It had been a concerted effort yesterday, but Asher had done his best to behave, to act professionally and as platonically as possible so that Faith wouldn’t feel uncomfortable. They’d spent the day poring over her research, and that of TBI and Gatlinburg PD, from when he’d been in the hospital. And they’d brainstormed various theories, not that they’d made much progress. She’d gradually relaxed and they’d fallen into their old routine of easy camaraderie. It was a good day, far better than he’d expected when it began.
When she’d fallen asleep at his desk in the early morning hours, he’d wanted to carry her down the hall to the guest room. But his still healing shoulder wouldn’t cooperate. Instead, he’d urged a mostly-asleep Faith to shuffle to the couch with his help. He couldn’t get her to go the extra distance to the guest room without her sleepily threatening to shoot him. Chuckling, he’d tucked the infamous pink blanket around her, the one she’d left at the hospital when she’d run out. He’d been curious about how she’d react when she woke and saw it. Her laughter the next morning had him smiling when he heard her from his master bath where he was brushing his teeth.
She’d gone home to shower and change, leaving the pink blanket neatly folded over the back of the couch. He hadn’t tried driving since getting hurt but he was thinking he’d have to either give it a try or call Lance for a ride to Grayson’s mansion for the morning UB meeting. But Faith had surprised him by pulling up and offering her services as his chauffeur.
Approaching Grayson’s mansion was just as awe-inspiring this morning as it was every time Asher saw it. Honey-colored stone walls sparkled in the morning sun. A giant portico shaded much of the circular drive out front, with enough space for half a dozen cars beneath it.
Massive windows that Grayson had added in a recent renovation reflected the trees and English gardens out front. They were made of bullet-resistant, one-way privacy glass, just like the windows at Unfinished Business. And they went floor to ceiling in every room.
“How many square feet do you think this place is?” Faith asked as she parked behind Lance’s white Jeep. “You could fit four or five homes like mine inside, and my house isn’t exactly tiny.”
“No clue. I’ve never asked. Have you ever seen the whole thing?”
“Don’t think I have, actually. Maybe we should ask for a guided tour someday.”
“In our spare time?”
She smiled. “Maybe we’ll have time for a real vacation one day, instead of the fake one we had to work for the Parks investigation.” She cut the engine.
“We?”
Her smile faded. “I mean, you know, both of us, our own vacations. I didn’t mean to—”
He gently squeezed her hand. “I was teasing, Faith.”
“Oh. I knew that.”
He grinned.
She rolled her eyes.
“I’ve missed this,” he said. “A day isn’t complete without you rolling your eyes at me.”
“Well, now that I know how much you love it, I’ll be sure to do it more often.”
He laughed and they both got out of her Lexus and headed inside.
As he closed one of the double doors behind them, which was even larger than the ones at his place, he leaned down next to her ear. “I’m always surprised when a stuffy English butler doesn’t answer the door here. But then, Grayson doesn’t stand on ceremony, in spite of all his money. He’s pretty down to earth.”
“He’s not what people expect, that’s for sure.” She took a turn around the magnificent polished wood and marble entryway. “I think he’s got a dozen employees running this place. But half of them are elderly and have lived here longer than he has. It’s more of a service he’s giving them than the other way around, making sure they can live out their days in style instead of being relegated to some retirement home.”
Willow stepped out of the double doors to the left that led to the library. “And if he hears you talking about how wonderful and kind he is, he’ll turn ornery and resentful. He’s not good at taking compliments.”
Faith hugged her. “I’m so glad the two of you ended up together. You’re the perfect couple, yin to his yang and all that.”
“He’s perfect for me, that’s for sure. Now, let’s get this party started. You’re the last two investigators to arrive. The rest are already here—Ryland, Lance, Brice, Trent, Ivy. Even Callum put his current case on hold to be here for the meeting. He drove in from Johnson City last night. The only one missing is our resident TBI liaison. Rowan is negotiating the access to evidence in some of our cases but will be here later. No need for us to wait. There’s a breakfast buffet set up in the library. After that, we’ll get down to business.”
The library was exactly that, a two-story-high room that was filled with books. But it was also the equivalent of a family room with groupings of couches and recliners in several different areas. Or, they would have been, except that some of the groupings had been combined into one big U-shaped cluster in the middle of the room for the meeting.
