[21]

Quinn rolled over and looked at the clock on the nightstand. Twenty minutes later than the last time he’d looked. After Danvers’s bombshell last night, they’d discussed their next move in this crazy game of serial killer chess. The connection wasn’t a coincidence, of that he was sure. Now they had to figure out what to do with what they knew.

They had to find Leonard Nance, aka Robert Tabor. He swung his feet over the side of the bed and sat up. He’d shower, then knock on Maddy’s door.

His phone buzzed and he picked it up from the nightstand to check the screen. His mother. He let it ring two more times before he answered. “Hi, Mom.”

“Good morning, Quinn.”

“What can I do for you?” He walked into the bathroom and pulled his toothbrush from his bag.

“It was really good to see you the other day—in spite of the circumstances.”

He paused. “Yes, it was good to see you too.” He hesitated and waited for the accusations to start.

“I . . . uh . . . called to see if we could reschedule our lunch since you . . . uh . . . had to cancel the last one.”

He hadn’t canceled, he’d stood her up. At least in her eyes. She didn’t know he’d been running from a madman and fighting for his and Maddy’s lives. And he wasn’t going to tell her. He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry about that, Mom. I really am. Something came up at work and I had no choice.”

“And you couldn’t call?”

He sighed. “No. I couldn’t call. I should have called after, though, and apologized. And explained. And I’m sorry I didn’t.”

Silence echoed back at him. Shock had probably rendered her speechless.

“Mom, I want to get together with you, I do. I want to . . . um . . . talk. And well . . . you know.” A short gasp filled the line. More shock. “So, I’m in the middle of a case right now and I’m actually not even in town. But when I get back, I’ll call you, all right?”

“Oh, that would be wonderful, Quinn. It really would. Your dad will be so happy to hear this too.”

He paused. What was going on? Just the other night, she’d been tight-lipped and silent while his father reminded him how important loyalty and family were. And now she wanted to meet for lunch. And she hadn’t thrown one verbal dart in his direction. “All right, Mom. I’ll call you as soon as I get everything wrapped up.”

“Does your case have anything to do with the officers I’ve seen watching our house and following us when we leave?”

Quinn pinched the bridge of his nose. “Yes.”

“I see. Anything else you can tell me?”

“No, but when you don’t see the cops anymore, you’ll know the case is over. They’ll make sure everything is fine and your lives can go on uninterrupted for now.”

More silence on her end. “Are the children in danger?”

“I . . . can’t answer that. Not because I’m sworn to secrecy, but because I really don’t know. I don’t think so. At least not right now.” The killer was in Florida, not South Carolina. That much he knew. He just didn’t know if the guy had help that might still be in South Carolina. “I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t mean to put anyone in danger. This is a special kind of case that’s going to require my undivided attention. It’s . . . personal this time.”

“I see. Well, not really. Personal as in putting your father and me and the kids in danger?”

He sighed but couldn’t lie. “Yes.”

“All right, then. We’ll make sure we’re alert.” She went silent for a moment. “Quinn, just be safe whatever you’re doing.”

“I’m doing my best.” He swallowed. “How’s Dad?”

“He’s actually doing all right. He and Alyssa are down by the pond fishing. JJ is here helping me make cookies.”

“Good. Good.”

“JJ wants to speak to you.”

“Sure, put him on.”

“Hi, Uncle Quinn.” JJ’s sweet voice came through the line, and Quinn wanted to hug the little guy.

“Hey, buddy, how are you doing?”

“I’m good. We’re making cookies. I’ll save you some.”

“Thanks, man, I look forward to eating a few.”

“Bye! Gotta go.”

“Bye, kid.”

His mother came back on the line. She cleared her throat. “Just so you know, I told your father to keep all that family loyalty stuff to himself, that he needed to shut his mouth and leave things alone.”

Stunned, Quinn couldn’t speak for a second. “You did?”

