THE VANISHING AT OPAL CREEK

A THOMAS AUSTIN CRIME THRILLER

BOOK 10

D.D. BLACK

A Note on Setting and Characters

While many locations in this book are true to life, some details of the settings have been changed. Only one character in these pages exists in the real world: Thomas Austin’s corgi, Run. Her personality mirrors that of my own corgi, Pearl. Any other resemblances between characters in this book and actual people is purely coincidental.

But what about the unlikable author, David Dierdrick Zwart, and his cruel wife, Eve? How much of them are based on you and your wife, who writes under the name Eva Blue?

To be honest, not much. I had a lot of fun creating unflattering alter egos for us, and there are perhaps one or two small details taken from our real lives.

But you’ll have to guess which ones.

Thanks for reading,

D.D. Black

“Fiction reveals truth that reality obscures.”

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

“The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”

- Oscar Wilde

“In Hollywood, the illusion is everything.

Reality is nothing.”

- Rex Reed

PART 1

MERE MORTALS

CHAPTER ONE

Opal Creek Wilderness Area

Marion County, Oregon

“Bet, Bigfoot would literally flex, bro.” Grayson continued swinging the branch he’d snapped off a Scouler’s willow near the trailhead. “Sasquatch would dropkick Spiderman across Oregon while shoving a pine tree up Superman’s⁠—”

“Shhhhh!” Chloe had heard enough. “You’re going to scare away the birds.”

“I don’t think he’s here for birds,” Henry whispered.

“Facts,” Grayson agreed.

Grayson used the branch to lift a rogue blackberry runner off the trail, allowing Chloe to pass safely.

Chloe nodded. “Thanks.” She turned to walk backwards as she passed the thorns, directing her attention to Henry. “I hope I’m not the only one who knows we’re not actually going to find Bigfoot out here.”

Grayson let the runner swing loose at Henry, who jumped, successfully dodging its massive thorns.

“Boom!” Henry said, much too loudly for the quiet forest atmosphere.

“G.O.A.T. skills, bro,” Grayson said. “You totally yeeted that.”

Chloe rolled her eyes and let the boys pass as she scanned the massive forest surrounding them. “I’d be stoked if we see a Blue Rock Thrush or Blackpoll Warbler, though.”

Henry shrugged.

Chloe knew Henry had little interest in birds, and she didn’t think he really believed they’d find Sasquatch. He was probably just happy to not be trapped behind a high school desk for the day.

Grayson, however, was a true believer—both in Sasquatch and in its powers. He spent time on the message boards, listened to all the conspiracy podcasts, and had even gone to a Sasquatch conference in Portland with his dad.

The three of them had made it through the first three days of school, but via a series of texts exchanged late into the previous night, they’d all agreed that they needed an extra day off. Today, they were taking it.

In their small town of Mill City, there was nowhere to hide but the woods. They’d been out on the trails for an hour so far, mostly following Grayson’s intuition about where they might find Bigfoot. Henry had stolen weed from his dad and he and Grayson wanted to smoke it on the trail, but Chloe wouldn’t let them. She didn’t like the smell and didn’t want to spend all day convincing them they weren’t lost when the paranoia set in.

Most importantly, though, that stuff would scare away the birds. And the birds were why she was really here. The Opal Creek Wilderness Area was home to some of the rarest warblers and thrushes in the region, not to mention the Peregrine Falcons that nested along the rocky cliffs. The old-growth forest, with its towering Douglas firs and centuries-old cedars, created the perfect canopy for dozens of species. The thought of missing even one glimpse of a Blue Rock Thrush or a Townsend’s Warbler because her two loser friends wanted to get high made her stomach turn.

She scanned the trees, sighing as Henry and Grayson talked loudly about some movie they’d seen last weekend. She should have known the nice, quiet walk she’d been promised—while certainly nice—was not likely to be quiet. The boy’s voices traveled further than their smoke would have.

She wouldn’t see much avian activity today. Not while hanging out with these two.

“You know what I’d like to find?” Henry asked. It was a rhetorical question. “Where they plan to shoot that reality show, Alone in the Forest. I love that show. They eat bugs, use leaves for pillows, everything. I heard they’re supposed to start filming somewhere in Opal Creek next week.”

“Nah bro, they already started filming,” Grayson corrected. “My dad saw some of their crew in town just yesterday. But anyway, Bigfoot would crush any superhero in a one-v-one matchup.” He couldn’t let go of his previous train of thought.

Chloe rolled her eyes. These boys were basically just talking to themselves.

Grayson swiped a thick patch of dirty blond hair out of his eyes, then yammered on. “Think about it! Bigfoot’s got this insane strength, right? Like, he’s been living in the wilderness for hundreds of years, lifting trees and boulders. Built like a tank. Plus, he’s got crazy stealth skills—he’s been hiding from humans forever, so obviously he can sneak up on anyone. ‘All warfare is based on deception.’” He’d changed his voice to an authoritative drone. “Thus said Sun Shoe or whatever.”

Chloe thought it was Sun Tzu, but even she wasn’t sure.

Grayson continued swatting the pussy willow branch about as he continued. “What’s Spiderman gonna do, throw a web? And Superman? Bigfoot would totally use his environment to his advantage, like drag him by the cape into the thick forest where he can’t fly fast or do any of his laser-eye stuff without burning everything down. I mean, maybe I’m underestimating the powers of spidey sense.” He paused briefly. “Naw, bet. Bigfoot’s gotta have some kind of mystical powers, right? Like, how else has he stayed hidden for so long?”

Chloe stifled a laugh. There were three things Grayson took seriously: sports, video games, and theoretical battles between fictional characters from contrasting paradigms. The juvenile subject matter was in humorous contrast to the deep masculine voice he’d grown into.

“That’s Dead Man’s Fork,” Henry said, stopping mid-trail and pointing to a split in the woods ten yards ahead.

“Why do they call it that?” Chloe asked.

Henry frowned. “You don’t know the story of Old Man Misery?”

Grayson and Henry stood shoulder to shoulder, both towering about a foot above Chloe. However slight, and even though she was only a freshman, she wasn’t intimidated by the boys. They were juniors, but that didn’t make them wiser.

In fact, they were definitely not wiser.

Besides, they knew they had no chance with her. She’d made it clear that she wouldn’t be dating anyone until after she went away to college, although she had secretly considered making an exception for Henry. But he’d ruined that when he’d gone and asked Jenny to homecoming. Chloe didn’t know what Henry saw in Jenny. She wouldn’t last a hot minute on a show like Alone in the Forest. The thick layer of perfume she used would either scare away her dinner or attract bees. She’d starve or be stung to death. “Who’s Old Man Misery ?” she asked.

A cool breeze picked up, carrying the scent of damp pine and moss. Her question hung in the air as Henry made an exaggerated shocked face he’d probably learned watching Youtube. The Opal Creek Wilderness spread out around them, towering trees casting long shadows and the sound of the creek echoing through the stillness.

“Old Man Misery was once the richest person in town,” Henry began. “Started out owning the general store back when the timber industry was taking off. The kind of guy people would step aside for when he walked down the street, right? Left town to start a small bank in Portland. Made even more money. Got full of himself and tried to move to New York to take on the big bankers there. Three years later he came back here broke as hell—stock market or something—and, by then, his competitors had stepped in and taken over the town.”

“So what did he do?” Chloe asked.

“Killed himself,” Grayson interjected.

Chloe shook her head.

“I guess he totally lost it when his wife left him.” Henry shook his head, pointing as though Old Man Misery’s body still lay across the fork in the trail. “Took his own life right here.”

“One theory I read online,” Grayson said, “is that’s why Bigfoot hangs out here. In addition to being a total badass, Bigfoot is a sensitive soul. Never got over seeing the suicide is my guess.”

“From here,” Henry said, “the trail splits into two paths for less than a quarter mile, then comes back together. There’s a nice view of Crystal Falls at the spot where they meet up again.”

Grayson grew serious. “I know you two don’t really believe. But humor me on this. A guy I’m on message boards with said he spotted something a week ago while flying his drone over this patch.” Grayson gestured at the expansive forest area surrounded by the split and merge trail. “Get your walkie-talkies on,” he continued. “Chloe, you head to the left. Henry and I will head to the right, which has a better view. Chloe, your job is just to make sure he doesn’t escape to the left. If you see anything, ping us on the walkie-talkies.”

Both boys pulled out their phones and began recording.

Chloe rolled her eyes again, but didn’t say anything. Instead, happy to be away from the guys for a moment to listen for her birds, she began strolling down the trail to the left.

The wind picked up, and Chloe shoved her hands into the pockets of her jeans, fingering a piece of lint that always seemed to end up in the same spot no matter how many times she took it out.

The jeans had been her mother’s. After dying of cancer four years ago, she’d left Chloe these jeans, a drunk stepfather, and little else. Chloe’s stepfather was the main reason she spent as much time as she could listening for warblers and thrushes in the forest.

She heard something to the right—maybe a branch snapping. Glancing toward the sound, she saw nothing. It was probably the boys messing around on the twin trail, which she couldn’t see but guessed wasn’t more than fifty yards through the woods. She imagined it mirroring the trail she was on, widening in the center before coming back together, the view from above outlining the shape of an eye.

Walking further, Chloe’s trail began veering to the right again, heading for the connection point. The distant white noise of rushing water filled the soundscape and Chloe felt the air becoming slightly damper.

After taking a few more steps, she looked up, finally able to catch a partial view of the waterfall cascading down from the moss-covered cliffside, its stream slicing through jagged rocks before pooling into the lush greenery below. Towering pines framed Crystal Falls, their trunks dark against the vibrant mosses and ferns that hung clinging to the rocks. The water fell in a delicate ribbon, mist catching the faint light that filtered through the trees.

Then she saw something else—a dark form moving laterally toward the water along the crown of the waterfall. Its movement told her right away that it wasn’t a deer and it wasn’t a bear.

It was a person—a man judging by his size and gait—dressed all in black.

He walked precariously on the cliff, not more than a yard from the waterfall. Maybe he was a producer scoping out the area for the reality show. Or maybe a cast member if Grayson was right that filming on Alone in the Forest had already begun.

But why was he getting so close to the edge? In these parts, a still surface with even the least bit of moisture will grow moss. Those rocks would be very slippery.

She jogged a few paces towards the waterfall, thinking she might warn the outsider of the danger. But she was still a couple hundred yards away from him, and, when she looked up again, she saw the dark form disappearing behind a patch of bushes that bordered the cliff.

She stopped, stared. Ten seconds passed, then twenty. What was he doing?

Embarrassed, it occurred to her that he might just have stepped behind the bushes to relieve himself. Then, as quickly as the thought had formed, the man stumbled out into view toward the cliff’s edge.

His foot struck something, a rock or root perhaps. She couldn’t see for certain. Waving his arms wildly for balance, he fell, slipping forward feet first and disappearing below the tree line.

Chloe gasped, momentarily frozen. “Oh no,” she whispered.

She began running down the path. She hadn’t heard him strike the rocks below because of the sound of the waterfall itself, but she didn’t need to hear it to know the truth: that fall would have killed him.

What the heck had he been doing up there in the first place?

As she approached the spot where the trails met back up, she heard a shout.

It was Grayson. “Hurry!” he was yelling. “Chloe, hurry! Get your phone out! I think he ran to the left!”

Chloe reached for her phone instinctively, then realized Grayson wasn’t talking about the man who’d just fallen from the cliff. He was still talking about Sasquatch. Chloe skidded to a stop and looked to the left. Ahead of her, she definitely saw something—but it wasn’t Bigfoot.

It was a medium-sized black bear.

Chloe knew the right thing to do: stay calm, make herself look big, and back away slowly without turning her back to the bear. Thankfully, it was already heading away from her, but she kept her distance and made sure to give the animal plenty of space.

The boys caught up with her a moment later, panting with excitement.

“It was a black bear, you idiots,” she said. She took a few deep breaths, trying to calm herself. “Didn’t you see the guy up there?” She turned and pointed, but from their current vantage point, the trees blocked all but the very top of the waterfall.

“What are you talking about?” Grayson asked.

“There was a guy up there,” Chloe said, pointing. “Right there. Through the trees. Top of Crystal Falls. He fell, or slipped, or jumped, or something.”

“Jumped?” Henry asked. “There’s no pool at the bottom, that guy would have…”

“Not jumped, but…” Chloe was interrupted.

“A second suicide?” Grayson shook his head. “Sasquatch is going to need counseling.”

“This isn’t funny,” Chloe said. “I couldn’t see really. He came out from behind a bush, and… what the heck was he doing up there? We need to go check it out.”

What she didn’t say was the thought, the fear, that had lodged somewhere in her toes: That the man had possibly been pushed out from behind the bushes. She didn’t say it because it was paranoia, irrational fear. But her homelife had given her plenty to be afraid of.

In the far distance, they heard sirens, faint at first but growing louder.

A wave of fear passed over Henry’s face. “I can’t get caught here, skipping school and with weed.”

Chloe frowned. Henry was right. Her stepdad was cruel on his good days, violent on his worst. If she got caught skipping school with two older boys… she couldn’t even imagine what he’d say, what he’d do.

The black bear was still between them and what she presumed was the man’s body. She heard a humming sound and looked up to see a drone overhead, probably part of the crazy reality show production that was going on.

The sirens were getting louder.

Grayson had already turned and was heading back the way they’d come. “Let’s get out of here,” he said, grabbing Chloe’s hand and pulling her back toward their car. “If a guy fell, they caught it on that drone and those sirens are the paramedics.”

CHAPTER TWO

Hansville, Washington

It had been a good summer, but darker days were coming to Hansville. Detective Thomas Austin sat in the corner of his little café, staring out at the water, which had taken on a slightly golden hue in the warm fall light.

Run, his corgi, lay on her side in what Austin called her stretch-limo sleep mode. Her front and back paws, which were crossed and floating daintily just above the floor, gave an occasional, rhythmic wiggle. Austin smiled, considering that the two-mile walk they’d taken that morning—roughly the maximum distance Run’s short legs could physically march—had been insufficient. His little dog was now dream-walking another mile or two along the beach in her sleep.

The morning rush had died down, and only Mr. and Mrs. McGuillicutty—his two most loyal patrons—lingered over their coffee on the opposite end of the small dining room.

After his last major case, Austin had been happy for a summer mostly free of major incidents. He was still getting used to being a full-time detective again. In between following up on the case of elder abuse, fraud, and murder he’d recently solved, and other procedural tasks within the department, it had been a summer of slow and tedious work.

His girlfriend, Simone Aoki—whom everyone just called Sy—had gotten herself a little apartment in Kingston and was spending four days there and three days hundreds of miles away, interning at a winery. In truth, she spent at least half of her local nights at his place. Their relationship was going well—better than Austin had expected when she moved to Washington from the east coast a few months earlier. Along with spending time on the beach with Run, spending time with Sy was where he found his joy.

“Boss, I thought you’d be finished reading that by now.” Andy, Austin’s head chef and the manager of his café, general store, and bait shop, had appeared behind him. He refilled Austin’s black coffee from a carafe.

“Well kid,” Austin said, nodding at the book in front of him. “Not all of us can be a whiz at ancient Mesopotamian poetry. Besides, I’ve almost made it to the seventh tablet.”

“You’ve had the book for four days already,” Andy said, heading back toward the kitchen. “At this rate, you won’t finish it before your trip with Sy.”

It turned out, in addition to basically running Austin’s joint, Andy had been quietly working on a master’s degree in classics of all things. The program was mostly online but—as Austin discovered when Andy surprised him with a request for a week off earlier in the summer—it also required in-person attendance five days a year for intensive study. Andy had been focusing on ancient texts in secret and, upon his return to Hansville, handed Austin a rare hardback edition of what many considered the first piece of literature to survive into modern times: The Epic of Gilgamesh.

Austin had been intrigued by Andy’s dedication to such an unexpected field of study. He hadn’t pegged his chef as the type to dive into ancient literature, but there he was, discussing Sumerian mythology between prepping burgers and omelets.

“What are you reading?” Mrs. McGuillicutty called from across the quiet dining room.

Austin held up the book and she squinted toward it, clearly not able to make out the faint writing on the worn cover.

“He’s reading The Epic of Gilgamesh,” Andy yelled from the kitchen. “The first story we have.”

“What’s it about?” Mr. McGillicutty asked.

Excited, Andy explained loudly from the kitchen. “It’s sort of a city slicker meets country bumpkin story. Two men—well one of them is part god, part tyrannical king. Anyway his name is Gilgamesh. The other guy, Enkidu, was made from a lump of clay—they fight, then become brothers.”

Austin stood and walked across the dining room to stand next to their table. “So far,” he said, “Enkidu has learned how to be human. And Gilgamesh decided not to rule from a place of insecure oppression. They killed a beast that was guarding a cedar forest so Gilgamesh could build an epic wall for his people. Now, because Gilgamesh refused the goddess Ishtar’s advances—for good reason, mind you—she had her father release the Bull of Heaven, which is currently after them.”

“What were his reasons?” Mrs. McGillicutty asked.

“According to Gilgamesh,” Austin leaned down to whisper playfully. “She led her previous suitors to ruin and destruction.”

“Well,” Mrs. McGillicutty whispered back, “thank goodness Mr. McGillicutty here wasn’t quite so discerning.”

“What’s that now?” Mr. McGillicutty hadn’t been listening.

“It’s got everything,” Andy called. “Friendship, loss, aging, the search for meaning and immortality. It’s the foundation for western stories, period. Kind of like the way a good stock is the base for so many great dishes. After you throw in the carrots, celery, and onion, you can build everything on top of it, layer by layer. All the literature we have today builds on this one epic. Without it, storytelling wouldn’t taste the same.”

“Speaking of food,” Austin said, “how’s the new menu coming?”

“New menu?” Mr. McGillicutty asked, suddenly perking up. “Now you’ve got my attention. Books, I could take them or leave them. Food, though—I’m listening with my mouth wide open.”

Austin chuckled. “Don’t worry, we’re keeping all the popular stuff—the burgers, the waffle sandwich, the chowder. But—” he sighed dramatically, “my girlfriend Simone has convinced me to eat more vegetables.” He shook his head in mock shame. “It’s a sad thing to admit, but I’ve even learned to enjoy them.”

“Heaven forfend!” Mrs. McGillicutty mimed clutching her pearls.

“I know, I know,” Austin said. “But Mrs. McGillicutty, if heaven strikes me for liking vegetables before a stroke strikes me for not eating them, I’m counting on you to strike Sy.”

“I have no problem with that,” Mrs. McGillicutty said sweetly.

Austin winked at her. “We’re adding three or four new vegetable sides, a salad or two, and a couple of entrees that—while not vegetarian—aren’t just piles of meat with a lettuce garnish.” Austin held up his hands defensively before Mrs. McGillicutty could clutch at her pearls again. “But don’t worry, we’ll keep those on the menu, too. Just trying to get a little more balanced.”

Suddenly, Mrs. McGillicutty shrieked, causing Austin to step back and follow her gaze to the television over the little bar. It was tuned to a local Seattle channel, which they usually kept muted unless there was a big game going on. Austin’s eyes flicked from the video, which was panning slowly over a lush green forest, to the scroll at the bottom of the screen.

Kitsap County author dead in Oregon wilderness.

“Turn it up,” Mr. McGillicutty said urgently. “Isn’t that your⁠—”

“Yes, my favorite author.” Mrs. McGillicutty finished his sentence. “He lives not two minutes from here. Or… lived, if this is true.”

A picture popped up on the screen of a man in his mid-forties wearing a black jacket. His brown hair was slightly longer than average, and he had a slightly snobbish, intellectual look on his tanned face. Austin recognized him right away, but couldn’t place the name.

“David something?” Austin asked.

“David Dierdrick Zwart,” Mrs. McGillicutty said just as his name appeared under his photograph on screen. “His fans call him ‘DDZ.’ How do you not know his name? He lives right down the road.”

Though Austin had seen him in the café once or twice, the truth was he didn’t know the man well. Zwart was known to be somewhere between a shy recluse and an arrogant snob, depending on whom you asked. Austin had heard he wasn’t particularly nice, but figured authors were often eccentric, so he’d given him a mental pass. In fact, since Austin himself had never had a negative interaction with the man, he hadn’t given it much thought.

Mrs. McGillicutty shook her head sadly, not waiting for Austin’s reply. “I was up reading one of his books only last night. Kept me up so late, fighting sleep. Eventually I passed out and dropped the book on my head—I could have knocked myself out. Fortunately, the jolt of adrenaline woke me up and I was able to keep reading.” She smiled and then suddenly frowned as though she’d momentarily forgotten and then remembered the tragedy. “What could have happened to him?” she asked, her voice tinged with concern.

Austin didn’t reply.

Andy had already unmuted the television. “I think we are about to find out.”

CHAPTER THREE

“Maria Dominguez here,” the report began, “with breaking news about a beloved local author. Yesterday, Kitsap County author David Dierdrick Zwart passed away in the Oregon wilderness while filming a reality television show called Alone in the Forest. Zwart was the author of nine hit mystery novels set throughout the Pacific Northwest. A graduate of the University of Washington, he lived in Seattle until his mid-thirties before relocating to the little beach town of Hansville in Kitsap County.

“His first well-known novel, The Bodies in Beaker Bay, topped both the Amazon charts and the New York Times bestseller list for over three months, launching him into the upper echelon of American mystery authors. Although his career had fallen off a little, according to a producer on the show, he was hoping his appearance on this well-regarded reality franchise would help him drum up renewed interest in his novels. The producers of the show released the following statement.”

The statement appeared on the screen as the news anchor read it aloud.

“We are deeply saddened by the tragic accident that took the life of our beloved cast member, David Dierdrick Zwart, while filming Alone in the Forest. David was not only a talented author but a cherished member of our team, bringing his wit, charm, and passion for the outdoors to the production. His unfortunate passing was a shocking accident during what was meant to be a challenging but safe experience for all participants. David made many friends on set, and his loss is felt deeply by everyone who worked with him. As we continue to honor his memory, we remain committed to showcasing the intensity and excitement that makes Alone in the Forest such a groundbreaking survival series.”

Mrs. McGuillicutty mumbled a prayer under her breath.

Austin shook his head. As tragic as this was, he couldn’t help but notice how the statement had managed to sneak in a subtle plug for the show alongside the condolences.

“New this hour,” the anchor continued, “we have shocking video of the author’s final moments. We warn our viewers that discretion should be exercised. While the video does not show the final moment of death, it does show Zwart in his final minutes before the deadly accident.”

The video opened with a wide shot from a drone hovering above a dense forest, the towering pines swaying slightly in the wind. The camera—likely trained to follow human motion automatically—zoomed in on David, who was dressed in rugged outdoor gear, all black. He was climbing a steep, rocky path with slow, deliberate movements, stopping occasionally to pick an end-of-season blackberry off one of the bushes that leaned out into the trail.

The camera view switched to what appeared to be a body camera, the kind police officers sometimes wore. And now the footage came with audio. Zwart’s breath was heavy, his boots scraping against the rock.

Pausing for a moment, he glanced back at a stationary camera mounted on a nearby tree, his face tight and sweaty. He pushed forward toward a steeper section of trail, tall rocks on both sides of him. As the drone tracked him from above, catching every strained motion as he neared the top, he chose each handhold carefully. The angle then shifted to a dizzying shot of the forest floor far below, amplifying the sense of danger.

Austin wondered what it must have been like to be out in a magnificent wilderness area like Opal Creek, isolated and alone, determined to survive for two weeks, while at the same time being filmed from every angle and wearing a microphone that recorded your every word, every breath. The juxtaposition of isolation and intrusive tracking almost broke Austin’s brain. He’d known for quite some time that he was falling behind as the rest of the world seemed to be speeding at ninety miles an hour down a one-lane highway into a future where everything was filmed and uploaded for public consumption. But still, why sign up for it?

At the cliff’s edge, Zwart stopped, looking out over the endless stretch of wilderness. He looked to the right and down, bringing into view the lovely waterfall, which had been providing background noise whenever the footage from the body cam was rolling. The wind picked up, tostling the author’s hair and flapping the fabric of his jacket open.

The whole thing had a strange feel to it, the different cameras splicing together an overall picture of the area. It felt produced, and Austin wondered whether he was just becoming cynical or if the show’s director had released the video partially as a promotional tactic.

The drone camera high overhead captured Zwart stepping behind a small group of bushes by the cliff’s edge. For what seemed like eternity, he stood there. The drone footage didn’t have the resolution or clarity of the other cameras, and it wasn’t clear to Austin what he was doing.

Then, suddenly back on the bodycam, Zwart was stumbling forward, slipping, then sliding downward. Just as suddenly, there was a loud thump and the screen flicked to black. The audio fell silent, and the next shot was again from the drone. Now Zwart clung against the sheer cliff of the rockface.

It wasn’t clear from the video, which was shot from considerable distance, if he’d slipped from a rock he’d been gripping or if he’d been clinging to a branch that had snapped. But suddenly he dropped, arms flailing as he vanished below the treeline out of the drone camera’s view.

Then the video went briefly black as a loud, sickening thud echoed through the forest, a sound Austin assumed had been captured by a nearby tree-mounted camera.

The final shot pulled back to show the cliff from a distance, towering above the woods, the treetops obscuring the forest floor. The sound of the falls faded and the caw of a distant bird offered a dark, macabre conclusion. Then, abruptly, the video ended, leaving only the image of the empty wilderness hanging in the viewer’s mind.

The news anchor continued. “Sadly, according to producers and local police, Zwart’s body has not yet been recovered and is believed to have been consumed by black bears in the area, though the search for remains continues.”

Austin glanced at Mrs. McGillicutty.

“It’s so terrible,” she said over and over, the words barely escaping from behind her hand, which covered her mouth.

“Poor guy,” Mr. McGillicutty said.

Austin looked up at Andy. “Can you mute the TV?”

Andy did, then came and sat next to Austin, who had returned to his table. “I remember the last time he was here,” Andy said. “It’s strange. I’ve never had someone very close to me die. Both my parents and grandparents are still alive. I’ve got a few aunts and uncles, too. I guess I’ve been lucky.”

Austin was surprised. “Were you close to him?”

“Not at all,” Andy said. “To be honest, he was the worst tipper we have. Complained about everything. But still, doesn’t mean he deserved to take that fall.” A wave of disgust passed over Andy’s face. “I can’t believe they released that video.”

“I know,” Austin said. “Never miss a chance to promote your show, even if one of your contestants dies.”

Austin ran a hand through his hair and checked the time. He was supposed to pick up a gift for Sy, and he was determined to get it before their wine tasting vacation in Central Washington and Oregon.

“I’ve got to get going,” Austin said, the eerie footage still lingering in his mind. On his way out, he stopped at the table and put a hand on Mrs. McGillicutty’s shoulder. “I’m sorry you had to see that, and I’m sorry you lost one of your favorite authors.”

