Chapter 18

Griffin jogged back to his truck and returned with gloves and an evidence bag. "Are you sure?" he asked as he picked up the dirty ladybug. "Are youabsolutelycertain this is Sarah Bristol's earring?"

"Yes." Bel snatched the bag and held it up to the sunlight. "The news showed a photo of her wearing these, and I remember thinking the earrings were extremelyprominent,as if oversized bugs were crawling on her ears. These are hers…" Her eyes jerked up to stare at the two-story house. "Sarah's here." Bel shoved the evidence at her boss and raced toward a rear window where the curtains hung an inch apart. "She's in there. He has her." She peeked through the space, but all she saw was a pristine beige couch.

Griffin cursed. "You swear this is Bristol's?"

"Yes!" Bel tugged at the window in vain. It was sealed shut, and the fear racing through her was so violent she feared she'd be sick in the grass. "This monster has her. She's in there!" She gazed at her boss on the verge of tears, desperation wafting off her to beg for help he couldn't give.

Griffin stared at her with an unreadable expression, andthenhis spine stiffened. "Do you hear that?" he asked as he shoved the earring into his pocket and pulled his sidearm out of its holster. The neighborhood was silent, though, and Bel opened her mouth to ask what he meant.

"Someone's screaming for help, right?" he cut her off before she could speak.

The realization dawned on her. "Yes." She drew her weapon, and they aimed for the back door. "Yes… it's a woman."

"That's probable cause." Griffin squared off with the door, and with a powerful kick, he broke it open. "Bajka Police Department!" he shouted as he surged into the house, Bel protecting his rear.

"Clear." He scanned the living room as she moved to the kitchen.

"Clear!" She stepped into the dining room, and together, they systematically searched the house. They moved as if in a dance, anticipating each other's stepswith grace and efficiencyas they climbed to the second floor, but for all their finesse, the residence was empty. It was immaculately clean, not so much as a streak of dust marring the beige décor, and Griffin leaned against the wall with a curse.

"If Sarah Bristol was here, she's long gone," he said. "I wonder if she was his next Matchstick Girl, but we found his freezer before he could lock her inside. That would explain his leave of absence. He needed to get rid of her."

"Maybe something here can tell us where he went." Bel scanned the upstairs hallway, unsure where to start.

"We're going to have a hell of a time explaining why we broke in." Griffin ran a hand through his salt and pepper hair. "Ireallyexpected to find her. I guess I was hoping she was in here. It would mean she wasn't dead, but if he's taken her somewhere else, I doubt she's still alive." He cursed again.

"We haven't found a body, so there's still a chance…" Bel trailed off, not believing her own words. When a victim was moved to a second location, their chances of survival were cut in half. Being transferred to a third location was a death sentence. "I can't stand the thought of another young dead girl." Unwelcomed tears threatened her eyes. "I can't… what's that?" She sidestepped the sheriff and walked down the hall until she stood below a scuttle attic door. "Griffin." Her voice escalated as her brain processed what she was seeing. "It's a lock. The attic is locked from the outside." She whirled on him, her eyes wide as the reality of what that lock meant flooded her. "I think she's up?—"

Bel's words caught in her throat as the face that greeted her wasn't the sheriff's, but a stranger's. He glared at her from over Griffin's shoulder, his tall frame hovering on the stairs that had been empty seconds before, and for a moment, no one moved. No one breathed.Theysimplystared at each other as if neither knew whowas the predatorandwhowasthe prey.But then Griffin shifted to see what she was staring at, and all hell broke loose.

The stranger aimed a gun at Bel's head, and before she could react, Griffin barreled into her, roaring as a gunshot echoed throughout the house. The bullet hit the wall, the impact inches from where her skull had been. Time slowed as they sailed through the air, but the moment they landed on the spare bedroom carpet, time sped up with alarming speed. Bullets sprayed the wall as the stranger pumped the hallway full of lead, and Bel screamed as wood splinters broke off with violent force. They rained down on her, the gunshots firing one after another, and Griffin seized her waist and pulled her protectively beneath him.