He heard her sigh. “He just wants you back with us as much as I do, and he thinks beating you over the head about being loyal to your family is going to make you . . . well, never mind. I’ll let you go. We’ll talk about it when your case is over. Call me when you can.”

“I . . . uh . . . I will. Thanks, Mom.”

He hung up and stared at his phone for the next few seconds. What had just happened? His father wanted him back with them? What did that mean? He’d thought his father had been harping about family loyalty because he wanted to beat it into Quinn’s head that he should have covered up what his brother-in-law had been doing.

Had he completely misread what his father meant?

Maybe Maddy was right. Maybe it was time to stop pushing people away. His mother appeared to be trying to bridge the gap. Quinn just didn’t know if he could let himself do it. He’d cost his sister her husband. Then he’d taken his sister away from his parents. He didn’t deserve to—

A knock on the door brought his head up. Maddy. He tugged on his sweatpants and crossed the room to open the door. She stood there looking beautiful in her casual blue jean shorts and green T-shirt, her hair pulled up in a ponytail. “Morning,” he said.

“Morning.”

“You look cute.”

She blinked. “Thanks. So do you. Bed head really works well for you.”

He gave a choked laugh and ran a hand over his unintentionally spiked hair. “Right. Give me ten and I’ll be ready.” He heard her phone ringing in the background as he shut the door and sighed. What was he going to do about her?

Marry her.

He froze. “What?” Speaking the word aloud pulled him from his . . . whatever. Craziness? Maybe. But the thing was, if he ever decided to get married, Maddy was definitely the woman he’d want to settle down with.

The fact that he didn’t break out in hives at the thought nearly had him running out the door. Instead, he turned the shower on and waited for the water to get hot.

Maddy picked up her ringing phone. “Hello?”

“Greg Danvers here.”

“Hi, Sheriff, what’s up?”

“We’ve ID’d the first body in the grave.”

“I see.” She sat on the nearest chair. “Who is it?”

“Gabriel Clemmons. He went missing about nine months ago. He was a local architect. I suspect that the other two people in the grave with him are two more missing person cases I have on my desk.”

“Who would they be?”

“Lamar Henry and Jason Roach. They were partners who owned a construction company. They disappeared about a month after Clemmons.”

Maddy sat up. “An architect and two guys who knew construction.”

“Yes.”

“Our killer killed them too.”

“Yeah. That’s what I’m thinking. He grabbed the architect and had him design the building where he kept you, then the two construction guys who built it.”

“And when he didn’t need them anymore, he simply . . . disposed of them,” she whispered.

“If it’s them,” Danvers said.

“It’s them.” She raked a hand through her ponytail. “This guy is more than just twisted. He’s—”

“A psychopath.”

“In some instances he comes across that way, yes,” she said. “In others, he displays more sociopathic tendencies.”

“What do you mean?”

The knock on the connecting door brought her head up.

“Hold on a second. Quinn’s at the door.” She walked over and opened it and motioned him in. “I’m talking to Sheriff Danvers. They’ve ID’d one of the bodies. He was an architect who disappeared nine months ago.” She brought him up-to-date on the conversation, then put the phone on speaker. “So, Sheriff, as I was saying, the well-thought-out planning of the kidnappings, the patience that was required for the surveillance, et cetera, are characteristics of a psychopath. But the fact that I think he’s being motivated out of anger . . . rage because someone he loved was taken from him—” She shook her head. “That’s more than a psychopath. Psychopaths can disassociate from their emotions, which is why they can kill a person without remorse. And even find the killing amusing. Which I know is an emotion, but . . .” She sighed. “And then you have to factor in that he may have some OCD tendencies. It can be kind of confusing. Sometimes you can’t just put a person in a category and stick a label on him. Humans are complex beings.”

Quinn ran a hand over his head. “All of this doesn’t sound like the same person.”

Maddy nodded. “That occurred to me. On the one hand, you have the guy who thinks he’s doing something that’s been ordered from a higher calling.”