On the opposite wall to the windows, the buffet that Willow had mentioned was set up. It contained an obscene amount of food running the gambit from fruit and bagels to eggs, biscuits and gravy. To a stranger, it might seem wasteful. But everyone at UB knew the truth. Nothing went to waste here. Grayson was generous and shared everything with the staff and any of the temporary workers in the gardens. No doubt the kitchens were bustling right now to ensure that everyone got plenty of fresh, delicious food. And if there ended up being too much for the staff and their families, it would be taken to a local food bank.
True to Faith’s caring nature, in spite of the prickly exterior she often showed the world, she fussed over Asher, making sure he ate far more than he really wanted.
“You have to regain your strength,” she said, bringing him a second glass of orange juice. “And you need plenty of vitamin C to help your muscles heal.”
He eyed the glass without enthusiasm. “I guess that explains why you’re trying to get me to drink a gallon of this stuff. I don’t really care much for orange juice, to be honest.”
“Doesn’t matter. It’s good for you.”
Lance, sitting on a nearby couch, started laughing.
Faith narrowed her eyes. “What’s so funny?”
He shrugged, still grinning. “Just beginning to understand why your sister calls you a smother-mother.”
She gasped. “Who told you that?”
He pointed at Asher.
“You didn’t.” She crossed her arms.
He started drinking the juice to avoid answering.
She sat back, her expression promising retribution later.
He couldn’t help grinning when he finally set the juice down. But before Faith could make him pay, Grayson and Willow stood.
“Thank you all for coming here,” Grayson said. “Rather than have this status meeting in the conference room at the office, I wanted to have it at our home because this is a special occasion. Asher, thank God, is with us today when he came close to dying a little over a week ago. Willow and I are both extremely grateful that you’re on the road to recovery and back with the team.”
Everyone clapped and cheered. A few whistled. Asher shook his head, motioning for everyone to stop.
Faith subtly moved her hand on the couch between them, gently pressing her fingers over the top of his hand.
He glanced at her in question and she simply smiled. He knew she was thanking him, as the others were. But her private gesture moved him more than all the others combined.
Before Asher could say anything, Grayson cleared his throat and the noise died down.
“I’ll add one more thing,” Grayson said. “Asher risked his life to save the life of another. That’s rare. Even more rare is for someone to help another by actually giving them the shirt off their back.”
Asher groaned at the corny joke.
“Willow and I would like to compensate you for your loss.” Grayson pitched something at Asher.
He caught it against his chest, shaking his head when he realized what it was.
A shirt.
Soon, shirts were being tossed at him from everyone there, the last from Faith, who was laughing as it landed on top of the small pile of clothes on his lap.
“Very funny, everyone,” he said dryly. “Hilarious.” He made a show of checking the tag on one of them and tossed it at Lance. “Someone must have meant that one for you. It’s a small.”
Lance, who was just as big as Asher, tossed the shirt back. “Then it’s definitely for you, little guy.”
Faith started folding the pile of shirts.
“Thanks, darlin’,” Asher whispered.
She avoided his gaze but subtly nodded.
“All fun aside,” Grayson said, “we’re all busy and have a lot of work to do. Ryland, you want to give your status first? We can end with Faith.”
He nodded and began updating the team on his current case. They each gave updates, as they normally did each morning whether at UB or via remote link, depending on where each of them was working that day. They bounced ideas off each other and made suggestions. When it was Asher’s turn, he gave a quick summary of what had happened when Faith zeroed in on Stan’s Smoky Mountains Trail Rides as a potential place for Leslie Parks to have been taken.
“You know the rest. We were lucky to find Leslie. But, unfortunately, the killer got away. Faith can tell you what happened after that since I was out of commission for a bit.”
“He totally glossed over the details that some of you haven’t heard,” she said. “The perpetrator strung up Leslie with a noose around her neck. He had her stand on a log and had a rope tied around it, with one end trailing into the woods where he was hiding. As soon as Asher found Leslie, the perp yanked the rope. Asher dove at Leslie, grabbing her legs against the tree just as the log upended her. If he hadn’t done that, her neck would have snapped. Then the coward in the woods threw his knife at her to finish the job. But Asher twisted his body in between the knife and Leslie, again saving her life. Leslie told me that knife was headed straight for her heart. Even with the knife embedded in his back, puncturing a lung, Asher managed to get the noose off Leslie and mount a horse with her to bring her back to the stables.”