"Griffin!" she shouted his name as the bullets battered the wall. Not long ago, another man had shielded her with his body, only he was a monster not easily killed, and her boss was averymortal human. One disastrously placed bullet, and he would bleed out on top of her.

Griffin swore witha violenceshe'd never heard from him, and he leaned into the doorway and fired three shots of his own. "Move!" He rolled back to safety and shoved her away from the wall as their attacker paused his assault. "Get behind—ahh!" he roared, and everything inside Bel went cold. Not him. Not her boss. Please, please, please. Not him.

An explosion of gunfire drowned out her fear, but Griffin grabbed her waist and yanked her behind him before throwing himself to the carpet. He rolled to his side, the wall shattering as he landed in the doorway and fired.

Bel threw herself at him and seized his belt, but he pulled the trigger before she could drag him out of the line of fire. A grunt sounded, and the spray of bullets died as something crashed down the stairs.

"Griffin!" Bel's fingers dripped red, and blood coated the carpet where it pumped from his leg. "Oh god." She shoved her hands against his skin, her panic multiplying in her chest until she feared she would pass out. This couldn't be happening. He couldn't heal. He wasn't Eamon, and the blood loss would kill him. This town had already seen so much death. She couldn't lose this man, this second father she loved. She needed him. The darkness couldn't have him. Not him, not him, not him.

"Isobel!"

Bel jerked backward as Griffin captured her face in his hands. He rarely called her by her first name, and with uneven breaths shaking her body, she realized she'd been speaking her fear aloud.

"Isobel, go!" he ordered. "Clear the house."

"I'm not leaving you," she argued.

"It's a flesh wound." He ripped his pants wide to reveal a gory but non-fatal gash.

"Oh god." She collapsed forward, her forehead hitting his chest as the terror loosened its grip on her.

"It's okay." He cupped the back of her head and kissed her hair. "I'm okay, so I need you to clear the house."

"Okay." She stared down at her bloody hands, unable to move until he gripped her wrists and dragged them across the carpet to dry her palms. "Thank you," shewhispered,andforcing herself to her feet, she grabbed her weapon and stepped out into the hallway. When the silence held, she slipped to the staircase and peeked around the railing just enough to see the ground level without exposing her head, but the precaution was unnecessary. Their attacker lay at the bottom of the steps, a bullet wound in his chest.

Bel holstered her gun and jogged down the stairs. She pressed her fingers against the man's throat, but no pulse greeted her. She hadn't expected one, though. Griffin's aim had been dead center. There was no surviving that gunshot.

She squatted beside him and dug in his pockets, locating his wallet and keyswith ease, but she already knew whose name was printed on the driver's license. He didn't like to kill his Matchstick Girls violently, but cornered animals were different breeds of predators. Police were in his house and seconds away from finding his final girl. There was no escape for him, save a bloody exchange to choose the survivors.

"It was Frost," Bel said as she returned upstairs to Griffin's side.

"Dead?" he asked.

"Dead."

"Good." It was a single, uninspired word, but it encompassed how every officer working this case felt. "I'll call for backup," he continued. "Go get the girl."

Bel nodded, staring at his bloody leg for a second before bolting down the hall. It took only three tries to learn which key unlocked the attic, and pulling down the retractable ladder, she scrambled up the rungs.

"Oh my god." She raced across the dusty floor to where a single cot rested below the rafters, but it wasn't the cot that demanded her attention. It was the girl lying atop it. Agirl with only one ladybug earring in her ear.

"Sarah!" Bel captured the college student and pulled her off the pillow, panicking for an endless moment when the girl's limp body didn't respond. "Please, Sarah," she sobbed. "Please, wake up. You can't die. Not like this."

Sarah groaned at Bel's outburst, her eyes fluttering open, but when she saw Bel, she shoved her weak fists against her face.

