Fort Casey had always been his favorite.
Of course, it had also been one of Callie’s favorite places when they’d been dating.
She kicked off her shoes and put her feet on his dashboard.
“Um. What are you doing?” He glanced in her direction. “You know I hate that.”
“Payback is a bitch,” she said, snapping her jaw and giving him a wickedly sarcastic smile.
“I guess I deserved that.” He took off his shades and set them in the center console. The sun settled behind the mountains, and the fog rolled in, hugging the roads like a ghost floating through a cemetery, stretching his fingers, reaching out into the night for something to grab hold of.
By the time he pulled into the camping area, the night sky had completely taken over. He went about putting up his four-man roomy tent with a space heater while she set out the fried chicken meal he’d picked up at Star Market on the picnic table. He rolled out both sleeping bags. A year ago, he would have turned them into a double bed, but now he contemplated putting up a drape, creating two rooms.
Fuck it.
If she wanted him to, he’d do it when they went to bed.
“So,” he started as he stepped from the tent. “What kind of angle are you taking with this chapter dedicated to me? I mean, you spent a ton of time already discussing my mistakes.”
“The publisher wants me to cover what your thoughts on the case are now. I hadn’t planned on taking that approach, but I think it’s a good one. That is if you were willing to talk to me.”
“And what had you considered doing?” He straddled the bench and grabbed a piece of fried chicken. “If I chose to keep my lips sealed.”
“Honestly?”
“Please,” he said, licking his fingers.
“I didn’t think you’d let me interview you. So I was going to do the old talk to all your friends and family. Ask them about how you were handling what happened. And if no one really talked, then I’d go with the ex-fiancée angle and what I thought of what transpired and make assumptions.”
“Oh, that could seriously be a low blow.” He bit into the cold chicken and closed his eyes. “Oh, my God, this is good.” When he blinked them open, she’d cocked her head and glared at him. “What?”
“Do you really think I’d hit you below the belt?” she asked.
He nodded. “Based on the eight pages earlier in the book, yeah.”
“Okay. I guess I deserved that,” she said, waving a drumstick in his face. “But for the record, the publisher’s notes have me toning it down and bringing it to about four pages, so you won’t look like such a dick.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” she said with a slight laugh.
“But you were right. I fucked up big time. I had no reason to arrest him until after the search warrant had been executed. I jumped the gun because I wanted so desperately to believe he was guilty.”
“Wanted to believe? Are you saying you didn’t?”
“I told you I spent a long time discussing your theory with Levi. I also discussed it with Matt Montgomery. Do you remember him?”
“Isn’t he married to Nic, the owner of that awesome cake bakery?”
“That’s the one,” Jag said. “Matt wondered if the FBI profile might be off, but we couldn’t come up with one that fit either, especially since we never could agree on the killer’s motivation.”
“It would have been easier if it was sexually motivated,” she said.
Oh boy. This was not going to go well; he could feel it. “Maybe, but we had straight, lesbian, bi, and a transgender. But, often violent crime scenes point to sexual motivation.
“What?” She dropped her piece of chicken on the paper plate. “My sister’s was pretty brutal. But I don’t remember any of the other victims being beaten and stabbed more than three times.”
“Renee had been beaten almost beyond recognition, and she’d been stabbed twenty-one times, much like Stephanie.”
Callie gasped. Her chest rose up and down as she took a few harsh breaths. “Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?”
“It took a while before we could lump Renee in with the Trinket Killer because of that discrepancy with the next couple of victims, but the Trinket Killer left me a little note letting me know Renee was his work.”
“What kind of note?” she asked with narrowed eyes. “And when?”
“Right after you dubbed him the Trinket Killer, he sent me envelope with a picture of Renee at the crime scene, alive. Told me to make sure he got credit for all his kills. Seemed he got off on the way you told his story.”
She picked up her chicken and tossed it at him.
He ducked, but it still managed to hit him on this temple. “Hey.”
“You should have told me.”
“I couldn’t. It was one of those things we kept from the public and the press. Technically, I shouldn’t be telling you now. So I’d rather you didn’t print it in your book.”
“If I can’t print it, why’d you tell me?”
He shrugged. He really didn’t know why he decided to fill her in on some of the things he hadn’t been able to in the past. Maybe it was because she wasn’t a reporter and he wasn’t working the case anymore.
Or perhaps it was because he wanted to put the past where it belonged, and it was high time he found a way to forgive her for breaking his heart.
“I wanted you to know.”
“Doesn’t make me feel any better.” She took a napkin and dotted the corners of her eyes. “The detective that took over for you, in his statement after my sister’s murder, he said he believed that she knew her attacker. Do you believe that?”
“I believe that of both Renee and Stephanie. Their deaths were
