Left To Die (47 page)

The word “overkill” sprang to mind.

They ordered sandwich wraps and coffee, then sat at a table wedged between a staircase and a bank of pane windows that looked out onto a rustic front porch. Outside planters, now filled with dirt and not much else, sat ready to be filled with colorful annuals once the weather turned.

“I do remember being here,” Jillian said as she eyed the row of bar stools located at the counter that separated the baristas and kitchen staff from the dining area.

Today there were a smattering of patrons lounging over coffee and reading the paper, listening to music or using their laptops.

“Was anyone else here that you’d recognize?”

She shook her head. “I was in such a hurry, I just came in, used the restroom and grabbed a coffee drink to go. There were a few people, kind of like this, I guess, and I was behind a woman with a little girl of maybe five or so. They were bundled up in snow gear and the little girl was having trouble deciding what kind of muffin she wanted with her hot chocolate, but that’s about it. I ordered my coffee, paid for it and worried a little about the weather.”

“No one followed you?”

“Not that I noticed.”

They talked and ate and even spoke to the same girl who had waited on Jillian before, who said, as she wiped the nozzle of the foam dispenser, that she’d answered the same questions from the police a while ago and remembered nothing unusual about that day.

“Strike one,” MacGregor said as he helped Jillian into the truck. They took off again, this time turning around, pointing the nose of the loaned truck south, with the full intention of continuing her original journey to Missoula. Using her cell phone, Jillian called her mother and left a message that she was out of the hospital. Then, finding the card Detective Alvarez had left her with in the hospital, she put in a call to the cop’s cell phone.

Alvarez picked up on the second ring, and when Jillian explained where she was and what she was doing, the detective listened, then graciously gave her an update—sparing her the directives of what she should or shouldn’t be doing that Jillian had half-expected. Zane drove on with a scowl on his face. He didn’t trust the cops, any cops, and who could blame him? But Jillian was glad she’d placed the call. He just kept driving steadily southeast toward Missoula.

When Jillian hung up, she cradled the phone in her hand and said thoughtfully, “They don’t think I’m a victim of the Star-Crossed Killer.”

Zane threw her a look. “What do you mean?”

“They think whoever did it is a copycat, that he lured me here and used the same MO to throw everyone off.”

“What brought them to that?”

“I don’t know.” She relayed as much information as she’d learned, then said, “They’re obviously not telling me everything but at least I’m not the target of some maniac.”

“No? You’re a target of someone. I suppose it might be better that you’ve got your own personal head case. At least there could be a motive that makes sense and leads us to him, rather than some random sicko picking off a group of women.”

“That doesn’t sound better. I really do have to find him, Zane. Going home won’t help. He’ll hunt me down.”

MacGregor’s jaw tightened. “That’s what this trip is all about—hunting the hunter.”

“So you’re my personal bodyguard?” She half-smiled.

“Something like that.” He slowed for a corner. “This all started with the e-mails and phone calls and pictures concerning your first husband. So it has to do with him, someone who knows him.”

“Seems likely, doesn’t it?”

“But you don’t think it’s your ex? The Rivers guy?”

“The only reason I thought Mason might know something about it is because of the postmarks, but no, I don’t see any reason to think he’s behind it. Originally, I was so determined to find out what happened, I was headed to Missoula and I was going to start with Mason.”

“But now?”

“Now, I just don’t get why he would be involved. I guess I’ve had more time to think about it, and there’s really no reason for him to want me dead.”

“What about his wife?”

“Well, she hates me. That’s for sure. But I don’t think she’d do anything to bring me closer to him. I think Sherice would like it if I moved to Anchorage or Tokyo or Istanbul. The farther away, the better.”

“She’s afraid Mason still has feelings for you?”

“I don’t know what she thinks. She’s got…issues. But why try to kill me now? Why bring me to her with all this Aaron business? That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Then who else in Missoula?”

“No one that I can think of.”

Her words hung in the air as he drove for a few miles. When they reached Grizzly Falls again, and after they’d filled the gas tank and cleaned the windshield, MacGregor pulled to the side of the attached convenience store and cut the engine.

