“The idea—the seed of the plan—started with only one of them,” Rowan suggested.

  Now he had the itch, too. “My money’s on Sue Ellen.”

  “Exactly. Let’s pay the lady a visit.” Rowan grabbed her bag and stood. “Then you can buy me lunch.”

  He pushed to his feet. “Did you just mention lunch?”

  She looped the strap of her bag over her neck. “I did. Should we mark this day on the calendar?”

  “I don’t know about all that, but I would love to buy you lunch, Dr. DuPont.”

  Rowan smiled. This felt more like the way things were supposed to be between them. Maybe the kiss was necessary to break the out-of-control tension. Now they could move on.

  She dropped by Charlotte’s office and let her know that she would be back in a couple of hours. Charlotte had already been out to lunch, since her list of duties included dropping by the post office and picking up supplies for the lounge. Rowan couldn’t imagine trying to handle all that on her own. At the beginning of the year she intended to give Charlotte another raise. A really good one.

  She did not want to lose Charlotte.

  As they walked outside, Rowan asked, “Anything new on Utter?”

  Billy shook his head as he settled behind the steering wheel of his truck. “Haven’t located him. I have a feeling he’s laying low.”

  “You think he knows more than he’s shared?”

  Billy started the truck. “Don’t you?”

  She nodded. “I do.”

  If Utter wasn’t hiding out somewhere, he was likely dead. A smart killer didn’t leave loose ends like an old man who could spill his guts. A smart killer cleaned up after himself as he went along.

  Rowan couldn’t say whether Carlos Sanchez had been smart or not, but Julian Addington was brilliant.

  * * *

  Sue Ellen Thackerson’s vehicle was at her father’s store. Technically it was her store now. The estate would need to go through probate, but, for all intents and purposes, it was hers. Unless it was discovered that she was involved in her father’s death, at any rate. Then everything would change.

  A new face was behind the counter in the store. Male. Thirtyish. Rowan didn’t know him. Most likely Yancey Quinn had been fired for providing his two cents’ worth about the relationship between Sue Ellen and her father.

  “Sue Ellen in the back?” Billy asked.

  “She is,” the man said.

  Billy gave him a nod and walked in that direction.

  “I don’t think she wants any company, though,” the guy shouted.

  Billy kept walking; Rowan did the same.

  At the door that separated the back storeroom from the living quarters, Billy knocked.

  Beyond the dingy door a female voice shouted, “Come on in. I didn’t lock it.”

  Obviously, Sue Ellen thought the person at the door was the guy working behind the counter or some other friend she was expecting. Billy glanced at Rowan, then opened the door.

  Sue Ellen looked up from the boxes she appeared to be packing. Her gaze swung from Billy to Rowan and back. “What do you want?”

  “I have a couple of new questions for you, Sue Ellen.”

  The woman glared at Billy. “You can talk to my lawyer. You’re not allowed to talk to me anymore.”

  She threw more items into a box and then reached for the next row on the bookshelf. Apparently, she was packing up her father’s belongings. He wasn’t even buried yet. Why put off until tomorrow, what you can do today? Rowan mused. The woman defined heartlessness.

  “This is one of the most painful parts of losing a father,” Rowan said, thinking of her own father. She hadn’t packed up any of his things. She’d left all of them right where they were. Just as he had Rowan’s mother’s things and Raven’s things. Then again, what she and her father had done was called denial.

  “It’s no fun,” Sue Ellen muttered, “that’s for sure.” More items went into the box. She seemed to pay little or no attention to what she tossed in. These were her father’s personal possessions and she wanted none of them. No surprise there since she was, in all likelihood, the reason he was dead.

  Silence throbbed in the air for five or six seconds.

  “Chief Brannigan was telling me,” Rowan began, “that the bodies may be released by the end of the week.”

  “Yeah, I heard that already.” She looked Rowan up and down. “I’m still not answering any questions and I’m using a funeral home in Tullahoma.”

