The most recent disappearance was only a short time before the Bureau was called in, and the fresh reality of that girl being missing hangs over the town. On the way down Main Street last night, I noticed a missing poster attached to a light post. It hasn't even had time to get faded by the sun.

  I suddenly realize the time has gotten away from me. I need to hurry if I don’t want to be late to breakfast. As it is, Jake's already waiting for me at a table when I get to the tiny restaurant. He smiles at me and waves as if I'm going to miss him among the six other tables. But I smile and wave in return.

  “How did you sleep?” he asks when I slip into the booth across from him.

  “Very well, thank you. How are you this morning?”

  It should be the uncomfortable small talk of people who don't know each other and are trying to get accustomed to sharing the same space. But it's not. For some reason, I feel at ease with Jake, like I've always known him. In a way, that puts me on edge even more than the discomfort would. I didn't come here to form connections, and the immediate draw of this man surprises me. Maybe it's because he's so different. From the shine in his eyes to the ponytail tied loosely at the back of his neck to the playful energy around him, he's nothing like any man I've ever dated. It might be the sheer novelty of him and the way he looks at me like I'm the only thing he notices in the room that keeps me fascinated. That stops me from ending this now and staying locked away with nothing but my work.

  A waitress comes by and hands us menus. I order a cup of coffee before she walks away, and Jake laughs.

  “Are you one of those people who believes they aren't capable of any sort of functioning before they have the right saturation of coffee in their blood in the morning?” he asks.

  “Without a shadow of a doubt,” I respond without hesitation.

  He laughs again. “Me, too.” The waitress returns and sets mugs in front of both of us. He lifts his to show me. “See?”

  She takes our breakfast orders and leaves. I stare at Jake expectantly.

  “Well?” I ask.

  “What?” he asks.

  “I believe we had a deal,” I say. “You're supposed to tell me about these disappearances.”

  “The agreement was we'd meet for breakfast, and I'd tell you. We haven't had breakfast yet, so technically, the terms haven't been met,” he points out.

  “You drive a hard bargain. Are you just trying to stretch this out?”

  He picks up his coffee and puts it to his lips for a long sip. Gazing at me over the mug, he winks like he did the night before. It has the same effect.

  “You see that man over there?” he asks when he's finished with his sip.

  I look where he's pointing and see a man in a red and black plaid golf hat sitting by himself in the corner of a booth.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “That's Elliot. He comes here every single morning and has the exact same breakfast. Coffee, orange juice, a bowl of grits with butter, two over-easy eggs, and a piece of white toast, heavily buttered.”

  “Just one piece of toast with two eggs?” I ask.

  He gives a slow single nod, still watching the older man. “It's cut in half, and he uses the points of the triangles to poke open the yolks of each egg. He's been doing it for twenty-five years,” Jake says.

  I scoff at him. “How could you possibly know that? You aren't old enough.”

  He straightens up. “I'm thirty-four.”

  “Seriously?” I start.

  He looks at me strangely. “Why is that so unbelievable?”

  “You just seem younger,” I tell him.

  “Well, if you want to talk about young, look over to the booth under the window.”

  I do, and see a pretty brunette woman around my age, maybe a couple years older, feeding a baby sitting in a highchair at the end of the table.

  “Okay,” I nod.

  “That's her grandson,” he says.

  “What?” I ask, my voice climbing so loud and sharp, nearly everyone at the restaurant turns to look at me. “Sorry,” I whisper meekly, then look back at Jake. “What?”

  He nods, chuckling. “Yep. Her family is known for their… let's say, consistency. For the last four generations, the women have gotten married and had their first baby at fifteen. That's Ella. She followed right along in her mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother's footsteps. She has a sister, Fanny, who just turned fourteen and says she isn't speaking to anyone male until she turns twenty.”

  I laugh. “Smart girl.”

  Our breakfasts come, and we eat for a few moments in silence. Finally, Jake takes a sip of coffee to wash down a bite of his omelet.

  “You sure you want to hear all this?” he asks, forking a piece of his food.

  “Yes,” I tell him.

  I settle into the bowl of yogurt and granola in front of me and listen as he tells me about the disappearances. He doesn't give me any information I don't already have from the case files, but there are emotion and insight those clippings and printouts didn't give me. The emotion of living through the discovery of each disappearance and the horror of the two bodies is evident in his voice. This has had a major impact on the people of this town, and it's seeping deeper. Every day without a resolution is stirring suspicions and turning people who were once content to never lock a lock and stroll everywhere in town at night into those who hide behind deadbolts and keep to their homes.

  “I started escorting people home when it got obvious the police weren't going to find whoever was doing this and make them stop. I hate the thought of anyone coming to my place to relax and enjoy themselves, only to have something happen to them when they leave. Keeping them safe became a top priority for me. I want to protect them and do whatever I can to make this town as secure as possible. Watching people change their lives because of this is heartbreaking. No one should have to live in fear all the time and not be able to just live their lives.”

  “I agree.”

  Chapter Six

  “No, no, you don't understand. It was everywhere. In his ears. In his hair. It was the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.”