“He was my favorite author.” She wasn’t crying, but her face still showed shock. “His poor dog. He loved that dog so much!”

“He really did,” Mr. McGillicutty said, nodding at Austin. “Always posted photos of it online, everything.”

Austin patted him on the shoulder and headed for the door.

Run, who had slept through the video, jumped up and sprinted across the room the second she heard Austin push open the door.

She was ready for their next adventure.

CHAPTER FOUR

With Run beside him in the truck, Austin headed out of town.

The gift for Sy was a small statue of Siduri. Although Austin hadn’t finished reading the Epic of Gilgamesh, he’d learned about her from Andy’s stove-side lectures. Apparently, Siduri was often considered the earliest alcohol maker in recorded literature. Austin planned to give Sy the statue to celebrate her new adventures in winemaking.

Searching on eBay and Craigslist, he’d found the statue and ordered it. He wanted to have it and the book packed and ready to give her before starting the trip to the central Washington wine country and the Willamette Valley in Oregon.

Only a few doors down from his store, Austin saw a small crowd gathered outside a house. He realized immediately it was the house of the deceased author, so he pulled to the side of the road and hopped out, watching the scene from across the street.

A man dressed in a snazzy blue suit was coming in and out of the house, carrying small white boxes. Austin was fairly sure he’d never seen the guy before. He looked like a lawyer or celebrity or something, but regardless of who he was, Austin found it odd that he was taking things from the author’s house, given that the man had died only the day before.

Austin crossed the street, greeted a couple of neighbors who were whispering in hushed tones about, and approached the man as he shoved what appeared to be the final white box into his car. “Thomas Austin,” he introduced himself.

The man’s eyes were shifty, but not in a way that made Austin think he was a criminal. He just seemed nervous or out of place somehow.

“Theodore Oliver.” The man shook Austin’s hand quickly as he introduced himself. His grip was weak. Oliver leaned back and eyed Austin with a furrowed brow. “I think I know you. I recognize you. You’re that detective.”

“I am a detective,” Austin said cautiously.

The man smiled. “I spoke with David about you. He told me I should try to sign you.”

“Sign me?” Austin asked.

“For a book deal. He meant I should get you to sign a representation contract. I am, I mean was, I mean am.” He sighed. “I mean, I guess I was David’s literary agent.” He gestured toward the boxes in the car. “I’m here gathering up some of his papers.” He lowered his head and shook it sadly. “I know it must seem crass, so close to David’s death, but, well, I had planned this trip out here already. He wanted me to look over the notes on his upcoming book.”

Austin offered a sad frown. “I’m really sorry about what happened.”

“Thank you. He was like a brother to me, despite the fact that the guy could be a real, well—he wouldn’t mind me saying so—a real bastard. I should say,” Oliver continued, his tone becoming suddenly more positive, “true crime books are hot right now. True crime is always hot. I read a couple of articles about the case you solved in New York. The Nightmare and all that. Your wife. I could secure you a mid-six-figure advance for that story by the end of the week, my friend.”

Oliver smiled as though he’d just offered Austin an ice cream sundae.

“I don’t really know what you mean,” Austin said, “but if you’re talking about me writing a book...” He paused, shaking his head. “That’s never going to happen.”

Oliver glanced up and down the quiet street, gesturing at a couple neighbors. “Pretty happy with the small-town life, then?”

There was a hint of something in his tone that Austin recognized. Dismissiveness, possibly. Or maybe even disdain. There were some New Yorkers—definitely not most, but a good share of them—who felt that if you weren’t in New York City, you were letting life pass you by. That you weren’t part of the culture in a way that mattered.

Austin figured this guy was one of them. “Quite happy,” he said curtly.

“And a three- or four-hundred-thousand-dollar advance for a book that I could have someone ghostwrite for you isn’t appealing?”

Austin made his face hard. “What are you leaving out, though?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Let’s say I have someone ghostwrite a book about Fiona and the case in New York City. About how I fell from the Brooklyn Bridge and should be dead right now. About how—only by the grace of God, or the god of storms—the waves in the river were just right that day so that when I hit the water my legs didn’t shatter immediately. Let’s say I have someone ghost write that book, or even that I write it myself. What then? I think you’re leaving out that I’d have to go on television, talk about it, give interviews, and shed public tears about my wife. Am I wrong?”

“Well, yes. Any publisher would assume you’d want to promote your book.”

“Do I strike you as a guy who wants to go on TV and shed public tears in exchange for money?”

Austin shoved his hands in his pockets. He was done talking to this guy. He just stared at him until Oliver offered a slightly condescending smile and got in his car, probably heading back to the airport.

As Austin got back in his truck to go pick up the statue for Sy, he guessed that Theodore Oliver would not again in his life have occasion to return to Hansville. He’d gotten Zwart’s books and papers, which he would no doubt find a way to turn into loads of money now that his client had passed away. He’d probably be back in New York City in time for late night cocktails.

CHAPTER FIVE

Willamette Valley, Oregon

One week later

“Are you going to have a glass of Pinot Noir with your eggs and toast?” Lucy asked.

Austin chuckled. “I don’t think so. The cabernet last night is going to be my last glass of wine for a bit.”

“It’s been a great trip, but I’ve seen enough wineries to hold me for life.”

“And you didn’t even taste any of the wine…” Austin said, a silent question in the statement.

Lucy just shrugged. “Wasn’t in the mood.”

Jimmy and Sy had headed out that morning for the final tour and tasting of the trip. Lucy and Austin had decided to sleep in and enjoy a leisurely morning at the hotel, which had been fine by Sy and Jimmy, who had hit it off during the trip and now considered each other friends.

Austin had had enough wine to last him for months, but the trip had been exactly what he needed. The journey from Kitsap County to the Walla Walla Valley had been long, but beautiful. As they drove east, the dense evergreens broke just over the mountains giving way to golden fields and rolling hills, the autumn colors splashed across the landscape like a painter’s canvas. The winding roads had been peaceful, and the crisp fall air had set the perfect tone for their venture into Washington’s wine country.

Their first stop had been at a small, family-owned vineyard nestled in the hills. Sy had immediately fallen in love with the rustic charm of the place, and while she enthusiastically sampled various red blends, Austin found himself more entranced by the sweeping views of the valley. At another winery, they were given a private tour, learning about the harvest process as the cool breeze rustled through the grapevines, leaves already starting to turn shades of red and yellow.

By the time they reached the Willamette Valley in Oregon, famous for its pinot noirs, Austin was ready for a change of pace. The drive through the winding roads of the Columbia Gorge had been breathtaking, the river glistening below, steep cliffs on either side. They visited two more wineries, but Austin found himself more interested in the quiet moments—the walks through the vineyards, the smell of fermenting grapes, and the feeling of peace brought by cool autumn afternoons.

As much as Run had enjoyed the trip, by the previous day Austin was beginning to sense that even she was growing bored. Run was more of a beach dog than a forest or vineyard dog, preferring the feel of sand between her paws over the crunch of leaves and twigs. At the beach, she’d sprint along the shoreline, barking at the waves and chasing seagulls or tennis balls with boundless energy. But here, in the vineyards and forests, she seemed a little out of place—less interested in the towering trees and more curious about the stray bits of food they’d drop during picnics.

Every now and then, she’d give Austin a sideways glance, as if to ask, When are we getting back to the beach? He’d walked her that morning and promised to bring her back a snack before she’d fallen asleep in the hotel room.

“You ready to get back to work?” Austin asked.

“This has been a fun hiatus,” Lucy said, “but yes.”

Lucy and Jimmy had traveled out separately, meeting Sy and Austin for the final two days of the trip. Lucy had a meeting of detectives from around the region in Portland the following day, and had left Kendall in charge of the office. “I do wish I was going back to Kitsap,” Lucy said. “An all-day meeting of detectives actually doesn’t sound like much fun. Bad coffee, stale pastries, and congratulatory back-slapping. That’s not my idea of a good time.”

“Mine either,” Austin agreed.

Lucy’s phone vibrated on the table next to her coffee cup and she studied the number for a long time before answering. “Don’t know who this is, but I’m not one to shy away from a game of cell-phone roulette,” she said, picking up the phone. “Hello? Yeah, yeah… Sure, I heard about it… My mother called me right away when she heard. She’s a big fan. I borrowed a copy of the first book in his most popular series, but I couldn’t crack the spine after reading the blurb on the back cover.”

Austin hadn’t been trying to eavesdrop, but the mention of the deceased author caught his attention. Over the last few days, he’d gotten a few calls from reporters about David Zwart and had politely declined to make any comments. After a couple days of positive stories about how much he’d be missed, Austin’s sense was that the press was looking for people to badmouth the guy publicly, which would be sure to get them some clicks or shares on social media.

Sure, no one he’d spoken with was especially fond of the guy, but Austin didn’t need to say that in the press. After all, he’d learned that you shouldn’t pour salt on a man’s grave. Or was that just wounds? He did know that you shouldn’t photograph a man’s grave. Austin considered that both might disturb the dead man’s eternal rest and he didn’t want to rob anyone, living or dead, of their peace.

“So, it was definitely an accident?” Lucy asked. “I mean, that’s how the footage looked, but…”

She cocked her head in a way Austin recognized—questioningly.

Next Lucy listened for a long time, then held her hand over the microphone on her phone. “You busy?” she mouthed to Austin.

He nodded at the newspaper on the table to indicate his plan to read for the morning. “Sy and Jimmy are gone ‘til after lunch.”

“You want to take a ride?”

Austin smiled. As much as he hated to admit it, he enjoyed work more than vacations. He was having a great time with Sy, but three days away from the job was enough.

Lucy took her hand off of the microphone. “I can do you better than a Zoom call, Sheriff Barker. As it happens, we’re in Oregon. Not that far from Mill City… That’s right… that’s right. Thomas Austin, yes, we’ll be there in…” Lucy held out her phone and typed an address into the maps app. “Give us an hour.”

CHAPTER SIX

Mill City, Oregon

After giving Run a quick walk around Mill City and leaving her at the front desk with Sarah, the office’s receptionist, Austin and Lucy took the first door on the right into the sheriff’s office.

Lucy introduced the sheriff as Jack Barker. Though she’d never met him, they had talked a few times regarding cases that happened to cross state lines. In most cases, the FBI had taken them over, so they never actually worked together.

The office was small, but Austin didn’t mind close quarters. It was clean and tidy and reminded him of a couple of small-town sheriff’s offices he’d visited while working cases in upstate New York during his time with the NYPD.

Barker was a weathered man in his early sixties, with deep-set eyes and a warm brown tone to his skin. On his forearm he had an intricately detailed tattoo of a ship’s wheel wrapped in ivy. Austin figured this was a nod to a career as a merchant marine before entering law enforcement.

As Sheriff Barker summarized the situation, he spoke confidently, like a man who knew what he was doing in the job, even if he didn’t always enjoy it. There was a calmness about him that Austin appreciated. No need for raised voices or harsh words; his presence alone commanded respect.

As Barker told it, some of the wilderness areas in the region had been ravaged by fires in the last few years, and the state had made a deal to allow filming of the show in exchange for a good chunk of money—money they planned to use to restore some of the forested areas that had been devastated. It was a compromise many people in the community had been upset about, but Austin could understand.

David Dierdrick Zwart had been filming for a few days when the accident occurred.

“I’m sure you’ve seen the footage,” Barker continued. “The fall took place around nine in the morning, but the footage wasn’t reviewed until the end of the day.”

“Nobody noticed ‘til then?” Lucy asked.

“The drones are all run by AI, trained to follow human movement. The body cam and tree cam footage just gets sent to hard drives and their video editors and producers review it at the end of the day. They really are alone in the forest.”

“And after the fall,” Austin said. “Bears?”

Barker grimaced. “Black bears are abundant in the area, and very curious. They had ravaged his corpse before anyone even knew he had fallen. By the time the rescue team found him, there was nothing left but his broken camera, a shoe, some tiny bone fragments, a tooth, and some clothing scraps. I’ve seen two other deaths by bears and, well, it’s never a pleasant experience. They can clean things up pretty good.” His face looked pained, “We’ve got park rangers looking for more. Both throughout the park and in the bears’... well, there’s no polite way to say this… their excrement.” Barker continued to explain that he had seen hours of the relevant footage, including some that hadn’t been released publicly, and had ruled the death an accident. Though it was unclear why he was at the edge of the cliff, it didn’t appear as though he had jumped, or that he’d been pushed. And though it was possible someone had drugged him or coerced him to go up there, there was simply no evidence of that.

“So why get involved further? Why call us?” Lucy asked.

Barker sighed. “Got an anonymous call saying there was something more going on. That maybe it wasn’t an accident.”

“That’s it?” Lucy asked.

“One call, I might’ve ignored. Then I got another. Things are slow around here and, well, I’m no big fan of Hollywood reality shows. I figured I ought to make sure.”

“And you called Lucy because he lived in our county?” Austin asked.

He nodded.

“So how sure are you that it was an accident?” Austin pressed. “Is there any evidence to the contrary?”

“I was 100 percent sure until I got that call. I’m still 98 percent sure. But with the media scrutiny on this one, I need to get back to 100 percent.” He cocked his head. “Did you know him?”

“Not really, though he was my neighbor. Seemed to have some enemies. Not blood rivals or anything, just rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. I met his literary agent as he was clearing out some of his manuscripts from the author’s house the other day. The agent was…” Austin shook his head. He wanted to call him something less than flattering, but he held his tongue. “Not what I would call a fine fellow. But hey, I don’t know the book business.”

“What about the author, though?” Barker asked.

“Bad tipper. He seemed to piss off most of the readers he met in person, despite the fact that they loved his books. He was also going through a bitter divorce, from what I’ve heard. I don’t know. It’s not that I want to see murder where there’s an accident. And when a body gets eaten by bears, that means there’s no way to test it for drugs, or dehydration, or health issues. Hell, he could have survived the fall and been murdered later that day. We really don’t know for certain and⁠—”

“And he’s bored from too many wine tastings,” Lucy interjected. “Needs a case to work.”

Barker smiled. “I hear that, but I think you’re reaching.”

“You called us,” Lucy pointed out.

“I know,” Barker said, glancing at his watch. “I do have one more thing to follow up on before I put this thing to bed for good. A couple high school kids cut school that day and were seen around the woods. One of my officers is going to bring them out to the scene, see if we can scare them into talking. I don’t think they have anything, but it’s worth a shot. You want to ride along?”

Austin glanced at Lucy. “We’ve got a little time, right?”

Lucy smiled. One of the things they shared in common was an excitement over the next case. “We do, and maybe we’ll get lucky. This thing turns into a case and I’ll have an excuse to skip the meeting in Portland.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Sheriff Barker pulled into the parking area at the Opal Creek Wilderness trailhead, gravel crunching beneath the tires as he slowed and parked.

As Austin stepped out, he breathed in the cool air and took in the towering evergreens surrounding them, which seemed to reach for the low-hanging clouds above. He’d enjoyed sipping Cabernet blends in opulent wineries, but he enjoyed this more.

They wandered a few hundred yards into the woods, following a narrow trail that wound between the moss-covered trees and thick ferns, the sound of a nearby stream faintly audible in the distance.

Waiting for them on the trail was Officer Suzanne Green, a woman in her mid-fifties with a warm, round face and a no-nonsense demeanor.

Beside her stood three teenagers, whom she introduced as Henry, Grayson, and Chloe.

Chloe, much smaller and apparently a couple years younger than the boys, peeked out from behind them, glancing at Austin and Lucy but noticeably avoiding eye contact with Sheriff Barker.

“Hi Chloe, good to see you,” Barker said. “How’s your dad?”

“Fine, thanks,” Chloe said, almost in a whisper, still not looking at him.

The fact that they knew each other wasn’t uncommon in such a small town. Part of a sheriff’s job was to know the people in the town they served, after all. But there was a slight tension in the air—something unspoken that made Austin wonder if there was a story between Sheriff Barker and Chloe’s family.

Henry scowled impatiently. “I can’t believe you’re making us miss calculus class for this.”

Sheriff Barker smiled. “First high schooler I’ve ever heard complain about missing school.”

“Bro, you’re failing calculus anyway,” Grayson said, laughing. Tall and lanky, he seemed to be the jokester of the group. “You wouldn’t pass that class if Einstein’s ghost showed up to take the exams for you.”

Chloe, who wore old faded jeans and a green hoodie, stood with her arms folded, scowling slightly. But Austin thought it was more of an embarrassed look than an angry look. He’d never been a fourteen year old girl, but he’d been a detective long enough to know that the workings of a young lady’s mind were often very different than his own.

Barker folded his arms, made his voice a little more stern. “Let me see here… On the day of the accident, you three cut school to smoke weed and hunt for Sasquatch. Do I have that right?”

Henry nodded cautiously. “We never actually smoked anything. I swear.”

Officer Green chimed in. “I’ve confirmed with the school that they were absent. I haven’t spoken with their parents yet but⁠—”

“Please don’t speak with our parents,” Henry interrupted.

“Yeah, please,” Grayson added.

Even Chloe, whose expression hadn’t changed, looked up at Austin imploringly, as though he had the power to keep this secret.

“Whether we tell your parents will depend on how the next five minutes goes,” Sheriff Barker said. “Tell me absolutely everything you did and everything you saw and heard that day.” He held up a finger before Henry could speak. “And before you begin, think about what you say—really think. We’re a small town without many resources, but I’m pretty good at my job. If you lie, if you leave stuff out, you know I will find out. Understood?”

All three of them nodded. The gravity of the situation was starting to sink in.

“We were going to smoke, but Chloe wouldn’t let us because she didn’t want to scare away the birds,” Henry began, shifting nervously from foot to foot. “I’m not going to lie. We don’t drink, and we never drive until it’s worn off. But yeah, we were gonna smoke, but we were just hanging out and talking about Sasquatch and Superman and just kind of wandering through the woods, hoping to find the Holy Grail, you know?”

“We just needed a day away from school,” Grayson added.

“Have you seen the video of the author who fell from Crystal Falls?” Barker asked.

They all nodded yes.

“And none of you saw him?”

They all shook their heads no.

“None of you heard anything?” Barker asked. “Or saw anyone suspicious?”

Again they shook their heads, indicating that they hadn’t.

For the next ten minutes, Barker and the teens went round and round. The kids offered all sorts of incriminating details about themselves—skipping school, stealing marijuana from Henry’s dad, Henry even admitted to plagiarizing a history essay—but they genuinely didn’t seem to know anything about the author’s fall.

One piece of information that did add to the case, however, was that they had seen a bear in the area right around the time the author had died.

“We also heard sirens,” Grayson added, “just before we left.”

To Austin, this didn’t add up. “Why would there have been sirens if the fall wasn’t discovered until the footage was reviewed later that night?”

“Coincidence,” Barker said. “Hiker fell about a mile that way…” He pointed through the forest. “Wife called an ambulance. Just a twisted ankle, only bad enough so the guy couldn’t make it out of the woods hiking on it. Happens all the time. People call ambulances out here for lots of reasons—they don’t realize how far they’ve hiked, how dangerous it is, or they get hurt on the trail and need help. One guy actually called 911 to report a bear stole his lunch and thought the parks department ought to reimburse him for it.”

“I bet it was Sasquatch,” Grayson said excitedly. “Was it chicken salad? I read once that’s their favorite.”

“I didn’t ask. I reminded him of the bear safety acronym that we post throughout bear country. You kids know it, right?”

“B.E.A.R.S,” Grayson and Henry said in unison. Chloe didn’t join in.

Austin noticed that Chloe had consistently stayed quiet, agreeing when necessary but mostly not adding anything to the conversation. He wasn’t sure why, but something in him wanted to pull her aside. When they hit a lull in the questioning, he nodded down the path and said, “Can we chat one-on-one for a moment?”

Chloe nodded and Austin then looked up at Barker, who nodded his approval.

Heading a dozen yards down the trail with Chloe, the sound of the others faded, replaced by the quiet whisper of the wind through the trees.

“How’s the hunt for Bigfoot going?” Austin asked as they took a slight bend in the trail. “Have you ever found any evidence?”

Chloe stepped onto a large root protruding from the ground, standing up on her tiptoes, becoming almost as tall as Austin for a moment. She glanced at him as she let herself fall forward from the root.

“Ha. Ha. Ha,” she said dryly. “And before you say anything else, no, I don’t think we’re going to find Bigfoot out here. I come for the birds. Grayson and Henry, but especially Grayson—I guess they really think Bigfoot is out here. They are big into conspiracies. They like to ‘do their own research’ on YouTube and stuff. For about a week, Grayson thought the Earth was flat. Henry believed for a full month that we had faked the moon landing to cover up the fact that Russia had bombed Washington, D.C. in 1968, or something like that.” She smiled at the ground as she shoved her hands into her oversized jeans. “I don’t know.”

“You seem a little more skeptical,” Austin said, happy that she had suddenly become more talkative. “I can relate to that.”

She stopped and turned. “You’re a detective, right? Isn’t that kind of, like, your job?”

“That’s one part of my job,” Austin said, smiling.

He liked this girl. She was obviously smart, and he couldn’t tell why she was hanging around with the two stoner kids. “I’m going to go out on a limb here,” he said. “My sense is that you had something to say, but perhaps you didn’t want to say it in front of Sheriff Barker. Or maybe in front of the boys.”

Austin let his half-question hang in the air as he followed her down the trail.

Chloe tugged gently on a strand of brown hair behind her ear. She had a short pixie haircut that looked almost like she’d done it herself because of the seemingly random unevenness on one side. But, Austin thought, maybe that was the style these days. He wasn’t exactly keeping up with the trends.

“He’s on a bowling team with my dad,” she said, not turning around.

The way she said the word dad told Austin two things. First, she wasn’t especially fond of him, and second, there was more to the story that she didn’t want to share.

They walked in silence for a minute, finally stopping in a clearing. The light shifted, casting a soft glow on Chloe’s cheek. Austin’s eyes, trained to notice subtle details, caught a faint discoloration—barely visible, a shadow of a bruise fading along her cheekbone. It wasn’t fresh, likely a week old, judging by the pale yellow hue that remained. It could have been from anything—a fall, a knock during some roughhousing—but the placement and its almost hidden nature made Austin suspect more. He didn’t say anything, but the thought lingered.

“I know you didn’t see anything,” Austin said, “but you did watch the video, correct?”

“Everybody watched it. Not much news hits out here. The fact that some semi-famous author died in our woods was a big deal. I probably spent half of last week watching that on various people’s phones.” Austin detected a slight cynicism in her voice.

“Did you tell people that you were out in the woods at roughly the same time?”

She continued walking, shaking her head. “No, but people knew we’d skipped that day. Word gets around. How do you think Barker heard about us missing school?”

“But your school friends didn’t know where you were?”

She shook her head again.

“And the video, did it line up with the things you saw? I mean—the color of the sky, the sounds, the light on the trees? You were the only ones known to actually be in the area around the time, and I think you can understand, from my perspective, the video is very convincing. But it’s easier than ever to fake videos these days.”

“AI and all that?” she asked, stopping and finally looking at him. “I don’t understand how any of that works, but I know we can’t trust what we see the way we could two years ago.” Chloe perked up suddenly, listening. “Did you hear that?”

Austin’s senses went on high alert as he listened for a break in the silence. Far away, he heard the distinct kee-eeeee-arr of an unseen bird.

Chloe’s eyes lit up. “That’s a red-tailed hawk!” she said. “You can tell by the raspy, high-pitched scream. Most people confuse it with an eagle’s call, but they’re way more common around here. They soar in big circles, looking for prey. It’s incredible how they ride the thermals. They hardly have to flap their wings.”

“That’s cool that you know so much about birds,” Austin said.

“And you seem pretty cool for a cop.”

Austin smiled but didn’t say anything.

“There was one thing about the video,” Chloe added, her tone more serious now. “Something that didn’t line up.”

Austin felt a bright citrus sparkle in his mouth. Little bubbles of excitement—like a velvety lemon-lime soda—but he played it cool on the outside. “What was that?” he asked casually.

“Please don’t tell Sheriff Barker I’m telling you this.”

“You know I can’t promise that,” Austin said. “If you saw something, I will do everything I can to protect you, but I can’t lie to him. And anyway, I wasn’t in the state. There’s no way I can conceal who’s giving me the information.”

“Make him promise not to tell my dad, then. I’d prefer not to deal with him knowing anything about me.”

“The bruise on your cheek,” Austin asked, “did your dad give you that?”

He expected Chloe to look away. Teenagers who were abused often tried to cover for their abusers, not knowing they had help out there. But she held Austin’s gaze for a long time, making it clear she didn’t want to talk about it.

“What bruise?” she asked.

Austin sighed. “I can help you if you want. If you’ll let me.” He slipped her a business card with his cell phone number on it, but he wasn’t going to press it. “Tell me what you were going to tell me, and I will make Sheriff Barker promise me—before I tell him anything—to protect you from your dad. Or anyone else. Do we have a deal?”

Chloe nodded. She looked up at the trees for a moment, then said, “On the video, I heard a bird call. It was a common loon. It’s at the spot before he falls, like when he’s a few feet from the edge. The call is kind of haunting, a rising wail, like a wolf’s howl almost. But the thing is, loons don’t migrate through here in the fall.”

Austin tilted his head. “What’s that mean?”

“No bird that sounds like that flies within five hundred miles of Oregon this time of year,” she said. “I don’t know how that bird call got on the footage, but it wasn’t recorded around here.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Sy held up a glass, the straw-colored liquid glimmering against the candlelight. “To a great trip,” she said, “and good friends.”

“Why not great friends and a good trip?” Jimmy asked playfully.

“Quiet, you fool,” Lucy said. “Let her finish the toast.”

Austin knew not to take their insults seriously. He’d been watching them banter for a few years now, and it was just the way they communicated. He raised his glass and clinked with Sy, then Jimmy, then Lucy, who was drinking lemonade.

“Thanks for organizing it,” Austin said. “And sorry Lucy and I bailed today.”

“No worries,” Sy said. “Jimmy and I had a great time. Plus, I got to have a second glass of wine because Jimmy was the designated driver.”

After returning from the Opal Creek Wilderness, Austin had filled Sheriff Barker in on what he’d learned from Chloe and made him promise not to tell her dad. They’d also run through the footage and confirmed that the bird call had been in the spot Chloe had mentioned, but none of them knew enough to know if she was right about the type of bird making the sound.

They were scheduled to leave in the morning, Sy, Austin, and Jimmy back to Kitsap and Lucy to Portland. But the plan was about to change.

He took a sip of the Chardonnay and set his glass on the table. “Sy,” he said, “do you mind getting a ride back tomorrow with Jimmy?” He glanced at Lucy. “Sheriff Barker—he’s the guy we went to see today—asked us to stick around and help out. David Dierdrick Zwart was a Kitsap County resident, so even though this isn’t our case, he wants to deputize us temporarily. They don’t have much of an investigative staff out here, as small as this county is.”