  “I understand.” Billy gifted her with a patient smile. “It’s just that we learned some disturbing information about Wanda Henegar that might impact the case.”

  Her eyebrows lifted the slightest bit. Rowan wanted to give Billy a high five. Very good move.

  “What do you mean?” Sue Ellen dropped another item into the box and stared at Billy, waiting for an answer.

  Oh, she was listening now and Rowan imagined she would be doing plenty of talking.

  “Whoever killed your father and Mr. Henegar may have been trying to make the murders appear like the work of someone else.”

  “I’m not sure I understand.” Caution weighted Sue Ellen’s tone. “I thought that serial killer Addington was the top suspect. Are you saying he didn’t do it? I’m positive the man I saw talking to my father was him.”

  “It’s possible it was him,” Billy said.

  “But the work wasn’t up to his usual standards,” Rowan said for clarification.

  For one single instant, fear gleamed in the woman’s eyes. “There are standards for murder?”

  “Murderers have MOs,” Billy said. “Many of them are recognizable by those MOs. And we thought the MOs in your father’s murder and in Mr. Henegar’s were similar to one Addington once used. It was the execution of that MO that didn’t live up to his standards. The work was sloppy, unfocused.”

  Sue Ellen shrugged. “Like on CSI or something like that.”

  Billy nodded. “Exactly like that.”

  “Except,” Rowan said, infusing skepticism into her voice, “Addington killed more than a hundred people. I’m not sure all those murder methods, MOs—” she glanced at Sue Ellen “—were reported in the news. How did you say you thought this new suspect found what he needed to try framing Addington?” She directed the question to Billy.

  Billy flared his hands. “That’s the million-dollar question.”

  “What about on the internet?” Sue Ellen said. “You can find anything on the internet.”

  Rowan smiled. “My goodness, Sue Ellen. You sound like a detective yourself. You’re absolutely right. We should have thought of that.” She made a face at Billy.

  The younger woman smirked, enjoying the compliment a little too much. “I’ve damn sure watched enough of those crime-scene shows to be one.”

  And there was the answer Rowan had come here looking for.

  Her cell vibrated and she checked the screen. Charlotte. “Excuse me—” she looked from Sue Ellen to Billy “—I have to take this.”

  While Billy thanked the woman, Rowan moved into the storage area and answered Charlotte’s call. “Hey. Everything okay?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  The worry in her assistant’s voice bumped Rowan’s pulse into a faster rhythm. “What’s wrong?”

  “There’s a woman here to see you.”

  Rowan’s first thought was of Anna Addington. “Did she give you a name?”

  “No. She said she would only talk to you.”

  Rowan licked her abruptly dry lips, ordered her nerves to stop their twitching. “Is there anything else I should know?”

  “I can’t pinpoint anything in particular. She doesn’t appear to be dangerous.”

  That was good news, but Charlotte didn’t sound as if it were good. Her voice was really low now. Rowan had to strain to hear.

  “But she’s odd.”

  Rowan relaxed a little. This was Winchester, there were a few odd folks. Maybe she wasn’t the only one dealing with paranoia. “Is there anyone with her?”

  “No, but she came in wheeling one of those big suitcases, as if she’d just gotten off a plane.”

  Renewed concern pulsed through Rowan. “I’ll be right there. I want you to take Freud out. Tell her he needs to relieve himself and that I’m on my way. You go out the front door and keep walking.”

  “But what about—”

  “Just do it, Charlotte. Now.”

  “Okay.”

  Rowan turned to find Billy coming up behind her. “Everything okay?” he asked.

  “Not at all. We have to hurry.”

  As they rushed to his truck, she filled him in on the conversation with Charlotte.

  “Damn.” As he drove, he called Clarence Lincoln and told him to contact Sheriff Colt Tanner. Tanner had a deputy who was a former bomb expert in the military. Billy wanted him at the funeral home ASAP.

