Since they couldn’t interview Sela Abbott until after the doctors were finished examining her and Bellemont had spoken with her, Falco had left to take care of something. He wouldn’t say what, only that he would be right back.

  Kerri hadn’t possessed the mental fortitude to question him. She’d checked her voice mail and found a message from the lab confirming that the meat Robby had saved all those years was human. The tissue would be compared with the bones found beneath the pool at Whisper Lake Circle to determine if they belonged to the same person. Kerri didn’t need any sort of analysis to tell her this. The remains belonged to Janelle Stevens, Sela’s sister.

  A few minutes ago the doctors had finished with Sela Abbott and pronounced her in reasonably good condition. She was slightly dehydrated and had a number of minor injuries, but otherwise she and the baby were stable.

  Now Bellemont was in the room with her. When he gave the word, Kerri would be able to question her. She was all too ready. But she would really like her partner to be here for this. She glanced back down the corridor. Where the hell was he?

  She thought of Jen and was grateful all over again that she hadn’t gotten herself killed showing up at Thompson’s house early this morning. Falco had already been called to the scene at Whisper Lake Circle. Since Jen had parked on the street behind Thompson’s house, Kerri and Falco hadn’t spotted her car when they’d arrived. An officer had taken her to Diana’s house. Kerri wasn’t sure how her sister would take what Jen had to tell her about being at the house the night it burned, but that issue would have to be worked out eventually. The pain might just be too raw now.

  Kerri leaned against the wall. Too damned tired to hold up her weight on her own anymore. She glanced at the room down the hall where the two unis stood on either side of the door. Around-the-clock protection had been ordered for Sela Abbott.

  How long did Bellemont expect to put off the questioning? Kerri finished off her cold coffee. What the hell was taking Falco so long?

  As if her thought had summoned him, Falco rounded the corner and strode toward her. She had never been so glad to see anyone in her life.

  “Are the doctors still with her?” he asked with a glance at the door of Abbott’s room.

  “They finished, said she was in good condition. Bellemont is with her now.”

  Falco glanced around. “We need to talk.”

  They moved down the hall a few yards. “What’s up?” Kerri wasn’t sure she could handle any more. Her niece was dead, along with a whole slew of other people.

  And she had killed a man.

  She closed her eyes. Shit.

  “Falco.” She looked up at him. “I’m not sure I should even go in there for the questioning. At this point, my involvement could jeopardize the case. After what I did—”

  “Stop.”

  She frowned, waited for him to continue.

  “There was no body.”

  “What?” She stared at him, too weary and confused to follow, obviously.

  “I went to the cabin, and the living room area was clean. I’m talking spotless. No body. No blood. Nada. I walked through the kitchen and out the back door and around the yard. Nothing.”

  “That’s impossible. I killed him. He was dead. There was a lot of blood. Do you hear me? The bastard was dead dead.”

  “Doesn’t matter if there’s no body.”

  Oh hell. “Did you clean it up?” Irrational anger bolted through her. “Did you?” She did not want to drag Falco down with her. Damn it. It was bad enough Tori would suffer for her sins.

  “Devlin, I’m telling you it was clean when I got there.”

  She wasn’t sure she believed him. “I still need to make my statement. If what you’re saying is true, I don’t know what the hell happened, but I know a dead man when I see one. I killed him.” If she was smart, she would back off, let Falco finish this. But she couldn’t, she suddenly understood. Whatever mistakes she had made, she had to see this all the way through. For Amelia.

  “Just wait,” Falco said. “We need to see how this all shakes down first.”

  Kerri couldn’t comprehend how that would matter. Eventually someone was going to report York as missing. He had a daughter. Partners at the firm.

  She closed her eyes again. This case had exploded in the past thirty-six hours.

  Her family was devastated. She was devastated.

  At least eight people related to this case, besides York, were dead.

  Suzanne Thompson and Neal Ramsey in addition to Daniel and Tempest Abbott along with Joey Keaton.

  And Amelia. Sweet Amelia. The crack in Kerri’s heart widened.

