orders.”
As it had for me, Myles and Laurel’s story apparently brought back memories for Max. Again, he glanced over at me, and I felt the conversation take another turn, from my perspective a dangerous one. “Rather like what happened with us,” he said, as he turned onto a road that veered farther west. “Clara, we both know that if the prophet and your parents hadn’t interfered, we would have—”
I didn’t let him finish. “Alber’s past is undoubtedly littered with stories like ours,” I said.
“Yes, well…” he muttered.
“Again, let’s go back to Laurel and Myles,” I suggested. “We have four murders to solve, remember.”
Max bristled, but didn’t argue. “Okay, but I’m not sure how what you’ve learned ties into what we saw at the ranch. How it’s germane, considering what the killer did to Laurel.”
“I don’t know that it is,” I admitted. “Although the murders did seem to all be about her, so it’s reasonable to think that she has some kind of a tie to the killer.”
Down a long, winding driveway, a small log cabin came into view, with a barn beside it. “Clara, if Myles loved—maybe still loves—Laurel, how does it make sense that he’d want to first kill her and secondly shame her like that?” Max asked. “If he loved her, why didn’t he kill the others and take her?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “But love doesn’t always mean happiness or safety, after all. We’ve both, I’m sure, worked many cases where love turned to hate, the ardent suitor who murdered the woman who turned him down. A husband who promised love but delivered violence. The wife who murders rather than allow a man to leave. Even parents who murder their own children.”
“Yeah, but…” he started, and then stopped.
I stayed quiet for a moment, considering my own past, the violence that spurred me to run from Alber. But then again, that was completely different. In the case of my marriage, love had never been part of the equation.
“But what?” I asked, and I heard the edge to my voice, the anger at memories I tried to keep hidden. “We don’t know what they were talking about on Saturday, out there alone on that road. Maybe Laurel and Myles argued. Maybe Myles blamed Laurel for deserting him and with this morning’s killings, he took revenge.”
Max sighed, and then said, “I guess it really is an old story, isn’t it?”
“Unfortunately, it’s also a frequent one,” I said.
Max looked uncertain. “To me, Carl’s still the more likely suspect. Those photos he took of Laurel suggest an obsession.”
“Absolutely. Carl’s still on the list,” I said. “What we need is something to pop up in the lab reports that points to someone, that clears up the confusion, or for Jacob to wake up and tell us what he knows.”
“Yeah,” Max said. “But somehow I’m wondering if either of those possibilities will come together. When I think of Jacob breathing like he was, all the blood he lost. What are the odds he’ll live?”
“It doesn’t seem likely.” We pulled up to the house and parked the car. “I’ll take the front. You cover the back door.”
Looking at the lonely setting, Max mused, “Maybe we should have brought backup?”
“We’re just here to talk,” I said.
Moments later, my hand on my holstered gun, I stood outside Myles Thompkins’ front door. From the barn off to the side, a cacophony of barking dogs should have alerted their owner to our arrival, but I waited a few moments for Max to get in place, and then I knocked. No answer. I knocked again. Still no answer. “Mr. Thompkins, Chief of Police Clara Jefferies and Chief Deputy Max Anderson here. We’d like to talk to you. Please open up.”
The dogs yapped ever louder. No answer from inside the house. Max walked back around to the front. “I peeked in the windows. I don’t think he’s home,” he said.
“Let’s take a look around the outside,” I suggested.
Off to the side sat an aging fire-engine-red Ford pickup, no one inside. I put my hand on the hood. It was cold. The cabin wasn’t large, but it looked well-built; the timbers had been notched and joined using hand tools. I walked around and peered in the windows. The interior appeared warm, comforting, rustic and inviting. Myles had an old desk in front of an entire wall of shelves crowded with books. A heavy, vibrantly colored wool shawl with fringe covered a table, resembling one I’d bought at a Navajo pawn shop years