Surrounded by the riot of color in her apartment, she seemed almost unnaturally still in contrast, a little sparrow sitting quiet and watchful in the midst of chaos.
A shrill sound emanated from inside the blue briefcase, making her jump. “That might be a student—I have to get that.” She snapped open the case and retrieved a small silver phone. She flipped it open. “Hello?”
As she moved toward the kitchen, Gabe glanced at the contents of the open briefcase. A stack of files and papers lay within, nondescript at first glance. But the edge of a photo peeked out of one folder. The only thing he could make out were a patch of tall grass and a woman’s single shoe.
But it was enough to make his blood run cold.
He glanced up at Alicia. She’d moved all the way into the kitchen, her back to him as she spoke in low tones on the phone.
Gabe reached into the case and pulled out the file containing the photo. He took the photo out and stared at it, his pulse hammering in his head.
Brenda.
She lay as he’d found her, wedged between the tree and the bush, her skirt demurely in place, her legs slightly bent. Her brown pumps were still on her feet, though the police had informed the family that there had been scrapes on the heels of her feet and shredding of her stockings consistent with being dragged through the rough parking lot outside the trucking company.
When Victor Logan raped and killed her, he’d made sure she was left in a dignified position in death. Apparently he’d fancied himself a gentleman. Gabe’s lip curled with disgust.
“I should have closed the briefcase.”
Gabe looked up at Alicia’s words. He hadn’t heard her approach. “What are you doing with this?”
The look on her face was equal parts guilt and determination. “Well, I’d hoped that Cissy would get here before the subject came up, but I’m pretty sure that’s why she called you to come here.”
Connections started forming in his mind, though they made no sense. Brenda’s murder had been solved finally, after twelve years, when his twin brother Jake and Jake’s wife Mariah had put the pieces together that implicated an itinerant mechanic named Victor Logan in Brenda’s murder as well as several other murders in a three-state area. Logan had died in a gas explosion at his home in Buckley, Mississippi, not a month earlier.
Cissy knew Victor Logan had been living in Chickasaw County at the time of her mother’s murder and that he’d kept a scrapbook on the series of murders that had included articles about Brenda’s death as well. She knew why the police believed Logan was her mother’s killer, so why would she have called him all the way here just to dredge up a closed case?
“Brenda’s murder investigation is over,” he said aloud, dropping the file onto the coffee table dismissively. “The killer is dead.”
A knock on the door sent a jolt through his nervous system.
Alicia gave a small start, too. She crossed to the front door and glanced through the peephole. Her tense posture eased and she opened the door to reveal Gabe’s niece Cissy.
Cissy’s green eyes met Gabe’s, first with delight then with a growing sense of dismay as she sensed the tension in the room. “Has something happened?” she asked Alicia.
“He saw the file,” Alicia answered quietly, closing the door behind her.
Cissy pressed her lips into a narrow line. “I wanted to set it up better, but I guess you know why you’re here now.”
Gabe shook his head. “Not really. How about you start telling me why you really dragged me down here?”
Cissy took his hand for a moment, then wrapped her slender arms around him and gave him a tight, fierce hug. “I know you wanted this to all be over. I did, too.” She stepped back, pinning him with the full force of her green-eyed gaze. “But it’s not. Victor Logan didn’t kill my mom.”
Chapter Two
Alicia watched Gabe Cooper’s expression go from puzzled to furious in the span of a second. His gaze whipped up to snare her own, snapping with anger so intense her stomach knotted.
“Did you put this idea in her head?” he asked.
Cissy tugged at his arm. “Alicia can’t make me believe something if I don’t think it’s true. I’m the one who raised the subject with her, not the other way around.”
Gabe turned to his niece, his brow furrowing. “Why? You heard everything Mariah and Jake told us about Logan. You know about the scrapbook—”
“Nobody’s ever tracked down the other guy,” Cissy pointed out. Alicia knew she was referring to a second man the police were looking for in connection to Victor Logan’s death. Cissy had filled her in on everything the Cooper family knew about Logan and the events of the previous month, when Logan had taken Cissy’s Uncle Jake and his wife Mariah captive.
“Jake’s certain the other guy wouldn’t have been more than a teenager when your mother was murdered,” Gabe said, gently stroking his niece’s arm. “I know it doesn’t feel like closure. We never got to face Victor Logan and make him admit what he did, but grasping at straws—”
“They may not be straws,” Alicia interjected.
Gabe’s head snapped toward her. “What is your deal? You’re so desperate for a thesis topic that you’d mess with a young girl’s mind about her mother’s murder?”
“Damn it!” Cissy pulled away from her uncle. “I’m not a baby and Alicia’s not messing with my head. Do you have any idea how insulting you’re being right now?”
Gabe’s expression fell, and he raked his hand through his dark hair, turning away. “I’m sorry.”
Alicia crossed to Cissy’s side, offering a united front. “Cissy had questions about her mother’s murder before she ever stepped foot in my lab. When she found out I was doing my doctoral thesis on a series of unsolved serial murders in the Gulf states, she asked my opinion about her mother’s case.”
The hard muscles of Gabe’s jaws tensed. “My brother and I have both spent the last twelve years looking into every lead that emerged, most of which fell apart. We know a viable suspect when we see one. Victor Logan had the means to do it and the opportunity. And based on his issues with women, we’re confident we have a good idea what motivated him—”
“Why you?” Alicia interrupted, struck by something he’d said a moment earlier. “I mean, I get why Cissy’s father would have devoted his life to finding an answer, but why you?”
Gabe glanced at his niece before answering. “I’m the one who found her body.”
Alicia glanced at Cissy, whose expression was solemn and tinged with sympathy as she gazed up at her uncle. If she found the answer as incomplete as Alicia did, she gave no sign of it.
“I see,” she said, although she didn’t really. Finding the body might have given Gabe a bigger stake in learning what happened to Cissy’s mother, but not enough to spend twelve years following leads long after the case had grown stone-cold.
“I appreciate that you have a paper to write. And I get that having Cissy here is like a case study practically falling into your lap. But all the authorities who’ve ever looked into Brenda’s murder are convinced that Victor Logan is the guy.”
“He’s