He rose regretfully at last and headed for the shower. She made a point of not following him. When he was done, she showered and dressed, then joined him at the table, where he was drinking coffee and speaking on the phone.
“I’m heading to the station,” he said when he finished his call. “I’m going to do whatever I can to clear Jack, but I promise you, I won’t let myself think that it’s impossible for him to be involved, even if he is a dedicated police officer. Sad to say, he wouldn’t be the first. Sam and Jenna are heading to Danvers—old Salem Village—to show Hermione’s picture around.”
He got up, stood behind Devin and put his hands on her shoulders. “What we need now is more knowledge about your ancestor—Margaret Nottingham. Why does she come to see you? To warn you? To help you? Because she’s worried about you? Is she connected to the murders themselves in some way, or only to you?”
A knock at the door stopped him from theorizing any further. He looked through the peephole before opening it to the rest of his teammates, who were standing in the hallway.
“Ready to roll, if Devin is set,” Angela said.
“Jenna and I are taking the team rental to the lab to find out if anything pertinent was discovered about the pentagram,” Sam said.
“Angela, Jane, and Devin are going to do more research and get Hermione’s picture out on the street, ask people if they saw her,” Rocky told him. “I’m going to meet up with Jack at the station.”
“And we’ll all spread the word around town that you and Devin are going to stay at the cottage tonight,” Angela assured him.
“Good plan. Everyone keep in touch,” Rocky said.
“We will,” Angela promised.
*
Rocky met Jack at the station, and they started going through case files again, hoping something would miraculously jump out at them, something they’d somehow managed to overlook a dozen times before.
Jack leaned back in his chair. “Okay, we know that Vince has an alibi. We couldn’t find a thing on Brent Corbin. We believe the killer was tall, which means we’re not looking at Renee—though I suppose she could have been an accomplice, which...I’m not seeing it.” He paused, staring at Rocky. “You would make a good suspect—except you were in California when Carly Henderson was murdered. So let’s be up front here. It has to have occurred to you that it might have been me.”
Rocky looked at him with a steady gaze. “Yes.”
“I’ve got an alibi,” Jack said. “Though I admit that Haley and I are collectors, and we own several athames we’ve picked up over the years. I’ve never owned a pentagram necklace, but I’ll bet Haley has at some time.”
“Just to cover all bases, let’s trace your movements,” Rocky said.
“I’m either on the job or I’m at home, with Haley.” Jack laughed without any real humor. “Next thing I know, you’ll tell me she’s a suspect, too. She’s tall enough. Hell, maybe she and I are in it together. Or maybe all of us take turns.”
“When we were kids, any one of us could have lured Melissa into the woods. Haley was in great shape, tall and athletic. We were all big kids—you, me and Vince. The three of us didn’t get together until she’d already been dead for several hours.”
“And you found her,” Jack reminded him.
Rocky nodded. “Don’t worry. I’d suspect me, too.”
Jack thought for a moment, then said, “It’s possible the current killer’s a copycat—someone who saw Melissa’s body. But that brings us back to you, me and Vince. And none of us fit. I mean, the cops, the M.E., they saw her, too, but...”
“You’re forgetting someone,” Rocky said. “The murderer.”
“Or murderers,” Jack said. “Except,” he added with a note of disgust in his voice, “it’s hard enough for one person not to leave a scrap of trace evidence. Two?”
Rocky was thoughtful. “Maybe one person gets the victim out there and the other one does the killing.”
Rocky pushed a folder forward. “Theo Hastings,” he said.
“He wasn’t here when Melissa was murdered,” Jack said.
“We don’t know that,” Rocky said. “My team discovered that he’s really from here, he just moved to the Midwest for a while.”
“Let’s bring him in, see what he has to say,” Jack said.
*
They started with the shops and restaurants on Derby and Essex streets, splitting up, with Jane taking one side of the road and Angela and Devin taking the other. For the most part, people were eager to help, but despite that, no one recognized Hermione Robicheaux.
Eventually, though, Devin and Angela found a busy waitress who started when she saw the picture, then put down her tray to take it from them. “Yeah, I saw her—she was in here a couple weeks ago. She sat at the table by the window there. She was telling me that it was her first trip here, and she was really excited. She said that she could trace her roots back before the witchcraft trials.” The woman paused. “Me, I can’t trace my family back past my mom and dad. Well, I think my grandparents on my dad’s came from Cleveland, but that’s about it. Cool to know where you came from the way she did, huh?”