It was hard for me to contain my relief. The man I thought of as T. J. West hadn’t been stalking Tilly. He wasn’t a killer, but a kind and sensitive writer and caregiver. I no longer had to bear a feeling of responsibility for Tilly’s death. I could also direct my anger where it belonged. “Kirk Mason.” I spoke his name with loathing.
“The phantom festivalgoer who seems to have dropped off the face of the earth!” Sean threw out his hands in exasperation. “I’ve had men watching his house for days and there’s no sign of him.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Wait, are you telling me that you’ve identified Kirk Mason?” Picturing his long, lean body, the dark eyes, and his silver piercings winking in the light, fear fed my anger.
Sean shifted uneasily in his chair. “Yes, but there was no sense in sharing that information with you. I didn’t want you to be alarmed that we’d found his residence unoccupied, indicating that he was still at large.”
Indignation uncoiled within me. “I had to read about Tilly’s death in the paper and now this? I’d rather you were more forthcoming instead of trying to keep me in the dark. You think you’re protecting me, but not knowing what’s going on makes me feel much more vulnerable. Kirk Mason’s probably killed two women, Sean. I don’t want to be in the dark when it concerns him!”
“I read you loud and clear, but we don’t have any evidence that the two murders are connected,” Sean replied hastily, and then he took a deep breath and reached for my hand. “You’re right, Lila. If Mason is the murderer he poses a threat to you. After all, you know what he looks like. That drawing you worked on with the sketch artist has been distributed, but no one we’ve spoken with has seen him. The guy doesn’t have a driver’s license. I have no idea how he gets around, but, unfortunately, if he was the shadow outside Tilly’s house the day you were there, he might think that you’re hunting him. Which, in a way, you are.”
I tried to keep my alarm in check, but my fingers started trembling and Sean gripped them tighter.
“An officer has been watching you from a safe distance since yesterday morning,” Sean assured me softly. “No one’s getting near you, sweetheart.”
Nodding, I looked away. Didn’t Sean think I’d like to know that I was officially under police protection? How many other secrets was he keeping from me? I peered at Sean’s concerned face and realized my ire was misdirected. I should focus my anger on Mason. If it weren’t for him, Sean and I wouldn’t be at odds and two women wouldn’t have lost their lives. “What does Kirk Mason do? Does he have a job?”
“He’s a software engineer,” Sean said. “Apparently, he creates programs for smartphones. Works from home and brings in a nice salary. He recently completed some big project and informed his employers that he was taking the week off. He left his cell phone behind, and the neighbors don’t know where he went or the names of any of his friends or family members.”
“Can’t you search his house?” I asked.
Sean shrugged his shoulders and frowned. “We don’t have any evidence. I can’t obtain a warrant without probable cause, and right now, all I have is a name.” He let go of my hand and rubbed his temples. “I’ve called airlines, rental car companies, and dozens of North Carolina residents with the last name ‘Mason.’ This guy is like smoke. I can’t pin him down.”
We fell silent, and I sensed that Sean and I were both feeling angry, helpless, and frustrated. It was the Information Age. People couldn’t just disappear, could they? As I struggled over this question, the smell of hot pizza wafted through the air. “Delivery for Griffiths!” The redheaded cop who’d taken my twenty carried a pizza box in one hand and a plastic take-out bag in the other. “Meat lovers’ supreme and a Greek salad, per the lady’s orders. Enjoy.”
Sean pried back the box lid and inhaled, his eyes brightening for the first time since I’d arrived at the station. “You are a queen among women, Lila.”
He fell on his lunch, devouring a slice laden with sausage, ham, pepperoni, bacon, mushrooms, and green peppers. Once his initial hunger had abated, he wiped his mouth with a paper napkin. “Dig in,” he offered, sliding the box toward me.
“Maybe later,” I said. “While you were gone, I did a Google search on Wipple and I also tried to come up with a list of things Melissa and Tilly had in common. They were both involved in the world of books and they both had ties to Dunston.”
Popping open a can of Coke, Sean hesitated before taking a drink. “If the murders are connected, then there has to be something more linking the two women besides books.”
My mind rifled through the limited facts I had on the two women. “Tilly wrote books about a kid in search of his parents,” I began. “And Melissa specialized in signing authors who wrote about families. What if that’s the common denominator?”
He considered my theory. “So you think that an element in Tilly’s writing is pertinent to Melissa in some way, and that this theme or subject matter led to both of their murders? That seems a little dubious. We don’t have any evidence pointing to the fact that their deaths are linked. The MO is different, the—”