Page 28 of Girl, Unknown

“How about this one?”

Arthur squinted again. If Ella’s theory was right, Arthur wasn’t responsible for Vanessa’s murder but she wanted to cover all bases.

“Yeah,” Arthur said. “This is Vanessa.”

Ella and Ripley gazed at each other, both taken aback. “How did you know Vanessa?” asked Ripley.

“Her mom is in Blue Ridge. Vanessa just went through a messy divorce. Worse than mine’s going to be. Everyone in the community knew about it.”

“You talk to her often?”

“No,” Arthur snapped. “I saw her around. That was all. And before you ask, no I didn’t.”

Ella tried to read the suspect’s microsignals but she wasn’t sure where the mask ended and the real face began. For a man of such criminality, she had no doubt Arthur Walters became a master performer in the face of consequence.

“The past two nights,” Ella said. “Where were you?”

“Not here.”

Ripley said, “That’s not good enough.”

“I’m serious,” Arthur said. “I wasn’t in town. I’ve been in Des Moines since Friday. Got back around six a.m. this morning.”

Ella’s heart became an anchor, dropping to the pit of her stomach. She didn’t want to betray her true feelings, but she couldn’t help but glance at her partner in dread.

Ripley continued, “Can you prove that?”

Arthur contemplated for a moment then said, “Yes I can. I was viewing houses. I got a cab there and back, had appointments, saw three different realtors.”

Ella didn’t want to believe it, prayed that through some conspiratorial improbability that Arthur Walters could have been in two places at the same time. Ripley scooped up the crime scene photos on the desk and said, “We’ll need to see evidence.”

“I can give you that.”

“We’ll assign an officer to check it out,” Ripley said, then tapped Ella’s arm. The universal signal that they had nothing left to discuss. She got to her feet, but Ella stayed rooted to her seat, a pain running through her spine as though she was locked in place with rusty nails.

She couldn’t believe she got it so wrong.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

By nightfall, Ella had come to accept the discouraging truth that Arthur Walters was not involved in the recent murders. As she and Ripley checked into the Capri Motel for the evening, a text from Sergeant Grant came through that absolved Walters of any attachment because his alibi was rock solid. He had cab receipts and three different realtors placed him two hundred miles away at the time of Vanessa and Katherine’s deaths. It was a crushing blow, but more devastating was the time that they’d wasted chasing an innocent suspect.

“Sorry, Dark. Close but no cigar.”

“Back to square one.” They had officers patrolling the streets between each crime scene throughout the night, but without a third point, it was impossible to ascertain a triangular hunting zone. And if this wasn’t a lone serial killer, either of these two unsubs could branch out three to five miles in any direction.

“We’ll dig in deeper tomorrow. We’re still waiting for some forensic results from the stairwell at Katherine’s place and the petals on Vanessa’s body. All it takes is a partial and we could nail at least one of these sons of bitches.”

A weary-looking motel worker passed the agents their keycards for the night. They journeyed upstairs to their rooms in silence. Ella reached hers first.

“Eight a.m. on the dot,” she said.

“On the dot,” Ripley confirmed.

Ella slid herself inside, dropped her bag down, and readied herself for the long night ahead. It was just after midnight and so far there’d been no follow-up calls from Clarissa. Ella turned the volume up on her phone, placed it on the nightstand, and set her laptop up. For a chronic insomniac, sleep was difficult at the best of times, but it was near impossible when you had a head full of ghosts all vying for your attention.

She dived headfirst again into the lives of Vanessa May and Katherine Parkinson, and right now she still couldn’t positively say whether these murders were the result of two separate hands or one very versatile hand. If she rounded up the ten best profilers the FBI had to offer and asked them the question, they’d probably be equally split among both camps. The psychological profile suggested two separate offenders, but there was just enough circumstantial evidence to doubt it.

It had taken a night’s worth of investigation, but Ella could positively conclude that Vanessa and Katherine had no connections to each other. They ran in different circles, worked vastly different jobs, had nothing in common personality-wise. Vanessa was a traditionalist, a low-key baker who slotted into a close-knit community like a hand in a glove. Katherine was a vocal advocate for a fair society, a modern woman through and through.

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