Temporary deputization meant that he and Lucy would be granted the authority to assist in the investigation as if they were deputies of the local sheriff’s office. Sheriff Barker had explained that this was a legal way to use their expertise in the case. The process was straightforward, involving a quick briefing on the specific powers they would be granted and an agreement to follow the local protocols.

Sy frowned briefly, but then cracked a smile. “You two just can’t help it, can you?”

Jimmy laughed.

“What’s the joke?” Lucy asked.

“We were talking about it today,” Sy said. “You two are actually a lot alike, and Jimmy and I are alike in some ways as well.”

“You’re a meathead too?” Lucy asked.

Sy frowned.

Jimmy tore off a piece of a dinner roll and tossed it at Lucy’s head. Lucy glanced around the restaurant, embarrassed, after it sailed past her and landed on the floor. This place was far too fancy to be throwing dinner rolls around.

“No,” Sy said, “I mean you two are addicted to the job and probably will be for life. I used to think I was. But it turned out I was happy to retire at my first opportunity, and now I taste wine for a living. Well, for free, but eventually I hope it’ll turn into a living.” She looked at Austin. “Absolutely, you should stay. I’ll take Run back to the beach where she belongs. Besides, it will be nice to take a couple of days alone to write up all my tasting notes from the trip.”

“For your degree?” Austin asked.

She nodded. “Can’t believe I have homework again.”

In addition to interning at a winery, Sy was studying for a degree in wine that Austin didn’t fully understand, but it seemed to make her happy, which made him happy. And just because he was addicted to investigating crimes didn’t mean everyone had to be. In fact, he thought that if she were doing what he did, the relationship would be a lot tougher. It helped to have one person leading a more normal life.

“Thanks,” he said. “I appreciate it.”

The mention of Run had reminded Austin of a promise he’d made when leaving her in the room. For dinner he’d ordered a delicious chicken pot pie with wild mushrooms, peas, carrots, and fresh herbs. Digging through the dish with a fork, he retrieved a couple shreds of chicken, wrapped them in a napkin, and shoved them into the inside pocket of his blazer. Another gesture that was probably too tacky for such a nice restaurant, but he couldn’t help himself.

“What about the meeting you’re supposed to go to?” Jimmy asked Lucy.

“At least I have a good excuse to skip it,” Lucy said. “We learned some things about the case today that reopened it as a possible murder. Tomorrow we’re going to meet quite a few suspects. Sheriff Barker lined it up.”

Sy held up her phone. “Is the wife on that list?” she asked.

Sy had been staring at it for the last few seconds, and Austin tried to read the headline it displayed, but she pulled it back before he could. “I couldn’t help myself,” she continued. “I’ve been reading about the author. Have you seen what his wife has been saying about him in the press?”

“I thought he was divorced,” Austin said.

“Almost divorced,” Sy corrected. “This is from a Kitsap Sun article that ran yesterday. You would think that a grieving wife might decline to comment.” She cleared her throat. “She did not decline to comment.”

Then she read aloud, making her voice purposefully grating: “‘My husband was once a fine author. I supported him for ten years as he honed his skills and broke into the literary business. At one time he was driven and committed to his craft, but the second he had success, he changed. He was always arrogant and aloof, but he became a real bastard once he achieved small town celebrity.’”

“Holy crap,” Lucy said. “She said that, after he died?”

Sy nodded. “Wait. It gets worse. ‘I wouldn’t wish death on anyone, but after he began cheating on me and I filed for divorce, he set out to ruin my life. One example—and this isn’t even the worst thing he did—he fought me for a year over who would take ownership of our beloved Cocker Spaniel, Misty, a dog he publicly pretended to love. Finally, out of exhaustion and because I couldn’t afford to pay the lawyers anymore, I signed over custody of Misty as one of the final pieces of our divorce agreement, which we’d both agreed to sign in a couple weeks. He took my dog that night. The next day he dropped off Misty at the Humane Society. Abandoned her, just like that. He hadn’t fought to keep her because he loved her, he’d fought to take her from me, out of spite. And then he left her.’” Sy paused for a moment, then added, “It gets worse from there.”

Austin said, “Do you think he really did that? Fought his wife for custody of the dog, then gave it away? That’s…”

“Something only a true bastard would do,” Jimmy said.

“I’m not saying she would be justified in murdering him over that,” Sy said, setting her phone on the table, “but it sounds like a motive. After all, women love their dogs. Often more than they love their husbands.”

CHAPTER NINE

The next morning, Jimmy drove Sy and Run from the hotel at seven in the morning and Lucy hopped in Austin’s truck.

A mist hung low over the vineyards as Austin and Lucy set off from the Willamette Valley. The sun had barely begun to rise, casting a golden hue over the hills, and the autumn air carried the scent of damp earth and fallen leaves. As they drove toward Marion County, rows of vines gave way to forests of evergreens and the quiet, early morning stillness made the drive almost peaceful, despite the potential turmoil ahead of them. And it wasn’t just the author. Austin hadn’t been able to forget the bruise on Chloe’s cheek, though he hadn’t yet figured out what to do about it.

Overnight, Sheriff Barker had confirmed with a local expert that Chloe was likely right about the bird call discrepancy she’d heard on the video. However, he didn’t think it necessarily meant anything nefarious was going on. After all, it was possible the bird had simply gotten lost. Bird migration patterns weren’t set in stone, after all, and a defiant bird might well have simply chosen a different path. Furthermore, television shows used stock sounds all the time. It was entirely possible that a stock bird sound had been inserted into the footage by accident. So, while Barker was ready to take the next step in the investigation and begin questioning potential witnesses and suspects, he remained skeptical that they were truly dealing with a murder.

The first interview had been scheduled to start at nine, but it seemed to be in full swing when they arrived at 8:45. Gunner Thompson, a bulky man whose arms were deeply tanned and covered in tattoos, sat behind a folding table that looked much too small for him. Veins popped on his bald head like live wires as Sheriff Barker conducted the interview, pausing just long enough to wave at Lucy and Austin.

“So,” Barker asked, “you’re the liver supplement king of YouTube? And a contestant on the show?”

After the author’s death, the show had announced a temporary production pause, but had resumed filming three days later and was now back in full swing.

Thompson—his eyes wide like he’d just downed three energy drinks, or possibly something stronger—nodded enthusiastically. “I am. And I’m going to win the show. I can’t believe they let me leave the set, I mean the forest, for this little chat. I can’t eat or receive any help, by the way. Otherwise I’m disqualified.”

“I heard you had some beef with the deceased,” Barker said.

“Everyone had beef with that guy,” Thompson said, shrugging. “Total jerk, but I wasn’t gonna let him ruin my vibes, right? I’m all about dominant positivity.”

And hawking snake-oil supplements online, Austin thought, but he stayed quiet.

“What about this?” Barker pressed a button on a remote control, then another. A small television on the wall lit up and a video began to play.

Sheriff Barker paused the video and gestured to Austin and Lucy, who had been standing in the doorway. “Come on in and shut the door,” he said. “Mr. Thompson, these are Detectives Thomas Austin and Lucy O’Rourke. They’re helping me out in this investigation.”

Thompson nodded but didn’t say anything. He seemed like the kind of guy who was so uniformly focused on himself, he barely even registered the presence of others.

“This video,” Sheriff Barker continued, “is from the day before filming started on the show.”

Thompson was about to say something, but Barker held up a hand. “Let’s just watch it.”

The video flickered to life, showing Zwart and Gunner Thompson sitting on two large rocks, the rugged backdrop of the wilderness framing them. Thompson wore a white tank top and Zwart the same black outfit he’d been wearing when he fell.

Even from the grainy footage, the tension between them was palpable.

Zwart was the first to speak, his voice dripping with disdain. “Look, Gunner, I don’t care how many reps you can do or how many supplements you sell. This show isn’t about who can lift the most weights. It’s about survival. Real blood and guts survival.”

Thompson smirked at the author, flexing his massive biceps as if to underscore his point. “Survival? You mean like writing another book that no one reads? Face it, man, you’re washed up. This show is my ticket to a bigger platform. I’m the one people are gonna be talking about after this airs. Not you.”

Zwart shook his head, his jaw tight. “Oh, please. This is about who can last out here, not just physically—mentally, too. Brawn isn’t the only thing on display for the viewers at home, brains happen to be an equally crucial determinant of survival on this show. And last I checked, Gunner, part of your brand is being dumber than a sack of rusty hammers. You aren’t going to be able to bench press your way out of the ravaging effects of social isolation, a sport in which I am at optimal fitness to dominate.”

If these two were playing the game of Most Unlikable Contestant, Austin thought they were tied at halftime.

Thompson’s eyes flared, his voice dropping and becoming slightly menacing. “Brains? You’ve gotta be kidding me. You think the viewers care about your philosophical literary musings when you’re freezing your ass off out here? Ohhhhhhhhh, look at me, I can put a Moby Dick reference in my mystery novel. I’m the next Shakespearre.”

“Wait, you read one of my books?” Zwart seemed genuinely surprised, and pleased.

“It sucked.”

Zwart cleared his throat. “Anyway, my brains will beat your brawn in the wild, just you wait.”

Thompson slowed his voice as though speaking with a toddler. “No. One. Cares. This is about total package dominance. And I dominate everything I do. Viewers want to see me take control, not watch a fat white whale scribbling notes in their little book.”

Zwart laughed, but there was no humor in it. “Dominance? You’re nothing but a walking infomercial for protein powder. If you think for a second that this show is going to make you a national star, you’re in for a rude awakening. Meanwhile, I already am one. You’re just another musclehead marketing a fad. I’m poised to leave a legacy of ideas. The only thing you’ve left anyone is constipated.”

The video paused just as Thompson leaned forward, his eyes locked on Zwart with barely contained fury.

Sheriff Barker turned back to Thompson. “Care to explain this little exchange?”

Thompson smiled. “You know how these reality shows go. They don’t exactly tell us to get in fights with each other, but we all know that if we want to be featured on the final cut, the more conflict the better. It’s what sells. It wasn’t an accident that they put my cabin next to his during pre-production. Brains versus brawn is one of the oldest stories in the book.”

About this, Thompson was right. Austin still hadn’t finished reading the Epic of Gilgamesh, but, according to Andy, wisdom versus strength—a precursor to brains versus brawn—was a major theme by the end.

“You’re saying the conflict was fake?” Barker asked.

Thompson seemed to consider this as he tugged at a few stray whiskers on his chin. “What’s real and what’s fake in Hollywood?” he asked, as though posing a deep philosophical question.

Sheriff Barker questioned the muscled reality contestant for another fifteen minutes, getting nowhere. He finally excused himself and led Austin and Lucy out into the hallway.

“What do you think?” Barker asked, looking at Lucy.

“Guy reminds me a little bit of my beloved husband,” Lucy said. “Full of muscle and bravado, but actually a little teddy bear inside.”

“Must be deep inside,” Barker said, “because I’m not getting that. What about you, Austin?”

“I’m not sure,” Austin said. “I wouldn’t say teddy bear, but he doesn’t strike me as a cold-blooded killer either, though he obviously has the strength to push a man off a cliff from behind some bushes. Speaking of that, in your review of the footage, did any evidence emerge that anyone else was up on that cliff?”

Barker shook his head. “Nothing yet, but we’re talking about hundreds of hours of footage. Producer I spoke with said no one else was up there as far as he knows.”

Austin considered this. “I’m still wondering about that bird call.”

Barker shook his head. “We’ve got the producer and director of the show coming in soon, and maybe they can speak to that. But, for now, next room over, Justin Jones. Local environmental activist. Known him for years. Multiple arrests. He made threats against various people involved in the show before they even started filming.” He looked at Austin. “You did a good job with Chloe. Wondering if you’ll take the lead on this one. I have a history with this guy, too, so he’s not going to open up to me. Honestly, I’d throw his ass in jail again if I could.”

“What’s he got in his jacket?” Lucy asked.

“Couple bar fights. Harassment a few years back when they built the new strip mall outside of town. Nothing violent that didn’t stem from an argument and too many shots of Fireball, but I’ve suspected him of a few other things.”

Austin gestured toward the door. “In there?”

Barker nodded.

“And where do you want me?” Lucy asked.

“Take your pick,” Barker said. “Behind door number one we have the muscle supplement salesman. Door number two leads you into the arms of a semi-violent activist, who doubles as the town drunk. Either door leads to a lovely way to spend your morning.”

“I’d love you in here with me,” Austin said, gesturing toward door number two. “Another set of eyes and ears and all that.”

“Oooh, I just love the smell of Fireball in the morning,” Lucy said.

“Not interested in learning more about Gunner’s supplement line?” Austin asked.

“No, and not only because I gained ten pounds adhering to the last fad supplement diet I tried.” Lucy took a deep breath and smiled. “Lucy O’Lovehandles, I believe Jimmy called me that month, until I made him sleep on the couch for a week. It makes sense for me to go in there with you. I like to see how perps respond to a female detective. Often they don’t care, but sometimes they want to kill mommy or they want to tell her everything. In either case, we get useful information.”

Austin nodded and led Lucy into the small interrogation room.

Justin Jones was large, like Gunner Thompson, but nowhere near as muscled. Sitting slumped in the chair, his long black ponytail hung down his back, greasy and unkempt. He looked to be around forty years old, with deep bags under his eyes and a sallow face, the telltale signs of too many nights spent at the bar. A few of his teeth were missing, and his messy beard did little to cover the unhealthy pallor of his skin. He wore faded jeans and a jean jacket over a dirty t-shirt, all of it rumpled and stained.

Despite his rough appearance, it was the intensity in his eyes that made him look kind of scary—like someone who’d spent much of his life with blood alcohol levels that needed to be held in a narrow therapeutic window to sustain life.

Bottom line, he was someone you wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley.

CHAPTER TEN

Austin introduced himself, then Lucy, and was about to ask a soft opening question when Jones spoke in a strange voice that sounded both hoarse and wet at the same time. “Now, I believe I’ve been arrested by every single officer in the county, and yet I’ve never seen you two.” Jones spoke with a refinement that surprised Austin because it didn’t match his gruff demeanor. He had learned never to judge a book by its cover, but that wasn’t always easily put into practice.

“We’re out of towners, here helping out on this case,” Austin said. “We know that you’ve heard about the death of the author.”

“He was from Kitsap County,” Lucy said warmly, “where we live, up in Washington State.”

“I should say right off the bat,” Austin added, “you aren’t a suspect, but thank you for being willing to be questioned. You’re well known in the area, and we thought you might have seen something or heard something that could help us out.”

“Wait, wait, wait, I’m not a suspect?” Jones was almost laughing. “I’m always a suspect when something happens in Mill City or anywhere within fifty miles. But are you even investigating a crime here? Everyone understands it was an accident. Dude fell, we all saw the video. Nobody pushed the guy even if he deserved to fall to his doom. I told those Hollywood chumps this is sacred land—to stay away. Nobody killed that guy, but karma is karma, right?”

“So, you had a beef with the whole production?” Lucy asked. She folded her arms. “Tell us more.”

“No point in hiding it. I protested the show legally before the county took the blood money from those Hollywood bastards.”

“Blood money?” Austin asked. “I heard they used a significant portion of the money raised from the show to help restore the forest and the wilderness.”

“They say they’re going to do that, but who knows? Meanwhile, they’re bolting cameras to ancient trees, scaring away the animals. Plus, fires are a natural part of the forest cycle. The strongest trees have been here for hundreds of years and will remain. New ones will come.”

“Be that as it may,” Austin said, “you did make threats, didn’t you?”

Jones set his beefy, tattooed hands on the table. “I thought you said I wasn’t a suspect.”

“Just wondering why,” Austin replied. Truth was, at the beginning of an investigation, everyone was a suspect until proven otherwise. But telling people they weren’t was a way to get them comfortable, to get them talking.

“I was drunk. I’m sure I did leave a few phone messages I shouldn’t have.”

“What did you say in those messages?” Lucy asked.

“I was too drunk to remember,” Jones said, smiling. “In vino veritas.” He put his hands behind his head.

“What?” Austin asked.

“Something about wine, I’m thinking,” Lucy said. “Vino?”

“Is that an Italian saying or something?” Austin asked.

“It’s Latin. The Romans knew a thing or two about the effects of alcohol—it’s a quote from their encyclopedia.” He held a finger to the sky for emphasis. “In wine there is truth.”

Austin smiled slightly, then added, “Fill your belly with wine. When you’re drunk, the world is yours.” He paused.

Jones chuckled, leaning back in his chair. “I like this game. Who said that quote?”

“Ooh!” Lucy exclaimed. “That alemaid from the Epic of Gilgamesh, right?”

“I was paraphrasing, but yeah.” Austin was confused. “How did you…”

“Jimmy told me about the gift you got for Sy,” Lucy interrupted. “This guys a real charmer.” She pointed her thumb at Austin.

Jones nodded. “Seems like that alemaid had things figured out, too. Anyway, look, I had nothing to do with that waste-of-paper author falling off the cliff and I don’t know of anyone who might have.”

“Like I said,” Austin continued, “you’re not a suspect. We both know you’re not a stupid man. You wouldn’t make a bunch of threatening calls and then kill someone.”

“You’re right about that.” Jones softened his tone slightly. “But what makes you think he was killed? I mean, we all saw the video—he fell.”

Lucy stepped in. “We are investigating this just in case. Perhaps he was drugged. Perhaps⁠—”

“No offense to the deceased,” Jones said, “but maybe he was racked with guilt over the fact that they were willing to trample our precious wilderness to make a stupid television show, and he took his own life.”

“We’re investigating that as well,” Lucy said curtly.

“Did you see anyone strange in the area over the last couple of weeks?” Austin asked. “Specifically, around seven to nine days ago?”

“All the idiots on the show have been around,” Jones said. “I’ve been drinking at BeBe’s since I was fifteen years old. This is the first time a bunch of a-holes from L.A. have shown up. I overheard two of them talking about how they loved their little sojourn into ‘real America,’ but they couldn’t wait to get back to their Pilates classes in La La Land.”

Austin thought for a moment that the giant man was about to spit on the table, but he didn’t.

He just sat there smiling and shaking his head. “You know,” Jones continued, surprising Austin with his sudden shift in tone, “here’s another old saying: The man who is not at home in his own company will never be at home anywhere.” He let the words hang in the air for a moment. “These people come out here, out of their element. They go to the wilderness for a TV show, but they’ve got no idea what it’s really like. They’re all just bad actors. That author didn’t strike me as a man who was at home in his own company. I think he did it on purpose.”

“Did you see him at BeBe’s or anywhere else you frequent?” Austin asked. “Before they started filming, I mean.”

“I did not,” Jones said. “But I’ve usually got my head in a book or a bottle when I’m there. Often both. After he died, I grabbed one of his books from the library. Like I said, the guy’s thoughts are a waste of paper, no profundity there.”

“That’s fairly harsh,” Austin said. “You read the entire book?”

“Had to,” Jones said. “I’m a member of the failed novelist club. I gotta see who I’m not in competition with.”

Austin gave him a side-eyed look. “What do you mean?”

“It’s not an official club or anything,” Jones said. “A lot of people try to be writers. Most don’t make it through their first work. I didn’t. Some of us like to sit around at our keyboards badmouthing those who have. I’ve seen some pretty nasty comments about the deceased. I know I’m jaded and bitter and time has run out, but I’ve got the self awareness not to take it to the message boards.”

“You can’t be more than forty,” Lucy said. “There’s still time.”

He shook his head sadly. Either this guy was a phenomenal actor, or he could shift between emotions faster than anyone Austin had ever known.

“There’s no time. I’ve got liver disease.” Jones paused. “With mets, they’re telling me.”

Austin let that hang in the air for a long time, then risked a more pointed question. “You’re terminal?”

The man looked up and nodded slowly. “Guess I’ve earned my mortality at the hands of the grape.” He smiled.

“I’m sorry,” Lucy said.

“Listen you two, it’s been real nice waxing philosophical with you. But all this talk of dying has me thinking it’s about time I refill my prescription. And since I’m not under interrogation, I think I’d like to get myself to the bar.” He stood and pointed at the door as though asking permission.

“Of course,” Austin said. “Call us if you see anything on those message boards you visit—or if you think of anything else that might help us paint the picture of what happened in the woods.”

“Of course,” Jones said, waving as he walked out the door.

Lucy turned to Austin, her slightly furrowed brow indicating concern for the man.

“Think he had something to do with the fall?” Austin asked.

“Like Gunner Thompson, he’s certainly big enough to have pushed him. That is, if he happened to be passed out behind that bush when Zwart arrived.” Lucy shrugged. “I don’t know, but it sounds like he has nothing to lose.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Poulsbo, Washington

Jimmy dropped Sy off at Austin’s apartment in Hansville, then hurried into Poulsbo to meet Kendall. Before leaving the Willamette Valley, he’d agreed to reach out and have a chat with the deceased author’s wife, Eve Zwart. After all, she seemed fairly angry for someone whose soon-to-be ex-husband had just died. Even though they were in a highly contested divorce, one would think the shock of losing someone you had been that intimate with would soften your anger. The plan was to feel her out and let Lucy and Sheriff Barker know whether she was worth investigating.

Jimmy found Kendall sitting in the gazebo at the Poulsbo waterfront, taking in the bright fall afternoon.

“Gorgeous here,” Kendall said, not looking up as he sat next to her. “Sure doesn’t make me miss Los Angeles, I can tell you that. Look at those leaves.” She pointed to a small pile of bright leaves, which had fallen from a nearby tree.

“They’re leaves,” Jimmy said.

Kendall looked at him like he was the dumbest man in the world, then punched him in the arm, a gesture she’d learned from Lucy. “They are pretty leaves. They’re all different—look at how every leaf shifts colors—green to yellow and orange and red.”

Jimmy chucked. “What are you, a poet? It’s chlorophyll breaking down.”

“What are you, a scientist?” Kendall clapped back, then stood up suddenly. “Let’s get to work.”

“Thank goodness,” Jimmy said.

“Eve Zwart lives a block or two from here,” she continued. “Rents half of a duplex.”

Jimmy let her lead the way as they walked up a slight slope away from the water and toward the residential part of town.

Even though he’d been working with Kendall for a while now, they hadn’t yet shared any cases, so he hadn’t actually spent much time with her. And he realized now that she made him slightly uncomfortable. And it wasn’t only the black leather jacket she wore on her back or the quiet intensity she wore on her face. Maybe it was because, despite the fact that they’d both been born and raised in Kitsap County, she had spent years of her adult life in Los Angeles, while he’d never left. He took her sabbatical in California as some kind of betrayal to the area, as a personal affront despite knowing how ridiculous that was. Or maybe it was that her coming back reminded him that he’d never left. In any case, there was no doubt she was a good detective.

“How was the trip?” Kendall asked, crossing the street.

“Good, good,” Jimmy said. “Had a little wine. That was fun. Austin and Sy seem good. I didn’t think they were right for each other at first, but the more I get to know Sy, the more fun she seems.”

“Austin needs fun,” Kendall said. “Good for them. And, did you have fun?”

“Yes, it turns out me and Sy get along pretty well, too. Very well.” Jimmy smiled over at Kendall, waiting for her to get the joke.

“Oh, very funny, dumbass. We all know that you and Lucy O’Loves-her-Jimmy are in it for keeps.”

“Who keeps whom? That’s what I want to know.” Jimmy kicked his foot underneath a small pile of dry leaves and they made a crinkling sound as they flew up and then floated down silently in front of them.

“She keeps you,” Kendall said definitively.

“You think Austin and Sy are in it for the long term, then?” Kendall asked.

Jimmy shrugged. “I don’t know.” And he truly didn’t. He tried not to give much thought to other people’s relationships, tried not to gossip, and he already regretted bringing them up.

“I think settling down would do Austin good,” Kendall said. “Might mellow him out a little.” She thought for a moment. “He deserves it after what he’s been through.”

“You’ve been through a lot yourself,” Jimmy said.

She smiled. “I deserve it, too, but I’m not sure there’s a man in Kitsap County who deserves me.” She said it with enough of a wink in her tone that it didn’t come off quite as arrogant as the words themselves would indicate. Still, Jimmy thought, she was a bit full of herself.

“Oh, you’re not that bad,” Jimmy said dripping with sarcasm.

Kendall smiled broadly at his twisting of her meaning. “I don’t know. Most men wouldn’t dare get close enough to find out.”

“That we can agree on,” Jimmy said. “All my friends would be afraid of you.”

“An aura I’ve cultivated carefully.”

They laughed as they crossed another street in a brief jog to avoid oncoming traffic.

“Seriously though, what about you?” Kendall asked. “How are you and Lucy doing?”

“Actually, we’re talking about having kids,” Jimmy said.

“That ought to be a barrel of fun,” Kendall said, pointing up at a row of brightly-painted houses. “She’s in that one, number sixty-two.”

“You want to take the lead on this?” Jimmy asked.

“You know more about this than I do,” Kendall said. “You handle it.”

Jimmy strode up three steps and knocked on the door, then waited. There was no answer, so he knocked again.

He pointed at a small pile of Amazon packages on the porch, indicating that Eve Zwart may have been gone for a while. “Out of town?”

“Some people do all their shopping online,” Kendall said. “Could just be out.”

When no one answered for another minute, he glanced around, seeing only a woman poking her head out the door in the adjoining duplex.

“Are you looking for Eve?” she called, hurrying down her stairs and stomping right up to Jimmy. “That bitch stole my dog!”

Looking to be in her mid-thirties, her face flushed with anger, the woman had shoulder-length brown hair pulled back into a ponytail. Her leggings were a kind of red and white zebra print and her oversized sequin top made her look like she was on her way to hit the clubs, not her neighbor.

“She stole my dog!” the woman repeated, arms crossed tightly over her chest. “Can you believe that? Took him from my yard.”

Jimmy raised a hand, trying to calm her down. “When did this happen, ma’am?”

“Early this morning,” the woman said, her voice shaking with frustration. “I let him out to do his business, and by the time I came back out, he was gone. I know she took him.”

Kendall was skeptical. Gesturing to the stack of Amazon boxes on the porch, she asked, “You sure she’s even in town? Looks like these might have been sitting here a bit.”

The woman scoffed. “She gets six or seven packages every day. Every. Single. Day. Neurotic as hell, that one. Tries to soothe her emotional dysfunction with shopping, but it’s not working. Actually, today’s delivery looks light.”

Before Jimmy could ask another question, another neighbor—a tall woman with frizzy blonde hair and glasses—approached. She looked friendlier, but no less serious. “I saw Eve in town,” she said.

Jimmy exchanged a look with Kendall. “Where?”

“Did she have my dog?” The sequin-shirt neighbor asked.