Willow, seated with Grayson across from them, went pale. “I had no idea just how bad it was up there. Good grief. We really are lucky you survived, Asher.”
“I appreciate it. But it’s over. I’m doing fine.” He motioned to Faith. “You worked up a timeline based on yours and Gatlinburg PD’s research. Want to tell them about that?”
She took mercy on him by taking over, speaking to all of the research she’d done in the past handful of days.
“The perpetrator walked Leslie into the stables, stole the two horses and forced her to ride up into the foothills. He was rough, slapped her around, gave her some shallow cuts with that same knife. Mostly, he terrified her, telling her the awful things that he was going to do. Thankfully, he never got to the point of carrying out those plans. Asher rescued her before the perp could assault her in the way he’d planned.”
Ryland leaned forward in his chair to Faith’s left. “Why did he return to the stables and leave her up in the foothills? And why kill the two he left in the tack room?”
“Leslie said that when Stan Darden Junior rode into the foothills searching for the horses, he stumbled right onto them and saw Leslie tied to that tree, being tortured. Stan, again, the real one, tried to intervene. But the perp got the better of him and stabbed him. Stan was able to stagger to his horse and take off, presumably to get help. You can all pretty much guess what happened after that. Our bad guy took off after Stan. He caught him and butchered him at the stables. Then he did the same to Stan’s father when the noise alerted him and he came outside looking for his son.”
Ivy winced across from Faith. “How awful. That poor family.”
“I know.” Faith shook her head. “It’s so sad. Such a useless waste of life.”
Asher took up the tale. “It appears that he was getting a fresh horse, hiding the bodies and grabbing supplies so he could head deeper into the mountains with Leslie at about the time that Faith and I arrived.”
Faith nodded. “Leslie hasn’t spoken to anyone aside from me that first day. We were both together because the police wanted us to help the sketch artist make a composite of the man who attacked her. Immediately after that, she gave me the basics that I just told you. But after that, she stopped talking, wouldn’t even speak to the detectives on the case. I think she’s been in shock, unable to face the trauma of what happened. I’m hopeful that she’ll agree to speak to Asher and me, given that he saved her life. Willow, as our victim advocate, you’ve already made inroads with the family. Do you think you could speak to them, see if Asher and I can interview Leslie? Today if possible?”
“Absolutely. Her well-being will be my first priority, of course. But if she’s up to it, and her family agrees, I’ll let you know right away.”
“That’s all I can ask for. Thanks.”
Willow smiled.
At that moment, Rowan Knight arrived. Nodding at Asher, he went directly to Grayson and handed him a piece of paper. They spoke for a moment before Rowan turned to leave. On his way out, he tossed a shirt at Asher and grinned as he hurriedly left.
Asher chuckled and added the shirt to the pile that Faith had set between them just as Grayson handed the paper to Faith.
“The medical examiner,” Grayson said, “with the help of a forensic anthropologist, identified the final two victims. Those are their names, brief descriptions including limited background information on them, as well as their last-known addresses.”
Faith summarized the findings for everyone, reading the pertinent details out loud. “Victim number five identified as June Aguirre, female, Hispanic, twenty-six years old. She was single, had a steady boyfriend—Nathan Jefferson. Lived in Pigeon Forge. Occupation, branch manager of a credit union. Disappeared on her way home from work in downtown Gatlinburg and was never seen again. That was five years ago.” She blinked. “Wow, she disappeared one day before Jasmine Parks.”
Asher frowned. “That’s a heck of an escalation, from about six months between our earlier victims and only one day between those last two. Definitely something we need to pay attention to. What about cause of death? The ME couldn’t come up with one on the other victims. Anything on June Aguirre?”
Faith reread the short summary then shook her head. “Manner of death, homicide. Cause of death, undetermined.”
