“Unfortunately, no, we don’t.” He flicked her a glance. “Don’t worry, you’re not taking anyone’s room and my wife is used to me bringing home strangers. She will be more than happy to make you comfortable.” He turned up the heat.
Warm air filled the cabin and Ava nodded, stifling a yawn. The idea of staying with this couple was getting better by the second. “I don’t want charity; I’ll work to pay for a room. I can get a job if I have a place to stay.”
“Well, maybe we can come to some arrangement.” He smiled at her. “There’s always chores need doing on a ranch but it will be hard in this weather, chopping wood, cleaning out stables, and the like. Have you had experience working on a ranch?”
“I learn fast.” Ava emptied her to-go cup and wished she had more. The sandwich had barely filled the chasm in her belly. “Is it far?”
“Not much longer.” He looked at her. “What’s your name?”
She waited a beat and then shrugged. “Ava.”
“You can call me Preacher.” He flashed her a grin. “Everybody who stays over knows me by that name.”
Ava yawned. “Sure, nice to meet you, Preacher.”
“Would you like me to contact your family in the morning, to let them know where you’re staying?” Preacher sighed as if it was a chore to talk to her. “Although, I do understand if that’s a problem. We have a ton of people who come to Black Rock Falls to disappear. You should know, there are quite a few homeless, addicts, and battered women and men just wanting to live off the grid here. We also have places to help you as well. You chose a great town to stop by.”
She blinked at him, her eyelids so heavy she had to force them open. “That’s good to know.”
Tiredness engulfed her and she leaned her head against the window. Fighting against the sleepiness, she shook her head and looked at him but his attention had fixed on the snowy blacktop winding ahead of them into the night. Darkness surrounded them and the headlights lit up a forest, so dense she couldn’t see any space between the tall pines. She’d close her eyes for just a few seconds, what could possibly happen?
Nine
Tuesday
Breakfast was just a pleasant memory by the time Jenna and Kane had finished canvassing the guests in the outlying cabins. The person who’d displayed the body parts on the tree must have been a phantom, as not one person they’d interviewed had seen anyone at all on the backroad at any time from Sunday to Monday afternoon. Exhausted from trudging through snowdrifts, Jenna stopped to catch her breath and scanned the sky. Although the snow had ceased for a while, the clouds promised more before long. She dragged her aching legs back to Kane’s truck, creating a cloud of steam around her. The late night and early morning had taken its toll and right now all she wanted to do was get warm. Her feet had become way too cold inside the thick socks and her lips needed a coating of ChapStick. Of course, she’d left the latter in her other coat pocket, which was damp from the previous evening. The idea of returning to the resort was alluring but they’d checked out and thanks to another killer in town, their vacation was officially over. She stamped the snow from her boots and climbed into the passenger seat. Leaning back, she let out a long sigh. “Well, that was a complete waste of time.”
“At least we left no stone unturned.” As if reading her mind, Kane offered her a ChapStick from a packet in his console. “Need this?”
“Thanks.” Jenna applied the balm and sighed with relief. “That’s better. Let’s get out of here.”
“Where to? The office or do you want a ride home?” Kane turned up the heat.
Jenna smiled. “Home please. I need to get out of these clothes and eat. We don’t have to rush into the office unless something comes up. We’ll head back later. I called Rowley earlier, he has everything under control in the drug bust case. He obtained the warrants and statements. He’s turned over everything to the DA. All the men apart from Dean James are going to county for processing. James is undergoing surgery on his knee this morning.” She gave Kane a long look. “But he’s not our problem anymore either, the DA is calling in the Feds to deal with him. The package under the bed was uncut cocaine and Wolfe said it weighed two pounds.”
“Any comeback on me?” Kane started the engine and frowned when he turned to look at her. “I was expecting some noise about police brutality.”
Jenna wondered why he’d been so distant all morning and shook her head. “No, the woman they kidnapped and my statement puts you in the clear.” She smiled. “The DA couldn’t believe you came out of a six-on-one fight with only a small bruise on your cheek.”
“Hmm.” Kane swung the truck around and headed down the mountain. “I’ll have to practice ducking some more.”
Jenna leaned over the back to rub Duke’s ears. “Maybe, but your actions looked just fine to me. If you’re that fast now, I can’t imagine what you’d have been in your prime.”
“I am in my prime.” Kane chuckled. “Although the cold slowed me down some.” He waved at the snow building up on the windshield. “It’s snowing again and this makes it perfect for a killer. By the lack of evidence at the scene, I’d say it was snowing when he arranged the body parts.”
“It seems so.” Jenna turned back in her seat. “I wonder where he dumped the rest of the bodies. In this weather it won’t show before the melt.”
“We had a good look around the scene and didn’t find a trace.” Kane’s lips flattened into a thin line.
Jenna stared at him. “Well, come on, put on your profiler hat. I can see this killer is different from the usual kill and dump. He is exhibiting his work. What do you think?”
“Yeah, but I would have thought he’d make a show of the torsos as well.” Kane slowed to maneuver around a fallen branch. “He could be keeping them for another display. I agree, I figure this macabre presentation is a sculpture.”
“The mind never ceases to intrigue me.” Jenna leaned back in her seat. “All the psychopaths we have encountered are different, well, apart from being killers.”
Her phone chimed. She looked at the caller ID. “It’s Wolfe. I’ll put him on speaker.”
“Hi Jenna. I’ve examined the body parts, and they are from two different people. The killer severed the limbs post-mortem and from the pattern on the ice, the killer used a chainsaw or similar. I believe this points to the killer keeping the bodies frozen prior to dismemberment, rather than leaving them to freeze in situ. I’ll have to wait for them to thaw and examine tissue samples to determine how long they’ve been frozen.”
Jenna glanced at Kane and raised an eyebrow. “Any idea of the victims’ sex? I noticed one had nail polish.”
“Not yet. They are different blood types but nail polish doesn’t necessarily mean a person is female. I’m running a DNA profile on each one and the chromosome analysis will give me gender. I’ll get back to you in a couple of hours with the results.”
“Okay thanks.” Jenna disconnected and stared at the blinding white lowlands dropping away in the distance. It was so beautiful, and reminded her of the untouched frosting on a cake. “Two people murdered and not one call about a missing person.” She cast a look at Kane. “Don’t tell me Black Rock Falls has become a dumping ground for bodies now?”