“Saw her down by the bakery about half an hour ago.” The blonde woman squinted at Jimmy’s badge. “You know,” she continued, her eyes widening. “Her husband died. Or, wait… maybe that’s why you’re here.” She was talking fast, interrupting herself before Jimmy could get a word in. “Oh my God, do you think she did it? I’m obsessed with crime shows, and it’s always the husband... or sometimes the wife. Maybe this is a reverse Scott and Laci Peterson thing.” She was nearly shaking with excitement. “It’s usually the husband, though.”

Jimmy held up both hands, palms out, trying to slow her down. “Other than what you’ve seen on television, do you have any evidence to back that up?”

“I mean, no evidence per se,” she continued, barely stopping to take a breath, “her husband was a bastard, but…”

“Did that bitch have my dog or not?” The woman’s sequins shimmered as she spoke.

The blonde neighbor glanced in her direction, but continued reporting without giving her an answer. “You’ll see once you get inside her house. She has an absolutely debilitating shopping addiction. Five to ten Amazon packages a day. Maybe she spent all her husband’s money and that was her motive?” Her speech was now accompanied by illustrative arm movements. “Can you be a hoarder if you only collect brand new stuff? Usually people on those shows just have garbage, right? I don’t know. But anyway, they were going through a divorce and… oh my God, if she killed him this is going to, like, make my year. So much entertainment.”

Kendall frowned. “You sure you want to have said that?”

“Before you say anything else,” Jimmy put in, trying to steer the conversation back on track, “I think your neighbor would like to know if you saw her dog.”

“Yes,” the blonde neighbor said absently. “Eve had her on a leash. Laci Peterson had been out walking her dog, too. There’s something wrong with her.”

“Wrong with my dog?” The sequins made a clicking sound as she brought her hands to her mouth with a quick, audible inhale. “Oh, God, I gotta get down there.” The sequins click-clacked as she trotted down the apartment steps.

“Her dog’s fine,” the blonde lady said. “I meant Eve. There’s something not right about her.” She clicked her tongue, as though thinking through clues. “DDV. He had money. I think he had a lot of money.”

Jimmy shot a quick look at Kendall, who raised an eyebrow, signaling that she’d also mentally filed the information away. “Looks like we’re heading back into town,” he said, nodding at the blur of sequins jogging down the street. “I think we can catch up with Eve’s neighbor if we hightail it.”

“You know me.” Kendall sighed, but gave a small smile. “Los Angeles trained me to solve the most difficult cases and pursue the most vicious criminals. Like dog thefts and grieving widows.”

“After me,” Jimmy said, hurrying down the stairs.

Having overtaken the sequined woman, Jimmy and Kendall found Eve Zwart near a well-known bakery and donut shop in downtown Poulsbo, exactly where her neighbor had said she’d be. Eve was casually pacing the sidewalk, leading a small brown dog on a leash with one hand and munching on a comically large donut with the other. When she spotted them, she stopped walking and froze mid-bite, her eyes narrowing in recognition.

“Eve Zwart?” Jimmy called out as they approached.

Eve glanced at the dog, then back at Jimmy as she chewed and swallowed half of what was in her mouth before speaking. “What? What do you want?”

The little dog looked up at her mouth and, seeing her spew bits of sugary crust, began snuffling and touching the tip of her tongue to the ground to gather up all the sweet stuff.

“We’ve had a complaint,” Kendall said, stepping forward, “about the dog.”

Eve rolled her eyes and took another bite of the donut. The little dog weaved left and right at the end of its leash, like a kite in a gentle wind. “Complaint?” Eve finished swallowing and the dog sat at attention. “I didn’t steal her, if that’s what this is about. I rescued her. She was neglected.”

“Rescued?” Jimmy asked, his tone even. “That dog was taken from her owner’s backyard. Doesn’t sound like much of a rescue to me.”

Eve’s eyes narrowed, her voice becoming cold. “That woman leaves her outside to bark all night, doesn’t feed her properly, and basically abandons her. I did what anyone would do—gave her a better home. Look at her now, she’s happy!”

“Happy?” The sequined woman who had accused Eve of stealing her dog had caught up with them. “She was happily playing in my backyard this morning! I let her out for a few minutes. You stole her you crazy⁠—”

“I didn’t steal her, I saved her!” Eve’s voice rose and she pointed the doughnut at her neighbor as she spoke. A sizeable chunk fell and the dog rushed in, snatching it out of the air before it could hit the ground. She swallowed it without chewing. “See, you never feed her! She’s miserable with you.”

“That’s not true!” the woman yelled. “You had no right⁠—”

Jimmy held up a hand. “Everyone, let’s calm down. Mrs. Zwart, we understand you may have thought you were doing the right thing, but you can’t just take someone’s dog without their permission. There are avenues if you think a dog is being abused, but from what I can tell, this is not one of those cases. Let’s settle this peacefully.”

Kendall nodded, stepping in to back him up. “You’re not doing anyone any favors by keeping her, Eve. How about we work this out? You give the dog back to your neighbor, and we move on.”

Eve’s eyes flicked from the dog to the woman, then back to Jimmy and Kendall. She sighed, clearly outnumbered. “Fine,” she muttered. “I’ll give her back. But if I hear she’s being mistreated again, I’ll report it. This dog deserves better. She deserves, well, me!”

The sequined woman stepped forward, relieved, and took the leash. “You really are a crazy bitch, but I’m sorry your husband died.” She offered Eve a stony glare before walking off with the dog.

Jimmy turned his attention back to Eve. “Now that the custody of the dog has been settled, we have one more thing to ask you about.”

Eve raised an eyebrow, biting into the last of her donut. “David, I assume?”

You don’t seem especially upset about his death,” Kendall said. “Stealing dogs and munching on donuts while he’s gone.”

“We all grieve in our own way.” Eve paused, chewing slowly before continuing. “Plus, the bastard deserved to die.”

Jimmy gave Kendall a look, then said, “That’s enough for me. We’re going to need you to do a secure Zoom interview with some folks over in Oregon.”

Eve’s expression didn’t change as she shrugged. “Fine by me. I have an alibi, and everyone deserves to know about him. About what he did to me.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

Time was, it was rare for Austin to speak with a potential witness anywhere other than a witness room. Somewhere he could hear, see, and smell them. He still hadn’t gotten used to the fact that interviews were often conducted over video these days.

But now, as he sat in the small office next to Lucy, and as Sheriff Barker put his feet up on the desk and leaned back in a creaky wooden chair, a little screen on the wall blinked to life, revealing Jimmy’s confused face.

“What’s going on with this thing?” he was mumbling.

Jimmy was 250 miles away, but the surround sound speakers on the TV made it sound like he was sitting right next to them. He seemed to be trying to fix the camera or something.

“Got it,” he said after a moment, and the shot changed to a wider view that showed Kendall sitting next to a woman Austin assumed was Eve Zwart.

Sheriff Barker cleared his throat and leaned forward. “Mrs. Zwart, this is just a preliminary discussion. You’re speaking with us voluntarily, and you’re not under arrest. You’re also not required to have a lawyer present, but you can choose to have one at any time. We just want to learn more about your husband and his death. At this point, we’re still trying to determine the exact circumstances. Do you understand, and are you comfortable proceeding?”

Eve nodded, sitting stiffly in the chair next to Kendall, her arms crossed defensively over her chest. She had a sharp, angular face, framed by dark brown hair pulled back into a tight ponytail. Her features weren’t unattractive, but there was a hardness to her expression—a permanent sourness that twisted her mouth slightly downward. “Like I told Officer Timmy here,” she said, “you deserve to know about my bastard soon to be ex-husband.” Her eyes, a cold hazel, darted between the screen and Kendall, as if calculating her next move or maybe sizing Kendall up. Dressed in a plain black sweater and jeans, she had the look of someone who had long since abandoned any pretense of warmth.

“Before we get going,” Eve said, “I gotta pee.”

“Um, okay,” Barker said, and Kendall offered to show her to the ladies room.

For the next couple minutes, everyone waited awkwardly. Austin sat, eyes closed, a picture of Eve hanging in his mind. Her gaze was what had struck him most. It held a meanness, but it wasn’t a rough exterior that hid vulnerability—it seemed more like a weapon, ready to be used at the slightest provocation.

“Let me begin by introducing Detectives Austin and O’Rourke,” Sheriff Barker said when Eve and Kendall returned.

Jimmy chimed in. “You can call her Lucy O-look-at-me-I’m-a detective-in-Oregon-now.”

Lucy scowled, shaking her head with an amused sigh. “Real professional, Jimmy.”

“I know you,” Eve said, clearly referring to Austin. “Your pies are overrated. You really should bake them yourself. Serving store-bought pies in a place like yours is pretty weak if you ask me. The burger was good, but hun, this is 2024. You really ought to have more vegetables on your menu. It’s obviously a menu designed by a bachelor.”

Austin was amused, and not only because her complaint about the lack of vegetables on his menu mirrored Sy’s. It was true they didn’t make their own pies at his café. They were made by a young couple in Kingston every morning and delivered fresh, and he thought they were pretty damn good. Certainly better than anything he could make himself.

“Well,” Austin said, trying to keep the mood light, “we’re working on the vegetable thing.”

Eve’s eyes flashed at Barker. “And before you begin, Sheriff Whatever-Your-Name-Is, how about we skip all the BS? I know how this works. I’m not going to pretend I still loved the guy, and I’m not going to pretend he still loved me. You’ve probably read what I said about him in the paper, and I meant it. Here’s the deal: I supported that guy for ten years while he got his career off the ground. First ten minutes of fame he got, he started pushing me away. I’m not talking about cheating on me, he was doing that loooong before the fame. He never would have guessed it, but I was having my cake on the side, too. That’s the thing. I knew he had other relationships. Do you know how I knew? Because I actually cared. If he’d cared about me in the least, he’d have paid enough attention to know I’d been doing the same.” She paused. “Can I use the restroom again?”

Next to her, Kendall nodded and led her out of the room.

As Lucy and Jimmy took the opportunity to playfully bicker back and forth, Austin considered what Eve had said. He was surprised at the matter-of-fact tone in which she had mentioned the affairs. Usually, there was much more emotion behind comments like that—anger, guilt, confusion. Affairs usually brought out the worst in everyone. She’d said it with no more energy than she’d used to criticize his menu.

A couple minutes later, Eve returned and picked up right where she had left off. “Okay, so as I was saying about the affairs—yeah, that’s all water under the bridge at this point. Now we’re really just fighting about the money. Or, were, when he agreed to go on that stupid show and died.”

“And what was the status of the financial arrangements in your divorce?” Sheriff Barker asked.

“Divorce was set to go final soon, as I explained to Detectives Ken Doll and Timmy here.” She gestured toward Jimmy. “We fought over our dog for a long time, and then I agreed to let him keep her in exchange for his letting me take what’s left in the 401k.” She shook her head, her tone softening slightly. “I sold out our beloved Misty for $100,000 in index funds and bonds. And he gave her to the Humane Society the next day. He didn’t even want her, he just didn’t want her coming home with me.”

“Did you go try to claim her from the kennels yourself?” Jimmy asked.

Her tone grew bitter again. “He told them I was abusive to her. Even showed them pictures of what I had ‘done’ to her. They were from a time she got cut when a bicyclist ran into her. Anyway, they wouldn’t let me adopt her. Went to some family over in Bainbridge Island. Probably some house who has her on a strict vegan diet. She likes steak, damn it. And a morsel of doughnut.”

“Obviously, you two were in a bitter dispute,” Austin said. “Can you explain what your financial situation would have been like had the divorce gone final, and what it will be like now that he’s gone?”

“Follow the money, right?” She laughed bitterly. “Yeah, I saw All the President’s Men. It’s always about the money or the sex. In our case, it wasn’t about the sex—at least not the sex between the two of us—so I guess you figure it must be about the money, right?”

“Just asking questions,” Austin said.

“It’s no secret. I’ll do better now that he’s dead, but I was going to do fine with him alive, too. In the divorce, I would have received half of the earnings from everything he’d written up to that point. I wouldn’t get any money from his future books, but that’s fine. I was going to get plenty.”

“Your neighbor told me,” Jimmy chimed in, “that you have a bit of a shopping addiction.”

“That dog abuser can go to hell,” Eve snapped.

“Is it true?” Lucy asked.

“Well, if you must know, my therapists have labeled it a ‘dopamine addiction.’ At the moment, shopping is my fix. But show me one sane person who has lost their dog to strangers and didn’t dive head first into their vices. Safer than heroin, though not much cheaper. I spend about $100,000 a year on Amazon, but in the divorce, I was going to get more than a quarter million a year. I would have been fine, and it’s definitely not a reason to kill the bastard. I had plenty of other reasons to do that.” She offered a wry smile. “But of course I didn’t kill the guy. I don’t have my shit together enough to pull off something like that. Plus, I mean, we all saw the video, he fell. The clumsy bastard. One time when we were first married he took too many sleeping pills and, right before pissing himself on the bathroom floor, he told me he only became a writer because he sucked at sports.” Her voice carried a level of disdain that sounded well beyond hatred. But it was the kind of hatred that came only after a deep love had gone bad.

“So, assuming you had nothing to do with this,” Sheriff Barker said, “and just spitballing here, but if his death wasn’t as accidental as it appeared on the video, what do you think could have happened? For example, did your husband use drugs?”

At this, Eve squinted, as though looking into the past—or possibly the future. “No, no drugs. His only virtue, I guess. But he did have a few stalkers. Readers who either loved him or hated him. A couple jealous writers had come after him in various ways. But no physical threats or anything. Some slow drivers in front of the house that we’d recently seen at an event, or he’d have a reader who thought they had a right to compensation claiming he’d used their story in a book, stuff like that, you know. Maybe he realized what a horrible person he was and took his own life. He had depressive bouts, although getting rich and a little famous had cured him of most of that.” She laughed strangely. “We used to joke that our celebrity couple name would be ManDep. I’m Manic, he was Depressive.”

“Opposites attract,” Kendall said dryly.

“Shallow jerk that he was,” Eve continued, “Yesterday I found myself wishing he was alive so I could punch him in the face.”

Austin noted that Eve was the second person in as many days who had suggested that maybe he took his own life because he realized he was a terrible person.

He’d watched a look of frustration spread across Kendall’s face for the last couple minutes, and figured she was about to interject. And he was right.

“I’m sorry Mrs. Zwart, I don’t want to waste your time and ours,” she said sharply. “My colleagues are being overly kind. Let’s get right to it. Where the hell were you the day your husband died? I already spoke to a couple of your neighbors—they said you weren’t at home.”

Eve turned to Kendall, her eyes narrowing as she stared for a long moment. “Well my goodness,” she finally said, her voice cold, “don’t you just absolutely remind me of one of the sluts my husband went for. Tall, skinny, and wearing a leather jacket. Just as full of yourself as my husband was full of something else.”

Kendall held her ground, unflinching. Both were now ignoring the camera in front of them, leaving Austin with only side views of their angry faces.

“I was at the bar in downtown Poulsbo, until around one in the morning. Went home, watched some Netflix, and crashed on the couch ‘til eight.” She paused briefly, then continued, her tone dripping with bitterness. “And now, I’m done. I was trying to help your investigation, but because I don’t like your tone, I’m going to be reaching out to my lawyer. This conversation is over, and I need to pee.”

She stood abruptly, eyes flashing with anger, and walked out of frame.

“Sorry,” Kendall said, turning to the camera. “That was… overly aggressive.”

“Let’s check in this afternoon,” Jimmy said, and the screen went blank a moment later.

“Well,” Lucy muttered. “That could’ve gone better.”

“I think it went great,” Austin said. “We have a suspect.”

Sheriff Barker nodded. “Agreed.”

Austin stood. “Is it just me, or do you think she is going overboard admitting her hatred for the guy? Does she think telling the police how much she loathed him might prove she has nothing to hide?”

“Right,” Barker said. “Her entire vibe feels a little theatrical.”

Lucy leaned back in her chair, frowning. “Exactly. It’s a weird reverse psychology trick—like, ‘I hated him, so obviously I didn’t kill him.’ But who goes that far to broadcast their innocence? She’s nuts, sure, but she might also be pretending to be nuts, know what I mean?”

Austin nodded.

“Anyway,” Barker concluded. “Tell your folks to keep tabs on her back in Washington. Meantime, I’ve got our final two interviews arriving soon.”

“Who’s on the docket?” Lucy asked.

“Next up, the show’s producer and director. Let’s wrap for lunch before we get them settled into their hot seats.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

An hour later, Sheriff Barker, Lucy, and Austin sat in a dimly lit conference room at the end of the hall, across the table from Saffron Blue, the show’s director, and its producer, Marty Adams.

Saffron was a wiry, distracted man in his late forties, with slicked-back hair and a phone that Austin doubted ever left his hands. He barely glanced up from the screen as the conversation began, occasionally smirking or tapping furiously at whatever email or text thread was more important than the fact that one of his cast members had died.

Staring at him, Austin tasted an overpowering nutmeg flavor—more specifically, room temperature, burnt, yet somehow still undercooked triple nutmeg pumpkin pie. It felt like an assault as it rushed over his palate. With a name like Saffron one might’ve thought that he’d be subtle, smooth and refined. But Saffron Blue struck Austin as having all the wrong flavors and textures.

Adams, on the other hand, was a solid, affable guy in his early fifties, with a calm demeanor and an open face that made Austin want to trust him. The producer seemed genuinely rattled by the situation, occasionally running his hands over his bald head while trying to keep things professional.

Sheriff Barker cleared his throat. “I’d like to start here, gentlemen. How is it possible that the video you released to the public has audio of a bird on it that could not possibly have been in the area?”

Marty Adams adjusted his glasses, looking embarrassed. “That’s on me. From time to time we add stock sounds to enhance a scene where we didn’t catch optimal audio. A gust of wind, some crackling leaves, occasionally a bird. When I asked our video editor to put together a cut of David’s final minutes, she took it a step too far.”

“Added it for dramatic effect?” Austin asked.

Adams nodded. “Not a good look, I know. I should have made it clear that the video needed to be straight. We were all in shock.”

Barker glanced at Austin, then cleared his throat. “Definitely not a good look, and it makes me wonder what else might be misleading about the video.”

“We’ve given you all the raw footage,” Adams said.

Barker frowned. “And we’re reviewing it.”

“Any luck on finding the body or…” Adams swallowed hard… “more of what’s left of the body?”

“Not yet, but please, Mr. Adams, let me ask the questions, if you don’t mind. Let’s talk about the day David Dierdrick Zwart died. Saffron, where were you when the fall occurred?”

“Yeah, yeah, sure,” Saffron muttered without looking up. “Hold on a sec.” He swiped something on his phone screen, then looked off to the side at the floor. “We were filming some B-roll shots, you know? Getting the background stuff done—shots of the river, birds in the trees, other wildlife. Just the usual scenery to fill in between the action when we cut the episodes.”

“That was where, and when?” Lucy asked, her voice carrying the steady calm of someone who knew she’d be ignored for a while before getting a proper answer.

“Uhh... around nine, I think,” Saffron replied before he continued tapping at his phone, completely uninterested. He smirked as something on his screen lit up, clearly unrelated to the investigation. “Oh, and we were in area six, that’s about half a mile east of Crystal Falls.”

Austin glanced at the producer, Adams, who seemed ready to step in as though sensing the officer’s irritation with Saffron growing. Austin wondered how often this producer had needed to step in when Saffron’s social ineptitude led to key stakeholders threatening to walk.

“I was with one of our cinematographers,” Adams said. “Actually doing some test shots. Trying out some new nighttime cameras in one of the caves. David had been over by the falls for a day or two. Eating berries and whatnot. We reviewed cast member locations every night via the footage that came in through the day.”

“Were you in audio contact with him?” Austin asked.

“No, but we’d given him some notes the day before.”

“Notes?” Austin asked, surprised. “I thought this was a survival show.”

Adams smiled. “You know how it is with reality TV. Even the ‘real’ parts need a little scripting. Each cast member has a text pager. We can send them notes or—in an emergency—direct them out of the forest. But they can’t contact the outside world on it and it doesn’t have internet access.”

“You see,” Saffron said, “people underestimate the amount of zhuzh shows like this require.” He made eye contact for the first time and the surge of nutmeg Austin tasted became almost blinding. This man was deeply off-putting. “Especially those contemplative types, like DDV, you have to get them out of their heads so they don’t think too much about what they want to be heard saying. You have to boost their ego a little, maybe anger them a bit, getting someone to say something they later might regret is the best sort of theater reality television has to offer. Also, sometimes alcohol can…”

“Uh, just to be clear,” Adams interrupted. “We did not give Mr. Zwart alcohol before he went climbing and fell off that cliff.” He gave a stern look toward Saffron, whose attention had already gone back to his phone. “Personally, I believe he went up to the top of the falls looking for more berries.”

Austin nodded. “I see.” The whole enterprise of reality television was coming into a distasteful focus. “What were Mr. Zwart’s notes, then?”

Adams sighed, looking slightly uncomfortable. “Well, we wanted him to do a little more monologuing. You know, saying profound or forlorn stuff into one of the tree-mounted cameras. Even told him he could subtly promote his books at the same time. We were hoping to make his character pop a little more with viewers, boost ratings. Obviously, that never happened. He won’t be appearing in the show at all, which I imagine goes without saying.”

Saffron looked up at Adams, his right leg shaking excitedly. “Yeah, but look where we are now. Anticipation for this season is through the roof.” He looked back and forth from his phone to Adams, scrolling rapidly before his thumb stopped abruptly. Then, holding his phone’s screen facing away from himself, he scanned it across the room in an arc. The image was an upward sloping line graph. Austin felt he wouldn’t be surprised to find out the image had actually been a graph of temperatures reflecting a region approaching summer. “That’s a graph of articles about the show. We’ve had more media attention because of this ‘tragedy’ than we had all of last season.”

Austin didn’t like the way he’d said “tragedy.” It sounded like Saffron viewed Zwart’s death as little more than a marketing tool, as though it meant nothing more to him than a PR bump.

Austin glanced at Lucy, who raised an eyebrow slightly. They were both thinking the same thing.

“And you’re not worried about that? That this could have been more than an accident?” Lucy asked.

Saffron shrugged and, for a moment, his total focus shifted away from his phone screen. “Accidents happen. Happy accidents happen. Bad accidents happen. That’s the thing about accidents. They can be good and bad at the same time, you know?”

“Good and bad, like how?” Barker asked.

“I mean this… considering… what is what… and…”

“Sometimes he does this when he’s gearing up to say something,” Adams explained.

Austin took a deep breath as they gave him a beat.

“Yes.” Saffron said the word as though he’d received a download from the akashic records. “We’ve been throwing mold in the form of penicillin at harmful bacteria since the 1920’s. Happy accident, case in point. Also—mark it—Marie Curie’s work on radioactivity was invaluable, unfortunately it led to her accidental early demise. And that guy who inspired the modern parachute, what’s his name? He died jumping off the Eiffel Tower testing a prototype.” Saffron was running like a glitchy search engine, his voice steady, his leg shaking frenetically as he spoke.

“Nice analogy,” Lucy said, “But it’s hard to put the impact of this author alongside those of a couple of Nobel prize winners and an inventor, even if they died on accident.”

“Eh.” Saffron blinked as though something painful had landed in his eye. “We don’t know the future, right? Maybe this season of the show is a huge hit and we can continue to collect the ad revenue that allows us to shoot the next season. Maybe next season one of our contestants stumbles onto a life sustaining biohack that our viewers learn to emulate. I don’t know, an unknown fungus that cures every disease. The earth is then shattered by an apocalyptic event that would have led to our extinction if we hadn’t implemented the very survival strategy used on the show. Boom, humanity’s saved. And all of that was set into motion when DDV fell by accident.” Saffron put extra emphasis on the word ‘by.’ “That’s another thing. ‘On accident’ is what you said. The correct usage is ‘by accident.’”

“In your opinion, then, did Mr. Zwart die by accident?” Barker asked.

“Since I wasn’t there…” Saffron had gone back to scrolling his phone but his eyebrows did raise as he spoke. If they couldn’t get full attention at least they could get proof of life. “I wouldn’t say anything.”

Austin reached out and put his hand over the man’s phone. “Look up.”

Saffron did.

“You’ve watched all the relevant footage, and Sheriff Barker’s team is reviewing it as well. Bottom line, was anyone else in the area at the time of the fall? Was anyone else up on that cliff?”

Saffron’s face was expressionless. “The camera doesn’t lie, and you saw the drone footage. No one else was captured on camera.”

As Austin considered his answer, Barker switched tacts. “We’ve uncovered some things we’d like to go through about your past, Saffron.”

This was news to Austin.

Saffron’s phone stopped moving for a moment. He looked up with a smirk, but his eyes betrayed a flicker of unease. “Oh, yeah? What’s that?”

“You were involved in a similar situation a few years ago,” Barker said, his voice hard. “Another reality show—another death of a contestant—that happened under suspicious circumstances.”

Saffron’s face tightened, but he quickly regained his composure. “That was cleared up. Completely unrelated, but also accidental.”

Marty Adams shifted uncomfortably in his seat, looking between the detectives and Saffron. “Look, this whole thing is terrible, but I’m sure there’s no connection. We’re just trying to figure out how this happened. Make the show safer for everyone going forward.”

Austin let the silence hang for a moment before trying another angle. “Adams, you’re a producer, right? You must have your hands in a lot of projects for the show.”

Adams perked up, sensing a shift. “Yeah, I’ve got a few irons in a number of fires. Actually, I’ve been working on this hot new YouTube show, kind of a mix between travel and food. Really taking off. Hey, speaking of food, I heard you run a café. Ever think about cooking your signature dish on camera?”

“On camera? Not me.” Austin chuckled, glancing down. “I’ve got a few dishes I’m known for, but I’m more of a behind-the-scenes kind of guy.”

Adams smiled warmly. “Hey, no pressure. Just thought I’d mention it. You’ve got a way with people. I can tell. I bet you’d be a hit.”

Austin liked the idea of creating a cookbook, putting his favorite recipes in writing for others to enjoy. But, did the world really need another cookbook? “I’ll think about it,” he said, noncommittally.

A phone beeped, bringing Austin back to the present. Saffron scrolled, then tapped a response.

Lucy, watching Saffron’s every move, pressed on. “So, David didn’t seem concerned about his safety? No issues between him and anyone else on set?”

Saffron’s smirk returned. “David was a pain, honestly. Always complaining about something or someone. But safety? Nah, he never mentioned anything.”

Adams cleared his throat, clearly more uncomfortable as the conversation continued. “David had a lot on his plate, personally and professionally. But no one expected this.”

Austin studied them. Adams seemed genuine, his discomfort coming from a place of wanting to help, but not knowing how. Saffron, on the other hand, was too slick, too detached from the reality of what had happened. It was clear his primary concern was the show, not the man who’d died.

Bringing up Marie Curie and the parachute guy? It was almost as though Saffron had been brainstorming ideas to feed to the other contestants for the remembrance moment scenes that he’d no doubt been planning for a future episode.

