A Merciful Secret (Mercy Kilpatrick #3)(84)

I nod and turn back to watch the road.





THIRTY-FOUR

Simon’s meow escalated in volume.

“Jeez. Hang on.” Truman set the cat’s bowl on the floor in his kitchen. Without a second glance at him, the black cat daintily began to eat her breakfast, wrapping her tail around to her front feet.

Truman watched for a moment, fully aware he was a slave to the feline queen. She’d picked him, not the other way around. Showing up at his door every day until he let her in. If it had been up to him, he wouldn’t have any pets, but apparently she’d decided what was best for him.

His cell phone rang, and he checked the time on his microwave, wondering if he was late to work. To his relief it wasn’t even seven.

Detective Bolton greeted him. “I think you need to see something.”

“What do you have?” Truman poured coffee into his usual travel mug.

“I’m out at Christian Lake’s home. Gunshots were reported in this area yesterday, but we couldn’t check on them until this morning.”

He froze in the act of screwing the lid onto the mug. “No one responded to a gunshot call?”

“Only one call came in, and it’s not unusual to hear shots out in a rural area.”

“True. But why are you calling me? The Lake home isn’t in my jurisdiction.”

“Because first I called the FBI, but Ava and Eddie are still in Portland. Jeff said Mercy has been covering the case locally for those two, but I got her voice mail when I called.”

Truman’s heart sped up. “She’s gone to her cabin for the weekend, and her cell service is sketchy up there. I only get through about half the time. Is Jeff sending another agent out there?”

“He’s going to try.” Impatience rang in Bolton’s tone. “I know you’ve kept your nose in this case, and I’d hoped your perspective could help us figure out what the hell happened up here.”

“What happened?”

“I’ve got a dead body. Brent Rollins. He was shot in the head and he’s hanging out of Salome Sabin’s Subaru.”

The hairs on his arms lifted. “You’re fucking kidding me.”

“I wish I was. The Lake home is deserted, and I can tell there was a struggle here.”

“I’m on my way.”



A deputy escorted Truman on foot to the crime scene. At least the snow had stopped and nothing new had fallen overnight. After twenty minutes of huffing and puffing, they reached Bolton. Two county vehicles and Bolton’s SUV were parked fifty yards back from the scene. They must have arrived at the scene before realizing they needed to keep other vehicles—like Truman’s—off the property to preserve the tracks in the snow.

They got lucky with the weather.

From a distance Truman saw the victim in the car. His head slumped out the driver’s window. Truman followed Bolton to the Subaru, swallowing hard as he recognized Rollins even though part of his skull was missing.

“Jesus Christ.”

“Amen,” answered Bolton.

“Who shot him?”

“That’s the big question.”

“You said you checked the main house?”

“Yep. It’s empty. All the doors were unlocked, and there was food left on the kitchen counter as if someone left in a hurry.”

“Any missing vehicles?”

Bolton twisted his lips. “There are two empty spaces in that huge garage. I didn’t see the Hummer, but who knows if something else is missing. I put a BOLO out on the Hummer.”

“I know he has a black Lexus SUV.”

Bolton’s face cleared. “I didn’t see one in there.” He turned to one of the deputies. “Get the information on a Lexus SUV owned by Christian Lake and put out another BOLO.”

Truman stepped closer to the Subaru and looked through the shattered rear driver’s-side window. A chaotic grouping of groceries and blankets filled the back of the Subaru . . . as if someone had packed in a hurry. On the floor on the passenger’s side was a small pink hat. “Shit.”

“I saw it,” Bolton replied.

“Might be from another day,” Truman stated. “It is her mother’s car.”

Both doors on the other side of the car hung open, and a broken trail in the snow led away from the car.

“Where’s that go?”

“About fifty feet to that tree. It looks like they crouched behind the tree. And there is a second path where someone else joined them.”

Truman noticed how the trail from the Subaru was frantic and messy. The second trail to the tree was distinct footsteps.

“At some point they all came back to the road.” Bolton pointed at a wider broken path that led from the tree to about twenty feet from the Subaru.

Truman spotted familiar wide tire tracks on the road where the third trail ended. “They got in the Hummer.”

“Right. But were they forced? Did they go willingly?” Bolton shook his head at the possibilities.

Truman moved to the broken driver’s window, looking past the grisly corpse. Blood spatter covered everything in the front of the car: windshield, dashboard . . . but a large section of the passenger seat was clean. And so was part of the passenger door.

“Someone was sitting in the passenger seat when he was shot.”