Chapter 37

THIRTY-SEVEN

Dark clouds hung low and heavy over the peak where the church sat. Josie adjusted her vest for the third time, but no air was getting between it and her soaked polo shirt. The humidity was worse today than it had been in weeks. Although rain never made processing a crime scene easy, she found herself wishing for it as fat drops of sweat slid down her spine and between her breasts. Next to her, Noah, Gretchen, and Turner all trudged along, looking just as drenched and exhausted as she felt. No one spoke. Even the uniformed officers behind them were silent.

They’d parked near Griffin Hall, the more intimate bed and breakfast that sat apart from the main resort buildings. The path from there to the church wasn’t that long, but it was on an incline and there was no breeze. They’d decided not to wait for a staff member to bring one of the golf carts. Josie didn’t want to waste a single second. Even once they passed through the hedgerow that surrounded the church, at the very top of the mountain, the air didn’t move at all. It felt dense and thick. Breathing it in felt like hard work. Noah conferred with the Harper’s Peak managing director, Tom Booth, while the uniformed officers circled the church. Josie watched as a few of them cupped their hands around their faces and tried to peer through the gauzy curtains covering the windows.

She approached the stone steps at the front, pausing at the bottom step. A shudder worked through her as she recalled the body they’d found here on the day she and Noah were supposed to get married.

Something bumped her shoulder. Turner stared down at her, sweat beading along his forehead. In a low voice, he said, “You okay, Quinn?”

He actually sounded concerned, which was odd. Flashing back to her conversation with Trinity, Josie wondered if he was really human under all his horrid, sexist, inappropriate behavior. Was it some kind of act? It was awfully damn convincing. She’d still bet money he had been acting for Trinity’s benefit and that the douchebag was his real personality.

“Fine,” she mumbled.

Gretchen joined them, a set of keys in her hand. “Tom said someone definitely broke in through the back door. The padlock looked like someone took a hammer to it. These are for the front door.”

The last time Josie had been here, she’d snuck in through that back door which a killer had already broken into. History repeating. The sweat causing her shirt to cling to her back suddenly felt cold.

Gretchen looked at the ground, at the same spot that Josie had been fixated on. “For some reason, I thought we would find something outside the church.”

“Is that what happened when you worked the case here?” Turner asked.

He hadn’t asked a lot of questions, still. Josie had given him the broad strokes of the Harper’s Peak case but left out all the parts about the failed wedding and Lisette’s murder.

Gretchen didn’t answer him. Instead, she directed her next statement at Josie. “Cleo Tate and Stella Townsend were found outdoors.”

Here on the ridge of a mountain, the swollen clouds seemed close enough that Josie could reach up and touch them. A sudden gust of air shook the leaves of the nearby azalea bushes. “Maybe he’s tracking the weather. Maybe with Cleo and Stella, he depended on us to find the outdoor locations in the photos before it rained. But here…”

Another gust shook the shrubbery, this one stronger. When the wind batted at Josie’s face, all she felt was relief at the air caressing her cheeks.

Noah jogged over. “We’re all set. Before we arrived, Tom checked the security footage from the last couple of days.”

Gretchen sifted through the keys in her hand. “That’s a lot of footage. This place is huge.”

“Right,” Noah replied. “Which is probably why he didn’t find anything, but one of his employees says that there’s a vehicle in the Griffin Hall parking lot that doesn’t belong to anyone in the wedding party currently staying in that part of the resort, so he’s going to zero in on that parking lot. One of our guys will run the tags while he’s doing that. See who comes up as owner in case it’s connected to whatever we find in this church.”

What he really meant was “whoever.” If the killer had driven here with a victim—and he would have been a fool not to do so—then Griffin Hall’s parking lot was the closest he’d be able to get to the church in a vehicle. Unless he’d stolen one of the resort’s golf carts, but Josie knew Celeste kept a close watch on those.

Their radios squawked. Uniformed officers were stationed at the rear of the church in case anyone ran out the back door. An ambulance was on its way to the ridge, only two minutes out.

“Let’s go,” said Gretchen, stepping up to the door and sliding the key into the lock. They pulled their weapons and held them in a low ready position. The door creaked as it swung open. Heat pulsed from inside the church, washing over them like a wave, bringing with it a mixture of unpleasant smells. Something musty. The unmistakable coppery scent of blood—a lot of it. Human decomposition.

Turner mumbled, “Guess we’re in the right place.”

Squashing the sadness that bloomed inside her, Josie focused on the task at hand. She entered first, a fresh sheen of perspiration instantly covering her body. “Police!” she called. “Denton Police. If anyone is inside, show yourself!”

Her eyes and the barrel of her pistol moved in tandem, taking an initial sweep of the place. The windows let very little light through. It was a one-room church, with a handful of pews bisected by a short aisle. The altar was straight ahead, its pulpit overturned and shrouded in shadow. A figure lay in a heap in the center aisle.

“Denton Police!” Josie said again, loudly enough to carry through the entire building. “Come out where we can see you!”

She didn’t think the killer had stuck around but she was still required to announce their entry.

Turner moved at Josie’s back. A light switch flicked. The dull yellow glow of overhead bulbs chased the darkness away. Gretchen and Noah’s boots sounded behind her, their weight causing the rough wooden floor to groan. They fanned out, threading between the walls and the pews while she and Turner headed down the main aisle, clearing rows of pews as they went to ensure no one was ducked down among them. The heap resolved into a woman face-up in a pool of dark, congealed blood that touched the edges of the pews on either side of her as well as the step up to the altar near her head. Her right arm extended out, parallel with her shoulder, while the other one was slung across her chest. Her blood-soaked shirt was torn in multiple places. She had the most stab wounds of all the victims so far, from what Josie could see. Several blowflies buzzed lazily around her head and torso but it was nothing like what they’d seen at the Tate or Townsend scenes. Judging by her appearance—no bloating and no marbling even given the temperature inside the church, Josie guessed she hadn’t been dead that long.

“We’ve got our knife,” said Turner.

At the victim’s feet was a chef’s knife. Just like the ones left at the feet of Cleo Tate and Stella Townsend.

Turner said, “There’s no polaroid.”

He was right. At least, not where they could see it. Then again, if it was beneath her or in one of her pockets, it had likely been ruined by soaking in blood for so long. With all the killer’s careful planning, it seemed odd that he hadn’t accounted for that. Unless this was the last body. The ending to whatever story he was trying to tell.

Josie knew they’d never be that lucky.

Noah and Gretchen met at the altar, quickly circling the fallen pulpit. It was made of red oak, simple but solid. It would have taken considerable force to overturn it. Just like it had taken considerable force for the killer to stab his victims.

“Son of a bitch,” Gretchen said. “We’ve got another one.”

Josie felt the words like a jolt of electricity. Looking away from the altar, her eyes traveled up until they found Turner’s. One of his brows arched. “That’s new.”

She and Turner moved quickly through the nearest row and followed the aisle near the wall to the altar, leaving the female body undisturbed. The only thing visible beneath the massive wooden structure was a large hand, palm-down, with blood dried across the knuckles. Beneath the index finger was a polaroid.