Sheriff Barker leaned back in his chair, eyes fixed on Saffron. “We’ll be looking into that past incident, just so you know. If there’s more to it, you’ll be hearing from us again.”

Saffron shrugged, head down, completely unfazed. “Do what you gotta do. Gravity and accidents will someday have their way on all of us.”

At the end of the interview, Sheriff Barker walked the two men out, and Austin considered all of the witnesses and possible suspects they’d interviewed thus far: Thompson, the muscled YouTuber; Justin Jones, the equally large but much less muscled activist with a rap sheet; Eve Zwart, the author’s wife; and now the two leaders of the show. All of them were decent suspects, but the truth was, they had scant evidence that the death was anything but accidental.

That gave Austin an idea. It was still early enough in the afternoon that they could take a look at the crime scene before dark.

He nodded at Lucy. “You want to take a ride out to Opal Creek?”

“You read my mind,” she said.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

By the time they reached the rocky area at the bottom of Crystal Falls, the sky had turned a pale shade of gray, and Austin thought rain was likely in the near future.

Barker was on the same wavelength. “Good thing we came now. Our crime scene people do a pretty good job, but what’s left of this scene is about to get wrecked.” He handed Austin a file full of photographs. “These are from the first day, the day after the fall. First day we were on scene.”

Lucy, who’d been lingering behind them on a call with Jimmy, jogged down the path to catch up.

“It’s right up ahead,” Barker said to her, pointing.

“That’s Crystal Falls?” she asked, gesturing toward the long, thin stream of water that fell from its crown about a hundred yards up and then crashed onto the mossy rocks below.

Barker nodded.

Austin had been listening to the sound of the waterfall for the last few minutes as they walked, but now he heard something else. A drumbeat, he thought. He noticed it just as they emerged from a patch of trees into a small clearing and immediately saw where it was coming from.

A small group of people, including the massive Justin Jones, stood just outside the yellow police tape that separated the area where Zwart had fallen from the rest of the park. Justin was leading the group in a song. Austin recognized the melody, but he couldn’t pick out any of the words. It was a native song that sounded prayer-like, both somber and celebratory.

Next to the group were a handful of young people taking pictures.

“Hold on a second,” Austin said to Lucy and Barker. “I want to see something.”

He noticed that, every few seconds, Jones would take a few steps forward toward the photographers, putting on a menacing face despite the beautiful song he was leading. The photographers held their ground at first, then backed away slowly. It was almost a dance, but also some kind of face-off. Ceremonial singing versus paparazzi.

Austin knew that the story of Zwart’s death had gone national. It wasn’t the biggest story in the country, but it was being talked about widely because of his status as a fairly well-known author and the connection to the reality show. Austin guessed that these paparazzi were just trying to get any footage they could. And he knew that whatever he, Lucy, and Barker were about to do would be on the internet within the next thirty minutes.

“Sheriff Barker,” Austin said, “any chance you could distract those photographers for a couple of minutes? I’d like to take a closer look alone.”

“Sure,” Barker said.

“And I’d like to chat with Mr. Jones for a moment,” Lucy added. “I still haven’t ruled him out.”

Austin ducked under the police tape and glanced back at Sheriff Barker, who seemed to be fully preoccupied with the photographers now. Lucy had started a quiet conversation with Justin Jones, who had broken off from the group of singers. As the haunting melody continued in the background, Austin knelt beside the jagged rocks, the overcast sky casting a dull, gray light over the uneven surface.

Glancing up, he saw the bushes from which Zwart had stumbled and the cliff he’d fallen from. About ten feet below the cliff, a slight outcropping of rocks held a few ferns. That’s where Zwart had hit first before crashing about thirty feet to the jagged rocks below.

The air felt heavy as he leaned in closer to study the dark stains that marred the stone. The blood spatter didn’t sit right—not just in its placement but in the way it seemed to cling unnaturally to the rock. Most of it had pooled in small depressions, thick and dark, but the streaks and smears didn’t match the chaotic spray pattern he would expect from a fall like this.

He pulled out the crime scene photos, flipping through them and comparing each shot to the real thing in front of him. In the photos, the blood looked more scattered, as if splattered at random—a result of the violence of a body plummeting from such a height. But here, under the cold light of the overcast afternoon, the blood on the rocks told a different story. The streaks were too smooth, too purposeful, as if someone had brushed it across the surface. His first thought was Saffron Blue, the enigmatic director. Austin could picture him now, arriving at the scene and unhappy with how Zwart’s blood had splattered. Wanting something more cinematic, perhaps he’d added a little red paint.

Austin frowned. It was possible someone had manipulated the scene, but now he was letting his imagination take him too far.

He stood, stretching his legs, and began to climb. The incline from the rocks to the ledge where Zwart had hit was steep, but Austin was able to climb it slowly and carefully. Though the dampness in the air made the rocks slicker than usual, by moving laterally as he went up, he was able to get enough traction to make the ascent to the ledge. Finally he reached the narrow outcropping where Zwart had struck first, taking in the scene.

The roar of the waterfall was constant and easily drowned out the song and conversations below, which now seemed far away. Above him, a gnarled branch jutted out from the rock face, its dark bark almost blending into the dreary landscape. At his feet, a root came about four inches out of the ground, the root Zwart had gripped before falling.

Something else caught his eye—tiny fibers, barely noticeable, clinging to the rough surface of the root. Austin leaned in, reaching out to carefully pluck the threads free. Even in the dim light, he could see that they were blue, yellow, and white. He held them up, squinting. The fibers were delicate, far too refined for this wilderness. High-end fabric—maybe cashmere or some kind of luxury wool, not like the coarse hair of deer and elk that might have grazed in the area. Not left by an animal you’d expect to find in the Opal Creek area, and not one of the colors Zwart was wearing, unless perhaps he’d been wearing socks or an undershirt that weren’t visible in the video.

The fibers hadn’t been mentioned or captured in any photos, and neither had the odd way the blood pooled on the rocks below.

He turned the thought over in his mind, piecing together the subtle differences between what the photographs showed and what he saw in front of him.

Austin moved to the left and looked down. One of the photographers had broken away from Sheriff Barker and was now snapping pictures of him. It still made Austin uncomfortable, but it came with the territory at this point. As much as men like David Dierdrick Zwart craved the camera’s attention, Austin did everything he could to avoid it. But he couldn’t escape it entirely.

Considering the fibers and the unusual pooling of the blood, Austin flipped through the crime scene photos, which he’d carried up the cliff stuffed between his belt and his jeans. It wasn’t that they told a completely different story—just that the way the evidence had been framed led to a different interpretation. His mind wandered to the suspects: Justin Jones, still singing below, Eve Zwart, the angry widow, and Andy and Saffron, the producer and director.

As their faces hovered in his mind, a new theory began to form. Reality shows were notoriously staged, their scenes often scripted for maximum effect. What if Zwart’s fall had been part of the script—a planned stunt to create danger and boost viewership?

And what if something had gone wrong? What if an accident had occurred and the producer or director—maybe both—had scrambled to cover it up. They would have needed to dispose of the body to protect the show, and their careers. But neither Andy nor Saffron had seemed capable of that level of deception, at least not in the brief time he’d interviewed them.

He thought back to the video of Zwart stumbling out from behind the bushes and toppling over the ledge. More than anything, it still seemed like the most plausible option was that he’d been pushed.

Austin’s gaze drifted back to the blood on the rocks, the fibers still between his fingertips. The small but significant details that were beginning to weave a narrative very different than what had been presented.

PART 2

BLOOD TRAIL

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

After heading down the cliff, Austin carefully bagged the strange fibers and snapped a few photographs of the blood splatters. He didn’t want to discuss his findings out in the open, so he suggested they all head back.

Two hours later, they sat in the small office of the Marion County Sheriff’s Department, finishing up a box of sandwiches and discussing the case. Sheriff Barker had called in a favor from a friend at the Portland FBI office to have the fibers tested that very day. They were already enroute on a same-day FedEx truck, with hopes of hearing something preliminary by the end of the night.

“I’ve got some news as well,” Lucy said, breaking the silence. “Jimmy checked out Eve Zwart’s alibi. It was total BS. She wasn’t at the bar that night.”

Sheriff Barker rapped his knuckles on the table. “Hot damn. Eight times out of ten, someone who lies about their alibi is guilty. The other two times, they’re guilty of something else. Was it an affair? Usually it’s an affair.”

“But she already admitted to some dalliances,” Austin said.

“But she didn’t admit to murder.”

While they’d been at the scene, Eve Zwart’s lawyer had called, offering to bring his client in for another discussion first thing the next morning. He’d assured the officers that he could clear her name, and now it appeared he was walking right into a situation that favored the investigators. If she’d lied about her alibi, that would give them a fair amount of leverage.

Austin and Lucy spent the night in the last two available rooms at the local bed-and-breakfast, and made it back to the office just before Eve Zwart arrived with her lawyer. A tall, sour-faced man with a look on his face as if he had just smelled something foul. They sat together in the conference room, sipping stale coffee from Styrofoam cups, as the lawyer began to lay out the ground rules for the conversation.

“My client is here voluntarily,” the lawyer said, his tone more confident than he had any right to be. “She’s not under arrest, and she’s not here as a suspect. You can ask her about the events surrounding her husband’s death, but I won’t allow any leading questions that imply guilt or suspicion. No fishing expeditions, no hypotheticals, and certainly nothing about her personal life unless it directly pertains to the case. If at any point I feel the questioning is crossing the line, I’ll shut it down immediately. We’re here in the spirit of cooperation, not to be interrogated.” He paused, looking at each of them to ensure his message was clear before sitting back with a smug sense of control.

Austin didn’t mind the lawyer’s tone. He knew Sheriff Barker was ready for the show, armed with the knowledge that Eve Zwart had lied about her alibi. That would give them the upper hand, no matter how smug this lawyer wanted to be.

“First of all,” Barker said, “fine, except for one thing. We are the ones who decide who our suspects are, not you.”

The lawyer pressed on, ignoring Barker’s correction. “Before we go any further, I’d like to clarify something about my client’s whereabouts the night and morning her husband passed away. She initially gave you a mistaken alibi. She misremembered where she was that night. She was diagnosed with ADHD seven years ago and—as you may or may not know—forgetting minor details like this is a fairly common symptom. Mrs. Zwart, would you like to clarify where you were?”

Before Eve could speak, Barker cut in. “ADHD or no, she lied about her alibi. Let’s call it what it is. What we’d like to know is why. If you weren’t at the bar until one in the morning and sleeping on the couch ‘til eight, where were you and why’d you lie?”

The lawyer frowned but remained silent, and Eve Zwart launched into a monologue that surpassed even their video interview in both admissions and strangeness.

Taking a deep breath, she hardened her eyes as she glanced from Barker to Austin. “I didn’t kill him.” Her voice was sharp, defensive. “Yes, I lied about my alibi. I panicked. But you have to understand, after twenty years of giving everything to David, I wasn’t about to hand over my entire life on a silver platter just because he’d decided I wasn’t useful to him anymore.”

She folded her arms across her chest, as if steeling against what she would hear herself say next. “I know what this looks like. I lied because I didn’t want anyone to know the truth—not about David—also, not about me. We were supposed to be this perfect couple, you see? And I played that role sweetly—for years. But when he finally started seeing some success with his books and pulled away, he started resenting the fact that I was even alive. Now that he has his marble staircase built and shined, the dilapidated wooden ladder he’d climbed for years could be discarded. Have I done nothing to help raise him to those upper levels during the construction of his mansion?” She reached into her purse and pulled out a handkerchief.

Austin thought the analogy was a little off, but he allowed her space to continue.

“I’m a perimenopausal, rapidly-decaying reminder of his life before fame. I helped make everything beautiful for him. He got all the credit. He stopped sleeping with me, stopped talking to me. Stopped sharing books with me.” Her lips twisted into a bitter smile. “So, of course I took a lover.” She almost screamed the words before taking a ragged breath that moved into a long, controlled exhale.

“Why wouldn’t I try to find affection out there?” She continued more calmly. “People need to be touched, you have to touch them even if they give you splinters.” Her eyes had gone bloodshot and tears welled at their corners. “I know it makes me look bad when I get angry like that but I’m not murderous. And what about David though? David was worse. He was always worse. If our roles were switched you would easily guess him to be my murderer. If he wants something to suffer, then suffer it will. He would have hid in those bushes and pushed me right off the cliff without a second thought.” She clutched at her handkerchief. “That man met with every top divorce attorney in the region just to screw me over. Left me with the scraps, some third-rate lawyer who can barely remember my name—even though…” Tears streamed down her face now, falling from her cheeks onto her chest. “He couldn’t remember it… even though my name—not David’s, which he could remember because now he’s so famous—had been used to sign many large checks. Anyway, anyway, anyway…” She shook her head rapidly and waved her clenched fist in front of her face before coming back to stillness and clamping the kerchief back onto her dripping nose. “David made it so he could choose from the best of the best in divorce attorneys. Had every last good one all lined up to bleed me dry.” She glanced apologetically at her lawyer. “Um, sorry.”

Austin considered this. In their first interview not only had she admitted to infidelity, she claimed that she would be doing fine despite the divorce. Now she was singing a very different tune. Austin watched her eyes, shifty and somehow both menacing and melodramatic at the same time. She’d mentioned she was manic, and Austin couldn’t help but wonder what medications she was on, and whether she’d forgotten to take them.

Eve bowed and shook her head, then looked up again, her eyes narrowing on Austin. “David was a manipulative bastard. He said he’d drag the divorce out forever, that he’d confuse me, waste my time, and ruin my life. Never missed an opportunity to remind me that he didn’t care. He could sleep with anyone he wanted, live his life however he wanted, because he had the money and the fame now. I was nothing to him. He even canceled his life insurance, just to make sure I wouldn’t get a dime if anything happened to him.”

Her voice cracked, then she quickly shifted gears, masking her sadness with anger. “He made sure I wouldn’t get anything. Not from the books I helped him write, not from the fame I helped him create. He took in the sun as I stood all those years wilting in his shadow, watering and weeding around his roots. He promised me I’d get the minimum possible, and that he’d be living it up over in Europe while I was stuck out in Hansville, a place he’d always loathed and wanted to leave the minute he could. He even hated America. ‘No culture here,’ he’d say. ‘What is a life without deep and profound intellectual discourse? Europe’s where the real minds are living. The smart people, the ones worth talking with. You wouldn’t understand.’ Well, maybe he’s right. So what if I do like simple things. Why did he have to take my dog? Misty. I loved that dog. And he took it, just to spite me. Then he dumped her at a shelter like she was nothing. Like she was some kind of unwanted mutt.”

She paused, her hands trembling slightly. “So yeah, I’m angry. I’m furious. But I didn’t kill him. Why would I? Killing him wouldn’t pull me out of the hell he’d already sent me to. The truth is, David was already dead to me long before he landed on those rocks. Look, we’ve both pushed each other—but never from any considerable height. I can admit to tipping him over an existential cliff or two. Can you blame me? That poor man spent so much time just standing there leaning over the edge, begging to be nudged. He would push me off emotional cliffs but that’s different—he was also the one who’d chased me to them. If I’d wanted him dead, don’t you think I would have pushed him to his death before he’d taken everything from me? I’m not shedding any tears over his dead body. And I’m not responsible for it. Actually, damn you to hell Zwart, I am.”

“Uh, what she means is…” her lawyer interjected.

“What I mean is,” Eve continued. “I didn’t kill him. But since the divorce never actually went through, I’m the one who’s left to deal with his remains. He would set me up to bring home the bag of bones and teeth, once they pull them out of the bears’ stinking crap. At least I’ll finally get to see him in his truest form.”

Her eyes darted to the lawyer, who gave her a slight nod, as if signaling that she’d said enough. But Eve wasn’t finished. “I’ll admit to being a liar, to being bitter, to being unfaithful. But a murderer? No. That’s not me. I had every reason to hate him, sure. But I had no reason to push him into the arms of his maker.”

“Who is the man you’re having an affair with?” Lucy asked. “That was a moving speech, to be sure, but you still haven’t provided anything other than an admission that you lied to a team of detectives.”

Eve glanced at her lawyer. “Do I have to tell them?”

The lawyer nodded, placing a hand on her shoulder. “It’s okay. You didn’t do anything illegal.”

Eve hesitated, then spoke. “Ira,” she said. “His name is Ira, and he works as a bartender at the Waterfront Tavern in Poulsbo. It’s been going on for a few months. He’ll tell you I was in his arms all night.”

Austin cocked his head, thinking.

Sure, that could be a real alibi, but it could also be that they were having an affair, and now she had someone else to lie for her. In fact, in cases where wives murdered their husbands—or paid someone else to do it—there was often a lover involved, helping them plan it out. And more often than not, the murdered husband had money that the new couple wanted.

After another hour of back and forth, during which the lawyer interjected more often than not to stop Eve from answering certain questions, Austin huddled with Lucy and Sheriff Barker in the hallway.

A preliminary analysis of the fibers had come back, confirming they were from a high-end wool fabric. Nothing Zwart had been wearing the day he fell matched it. Tracing it further could take days, possibly even weeks, and even then, it was unlikely to yield much.

“Occasionally,” Austin said, “you can trace wool fibers to specific manufacturers or suppliers, but it’s rare. It’s tough to narrow it down that way. Even if we find out where it came from, it might not get us closer to who was actually wearing it.”

Lucy nodded, her brow furrowed. “So we can’t count on that leading anywhere anytime soon.”

“Not likely,” Sheriff Barker agreed. “But we still have enough to keep the pressure on her.”

Austin opened the door to the interview room where Eve Zwart still sat with her lawyer. “Just a couple more questions,” he said, leaving the door open. “Was your husband allergic to wool by any chance?”

Eve glanced at her lawyer, who shrugged. “No,” she said. “Not that I know of.”

“And are you allergic to wool, Mrs. Zwart?” Austin asked.

She shook her head. “Why do you ask?”

“Just to be clear,” Austin continued, “you’ve never been to the Opal Creek Wilderness? You didn’t visit your husband before the show began? You didn’t go there a week before, or yesterday, or stop by at any point?”

“Absolutely not,” Eve said firmly. “I think I’ve been fairly clear on that point.”

The lawyer frowned at Austin. “She’s been very clear on that point.”

Austin imagined the check Eve Zwart would later write this lawyer for the hard work of parroting her verbiage.

Before Austin could say anything else, he heard shouts from outside. Sheriff Barker was already moving down the hallway. Following him, Austin burst out the front door of the sheriff’s office, where a fight had broken out.

He immediately recognized Justin Jones because of his size and the fact that he still wore the same jeans and jean jacket from their earlier interview. Jones was on top of another man, pushing him into the sidewalk.

The other man, using a move like a mixed martial arts fighter, raised his hips and pressed the larger man off, rolling on top of him. Austin blinked in surprise—it was the show’s producer, Marty Adams.

What the hell was going on?

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Justin Jones, the massive, burly activist, was on top of Marty Adams, trying to pin him down using his weight. His fists were swinging, but they lacked precision, each punch glancing off as Adams twisted and ducked to deflect and avoid the blows.

“Let them go a minute,” Barker said. “Unless one pulls a weapon, sometimes it’s better just to let them work it out.”

Austin was surprised, but it was Barker’s town, and neither man seemed to be doing any serious damage to the other.

Adams, though smaller and older, was clearly the better fighter. His movements were sharp and controlled. He landed a clean punch to Jones’ side, making the big man grunt in pain. Another punch followed, this time catching Jones in the jaw, snapping his head back. But Jones, fueled by rage and size, powered through, grabbing Adams’ shoulders and shoving him hard against the pavement.

They rolled, fists swinging, grunting and cursing. Jones’ fists pounded into the concrete as Adams slipped out from underneath him, landing a jab to the ribs. Jones growled, his massive arms swinging in wide arcs, trying to crush Adams under his bulk. He connected with a punch to Adams’s shoulder, sending him sprawling backward.

Austin took a step forward, ready to intervene before it went too far, but before he could, Adams used his legs, bracing against the ground and kicking out with surprising strength. His boot slammed into Jones’ midsection, knocking the wind out of the larger man. Jones stumbled backward, gasping for air, his face twisted in pain.

For a second, both men paused, breathing heavily, and then, without a word, Jones turned and fled down the street, clutching his side. Adams pushed himself up, wiping blood from the corner of his mouth, breathing hard but still standing.

Austin blinked, momentarily stunned by how quickly the fight had shifted, and then moved toward Adams, who was already dusting himself off. “What happened? I mean, are you okay?” Austin asked.

“He—” Adams began, but he couldn’t finish the thought. As though all the energy left him at once, he flopped back to the ground, coughing and spitting up blood.

Sheriff Barker said, “I’ll call an ambulance,” and ran inside.

Austin glanced up as Jones disappeared around a corner. He knew Barker wouldn’t want him to pursue on foot, but that’s exactly what he was going to do.

The man’s blood left a visible trail, glistening in the bright light that had burned through the cloud cover.

Austin sprinted down the narrow streets of Mill City, eyes locked on the faint blood trail. Bright red smears on the cracked sidewalks lead him deeper into the heart of the quiet, nearly-deserted town.

Jones moved with surprising speed for a man of his size and disease process, but Austin had the advantage of health. He followed quietly, senses on high alert, scanning every movement ahead.

When he turned down an alley, he realized that Jones knew he was being followed. All the garbage cans had been overturned, forcing Austin to slow and weave through the debris as quickly as possible. The faint sound of Jones’ heavy footsteps echoed from around the corner, still close, but fading fast.

A dog barked furiously behind a chain-link fence as Austin slipped out of the alley, its growl rumbling after him as he spotted a few drops of blood to his left. He kept his pace steady, his pulse quickening as he glanced down the next corner. There was no sign of Jones, just the occasional drops of blood leading toward the edge of town. He passed an old hardware store, its windows coated in dust, then a diner that still had its “Open” sign flickering, though there were no customers inside.

As he rounded the corner, an old woman shuffled out from a porch, squinting at him suspiciously. “What are you doing here?” she demanded, her voice sharp and accusing.

Austin barely slowed, offering a quick wave, not wanting to lose time. “Police business, ma’am,” he muttered, dodging her as she cursed him for trampling her postage stamp front lawn.

The town’s commercial district loomed ahead, old buildings with faded signs and cracked windows, remnants of a more prosperous era in Mill City. The streets were eerily quiet, save for the soft wind rustling through the few trees that rose from patches in the sidewalk.

Passing quickly through the town’s small commercial center, Austin saw a lovely old bridge ahead, which Jones was crossing. Abandoned mills stood along the water on the other side, their silhouettes casting long, dark shadows across on the river.

On any other occasion, Austin might have stopped to admire the beauty of the old bridge. He had a thing for small towns in the west, marked as they were by the history of the country. The bridge was old iron, the walkway worn wooden planks. But today, he followed Jones to the center of the bridge, close enough for the first time to reach him with a shout. But as he opened his mouth, he suddenly became faint, dizzy.

He dropped to his knees. What was happening to him?

Austin looked in the direction of Jones, but his vision was blurry. The sound of his boots on the wooden planks still echoed in his mind, despite the fact that he wasn’t moving.

And just like that, he was back in New York—back on the Brooklyn Bridge. The bridge from which he’d fallen. The fall that should have killed him.

His head spun, his mind raced. He tried to look up and follow Jones, but the man had disappeared into the woods.

What was happening to him?

Lucy knelt down next to Marty Adams and put a hand on his shoulder. She wasn’t a trained medic, but like every officer, she had studied emergency medical procedures. As far as she could tell, the man had no fatal wounds, just a bunch of minor ones that could give him trouble if left untreated. His face was scratched and bloody where it had been dragged across the pavement. He was clutching his stomach, where he’d taken at least one heavy blow. But to her surprise, he was smiling.

“Are you okay?” she asked. “I mean, I know you’re not okay, but are you okay?”

The producer’s face took on a quizzical look. “Guys like me, we spend a lot of time on the phone, a lot of time in front of computer screens. We like to watch violent movies or take amateur MMA classes because we know we’ll never be involved in anything violent ourselves.” He looked around for his glasses, spotted them a few feet away, and, realizing they were broken beyond repair, tossed them aside. “Funny thing is, I always pictured myself in a fight like that defending someone. You know, stepping in to help an abused woman or stop a mugging or whatever. I didn’t imagine myself getting jumped by a guy like that.”

“What happened?” Lucy asked.

He pulled a small device from his pocket, which Lucy recognized as a portable USB drive. “At least this wasn’t destroyed,” he said. “As promised, our team, led by our enigmatic director Saffron, has been poring over footage, and I came to give you guys more evidence. Jones was out here when I arrived, like he was waiting for me or something. Lingering. Then—I don’t know—he just jumped me.”

Lucy took the USB drive from him. “What’s on it?”

Adams stood slowly, still holding his stomach. “I can’t see especially well. Don’t let me trip on anything, okay?”

Lucy took him by the arm and led him into the sheriff’s office, where they were joined by Sheriff Barker. “We’ve got an ambulance on the way,” Barker said.

Lucy handed Barker the thumb drive. “More evidence, apparently.”

Adams, still winded, added, “I know you’re looking into a bunch of people. I still think you’re wasting your time, but that’s not up to me to decide. Saffron had our video editors go through everything—all the footage. You’re welcome to all of it, but we put this together for you to save you some time. It really looks like this was an accident. Gunner Thompson, the YouTuber—this will clear him outright for sure. One of the videos on there shows that he was over three miles away when the fall happened. And there’s a lot more.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Austin shook his head, trying to bring himself back to the moment. Slowly, very slowly, things began to come back into focus. He placed one foot on the ground and pressed himself up, wobbling against the bridge’s railing. Slowly, he began walking forward, one foot in front of the other, trying to regain his balance. Speeding up as the world sharpened around him, he realized he must have just had a traumatic flashback. It was something he’d read about in his discharge paperwork. Something to watch out for. PTSD.

But he didn’t have time to think about it now. He’d deal with the emotional stuff later.

Off to the right, Austin heard the river and followed Jones’ trail to what appeared to be a garage attached to an old abandoned mill. The place was a relic from the town’s timber days, with peeling paint and a rusted sign that once advertised gas for under a dollar. Austin leaned on a tree as Jones fumbled with a set of keys, glancing over his shoulder once, twice. Austin held his breath.

Finally, the garage door creaked open and Jones disappeared inside. Austin waited, counting the seconds. He needed to be sure the man wasn’t coming back out before he made his move.

The seconds stretched to a minute, then two. Austin’s patience was rewarded when the garage door reopened briefly, the man stepping out, now without his shirt, wiping the last traces of blood from his skin. He tossed the shirt into a nearby trash bin, glancing around one last time before heading off in the opposite direction, away from the town center.

Austin slipped out from behind the tree and moved quickly to the garage, staying low and keeping to the shadows. He reached the door just as it was about to close completely, sliding in with a silent prayer that it wouldn’t make any noise.

Lucy inspected the bandages on Adams’ face and neck. “That’ll do for now.”

