Page 6 of Only One More Lie

The sprawling, five-hundred-acre resort was in the subarctic boreal forest. It had started as a reindeer farm and had grown into a family vacation destination.

The camp had twelve cabins, a large lodge with ten rooms, and a dining hall. Twenty-two people were employed here, and more than ten thousand guests came through each year.

Some of the cabins had glass ceiling tiles so visitors could see the northern lights over the White Mountains. In the winter, they offered snowmobile rides, campfires, and ice fishing. In the summer, they took guests on UTV rides to the Arctic Circle, hikes, river rafting trips, and panned for gold.

Andi had researched it before coming.

The camp seemed like such a lovely place for such a horrible thing to have happened.

Andi’s throat clenched at the thought of it.

This was where the December Dismemberer had claimed his last victims.

For the past six years, the killer had struck on the same date in various locations around Fairbanks. He slit his victims’ throats and then built a snowman . . . leaving various body parts on the snowman as his calling card.

There was no rhyme or reason to his chosen victims. They shared nothing in common.

That made the man even more terrifying. And people in the Fairbanks area hadn’t forgotten. Andi had heard customers whispering about the upcoming date in the grocery store. She’d read news articles in the local paper. She’d seen social media posts where people proclaimed they were leaving town on the date, just to be safe.

Residents of Fairbanks shouldn’t have to live in terror.

But maybe that was what this guy wanted.

December 6 was quickly approaching.

Andi and her team had only four days to stop this guy before he continued his murderous spree this year.

Juniper Burrows, the daughter of the most recent victims, had personally reached out to them—to Simmy, specifically—to ask for their help. She wanted closure.

She’d actually approached them much earlier, but they had too many other cases they had been tied up with. Unfortunately, they were now down to the wire.

Two and a half months had passed since the team had brought oil tycoon Victor Goodman down.

Since then, Ranger and Simmy had gotten married and moved into a nice home in Fairbanks with Ranger’s daughter, Anastasia. They would live there during the school year but utilize another cabin Simmy’s father had left her in the summer. The three of them seemed so happy together. They had a live-in nanny, Karen, who helped take care of Anastasia when they were on trips like this.

Mariella was mostly living in Anchorage, partially so she could be closer to her boyfriend, Jason Somersby, who lived farther south in Salmon-by-the-Sea.

Matthew had moved to Anchorage with his sister. The two of them managed the day-to-day operations and production schedule for their true-crime podcast,The Round Table.

Then there were Andi and Duke.

Andi glanced at Duke’s strong profile as they slowed near the entrance of the camp.

Duke with his wavy, dark hair and barely there beard and mustache. The former Army CID investigator had given up his Alaska tour agency in order to go full time with the podcast.

But really, the only reason he’d started the business was so he could find his fiancée, Celeste. He’d accomplished that, and now he’d moved on.

Not just career-wise either.

He and Andi had officially been dating for more than two months.

She’d never been happier.

Duke stopped in front of a large log cabin, and Ranger and Simmy pulled up behind them. They’d driven separately so they’d have two vehicles on hand, just in case. Plus, the newlyweds probably wanted some alone time.

Andi glanced at the camp in front of her.

Black light poles lined the road, each draped in evergreen. In the dim light of the midafternoon winter day, colorful Christmas lights twinkled on several buildings in the distance, including a large one at the center.

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