Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 103552 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103552 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 518(@200wpm)___ 414(@250wpm)___ 345(@300wpm)
“Or she might not have gone out in the last few days,” I said, hopeful.
“We’ll see soon enough.”
At the end of the drive, the densely packed trees parted to reveal a small clearing, a bright blue cottage sitting in the center. The trim and front door were a vibrant purple, and orange pumpkins sat on either side of the porch, uncarved. A car was parked under the carport. Nothing looked abandoned or as if the owner hadn’t been here recently. My palms tingled, itching to knock on the door. She could be right there with the answers as to who’d ordered that necklace made and for whom. One more piece in the puzzle. We were so close I could taste it.
I unclicked my seatbelt. “Avery,” West said, reaching out a hand to stop me.
I hopped out before he could. He met me at the front of the SUV. “Avery, for now, let me take the lead. Understand?”
I wanted to argue. I didn’t. West wasn’t wrong. He was the police chief. It made more sense to let him take the lead. I was just impatient. We were so close. Ever since we’d found the necklace, we’d been trying to get here.
“All right, let’s go,” I said.
We climbed the front steps of her tiny porch. The concrete looked recently swept, the mat arranged just so. It did not look like the front porch of someone who had been out of town for a while. The doorbell sounded, a happy chime echoing through the small house. I waited, breath held, for the answering sound of footsteps. There was nothing.
“Her car’s here,” I said to West.
“I know. It doesn’t mean she is. Or she could be in the shower or working. Relax.”
His hand rested on my lower back, the heat of his palm spreading through me, anchoring me, but not slowing the frantic beat of my heart. My anticipation was too heady to shut down.
West rang a second time, and again we waited. Still nothing. No sound, just the chime of the bells and silence. After the third time, West gave up on the bell, opening the storm door to pound on the wood of the door. “Ms. Novak? This is West Garfield, the police chief in Sawyers Bend. I need to have a word with you.”
Nothing.
“So now what?” I asked.
“Now we peek in some windows. Stay close to me. Don’t wander off by yourself.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said, following him down off the porch, staying a pace behind as he circled the house. The side windows were too high to see in from ground level. At the back, there was a small deck and a sliding glass door.
“Bingo,” West said. The house was small enough that we’d be able to see most of the first floor from there, assuming there weren’t curtains or something. I turned to scan the woods behind the porch. She had plenty of privacy. I guessed that an artist who liked to recreate nature in her work wouldn’t have blinds to block out the woods. As we rounded the stairs and went up to the deck, I saw I’d been right.
It was too bright outside to see much until we got close. When the shadows gathered enough to block the reflection off the window, I wished I’d stayed in the car.
Two smeared red handprints marked the bottom of the sliding door. I wasn’t a cop or a doctor, but I knew blood when I saw it.
Fuck.
I took a step closer, peering into the house.
The living room was a disaster. Chairs were overturned, stuffing coming out of the couch, and blood splashed across the golden pine floors. So much blood.
“Avery, stop.” West’s arm shot out, catching me in the chest. “Off the deck. Now.”
“Why? What do you see?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to know, but I had to.
“Get off the deck now,” he repeated. I turned and jogged down the stairs, the fight draining out of me. There hadn’t just been blood splashed across the floors. There had been a puddle of it by what I guessed had been the kitchen table, now broken boards and splinters on the floor.
A puddle that looked big enough that it had to have come out of a body.
I watched, numb, as West pulled his phone out of his pocket, calling for backup. He pulled a glove from inside his jacket, protected his hand, and carefully tugged at the handle of the sliding glass door. It slid open. I didn’t know what that meant, except it left me with a hollow feeling in my stomach. Something bad had happened in there. Whoever did it had probably left through that door.
“West,” I called out. “Be careful.”
His eyes landed on me as he nodded, then looked behind me at the empty clearing in the woods beyond. “Come back up on the deck,” he said. “I want you in sight. I won’t be more than a minute.”