"No," she cried, her fear present even through her drugged state. "No. Please." She resisted despite her weakness.

"Sarah, I'm here to help," Bel said, hating how young the girl looked in her terror. "My name is Detective Isobel Emerson. You're going to be okay. I'm taking you home."

"Home?" Sarah mumbled as Bel pulled her to her feet. "I want to go home."

"I know, sweetheart." She caught the girl as her legs gave out. "You're safe now."

"I want my mom." Sarah collapsed, unable to walk with the drugs ravaging her body, so with a roar of determination, Bel hoisted the young woman over her shoulders and made her way unsteadily down the ladder.

"I promise you," she said through gritted teeth, "I will get you to your mom."

Sarah mumbled into Bel's back as she climbed, but her words were unintelligible. She groaned and rambled as Bel cried and strained, but together, they reached the destroyed hallway.

"Emerson?" Griffin shouted.

"I found her!" Bel stumbled down the hall and collapsed to the floor before her boss, Sarah cradled in her arms.

"Oh, thank God." He inched closer to the women kneeling in the disastrous remains of what was once a suburban paradise.

"She's alive." Bel shifted the student until she rested against her chest, her tears falling so forcefully she could barely see the sheriff. "We found her alive."

Bel stood in the bullet-torn corridor as the ambulances' sirens faded into the distance, and staring at the destroyed hallway, she wondered how they'd survived. In the heat of the moment, she hadn't paid attention to the sound of Jax Frost's gun, the way it pumped bullets into the wall at an unnatural speed, but looking at the carnage, she wasn't sure how she'd missed it. Thank God Griffin was a good shot because their attacker had come after them with an assault weapon. For a man who enjoyed killing his victims without violence, he'd certainly had no qualms about ripping the officers to shreds, but then again, she and Griffin weren't pleasure kills. They'd taken him by surprise, and he'd silently climbed the stairs to find his intruders seconds away from discovering his trophy. They were a threat to his survival, and if he killed them, he'd be free to flee Bajka in the hours it took the police department to realize their boss was missing.

"It'll take time to catalog the attic, but by the looks of it, Sarah Bristol has been locked up there for days," Olivia said as she climbeddownthe ladder. "So, we at least have him on kidnapping…" She glanced uncomfortably at what remained of the walls. "And the attempted murder of two police officers. Even if we can't prove he's The Matchstick Girl Killer, we have plenty of evidence of his guilt. No one will accuse Griffin of shooting an innocent man, especially since he's on his way to the hospital with a bullet in his leg."

Bel involuntarily glanced at the bloodstained carpet. How many times would she have to stare at a pool of blood that had drained from someone saving her life? Three times she'd been spared because someone who cared about her took the attack for her, and three times, she'd been lucky.BothEamon and Griffin had emergedthesurvivors, but one day her luck would run out. At what point would her life cost someone she loved theirs?

"I wish I'd been with you instead of helping Lina with the Jane Does' evidence," Olivia said.

"I'm glad you weren't," Bel said. "I already lost one partner, and for a moment there, I thought I lost my sheriff. I can't lose you."

"Thank God Griffin can aim and Frost couldn't." Olivia slipped her hand into Bel's and clutched it so tight it almost hurt.

"I was certain we wouldn't make it," Bel whispered. She didn't want to frighten her partner more than she already was, but the adrenaline had fled her body the minute she packed Griffin into the ambulance. All that remained was an uncomfortable mixture of fear and relief, and she couldn't stop the confession. "I know this hallway screams of Frost's guilt, but weneed tobe thorough. I won't allow a lawyer to come after Griffin for Frost's death. We both almost died in this house. Sarah Bristol almost died in this house. So we stay until every inch of this home has been cataloged. Just because our suspect no longer breathes doesn't mean we can cut corners."

"I wouldn't dream of it," Olivia agreed. "Right now, we have no concrete proof Frost is The Matchstick Girl Killer, but after he shot our sheriff, every officer is on the same page. This is one of the most important scenes of our career."