She flipped the paper over. “Victim number six is Brenda Kramer, female, white, twenty-three. Also single, with a steady live-in boyfriend—Kurt Ritter. She was a lifelong resident of Gatlinburg. After high school, she took two years off to travel. When she came back, she began attending business school. She was one year from graduation when she disappeared one night after partying with friends. Her boyfriend said she never made it home. That was seven years ago. And before you ask, cause of death again is undetermined.” She grimaced. “This is weird. Some smooth river rocks were found in the victim’s pocket. Could that be significant?”
“Were there rocks found with the others?” Grayson asked.
“Not that I recall. Asher?”
“I’ll double-check, but I don’t think so. I remember one of the victims had really hard dirt caked on what was left of their clothes. The ME speculated it might have been mud at the time the body was buried. That could mean two of the victims had been in or near water shortly before their deaths. Or it could be as simple as someone hiking and picking up rocks. And the other getting caught in the rain and getting muddy before they were kidnapped. I’m not seeing how rocks or mud can help us, but we’ll note it, see if it ties into anything else we’ve found.”
Grayson crossed his arms, his brows pulled together in a frown. “Seems thin, agreed. I know it’s been years since the murders and the only thing the ME has to go on are skeletons, but can’t we get her to at least speculate about possible causes of death? Like strangulation? Isn’t that a common COD in serial killer cases?”
Asher nodded. “It’s actually one of the most common ways serial killers murder their victims. But usually that breaks some bones in the throat, and that will be found during the autopsy. Since none of our victims had their hyoid bone broken, strangulation doesn’t seem likely. Lack of tool marks or splintered bones on any of our victims also makes it seem unlikely they were stabbed. There weren’t any bullet holes in any of the bones, no bullet fragments. So shooting is highly unlikely.”
“What about poison?” Grayson asked. “There was some hair found with some of the victims. Can’t they test the hair for toxins? I seem to remember hearing that hair continues to grow for some time after death. If that postmortem hair contains toxins, could it prove someone ingested some as a cause of death?”
Faith smiled. “Changing professions, boss? Wanting to become one of your investigators?”
“I don’t want to work that hard,” he teased. “But I’m as frustrated as I’m sure you and Asher are. Just asking questions that come to mind.”
“They’re good questions. Questions that Asher and I have discussed as well. Or, we did, when discussing the earlier victims. With June and Brenda added to the mix, I’m sure we’ll rediscuss all of that. Poison is one of the things we can’t rule out. Even with hair growth after death, to have enough concentration of toxins in that hair to detect would only happen if the poison took a long time to kill the victim. The heart would have to be pumping long enough to circulate toxins all over the body and to end up in hair follicles in large enough concentrations to detect. I can’t see a serial killer dosing victims over a long enough period of time for the poison to show up in postmortem hair deposits.”
Asher nodded his agreement. “It’s also rare for men to use poison to kill. That’s more of a female killer’s method of choice. We know our killer is a white male in his early thirties. That matches our latest FBI profile on him, and the eyewitness accounts—namely Leslie’s, Faith’s, and mine. The profile also said he’s likely single, never married, and has difficulty holding down a steady job. He’ll resort to hourly, cash jobs, possibly outdoors, like landscaping or construction. That goes along with his comfort up here in the mountains. This location is his domain, where he feels most at ease. He likely started killing in his mid-twenties, which would go right along with our first victim having been killed seven years ago. As often happens with serial killers, there was likely a trigger at that time that sent him over the edge from hurting and murdering women in his fantasies to actually doing it.”
“Don’t forget the trauma he believes the killer suffered during his childhood, as a preteen or early teen,” Faith added. “That supposedly had a major impact on his world outlook, maybe even began his hatred for women. It might help explain his depravity, but I don’t see how that helps us figure out who he is other than looking for some kind of childhood trauma in any background searches we do in the hopes of narrowing any potential suspect lists down.”
“Faith and I speculated that hanging could be his go-to for how he kills, since he tried to hang Leslie Parks,” Asher said. “But she called the ME about that possibility shortly after we rescued Leslie. That’s when the medical examiner explained about the hyoid bone and lack of any other broken bones in our victims. With hanging, it’s possible not to break the neck. But she believed it unlikely that at least one of the deceased wouldn’t have showed some kind of bone injury if they were all hung. Then again, we’re assuming our killer is consistent with how he kills. Most are. But some do change it up. They learn from their mistakes, adjust their weapon of choice.”