  Jake's laughing almost as hard as I am, making it difficult to understand exactly what he's saying. We're walking through snow that fell heavily over the town three days ago but has started to melt in the slightly warmer temperatures. Those warmer temperatures are still keeping me chilled to the bone most of the day, but the time I get to spend with Jake is very effective at distracting me.

  We've seen each other every day since I arrived in Feathered Nest, and the closer we get, the more I feel like he's infiltrating me into the real version of this town. Showing me around and introducing me to people gives me an in with them, automatically giving me more credibility. It lets me have conversations with them without the cocked eyebrows and hesitant speech, or at least with less of it. Gradually, I'm getting more comfortable. When he goes into the bar in the evenings, I bury myself in the case, filling pages with notes and making every link and connection I can.

  Yesterday I got the opportunity to talk to the mother of one of the missing people. Even a year after the last time she saw her daughter, she gets emotional just saying her name. It was hard to watch her struggle with herself to talk without dissolving into tears. I comforted her, telling her it was alright to cry, but part of me felt fake offering the comfort. I'm the one who still buries my face in my pillow to cry over my parents. And it has been much longer than a year.

  There was something about the conversation that struck me. Though she fully accepted her daughter was gone, abducted by someone, and very likely killed, she couldn't wrap her mind around the way it happened. Her blood was found strewn across the alley behind where she worked, but her mother said she would never have gone back there alone in the dark. It just didn't make any sense. Her daughter hated the dark and didn't even like to walk through her own home by herself without turning on all the lights. She just couldn't imagine her going out into the alley to bring out the trash without someone being there with her.

  I'm still tumbling that around in my head as I walk along beside Jake, listening to him tell me stories about his childhood here in Feathered Nest. His mother, father, brother, and sister ensured he rarely had a dull moment. And when he did need something new to spark his imagination, or he was on overload and wanted a break, his grandmother's house was within walking distance, set on sprawling grounds filled with hiding spots and secret rooms and forts he crafted with his siblings. It sounds idyllic, and a pang goes through me at the thought of my own hectic, never truly settled childhood.

  “Alright. So, now you know the story of what happens to a peanut butter and marshmallow sandwich when it's put into the microwave for five minutes,” he says.

  “Important life lessons learned,” I smile.

  “Yes. So, now it's your turn. Tell me something about yourself. I know you're an only child.”

  “Yep. Just me. My mother was a ballerina in Russia when she was young but came to the United States after an injury ended her career.”

  “That's terrible,” Jake says sympathetically.

  I shake my head and take a sip of the steaming hot apple cider I've been carrying mostly to keep my hands warm as we walk along one of the smaller streets in town.

  “Not really. She enjoyed dancing, but it wasn't really her passion. She didn't live or die by it by any means. When it was over, it was simply over, and that was it. She was ready to move on to the next part of her life, and that meant my father.”

  “And you,” he says.

  “And me,” I confirm with a smile.

  “What about your father?”

  “He was not a ballerina in Russia.” Jake gives an exasperated laugh, and I giggle. “He worked for the government.”

  I don't go into any details. I learned early on in my life not to offer more than was asked of me, and most of the time, not even that much. Especially, when it came to my father.

  “Worked? Past tense?”

  I nod. “Both are gone.”

  Despite everything else I'm fabricating as I tell him, that answer seems to burn on my tongue. I can't tell him everything. I can't tell him my mother was murdered when I was young and my father, a top CIA agent, disappeared. I have to protect myself, my identity, and my motivations, but not telling Jake almost feels like a betrayal.

  “I'm so sorry to hear that,” he tells me. “Mine are, too.”

  I nod, and a few seconds of silence fall between us as we commiserate in the pain and emptiness of being without our parents.

  “I’m sorry,” I say.

  He looks directly into my eyes with an intensity that makes something inside me ache, but I don’t know why.

  “Emma, there’s something I need to tell you.”

  “Alright,” I say, gingerly.

  Jake looks away, then back to me.

  “It isn’t just my parents who are gone. I wasn’t always alone here. I was married.”

  “You were?”

  He nods. “It was a long time ago. We were both young, but it didn’t matter to us. We wanted to be together, and there wasn’t anything that was going to stop us. Fortunately, no one tried. We only got three months together before she died.”

  A lump forms in my throat at the sound of pain in his voice.

  “What happened to her?” I ask.

  “She was hit by a drunk driver,” he sighs. “The only thing that got me through it was knowing it happened instantly. She had no idea.” He lets out a long breath, and his eyes meet mine again. “Does it bother you?”

  I shake my head. “Of course not.”

  Jake leans forward, touching his forehead against mine. I’ve only known him for a few days, but I’m slipping deep into him, and I’m afraid of what might happen when this is all over.

  Finally, I break the silence by turning to him.

  “Favorite family vacation,” I ask.

  “Hmmm,” he muses, leaning his head back slightly as he thinks. “That's a tough one. We did a lot. My mother was the family adventure type. I'm going to have to say Disney Animal Kingdom. I was seven years old, and I remember seeing the elephants and thinking about how incredibly big they were. That seems so silly now, but when I was that age, I didn't really think about an animal being that big in real life. When I got to see them fairly up close, it was just mind-blowing.”

