The Last of the Moon Girls(91)

“The sharp, pointy kind,” Clark chimed in. “Must have dropped it on his way out. Nasty thing too. Come have a look.”

Andrew followed Landry and Clark around back. The mudroom door was still open, presumably awaiting the print team. Landry flipped on his Mag again, aiming the beam at the base of the stone steps. “There ya go. Like I said, nasty thing.”

Andrew followed Landry’s light. Nasty was right. It was an unusual knife, nine or ten inches in length, slender with a stainless handle and a curved, sinister-looking blade.

“What the hell is that?”

“It’s called a breaking knife,” Landry supplied. “Hunters use them to butcher game. They’re good for severing cartilage and bone.”

Andrew shoved away the images suddenly flooding his brain. “And he was carrying it?”

“Unless it belongs to the Moons. It could, I suppose.”

“They’re vegetarians.”

Landry cocked his head. “Come again?”

“The Moons—they’re vegetarians. They’d have no need for a knife that breaks bone.”

“Gotcha. I’ll make a note of that. The techs should be here soon to process the scene. They’ll take it with them, run it for prints, ID the manufacturer. We’ll check out local suppliers, though I doubt it’ll tell us much. This is deer country. There are probably dozens of these around town. Then again, we might get lucky.”

A white SUV pulled in behind the squad cars and cut its lights. Clark nodded toward the drive. “I’ll go brief ’em on what we’ve got.”

Andrew watched him go, then turned back to Landry. “You guys know what’s been going on, right? The threats Lizzy’s been getting?”

Landry nodded. “Everyone knows. It’s all over the papers. Summers isn’t any too happy about it either. Says it’s not good for the town’s image.” He paused, watching the print team file in through the mudroom door with their equipment, then turned his attention back to Andrew. “About Ms. Moon. I know you said she’s all shook up, and didn’t really get a good look at the guy, but we’ll need a statement for the report.”

“Sure. We’ll set something up tomorrow. I’m going to try to convince her to stay at my place tonight. I don’t think she should be alone.”

“Good plan until we’ve got a better handle on what this was. Could just be some punk looking to pinch a stereo for meth money.”

Andrew eyed Landry squarely. “It wasn’t, though, was it?”

Landry’s chin dropped a notch. “No. Probably not. We’ve got a car sweeping the neighborhood, but so far nothing. Tomorrow we’ll knock on some doors. Maybe we get lucky and somebody saw something, but it’s probably going to come down to whatever the scene techs find. We’ll lock up best as we can when they’re through, and have someone keep an eye on the place overnight. You never know, the guy might realize he dropped his knife and come back.”

Andrew took his time walking back to the house. He needed time to digest what he knew so far. He couldn’t get past the fact that the intruder had waited until Evvie and Rhanna were away. The breakin could have been random, but did a guy looking for stereos and pocket change go to the trouble of cutting the power? Or come equipped with a hunting knife?

No, this was personal.

Whoever it was had been hunting Lizzy, and he’d come much too close to catching her.



She was asleep when he returned, curled awkwardly in the chair with the blanket tucked under her chin, her face relaxed in slumber. He should wake her, fill her in on what he knew. But after the night she’d had, he wasn’t sure he had the heart. There was nothing more to be done until morning. He was still weighing the decision when her eyes opened.

“You’re back,” she said, her voice thick with sleep.

“I’m sorry I woke you.”

She sat up, wincing. “Did the police come?”

“Yes, but whoever broke in was long gone. They’ll need you to go through the house in the morning, see if anything’s missing. The fingerprint team was still there when I left.” He paused, wishing he didn’t have to tell her the rest. “They’re pretty sure he was carrying a knife.”

Lizzy wound her fists into the blanket, cinching it tight to her throat.

“The police found it on the ground. They thought it might be from the house, but I told them that was unlikely.”

“Why unlikely?”

“It was a breaking knife. The kind hunters use to butcher deer after they shoot them.”

Lizzy nodded slowly.

Andrew watched as her eyes glazed over, fairly sure he could guess what was going through her head. She was imagining what might have happened if she hadn’t gotten away, if he’d chased her into the woods, if he’d caught her. He’d been imagining it too.

“You’ll stay here tonight,” he told her firmly. “The police will be watching the house for a few days, on the off chance that he comes back. No one thinks he will, but it’s what they do after this sort of thing. Tomorrow we’ll go down to the station and see what else they found. Summers has to take this seriously now.”

“You think the man in my kitchen tonight killed Heather and Darcy Gilman.”

Andrew’s first instinct was to say no, but there was no point in sugarcoating things. “I think it’s hard, given everything that’s happened, not to put two and two together.”