Find Her Alive (Detective Josie Quinn #8) - Lisa Regan Page 0,102

from where I was. I wanted to ask her after he left but I don’t want to be that person. I’ve tried to talk to him again but he’s never near where I’m working. Lately he’s just in the woods all the time. I don’t even know what he’s doing out there.

Lisette stopped reading and turned some more pages. Across from her and Josie, Noah leaned in between the Paynes to study the computer screen.

Josie said, “Is there anything more, Gram?”

Lisette looked up from over her reading glasses and said, “Oh, one more you might be interested in.”

Vanessa:

I saw Max in the woods today. I don’t know if I should say something to the preserve director or not. It was so weird. It’s not like he was really doing anything wrong. I was out collecting litter and I saw him on one of the other trails. He was messing with this dead animal. I mean, it’s not unusual to find dead animals in the woods. I’ve seen more dead animals working at this stupid preserve than you can even imagine. Anyway, not the point. It was small—like maybe a rabbit or something—and already skeletonized which also is not unusual cause any dead animal in the woods gets picked clean by the scavengers. Basically, other animals. Circle of life, food chain, something like that. This is stuff I have to write about for the judge when I complete my community service. Max was arranging the bones, making different shapes with them. I watched him for a long time. I have no idea what he was trying to do but the whole thing was making me sick. I didn’t say anything to him. Finally, he just threw the bones into the woods, all scattered around and walked back to the main building. Really bizarre, right? I thought about telling on him, but what would I say? Max found some old bones in the woods and played with them? So what? It’s not like he killed the animal. He didn’t keep the bones. Plus, he’s a boy and boys are freaks. I mean, this boy at my school takes his little sister’s Barbie dolls, burns their private parts off, and brags about it, but no one cares about him. So what if Max touched some animal bones? The whole thing gives me the heebie jeebies.

Shannon, Christian, and Noah were all staring at Lisette by the time she finished. Noah said, “No wonder she became obsessed with the case. She knew this guy.”

Josie said, “She didn’t know him, though. Not really. He was a weird boy she met when she was fourteen. But I think the deeper she got into her investigation, the more she suspected that the bizarre guy she worked with at the nature preserve when she was a teenager might be the Bone Artist.”

Noah said, “She would have recognized him when he pulled up to the cabin. Especially when she saw his scar.”

“Sweet Jesus,” Christian said.

Shannon touched his arm. “Come on, we have to find the preserve. Keep looking. Lisette, you can keep reading.”

Nodding, Lisette turned a few more pages. Then she started to read once more.

Vanessa:

I haven’t written in a few days because everything has been crazy. I’m done at the nature preserve now, finally. I was feeling bad about leaving, but the last week there really freaked me out. I found human bones! Like a dead body! It was so weird and nothing like I thought it would be. It didn’t even smell or anything. I guess because the guy was dead for so long. Turns out it was this hunter who went missing last year. An elderly guy. It was very sad. Anyway, I was out clearing debris from the hiking trails but what I was really doing was looking for Max. I couldn’t stop thinking about him and those bones. I was wondering if he went out all the time searching for bones. I think I was right because I found him standing over that hunter’s body with the skull in his hands. Can you believe that? He touched a dead person’s skull!!!! Gross doesn’t even begin to describe it. He saw me, and I must have looked super shocked cause he said he was out taking a walk and just found them. I got a closer look at them and it looked like someone curled up on their side and went to sleep or something. The police already said there was no ‘foul play’. The guy