“You sure you don’t want to go to the hospital?” Barker asked.

“This’ll be a better story for my kids and wife,” he said. “I toughed it out. I’m all about a good story.”

While he’d been getting bandaged up, he’d connected to the Wi-Fi and downloaded the first few videos his team had put together. He squinted at his phone as he queued up the first video, then cast it to the flat screen TV on the wall of the conference room.

“Before he punched me in the face, I was showing Mr. Jones this video on my phone,” Adams said dryly. “It’s from one of our drones, along with footage from the bar, and proves he had nothing to do with the author’s death. If Zwart was pushed out of those bushes, it wasn’t by Justin Jones.”

From Lucy’s perspective, the video wasn’t particularly exciting. Dated the same morning Zwart had taken his fatal fall, the beginning was just a few hours of drone footage, set to time-lapse speed to get through it quicker. The camera hovered over the small town, its lens zooming in on Justin Jones. His black ponytail, jeans, and jean jacket were unmistakable. But what was he doing?

“This is from the night before Zwart died,” Adams said. “We usually had a drone or two capturing footage of the town. You know, to splice into the show for local color, to set the scene, and so on.”

For the first few hours, which took about ten minutes to get through, the footage was mind-numbingly dull. Jones wandered around the quiet streets late at night, seemingly aimless. The drone kept him in frame as he entered a bar at the edge of town. The sign out front read BeBe’s.

The footage shifted to surveillance video from inside the bar and the timestamp on the footage rolled on and on, speeding through the hours.

Lucy was about to ask where it came from, but Adams offered helpfully. “Owner was nice enough to share his footage when we told him we were trying to clear Jones.”

For the next few hours, the footage showed Jones sitting at the bar, nursing drinks. Occasionally, he got up to use the bathroom, but he didn’t leave.

At around two in the morning, Jones slumped over on the bar and fell asleep. The next time Jones stirred, the sun was high in the sky, casting bright light through the bar’s windows.

Jones finally emerged from the bar around ten in the morning, looking even more disheveled than he had the night before. The drone followed him as he stumbled down the street, but it was clear he hadn’t been anywhere else during the crucial hours of the early morning.

Lucy glanced at Sheriff Barker. The footage was boring, sure, but it was conclusive. Justin Jones had been in that bar all night—he couldn’t have had anything to do with the author’s death.

Inside the garage, the only light came from a small window high up on one wall. The place was cluttered with old tools, boxes, and a workbench that looked like it hadn’t been used in years, possibly decades. But Austin wasn’t interested in any of that. His focus was on the ladder he spotted leading up to a loft above.

The ladder was smeared with blood, meaning Jones had been up there for some reason, if only briefly.

He paused at the base of the ladder, listening intently. No sounds from above, just the faint whoosh of the river outside. Carefully, he began to climb, wincing as the old wood creaked under his weight.

When Austin reached the loft, he pulled himself up as silently as he could. The space was small, with a low ceiling and a naked bulb hanging from a wire. But what caught his attention was the wall plastered with maps, photos, and notes—dozens of them, all connected with yellow string, a chaotic web of information.

Austin’s eyes darted over the evidence, piecing together what he could. Jones had been tracking people—everyone involved in the show, maybe even Austin himself. There were photos of the producer, the director, some of the contestants, and a few others, whom Austin didn’t recognize.

Austin pulled out his phone to take a few preliminary photos of the evidence. Just as he was about to snap the first shot, a faint, acrid smell hit his nose. He froze, his senses suddenly keen. For a moment, he thought it was his synesthesia acting up.

But it wasn’t a taste, it was a smell.

Smoke.

Inching toward the edge of the loft, he looked down and saw it—a thin trail of smoke rising from below.

Then it struck him all at once.

Justin Jones was burning down the garage. With him in it.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Austin hurried down the ladder, his boots hitting the concrete floor of the abandoned garage with a dull thud. His eyes darted around the space, searching for any sign of a fire extinguisher, but the place was a mess—rusted tools scattered across workbenches, old oil cans stacked in the corner, and cobwebs hanging like drapes from the ceiling beams. The walls were lined with empty, dust-covered shelves.

And no fire extinguisher in sight.

His breath quickened as the acrid smoke filled the air, growing thicker by the second. He was scanning the room, heart racing, when his eyes landed on something—a heavy blanket draped over the hood of a forgotten car in the corner, the kind of thick cover used to protect a vehicle from dust and debris.

Austin grabbed the blanket, the fabric stiff and worn under his fingers. He spun around and sprinted to the corner of the garage, where a small but menacing fire flickered against the wooden wall, licking up toward the rafters. The heat radiated off the flames as he moved closer, and, for a split second, he felt the sting of the fire on his skin.

Wincing against the pain, he threw the blanket over the flames, smothering them with the heavy fabric. Smoke billowed out from beneath it as he pressed down, almost burning his hands as the heat intensified. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he worked, but slowly the flames began to die out beneath the weight of the blanket.

Chest heaving, the smell of charred wood and smoke filling his lungs, Austin watched the last flicker of fire die beneath the smothering fabric. He stepped back, wiping sweat from his brow, mind snapping back to Jones.

He bolted out the door, scanning the area, and spotted him almost immediately. Justin Jones stood by a large tree, his face twisted in confusion as he glanced back toward the garage, clearly wondering why the fire he’d set was already out.

Austin moved swiftly, closing the distance between them in a few quick strides. Jones, though burly, was already bloodied and exhausted from his earlier fight. He barely had time to react before Austin was on him. With practiced precision, Austin ducked under Jones’ wild swing, using his opponent’s own momentum against him. He pivoted, grabbing the bigger man’s arm and wrenching it behind his back with a sharp twist.

Jones stumbled forward, off-balance, and Austin swept his leg, sending him crashing to the ground with a thud. Before Jones could even think of getting up, Austin dropped a knee into his back, applying just enough pressure to keep him pinned.

“Stay down,” Austin said, his voice calm but firm.

Jones struggled for a second, but Austin had the leverage. He didn’t need brute force. With one hand, he quickly slapped a pair of handcuffs around Jones’ wrists, locking them tight.

Jones groaned, face pressed into the dirt.

Austin stood up, looking down at the subdued man. “It’s over,” he said, dusting off his hands. “You’re done.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Two hours later, what could only be described as a motley crew sat in the conference room of the Marion County Sheriff’s Department, staring up at the screen on the wall. Lucy had filled Austin in on the video Adams had shown her and Sheriff Barker, but he was still shocked by it—both by how boring it was and by what it seemed to prove.

Sitting next to Adams, Lucy kept her eye on Justin Jones, who had calmed down significantly and had been released from the cuffs with Adams’ okay. In fact, Adams had insisted that he wasn’t going to press charges. He just wanted the whole mess to be over so his show could move forward. And, as he kept pointing out, he now had a great story to tell his kids.

Unless the video was doctored, which was always an option, it showed that Jones had been in town and at the bar until around noon on the day that David Dierdrick Zwart died. When Lucy flipped off the television and the screen went blank, they all sat in silence for a long moment.

“Is there any way,” Adams said, breaking the quiet, “that we can just put this behind us? I know you all are just doing your jobs, but this was a tragic accident.”

Adams didn’t know what Austin had seen in the garage, didn’t know that Jones had tried to burn it to the ground. And Austin wasn’t about to share that information. “Sheriff Barker, my suggestion is that we send Marty Adams on his way and have a little chat with Mr. Jones.”

Barker nodded and stood, then ushered Adams out, returning to his seat a moment later. “He insists he’s not going to press charges for the assault,” Barker said, turning to Jones. “Lucky for you, Justin.”

Jones shrugged. “Done enough time. It wouldn’t matter to me one way or another.” Then his face grew serious, and Austin could almost hear him thinking. But he didn’t say anything.

Rarely had so much contradictory evidence regarding a single suspect emerged in the span of an afternoon. It struck Austin that while Lucy and Sheriff Barker had been watching the footage that supposedly cleared Jones, Austin had been discovering evidence that Jones had been monitoring the entire television crew and all the cast members.

Jones folded his arms defiantly, but his words came out like an explanation. “You’re going to want to know what all that stuff in the garage was, and why I tried to burn it down.”

“That is the understatement of the year,” Sheriff Barker said.

Austin had filled him in on his pursuit of Jones, and Barker had sent two uniformed officers to the site to investigate further and lock down the crime scene.

Barker held his phone up to Jones, showing him a series of photographs the officers had texted him in the last few minutes—preliminary evidence, pending a full cataloging, but enough to make Jones wince.

“First of all,” Jones said, “that video was accurate. I passed out drunk that night, like I often do. Slept with my head on the bar, like I often do. But I didn’t kill anyone. I’m not going to lie, though—it crossed my mind. You have to understand. These forests are sacred to us. And not just to the natives who were here before white folks showed up. We’ve got all sorts of people involved in our cause, ready to strike fear and inflict ruin.”

Lucy asked. “So, they’re capable of murder?”

Jones shook his head. “In this day and age, it’s more powerful to destroy someone through online discourse than to kill them in flesh. The murdered become martyrs and the cops come a lot sooner and the trees fall a lot faster when they start carting us off to jail. When the show was announced, our large online crew went into action. My job was to surveil them on the ground, learn everything I could about everyone involved in the show. I was just there to document every piece of destruction of the sacred forests and everyone involved in it.”

“Why?” Austin asked. “What for?”

“I was getting to that,” Jones said, his voice tinged with irritation. “I didn’t hurt a single person. But the idea was to get enough evidence on them—of whatever sort we could. Maybe they were harming a tree, maybe they were violating some local code. Maybe the producer was having an affair, or whatever. The idea was, I’d gather the evidence and then I’d have a team spread it online to embarrass them, scare them—possibly get them canceled online. Harass them enough that they’d leave the trees alone. We never got around to executing most of it. But I knew how guilty it made me look, and that’s why I was going to burn down the garage.”

He turned to Austin. “You have to understand… Austin, I’m so sorry… I had no idea you were in there. Ask Barker, the only people I ever hurt were in bar fights, and they punched first.”

Austin placed his hands on the table and looked at Sheriff Barker. “He didn’t know I was in there,” Austin agreed. “On that, at least, we can believe him.”

“So why’d you hit Adams when he showed you that footage?” Lucy asked.

“Got me there,” Jones said. “That time I hit first, but he hit back, harder.”

“But why?” Lucy demanded.

“Because he’d tracked me for hours on a drone, gotten footage of me passing out drunk. Maybe he didn’t break any laws but, I’m sorry, do we want to live in a world where that’s okay, where that’s normal? Orwell would not be pleased.”

It didn’t excuse the violence, but Austin couldn’t exactly argue with him.

After another hour of questioning, Sheriff Barker decided to let Jones go.

When Lucy questioned the decision, Barker assured her that Jones wasn’t going anywhere. “We will follow up with him on the surveillance and whoever his online buddies are, but he barely ever leaves town, he’s easily recognizable, he has no money and no passport. Not to mention, he has a terminal disease and his doctors are here.”

Despite Jones’ rough life, his drinking problem, and his occasional nefarious activities, Austin was more convinced than ever that he had nothing to do with Zwart’s death. Austin agreed that there was no chance he’d run.

Gathered again in the conference room, Sheriff Barker let out a long sigh. “This is one of the strangest cases I’ve ever been involved with. Does it ever feel like you need a degree in technology, video editing, or computer science to work a case these days?” He shook his head. “I remember being confused by DNA—that was thirty years ago. Now, you can’t trust anything you see, anything you hear, or anyone you talk to. I don’t think I’m cut out for this job anymore.”

Lucy patted him on the shoulder. “You’re doing a fine job.”

“Yeah?” Barker sounded frustrated. “Then how come we’re nowhere?”

“We’re not nowhere,” Austin replied. “I don’t know about you two, but I’m ruling out Jones as a suspect. Barker, it’s up to you whether you want to pursue an arrest for arson or whatever, but I don’t think he’s our guy on the Zwart. I’m back on the wife, Eve. I don’t know how she did it, but I think she did.”

“Easiest answer,” Lucy offered, “is that somehow she arranged to meet her hubby up on that cliff and pushed him or, more likely, arranged for someone else to meet him there.”

“Maybe someone who was going to help him cheat on the show?” Austin was thinking out loud.

Just then, Sheriff Barker’s secretary knocked on the door, tentatively poking her head in.

“Yes, Sarah, what is it?” Barker asked.

“Call from New York City,” she said. “Man claims he’s Zwart’s literary agent or something.”

Austin raised an eyebrow. “Sheriff Barker,” he said, “you should definitely take the call. You are going to absolutely love this guy.”

“Give us a minute,” Barker said to Sarah, “then patch the call through.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

Barker had noticed Austin’s sarcasm. “I saw that eyebrow raise. Tell me about this guy.”

Austin leaned back and offered a wry smile. “Theodor Oliver, and when I said you’d love him, I actually meant—well—I don’t think you’ll enjoy him much at all.”

“I saw him on some morning show the other day,” Lucy added. “Fine fellow, indeed!”

Austin laughed. “Big New York literary agent. He came out to Zwart’s house in Hansville before the body was even cold, rummaging through papers, unfinished manuscripts—that kind of thing. Clearly he wanted to cash in. Probably nothing that a hundred other literary agents or lawyers wouldn’t have done, but still, it didn’t sit right with me.”

“Grave-robbers, right?” Lucy said, “What do you think he wants?”

Austin shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

“It is a motive, of sorts,” Barker said.

Before they could say more, the speakerphone on the desk rang.

Sheriff Barker tapped the button to answer. “Theodore Oliver?” His voice was calm but firm, as though he was bracing himself for an onslaught of BS. “This is Sheriff Barker, and I’m here with Lucy O’Rourke and Thomas Austin, detectives in the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Department. They are helping on this case. I assume you’ve called to offer us your unequivocal support.”

Austin exchanged a glance with Lucy, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“Yes, this is Theodore Oliver.” The voice on the other end was sharp, clipped, and oozed pure arrogance. “I’ve been made aware of your ongoing investigation into the death of the late David Dierdrick Zwart. I am his literary agent, which I mention so you are clear what my role is regarding his work and reputation, including how it is to be handled posthumously.” His voice dripped with condescension. “Let me be perfectly clear—what happened was an accident. The idea that you’re dragging this out, wasting everyone’s time, is ridiculous. And frankly, it’s bad for business. We are moving forward with multiple deals that hinge on the tragic accidental death of Mr. Zwart, and I will not have you tarnishing his legacy with your baseless allegations.” Oliver’s voice grew sharper. “I’ve also been informed that you’ve interviewed his wife, Mrs. Zwart. That woman is currently working with us on a highly lucrative book deal about her husband’s life and untimely demise. Your continued interference is not only unnecessary but, frankly, harmful. And not only harmful to the reputation of this literary giant, harmful to his grieving wife and harmful to the bottom line of the companies I work with, and for.”

“It sounds like you want to be threatening,” Barker offered, his voice bored. “But—and I mention this only so you are clear on my role—I’m the guy who tells people like you to go to hell.”

There was a brief pause, and then even more venom crept into Oliver’s tone. “Maybe it would help if I reminded you who it is that I work with. The biggest publishers in New York—people with more money than you can imagine—who won’t hesitate to spend it on the biggest law firms in New York. If you continue to harass my client or drag this investigation further into the mud, I promise you, we will bury you. We have the resources to tie up your entire department in lawsuits for years. Your small-town budget won’t last a month against the kind of firepower we will bring.”

He paused again, his words deliberate. “I suggest you cease this witch hunt now and accept the fact that this was nothing more than a tragic accident. Drop the investigation into Eve, and we all move on peacefully. Otherwise, I’ll make an example of your quaint little sheriff’s department. New York’s pockets are deep, and don’t have holes. Small-town Oregon wouldn’t be able to patch theirs fast enough, trust me. Or, choose to continue down the path you’re on and my friends and I will be using Mill City and the Opal Creek Wilderness Area as a dirt bike course for our teenagers before you can say ‘next suspect.’”

A silence hung in the room, and Austin knew exactly what Sheriff Barker was doing. Barker wasn’t a man who could be easily intimidated, and sometimes it was better to let a fool spill everything they had before replying.

Finally, after a long pause, Barker asked simply, “Are you done?”

“Done speaking? Yes,” Oliver replied smugly. “But I’m not done until I’m sure that you are.”

Barker leaned toward the phone, his voice steady. “We have more evidence than ever that your client, David Dierdrick Zwart, was murdered. Furthermore, our lead suspect at this time is his wife. None of that is going to change based on empty threats from an arrogant bastard like you. If you’d like to sue us, go right ahead. Our pockets are more intact and deeper than you might think, and our will is iron.”

He paused, letting the words hang there like smoke. “In other words, go f—” He stopped, clearing his throat. “What I meant is, I must politely decline your request to cease our investigation.” With a satisfied tap of his thumb, Barker ended the call.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

“So what do we do now?” Austin asked.

“Call just came in—I silenced it while we were talking to Oliver,” Barker replied. “Let me listen to the voicemail.”

Austin watched as Barker’s face changed while listening to the message. Finally, a smile broke through.

“It’s from the lab in Portland,” Barker said. “The wool isn’t special, but the dye used on it is. It’s famous—one of those multicolored Hudson Bay blankets. Fairly expensive, not super common, but also not super rare.”

Austin pulled up a picture of the classic Hudson Bay blanket on his phone. It featured bold, evenly spaced stripes in vivid colors—green, red, yellow, and indigo—set against a creamy, off-white background. The stripes ran parallel to the short edges of the blanket, each color distinct and vibrant. From the photos, the wool had a slightly coarse texture, but it was durable, built to withstand the elements. The edges were stitched neatly, and the overall design gave off an air of rugged elegance, both functional and iconic.

“What would a blanket have been doing there?” Lucy asked, her brow furrowed.

“Well, that’s our job to find out. But there’s more,” Barker continued. “They took a look at the original photos from the crime scene, as well as Austin’s photos. They agree with Austin’s analysis—some of that blood may have been splattered there by a fall, but some of it was deliberately dripped. Something isn’t adding up.”

Austin noticed Lucy staring down at her phone. “What is it?” he asked.

“Kendall and Jimmy just got back to me. Well, Kendall did, but from work she did with Jimmy. They checked Eve’s second alibi, and it didn’t hold up either. Not only was she not at the bar, she wasn’t with the bartender that night. I don’t know if they’re having an affair or not, but it turns out the bartender’s married. He was at a couples retreat put on by their church group with his wife. An alibi that actually did check out. So she lied about having an affair and sleeping over at his house.” Lucy shook her head. “Does it ever strike you that people in this world are just more screwed up than we can possibly imagine?”

Austin chuckled. “Why do you think I quit the NYPD and moved to the other side of the country to run a café, general store, and bait shop?”

“To be fair,” Lucy said. “You moved to a town with David Dierdrick Zwart.”

Austin smiled. “We have a hundred authors crazier than him in New York. Maybe more.”

Barker laughed. “Always wanted to run a bait shop. Maybe when this is over, I can come out and work for you. I’ll take minimum wage over maximum stress. It’ll probably save me a bundle in medical expenses.”

“But if you live more years, that’s going to cost as well, I hear retirement is very expensive, too.” Austin laughed. “You’ll be fine. I’m sure you’re worth at least twenty bucks an hour in an off-the-force position.”

“Seriously,” Lucy cut in. “Can I tell Kendall and Jimmy to go arrest Eve Zwart already?”

“It isn’t entirely his call,” Austin reminded her.

“That’s true.” Lucy paused to think. “Still, I’d like your consent.”

Eve Zwart was a Kitsap County resident—so that put her in Lucy’s territory. The case had strange jurisdictional overlaps, but it was clearly best for everyone involved to be on board with who they brought in and where.

“Absolutely,” Barker said, leaning forward. “But I’d like to interview her here. Get her lawyer on the phone, get your people to pick her up, whatever you need to do. But first thing tomorrow, we need to talk to her. This case is about to break wide open.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Lila Luna Lopez sat in front of her double monitor setup, eyes dancing across the screens as the latest batch of footage downloaded from the drones. She still couldn’t believe the show was continuing, despite the fact that one of its contestants had died during the first week of shooting. But that was Marty’s call, and Saffron’s, and there was no way she was going to screw this job up.

This editing gig was the chance of a lifetime for Lila. After years of working her way up from freelance projects and minor editing jobs, she had finally landed a major show that would give her real exposure. It was more footage than she’d ever handled—tree-mounted cameras capturing every angle of the wilderness, aerial drone footage swooping over the contestants as they navigated their challenges, and hours of interview footage with every cast member.

Pre-show interviews, candid moments, and dramatic interactions had to be built into a cohesive narrative that would grip viewers for weeks. The show wasn’t set to begin airing for about a month, but it was her job to assemble all the raw footage into something compelling. Every moment mattered, and she knew this project could either launch her career to the next level or send her right back to the grind of splicing together YouTube videos for thirty bucks an hour.

The most interesting contestant by far was Gunner Thompson, the supplement salesman and YouTuber. Despite the fact that most of the contestants wore long sleeves to protect their skin from the sun and the terrain, he insisted on wearing brightly-colored tank tops to show off his tanned muscles. In the footage she was reviewing now, Thompson was talking to himself about mental toughness while using a stick to try to dig bugs out of the ground.

He wasn’t likable—far from it. In fact, Lila had learned to loathe men like this during her time in Los Angeles. All ego, muscle, and self-promotion. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t interesting. And her job wasn’t to make the contestants likable, it was to make watching them addictive.

As she scanned through more footage, she heard something from outside her hotel room. Footsteps, laughter.

The production had taken over an entire twelve-room motel, and her second-floor room overlooked the parking lot. Steps from the lot led up to a long walkway that connected the six rooms on her floor. It could have been the interns Mary and Hector coming back from the bar—she knew they’d started sleeping together during the first week of production.

Lila sighed. She missed her own boyfriend. She had FaceTimed with him earlier in the day, watching him fall asleep while she downed her third Red Bull before getting back on her editing rig.

This was going to be an all-nighter.

Scanning another batch of drone footage, Lila found a moment that was pure reality-TV gold—or at least, the kind of moment that could make the show memorable. Gunner Thompson was relieving himself next to a tree when he suddenly turned to look at a deer, accidentally pissing on his own foot. Then, as if still hyped up on his own energy despite being on the show for a week, he punched the tree like it was some kind of bar fight and stared at his bloody hand in surprise.

“What a buffoon,” Lila muttered under her breath.

The police had questioned the guy, but she couldn’t believe he had anything to do with the death of the author. Honestly, she didn’t even think it was murder. She’d been responsible for pulling together some of the footage for the producers and the police, and she’d seen no evidence of anything nefarious.

Still, something about it nagged at her. She’d watched enough true crime shows to know that things didn’t always add up at first glance. And from what she’d read in the papers, Zwart’s estranged wife had an ax to grind.

She was going to be up all night anyway, so she decided to take another look at the footage from the day Zwart died. Maybe something from that morning could tell her something that would help solve the case.

And if she was able to do that, it could even be an even bigger break in her career than landing the show in the first place.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Molly’s was Austin’s kind of diner. Small and made out of an old railroad car, it was busier and more crowded than he usually enjoyed, but it had the feel of a joint you wanted to be in.

He took a sip of black coffee out of the overly thick mug, and coffee had rarely tasted so good. The bacon was thick too, as was the French toast. He hadn’t eaten this well in a while.

Molly herself seemed to be in her early sixties, but moved around the busy diner like she was forty. Plus, she had the mouth of a teenager. She’d been flirting with Austin since the minute he walked in with Lucy and Sheriff Barker, but Austin knew that didn’t mean much.

She seemed to be flirting with everyone in the diner. That was just her thing.

“How long has she run this place?” Austin asked Barker, nodding up at her as she refilled coffees behind the bar.

“She started as a waitress here when she was sixteen,” Barker said. “Bought it when she was thirty and has run it for thirty-something years.”

“She’s sixty?” Lucy asked, surprised.

“That’s what I was thinking,” Austin said.

Lucy shook her head. “She struck me as maybe early forties.”

“Working keeps you young,” Barker said. “Plus, she doesn’t have kids.”

“What do you mean?” Austin asked.

“Maybe working keeps you young if you love what you do,” Barker said, “but having kids makes you old. Fast.”

Austin smiled. “How many do you have?”

“Five,” Barker said, digging into his corned beef hash. “My wife and I have five children—Annie, Alexander, Arthur, Alice, and Andrea. Don’t ask about the ‘A’ thing. It’s from my wife’s side. Her name is Amanda. It’s just what they do in their family. She said I could pick the names as long as they all started with ‘A.’“

“Either of you have kids?” Barker asked between bites.

Austin shook his head, and Lucy said, “No,” but with a tentativeness that confirmed Austin’s suspicions that she and Jimmy were talking about it.

“Tell me about it,” Lucy said. “Tell me about having kids and being in law enforcement.”

Barker leaned back, wiping his mouth with a napkin, his eyes twinkling with the kind of weariness only a father of five could have.

“Think of it as pulling a double shift every day for the rest of your life. Law enforcement officer by day, overwhelmed dad by night. You’ll love it, but it might kill you.”

“Give us an example,” Lucy said. “Evidence.”

He smiled. “My youngest, Annie, was maybe four, and I was working a double shift, trying to catch this idiot who thought he could outrun the county police after robbing a gas station. Long story short, the guy crashes into a ditch, hops out, and takes off into the woods. So I’m there, chasing him through the trees, radio crackling in one hand, flashlight in the other, dodging branches like I’m in some action movie. Finally, we catch the guy, I’m covered in mud, and I think my day’s done. Wrong.”

Molly appeared to refill their coffee, winked at Austin, and said, “Barks telling the gas station mud story again?”

“Don’t spoil the ending,” Barker said.

She slid a paper check onto the table and was gone as fast as she’d come.

“I get home,” Barker continued, “and all five kids are bouncing off the walls. Turns out, my wife had promised them a backyard campout, but she got called into a late meeting. So here I am, too tired to shower, mud caked all over, and they’re waving flashlights around, pretending to be cops, and telling me they’re ‘hunting bad guys like Daddy.’ I couldn’t say no, right?”

He chuckled. “I’m still in my uniform, mind you, sitting in this flimsy little tent they’ve set up in the backyard, trying to tell them a bedtime story while they’re jumping on me. Suddenly, Annie decides she’s going to be the sheriff and starts giving everyone ‘orders.’ And before I know it, we’ve got a full-blown campfire interrogation happening. She’s demanding answers, asking me where the bad guys hide, if I’ve ever had to use handcuffs, if I’ve ever tasered someone—you know, the important questions to a four year old. Meanwhile, I’m so exhausted that I’m falling asleep sitting upright. But then, just when I’m about to give in and call it a night, Arthur—he was about seven at the time—looks up and says, ‘Daddy, you catch all the bad guys so we’re safe, right?’ And I look at him and realize, yeah, I do. I’m out there every day, running through mud, chasing idiots, but I do it because of them.”

