Page 10 of Tears on Her Grave

“When did you notice that Cole and Abby were missing?” The sheriff made copious notes in her book.

Sipping her coffee, Josie met her gaze over the rim of her cup. “I didn’t know they were missing at all until days after. Like I said, couples and groups were coming and going all the time. I was spooked and Marissa was getting scared. We’d set up a small tent close to the fire. We climbed into our sleeping bags, zippedup the front of the tent, and talked until daylight. We were way too frightened to go to sleep. At first light, we didn’t hang around and made our way back down the mountains to the parking lot near the forest rangers’ station. I had a very old Jeep at the time and drove Marissa home. I went home and slept all day as far as I recall.”

“What did you do when you discovered that your friends were missing?” Kane drummed his fingers on the table. “Did you start calling everyone? And did you or anyone you know go out searching for them?”

Shrugging, Josie shook her head. “I didn’t, no. After hiking there and back, I had stiff legs.”

“Hmm, you remember all about that night but you can’t give us a name of anyone else who was there?” Kane leaned on the table. “Did the sheriff come by the college to take statements from everyone?”

She’d already said way too much and shook her head. “I didn’t see the sheriff or hear anything that was going on until I watched the news. I figured that Abby and Cole were just two of the people who wandered off during the course of the night. I didn’t hear anything unusual, no screams or people running in fear. Most people sat huddled around the fire until it got light and then we all wandered back down the mountain. It was an anticlimax after all the horrific stories that people had told about the axman. No one saw a ghost or anyone walking around carrying an ax with intent to murder anyone.” She raised one shoulder in what she hoped looked like a nonchalant shrug. “That’s all I can remember, I’m afraid.”

“I’m sure that at that time in college many of your friends were couples.” The sheriff folded her notebook and leaned back in the chair. “I’ve seen the yearbooks and have a list of names. I know Abby was prom queen. There’s a picture of her the year before she went missing, alongside a guy by the name of ClintWasser. Do you recall if they were an item at the time she went missing?”

Josie shook her head. “I believe they’d broken up before Halloween. Clint was a wide receiver on the football team, so a big name on campus. He had more than a few cheerleaders chasing after him at the time. I don’t know if he took anyone with him to the campout that night. I didn’t move around in his elite circle of friends. I was studying and wasn’t very interested in sports.”

“So you do remember another person on the mountain, Clint Wasser?” The sheriff made more notes.

Horrified at her big mouth, Josie blinked. “I guess so.”

“Do you believe there were two different groups in the forest that night?” Kane smiled. “The jocks and the nerds? That would have been a potentially lethal combination. I gather the beer would have been flowing in the jocks’ camp and the rest of you all sat around the campfire telling ghost stories.” He cleared his throat. “The football crowd can be a little wild at times. Weren’t you concerned being in the forest alone with them when they’d been drinking?”

Nodding, Josie considered her reply. That was not how it went down but it sounded feasible. “I guess so, but who doesn’t like a little adventure?”

“I would have expected that sort of setup to happen in high school and not in the last year of college.” The sheriff exchanged a glance with Kane and then looked at her. “Okay, thank you for your time.” She placed a card on the table and pushed it toward her. “If you remember anything else at all about that night, please give me a call. I’m sure the parents of the victims would appreciate knowing exactly what happened.”

Standing, Josie ushered them to the front door. “I will. I’m sorry I couldn’t help you any further.” She closed the door behind them and leaned on it for a few seconds before dashingback into the family room to grab her burner phone from her purse. “Marissa, it’s Josie. The sheriff was just here to question me about what happened to Cole and Abby. They have our names. Make sure you contact everyone about our meeting this evening. They need to know what I discussed so we can make sure we all have our stories straight.”

“The guys are going to go ballistic.”Marissa’s chair scraped and a door slammed.“This problem was buried and forgotten. How the heck did they end up in the darn river?”

Josie chewed on her nails. “I don’t know. Maybe they’ve come back to haunt us.”

