? Because if she was out of town, she was out of danger. But she needed to know for sure.
Liam. Beck’s brother’s name popped in her head, and she immediately started googling him. She didn’t find a residential listing—not like anyone had a home landline anymore—but she did find a business listing for Ramsey Advertising in Deep Ellum. Logic told her they wouldn’t be open at five thirty in the morning, but she plugged the address in her phone and dialed the number the second she got back in her car.
“Thank you for contacting Ramsey Advertising. Our regular business hours are…”
She almost hung up, but decided it was better to cover her bases, and when the voice mail beeped, she left what she hoped was a non-crazy, but urgent sounding message asking Liam to contact her right away. She was two blocks from his office when her phone rang.
“Moran, here.”
“Macy?”
She’d prayed it would be Beck on the other line, but the deep male voice was the next best thing. “Liam? Do you know where Beck is? I was just at her apartment and her neighbors said she hasn’t been home in a week. I’m outside your office because I didn’t know where else to go.”
“Hang on, let me check.”
She parked in front of his building while she was on hold and waited, impatiently, for him to return to the phone. A few minutes later, the front door to the building opened and Liam walked out and over to the passenger side of her car and knocked on the window. She unlocked the door and he climbed inside.
“She’s been staying with me.” He pointed to the top of the building. “I have a loft above the biz. But she’s not here.”
Her mind started racing. “Do you know where she is?”
“Out for a run. She’s been kind of obsessed with running since you two broke things off. She gets in at least two a day, morning and night. I’m beginning to think she’s secretly training for a marathon.”
Macy recalled Beck mentioning she liked to run, but she’d specifically mentioned mornings and the paths at the Village Country Club where her apartment was located. Surely she wouldn’t drive all the way back there to get in her morning run if she was staying with Liam. “Do you know where she runs?”
She could hear the tremor in her voice and apparently Liam could too.
“Macy, what’s going on?”
“I think she might be in trouble. Do you know where she is?”
“Hang on.”
Macy watched him run back inside the building wishing she knew what the hell he was doing. She looked at her phone again, praying for a text from Beck, but all that was there were her urgent messages, begging Beck to return her call. Either she was really in trouble or she really, really didn’t want to talk to her.
Liam burst out of the building and jumped back into her car. He shoved a piece of paper at her. “I found this in her room. I’ve seen her writing on it whenever she comes back from a run. I figured it was like a training log, but it’s a map. Look.” He pointed at the red Xs scattered around the body of water. “Do you make anything of it?”
She stared at the map of White Rock Lake and suddenly she knew exactly why Beck was running night and day. “Yes. Buckle up.” She slammed on the accelerator and took the first turn, hoping they weren’t too late.
* * *
Beck placed her foot on the stone bench and extended her leg to stretch. All the running she’d done over the course of the past week had started to take its toll on her muscles. If today was a bust, she was going to have to take off tomorrow to rest and revisit her strategy.
She’d been certain whoever the Parks and Rec Killer was, he would strike again at White Rock Lake. It had been his most popular spot ten years ago, and the recent killings had both occurred nearby. She’d finished her first round through the list of ideal locations to lure someone off the trail and commit a murder undetected last night, so this morning she was back to spot number one. The place where Jody Nelson’s body had been found. The place where she met Macy for the very first time.
As she slipped into the rhythm of her run, she allowed herself a moment to think about Macy and wonder what she was doing right now. She could almost picture her standing in the middle of her war room plotting her next move to catch the killer. Beck admired her tenacity, but she wished she wasn’t so myopic. It wasn’t like she wasn’t open to the idea the killer might be a cop, but Macy had been absolutely convinced it was true.
What if she’s right?
It wasn’t the first time the thought had occurred to her since she’d last seen Macy. Bruce Kehler had resigned under a cloud of suspicion about his role in the wrongful conviction of Frank Flynn. The case had gotten a lot of press coverage at the time, but then it had faded away as if nothing ever happened. Had there been a cover-up? Had the department handled Bruce by sending him into early retirement instead of dealing with the issue head-on? Would they have done something similar with Jack if she hadn’t gone public?
If that was the way they handled things, did she even want her shield back?
Yes, she did. Her mom had believed police work was a calling, and she was certain her mom had been right. What kind of person would she be if she ditched it all simply because the profession attracted some bad seeds? Besides, she honestly thought Macy was wrong about Bruce being the killer. He might have had the opportunity, but he’d been a decorated cop who’d risen through the ranks. Yes, he’d made mistakes, costly ones, when he’d been a detective, but he wasn’t stupid, and he could’ve done more to throw suspicion off himself if he was the Parks and Rec Killer. Macy had the right idea about the killer resurfacing in a macabre celebration of the ten-year anniversary, but she wasn’t convinced she had the right suspect.