  They’d found out since reaching the hospital that there was at least one more casualty.

  When Theo Thompson had been arrested, he had insisted his father be called since he couldn’t reach his attorney, Lewis York. T. R. Thompson hadn’t answered his phone, either, so a uniform had gone to his house to round him up, only to find the front door ajar and the man dead at the bottom of his staircase.

  The ME believed Neal Ramsey had been crushed between two vehicles. There was rear-end damage to the Lexus belonging to Suzanne Thompson. Paint transfer indicated her vehicle and Ramsey’s had possibly been in contact. Further testing would confirm. The last text message Ramsey received had been from Suzanne requesting a meeting. For now, Kerri and Falco were thinking that someone—maybe Theo Thompson or Keith Bellemont or Sela Abbott—had decided to tie up all the loose ends of this case.

  Had to be one of them. Everyone else was dead.

  The problem was, Bellemont had an airtight alibi, Sela was thirty-one weeks pregnant, and Thompson wasn’t talking yet.

  “I think we can safely say,” Falco murmured, “that anyone who had anything to do with what happened to Amelia, Sela’s mom and sister got what was coming to them. Except maybe for Theo.”

  “He’ll get his,” Kerri said. She would make sure the guy did not walk.

  The door to Abbott’s room opened, and Bellemont stuck his head out. “You may come in now,” he announced, “but we are not to overtax her. Doctor’s orders.”

  Kerri didn’t bother answering him; she walked in, and Falco followed. She tossed her empty coffee cup into the trash can near the bathroom door.

  Sela Abbott’s bed had been raised, allowing her to sit in a relaxed position. Her face was pale against the green nightgown. Both wrists were bandaged. The linens were smoothed neatly around her.

  “Sela”—Bellemont stepped close to the bed—“as I told you, any question that makes you uncomfortable can be skipped. You’ve been through a lot, so don’t try to say too much all at once.”

  She nodded. “I’m ready to make my statement.”

  Kerri pushed the tray-top table across her bed and set the audio recorder there. She turned it on, identified everyone in the room, and reminded Sela of her rights before turning the floor over to her.

  “State your name, and then begin telling us whatever you’d like to say. We may have questions as we go along.”

  She nodded. “My name is Sela Abbott. Very early in the morning on Wednesday, June sixth, a man came into our house. I don’t know how he knew the passcode to our security system, but he did. He shot my husband and then shot my friend Carol Lofland.”

  “The woman claiming to be Jacqueline Rollins,” Kerri said for clarification.

  “Yes. She was a very dear friend of my mother’s, and basically, she became my surrogate mother after her death. I became reliant upon her. I needed her with me, so it was simply easier to introduce her as my mother.”

  Not exactly normal, but whatever. Sela waited to see if Kerri had more questions; then she went on.

  “The man dragged me from my house and took me to a cabin in the woods. He restrained me and left me there.” She held up her arms to show her bandages. “Another man came to the cabin daily and gave me food and water. He occasionally emptied the bucket I used as a bathroom.”

  “Did you recognize either of these men?” Falco asked.

  She nodded. “I wasn’t sure about the first one. But the one who brought me food, yes. His name is Lewis York.”

  Ice chilled in Kerri’s veins. “From the moment the intruder broke into your house, did you at any time see anyone besides these two men?”

  Sela looked at her a moment. “No. But early this morning before I was able to escape, I did hear voices and a sort of struggle. At one point I thought I heard a gunshot. It was very loud. After that the house was quiet again; that’s when I was able to escape. I had been working on the ropes the whole time, trying to get loose.”

  How convenient. Kerri would have laughed outright if she weren’t terrified there might be a slice of truth in the woman’s words. She must have been there. If she hadn’t heard the voices, struggle, and gunshot . . . how would she know?

  “When you were able to get loose,” Kerri asked cautiously, “did you see anyone? A vehicle? Anything?”

  Sela shook her head. “The place was quiet. It was like the man holding me captive just disappeared. I walked all the way down Canyon Lane and onto Shades Crest before someone stopped to help me.”