Austin sipped his coffee.

Barker shook his head with a smile. “It’s chaos. It’s overwhelming. But it’s the best thing in the world. We’re put on this Earth to try hard and work hard and love harder, and let me tell you, nothing makes you work harder and love harder than being a dad and a cop at the same time. You’re always on duty, but it’s worth it.” He laughed. “Even if you have to sleep upright in a tent while still wearing your badge.”

Lucy got a strange look on her face—a look Austin recognized. She twirled a single finger through her curly red hair, her eyes glazing over.

“What?” Austin asked.

She didn’t respond.

“Lucy-O-lemme-in-on-the-secret,” he prodded.

Still nothing from Lucy, and Sheriff Barker was looking back and forth between them, wondering what the heck was going on.

Then, suddenly, Lucy looked at Austin. “Giving up alcohol won’t be a big deal for me if I ever get pregnant. But I think for Eve Zwart, it would be. When Jimmy told me her alibi was a lie, he also told me that she was at that bar every night until a couple months ago. The owner had even been wondering why she didn’t come around any more. What does that say to you?”

Austin looked at Barker, who shrugged.

“You got me,” Austin said.

“During the video interview,” Lucy continued, “did you notice anything?”

They both shook their heads.

“You two are clueless about women.” She shook her head. “Eve kept excusing herself to use the bathroom.”

Austin was getting her implication. “You think Eve Zwart is pregnant?”

“I do and⁠—”

Before Lucy could finish his question, the little bell on the glass door rang, and Austin looked up to see Sarah, Barker’s assistant, hurrying in. She leaned in close to Barker and whispered something in his ear. Austin watched Barker’s face change.

“Damn it,” Barker muttered. “Damn it all.”

Just as quickly as she’d come in, Sarah left.

Barker stood, looking weary. “We need to go pick up Mrs. Zwart for the interview, but it turns out we’re going to have another one as well. In the search of Justin Jones’s garage, they found a lot more than surveillance stuff. They found weapons. Explosives. He always struck me as a guy who had strong feelings and violent tendencies. I didn’t think he was capable of any real violence. I may have been wrong.”

“Is he still around?” Lucy asked.

Barker’s face showed his irritation. “I may have been wrong about his intentions, but I was right that he wouldn’t run. Sarah already sent a couple uniformed officers over to his place. He gave himself right up. Says he can explain everything.”

“Well, I’d love to hear this story,” Lucy said.

Barker let out a long, weary sigh. “As much as I’ve loved this job, I can’t wait ‘til I retire. I really can’t. Let’s go.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Mill City had only two places to stay, and one of them was taken up by the crew of the show. The other was a small bed and breakfast in an old house on the edge of town, where Lucy and Austin were staying.

As Austin led Lucy up the stone walkway toward the entrance, he paused. “You really think you and Jimmy are going to have kids?”

“We’ve been trying,” Lucy said. “Actually, I’m getting a little bit worried. I’m surprised our efforts haven’t worked yet.”

“Please.” Austin held up both hands. “Don’t fill me in on the details.”

“Don’t worry,” she replied. “I won’t.”

He was about to open the door, but hesitated for a moment. “All joking aside, I think you and Jimmy will be good parents. As much as we rib Jimmy, the guy has a heart of gold. He’d run through fire for you. Catch a bullet for you. And I know he’d do the same for the kids you make together.”

“True,” Lucy joked, “he’d run through fire, but he may have been the one who set the fire that burned the house down. The cheesy-toasts he likes to make in the pop-up toaster have nearly incinerated us twice now.”

“That’s an easy fix,” Austin said. “You get rid of his pop-up toaster, I’ll be purchasing a toaster-oven for your baby shower gift. That should be safer for everyone.”

“Even so, someone had better be gifting a fire extinguisher as well.” She smiled and opened the door.

To their dismay, Eve Zwart’s lawyer was waiting for them in the lobby.

“This harassment ends today,” he said, his face stern.

“Good morning to you, too,” Austin said. “Is Mrs. Zwart here?”

“Yes,” the lawyer replied, “but she’s going by her maiden name now. Firestone. Eve Firestone.”

“She can go by whatever name she wants,” Lucy said, “as long as she’s honest with us, we don’t care what she wants us to call her.”

Eve appeared behind them, holding a cup of coffee. “The coffee in this place sucks,” she said. “The coffee in this town stinks, and the coffee in Oregon stinks. My husband may have been right about America. Maybe the problem is that America stinks.”

“Lovely to see you again, Miss Firestone,” Lucy said. She tilted her head slightly, eyeing Eve carefully. He knew she was about to attempt something, but he didn’t know what.

“It’s probably because it’s decaf,” Lucy said. “Decaf always tastes different. You know, weaker.”

Eve’s eyes darted to the left, and she stepped back, almost defensively. “How did you know it was decaf?”

“Well, you’re pregnant, correct?”

Eve shook her head. “How? What? No,” she stammered. “I mean... what? No.”

Lucy put her hands on her hips, not saying a word, just staring at Eve, boring a hole through her forehead. But it wasn’t a mean look, it was a silent challenge, letting her lie sit there. Austin watched as Eve’s face unraveled before them.

“Why would you lie about being pregnant?” Austin asked.

The lawyer stepped between them, clearly shaken. It was obvious he hadn’t known she was pregnant either. As far as Austin could tell, she wasn’t showing, and his client likely hadn’t told him. Why would she when he couldn’t even remember her name? Normally, it was none of their business if a witness or suspect was pregnant, but in this case, it could have serious implications, although Austin wasn’t yet certain what those were.

Eve didn’t answer, just folded her arms stubbornly and allowed Austin and Lucy to lead her and her lawyer out to the car. Austin hopped into the passenger seat, letting Lucy drive. He could always tell when she was upset—her freckled cheeks grew slightly red, and her hands gripped the steering wheel a little tighter than usual.

She had made her thoughts plain to Austin. In Lucy’s mind, it seemed clear: Eve was the killer. Austin wasn’t as sure of her guilt, but it was certainly starting to look that way.

Perhaps it was her recent marriage to Jimmy, or the fact that they were thinking about having children that pushed Lucy over the edge. She didn’t seem willing to wait until they got back to the sheriff’s office to start the questioning. But instead of asking questions, Lucy simply laid out the facts, her tone flat and direct.

“I’d like to give you some things to think about as we drive over,” Lucy began. “We know your first alibi was a lie, as was your second. You’ve already admitted to having an affair. You hated your husband’s guts. We know you had a financial incentive to kill him. And we also know you’re pregnant, probably from the affair.”

Suddenly, Lucy rolled down all the windows and a cool breeze filled the car, carrying the scent of pine trees. “Smell that?” she asked, her voice calm, but sharp. “That’s the smell of freedom. Enjoy it. Because I think you might be having your baby behind bars.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Eve Zwart, now Eve “Firestone,” sat in the little interrogation room with her lawyer as Austin huddled in the hallway with Lucy and Sheriff Barker.

“Lucy, I’m thinking you should take the lead on this one,” Barker said. “Woman to woman kind of thing.”

“Gladly,” Lucy replied. “I don’t know what it is about this woman, but she really rubs me the wrong way.”

“Married to a guy like her husband, I can hardly blame her for how she turned out,” Barker said.

Lucy frowned. “I can’t believe you’re sticking up for her.”

Austin shook his head. “I can’t either.”

“It’s a chicken and egg thing,” Barker said, “Honestly can’t decide which one of them is worse.”

“Well, if she killed him,” Lucy said, “it’s her.”

“Fair point,” Austin agreed.

Shifting focus, Barker said, “I’ve got Justin Jones in the other room. He’s agreed to chat, and he’s still a little pickled from last night. I want to question him before he sobers up fully. Austin, I’ll leave it to your discretion to go room to room. Feel free to chime in on either interrogation as necessary.”

Austin nodded. He liked being in this position. He was fine leading an interview or interrogation when necessary, but he was more comfortable sitting back, watching others work, and piecing things together in his mind.

Sy had told him that one of the things she liked about him was that he was an odd mix of passive and active. He’d never thought about it himself—he just was who he was. But the way Sy had said hit home. He’d never been shy about kicking in a door when necessary, but it didn’t give him the high it gave some other officers and detectives. For him, the only thing that mattered was solving the case. Sometimes that required passivity—letting the suspect hang themselves—and sometimes it required action.

As Sheriff Barker broke off to the little room on the right of the hallway and Lucy to the little room on the left, Austin felt something strange. It was a sensation he’d only experienced once or twice before. It wasn’t exactly a taste, but more of a texture, punctuated by little explosions of flavor. It was as though his mouth was filled with a viscous black liquid—neutral, almost flavorless—but then little pings of cinnamon, cayenne, lemon, or soy sauce would appear and disappear. It felt like staring into a vast night sky of pure black, occasionally catching the twinkling of a star or the flash of a planet.

He didn’t fully understand it, but it meant it was time to take everything in, allow the whole case and all the characters to flow through him, and see what lit up inside him.

Austin followed Lucy into the room, and she didn’t waste a second, picking up right where she’d left off. “I should tell you before we really begin,” Lucy said, standing by the door, not even bothering to sit down. “Well, I guess we are beginning now, but before I sit down—because I don’t have time to waste—I should tell you that you are the lead suspect in the murder of David Diedrick Zwart, your estranged husband.” Lucy’s eyes locked onto Eve’s, her tone piercing. “You lied about your alibi, you lied about being pregnant, and I think I know why you did and what happened. I also think that when we pull your Amazon shopping history, we’re going to find a Hudson Bay blanket there, one that—for some reason—you took to the forest when you went there to kill your husband. So how about, before I waste any more breath, or my friend here wastes any of his breath, or your lawyer wastes any of his breath and your money, how about you just tell us how you did it and why you did it? And maybe—just maybe—we can all kick back and go to that lovely little traincar diner for lunch. I hear they make a mean BLT.”

Lucy finally sat down, her gaze never leaving Eve’s face.

Eve opened her mouth as if ready to speak, but her lawyer did something Austin had actually never seen from a lawyer in real life. He physically put his hand over her mouth.

“I need to speak with my client alone.”

Lucy smirked. She had clearly gotten to them, and it had only been sixty seconds.

“I’ll wait in the hall for five minutes,” she said, and with that, she walked out.

Austin joined Sheriff Barker in the room with Justin Jones. Leaning against the wall, arms folded, he took in the scene. For the first time, Jones looked scared. It was as though years of toughness, bravado, drinking, and fighting had caught up with him, and the little boy that had been locked inside all along had taken over.

“Justin,” Barker said, “how long have I known you?”

Jones didn’t look up. “Since I was a little kid. You were locking up my dad before I can remember and you locked him up even more times after I could.”

“I did indeed,” Barker said. “I don’t much buy into psychology, but there’s one concept that’s been resonating with me lately. I first heard about it at a local tribal meeting, but it turns out it’s something neuroscientists and others are thinking about. It’s called generational trauma. Do you know what that is?”

Jones looked up, his eyes weary and sad, but he didn’t say anything.

“Generational trauma,” Barker explained, “is the idea that the pain and struggles from one generation can be passed down to the next, even if they never went through the same experiences. It’s more than just what you saw growing up—it’s in the way your parents, or even your grandparents, reacted to the world. Their fear, their anger, their hardships—they get ingrained in you, even if you don’t understand why. It’s like a shadow you carry with you, and it influences how you live, how you make decisions, and how you handle pressure. Some people say it’s passed down in stories, others say it’s in the blood, in DNA, but either way, it’s there, shaping you whether you want it or not. Hurt people hurt people. They don’t intend to but if they don’t figure out how to heal, deeply heal themselves, they can and do.”

Barker paused, watching Justin carefully, then continued. “So I’ve been thinking, maybe we’ve all been carrying a lot more than we realize. I fought with the bottle, too, but I got lucky. Crashed into a tree when I was twenty. I had twelve beers at a party, maybe more.” He shook his head. “My dad decided not to pull any strings to get me off. He could have, but he didn’t. Left me in jail for a week. And I haven’t had a drink since. Could have easily crashed into a pedestrian. If I had, I might still be in prison. A lot of what happens is luck. Luck of the day-to-day and luck of where we come from. I know you’ve been struggling your whole life, and I know your dad struggled even more. And I know you have a little boy. And I think this is your chance to break the cycle of generational trauma once and for all. To set your boy up for a better life. Heal yourself, raise a healthy boy. Just tell me what happened. Tell me what you were actually planning. The weapons we found—you already know you can go away for a long time for that, right? You may die in prison, and I promise that doesn’t give me any joy in this moment. Help me out, and no matter what happens to you, I’ll make sure your boy is taken care of.”

Austin found himself close to tears. But he was also deeply impressed. Sheriff Barker was speaking genuinely, telling the truth.

But he’d angled it in such a way that it had moved the giant man to tears. Jones looked up, wiping his eyes. “I’ll tell you everything.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Lila hadn’t slept for thirty-six hours. But that was okay. Not only had she finished all of the preliminary editing she was required to do, she’d stumbled on something else.

She wasn’t sure if it was important or not, but it was definitely something people would be interested in. Now, as she put the finishing touches on the video, she let herself imagine the praise she would receive from the team when they saw it.

She knew enough about reality shows to know that a dead contestant would be a huge story. It already was, and anticipation for a new season of Alone in the Forest had never been higher. But if the show could solve the case as well, that would be unprecedented.

She pressed play on the video again.

David Dierdrick Zwart: “It’s just not going to work.”

Unknown Male: “At this point, it has to work.”

David Dierdrick Zwart: “Did you bring it?”

Unknown Male: [unintelligible]

David Dierdrick Zwart: “Why wouldn’t she have called?”

Unknown Male: “Might not want to leave a phone trail, or maybe there’s no signal. Check again.”

David Dierdrick Zwart: “I checked.”

Unknown Male: “Check again.”

David Dierdrick Zwart: “It doesn’t make sense. Why would she wait until now?”

Unknown Male: “Could be stalling. Could be something else.”

David Dierdrick Zwart: “We don’t have time for this—she was supposed to be here.”

Unknown Male: “Well, she’s not. What do you want me to do about it?”

David Dierdrick Zwart: “I don’t know. I’m just saying, if this goes wrong, it’s on both of us.”

Unknown Male: “It won’t go wrong if you stick to the plan. You’re just overthinking it.”

David Dierdrick Zwart: “Overthinking it? This is my life on the line!”

Unknown Male: “We’re all in this, David. You’re not the only one risking something.”

David Dierdrick Zwart: “I know. I know... but she should’ve been here by now. What’s next?”

Unknown Male: “We adapt. That’s all we can do.”

Lila paused the video, her pulse quickening.

What exactly were they talking about? It could be anything—an argument about the show, some last-minute change of plans, or something much darker.

This audio had been captured by a stationary tree camera set up near a creek, and captured about an hour before David’s death. The program she used to review video hadn’t caught it at first, but because she was—at least in her own mind—a genius, she’d constructed a program that could detect pings of human audio from hundreds of hours of otherwise useless footage.

What she didn’t know was who the other voice belonged to. Despite the fact that it was muffled and partially covered by the sound of the creek, she’d been able to rule out half of the male contestants on the show. The issue was that there was no video to go with the audio.

She heard footsteps on the walkway outside her door and tensed momentarily. But she was expecting him. She didn’t know how Saffron would use this footage, but she knew he’d be proud of her. Even if this wasn’t as important as she thought, perhaps showing a little initiative would at least get her a raise.

There was a knock at the door.

“Come in, Mr. Blue,” she called, not looking up from her screen.

She clicked the video to make it full screen. There was something haunting about a full screen of a basically static video of dark woods with this argument going on hundreds of yards away, captured by a long-range microphone.

A shadow appeared on her monitor. “Turn off your editing rig,” a voice said, but it wasn’t Saffron’s voice.

Turning around in her chair, it struck her: The voice on the video was the same voice as the one in her room. And he didn’t look pleased.

“Oh my God,” she whispered. “Dios mío.”

“You shouldn’t be looking at that.”

“Dios mío,” she repeated. “Dios mío.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Justin Jones stared at the floor for a long time before he spoke. When he finally did, his voice was rough, his words short, stilted.

“When my boy was born, something... something broke in me. People, they say kids make you better. Change you. But not me. It was like... something snapped inside.”

He rubbed his hands together, as if trying to feel them again. His eyes darted around the room, never landing anywhere for too long.

“I’ve been fighting my whole life. For the land, the water, the trees. I thought that was it. Thought that was my purpose. Then... then I had a kid. And I don’t know, man. All the stuff my dad went through. My granddad. It just... it all came out of me. Like I couldn’t keep it in anymore. The anger, the fear... all of it. Just became a fountain of rage that spewed from my chest.”

He paused, his breath heavy, his hands shaking.

“I got the weapons because I thought... I thought I’d need ‘em. Thought I was protecting something. But I wasn’t. I wasn’t protecting anything. I was making it worse.” He paused like he was done, then continued, his voice now angry, even bitter. “I was sick of it—people being in the forest all the time. Kids out there, filming everything, looking for Sasquatch like it’s a joke. People filming television shows, lighting fires where they shouldn’t, leaving beer cans and trash. I couldn’t take it anymore. That forest isn’t theirs any more than the air is. It’s ours. It’s the earth’s.” He clenched his fists, his knuckles white. “I had this plan. You don’t know... you don’t know what it’s like to feel this... this thing inside you, telling you to destroy. I wanted to protect the earth, but I... I was gonna kill them.” He looked up, finally looking straight at Sheriff Barker, then at Austin. “All of them.”

Barker leaned in, silent, letting the words hang.

“I don’t know what happened. But I was going to kill everyone on that show. Everyone. The earth... she needs to be protected.”

Sheriff Barker walked over and put a hand on Justin’s shoulder. “But you didn’t, did you?” There were tears in Barker’s eyes as well.

Jones said nothing, just let the tears come.

“No,” Austin said, “he didn’t.”

Austin had been silent the entire time, just sitting there in his sea of blackness, his endless sea of nothingness. But then something pinged within him. Justin Jones was telling the truth. He’d never been more sure of anything in his life, in fact. Jones had wanted to kill everyone on the show. Maybe he even would have.

But Austin was also sure that Jones hadn’t killed David Dierdrick Zwart.

And there was something else.

Jones had said something—something that sparked in Austin’s mind like the distant flare of a star in a faraway galaxy. The kids had been filming everything.

Chloe and Henry and Grayson.

The kids had been filming everything.

The silence that followed Justin Jones’s confession was heavy, and Austin excused himself. Standing out in the hallway, he took a couple deep breaths. One of the things most people didn’t understand about being a cop—about being a detective—was that things usually weren’t black and white. Especially in a small town like this, where the sheriff knew everyone, and in many cases had known them since they were little children.

On television, the bad guys were usually very bad, and the good guys very good. There was rarely much gray area. But putting himself in Sheriff Barker’s position, Austin could understand the tears. The older Austin got, the more he realized that things were never as simple as they seemed at first. Barker had lived in this town his whole life, seeing the good, the bad, and the ugly. He knew enough about people to know they had reasons for what they did—not good ones usually, but reasons nonetheless. Sitting in front of a giant, violent, broken, alcoholic man, terminally ill man in tears would make even the most hardened detective slow down a little and consider the bigger picture.

Justin Jones would likely be going to prison for the admission he just made. There was no way Sheriff Barker would let him go again. He had plotted multiple murders, and if David Dierdrick Zwart hadn’t died, it was possible Jones would have carried them out.

But that didn’t make the situation any less of a tragedy.

Austin ducked back into the room where Lucy was interrogating Eve Firestone, catching her mid-question.

“…think we wouldn’t figure it out?” she was asking.

“I didn’t think you would care to find out,” Eve replied.

“I don’t want you to waste any more of your time,” Eve’s lawyer chimed in. He took a folder out of a brown briefcase and slid it across the table. “We are officially willing to admit to that Eve Firestone was forgetful when giving you her alibi. Both her alibis.”

“She lied,” Lucy corrected.

He closed his briefcase and set it back on the floor. “This is her true alibi. She hoped it wouldn’t be necessary, as she’s a very private person, and we didn’t trust you not to leak this to the press. But it’s the truth. And we would like to appeal to your decency. We hope the department is willing to keep this information private.”

Austin sat down next to Lucy, who grabbed the folder and began slowly looking through the papers inside. They appeared to be intake records and detailed medical findings from a fertility and birthing clinic in Seattle.

Eve leaned back in the chair, crossing her arms, her eyes flicking between Lucy and Austin. She sighed, then leaned forward, her voice low. “I didn’t tell you where I was because I was at a private clinic. A high-risk pregnancy clinic. I’m in my forties, and that comes with... complications. My sister had three miscarriages, and she’s younger than me. You think I wanted anyone to know? Especially him?” She spat the last word, her disgust with her estranged husband clear. “He didn’t even want kids. So yeah, when I got pregnant I went to the clinic. Thirty-six hours, doctors running every test they could think of because I didn’t want to lose this baby. It’s not just my age. It’s... it’s everything. And, yes, before you ask, the baby is from the affair. There, I said it. You happy now?”

Her tone sharpened, eyes narrowing, daring them to judge her. “I didn’t tell you because I knew you’d leak it. Or use it. You don’t care about the truth—you care about making your case stick. I know how this works. The moment that detail hits the press, it’s over for me. I’ll be canceled, or whatever, and I’m working on a book deal of my own. Thinking about calling it Married to A-Hole. But the truth is, this baby’s the only thing I have left that’s mine.” Her lips curled into a sneer. “And you know why else I didn’t tell you? Because I don’t want you to solve his murder. That bastard doesn’t deserve justice. Whoever killed him did me a favor. So, no, I didn’t kill him. But I’ll be damned before helping you figure out who did.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Later that afternoon, Austin walked alone down a little forest trail behind the bed and breakfast. Fall was on its way, and the air had grown cold.

The forest felt ancient, its towering Douglas firs and moss-draped maples casting long, deep shadows across the narrow trail. The sound of leaves crunching underfoot was muffled by the soft, damp earth, while the distant gurgle of a creek played faintly in the background. Above, a crow’s caw pierced the stillness. The air smelled of wet bark, cedar, and the first hints of decay as autumn crept in.

After the interviews, Lucy had called the clinic and confirmed Eve’s alibi. She’d been nowhere in the area when her husband died. And, as far as Austin was concerned, Justin Jones was no longer a suspect. At least not in the murder of David Dierdrick Zwart.

Austin had pressed Sheriff Barker to bring in Grayson, Chloe, and Henry to ask whether they could look through their phones for any possible video evidence. Austin didn’t know if he believed they were concealing something or if they just hadn’t mentioned it. Either way, there could well be something on those phones. Barker had agreed, but only after the kids got out of school. He expected to hear from him soon.

His phone vibrated in his pocket, and he pulled it out, pleased to see Sy’s name on the caller ID. He only had one bar, but sometimes that was enough for a conversation.

“Hey there,” he said, picking up.

“Hey,” Sy said. “I’ve got some tea.”

“Are you saying we’re cutting back on wine?” Austin asked.

“No, it’s not that kind of tea. It’s tea about your work.”

“What does tea have to do with my work?” Austin was confused. “Oh, for Mrs. Zwart I mean Miss Firestone? You heard she doesn’t like the coffee here in America? That’s funny, you got tea to bribe her? But we already got her to talk.”

“I don’t mean tea like black or herbal. What are you talking about? Doesn’t like coffee in America?”

“Wait, what are you talking about?” Austin asked.

“I have some tea. It’s what people under thirty say when they want to gossip. Tea stands for the letter “T,” which stands for truth, and the whole thing also references the ritual of sitting together and gossiping over a shared pot of tea.”

Austin looked up at the branches of a tree. “Oh, I get it now. But we already know the gossip, too. The rumors are true, Miss Firestone is pregnant.”

“That’s not the tea I’m serving. But funnily enough, it’s closer.”

“For the love of all that is punishable, just spill the tea already!” Austin mocked impatience. “Am I getting it right? Is that the way people under thirty say it?”

“I’m not sure.” Sy laughed. “Lucy and Jimmy are going to have a kid. That’s the tea I’m hearing. At least they’re trying to.”

“I know that, too,” Austin said. “I heard from Lucy. How did you hear?”

“I was just at the beach with Kendall. She brought her dog over, and we took Ralph and Run to play. How’s the case going?” Sy asked.

“Don’t ask,” Austin said. “Being in this little town makes me realize that while I was in New York City with a million people’s stories, I could live there without really having to know any of them. The sheriff here, Barker, knows everyone and everything about his town, and he cares deeply and has served them for years and he lives with the pain of it. It’s too much, it’s like it’s killing him.”

“He holds too many people in his heart and it’s killing him but in the city you didn’t have to hold any. Both paths sound rough. Maybe you could use a good Cabernet.”

Austin laughed. “I probably could.” He took a deep breath, looking out at the patches of blue filling in the holes in the canopy of green above him.

“So, in this story you would be Gilgamesh and Barker’s Enkidu?” Sy asked.

“Wait,” Austin interrupted, “how are you referring to the Epic of Gilgamesh?”

Sy chuckled. “Andy. I think he’s passing out copies to anyone who comes by. I saw you reading it so…”

“Did you like it? I’m sorry, I interrupted… how am I Gilgamesh?”

“Gilgamesh has his best friend, Enkidu—Enkidu is this wild man who learns how to be a person by watching how other people live, he has them teach him about life and he learns to care for others.”

“I remember, he’s the guy that spent seven days making love to a woman,” Austin added.

“That part, too.” Sy laughed. “Anyway, remember how Enkidu helps Gilgamesh pursue his lofty goals but ends up losing his own in the process? That’s like Barker, helping others to his own detriment.”

“Right,” Austin said.

“Then poor Gilgamesh spends an eternity in a state of depression mourning his friend all the while searching, even though he’s so miserable, for a path to immortality.” Sy stopped and there was silence. “See?”

“See what?” Austin asked.

“Anyway, the book is kinda overrated, but I guess it’s historically important,” Sy said, brushing off his question.

“I want you to finish the thought. How am I Gilgamesh?”

“You’re not exactly,” Sy said. “It’s just that you can’t lay your life on the line for someone else’s story like Enkidu did for Gilgamesh. If you aren’t living your life, you might find yourself standing in front of a bull you weren’t meant to fight, then you’re dead. But there also wasn’t much worth in Gilgamesh’s life once it was devoid of the mess and wildness that his relationship with Enkidu gave him. What would it matter how long he lived if there was no joy?”

“I see what you mean about Barker. He’s solving everyone else’s problems and neglecting his own. I get that,” Austin said. “Anyway, I’m not trying to live forever.”

“No, but I think you might have lived a long time without joy and that can feel like forever.”

“It can.” He smiled slightly.