“Maybe whoever is after you has set a trap and is trying to lure you to Missoula. He nailed you on your way there, so he anticipated the move. Now that you’re out of the hospital, he’d expect you to do one of two things: return to Seattle or continue on to Missoula. Knowing you, which I have to assume he does, he’d know you wouldn’t back down. Am I right?”

She lifted a shoulder and felt that little niggle of something teasing her brain, the same idea that had tugged at her after her dream in the hospital, only to disappear.

“What?”

“I…I agree…something about this is out of kilter. Well, lots about it is. But I feel that my brain isn’t quite in full gear, that I’m missing something, something important.” She thought hard as she stared out the windshield. “Something that’s been in front of my face all the time.”

He waited a few seconds, and she listened to the sound of traffic rushing by, the tick of the engine as it cooled, the hiss of air as someone filled his tires.

What was it?

And why did Missoula, the only destination that held one iota of sense, feel wrong?

Because whoever this is, whoever is trying to kill you, wouldn’t be that careless. No way. Missoula is just the bait. Then what? If you don’t follow the obvious lead, then where will you go? You can’t return home; you can’t allow yourself to be a sitting duck.
Her stomach twisted as she thought about being left alone in the cold, without a stitch on, in the freezing temperatures…a copycat? Someone had used another twisted monster’s plan to get back at her. That’s why it was happening now, because whoever her personal nut job was, he was taking advantage of a serial killer’s sick scheme.

And now he would stop at nothing to finish the job. She knew it. Sensed it. Her skin crawled at the thought.

MacGregor touched her lightly on the shoulder and she nearly jumped out of her seat.

“He’s never going to stop,” she said, scared and angry as hell. “Whoever tried to kill me won’t back off.”

“I agree. He’s an opportunist,” MacGregor said, and she nodded, glancing in the sideview mirrors, watching as a van pulled up to the pumps. A man in his early twenties with a scrubby beard and baseball cap pumped gas as his very pregnant woman of about the same age picked her way through the pumps to the store. The man glanced at their pickup and she froze.

Did he really need gas? Or had this couple been following them? The van had no side windows…and what about the pickup with the camper, facing the other way? That guy, too, a big man with a sour expression, had cast a look in their direction.

She shivered.

“Cold?”

“Scared, I think. No…more like paranoid.” She kept her eye on the mirror, watching the twenty-something replacing the nozzle.

“Don’t be.”

The man walked into the convenience store and a few seconds later returned with his pregnant woman and a sack filled to overflowing with chips. A few seconds later they were in the van and driving away, no longer appearing sinister.

Jillian shook her head. “I’m…I’m jumping at shadows and it pisses me off. You know, the creep really did a number on me. I was never one of those scaredy-cats who run around with Mace or have triple locks on their doors or rely on alarm systems and big dogs. I’ve just never been really frightened.” She glanced at him. “Until now.”

“You’re not exactly locking yourself into a bunker and demanding police protection or changing your identity.”

“No, but…it’s unsettling.”

“To say the least. But maybe we’re going about this all wrong. What’s happening now appears to have started a long time ago. With your first husband.”

“You think this is really about him?”

“He was the reason you dropped everything and headed this way.” He didn’t say it, but the question hung between them:
Are you still in love with him, this man who left you? This con artist who may have faked his own death?

And the answer was a hard, resounding
no
. Aaron Caruso was a scam artist and a user, a man she’d thought she’d loved years before but really hadn’t known at all.

However, if he were alive, if he’d left her holding the bag, man oh man, did she want five minutes with the guy.

Even if he tried to kill you?

Her stomach plummeted. Why would he do that? Some old insurance policy? No way. Then he’d have to admit that he was alive. Once again, there just wasn’t any reason for this.

“Tell me about Aaron,” MacGregor said, twisting the key in the ignition. With a rumble, the old engine ground to life. “You said a few things, but let’s pick the man’s life apart. I’ll buy you a beer and you can spill your guts about your first husband.” He hitched his chin toward a tavern on the other side of the street. Long and low-slung, built sometime in the twentieth century and sporting a faux-western front, it was called the Elbow Room. Its windows were stenciled with a family of happy sledding snowmen in top hats and red and white scarves, ringed in stenciled holly. Behind the snowmen, in pulsing blue, pink and yellow neon, beer signs beckoned.