  Another of those eerie sensations slid through Kerri. No question about it. Sela was referring to the cabin belonging to Lewis York . . . the one where Kerri had shot and killed him.

  “What about the other man?” Falco asked. “The one who took you from your house.”

  “I don’t know his name, but I have seen him before.” She glanced at Bellemont. “In your office. It was that investigator you said could help us find the truth. He was using my friend Amelia Swanner too.”

  Hearing her niece’s name pierced Kerri’s heart all over again.

  Bellemont appeared horrified by the news but kept any comments to himself.

  “How did you and Amelia become friends?” Kerri wanted to know. Needed to know the whole story.

  “When Mr. Bellemont agreed to help Ben and me figure out what really happened to my sister, I was so thankful. The investigator suggested Amelia might be able to help since she was working at York’s firm. I made it a point to involve her in one of my fundraisers, and we became friends. Eventually I told her my story, and she wanted to help. She was so excited.” A tear slipped down Sela’s cheek. “I should never have allowed her to be involved.”

  Kerri’s lips tightened to hold back the angry words roiling in her throat.

  Since the lawyer hadn’t said a word, Kerri turned to him, outrage blazing inside her. “Is this true, Mr. Bellemont?”

  “As you can see, I have not been privy to all of Mr. Ramsey’s activities.”

  It wasn’t a yes or a no. Kerri wanted to kick his ass. He had children of his own! How could he do this to someone else’s child?

  Sela said, “He must have been working for someone besides you. You loved Ben like a brother.” Tears welled in her eyes. “This man, he . . . he shot my husband. The sound woke me up. Then he brutalized and shot my friend.” Sela put her hands to her face. “She tried to help me. She came into the room. He shot her there first.”

  This could be accurate, Kerri reasoned, as long as the woman was on or near the bed.

  “I screamed for her to run. She took off, but he chased after her.” She closed her eyes a moment. “That’s when I should have run, but all I could do was try to wake up Ben. When I realized the bad man was coming back, I tried to call 911. He took the phone away from me and knocked me out.”

  Falco asked several questions. Kerri asked her share as well. No matter how they asked the questions, Sela Abbott never changed her story. But there were holes. Like the fact that there was no blood trail suggesting the woman who’d been shot in the house ran from the master bedroom up the stairs to the nursery after being wounded. She admitted to having purchased a weapon, claiming she’d noticed someone following her on several occasions. She’d hidden the weapon in the baby’s crib, which was why her friend had rushed to the nursery when Ramsey was after her. The car she’d bought from Keaton, she insisted, was a way to prevent her stalker from knowing every move she made. In hindsight, she admitted, she should have told her husband.

  Kerri was blown away by how carefully she had planned every step—how easily she explained every little thing. Unbelievable.

  When they had been over the woman’s story at least three times, Bellemont ended the interview.

  In the corridor outside, Kerri said to the lawyer, “We will have additional questions for both of you.”

  He shrugged. “I wish I could give you more or better answers. I’m afraid I’m as in the dark as the two of you. I had no idea Ramsey . . .” He shook his head. “I would have trusted the man with my own children’s lives.”

  “Good thing you didn’t,” Kerri said, allowing him to see and hear her fury.

  When he’d walked away, she turned to her partner. “We need to go to that cabin now—ahead of the crime scene unit.”

  “You read my mind, Devlin.”

  York Cabin

  Canyon Lane

  Sure enough, in the bedroom at the back of the house stood a five-gallon bucket containing urine and feces. A rope was attached to the bed. More pieces of rope lay on the floor. The knob from a drawer in the bedside table had been removed, and the decorative metal plate that went with it had apparently been used as a sort of knife to cut through the ropes. Since it wasn’t exactly sharp, it would have taken days.

  Exactly as Sela Abbott wanted them to believe.

  An abandoned food tray sat on the floor.

  Scanning the bed, Kerri spotted a dark hair that was very likely Sela’s.

