“Whoever did this better hope you catch him before I do.” Ray turned and, with righteous indignation he didn’t deserve, headed toward the room to visit his wife.
* * *
The entire right side of the minivan had caved in. Good thing Isla hadn’t been transporting a passenger. Flares had been set up around the vehicle for cars to pass with caution. Olivia stood nearby, directing what little traffic approached the wreck. Karl stared down at the illuminated bridge. The bay flowed beneath it in murky silence. Across the water he could see Harper’s Point. It was late, and most of the lights were off.
“Where’s Walt Sebold?” Karl said.
“His tow’s out of commission for a few days, so I called Dicky Fox.”
“Guy’s such an asshole.”
“Tell me about it, but that asshole is the only tow available tonight.”
“What’s his ETA?”
“Dicky’s rig is twenty miles out of town.”
“Gonna be a little wait, then,” he said. “I don’t mind staying if you wanna take off, Olivia.”
“You sure? I was about to get off shift when this happened.”
“Go. You’ve got a family waiting for you at home.”
“For real, Karl? I don’t mind staying.”
“Get out of here.”
“Thanks so much. I owe you big-time.”
She jumped in her cruiser and sped away, leaving him standing alone in silence. From where he stood on the hill, he could see the bridge and the yellow traffic line bisecting the two lanes. Upon pointing his flashlight down, he noticed tire tracks greasing the road. He went over and examined them. The vehicle that had crashed into Isla’s car had skidded to a stop moments after hitting her. Then had sped up while driving away. Thick, new rubber. Most likely from a truck or an SUV. That didn’t help much, considering that half the population in Shepherd’s Bay drove either an SUV or a pickup truck.
He returned to the van and peeked inside. Isla had left a bag on the passenger seat. He opened the passenger door and snatched the bag. It contained all her styling tools. But her phone also sat in there. He grabbed hold of it and debated whether or not to take a peek inside, assuming she hadn’t locked it. There was no one around to see him. He turned on the phone, and it opened to a recording app. Had Isla recorded her conversation with Felicia Briggs? Was that the real reason she’d visited Harper’s Point and cut Felicia Briggs’s hair?
Headlights came toward him. He stashed the phone in his pocket and waved the Escalade away from the flares. Once it had safely passed by, he returned to the minivan and pulled the phone out of his pocket. He pressed on the app and listened to Isla and Felicia’s conversation.
Afterward, he stood quietly, absorbing Isla’s words. Although she hadn’t come right out and said it, Isla had hinted at being raped in college. Or, at the very least, feeling pressured to have sex with a sleazy college professor. The revelation enraged him. Had she told Ray about this? Probably not, as Ray had been the temporary solution to her feelings of shame and guilt. He felt his hands forming into fists. Best to forget it. If someone ever told him the name of that professor, he’d seriously consider driving over to that campus and having a man-to-man talk with the guy. It made him glad he had never gone to college.
Next, he searched her browsing history and discovered two sites dedicated to the show Felicia had starred in. One detailed the overdose death of Felicia’s costar, Dean Wells. The other mentioned Felicia’s new beau, Gil Briggs, the producer of her show. His ears perked up whenever the word death came up. As a cop, he knew that death followed certain people around the way a dog might follow someone gifted with animals.
Intrigued, he wondered if any other crew or cast members had died. So he Googled it on her phone, expecting nothing but always hoping. Wild stabs often led to unexpected discoveries—or so he read in all the police procedural books he perused in his spare time. Not like he had a lot of experience investigating murder cases in Shepherd’s Bay.
Nothing came up. He tried a few different iterations. He put in the names Gil and Felicia Briggs, as well as Felicia’s maiden name. He put in Willow’s name. He typed “murders in LA” and saw the futility of that needle-in-a-haystack search. LA was to murder