“You really know how to treat a girl,” she said as he drove around the gas station and sped across two lanes of traffic before finding a parking spot near the front door.

“Only the best for you.”

“Oh, you charmer,” she murmured, feeling her heart beat warm and deep. What was it with her? She always got involved with the wrong men, Aaron Caruso and Mason Rivers being two prime cases in point.

She decided to leave her damned crutch in the rig.

Leaning on MacGregor but walking better than she’d anticipated, she made her way through the scratched red door to the tavern, where peanuts covered the cement floor, a dart game was in session, a TV turned to some basketball game mounted over the bar. Only a few patrons were lounging in the Elbow Room today, so a waitress was Johnny-on-the spot to take their order, flipping out coasters like Frisbees, before Jillian had really settled into the booth.

She thought about the pain meds she was taking and, though she longed for a beer, decided to play it safe and keep her wits about her.

“How about a diet cola?” she told the girl.

“Lightweight,” MacGregor teased.

“He’s right. Make it with a slice of lime.”

“Walkin’ on the wild side.”

The waitress, a middle-aged woman with over-permed hair and an expression that said she’d seen it all, nearly rolled her eyes. But within two minutes, their drinks and a bowl of party mix were deposited on the glossy faux-marble tabletop.

“Tell me about the first Mr. Jillian,” he invited.

“God, he would have hated that.” She laughed and pushed at the wedge of lime with a thin black straw. “I fell hard for Aaron,” she admitted. “Too hard and way too fast. It was like the romance was turbocharged, at least in the beginning.”

She told MacGregor everything she could remember about her first husband. How she’d thought she was in love. Crazy in love. Blindly in love. How they’d hiked and camped in exotic places. How the outdoors had been their home and wanderlust their way of life. Aaron had been a mountain climber, an extreme skier, an avid boater and a general adventurer. He’d thought the world was his home and wanted to see every inch of the planet, or so he’d said. That’s how they’d ended up in South America.

Jillian and Aaron had planned to take the trip together and had been signed up as part of a tour group, but she’d taken ill right before their flight and Aaron, reluctantly, had gone alone but had been delayed and had missed connecting with the tour. When he’d reached Suriname, he’d gone off hiking by himself and disappeared.

Jillian had been devastated but had clung to hope for over a year that he’d return—even after learning that he’d embezzled half a million dollars from investors who had trusted him. She’d borne the brunt of the investors’ wrath and the scrutiny from the SEC and insurance companies, the press and the victims. Everyone had assumed she was in on the plot and had inherited a fortune in life insurance, which hadn’t been true at all. She’d slowly had to believe that the man she’d loved had been a crook, and she’d been sick over the betrayal.

“Do you know how that feels, to have everyone think you’re a part of something so ugly?” she asked, then wished she could call the words back when she saw the flash of anger in his eyes and remembered his own history. “Sorry. Of course you do.”

“Go on,” he said, his jaw tight.

“There’s not much left to tell. I went to Suriname to find him. I even got in the face of the local authorities, which was stupid. I think now I’m lucky that I wasn’t arrested. But it didn’t matter. After three months of getting nowhere, I came back to the states, and about two years after I’d reconciled myself to being a widow, his backpack was found by a couple of German hikers. They located it in the wilds of the high mountains. It was speculated that he’d taken a fall, dropped down to the bottom of a canyon covered in tall trees, his body hidden by the steep terrain and dense foliage. A search team was sent but he was never found.” She drained her drink, leaving only ice and the bit of lime. “Eventually I had to accept that he was dead, that he’d died up there on that ridge, and, you know, I felt guilty for not being with him.” She let out a derisive breath. “Even the insurance company finally paid me his life insurance benefits, which I used to pay off the investors, pennies on the dollar, but it was something. Then there were the attorneys.” She offered him a twisted smile. “Let’s just say I didn’t end up a rich woman.”