“It’s possible he won’t thank you.”
She jerked her glance to her dad’s. If AJ had done it, if he was guilty of murder, her dad meant. “I’ll worry about that later.”
“Okay, then, if you’re dead set on finding him, you need police help to do it.”
Lily saw the sun-faded red SUV when she pulled into the WPD parking lot, and her heartbeat slowed. It looked much like the one Dru had been driving when she and Shea had come to the xL on Thursday. Something’s happened, she thought. She went quickly up the walkway, but stepping through the door, she was hit by a blast of air so cold it took what was left of her breath. She paused, getting her bearings. Across from her, the counter that served as the duty desk was unmanned, which was no surprise. The Wyatt PD was perennially shorthanded.
“Mrs. Isley?”
She looked up. Shea was coming through a swinging door behind the counter, Dru in her wake. Both women were red-eyed. From crying? Exhaustion? “What’s happened?” Lily asked, but then, suddenly she knew. “The police have found AJ.”
“No,” Shea said.
“What is it, then?” Lily asked, and her voice was sharp, but in her distress, she couldn’t help it.
“Kate, Kate Kincaid.” Shea lifted her hand to touch her face, or perhaps her hair, but then it faltered midway, as if she’d forgotten it was there.
“Kate is—was—Shea’s maid of honor,” Dru said.
“Yes?” Lily knew that.
“She’s dead.” Shea lowered her hand.
“What?” Lily was incredulous. “When?”
“This morning. She was hiking at Cedar Ridge Canyon. She was supposed to meet Erik at Bella Vista, but they got their wires crossed, and when she didn’t show up, Erik figured she must have gone to Cedar Ridge by mistake. He went there to check. The police were already there. A couple of other hikers had found Kate and called 911.”
“He was just telling me about their engagement.” Lily felt winded. “He must be devastated. All of you must be. I’m so sorry.”
Shea said, “I can’t get my mind around it. She was my best friend, like a sister.”
“Is Erik here with you?” Lily asked.
“He’s at her mom and dad’s,” Shea answered. “He didn’t want them hearing what had happened from a stranger, or on the news. That’s how Mom and I found out. It was awful.”
“The police don’t think it was an accident,” Dru said in a manner that seemed pointed, ominous.
Shea pulled a delicate chain from inside her shirt. “You know I bought these lotus-blossom charms, one for me and one for AJ—they found one on the trail, above where Kate fell.”
Lily felt her blood cool.
“There were signs of a struggle.” Dru said. “The police think it was AJ, that he attacked her, that he was stalking her.”
“I heard the sirens,” Lily said. “I was at Monarch Lake. I—I found AJ’s truck—”
“Lily?”
She glanced up. “Oh, Clint.” She knew Clint Mackie, the Wyatt police department captain, in another, friendlier capacity, as a hunting buddy of her dad’s. “Shea and Dru were just telling me about Kate.”
“Jeb called a while ago and said you were on your way in.”
Clint’s look was trenchant, probing, as if Lily and her father, and their actions, were somehow suspect, and she realized she’d be foolish to consider he was anything other than her adversary. “Dad told you I found the truck?”
“Why don’t you come on back and we’ll talk in my office.”
“We can talk right here,” Lily said, because Shea and even Dru had a right to hear of her discovery. They’d know soon enough anyway.
“All right.” Mackie leaned against the duty counter. “Jeb said the truck was burned?”
Shea inhaled so sharply that Lily turned to her immediately, reassuring her. “No, no, AJ wasn’t there.”
“It was his truck for sure, though?” Shea asked.
“Yes.” Lily paused. She didn’t want to tell the rest, but she had to. “We found a knife, a chef’s knife under a tarp. A Shun, from the set I gave AJ last year.”
“Oh my God,” Dru said. “What more proof—”
“All that means,” Shea said, “is that whoever killed Becca took the knife and AJ’s truck from his apartment, and AJ, too. Can’t you see that, Mom?” Shea looked at Captain Mackie.
He said, “Sergeant Carter is on his way there now to retrieve the vehicle. It’ll likely go to Dallas, along with the knife and any other evidence they find.”
“So that’s it?” Lily flung out her hands. “You’ve made up your minds; you and your counterparts in Dallas have decided my son killed these girls? You know AJ, Clint. You know he isn’t capable.”
“There’s quite a lot involved here that you may not be aware of, Lily. For instance, did you know a note, written in lip liner, was found on Ms. Westin’s body?”
“He just told me about it,” Shea said, indicating Clint.
“I heard about it, too,” Lily said, not citing Edward as her source. Fixed you . . . The note’s message hovered in her mind.
“Another note was found yesterday evening under the windshield wiper of Leigh Martindale’s car,” Clint said. “Someone left it while she was parked outside the Gallaghers’. It was also written in lip liner.”
“It said, ‘I’m sorry for hurting you. I’m in trouble and I don’t think I can stop.’” Dru sounded accusatory, as if Lily had been the author.
“In addition to the notes,” Clint went on smoothly, “there’s evidence that Ms. Kincaid and Ms. Westin exchanged several texts on the day Becca was murdered.”
“Is that suspicious?” Lily asked.
“Not in and of itself, but taken along with everything else—”
“What’s suspicious,” Dru said, “is that Kate didn’t mention she and Becca had texted until last night, when the police came about the note Leigh found. Kate hadn’t even told Shea about the texts, and they told each other everything.”
“Are you saying she knew something about Becca’s murder, Mom?”
“No!” Dru seemed horrified by the idea, but maybe it was only pretense.
“Sticking to the facts,” Clint said, and he ticked them off on his fingers as he named them. “A piece of jewelry, a vehicle, and the possible weapon used in Becca Westin’s murder—all items belonging to AJ—were found in the same vicinity where Ms. Kincaid was hiking.”
“Why would AJ follow Kate, Captain Mackie? Why would he stalk her? What’s his motive? Can you answer that? No, I didn’t think so.” Shea was derisive.
“Are you going to keep patrolling our neighborhood, and Vanessa’s and Leigh’s neighborhoods?” Dru asked. “None of us is safe until this maniac”—she paused to glance sidelong at Lily, and Lily saw the accusation, the clear conviction in Dru’s eyes that AJ was the maniac—“the person,” Dru amended, out of pity, perhaps, “is caught.”