Dead in Her Tracks (Rogue Winter #2)(25)

Her mother’s name on his lips made her want to vomit.

Play along or keep silent?

He stared at her a moment longer and then sighed. He grabbed a chair, pulled it closer—but not too close—and sat. He worked his lips as he studied her, twisting and pressing them.

He looked more like an owl than ever. His big round eyeglasses frames were from a different decade, making him seem meek and mild.

“My mother was a strong woman like yours is,” he said. “She raised me right. Taught me the manners that so many of today’s youth are missing.” His expression indicated that he lumped her, given her current behavior, with “today’s youth.” “Young women simply aren’t taught how to behave these days.”

Someone has mommy issues.

She couldn’t remember much about Donald’s mother. She’d always been called Mrs. Montgomery. If she’d had a first name, it had never been used. Stevie faintly recalled a tall, heavy-boned woman with white hair. She’d always worn a housedress and carried a patent leather purse. Stevie was struck by a dim recollection of standing on the main street in Solitude and making faces at her reflection in Mrs. Montgomery’s purse as her mother spoke very loudly with Donald’s mother. The woman had lost her hearing as she aged, and Patsy said she rarely left the house the last few years of her life. Stevie had no memory of Donald’s father. She knew only that he’d been the town pharmacist before his son took over.

“I don’t know why you’re a cop,” Donald said. “It’s a very unfeminine role. It’s almost like you’re trying to prove something, like you’re not just a pretty face with beautiful hair.” He reached out and touched her hair, an admiring expression on his face.

Internally Stevie cringed, keeping her expression neutral as his fingers stroked her hair. The Medford women, Samantha Lyle, Vanessa Phillips. All long wavy or curly hair.

Bile burned the back of her throat.

His fingers hesitantly touched her cheek. She froze.

“Ah, Stevie. I think we’re going to get along just fine.”

She turned her face to the wall, unable to look at him any longer. Down low, right where the mattress met the wall, she spotted initials scratched into the concrete block.

   V.P.



She held back a scream.



Zane slowly drove the country road, watching for skid marks or a sign that a car had plunged into the brush. He’d put in a call to Stevie’s brother-in-law Seth with the county sheriff’s department, explaining the situation. Seth had immediately gotten some county vehicles on the roads, doing a search similar to Zane’s. Carly was in full investigation mode, calling every friend of Stevie’s to see if she’d stopped by.

Donald had told Kenny that Stevie had picked up the medication soon after five o’clock and left. Donald had had the impression she was headed straight to her mother’s house to make the delivery.

After getting Kenny’s report on Donald, Zane had sent Kenny to Fletcher’s and the Wayward Motel. He wanted Kenny to talk to Charlie and Jake, see with his own eyes that Stevie wasn’t with them. He also ordered Kenny to bang on every motel door. Zane didn’t care if the guests were disturbed. He wanted someone to get a look in every room, especially Tim Sessions’s. Too much of both murder investigations had centered on Fletcher’s and the motel.

Zane changed his mind and abruptly pulled a U-turn. County could search the roads. He wanted to see Jake Powers’s face and look in his eyes when he said he hadn’t seen Stevie that evening.

Jake was a horrible liar.



“Bob Fletcher was one of my closest friends,” Donald said. He’d been rambling for a few minutes as he stroked Stevie’s hair. She’d stayed mum, but when he mentioned Bob she narrowed her gaze at him.

Donald and Bob?

“He was!” Donald said at the disbelief in her eyes. “We had a lot in common.”

“Bullshit. You’re nothing like Bob.” Tread carefully.

Fury filled his face. “He liked me. He helped me out at one of the lowest times of my life . . . when my mother died. He was my friend.”

“You didn’t act that way when you told me there were drugs being dealt at the truck stop. You practically pointed at Bob as the head of the operation.”

He sneered. “I had you going, huh?”

She stared at him. He’d said all that to mislead her? And the police? Why?

Did he kill Bob?

A piece of the puzzle tentatively fell into place.

Donald supplied Bob with the oxy. Kept him addicted.

But why kill him?

“Why did you consider Bob a friend?” she asked slowly, dying to ask if he’d killed the man he claimed had been a friend.

Donald looked away. “I’m not the best at getting women to like me.”

You think? She bit her tongue. Maybe it’s the shackles and basement. “Bob paved the way for you to meet women?”

Donald nodded. “He’d loosen them up a little bit for me. They always were compliant at first.”

“You mean he put something in their drinks at the bar.”

He scowled. “It’s not like that. They were there to drink and meet men anyway. The Rohypnol just sped up the process a bit. Eliminated a step.”

Her mind whirled. Bob drugged women for Donald to have sex with. And then he killed them?