From Darkness (Hearts & Arrows Book 3)(20)

Josie shoveled more noodles into her mouth and set her dinner down, drumming her fingers on the desk before typing in another search term.

She’d chased the Google rabbit through the internet, looking for anything on Rhodes, but she’d come up empty. There were a few articles from his college days playing football in Boston, but before and after that, she couldn’t find a thing. She wondered if she could learn anything through his hometown—figuring that, like most small towns, half of the news was about high school sports—but the newspaper was so small that their website had nothing more than a few days old. She checked out the Helena Independent Reviewer, hoping that Montana’s capital city would at least have archives back through the ’80s, but she hit a dead end there, too.

Josie sighed and sat back in her chair.

Anne extended her orange chicken, and Josie accepted, trading her lo mein.

“Anything?” Anne leaned over the box and scooped noodles into her mouth.

“Nothing. I’m pretty sure I’ve read every article on him twice.”

Anne pushed her glasses up her nose. “Me too. I can’t find much on his parents either. His father died when he was fourteen, and after he moved to Jersey, his mom relocated. She died of cancer a few years ago.”

Josie looked through her computer, unable to focus her eyes. “I think I’m going to have to order copies of the newspapers from the library in his hometown, but I don’t know how long that will take. I feel like there’s got to be something there. If he played college football, he would have played in high school, so someone would have to know him and remember him. I just wonder what’s hiding in that little town.”

Anne chewed with one eye on Josie. “How sure are you of this hunch?”

“It’s called a hunch for a reason, and there’s no being sure of one. There’s no reason for me to be suspicious, but I am.”

Anne ate in silence for a beat. “Something bad happened to Hannah. I know that in my own gut, especially after talking to her friends and her boyfriend. She didn’t run away, and she wasn’t into anything that would have gotten her in trouble. Something happened to her on the way home, and I don’t think it was random. She’s too old to be hopping into windowless vans. So, if you say Rhodes has something to do with it, I’m gonna take your word for it.”

Josie heard the opening and took it. “You think I should fly to Montana?”

Anne nodded. “Otherwise, we’ll be sitting on our asses for weeks, waiting on newspapers. Plus, we all know that you talking to the people of that town in person will get you further than over the phone. If nothing else, we can rule out our only suspect.” Anne lifted noodles out of the paper carton and shoved them into her mouth, saying around them, “While you’re gone, I’ll tail Rhodes and see what I can dig up.”

“You sure about this?”

“As sure as you are. Can’t hurt to try, right?” Anne shrugged.

“All right. Don’t forget to put on pants and a bra before you go chasing the potential kidnapper.” Josie motioned to Anne’s naked legs.

“You can’t tell me what to do. Plus, if he caught me, he’d never remember what my face looked like,” she said as she shimmied her shoulders, which incidentally made her boobs knock into each other.

“I’ve always said you should have done burlesque with those puppies. Now, find me a flight.”

“Yes, sir,” Anne said with a salute.



The following afternoon, Josie found herself walking up the stone steps of the library in Deer Lodge, Montana, and was charmed by the old building as she passed between stone columns to the deep mahogany door. An elderly woman sat behind the desk with her gray hair in a tight bun and her rosy cheeks a companion to her smile. The nameplate on the counter said Mrs. Herold.

“Well, hello, dear. What can I do for you?”

“Hello, Mrs. Herold. I was hoping to look back through some of your old newspapers.”

“Of course,” she said with twinkling eyes. She adjusted her shawl around her shoulders. “We have every issue of the Silver State Post since its first publication in 1887. What are you looking for? Perhaps I could help you. I’ve lived my whole life in this town, seventy-two years,” she added with pride.

“Thank you. Actually, I could use your help.” Josie leaned on the counter. “Do you know the name Corey Rhodes?”

A shadow moved behind her eyes. “Yes, I do know that name. He was one of our star football players some years ago.”

“What can you tell me about him?”

“May I ask who you are?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’m an investigator in the New York metropolitan area, and Mr. Rhodes lives near where a girl went missing a few weeks ago.”

“Oh my,” she breathed as the color rose in her cheeks. “Is he a suspect?”

“No, not officially.”

Mrs. Herold nodded. “Well, his mother and I were very close when he was young, and our husbands worked together at the prison before hers passed away. Diane did the best she could with him, but something was always just a bit…”

“Off?”

“Yes, I suppose you could say that.” She shifted on her stool. “He went steady with Jane Bernard, and when she turned up dead after a storm, he was the only suspect.”