"Detective Emerson? Detective Gold?" A forensic tech climbed the stairs and paused behind them. "You need to see this."

He retreated down the staircase, and the detectives followed him to the basement door. "We think he was down here when you entered the house," he said as he led them into a finished basement. "It locks from the inside. It's why you didn't hear him come in after you."

"Where's his car then?" Bel asked, gooseflesh running over her skin at the idea that Jax Frost had been in the house the whole time, and they'd walked right into his trap. "It wasn't in the driveway or on the street."

"It was in the neighbor's driveway," the deputy said.

"What was it doing over there?" Bel asked.

"They had some sort of arrangement, I guess," he said. "Frost traveled often for work, and he didn't like his expensive car unattended when he drove the station vans. He worried leaving it for longperiods of timewould entice people to steal it, so he would park it at his neighbors so someone could keep an eye on it."

"Or so no one would know he was home," Olivia said. "It's a decent alibi. If your neighbor is watching your car because you're out of town on business, theywouldn'tsuspect you of being guilty of any crime committed intown."

"Oh, yeah…" The deputy glanced at her as if the puzzle pieces had just snapped into place. "Anyway, this is what you need to see."

"A darkroom?" Bel peaked through the doorway into a professionally organized workspace. "Frost was an award-winning freelance photographer. It makes sense he would develop hisownfilm."

"No, not the darkroom." The deputy nodded at the back wall. "Behind it."

Bel stepped into the dim light and crossed the floor to the wall. At a distance, it appeared solid, but standing before it, she noticed the slits hidden in the paneling. She couldn't find a handle, though, so she pressed her palm against it. A door clicked, popping open at the pressure, and she pulled it wide.

"Has anyone been inside yet?" she asked as she stared into the blackness.

"No," the deputy said. "I opened the door, but when I realized what it was, I shut it and found you. Trust me, youneed tobe the first person in that room."

Bel glanced over her shoulder at him, dreading the walk into that back room. She didn't want to see what spooked him so profoundly that he'd shut the door and run away.

"I'm right here with you," Olivia whispered. "We go inside together."

"Thank you." Bel clicked on her flashlight, Olivia following suit, and together, the partners stepped into the darkness.

The room was void of furniture, and for seconds, both detectives were confused as to why this had created such urgency within the deputy. It was empty… until Bel's flashlight beam fell on a desk against the rear wall. Blank computer screens sat atop it, and she knew what the techs would find when they transported them back to the lab. This was how Frost watched them die. This is where he sat as they froze to death.

"Bel." Olivia grabbed her wrist. "The walls."

She'd been so fixated on the computer that she'd been blind to her surroundings, but as her flashlight beam illuminated the dark, everything within her froze as if she was back in that freezer with only dead girls for company.

"Oh my God." Bel walked to the closest wall and dragged her fingers over the hanging photograph.

"Forty-two," Olivia said. "There are forty-two photos."

"Victoria Scotts." Bel traced the photograph of The Matchstick Girl Killer's first victim. "Carla Vans, Twyla Gates, Daphne Keating. They're all here." Bel paused before an unnamed Jane Doe. The image was hauntingly beautiful. They all were, but this one rooted her where she stood because the eerily haunting emotion that overtook her was unsettlingly familiar. She'd experienced it just that afternoon at the news station. Frost's portrait of the woman and child held the same horror as this frozen girl's image, and Bel finally understood Frost's appeal to the rest of the world. They didn't realize it, but they were viewing his subjects through the eyes of a serial killer, and his favorite muse had been women's pain. Whether they were mothers from war-torn countries or frozen girls forever locked away below a barn, Frost had eternally captured their suffering with his images, and the critics loved him for it.

Bel lowered her gloved hand from Jane Doe's photo and exited the hidden room to find forensics. Jax Frost was The Matchstick Girl Killer. They had irrefutable proof, and the world would no longer adore his work. She would make sure of it.