“Go ahead,” Kat told her.
It took a few starts and stops, but Ruth managed to relate the events of the rape fifteen years earlier by an assailant she couldn’t identify. After laying out the particulars—that Shiloh and Kat were with her while they were skinny-dipping in the pond—she gained momentum and went on to explain that they’d all scattered, but that Ruth was captured by the man, and that Shiloh and Kat had returned to rescue her. She finished with, “If they hadn’t come back for me, I believe I would have been kidnapped. That’s what I think happened to Addie Donovan. That’s what I know happened to Courtney Pearson, and maybe Rachel Byrd, and Erin Higgins. I’m sorry I didn’t come forward sooner. So sorry.”
Her voice weakened, and Kat stopped the tape. They both were silent for a moment, then Ruth said, “I’ve tried to block it out, but it doesn’t work that way. So I’ve been concentrating on the details of what I remember about him. Wide girth, furry skin, thick hands. That’s my mantra. That’s what goes through my head when I think of him.”
“I’ll take the tape to Sheriff Featherstone and Ricki. They’ll probably want to talk to you themselves,” Kat warned.
“I feel better now that it’s out there. I’ll be okay. Sorry I panicked. I had this mental image of me in a room with silent police officers, all of them staring at me, and it just didn’t work.”
“Arms folded across our chests. Cold judgment in our eyes.”
Ruth choked out a laugh. “I know that’s not how it would be, but . . .”
“You don’t know how it’ll be until it happens. It’s okay.”
“Thank you, Kat,” Ruth said, heartfelt. “I have a hotline, and I get calls from women who won’t come in, won’t finger their attackers, even if they know who they are. I know how they feel. The fear is crippling.” Ruth gazed, clear-eyed, at Kat. “But hiding the truth only delays justice. Speaking up is the only way to get these guys.”
“Maybe we’ll find him now,” Kat said. “The one at the pond.”
“He’s still here in Prairie Creek, and he hasn’t changed. I think he took Addie. You think so too.”
Kat nodded.
“He would have kidnapped me, if you and Shiloh hadn’t stopped him. I’m actually one of the lucky ones.” She reached into her purse and pulled out a notebook and an envelope similar to the one Shiloh had handed her earlier. “This is my list of suspects. There’s also one who’s a client, but I didn’t put him on there for professional reasons. And this is the photo he left in my mailbox.”
Kat accepted the items. “He hasn’t left one for me.”
“Yet,” Ruth said seriously. “Be careful, Kat. I’m spending almost every minute with other people. Ethan’s with me every night.” A faint blush stole into her cheeks. “Tell Shiloh to watch out too.”
“She’s staying at the Tate ranch with Beau Tate. They’re taking care of Morgan, and they’ve got a dog.”
“Ethan says you try to have dinner once a week or so, but that you haven’t been able to get together lately. Maybe we can all find some time in the near future?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll call you,” Ruth said, looking a little uncertain about Kat’s monosyllabic reply. The truth was, currently Kat couldn’t imagine ever eating again.
*
Three hours later, Kat and Ricki were in Ricki’s Jeep rattling down the long driveway that led to the Rocking D, Ira Dillinger’s ranch. Kat had tried to think of something to eat for lunch, but the image of the blood-red remains of her breakfast in the toilet was something she couldn’t get out of her head. She held on to the panic bar as they bumped along, hoping she didn’t upchuck on the upholstery. Finally, they hit the blacktop, and the ride smoothed out for the last quarter mile.
Ricki had asked her if Ruth had come in, and Kat had said no, without explaining that they’d met in the park. Kat was waiting until after this meeting with Ira Dillinger about the barbed wire to bring up Ruth’s recorded statement and the rape. She planned to present the facts of the crime to both Ricki and Sheriff Sam Featherstone at the same time, and the sheriff had been out of the office all morning.
“Still waiting on that full report on Courtney Pearson, but preliminaries are grim,” Ricki said now, her eyes straight ahead, her expression set. “Indications suggest she was subjected to rough sex, probably for years.”
Kat swallowed.
“Someone doused her in gasoline, inside and out. Maybe they meant to burn the body, or maybe they thought it would disguise DNA. It’s not clear. Her cause of death was from exsanguination.”
“She bled out?”
“That cut on her wrist was from the barbed wire. Not the wire that was binding her wrists. A separate piece, apparently, that wasn’t with the body.”
“He cut her wrist to kill her?” Kat said slowly, disbelieving.
“Or maybe she’d had enough and did it to herself.”
“Oh. God.”
Kat hung her head and felt saliva gather in her mouth. She swallowed quickly, several times.
“You want me to stop the truck?” Ricki asked.
“No.”
“Hangovers can really be a bitch,” she said sympathetically as they pulled up in front of the wide front porch of the two-story rambling mansion of wood and stone.
*
Ira Dillinger sat behind the huge desk in his den, his gray-white brows capping a pair of sharp eyes. He looked rawhide tough and weather-beaten, and he gave Kat a hard looking over as she entered his office behind Ricki. Kat nodded to him, then focused on the multi-generational photograph of the Dillinger family prominently displayed behind him. It had been taken years earlier, when Ricki was much younger. She was standing in front of a gray barn with a brilliant blue Wyoming sky behind them. Beside her were her brothers, Colton and Tyler, and her sisters, Delilah and Nell. Kat knew them all by sight, though none of them very well, other than Ricki.
“What is it you want me to see?” Ira asked his daughter.
Ricki pulled out the snapshot of the close-up on Courtney Pearson’s wrists. “Patrick Starr thought this was Dillinger wire,” she said, pointing to the barbed wire. “I figured you’d know for sure.”
He dragged a pair of wire-rimmed glasses out of his pocket and perched them on his nose. When he made no immediate comment, Ricki explained, “It was wrapped around the wrists of Courtney Pearson, who had been missing for fifteen years.”
Ira shook his head. “Well, it’s Dillinger, all right. Haven’t used it in years. Don’t like them finding it and using it for God knows what purposes.”
“We believe someone used it as a means of binding.”
“I can see that.” He shoved the picture aside. “I don’t like what I’m thinking about it.”
“I know,” Ricki agreed.
Before she could go further, he pointed a finger at her. “This is no job for a woman. I’ve said it before; I’ll say it again.”
“Dad.” Ricki was long-suffering.