  “She’s good,” Falco said. “I’ll give her that.”

  Just like her professor had said.

  Kerri took a breath. “We should go outside and call the crime scene folks.” Putting it off any longer would only look suspicious.

  They had gone over the front room to make sure nothing of Kerri’s scuffle with York had been missed. Whoever had done the cleanup and removed the body had done a hell of a job.

  Once they were outside, she turned to her partner. “It’s do-or-die time, Falco. Are we really going to try and pull this off? We both know she’s lying. She was not in this house when I was here this morning. But she somehow knows I was here.”

  Falco rubbed his jaw. “The cameras. Maybe she figured out how to use them.”

  Without another word, they went back inside and checked the computer that sat on the small desk in the corner of the living room. There was no log-on, which seemed odd to Kerri. Even odder, she didn’t remember seeing the computer this morning when she had been peeking inside to see what York was up to.

  The memory of him catching her rushed into her brain. She blinked it away. If the laptop was there, why hadn’t she noticed it? Maybe she’d been too focused on forcing the truth out of a man who didn’t know how to tell the truth.

  “I’m not seeing anything that suggests he has a surveillance program on here,” Falco muttered as he continued tapping keys.

  “Maybe there’s nothing there. He could have it stored on some cloud.”

  “We can’t take the risk.” Falco pulled out his cell and made a call.

  Kerri listened as he asked Cross to bring her geek.

  Even with all the known players dead or accounted for, this was getting more complicated all the time.

  Half an hour later Cross and her friend arrived. He looked like a homeless drunk she’d picked up from under a bridge. Kerri’s heart sank. This was a total waste of time. She should just call the LT and do what needed to be done.

  Falco provided both Cross and her friend with gloves and shoe covers. Kerri paced the room while the man who’d come with Cross sat down behind the computer and went to work.

  She thought of Tori and what would happen to her when this all came out. Could she plead temporary insanity? Would the new baby her ex was having with his fiancée cause him to ignore Tori even more? If Kerri went to prison, Tori would end up with him.

  Damn it.

  “Found it.”

  Kerri whipped around and stared at the guy.

  Falco was looking over his shoulder. “All right. Now we’re cooking with gas.”

  Kerri wandered over, her curiosity and no small amount of hope overtaking her.

  “He has a state-of-the-art surveillance program on here. It’s the bomb, man.”

  “Can we see the footage?” Kerri asked.

  “You could.” The guy looked at her. “Except someone deleted all of it. Every stinking pixel.”

  “Can you tell when this happened?” Falco asked.

  “This morning. Time stamp is nine forty-five a.m.”

  Kerri had already been out of here by then. She’d wrecked her car, and Falco had picked her up. Someone else had shown up after she’d left. But who? The one person they could definitely rule out was Lewis York. He had been dead before that. Jen had been with Thompson. Suzanne, T. R., and Ramsey were already dead by then. Daniel and Tempest Abbott too.

  Who the hell did that leave? Only Sela Abbott.

  “Does the FBI or someone like that have people who can recover the deleted files?” Falco glanced at Kerri as he asked the question.

  “Not if you don’t want them to,” Cross’s friend said.

  “I don’t want them to.”

  Everyone in the room looked at Kerri. She hadn’t realized she was going to say the words until she did.

  The guy tapped a few keys, then a few more. This went on for what felt like forever. Finally, he looked over at Kerri and said, “Done.”

  “Thanks, Cross,” Falco said. “I’ll square this with you.”

  Sadie Cross nodded, then glanced at Kerri. “See you around.”

  Kerri managed a vague nod.

  Cross and her geek left. Kerri wasn’t sure if she was relieved or undone.

  “We should call in the crime scene guys now,” Falco said as he dug out his phone.

  “Yeah. We should.” Kerri felt as weak as a kitten.

  “Don’t think about it,” Falco said as he waited for the call to go through. “That’s the best way to get past it.”

  She wondered how many times he’d had to do that. Maybe she didn’t want to know. He was her partner, and she trusted him.