“Any chance there was some paint transfer? From his vehicle to yours?” Alvarez asked, suddenly more interested.
“Maybe . . . I saw black marks and a bit of a dent on my bumper.”
“We’d like to keep your car. Try and get at some of those black marks, see if they’re paint.” Alvarez was all business. “Is there anything else you remember?”
“Not really ... oh, but, there was a witness,” Kacey said. Why hadn’t she thought of this before?
Because it was random. You didn’t really think the accident was connected to anything else. The driver hadn’t intentionally tried to run you down, she thought. Now, though ...
“Grace Perchant, she was out walking her dog, the one that’s part wolf.”
“Did you talk to her?”
Grace’s warning ran like blood through Kacey’s brain: You should never speak to him. He is evil. He means you harm. She’d tried to dismiss the pale woman’s message, but it had stuck with her, invaded her dreams.
“She told me not to try and chase him down, that the driver was ‘evil.’ When I asked her who he was, she couldn’t come up with a name, just that he meant me harm.”
“Sounds like Grace,” Alvarez said. “We’ll check it out.”
Fishing in her purse, Kacey came up with her key ring, then removed the key to her Ford and handed it to Alvarez. “I’ll need the car back soon.”
“Tomorrow,” Alvarez promised, scooting back her chair, indicating the interview was finally over. “And I’ll get hold of Grace Perchant.”
Trace had listened to most of the interview without saying too much, but as the discussion had worn on, he’d become more and more concerned for Kacey’s safety. After learning that she had possibly been poisoned and then viewing Pescoli’s gruesome pictures of Karalee Rierson, the most recent accident victim, he’d made up his mind.
As he held the glass door open for her, then followed her outside, he said, “You’re coming to my place.”
“Oh, I am?” Outside the snow was thick now, still falling, a wind blowing off the mountains. Night had fallen in earnest while they were in the police station. Streetlights glowed, offering a thin blue light to the powdery landscape.
“You’re sure as hell not going home alone. Dog or no dog.”
“Yeah?” she asked, but even in the semidarkness, he saw that she was teasing, her eyes a deeper green. Turning the collar of her coat against the wind, she followed a trail of footprints along a footpath leading past a flagpole, where chains rattled and the flags had already been taken down for the night. As Trace jogged to catch up with her, he noticed snowflakes settling onto her shoulders, sparkling like glitter in the dark strands of her hair.
“I don’t like what’s going on,” he said seriously.
“Me, neither.”
“So, no arguments?”
She studied him for a second. “None from me, but we have to pick up my dog and a few things, and then, in the morning, I’m going to need a way to get to work.”
“I think I can handle it. My neighbors, Tilly and Ed Zukov, are watching over things at my place until I get back.”
During Trace’s last conversation Tilly had assured him that Ed had taken care of the horses and cattle and she was already frying chicken. Trace had heard the sizzle of the meat cooking and the blare of the television, as Ed was more than a little hard of hearing. Satisfied that his son was safe and feeling well enough to ask Tilly to bake him brownies, Trace had relaxed a little.
But his sense of ease had been short-lived as the interview had worn on.
He didn’t know who was behind the “accidents” of the women who’d died, but the fact that Kacey looked like a target was enough to convince him that she shouldn’t be alone. Someone had gotten into her house without forced entry, had possibly poisoned her, was privy to her private conversations, and knew when she was alone.
Trace’s back muscles tightened just at the thought of someone listening in.
Was it possible that the person behind the surveillance equipment was the killer?
You bet. In Trace’s mind there was no question. None whatsoever. He unlocked the truck, waited as she climbed into the cab, then closed the door.
She smiled at him through the passenger window, and he felt that now familiar little tug on his heart that he felt whenever he was around her. In another time and place he might think he was falling in love. Right here, right now, he couldn’t even go there. Not while women who looked like her were dying.
As he slid behind the wheel, she voiced second thoughts. “I don’t know if staying with you is the answer,” she said.