“No bomb, no foreign substances. You’re clear to examine it,” he told a tall, barrel-chested man standing near the front of the line. Kristen dug in her memory for the detective’s name. Raymond—no, Rayburn. Captain Rayburn. She took advantage of her small size to slip through the huddle and reach Rayburn’s side just as he donned a pair of latex gloves and carefully opened the plastic bag.
He slanted a look toward her, his expression hard to read for a moment. Then his features relaxed and he gave a little half nod, as if beckoning her closer. “Reckon you’ll want to see this, too, Detective.”
She scooted closer. The contents were, indeed, the remains of a manila envelope. The bomb squad had apparently used a razor knife to slice it open and examine the contents.
Captain Rayburn reached into the plastic bag and delicately opened the edges of the envelope. Inside lay what looked like a small stack of five-by-seven photographs. Careful to touch only the outer edges, Rayburn pulled the stack from the envelope.
Kristen’s heart plummeted.
The top photo was an image of a little girl dressed in a robin’s-egg-blue shorts set, swinging on a swing at Gossamer Park.
The girl was Maddy Cooper.
Chapter Three
Sam stared at the photographs, his stomach rebelling. There were twelve in total, five-by-sevens taken on a digital camera according to the lab tech who examined them first before releasing them back to the Birmingham detectives. Each photo depicted his daughter Maddy at play, in a variety of places, from the playground at Gossamer Park to the farmer’s market on Main Street. Once or twice Sam was in the photo, as well; another time, his parents. One photo featured Maddy with Sam’s sister Hannah, fishing from one of the marina’s fishing piers. Maddy was holding up a small crappie and grinning at her aunt.
He looked away from the photos and rubbed his eyes. They felt full of grit.
“I called my office.” Kristen Tandy’s voice was toneless. He looked up at her and found her gaze fixed on the photos. “Foley’s on his way to the marina now to let your parents know what’s going on.”
“I need to get back there.”
Kristen nodded. “The detectives have agreed to send me scans of these photos.” She looked up at Dave Rayburn, who gave her a nod. She and the captain seemed to have come to an understanding, Sam noted.
“So we can go now?”
“Yeah.” Kristen shook hands with Rayburn and led Sam out of the office.
They didn’t talk on the way to the car. Sam wasn’t even sure what to say. The very notion of someone stalking his baby girl was so surreal, he spent half the drive back to Gossamer Ridge wondering if he was stuck in a nightmare.
Kristen broke the silence they’d maintained to that point, her voice uncharacteristically warm. “We’re going to find the son of a bitch who took those pictures.”
He looked at her. Her gaze angled forward, eyes on the road, her jaw set like stone. “He dropped them off yesterday evening,” he said aloud. “Before he even tried to take her. He wanted that to be the first thing I saw the morning I woke up with my daughter gone.” And he’d been sneaky, too, leaving the package outside the building after hours—but before the receptionist had left for the day. He’d probably waited around to make sure she saw the package and took it back to the office before she finished locking up for the night.
Kristen looked at him then, just a quick glance, but he saw fiery anger flashing in her blue eyes. “It doesn’t matter that the security cameras didn’t catch him. It won’t stop us.”
He hoped she was right.
At the marina, Kristen parked beside the bait shop, next to a Chevy Impala identical to the one she was driving. “Foley,” she said to Sam as they got out of the car.
Inside the bait shop, Maddy sat on her grandfather’s knee playing with a large cork bobber, tossing it in the air like a ball and nearly tumbling off Mike Cooper’s knees trying to catch it. Nearby, Foley stood at the counter, talking in low tones with Sam’s mother. All four of them looked up as Sam and Kristen entered.
Maddy’s eyes lit up and she scrambled down from Mike’s lap. “Miss Kristen!” she squealed, beaming up at Kristen Tandy as she ran to greet them.
Sam felt Kristen stiffen beside him. He quickly intercepted his boisterous daughter before she flung herself at Kristen’s knees and hoisted her into his arms. “What? No hello for your daddy?”
“Hi, Daddy!” She patted his face affectionately before twisting in his arms to look at Kristen. “Daddy Mike’s gonna let me feed the worms, Miss Kristen. D’you wanna come with us?”
Kristen looked positively green, but Sam suspected it had nothing to do with the prospect of feeding worms.
He tamped down a bit of resentment. “Miss Kristen has a job to do, baby. And I’m afraid you and Daddy Mike are gonna have to go worm feeding some other day. I’ve got plans for us this afternoon. Want to know what?”
“What?” She caught his face between her hands again, making his heart swell. But instead of her lopsided grin, he saw static, candid images captured in a series of still photographs. He glanced at Kristen, who was watching him, her expression for once unguarded. The look on her face was utter devastation. There was no other word for it.
He cleared his throat and looked back at Maddy. “We’re going to have a movie marathon! All the princesses—as many as we can get through before bedtime.”
Maddy wriggled excitedly in his arms. “Really?”
“Really.”
Sam heard Detective Foley make a low, sympathetic sound behind him. Normally, Sam would agree—an afternoon and evening full of animated fairy-tale musicals were to be avoided at all costs. But this time, he could think of nowhere he’d rather be than his parents’ guest cottage with his little girl tucked safely against him on the sofa, miraculously still with him to watch dancing brooms and singing mice.
“Can Miss Kristen come, too?” Maddy asked.
“I told you, Miss Kristen has to work.”
“But after work, can she come, too?”
Sam started to say no, but Kristen cleared her throat behind him. “Yeah, Maddy. I can come after work.”
Sam looked up at Kristen, startled. She met his gaze, sheer terror shining in her blue eyes. But her small, pointed chin jutted forward, like a soldier preparing for battle.
“Are you sure?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, unconvincingly. “Y’all are staying here for a few days, right?”
He started to tell her it wasn’t a good idea, but the glee in Maddy’s laughter stopped him before he uttered a word. He looked at his daughter, finding her grinning at Kristen with sheer delight, and stayed silent. “Yeah. There’s a guest cottage down the hill from my folks’ place.”
“I can be there by seven-thirty,” Kristen told him quietly after Maddy had climbed down to follow her grandfather into the back room. “I’ll bring some microwave popcorn or something.”
“You don’t have to do this.” Sam didn’t miss the reluctance in her eyes.
“She goes to sleep—what? Eight? Eight-thirty?”
“Yeah,” Sam agreed, not following.
“Good. Then you and I can go over a few things.”
He arched an eyebrow. “A few things?”
“A few cases, actually.” She stepped away from the counter, lowering her voice. “I think