  We walk a little farther, and Jake looks like he's about to say something when shouts ring out through the cold air. I look at him, and his eyes widen.

  “That's coming from the park,” he says. “Come on.”

  We toss our cups into a nearby trashcan and run as fast as we can through the snow. He leads me toward a small park several streets away from the main shopping area of the town. As we approach, we see a crowd starting to form.

  “Get off me!” I hear someone shouting. “Get your hands off me!”

  “What did you do to her?” another man demands. “Where is she?”

  A few voices from the crowd shout at the two men, split over which side they are supporting. Jake and I rush into the fray, and he forces people out of the way to reveal a man dragging another by what looks like a rope around his neck. The man thrashing on the ground has his hands shoved between the rope and his neck, desperately trying to keep it from choking him.

  “What's going on here?” Jake asks.

  The man with the other end of the rope drags the man on the ground a few more feet toward a low-hanging branch of a nearby tree, and my heart jumps into my throat as I realize his intentions.

  “He took my daughter,” he says.

  “I didn't do anything with his daughter,” the other begs. ”Please.”

  Jake grabs onto the rope and looks the first man directly in the eye. “Let go. You need to put down the rope.”

  “She's gone,” the man says, his voice cracking. “My little girl is gone, and he's the last one I saw her with.”

  “That doesn't mean he did anything to her,” Jake says.

  “There's blood in his car. I saw it.”

  “I went hunting. Like I told you. I put my knife down, and some blood got on my seat,” the other man insists.

  “You don't just put down a hunting knife without realizing it has blood on it. He had to have done something to her. And since he won't tell me where she is, I'm going to make sure he's gone, too.”

  “Stop,” Jake says sternly, tugging the rope again. “That's enough. Don't you think enough has happened in this town? We can't be turning against each other. We need to pull together right now and try to help each other through this, not lose control of ourselves.”

  As Jake talks, I drop down to my knees beside the man on the ground and release the rope from around his neck. He rubs at the red, raw skin left behind, but at least he's still breathing and not dangling from the tree like an homage to the vigilante justice of the Old West.

  “Thank you, Jake. I can take this from here.”

  Chief LaRoche walks through the crowd and stares at the two men. Jake hands over the rope and comes over to me, wrapping his arm around my shoulders to guide me away. I'm shaking, my hands trembling so hard I can barely keep them down.

  “I'm sorry you had to see that,” he sighs.

  “I can't believe someone would go that far,” I mutter. “He was ready to kill that guy.”

  Jake nods. “He was. The people around here are getting pushed too far. They want the police to find out who's been doing this and stop them before more people are lost.”

  I shiver as we walk away from the park. In those few moments, everything got so much more intense. There's a darkness over this town. Secrets it’s holding onto. If I don't bring an end to them, it will only get worse.

  An emergency in the kitchen meant Jake had to go in early. It leaves me with the afternoon to do something I've been planning since I arrived. Taking a bag of supplies and equipment with me, I pile into the car and start the long drive back in the direction I came. When I'm certain I'm close, I pull the car onto the gravel beside the train track and park. Climbing out of the car, I look around.

  A few feet away, the end of a wooden post sticks out of the remaining traces of snow. Bright pink plastic tattered by the wind and rain marks where the body of the woman, Cristela Jordan, lay months ago. It's one of the realities of crime scenes that often shocks people. Most people hope scenes like this are cleaned up when the police are finished with the initial investigations, so no traces of the horror are left behind. They want not just the body gone, but anything that might remind passers-by of what happened there.

  That doesn't always happen. In fact, it's rare for scenes to be totally broken down, even when cases are closed. It's too easy for investigators to just walk away and leave behind traces. Some linger for years after.

  I'm glad for this one. The marker matches the pictures given to me by Creagan. It's as clear in my mind now as if I'm holding the image in my hand. The gravel looks clean, but I'm sure if I dug down past the first few layers of rocks, I'd find traces of the blood that was spread across the entire area when they found her. Standing beside the marker, I orient myself and look down the tracks. I can't see it, but in the distance, there is likely another marker where the body of the man was found weeks later.

  In both cases, the bodies were badly damaged. The man was dissected, and several body parts were missing, while the woman appeared to have been hit by an oncoming train after death. Examining the body as much as they could showed she had marks on her like she was strangled and suffered various cuts and blunt force trauma, but the train mangled her, making it harder to determine what actually happened.

  The initial investigation into Cristela Jordan's death considered the possibility that she and her killer had hopped one of the commercial trains that come down this line several times per week. They theorized she was murdered after an altercation and tossed onto the tracks. That doesn't make sense. If she was thrown from the train, she would land directly on the gravel, not on the track to be hit. Later there were examinations of the trains that passed this way for several days before the body was found. None of them were covered in blood. That didn't surprise me much when I heard it. The high-pressure water used to wash the trains would remove any signs of blood before they knew to preserve anything. There was really no way of knowing what train hit her or when.