Page 49 of Vengeance of Childhood Proportions

“Atelihai Valley has had a rapid decrease in population over the past fifteen years.”

Carr raised an eyebrow. “Have they now?”

“A lot of families have been moving away, but there also has been a high number of suspicious deaths over the years. The cause of deaths are not suspicious on their own, but put them together and…” I let my voice trail off as I gestured to the pictures lining the window. I tapped the glass next to the headshot on the far right. “These are the deaths that stood out to me over the last fifteen years.”

“Walk me through it,” Carr prompted, putting the hockey photo on the open yearbooks on the table.

I gestured Carr to follow me down to the left. “Dr. Peter Sorgin was a hit-and-run almost ten years ago. One of the ER nurses who worked closely with him, Roberta Quinn, was shot during a robbery gone wrong eight years ago. Parker Shah and Cordelia Young were both EMTs and within a week of each other, Shah was stabbed on duty by a druggie and Young had a carbon monoxide leak in her apartment. Want to know the kicker?” I asked rhetorically. Carr still raised a dark eyebrow. “Her dog survived the accident. Neighbors found him wandering the halls and that’s how Young’s body was discovered.” I kept going down the line. “George Benedict was the hockey coach both years Atelihai Valley won their state championships. He was run over by a Zamboni in a freak accident.”

The look on Carr’s face said he didn’t believe it was an accident any more than I did.

I pointed to a couple. “Genelle and Allen Marteen. They were a murder-suicide, the first in Atelihai Valley history.”

“Fuck,” Carr murmured.

“These two were police officers in 2010 but both were dead by 2014,” I said to point out the significance of the 2010 championship. “Myles Hansen was shot while on duty and Troy Allis was arrested for tampering with evidence and then shanked while in prison.”

“How big is this small town?” Carr questioned.

“In 2010, population was around thirty-one thousand. Current census is around twenty-eight.”

Carr looked between the whiteboard and the window. “And you think all of these are connected? That Christopher Harrow wasn’t the first?”

“These,” I held my hands outward towards the window, “were made to look like accidents. But I think they were staged just as much as these were,” I said about the pictures on the leftof my board. “Just more subtly. This is so much bigger than a fucking hockey tournament. I just don’t know how.”

“How long before the principal gets here?”

“He’s on his way,” I told my boss. “Mira went to get him so he couldn’t refuse.”

“Have him come in here instead of interrogation,” Carr instructed. His eyes were falling over the two displays of headshots. “I want to see his face when he sees all this.”

“The day I met him when we were called to Harrow’s dumpsite, he freaked when he thought the victim was a woman. Said ‘they did it again’, but when I asked him what he meant, he did not elaborate. Said it was a prank that went wrong, but since the victim was actually male, it didn’t matter. Ithadn’thappened again. At the time, it was a single murder that we’d been called in on because neither local nor state police had ever seen anything like it. I figured I’d revisit it when I got around to looking into the murder.”

It was a sad statement but true. Police, both federal and local, just did not have the time and resources to devote one person per case.

“I’ll go down and wait in the lobby for them. Go get yourself freshened up in the locker room and, for the love of all that is holy, Mallory, take a fuckingshower. I’ll text you when we’re on our way up.”

I wasn’t embarrassed about my stink. It was to be expected, as I hadn’t showered since I’d last slept. “Thanks, Delroy,” I said with sincerity, dropping the formality. “I’ll be quick.”

“If I see you sooner than twenty minutes, Shawn, I’m taking you back to the showers myself and will scrub you down like I used to do to my children.”

I chuckled, grabbing my phone and suit jacket. I didn’t bother with my uneaten meal, because I had something more important than eating to do with my twenty minutes of freedom.If I took a fast shower, I could devote the rest of my time calling my little owl.

I just hoped she picked up.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Mal

To my frustration,my little owl did not pick up. I was refusing to call her ‘Phoebe’, even in my head, until she told me her name herself. But that didn’t keep my green-eyed monster from rearing his head every time I thought about the fact that I’d had to learn her name fromMira.

Though I wasn’t a big coffee drinker, I stopped by the break room to get myself a cup before heading back upstairs. I still had seven minutes before my twenty-minute minimum deadline was up. I was debating on stealing one of Jessica’s yogurts when my phone rang.

Absentmindedly, I answered, “Mallory.”

“Sir?”

My ears perked up at her soft voice. “Hold on a second, pet. Let me get to my office.”

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