“What about a signature?” Lance asked. “Even if a serial killer changes how he kills, there’s usually one thing, a ritual or whatever, that’s always the same. It could be as simple as how he binds his victims, or that he kisses their forehead before killing them. Is there anything at all you’ve been able to piece together as his signature, given that you only have the skeletons, some hair, and fragments of clothes and jewelry?”
Faith shook her head no as she handed the paper to Asher. “With so little to go on as far as physical evidence in each of the graves, we don’t even have a theory about his signature. It’s something we debate often but neither of us has anything concrete to offer there.”
She motioned toward the paper that Asher was studying. “These two latest victim identifications, on top of the information we have on the others, means that the killer’s first victim was Brenda Kramer. The rest, in order of when they were killed, are Natalie Houseman, Dana Randolph, Felicia Stewart and June Aguirre. Jasmine Parks is the last victim, five years ago. There aren’t any other bodies in that makeshift graveyard. TBI brought in their own scent dog team and reexamined the entire mountainside with ground penetrating radar. Six victims, total. He kills one every five to six months, then his last two only one day apart. After that, nothing. One thing I want answered is why he escalated from his routine of about six months between kills to one day between his last two.”
“No clue about the one-day-apart thing,” Lance offered. “But I didn’t think serial killers stop killing by choice. Either they die, are incarcerated, or incapacitated in some way that makes it impossible for them to continue. Have you explored the incarceration angle?”
“We have,” Asher told him. “We actually hired a computer expert for that because we had a massive amount of data on intakes and releases of prisoners from the Tennessee prison system to analyze. He wrote a program that compared all of that data with the dates that our victims were killed and the gap since Jasmine’s disappearance and Leslie’s abduction. Some of the more recent convicts to be released could theoretically have abducted Leslie. But our computer guy was able to exclude most of them because they were incarcerated during times when some of the other victims were killed. We ended up with only five potentials and were able to rule them out because their photos don’t match our killer.”
“That thorough analysis pretty much proves he wasn’t incarcerated during that time gap,” Lance said. “Unless he was incarcerated in another state, which I’d consider a low probability given that he’s choosing and murdering people here. He’s comfortable, knows the area. Maybe he hasn’t stopped killing at all and is burying the more recent bodies in another personal graveyard, perhaps on another remote mountainside.”
“Possibly,” Asher said. “But it’s all speculation without any facts at this point. It’s rare, I agree, that a serial killer stops or increases the amount of time between kills. Generally, the time decreases as the desire to kill grows stronger and they can’t resist it as long. But there are known documented exceptions. One is the BTK killer—Bind, Torture, Kill—out of Park City, Kansas. He killed several victims months apart and then went years without killing anyone before he started up again.”
“Regardless of whether our killer did or didn’t...pause,” Faith said, “we know he’s killing again. He would have killed Leslie for sure if you hadn’t stopped him. This is one of those areas Asher and I have discussed, and we both lean toward your way of thinking, Lance. We believe there probably is a second graveyard somewhere. We just haven’t found it yet.”
Grayson shook his head. “Russo and Frost will go ballistic if that’s the case. But it’s not like I can tell them there may be more bodies without having an idea of where to look.”
Asher shrugged then winced when pain shot up his back. He breathed shallow breaths until the pain began to subside then continued. “I’d be comfortable saying the second graveyard, if there is one, would be in the area we already speculated about in our earlier geographical research. If you draw a circle of about twenty-minutes’ travel time around the graveyard we already found, I’d bet big money that if he does have another burial site, it’ll be in that circle.”
“Absolutely,” Faith said.
Asher went on. “If most of us agree that there’s probably another graveyard, maybe we should get TBI involved, at least. The police don’t have the resources to hunt for it. But TBI sure does. We could share our geographical theories and research, and they could go on a wild-goose chase, if that’s what it is. Let them decide whether or not to look into this theory. They already pulled all the missing person cases of females in a thirty-mile radius of Gatlinburg for the past ten years to help the ME identity the victims we already have. They can use those as a starting point, see which cases don’t have any good suspects already and focus on those as potentially being the work of our serial killer.”
