He looked almost comically surprised. “You went into the trash for it?”
“I couldn’t stop thinking about the damn thing.”
“I don’t blame you. I didn’t just look guilty, I acted guilty, too.”
“No more doubts,” she said. “That’s behind us.”
“We’re a pair, aren’t we?”
They smiled simultaneously, and in the instant Bailey could almost believe they were any other couple in love, that there wasn’t the specter of murder hanging over them.
Almost, but not quite.
She screwed up her courage. “There’s something I have to tell you. Upstairs you said it wasn’t over, but you didn’t know what they could have. I do.”
She met his questioning gaze evenly. “I’ve remembered the day of the accident. Everything but finding Henry dead.” He nodded and she went on. “I went to check on Henry, the way Stephanie had asked me to. He had something for me. Something he found.”
She went on to describe the box and the items inside.
“Okay. So Henry was always treasure hunting. He picked up stuff he found and he put it all in a box. What’s the big deal?”
“Not stuff he’d collected here and there, Logan. He found the box with all of the items in it. It was someone’s special collection.”
“I get that. But what does that have to do with the missing women—”
She saw the moment he got it, connected all the pieces. “You think the items belonged to them?”
“I know they did.”
“You have … proof?”
“Circumstantial. The class ring was from Covington High, class of 2010, the year Amanda LaPier graduated.
“There’s one more thing about the box, Logan. Your initials are on it. Burned onto the bottom.”
Something horrible and sad crossed his features. He stood and went to the sink. For long moments he stood there, hands braced on the counter, head bowed. “I made that box when I was ten,” he said finally, voice thick. He cleared his throat. “Dad helped me. It’s one of the good memories I have of him.… I remember being so proud of it. And now—”
Violated, she thought. The memory. All of it.
“I’m sorry.”
“I hadn’t thought about it in years. I figured it’d been tossed out long ago.”
“When was the last time you saw it?”
He thought a moment. “In the barn or garage … sometime after Dad died.”
“The hay barn, maybe?”
He seemed to freeze. “Why would you think it’d be—”
“That’s where Henry said he found it.”
“The hay barn,” he repeated. “I haven’t set foot in there since Roane. Nobody has.”
“Someone has,” she corrected. “Besides Henry.”
They fell silent. Seconds ticked past, becoming minutes. “What are you thinking?” she asked.
He looked over at her. “How lucky I am, that after all of this, you’re still here.”
She stood and crossed to him. “I love you.” She slipped her arms around him from behind and rested her cheek against his back.
“Why?” The word came out broken.
“You’re worth loving, Logan. I believe in you.”
He turned in her arms and rested his forehead against hers. “Now we have to work on everyone else.”
“Rumsfeld’s the only one I’m worried about. Let the rest of them think what they want.”
He smiled and held her at arm’s length. “Why do you suspect the police have the box?”
She explained about looking for it and about Stephanie catching Billy Ray at Henry’s, putting something in his trunk.
“That son of a bitch. If the police have it, I’m screwed.”
“Then why’d they let you go?”
“Not enough to charge? Or they figure I’m not going anywhere, so they let me go, maybe lead them to evidence. I don’t know.” He dragged a hand through his hair. “It doesn’t really make sense. Unless there’s more we don’t know.”
“I have another theory. Billy Ray had the box, but expecting a search warrant for the farm, he planted it here. To frame you.”
For a long moment, Logan was silent. “Billy Ray really might have been right. Otherwise, why is the killer’s collection here?” As if thinking out loud, he began to pace. “It’s someone who knows the area well. Knows our family history, about Roane and that we abandoned that barn. The layout of the farm. But that could be almost anyone who’s lived in the area for a while.”
“At least since 2005.”
He stopped, looked at her. “Because of Nicole.”
“Yes.” He started to pace once more. “He lures them here … how? Drugs? Sex? I don’t know … something. Or does he restrain them? Lure them into his car, then—”
He suddenly stopped, obviously exhausted. Expression: beaten. “I don’t know where to start. When the law’s against you, where do you turn?”
“To me,” she said softly. “We’ll do this together.” She held out her hand. “Tomorrow. You need rest, Logan.”
“There’s no time. Rumsfeld, Billy Ray, they—”
“I need rest. For me. And for our baby.” She reached out again. “I’m not going without you.”
When he hesitated, she added, “We’ll be able to think clearly. We’ll know what to do, Logan.”
He took her hand. She led him upstairs to bed. Within moments of his head hitting the pillow, his breathing became deep, even and rhythmic.
Tonight it was she who wouldn’t sleep. She who would stand guard, worrying about keeping him safe, protecting him from those who would destroy them.
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE
Thursday, April 24
10:45 P.M.
Billy Ray sat at his kitchen table, three fingers of Kentucky whiskey untouched in front of him, gaze straight ahead. Abbott was gone. Released, charges dropped. No warrant was coming. No search of the property.
Everything, all his hard work, shot to hell.
By some substance-addled, bleach-blond bimbo.
Abbott had won again. The bully always won. On the playground. In the war room.
Behind closed doors.
“Hello, Billy Ray.”
He shifted his gaze. Stephanie stood in the kitchen doorway. He blinked, wondering if he was hallucinating, though he knew he wasn’t. “How did you get in here?”
“You left the door open.”
He frowned. Had he? He didn’t even recall arriving home.
“I heard about Logan being released.”
“Come to gloat?”