Steam from the griddle sizzled above the den of people as she entered the cafe. She knew she looked ragged so she rushed to the restroom and cleaned up. The scent of coffee, sausages and shrimp grits filled the cramped space. Heat enveloped her as she claimed a corner booth and grabbed a menu.
A waitress wearing a name tag that read Verna and a white apron splotched with grease stabbed a pencil behind her ear and glided toward her with coffee, but halted suddenly, her eyes glued to the TV set in the corner. “Oh, my word!” Verna flicked up the volume. “There’s been a woman murdered in North Georgia.”
Caitlin angled her head to see the set.
“This late-breaking story in now, folks. We’re here with Federal Agent Reilly Brown and Sheriff Miles Monahue of Raven’s Peak. A young woman’s body was discovered this morning in the mountains in an area locals call Devil’s Ravine.”
He shoved the microphone toward a tall, dark-haired man with black eyes. Behind him several cops combed the woods, others were huddled near the edge of a stream, and a team of paramedics hovered around a gurney. “Sheriff Monahue, did you find the woman’s body?”
The man’s face looked haunted. “Yes.”
“And is it true that the victim is your wife, Caitlin Collier Monahue?”
A shadow fell across the man’s face as he bowed his head and nodded. “Yes, we’ve been searching for her for weeks.”
Caitlin gasped. What was he talking about? She was alive. And she didn’t know that man at all.
“Was she a victim of The Carver?” the reporter asked.
Sheriff Monahue scrubbed his hand over his beard stubble. “It appears that way, but we’ll know more after we investigate.”
Caitlin’s heart stuttered as the photo of the sheriff’s wife appeared on the screen. No…dear heavens, it couldn’t be.
Her palms sweated as more memories churned through her foggy brain. The photo—yes, it was her. Caitlin. But she wasn’t dead.
So who was the woman in the water?
A fleeting image of standing in front of a mirror hit her, and she frowned, then realized that the mirror had not been a mirror at all, but another woman. It had been her sister—her look-alike…they were identical twins.
Dear God, her sister…Caitlin…Nora—Nora was dead….
Nora, the only family she had left. The only person who cared about her.
She doubled over as grief and fear swelled inside her. She was all alone now. And while she’d been locked away, someone had killed her twin.
Raven’s Peak, Georgia
Five hours later
THE LAST FEW HOURS had been pure hell.
Miles stood outside his rental house, his stomach knotted, his hands thrust inside his denim jacket to ward off the cold as the crime-scene investigators and Brown searched his house. He’d already succumbed to a DNA swab, had his bootprints taken and turned over the clothes he’d been wearing. Thank God he hadn’t given in to the need to touch Caitlin before Brown had arrived, so his hands would be clean.
One of the detectives confiscated his kitchen knives upon arrival and had already bagged them. Miles had noticed the serrated edges on the steak knives and prayed they didn’t match the lacerations in her chest. If they did, then someone had been inside his house and had set him up.
But if this were the work of The Carver, it was a ritualistic serial-killer case, not someone with a vendetta against him. The killer probably wouldn’t take the time to frame him. He’d want to bask in the glory and attention of his crime.
He slid his Ray-Bans on, then removed a notepad from his pocket and began a list of his possible enemies to question.
Brown cleared his throat as he approached. “We’re finished.”
Wind whistled through the trees, a gust sending dead leaves raining to the ground. “Will you let me know what the M.E. discovers? I’d like a report.”
Brown gave a clipped nod. “Don’t leave town. In fact, you should step down as sheriff until this investigation is over.”
Miles cut his gaze toward Brown, grateful for the shades protecting his eyes. “I want to find this lunatic as much as you do.” He indicated the notepad. “I’m already making a list of all my enemies.”
“You think this is about you?”
Miles shrugged. “I don’t know, but we can’t discount any angle.”
“Fax it to me when you complete it. You also know there were other similar cases across the states?”
“Yes, The Carver.”
“Then again, you’re a cop, you know his MO,” Agent Brown snapped. “You could easily have patterned this crime to look like The Carver’s work.”
Miles cursed. “Or maybe we have a serial killer here in Raven’s Peak, and you’re wasting everyone’s time hassling me.”
“Get your deputy to take over your office, Monahue. Do it now.”
Brown ran a gloved hand over his tie, then shrugged and walked to his car. His tires chewed gravel as he sped away. Miles strode to his Pathfinder and drove to the sheriff’s office to check his computer and talk to his deputy. His deputy agreed to take over, then left to make rounds. Coffee in hand, he logged onto the central database, plugging in the information about the crime scene to cross check across the states for references to the other Carver cases.
While he waited on the computer to process the information, he sipped his coffee, trying to warm his hands, but a deadly cold had seeped all the way to his bones. Seconds later, the data spewed on the screen. So far, the police had no real suspects. They had questioned all the boyfriends, family, husbands of the five victims. The only connection or similarity they’d discovered among the women was that they had all cheated on their husbands. Hmm. The reason The Carver carved the letter A on their chests—Adulterer?
In case they did have a copycat here, he entered the names of the men he’d arrested who had possible grievances against him, prioritizing them according to severity of their crimes and sentences. The first two men were lifers, one serving time for murdering his family, the other for brutally raping and killing a teenager. The third one, Armond Rodriguez, who’d been convicted of assault and battery on his wife, had been paroled two days ago. But Caitlin had been missing three weeks. Still, he’d check him out in case he had a friend on the outside who might have helped him. And he didn’t yet know if Caitlin had been abducted the day she’d left him or later.
The next prisoner, Ted Ruthers, had been released due to an illness and was supposedly in a hospice program. Hmm. Not him. Unless he’d hired someone to get revenge on Monahue.
The last one, Willie Pinkerton, had escaped jailtime on a technicality, but he was a ruthless bastard who’d been guilty as sin. He’d stabbed an old lady in his apartment complex just because he didn’t like old people. The last address he could find on him was in Georgia.
He heard the doorknob jiggle and the door swung open. Miles grimaced, wondering if Brown had followed him here to harass him or if someone in town had heard of the murder and had come to do…what? Sympathize with him? Tell him he was no longer wanted in Raven’s Peak?
The floor squeaked as a woman walked into the office. Shadows hovered around her, and she was shivering, wide-eyed, so pale her skin looked like buttermilk. Faded dirty jeans and a damp long sleeved T-shirt hung on her frame, and her long dark hair lay in tangles around her cheeks.
Shock bolted through him as he focused on her face. He had to be seeing things. A ghost, maybe?
She looked exactly like his dead wife.