As she approached the area of the trail near where Jody’s body had been found, she slowed to a walk, lifting first one foot and then the other behind her to stretch her calves. She’d just finished her stretch when she heard a voice from behind her.
“Excuse me.”
She turned slowly, allowing her gaze to sweep the perimeter as she looked for the man speaking. It was still dark outside, and the nearest lamppost was about thirty feet away. She could make out a shape coming toward her, about her height, stocky. As he came closer, she noted he was wearing jeans, black tennis shoes, and a plain black T-shirt. He didn’t look like a runner, but he could be on an innocent morning walk. Or something else, not so innocent.
She crossed her arms in front of her chest, letting one hand rest on the butt of her gun in the shoulder holster she wore under her jacket. She was already sweating from the run and the bulk of the jacket, which was way too hot for a June morning, but it was the only way she could conceal her weapon. He looked harmless, but she wasn’t ready to make a final assessment.
“Do you happen to know if this trail leads to the dog park?”
He kept walking as he talked, and he was only a few steps away from her when he finished his seemingly innocuous question. Except he didn’t have a dog with him, or even a leash for a prop, and she was certain she recognized his face, but before she could place it, she heard another voice and this one was calling her name.
She squinted to try to see who was running toward them and was shocked when Macy burst into sight. Macy stopped short next to the man and addressed him first. “Wayne?” she said, seemingly startled by his presence.
Beck saw a flash of anger cross his face which he quickly covered with a smile, and she remembered where she’d seen him. He was the reporter who’d written all the articles about the Parks and Rec Killer. Wayne Paxton. She’d seen his face on a feature piece he did about the serial killer. He’d covered every detail of each of the murders in excruciating detail, and cold certainty swept through her. There was a reason he knew every detail, and it wasn’t because he was a great reporter.
“Macy,” she said. “Can I talk to you?”
Macy looked from Wayne to her and back again. “What are you both doing here together?”
Beck willed Macy to read her mind. “Just a quick minute.” She jerked her chin to the right, desperate to get Macy to step away from Wayne. “Alone.”
Macy continued to look at her with a puzzled expression. She was going to have to find another way to intervene. She considered her options and decided pulling out her gun right now, with Macy this close to Wayne could turn into a disaster, so she settled on surprise as her best weapon, and she prepared to run toward Wayne and knock him to the ground.
She was two steps in when he pulled out a knife. She’d barely made it a third step when he grabbed Macy with one hand and held the knife to her neck with the other. Her heart wrenched as she watched Macy’s face morph from surprise to dread, and she reached for her gun.
“Drop it or I’ll slit her throat.”
Beck lowered her gun but didn’t let go. “I have a feeling you’re going to do that anyway.”
His laugh was hollow. “I might. I never had to before, but then again I had much more cooperative subjects.” He looked down at Macy. “You always were a fighter, but look at you being quiet when it counts.”
“Don’t listen to him, Macy. I’ve got you.”
“On the contrary,” he said. “I’ve got her. Now put the gun down.”
He growled the last words. Beck stared at Macy willing her to stay calm while she thought of a way out. She was staring so intently, she almost missed seeing a tall shadow approaching from behind them. Not wanting Wayne to notice whoever it was, she started lowering her gun hand to the ground to keep him focused on her. She had just released the weapon when Liam’s face came into sight a few feet behind Wayne and Macy. This was her best chance, and she took it.
She pointed over Wayne’s right shoulder and shouted, “He’s got a knife.” She was running toward them before she finished her yell. Wayne hadn’t been tricked into turning his head, but Liam grabbed his arm from behind and held it far enough away from Macy’s neck that Beck was able to snatch her completely out of his grasp and they both fell to the ground.
“Stay down,” she said and sprang to her feet to join Liam, who now had Wayne in a head lock.
“I’ve got him,” Liam said.
Beck pulled out her phone and dialed 911, giving them the nearest trail marker. She picked up her gun and joined Macy on the ground while she kept the barrel trained on Wayne.
“Are you okay?”
“It was Wayne. How could it be Wayne? How could I have been so wrong?”
Macy’s voice was hazy, and her eyes were dark. Beck held her close. “It doesn’t matter. You’re okay. Nothing else matters.”
“He was going to kill me.”
Beck shook her head. “I would never have let that happen.” She kissed Macy’s head. “You and me? We’re not done yet.”
Macy clutched her arm. “He could’ve killed you too.” She shuddered. “I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to you.”
Beck pulled her closer. “Nothing’s going to happen to either of us. Nothing we can’t handle, anyway.”
In a few minutes, the sun would come up and the park would be swarming with cops. They would pull her aside and take her in for questioning. She was prepared for the scrutiny, for the questions, for whatever came next, but when it was done, she was going to find Macy and together they would find a way to put all of this behind them and start over.