Hour Game (Sean King & Michelle Maxwell 2)

“A game about hunting humans?” Michelle said slowly.

King asked, “Did either of the bodies in the car have a watch on?”

Williams frowned. “Wait a minute, Sean, like I said, they’re totally different killings. Shotguns and, well, I still don’t know how Jane Doe died, but it wasn’t by buckshot, that’s for damn sure.”

“But what about the watches?”

“Okay, both the kids had watches on. So what? Is that a crime?”

“And you didn’t notice if they were Zodiacs?”

“No, I didn’t. But then I didn’t notice it on the Jane Doe either.” He paused and considered something. “Although Canney’s arm was sort of leaning against the dash.”

“Sort of braced up, you mean?”

“Maybe,” Williams said warily. “But he got hit with a shotgun blast. No telling how that would have blown him back.”

“Were both watches running?”

“No.”

“What was the time on Pembroke’s watch?”

“Two.”

“Two exactly?”

“I think so.”

“And Canney’s watch?”

Williams pulled out his notebook and turned some pages until he found it. “Three,” he said nervously.

“Had the watch been hit by the buckshot?”

“I’m not sure,” replied Williams. “I guess Sylvia can tell us that.”

“The girl’s?”

“Looks like a piece of glass from the windshield hit it.”

“Yet her watch read two and Canney’s three,” said Michelle. “If the girl’s watch stopped at two when she was killed by the shotgun blast, how could the boy’s have stopped at three without being struck by anything?”

Williams continued to be defensive. “Come on, except for this watch business, which isn’t all that convincing, I don’t see any connection at all.”

Michelle shook her head stubbornly. “First killing was number one, Jennifer Pembroke’s was number two and Steve Canney was victim number three. That can’t be coincidental.”

“You really need to see if the watches on Steve Canney and Jennifer Pembroke were Zodiacs,” King told Williams with a sense of urgency in his voice.

Williams used his cell phone to make some calls. When he finished, the police chief looked confused.

“The watch found on Pembroke was hers, a Casio. Her mother confirmed it was the one her daughter wore. But Canney’s father told me that his son didn’t wear a watch. I checked with one of my deputies. The watch found on Canney was a Timex.”

King’s brow furrowed. “So no Zodiac watch, but Canney’s was possibly planted by the killer, as it probably was in the first killing. As I recall, the San Fran Zodiac also committed a lovers’ lane killing. Most or all of his killings were also near bodies of water or places named after water.”

“The bluff Canney and Pembroke were killed on overlooks Cardinal Lake,” said Williams grudgingly.

“And Jane Doe wasn’t that far from the lake,” said Michelle. “You just had to go over the crest of the hill she was on, and there’s a cove right there.”