Chill Factor

Lilly would be discovered dead in the cabin.

A search of the entire area would ensue. One shocking discovery would lead to another. His abandoned car would yield the incriminating shovel in the trunk. Ultimately they would find the graves.

Tierney pushed on.

His eyelashes became encrusted by snowflakes that froze in place, causing temporary blindness that was annoying as well as dangerous. The condensation of his breath froze on the woolen scarf, making it stiff with ice crystals.

Beneath his clothing, he was sweating from the exertion. He could feel trickles of perspiration rolling down his torso where the injured ribs on his left side ached from Lilly’s well-placed elbow jab.

Ordinarily his innate sense of direction was as reliable as a compass. But when he paused only long enough to check his wristwatch, he began to fear that his sixth sense had failed him. Even considering the terrain he’d had to walk over, surely he should have bypassed the first switchback and reached the road by now.

He looked around in the vain hope of getting his bearings, but in the maelstrom of snow, one tree looked exactly like another. Natural signposts like rock formations and rotten stumps were blanketed by the accumulation. The only thing marring the otherwise pristine snowscape was the track he’d made in it.

His conscious mind was telling him that his sense of direction was fallible, that he could have become confused and was moving in circles. But his gut instinct overrode it, insisting that he was still on course, that his only miscalculation was in how far he needed to go to bypass the switchback and reach the road.

He had relied on that instinct too many times to start mistrusting it now. Ducking his head against the wind, he plodded on, assuring himself that if he continued on his present path, just a little farther, he would soon find the road.

He did.

Not quite the way he expected.

He landed on it after a nine-foot plunge through thin air.

His right foot found it first. With the impetus of a pile driver, it tunneled through twenty inches of snow, striking the icy pavement below with enough force to cause him to scream.

• • •

After announcing to Begley, Hoot, and Burton that he considered Ben Tierney their culprit, Ernie Gunn had nothing more to say. Without another word, he resolutely escorted his wife to the door. Their departure created a vacuum in Chief Burton’s cramped office.

Begley broke the uneasy silence. “We need to talk to that Hamer kid.”

Hoot had predicted that would be Begley’s next step. “It’ll be interesting to feel his pulse about Millicent’s disappearance.”

“Hold on a minute,” Burton said. “‘Feel his pulse’? Scott and the girl were sweethearts a year ago, so what?”

“So, we want to talk to him. You object?” Begley’s nutcracker dared Burton to put up an argument.

“I’d like to notify Wes first.”

“Why?” Hoot asked.

“This is a criminal investigation,” Begley said. “Anybody is fair game, I don’t care who his daddy is.”

“Well, that’s where we’re different,” Burton said belligerently. “We can’t just show up on their doorstep and start asking questions about Scott’s relationship with a missing girl.”

Begley actually laughed. “Why the hell not?”

“Because,” Burton replied tightly, “that’s not the way we do things around here.”

“Well, the way you do things around here hasn’t found those women, has it?” Burton’s lacerated face turned even redder, but Begley held up his hand to stave off whatever it was the police chief was going to say. “All right, all right. Simmer down. Never let it be said that the FBI violates local etiquette. Isn’t Hamer bringing some sandwiches back for our lunch?”

“Yeah.”

“When he gets here, tell him that we want to talk to Scott. Don’t go into details, just say we’ve got some questions for him. We’ll head over to their place after we’ve eaten.”

Without so much as a nod, Burton stamped out.

“They’re good friends,” Hoot said after the chief of police was out of earshot.