Grayson crossed his arms. “Why would they want to do that? Shouldn’t they focus on the known victims first, see if that can help lead them to the killer?”
“They’re already doing that,” Faith said. “So are we. And none of us has gotten anywhere. New cases, new to us anyway, might offer links we haven’t seen before, some new evidence that might break the case wide open.”
“When you put it that way, it makes sense. I’ll pitch that to Russo and Frost.”
“Can you also pitch them getting any evidence from the two newly identified victims to our lab?” Asher asked. “I know there wasn’t any viable DNA and no hits on the national database for the fingerprints found on the knife the perp used to stab me. Maybe we’ll get lucky and get a hit off of evidence found with Kramer’s or Aguirre’s bodies.”
Ryland joined the conversation. “You mentioned hits on the national database, AFIS. What about local law enforcement that might not be linked to AFIS, or that has minor, even nonviolent arrest records they’ve never bothered to enter into the system. Maybe Ivy or Lance can pursue that angle. You two are wrapping up a major case right now. Can one of you finish that up and the other pursue the fingerprints?”
Ivy glanced at Lance. “I can probably take it. You okay doing the wrap-up?”
“No problem. And I’ll help you as soon as I’m done.”
Asher smiled. “Thanks. That’s a great idea. Fingerprints are as good as DNA if we can get a hit.”
Ryland pulled out his cell phone. “I’ll text Rowan to contact the TBI about pursuing those other missing person cases. As for the rest of UB helping you two...unfortunately, most of us are heavy into some pretty urgent cases ourselves right now. Contact Ivy if you come up with anything urgent for her to pursue.”
Lance motioned with his hand. “Don’t hesitate to call me if there’s something you need help on. If I can fit it in, I will.”
Asher glanced at Faith in question. “Victimology on the two newly identified victims?”
“Absolutely. That would be perfect. Lance, Ivy, add that to your to-do list if and when you can assist. I’m sure that even working this on a limited basis, you can pull together information on Aguirre and Kramer faster and better than TBI and Gatlinburg PD combined.”
Lance laughed. “You’re laying it on thick there, Faith.”
She smiled. “Maybe a little. Anything you can find on them and send to Asher and me would be appreciated. That will allow us to focus on Jasmine and Leslie and any clues we can glean from the other victims that we’ve already been studying.”
“Sounds like we have a plan,” Grayson said. “Asher, do you need Faith to provide any further updates on what she’s worked on while you were in the hospital? I know it’s early and this is the first time you’ve seen each other since you were released from the hospital—”
“Actually,” Faith said, “I brought him up to speed last night.”
“At my place,” Asher said. “She slept over.”
She gasped. “On the couch! Alone!”
He grinned.
Several of the others started laughing.
Grayson coughed and glanced at a wide-eyed Willow.
Faith narrowed her eyes at Asher, in warning.
He chuckled. He was fine airing his attraction to her out in the open, even if Faith wasn’t. Heck, everyone at UB had probably known for a long time how he felt about her. She was the only one he’d foolishly hid it from, waiting for her to wake up and give him some kind of signal.
“I’m glad you’re both together again,” Grayson said.
Faith’s eyes widened. “Working, you mean.”
He arched a brow. “What else would I mean?”
Her cheeks flushed pink and she crossed her arms as the others laughed again.
Willow lightly punched Grayson’s arm and gave him a warning look. “I think what my husband meant to say is that he’s glad you’re an investigative team again.”
“Absolutely,” he said. “That’s what I meant.” He winked at Willow.
Faith’s face flushed even redder. If Asher survived the car ride back to his house, he’d count himself a lucky man.
Ryland addressed Lance and Ivy. “Keep me in the loop when you update Asher and Faith. If anyone else on the team frees up, I’ll send them your way.”
“Thanks, Ryland.” Faith’s cheeks were still flushed. “And thank you, Lance and Ivy. I appreciate any help I can get on this. Even from Asher, for what little that’s worth.”
He grinned at her teasing. She sat a little straighter, getting back into the groove of bantering with him and taking his humor in stride. It felt good. And when he winked again, and this time she actually smiled, it felt even better.
He was going to enjoy this. And he was going to give it his all—to the case and to his pursuit of Faith. He’d take nothing less than a win in both arenas.