TEN

Cold damp air seeped into every crevice of Jenna’s clothes as she walked back to the Beast. Raindrops splattered her cheeks and she pulled down the hood of her slicker, slightly annoyed by Mrs. Campbell’s almost total refusal to answer questions when it was obvious that she had full recollection of the night in question. It seemed incredulous to her that someone could remember bits and pieces of a night so horrific in their lives but absolutely nothing about the two people who went missing or who else was there at the time. She tore off her slicker and tossed it into the footwell, climbed into her seat, and clicked in her seatbelt. As they drove away, she turned and looked at Kane. “I have the distinct impression that that woman is withholding information. I know we can be a formidable couple but her hands were shaking from the moment we stepped inside her house. She was doing everything possible to avoid eye contact with us and was doing things to give herself time to reply to my questions. One thing’s for darn sure, she knows exactly what happened that night and is keeping it a secret.”

“My thoughts exactly.” Kane turn the truck toward Main. “We need to get back to the office and discuss this with theothers. Either she’s covering up for the person who murdered these kids or she’s involved.”

Dabbing at her wet cheeks with tissues, Jenna looked at him. “There is another reason. If she does know who the killer is, she might be keeping quiet because she’s in fear of her life. We don’t know what happened that night, and if others were involved, there’s a good chance that the killer threatened everyone. College kids do crazy things sometimes. For all we know they could all be involved with the murders and burials. It was Halloween after all, and you know as well as I do that things sometimes get out of hand. They could all be involved and therefore equally responsible. Getting one of them to break the code of silence is going to be very difficult. I guess we just keep interviewing everyone in that yearbook until we discover the truth about what happened to Abby and Cole.”

Jenna’s phone chimed and she looked at the caller ID. It was Wolfe. “Hi, Shane. This case is going to be a little more difficult than we imagined.”

“Yeah, and it has yielded a little more evidence.”Wolfe’s footfalls echoed on the tiled floor in the mortuary.“I’ve been working with Norrell on the bodies, and considering they’ve both been in the river, I can only attribute the findings to the fact that they were mummified. We discovered sand in the lungs of both victims.”He sighed.“This makes this crime more sadistic than we’d first imagined. These kids were buried alive.”

Horrified, Jenna stared ahead at the rain-soaked blacktop. People moved around hunched against the rain or under umbrellas. Everything appeared to be normal, but nothing was normal in Black Rock Falls. Twelve years previously, two young people had been brutally murdered and their slaughter covered up. The killer or killers could still live in the same community as her. She could be raising her children in this town, never knowing if the parents of the kids Tauri played with at schoolhad been involved. The thought that psychopaths moved among them on a daily basis chilled her to the bone. “What do you want us to do, Shane?”

“I figure if we let some of this information out to the public, we might draw out the perpetrators. There would have been others around that evening who weren’t involved and don’t want to be marked with the same brush. Norrell could hold a press conference and explain how she deals with the forensics of a case like this and how nothing can be hidden from science.”

Jenna nodded. “Okay, make the arrangements and we’ll be there. Thanks, Shane.” She disconnected and looked at Kane. “I hope this works.”

“So do I, Jenna, so do I.” He pulled into his parking space out back of the office. “I just hope Norrell isn’t painting a bullseye on her back because we have no idea how many people we are dealing with right now.”

Gathering her things, Jenna climbed out glad of the undercover area in front of the back door of the office. Being wet and cold all day wasn’t her idea of fun. She headed straight for the counter to speak to Maggie. “Have we had any response to the media release this morning?”

“Yeah, the phones have been ringing off the hook.” Maggie smiled and waved a pile of notes. “I’m not sure how I would have coped without Cade and Piper here to help out.” She handed the notes to Jenna and leaned on the counter. “Things have settled down now, so can I send these guys home? It’s been a long day for them and I don’t want them to be reluctant to come by again.”

Nodding, Jenna gathered up the paperwork. “Hey, Piper, Cade. Thank you so much for dropping by today and helping out. We really appreciate you being here. Maggie believes the rush is over now, so why don’t you head on home and enjoy the rest of the day?” She waved a hand toward the window and therelentless rain pouring down outside. “Well, as much as you can enjoy a wet rainy freezing cold day, I guess.”

“That would be good.” Cade stretched and then slid his coat from the back of his chair. “We’ll eat junk food and watch Netflix when we get home. We’d planned on going hiking over spring break but the rain ruined our plans.”

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