“Psychosis,” Quinn said.

“And then you have the cunning, the planning, the almost sadistic pleasure he takes in causing pain and fear in his victims.”

“What if there are two of them?” Maddy asked. “What if we’re not looking for one person, but for two who might be working together for whatever reason?”

“That’s certainly possible,” Danvers said.

They fell silent, contemplating that fact. Then Quinn leaned forward. “Have you found Tabor yet?”

“Yes, at least we think so. We got a report someone saw him arrive home about thirty minutes ago. We’re getting ready to go out there and pick him up. And the hair from the island house is his.”

“How do you know?”

“We talked to his son. He had a baseball cap that Robert had left at his house and it had some hair in it. We compared it and it was definitely a match.”

“So what was his hair doing in the house that he hadn’t set foot in since the owner died?”

“Yeah.” The sheriff sounded subdued. “That’s one of the questions on my list.”

“Do you mind if we ride along?” Quinn asked.

“I expected you to. I’ve just pulled up to the entrance.”

They ended the call and left the hotel room. Maddy noted the officer still outside the door. “Thank you for staying,” she said.

He nodded. “No problem.”

He and Quinn shook hands and they all took the stairs to the first floor and walked out of the hotel. Sheriff Danvers’s SUV sat right outside the door and Quinn and Maddy climbed in. Maddy took the back, scooted over to the middle, and opened her laptop. She connected to the hotspot on her phone and pulled up all of her notes thus far. She started typing everything she’d learned since her last entry. “So how did he keep these men in line while they built the room?” She looked at the sheriff in the rearview mirror. “When did they disappear again?”

“The architect? About nine months ago. Then about a month later, the two construction guys.”

“Right,” she said. “Seems like the two of them could have teamed up together and escaped or fought back or . . . something.”

Quinn shrugged. “Unless our killer had some kind of leverage to hold over them.”

“Their families? A loved one?” the sheriff asked. He cranked the engine and sat there a moment.

“That’s the first thing that comes to my mind.”

Maddy narrowed her eyes as she thought. “And so Ashley Gorman was killed almost seven years ago. Someone who loved her is out for revenge by making a huge statement and giving the killings religious overtones.”

“Like he’s trying to justify killing innocent people,” the sheriff said.

“Numbers are important to him, he quotes Scripture about how things need to be done in an orderly fashion,” Quinn said. “He’s got a twisted sense of religion.”

“So where did he get that?” Maddy asked. “Who were the big influences in his life?”

The sheriff backed out of the parking spot and drove to the exit. He glanced left, then right, and pulled out of the parking lot. “Well, I can’t attest to all of them, of course, but I do know that Robert’s father was one of those fire-and-brimstone preachers back in the sixties,” Danvers said. “I’m fifty-five years old, but I remember, as a kid, him coming to Key West and setting up his tent in an old field behind the courthouse before it was turned into a parking lot. I even went to one of his meetings. Scared the livin’ daylights out of me. Wasn’t until I was in my twenties that I realized God wasn’t out to get me or just waiting for me to make a wrong move so he could hand down the punishment.”

“It’s possible that kind of upbringing could influence him negatively,” Quinn said. “I’m not saying that everyone who grew up that way develops a twisted view of religion, but it’s definitely possible.”

Maddy rubbed her eyes. “It’s possible. Or it’s possible that his daughter’s murder just sent him over the edge, and feeling like he’s the one who has to do something about it gives him a special ‘license’ to kill to achieve the end goal.” She leaned over to look at Quinn. “Which is to make you suffer, make you feel like it’s your fault he’s killing these people. Make you wish you’d done your job ‘right’ the first time and not let the killer out to murder Ashley.”

He pursed his lips. “Yeah, well, he’s doing a good job. I do wish that.”

She touched his shoulder. “It’s not your fault, Quinn.”

He nodded. “My head knows that.”

