would not confirm this detail until she learned that she was pregnant. The timing of conception, while not conclusive, does support her claim, as do paternity tests that were conducted at the Bureau’s request. We also now have a credit card receipt placing Robb at a convenience store near the Wennerstroms’ cabin two hours before the murder of the Vermont victim, as determined by a medical examiner in that state and confirmed by the FBI’s crime lab. It is not possible for Robb to have committed that murder, either.”
“Then are you suggesting that Sheriff Walker murdered the Vermont Pagan?” asked a stout, gray-haired female reporter.
“No, we do not believe those crimes were committed by the same killer.”
“Then how do you explain the similarities between the two?” bellowed a rugged, well-known New York media figure who sounded highly skeptical.
“An examination of Sheriff Walker’s hard drive on his home computer showed that he used his privileged position as a law enforcement officer to request confidential files containing unreported details of the Vermont crime. We believe that he used that information to commit a copycat killing and to implicate Jason Robb in both murders.
“We also found that Walker had personal motives, both for murdering GreenSpirit and for attempting to frame Robb. The sheriff was extremely upset at his daughters’ involvement with Paganism, and numerous times expressed those concerns to members of his church, who were forthright in speaking to us. We believe that Walker’s anger reached murderous proportions when he learned that his oldest daughter attended a naked initiation ceremony. He found out about this because of a televised report by CBS News in which his daughter could be clearly seen and identified. Jason Robb made no secret of the fact that he directed the news crew to the initiation and gave her name to the press.”
“So the sheriff was trying to kill two birds with one stone?” asked a reporter for a Spanish language radio station. “GreenSpirit and Robb?”
“You could say that,” Messinger replied.
“Has Robb been released?” the reporter followed up.
“Yes, earlier this morning. He’s with his family.”
Those who knew the young man couldn’t help but ask themselves whether Jason had been chastened by his arrest as a serial killer. The answer was no. Not in the least.
After Aly revealed her pregnancy—and announced that they planned to marry—Jason pulled a Levi Johnston to her Bristol Palin. “No way, dude,” was his surly response, delivered with animated hand signs that were vaguely derivative of gang culture, on his Facebook page.
Other mysteries, however, remained unsolved. Forensia and Sang-mi, for example, could not contact GreenSpirit again, despite holding five séances. They finally attributed the Pagan leader’s ongoing silence to the peace that she’d found since her killer had been arrested. Then they turned their attention to the ongoing drought. A gathering of Pagans, in the familiar clearing where the initiation had taken place, performed a rain-summoning ritual.
Jenna, hearing of this plan, was skeptical. Both she and Dafoe were surprised when, moments after the ritual was scheduled to end, it began to rain. And this was no mere thunderstorm, here today, gone in an hour. The rain held steady for three full days, and when it ended the reservoir where Jenna and Dafoe had met held water for the first time in more than a year—enough to cover the carcasses and skeletons of drought-stricken deer and coyotes.
The last mystery was a murder in the Maldives that proved the final footnote to the tanker hijacking.
Adnan’s mother found Parvez’s body shifting in the restless tide on the island of Dhiggaru, a bullet wound in the back of his head, a bag of limes with a bomb lying feet away on the beach. The Maldivian media speculated that Khulood had played a lethal role in the murder of her son’s oldest friend. She had plenty of reasons for revenge. Adnan had been hauled off to an American prison in Afghanistan and Maldivian authorities had told her that it was doubtful that a man who’d been a would-be suicide bomber would ever be released. Men suspected of far less serious crimes had been held at the prison for years.
But no evidence was found that linked Khulood to Parvez’s violent demise, although the bag of limes hinted that perhaps the cleric had wanted Adnan’s mother to smuggle the fruit—and the bomb—to diamond island.
In any case, there appeared to be little interest in solving the crime. Khulood did make one public statement. Translated into English it read: “Crime? What crime?” Many in