LITMIR.BIZ

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barely noticing other phones ringing, other conversations, the continuous click of keyboards or even when Trilby Van Droz shepherded an obviously inebriated man past her cubicle. Pescoli was too into her conversation with Jillian Rivers’s only known sibling. Unfortunately, Pescoli thought as she listened to the whiner on the other end of the connection, it was obvious the woman didn’t give a rat’s ass about Jillian Rivers, sister or no sister.

      “Sorry, Detective, I’d like to help you, really I would. And this business about Jillian’s wrecked car, well, that just scares me to death, but it’s really not that much of a surprise. She’s always been so…outdoorsy. Kind of a daredevil. Not quite like Evel Knievel, but geez, she’s done everything from barrel racing in rodeos to parachuting. And she can’t stand a boss or anyone telling her what to do. No wonder she couldn’t stay married. She’s…well, she’s just wild. What you’re telling me worries me sick, but I don’t think I can help you. We’re just not that close. Never have been. I live in San Diego. She lives in Seattle. I have two kids and a husband. Jill isn’t married—well, not right now,” she said with the superiority of one who had landed a husband and held him fast. “And she never had kids. We don’t have a lot in common.”

      “I see,” Regan said, to keep her going. Dusti White Bellamy sounded a little breathless, as if she’d spent her day chasing kids or running up flights of stairs or working out on some kind of cardio machine. “As I told you, the last time I spoke to her was sometime near the tenth of November, I think, when she informed me she wouldn’t be coming down for Thanksgiving. Just like that! She didn’t say why and I didn’t ask.”

      “Was she dating anyone?”

      “Maybe. Probably. I don’t really know. She never said anything about a new guy, and my mother, she would have told me. Linnie can’t keep that kind of thing under wraps.”

      “Would Jillian have confided in Linnette?” Regan doubted it. Personally, she kept everything about her love life from her mother, as well as her daughter.

      “Oh, probably not. My—er, our mom isn’t one to keep her opinions to herself. She’s old school and…” Her voice faded for a second. “Oh God…I’ve got to go. My five-year-old’s on a chair near my husband’s aquarium. Reece!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. “Don’t!”

      “If you think of anything else, would you call me at—”

      Crash!

      “No!”

      The sound of shattering glass and a child’s cry was cut off with a distinct click.

      “So much for sisterly love,” Pescoli muttered as she finished her notes and scanned them over. If Dusti White Bellamy knew anything about her sister’s disappearance, she wasn’t giving it up. Nor was the neighboring student who was caring for Jillian’s cat. The Seattle police had interviewed Emily Hardy, who’d said only that Jillian had asked her to care for the cat, as she was “going out of town for a few days.”

      Pescoli looked over her notes to double-check. Emily Hardy had supplied the police with Jillian’s cell phone number, but when they’d called, no one had answered. Pescoli, too, had tried to reach Jillian Rivers, but her call had gone directly to voice mail.

      “Dead end, dead end, dead end,” she said, clicking her pen nervously as she reached for the phone again. The Seattle PD had already talked to Linnette White, but Regan decided to call the woman herself. She waited through six rings but Linnette didn’t answer. Leaving her name and number, she asked for a return call. If she didn’t get one by tomorrow morning, she’d dial Jillian’s mother again.

      Or maybe the FBI would send a Seattle agent out to talk with her. They were supposed to be working hand in hand with them and so far Chandler and Halden hadn’t gotten in the way. The agents had actually helped, so Pescoli wasn’t complaining.

      Yet.

      She glanced down at the list of Jillian Rivers’s known acquaintances. Written below the missing woman’s sister and mother was Mason Rivers, Jillian’s ex-husband. Pescoli tried not to let her experiences with Lucky color her judgment. Though she firmly believed there was no such thing as a “good” ex-husband, she tried to push her own prejudices aside. According to court records, Mason Rivers and Jillian had been married for four years and divorced for two. According to court documents, Mason had remarried about six months ago.

      “Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” she said, punching out his office number and leaning back in her chair.

      “Olsen, Nye and Rivers,” a no-nonsense woman answered. Pescoli asked for Mason Rivers but got nowhere. According to the receptionist, Mr. Rivers was “in court and not expected back until tomorrow afternoon.”

      Convenient, Pescoli thought, her detective radar on alert. Or was it her ex-wife radar? Or just her bullshit radar? She suspected the pert voice on the other end of the line was lying to her. But then, she always thought people lied to her. Especially anyone who was an ex to a missing person.

      She left her name and number and asked to have “Mr. Rivers” return her call. She hung up and stared at the phone, again clicking her damned pen. What was it about this case that no one knew anything? Flipping through her notes on Theresa Charleton, Nina Salvadore and Wendy Ito, she was struck by the same theme. “No enemies” was the common thread. “Well liked” resonated with all the victims. “Can’t imagine who would want to hurt her” had been said over and over again.

      Had the victims been random? Had the killer just started writing down initials in no particular pattern? Chandler didn’t think so. Neither did Pescoli. She turned to her computer and clicked on copies of the notes. Each one so similar to the others. Meticulous, as Chandler had pointed out. The victims had to have been chosen for some reason and their initials were part of it. So…the women were chosen for their names? Was that it?

      What kind of nutcase were they dealing with? She read the initials again.

      W T SC I N

      If she filled in missing letters, she got “WHAT SCENE” or “WANT SCORN” or “WILT SCAN.” Or maybe there were more letters added to the front and end of the message, if indeed it was one. Like “SWAT” or “SWEAT” or “AWAIT” for the first word…or maybe it was all one long word waiting for missing letters.

      Where would Jillian Rivers’s initials fit in?

      Though the room was warm, she felt suddenly cold inside, thinking of Jillian Rivers’s fate. Was she dead already? Being tortured? Awaiting her ultimate doom?

      “Crap!” she muttered and tossed her pen onto the desk.

      Dear God, she hoped they would find the woman before she was left in the freezing weather, lashed to a tree, a star carved over her head and her initials added to the deadly enigma that was the killer’s note.

      Jillian had to pee.

      No two ways about it.

      And she still couldn’t move.

      Great. Just…great.

      Her only option other than calling out to her captor/rescuer/whatever to help her to a toilet was to wet the bed.

      Out of the question.

      She listened.

      The cabin was quiet, aside from the rush of the wind and creak of old timbers. She held her breath, but heard no footsteps, no rustle of clothing or papers, no snoring. It seemed as if she was completely alone.

      Maybe he’s abandoned you. Left you here alone in the blizzard.

      She didn’t know whether that was a bad thing, or good. Couldn’t dwell on it, not with the pressure in her bladder.

      Setting her jaw so that she wouldn’t cry out, she forced herself into a sitting position, all the while feeling the dull throb in her rib cage. Once upright, she took a good, hard look around the room. Yes, there was a window, and it had to be daylight because there

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