The sheriff shrugged. “Bottom line is, someone saw Tabor recently drive the boat into the boathouse, and he said he hadn’t been out to the island in a few years. So he lied and I want to know why.”

“What about the rest of Ashley’s family? Mother? Siblings?” Quinn asked.

Sheriff Danvers scratched his chin and made a left into what had once probably been a nice middle-class neighborhood, but had been neglected in recent years. “I did some investigating yesterday when Burt became a suspect. Learned something I hadn’t known.”

“What’s that?”

“Robert . . . Leonard . . . was some sort of video game producer. He made a fortune designing award-winning games. Then he sort of dropped out of the picture after his daughter was killed, and his son, Jacob—also known as Bobby Tabor—took over the business with Brad Gorman, Ashley’s husband. Although, apparently, the last game Bobby and his company released was a huge flop, so he’s been under some pressure to release a winner.”

Danvers pulled to a stop at the front of the house, and three Monroe County cruisers did the same.

“This is the home of a guy who made a fortune?” Maddy asked.

“Yeah. This was where he lived before he hit it big. His son owns some huge mansion on a hill about five miles from here, overlooking the water. I think Mrs. Tabor stays with him when Burt has ferries to run.”

“Why does he do the ferry thing?” Quinn asked. “He doesn’t need the money, does he?”

“No, at least I don’t think so. I think it was just something to do after he lost Ashley. Being out on the ocean, doing something productive.” He put the SUV into park. “It kept him from sitting at home, dwelling on it, and seemed to make him feel better. I met him shortly after Ashley’s funeral and he was a mess. He’s come a long way.”

“If he’s not our killer,” Quinn said.

“So when he goes on these binges,” Maddy said, “how does he keep his business afloat?” She blinked. “No pun intended.”

The sheriff barked a laugh and Quinn grinned. “His son, Bobby, takes over and does some of the runs himself. And, as you know, sometimes Brad helps him out. Bobby’s a good guy. Seems to keep an eye on his father and makes sure his mother is taken care of when his father is off on his runs.” The sheriff got out of the vehicle and Maddy saw him wave the others to stay back. “Let me handle this and see if he’ll come in nicely. He sees a bunch of uniforms out here, he’s going to get twitchy.”

Quinn crawled out of the vehicle and Maddy followed. “You’ll need backup,” Quinn said. “If this guy is our killer, he’s not going to come nicely.”

Danvers frowned. “I’ve got backup,” he said wryly. “You just want to be close by in case there’s some action.”

“I’m not denying it. And I’m not wearing a uniform. We should be good.”

“I’m not in uniform either,” Maddy said.

Danvers rolled his eyes, then nodded. “Let me knock.”

Maddy skirted around the side of the house and unhooked the strap on her holster. She really hoped Robert wouldn’t give them any trouble, but hopes didn’t mirror reality most of the time. She walked up the back porch steps and slid up next to the glass-paned door. The position gave her a good view of the kitchen, and she saw nothing that alarmed her other than some dirty dishes still on the table.

“Burt, open up, will you?” the sheriff called from the front.

Maddy heard no response, but could see into the den where a foot hung off the edge of a couch. She banged on the door. “Mr. Tabor?”

The foot didn’t move. She twisted the knob and the door opened. Maddy pulled the weapon from her holster and stepped inside. “Mr. Tabor, are you all right?”

Still no movement from the foot. She walked on quiet feet until she could see the front door. The sheriff spotted her and she motioned for him to come around the back. He disappeared from her view, and within seconds, she heard him enter behind her. She glanced over her shoulder and saw Quinn and two other deputies right behind him.

“I’ll clear the back of the house,” one murmured. He went down the hall.

Maddy moved into the den to get her first look at the man who belonged to the foot and gasped. A gun lay on the floor beside him. Blood pooled on his chest. She crossed the room and felt for a pulse. “Call an ambulance, he’s still alive.”