  Rowan’s throat tightened. She had no idea how far away the nearest bomb squad was. Her chest ached. As many times as she had hoped never to see the funeral home again, she did not want her father’s legacy destroyed.

  By the time they reached the funeral home, her heart was thumping against her sternum.

  Billy parked on the street. “Stay put, Ro,” he ordered as he climbed out.

  “No way.” She spotted Charlotte and Freud standing outside the shop across the street. She climbed out and waved to them. Freud barked.

  Rowan started toward the funeral home and Billy blocked her path. “I mean it, Ro. You are not going in. You need to let me handle this.”

  “There’s a very good chance we could be overreacting,” she reminded him, though every nerve ending in her body was jumping.

  “Could be,” he agreed, his face impassive, “but you’re staying right here while I check it out.”

  Before Rowan could launch a new protest, he turned and strode across the lot, toward the funeral home and whatever waited inside.

  Her brain told her to stop him but she felt frozen to the spot, as if the world were spinning out of control and she was helpless to stop it.

  This could be Julian.

  Billy could be walking into a trap.

  Twenty-One

  Billy Brannigan should have known better than to expect Rowan to follow orders. Especially when it came to all the damn trouble she seemed to draw like a magnet.

  She entered the funeral home from the portico end. There was no way she was allowing him to face whatever was in there alone. Inside the door, she pulled her handgun from her bag, allowing the bag to slide down to the floor. She almost never stuck the damn thing into her bag. It usually took up all the room. But today, considering her dress slacks didn’t have pockets and were a little snug in the waist, she’d left behind her wallet and sunglasses. The gun was more important, she had decided.

  Moving silently along the carpeted corridor, she heard the front entrance as it opened. Heard Billy’s low voice as he spoke to the woman waiting in the lobby to see Rowan.

  “I can’t talk to anyone but her,” the woman insisted, her words a near screech.

  “Why don’t we step outside and you can speak to her there?” Billy promised. “She’s right outside waiting to see you.”

  Rowan somehow managed to shove the gun into her waistband at the small of her back and stepped into the lobby. The cold steel bit into her flesh. “Actually, I’m right here. How can I help you?”

  Billy glared at Rowan but she ignored him. He would be the first to say that she’d become very good at ignoring him.

  The woman stood from the bench where she’d been waiting. She was tall, thin and at least sixty, maybe older. “I need you to take care of this for me.” She grabbed the handle of her suitcase and dragged it forward. “He said you could.”

  Rowan froze.

  Billy had the suitcase wrenched away from the woman before she could take another step. She screamed at him. “Go,” he shouted at Rowan.

  Rowan held up her hands to show they were empty. “Why don’t we go into my office?” she suggested to the woman shouting at Billy. Somehow the words came out calmly, though Rowan’s heart was racing. “We can talk privately there.”

  This suggestion got the woman’s attention. She stopped screaming and turned to Rowan. “Yes.” She nodded adamantly. “We should talk privately.”

  Billy drew his weapon and pressed it into the woman’s back. “Take one step and I will shoot.” He arrowed another glare at Rowan. “Go. Now.”

  The woman turned to face Billy, his weapon now boring into her chest. “Go ahead, shoot me. I am not afraid to die. You, on the other hand, should be very afraid.”

  Oh, God. Rowan’s heart sank all the way to the floor.

  The entry doors burst open and uniformed officers poured in.

  Rowan’s knees gave out on her and she clutched at the wall for support.

  The woman’s screeching filled the air.

  * * *

  There was no bomb inside the thirty-two-inch wheeled bag.

  Folded inside was the body of a young woman. Evidence techs and the coroner were called. Burt estimated the woman had been dead around twenty-four hours, maybe less. The car, in which the woman whose name they still did not know, was registered in Colorado, but it had been reported stolen yesterday.

  Based on a photo from the databases Clarence had checked, the dead woman was twenty-nine-year-old Renae Cyrus from Denver, reported missing four days ago.

  Dressler had arrived and was in the interview room with the presumed killer. Rowan, Billy and Clarence watched.

