The Girls in the Snow (Nikki Hunt #1) - Stacy Green Page 0,79

her mother’s face.

She started with the photos. Her hands shook, and the contents of her stomach threatened to make an appearance. The images had already been scorched into her brain, but the photos contained details she’d forgotten. She had to look at them with a trained eye. The first few shots consisted of the exterior of the house. Then photos of the bloody footprints on the stairs and upstairs hallway. The photographer had followed crime scene protocol and worked from the outside of the scene in, so the first picture was a full shot of the bedroom. Her mother lay on the bed, arm dangling off the side, blankets on the floor, including her grandma’s quilt. Nikki couldn’t stand to have it around afterwards, so she’d put it in storage, along with other items she couldn’t look at but would never get rid of.

There were defensive wounds on her mother’s hands. Her face was slack, sightless eyes wide.

Nikki spread the pictures out on the table and then dug through until she found the coroner’s report. A bullet had grazed her mother’s shoulder and then embedded into the wall as she likely fled the killer after she’d gone to check on her husband. Marks on her feet showed she’d probably been dragged and then thrown back into the bed. Had she fought him off and then tried to get up, only to have him shoot her in the stomach?

The coroner estimated she took several minutes to die.

Your mother died instantly. She didn’t suffer. Hardin had made it a point to comfort her with the information. He’d said it several times in the days after the murder.

The coroner didn’t indicate how long it took to accumulate that much blood loss, but given the body temperature and blood coagulation state, he estimated she’d been dead for an hour or more, which put time of death between 1:00 a.m. and 2:00 a.m.

Nikki had found her at 2:17, and the blood had already clotted on the sheet.

Postmortem bruising on her mother’s wrists indicated both hands had been grasped by the killer. There was also postmortem bruising on her cheeks, chin and neck. Nikki thought it looked like the killer had held her hands over her head, and that indicated a sexual assault. Any cop with an ounce of sense would have come to the same conclusion. No wonder the deputy collecting trace evidence had issues.

Had Hardin lied to Nikki about her mother’s sexual assault to save Nikki some grief or to save his investigation?

She took a break and opened the cheap bottle of red she’d picked up earlier. Anger coursed through her. Her parents’ lives had been brutally cut short and Nikki’s only solace had been knowing their killer was in prison. But what if she’d been wrong this whole time?

She sifted through the paperwork, re-reading the detailed accounts from John and his friends. There was no mention of Nikki passing out or acting incoherently, nor were there any notes about drugs being at the party. Was Nikki putting too much stock in the paramedic’s story? Trauma made people say strange things.

Why would Hardin lie about the tox test? The paramedic had nothing to gain from his involvement, but Hardin had everything to lose.

Nikki sifted through the exterior photos again. The farmhouse they lived in sat at the end of a long, circular drive. Surrounded by mature trees, it had been nearly invisible from the gravel road. At the time, the rural area had several well-used dirt and gravel roads, but in general the only traffic belonged to the people who lived in the area. The handful of families watched out for each other. If someone saw a strange person or vehicle, they would have reported it.

Mark Todd’s parents had a small farm about a half a mile away. He could have taken a few different routes to her parents’ house, but the fastest was straight through the cornfield.

Hardin hadn’t looked for other suspects because there weren’t any.

Gunshot residue tests hadn’t been taken due to the close quarters and proximity of the victim to Mark. At least one thing had gone in favor of due process. If Mark really was innocent, he would still have residue from checking her mother’s pulse.

Nikki looked at the diagram used to show her father’s wounds. The bullet had embedded in the base of his skull, indicating her father was either kneeling or in the process of getting up when he’d been shot. Nikki realized that if Mark was standing