The Girls in the Snow (Nikki Hunt #1) - Stacy Green Page 0,101
through the knee-high snow. They reached the open door, and Nikki’s stomach hollowed out.
A chest freezer sat against the back wall with its lid propped open. Another deputy snapped pictures of the inside.
“Did you find blood?”
“Some,” the deputy said. “And a fake fingernail.”
Nikki glanced at Courtney, and they both pushed past the deputy.
“It’s big enough he could have put one on the bottom and stacked the other on top, like we thought.” Liam stood behind them, able to look over both their heads.
The medical examiner believed most of Maddie’s bleeding would have been internal, save for her superficial wounds. But she’d torn her skin to leave the initials on her arm.
“Pink shellac nail.” Courtney used tweezers to extract the nail that had been partially stuck in the dried blood. “It’s definitely the same kind Madison wore when she died.”
“But this makes no sense,” Nikki said.
Liam looked at her. “It’s pretty clear to me. He brought her to the cabin, killed her, then stashed her until he thought it was safe—”
“That’s just it,” she said. “John’s the sole owner of this cabin. The storage shed has electricity and the shed is locked. Those girls could have stayed hidden in that freezer for years. Why dump them? And why aren’t his fingerprints on Maddie’s belt?”
“Perhaps he unraveled. Panicked. We agree the killer has been getting more and more desperate. It makes sense that he was struggling with what he’d done before we even got here. Perhaps someone else does use the cabin. Maybe John had an accomplice,” Liam said. “What if the second mark on Maddie’s arm was an unfished ‘T’? As in Todd.”
Nikki stopped what she was doing and stared up at him. “What?”
“The first initial on Madison’s arm could have been an unfinished ‘R’ instead of a ‘P.’ If the second was an unfished ‘T’—”
“Rory hasn’t even been on the suspect list.”
“What’s to say he wasn’t involved?”
“You’re not thinking clearly at all,” Nikki said. “There’s nothing that ties him to either girl.”
“But he helped you get to that conclusion,” Liam said. “He’s hung around you, showing up at the right times. Is his being involved really that far out there?”
Nikki knew people. She would have seen something in Rory. But she’d been wrong about John.
“He’s a local. How hard would it be to get information on John? How well do you really know the guy? Honestly, if he wasn’t good-looking and being so nice to you, wouldn’t you be asking the same question?” Liam held up his hands before she could respond. “That came out wrong, but you know what I mean. Hell, I don’t even know what I mean.”
Nikki paused. Nothing Liam had said made sense, but Nikki was beginning to question her own instincts. Was it worth her asking the question?
Forty-Five
Lacey was fast asleep by the time Nikki called later that night, and she told Tyler to let her sleep. Nikki just needed to see her little face and hear that she was safe. Tyler had heard about Bailey’s abduction on the news and wanted to hear all about his rescue, but Nikki had been too tired to tell him anything but the bare minimum.
They’d dropped Bailey off at the hospital after leaving the cabin. Amy was recovering, and Amy’s mother had gathered her sleeping grandson in her arms and breathed him in. Nikki had watched as her wrinkled hand cradled the back of his head as she promised him that Mommy would be okay, and that Grandma and Grandpa would take good care of him until Mommy was ready to come home.
She found herself driving to Rory’s house and she sat in the jeep for a while with the lights off, wondering what the hell she was doing.
Nikki was sure that Rory couldn’t be involved, but she wouldn’t be able to rest until she’d talked to him. Liam had questioned her too many times, and she needed to prove to him that he was wrong about Rory.
Sleet pelted Nikki’s face as she knocked hard on the door. Rory had probably been in bed for hours. She knew construction workers got up early, though tomorrow was Saturday. Wasn’t it? Nikki realized she had no idea what day it was.
Go home, for God’s sake, a voice told her.
The door opened, and a shirtless Rory stared down at her. His hair was even more wild than usual, standing on end. His thin flannel pajama pants left little to the imagination.
“Nicole, it’s two a.m.,” he said, his eyes half closed.