  Billy was still a little irritated at Rowan for not following his orders. Tension radiated off him in tsunami-like waves, not easy to ignore in such tight quarters. The woman had been unarmed. There was cash in the glove box. Receipts from various gas stations along her journey. But no ID, no nothing, other than the wheeled bag with the body tucked inside.

  Why the hell would some woman kill another woman and then drive from Colorado to Tennessee to speak with Rowan?

  There was only one explanation.

  Julian.

  He must have sent her. There simply was no other explanation for this bizarre turn of events.

  The woman continued to stare at Dressler without saying a word. As soon as she had been cuffed, she had stopped talking. She hadn’t made a single sound since. As the officers had loaded her into a cruiser, she had stared at Rowan as long as possible. Rowan had asked Billy to allow her to interview the woman but Dressler had arrived and taken over. Rowan supposed she should be grateful that he had even agreed to allow them to watch the interview. But it was immensely difficult to be grateful to Dressler for allowing them to do what needed to be done.

  After half an hour, Dressler stood and walked out of the room. Seconds later he squeezed into the observation booth. “She’s not going to talk to me.”

  Rowan bit her tongue to prevent making a snarky retort.

  “We can park her in a cell for a few hours and see if that changes her mind,” Billy suggested.

  Rowan wanted to shake both of them. The woman wanted to talk to her! The answer to getting her to cooperate was standing right here.

  Dressler stared at the woman seated at the shabby table a dozen feet away, beyond the glass that allowed them to anonymously watch and discuss her. “I don’t think time will change her mind.”

  Rowan refused to agree with him, though she did. To do so would be like taking his side over Billy’s. Right now she wasn’t on either man’s side.

  “Well, Agent Dressler, since your extensive charm didn’t work, what’s your suggestion?” Billy turned to him and waited for his answer.

  Rowan bit her lips together to prevent herself from smiling.

  Dressler smiled that smug expression that made Rowan want to kick him. “I think it’s time we allowed Dr. DuPont to interview the woman. After all, our Jane Doe came all this way to see her.”

  Billy shifted his gaze to Rowan. “What do you think, Ro? You interested in helping Agent Dressler get this done?”

  “I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.” She shrugged, knowing Billy would prefer she not go into the room, but that he now understood it was necessary. “She’s secured. I’ll be fine.”

  Dressler held up his hands in surrender. “Can we get on with it, please?”

  Rowan crossed her arms over her chest. “Just waiting for you to move, Josh.”

  He smirked, then realized she was right and the sour expression that claimed his face made her want to smile. He exited the booth, Clarence did the same.

  Billy hesitated. “I need you to be more careful, Ro.”

  She nodded. He was right. She had gone too far. Things could have turned out vastly differently. “I know. Sorry about earlier.”

  She owed him that apology on another level, as well. She had disrespected his position as chief and as her friend.

  He gestured for her to exit first. When she reached for the door to the interview room, the men stepped back into the booth.

  Rowan took a deep breath and opened the door. She walked in and crossed to the table. Sitting down in the only vacant chair, she took a moment to get her bearings. Her chair was slightly offset from the other woman’s rather than directly across from it. That way she wouldn’t block the view of those in the observation booth.

  “Well.” Rowan placed her hands in her lap and met the woman’s gaze. “This was certainly quite the commotion for the opportunity to speak to me. I apologize for all the hoopla.”

  The woman said nothing.

  “You know who I am, but I don’t know your name.”

  More of that silence. The way she stared at Rowan, with watery, pale blue eyes, was a tad unsettling. Her hair was light, mostly that white sort of gray that somehow looked good with her complexion. She was thin and tall but not frail. She looked strong. Her posture was very good. Straight spine, square shoulders. The only telltale indications that all was not right in her world were the dark circles under her eyes and the iron cuffs she wore. The pink sweater and khaki trousers and white lace-up tennis shoes were completely incongruent with her current situation and the body in the bag.