Find Her Alive (Detective Josie Quinn #8) - Lisa Regan Page 0,100

pickup to me, but it was really dark. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Josie said. “You did great.”

“I grabbed a flashlight, came out here, and looked around. I checked to see if our bikes were still here. That’s what I thought—that someone had come to steal our bikes, but they were fine. Then I looked at my mom’s car, thinking maybe someone was back here vandalizing stuff. That kind of thing happens around here, unfortunately. Car was fine. I was just shining the light around to see if anything was messed with and I saw the box. When I saw your name on it, I had a real bad feeling. I knew something was up cause, like I said, we saw you on the news last night.”

“I appreciate you calling us,” Josie said. “Did you put the hockey sticks out?”

“Yeah, I didn’t want anyone to walk by and try to touch it or step on it or anything. I’ve been out here the whole time. My mom got up and drove around, trying to see if she could find the truck but it was gone. Then she had to take my brother to school and go to work. I figured it was okay if I was late to school for something like this.”

Josie smiled. “I’m sure I can work it out with your principal. What you did was very smart.”

The sun peeked over the horizon by the time Hummel and his team arrived to process the scene. Josie and Mettner conferred with Noah, Gretchen, and Drake while the ERT got to work. Unfortunately, no one else in the trailer park had noticed a white pickup or anything else unusual. The Bone Artist had escaped into the night like a ghost. Again.

“Boss,” Hummel called.

Josie walked over to the area Kyle had marked off where Hummel now knelt. In his gloved hands was the box, its flaps now open. Inside, in a bed of what looked like paper towels, lay a small curved bone about three inches in length. Josie knew immediately what it was, and her throat filled with bile. She thought of Bobbi Ingram’s ghastly scar and hoped the rib bone she was looking at didn’t belong to Trinity.

“I’d like Dr. Feist to have a look at it, see if she can glean any information from examining it. Then it needs to be sent to the FBI lab immediately for expedited processing,” Josie said, trying to keep her voice steady. “There was no note?”

“Only this,” Hummel said. He turned one of the cardboard flaps all the way out and pointed to two words written in black Magic Marker. ‘Your move.’

Josie felt a crush of bodies behind her and moved aside so the rest of the team could have a look. She took a few steps toward the street. Jenny Chan, a newer member of the ERT, knelt in the road. “Detective Quinn,” she said. “It looks like the killer left something behind.”

Josie dared not get excited as she moved closer to Chan and peered down at the asphalt. “Here,” Chan said, pointing to a small amount of mud on the otherwise pristine road. “Look what it’s in the shape of.”

Josie’s heart gave a little flutter. “A tire tread.”

Chan nodded. “From a truck, judging by the size of it. We’ll get it off to the lab and see if the soil can tell us anything about where this guy came from.”

Josie knew this was unlikely, but it was more than the killer had ever left behind at any scene before. “Thank you, Officer Chan.”

Fifty-Three

“I think I’ve found what Trinity wanted you to read,” Lisette said when Josie and Noah returned to the house. “Sit.”

Exhaustion clouded Josie’s mind, but she sat at the kitchen table anyway. Her head pounded harder than ever. She knew she needed to rest but not until she knew what else was in the diary. Noah made more coffee. Shannon had gone to bed, while Christian and Patrick sat in the living room. Christian had dozed off, and Patrick scrolled on his phone. Once Noah had supplied both Josie and Lisette with fresh cups of coffee, Lisette began to read again.

Vanessa:

Oh boy, did I ever get in trouble. All for being pushed into a girl and then getting my ass kicked by her. It hardly seems fair, but whatever. The good news is that Melanie got in trouble, too. Big time. Well, we both got suspended. I’m in worse trouble than her though because she told everyone I was the