“I think the whole message is,” Sy continued, “you can’t live for others and you can’t live for just yourself. You have to find your role and do that. I think you’re at a late-story Gilgamesh life point. Gilgamesh spends a long time wandering until he learns he can’t live forever and then there’s that snake that ruins his chances to regain his youth by eating his immortality flower. He doesn’t find contentment until he goes back home. He realizes that what gives his life meaning and purpose is his contribution to his community.”

“I’ll be back to the community soon enough,” he said. “Maybe I should take your advice, have the Cabernet, and just... breathe.”

“You remember the character Siduri?” Sy asked.

Austin’s phone buzzed. “Getting a call, talk soon…”

“Okay bye,” Sy ended the call before Austin. He appreciated that Sy always supported him to do what he needed. She was never insecure with him.

“Hello,” Austin said.

It was a number he didn’t recognize, but it was a local area code, so he wasn’t surprised to hear Sheriff Barker’s voice when he answered.

“Where are you?” Barker asked.

“Near the B&B, just walking in the woods,” Austin replied.

“Grab Lucy and meet me at the office, ASAP.” Barker let out a weary sigh.

“What’s up?”

“A body was found. Out in the wilderness. And this one is definitely a murder.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

The walk back to the bed and breakfast had been hell. The walk through the lobby was worse.

Eve and her lawyer were there, in the process of checking out. Austin didn’t know how, but somehow they had heard about the murder—maybe Eve knew someone on set or perhaps word had just gotten around town. But the way the lawyer looked at him—smugly happy that Austin had screwed up when he should have been sad to learn that a young girl had been murdered—made Austin’s blood boil.

And as Austin walked by her, Eve said the thing every detective hopes never to hear. “If you hadn’t wasted so much time on me, maybe you could have stopped it.”

Gritting his teeth, he found Lucy in her room and told her the news. She just shook her head, grabbed the car keys, and headed to the car. They drove in silence.

Perhaps they should have been discussing the case, but Austin knew Lucy shared his agony over their failure to solve it. It is an unspoken rule that if the drive is under half an hour, you don’t speculate before you get to the body. At least as far as Austin was concerned, he had to pay his respects, inspect the body, then see if this death had been a cost of his own failure before taking a deep breath and getting back to work.

Sheriff Barker met them in the parking lot of the park, his head down, staring at his phone. Without looking up, he said, “Just got off the phone with the young woman’s family. They have an officer with them who delivered the news, but they wanted to speak with an officer they knew, and that’s me. That family Immigrated from Mexico in 1990, worked their asses off to send their daughter to UCLA. Couldn’t have been prouder. They wanted to give her everything and now...” He shook his head.

He didn’t need to say anything else. There was nothing left to say. Lucy finally broke the silence.

“She was a video editor on the show?”

“Yeah. Lila,” Barker said, his voice like gravel.

“Any chance this isn’t related to our investigation? Boyfriend or something?” Lucy was right to ask, but even she didn’t believe it.

Barker said, “She didn’t know anyone out here. Only been here three weeks. Was staying in the motel. The motel doesn’t have security cameras in the parking lot or the walkway. I talked to a couple people she was friendly with on the crew, but so far no signs that this is personal or a robbery, or a drug deal gone wrong, or anything like that.” He began walking into the woods. “It’s about a hundred yards down this way.”

They trudged down the trail in silence and found a thick stand of trees, which had been cordoned off with police tape. “Young lady was walking her dog,” Barker explained, “like she did every day down this trail. Dog found the body.”

“This is our medical examiner, Linda. I’ll let her take it from here.”

“The body is that of a young Latina female, approximately twenty-three years old,” Linda said, her voice steady but tired as she worked.

Austin watched over the sheriff’s shoulder, taking in the scene. The dense canopy of trees cast shifting shadows across the clearing, the rustle of leaves a constant reminder of the wilderness surrounding them.

“Her skin showed early signs of postmortem changes consistent with death occurring within the last twenty-four hours. There were no signs of prolonged exposure to the elements.”

Austin noticed the unnatural angle of her limbs, as if she had fallen or been placed hastily.

Linda continued, “Minimal decomposition is present. Rigor mortis is still partially set, which suggests she has been deceased for less than a day.”

Austin’s gaze drifted to her face, framed by black hair matted with dirt. The examiner pointed to her forearm, where a tattoo of a digital circuit board stood out against her skin. “This distinctive tattoo may indicate expertise in computer work,” Linda noted.

“She was a digital video editor,” Barker said.

Linda nodded as though making a mental note.

Austin observed bruising on her knuckles, suggesting that a struggle had taken place before her death. “There was a struggle,” he said.

Linda agreed. “Multiple fresh contusions and lacerations indicate she was involved in a violent altercation shortly before she died.”

Austin stood quietly for a moment, processing the medical examiner’s report, his mind running through the details. He cleared his throat, breaking the silence. “Rigor mortis partially set… less than twenty-four hours dead. So, we know this wasn’t someone just dumping a body from days ago. She was killed recently. Whoever did this was either in a hurry or didn’t care about hiding her well. The loose soil suggests the killer didn’t have the time—or maybe the nerve—to bury her properly.”

He glanced down at the young woman’s knuckles, the bruises fresh. “Those bruises on her hands… that tells me she fought back, hard. There was a struggle, so this was probably not premeditated. More like an argument that escalated, or she caught the killer off guard.”

His eyes scanned her face, the tangled black hair, and the scattered leaves around her body. “And the placement of the body—just off the trail, not far from where people walk their dogs. The killer didn’t take her deep into the woods, didn’t plan this out long in advance. This was sloppy, rushed. They were nervous, probably scared of being caught. If this were about power or control, we’d see more deliberate actions. But this? This feels like panic.”

“Like part of a cover-up,” Lucy added.

Austin crouched, examining her tattoo and her bright red fingernails. “Skin, dirt, something. Under the nails.”

“We’ll get it tested,” Barker said.

Austin stood. “Whoever killed her wasn’t thinking straight. And if we move on them fast, they’ll still be scrambling. We’ve got a window before they start covering their tracks.”

Lucy nodded. “Or before they vanish for good.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

Leaving the medical examiner to finish her work, Austin followed Sheriff Barker and Lucy back toward the parking lot.

“I’ve got thoughts of my own,” Barker said. “But what are your initial impressions?”

Austin followed his eyes to Lucy, whose face was twisted in disgust. “Not only have we been on the wrong track this whole time,” she said, “but it led to this girl getting killed. Obviously, you shut the show down first.”

“That’s my next step,” Barker said, his voice hard.

“Someone is covering something up,” Lucy continued. “That means, in another sense, we’ve been on the right track the whole time. We already knew this wasn’t likely an accident, but now we know it for sure.” She let out a long breath. “The director, the producer, bring them in. Anyone in any adjoining rooms at the motel. Bring them in.”

Barker held up a finger. “On that already. I’ve got officers heading over there right now.”

“This struggle was violent,” Austin said. “Someone heard something. She left a mark on someone.”

“The walls aren’t especially thick at that place,” Barker replied.

“Obviously,” Austin added. “Her cell phone. Her computers. Anything she was working on. Maybe she was actually involved in whatever happened with Zwart, or maybe she found something she wasn’t supposed to find in the footage.”

“That’s exactly where my head was at,” Barker said, “but what?”

Austin leaned against a tree and ran the tip of his boot through the dirt, thinking.

“I don’t know what,” Austin said, “but I’d like your permission to go get those teenagers out of school. I think they know more than they’ve let on, and I think Chloe especially wants to tell us.”

Barker nodded. “I’ll call the principal, tell them you’re on your way. Meanwhile, I’ll head back to the station and start questioning... well, everyone.”

Lucy said, “I’ll go with you, Jack. I want to chat with the director and producer again, if you don’t mind.”

Austin turned to leave, then stopped himself. “Chloe. What’s her story at home?”

Sheriff Barker let out a long sigh. “Nothing more than your everyday sort of tragedy.”

The high school sat on the edge of town, a small, unassuming building surrounded by stretches of forest. Its brick facade was worn from years of Oregon rain, moss clinging to the corners where the sun never quite reached. A faded sign out front read “County High School,” and behind it, the dull clamor of student life hummed through the air.

Lunch hour was in full swing as kids gathered at picnic tables in the courtyard, some sitting on the low stone walls that bordered the grassy area. The leaves of the nearby maples had already begun to turn, their brilliant reds and oranges standing out against the evergreens that loomed in the background.

As Austin stepped out of the car, he spotted Grayson and Chloe standing along the fence, talking to someone whose back was to Austin.

As he got closer, Austin could hear what the man was saying. “I know you’re hiding the money. I know it. You little slut.”

“Don’t call her that,” Grayson protested, his voice shaking as he tried to put his arm around Chloe to console her, but she pushed him away.

“I earned that money babysitting,” Chloe insisted, her voice breaking.

Austin approached from behind and realized right away that this must be Chloe’s father. The man’s face was red with anger. “You live in my house,” he growled. “You babysit in my house. I’m entitled to that money.”

Austin saw Chloe clench her fists, trying to hold it together, but then the tears came. She reached into her pocket and pulled out two crumpled twenty-dollar bills, her hands trembling. She was about to hand them through the fence when Austin stepped in.

He slid into the small space between the man and the fence. “Can I help you?” Austin asked, his calm voice concealing a well of self-righteous anger.

“Who the hell are you?” the man barked.

“I’m someone who doesn’t appreciate hearing a grown man insult and threaten his daughter while she’s on her lunch break.”

Without hesitation, the man swung at Austin. But Austin easily sidestepped the punch, and the man’s fist slammed into the fence with a loud clang.

Austin twisted the man’s wrist behind his back and shoved his face against the chain link fence. “That was a mistake.”

“Don’t,” Chloe cried out. “That’s my dad.”

“It’s okay,” Austin said. “I’m not going to hurt him.”

Slowly, he relaxed the pressure on the man’s wrist and pushed him away.

“You’re not going to swing at me again. Are you?” Austin asked.

The man scowled, rubbing his wrist. The metal fence rattled slightly in the breeze.

“I was just protecting my daughter,” he muttered.

“Mr…” Austin prompted.

“Jakes,” he grunted. “Brent Jakes.”

“Mr. Jakes,” Austin said slowly. “We’re investigating a murder, helping out the sheriff’s department. And lucky for you I’m in a hurry or this might have ended very differently for you. Walk away now, and later you’ll be getting a visit from Sheriff Barker.” He stepped forward, his face quivering with rage. “Understood?”

The man held up both hands and stepped backward. Austin’s fists tightened, but he kept his composure. There were bigger things to deal with right now. “I’m going to give you five seconds to walk away,” Austin said, his voice even, “and that’s four and a half more than I want to give you.”

Brent Jakes shot a look at his daughter. “I’ll see you after school,” he spat, before turning and leaving.

Austin noted the threat but quickly pivoted back to the teens. “Chloe, I know this is tough, but I need you to pull it together. I know you have more videos of that day, and I need to see all of them. Right now. Your principal already knows. Head to the office and then meet us at the main entrance.”

Austin sat on the steps of the high school, Chloe’s phone in hand, thumbing through videos one by one. The footage seemed endless—trees swaying in the wind, birds chirping, and an occasional rustling in the brush. Most of the clips showed the two boys, Grayson and Henry on their long, meandering walks through the woods, the camera swerving back and forth, searching for something that wasn’t there.

Twenty minutes passed, then thirty. It was mostly the same—shots of the dense woods near Opal Creek, shaky camera work, and the odd rustle of branches that always ended up being nothing.

“Nothing but trees,” Austin muttered to himself as he fast-forwarded through yet another video. A bird call echoed through the phone’s speaker, followed by Grayson’s hopeful whispers that maybe this time they’d see something. But no.

After forty minutes, his patience was wearing thin. He was about to give up when he clicked on one more video. This time, he started fast-forwarding slowly, careful not to miss anything.

For the first few minutes, it was more of the same—just trees and Grayson and Henry off-screen, talking about animal tracks and comic books. Then, suddenly, something caught his eye. He hit pause and scrolled back, watching closely.

There, standing behind a tree, was a figure. A woman with gray hair, barely visible, like she was hiding. She stood behind a large oak, her body half-concealed, her head peeking around the side.

Austin felt his pulse quicken. For a moment he thought it was Eve because of the dirty blonde hair. But as he rewound again, he caught a split second where the woman turned slightly, revealing her face, and he realized it wasn’t Eve.

She looked to be in her mid-fifties, with soft wrinkles around her eyes and mouth, the kind that came from years of smiling. Her eyes, though, were bright and lively, even warm. She wore a light, floral blouse and a pair of dark green hiking pants. Her shoes were sturdy, the kind meant for long walks in the woods, and a faded denim jacket hung loosely over her shoulders. Despite her seemingly innocent appearance, there was something unsettling about the way she stood so still, half-concealed, like she was deliberately keeping herself hidden from the teens.

“Chloe,” he said. “Did you see this woman? Did you notice her?”

Chloe leaned in, squinting at the screen. For a moment, there was confusion in her eyes, then recognition. “I didn’t notice her at the time,” she admitted, shaking her head. “But... I know who that is.”

“Who?” Austin asked, his eyes still on the video.

“That’s Margaret Miller,” Chloe said, her voice tinged with certainty. “She’s the biology teacher at the high school. I’ve got her class next period.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

It took an hour, as the principal refused to interrupt a class halfway through, but eventually, Austin convinced him to ask Margaret Miller, the biology teacher, to join him for an interview. They were seated in the principal’s small office, with shelves full of dusty trophies and yearbooks that seemed to have gone untouched for years. Margaret sat across from Austin, wringing a crumpled tissue in her hands, her nervous energy filling the small room.

Austin leaned forward slightly, his voice insistent. “Mrs. Miller, we’ve come across some footage of you in the woods, near the scene of the incident. You seemed... well, hidden. Like you didn’t want anyone to see you. We need to know what you were doing out there.”

Margaret’s face flushed a deep pink, and her eyes darted toward the principal’s empty chair, as though she wished someone else were here to help her out. “I… I wasn’t feeling well that day. I had to call in sick,” she mumbled, her voice wavering.

Austin folded his arms, his gaze steady. “Sick enough to take a walk through the woods? Behind a tree, near a crime scene?”

She looked down at her hands, twisting the tissue tighter. “It’s not what you think. I didn’t know about anything that happened out there. Not until later.”

“Then tell me what you were doing,” Austin pressed, his tone growing more direct. “You were there, hiding. That doesn’t look good, Margaret.”

She swallowed hard, clearly battling with herself, and finally let out a long, defeated sigh. “Look, I wasn’t sick. I… heard there was a rare bird spotted in the area. The Marbled Murrelet,” she added, almost whispering the name, her cheeks flushing further. “They’re nearly impossible to find around here, and I love birdwatching. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I took the day off, called in sick, because I thought I might get lucky and spot one.”

Austin’s face remained impassive, though his patience was thinning. “So you faked being sick to go birdwatching?”

“Yes,” she said quietly, looking mortified. “I’m sorry, I know it’s irresponsible. But that’s all it was. I didn’t see anything. I was just... embarrassed, and I didn’t want anyone to know. That’s why I didn’t say anything when I heard about that man’s fall.”

Austin let the silence hang for a moment, letting her squirm. “I understand you’re embarrassed, but here’s the problem, Margaret. Not only did a man fall to his death, a young woman died in those woods. Beaten. Murdered.” He was losing his cool and he leaned away, steadying himself. “If you were out there and saw something—or if you were involved in some way—you’re not just a birdwatcher. You’re an accomplice to a crime.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

The show and its crew represented the largest influx of people the town had seen in years. So by the time Lucy and Sheriff Barker arrived back at the office, it was already overflowing with people who’d been brought in by his officers. After pushing her way through the chaos as officers took statements and tried to figure out who the victim’s immediate neighbors in the motel were, Lucy pulled Sheriff Barker aside. “You look like a tea kettle that’s about to boil over. What can I do to help?”

“We haven’t found Marty Adams yet,” Barker said. “The producer. I’m not too worried about him, but I’d like to get him in here. He seems to be the only adult involved in this show.”

“I wanted to talk to him as well,” Lucy said. “And he’s staying at the bed and breakfast. I wanted to talk to him anyway and Austin got something—he just texted me—something I’d like to ask Adams about.”

Barker rubbed the back of his neck. “Do I want to know what it is?” he asked, his face tight with frustration as the noise of a dozen people speaking at once filled the room.

“We’re not sure if it’s anything yet,” she replied. “I’ll go pick up Marty Adams and try to chat with Austin on the way.”

She hadn’t been able to reach Austin, but she found Marty Adams sitting on the steps of the bed and breakfast, talking on his cell phone. He hung up as she approached and walked down the stairs to greet her.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice tired. “I know Sheriff Barker needs to see me. I know he’s got most of the crew, but I just needed to talk to the show’s attorneys. As you can imagine, we’re all devastated. I hired her myself and… and this is a mess, but none of us know what to do.”

“A mess?” Lucy asked, indignant.

“I’m sorry, you’re right, it’s much worse than that. Luna—that’s what everyone called her—was a wiz kid. I mean, not a kid, a young woman, but to me, she was a kid. And all of this because of some stupid author.” He let out a groan. “Worse than that, three of his books are in the top ten on the New York Times bestseller list. I guess dying renewed some interest in the guy.”

“It is what it is,” Lucy said, crossing her arms. “But here’s the thing. Someone else was in the woods that day, right around the time Zwart took his fall. My partner’s questioning her now, but we need—once and for all—to get every piece of footage from the day before, the day of, and the day after the incident. We want to see if this person shows up anywhere else. Not a compilation, not a bunch of pieces. Every single minute from every single camera.”

“Who was it?” he asked, his face curious.

Lucy folded her arms tighter, her expression firm. “All I can tell you is that I can’t tell you.”

“I get it,” Adams said, nodding. “And yes, we’ll get you any footage you need. No problem.” He ran a hand over his bald head, which was glistening with sweat despite the temperature being in the low 60s. He walked into the bed and breakfast, trailed by Lucy. “Honestly,” he continued, “we gave it all to Sheriff Barker days ago.”

“I’d like my own copy,” Lucy said.

“Mrs. Jameson,” Adams said, referring to the owner of the bed and breakfast, “she rented out the little study to me to use as an office during the program. I’ve got a hundred terabytes of video in there on various hard drives.”

“We’re going to need all of that for evidence,” Lucy said, her voice firm. “I think you know this show is never going to go on the air.”

His face looked pained. “I know.”

“We can go get it now,” he said, resigning himself to the inevitable. “And if there’s anything else I can do for you, just let me know.”

Lucy followed him through the quaint breakfast room and down a wooden hallway that creaked with every step. At the very end of the hall, past the kitchen, a door opened into a small room with windows looking out on a sloped, grassy backyard.

Lucy stood in the doorway as Marty Adams gathered three small external hard drives. “Do you want any of the paperwork, or... I don’t know,” he said, clearly flustered.

She could understand why. Not only was his show being shut down, but he would also likely be facing lawsuits from multiple parties. His career might well be over.

“I don’t know,” Lucy replied. “What are they?”

“Come in and look,” he said, gesturing toward the cluttered desk. “Luna’s hiring papers, Zwart’s written interviews to get on the show. So much goes into these shows, you know—way more than people think.”

Lucy stepped into the room and walked around the desk, joining Adams as he shuffled through the papers. Then she noticed something—a scratch on the back of right hand, red and fairly fresh. She stepped back, looking at his neck and face, then his other hand. There wasn’t much, but that scratch, there was something about it. “How’d you scratch your hand, Marty?”

Suddenly, she heard a loud click and followed Marty’s eyes to the figure who’d joined them in the room.

It was the last person Lucy expected to see.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Margaret’s eyes widened, fear flashing across her face. “No! I didn’t see anything like that, I swear! I didn’t hurt anyone. I was just... out there, looking for the bird, hiding because I didn’t want to get caught skipping work.” Her voice broke slightly. “That’s all.”

Austin stared at her, not fully convinced. “You’re sure you didn’t see anyone else out there? No strange activity? You were hiding for a reason, Margaret. Was it just embarrassment, or something else?”

“I swear, it was just the bird!” she said quickly, her voice desperate now. “I didn’t see anything unusual, except...”

Austin’s eyes narrowed. “Except what?”

She hesitated again, then spoke slowly. “There was a group of people, maybe three or four, walking deeper into the woods. Chloe and Henry and someone else. I hid. I—” she paused, “I wasn’t supposed to be there and…”

Austin nodded, his mind working quickly. “You should’ve come forward the moment you heard about the death. You understand that, right?”

Margaret nodded, eyes downcast. “I know. I’m sorry. I didn’t think it was important since I didn’t see anything. I don’t know anything about the show, about anything other than my bio classes and animals.”

“So,” Austin said, “you saw some of your students, and you knew they were cutting school, but you were also cutting school, so you hid from them? Do I have that right?”

She nodded. “Are you going to tell the principal?” she asked, her voice small and mousey.

Austin ran a hand through his hair. This was the most ridiculous interview he’d ever been involved in. This woman had at least ten years on him, and she was asking if he was going to tell the principal on her. Sometimes this job was too much.

“You’re a biology teacher. The kids trust you, or at least some of them probably do. You are going to tell the principal and deal with the consequences. Understood?”

She nodded sheepishly.

“Did you take any videos while you were out there?”

“No, I’m not one of those. I just go for the birds.”

Austin shook his head in disbelief. “And you didn’t see anyone else?”

She shook her head again, eyes wide with sincerity. “I’m sorry, I really would help now if I could.”

How is it, Austin thought, that so many people had been in the area, and no one had seen anything?

“Where did you park that day?” he asked.

“At the trailhead,” she said, her voice quiet, as if she was trying to end the conversation.

Austin sighed and leaned back in his chair, trying to figure out if this woman was telling him everything. He had a feeling she wasn’t, but she wasn’t being outright dishonest, either. Something was there—something buried beneath her embarrassment.

“Think carefully, Mrs. Miller,” Austin said. “You didn’t see anyone, but did you hear anything? Anyone around when you were arriving, or leaving?”

Her fingers twitched at the tissue again, her eyes shifting slightly. “Well... now that you mention it... when I was leaving, I did notice someone.”

Austin sat forward. “Go on.”

She hesitated. “I didn’t get a good look at him. I was walking back to my car, and he was just pulling into the parking lot.”

“What did he look like?”

“Uh... he was medium height, I think? Maybe medium build too, I didn’t look too closely. He had a bald head, though. I remember that. And... he was talking on a cell phone.”

“Anything else? Did you hear what he was saying?”

She shook her head. “No, I didn’t stay long enough to hear. I just... I didn’t want anyone to see me there, so I hurried to my car and left.”

Austin nodded. “Do you think you could recognize him if you saw him again?”

Margaret bit her lip, thinking for a moment, then shook her head. “I’m not sure. I didn’t really get a good look.”

Austin tasted tart cherries. “Bald head? Medium height? On a cellphone?”

She nodded.

The producer, he thought, hurrying out into the hall.

Marty Adams.

Out in the hallway, Austin called Lucy, but the call wouldn’t connect. He had no signal. He raced out to the front of the school, where there was just enough of a signal to make the call. It went straight to voicemail.

He called right back. Again, straight to voicemail.

“Jack!” Austin shouted into his phone as he ran down the street, away from the schoolhouse and toward the sheriff’s office. Lucy had taken the car and wasn’t answering her phone, and he realized in a panic that he had no idea where she actually was. “Where is Lucy?”

“She went to get Marty Adams at the bed and breakfast,” he said, catching the urgency in Austin’s voice. “Actually, she should have been back by now. With all these people here it’s⁠—”

“Get people over there. Now.”

“What’s going on?” Barker asked, alarmed.

Austin changed course and turned the corner, speeding up. He figured he was about half a mile from the bed and breakfast. “I spoke with the high school biology teacher,” Austin managed between breaths. “Marty Adams was in the area at the time of the murder. He’s been lying the whole time.”

“What?” Barker exclaimed.

“You heard me,” Austin said. “Get people over to the bed and breakfast. I’ll meet you there.” He hung up and shoved the phone into his pocket, his legs burning as he pushed harder.

Austin skidded to a stop in front of the quaint, two-story building with ivy creeping up the sides. Lucy’s car was parked near the entrance. Heart pounding, he raced through the door and into the breakfast room, which was empty. He sprinted upstairs, flinging open the door to Lucy’s room. Empty.

Frustrated, Austin rushed back downstairs and found Mrs. Jameson in the kitchen, stirring something on the stove and humming a tune.

“Mrs. Jameson, have you seen Lucy?” Austin asked, trying to keep his voice steady.

She looked up from her pot. “Oh, I’ve had my head in the pans for the last hour. Haven’t seen a thing.”

“What about Marty Adams?” he pressed.

She frowned, wiping her hands on a towel attached to her apron. “He was around earlier. Cleared out a few things from the office, settled up his bill. Said he was gonna leave this afternoon. I guess his show will be shut down, huh? That poor girl!”

“What office?” Austin demanded.

“The one in the corner, down the hall,” she said, pointing with her chin.

Austin bolted down the hall and flung the office door open.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Finding the room empty, Austin scanned the desk and shelves quickly, but methodically. The USB drives, external hard drives, file folders, books, and papers weren’t exactly scattered about, but it did look like someone had left in a hurry. Moving across the room, he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and called Jimmy.

“How’s the case going?” Jimmy asked. “You know, I think I’m getting used to Kendall. She⁠—”

“Jimmy, stop it. I need to tell you something,” Austin interrupted. “Lucy. I can’t find her. I think she... I don’t know.”

“What?”

Austin could hear the panic in Jimmy’s voice.

Before Austin could reply, Jimmy said, “I’m coming down there now.”

“No,” Austin said firmly. “I need you and Kendall to do something. Eve Zwart, Eve Firestone or whatever she’s calling herself now. I need you to get to her house, make sure she’s there. She checked out of here maybe five or six hours ago. I think she was heading back to Kitsap, but⁠—”

“If Lucy is missing, I’m coming there.”

“I can’t stop you from coming here” Austin said. “But please, try to find Eve first. I have to go.”

He spent the next ten minutes searching through the bed and breakfast, moving swiftly through the eerily quiet halls. The tension in his chest grew as he checked room after room, all vacant.

Marty Adams was nowhere in sight. Neither was Lucy. And in her room, not a single thing had been packed.

No clues. No signs of a struggle. Just emptiness, and the cold sense that he was already too late.

Austin jogged out the front door toward the sheriff’s office, his heart pounding as hard as his feet hitting the pavement. He fumbled for his phone, calling Sheriff Barker while still moving.

“She’s gone. Lucy is gone,” Austin said, between heavy breaths. “And Marty Adams appears to have fled.”

Barker responded immediately. “I’ve already shut down the small, local airport. Adams has flown in and out of there once or twice, back and forth from LA. I confirmed that no one has left in the last couple hours, so we know he’s still in the state.”

“Can you get his description out to the Portland airport? Eugene? Salem? Anywhere else with an airport he might try to fly out of?”

“Will do,” Barker said.

“What about roadblocks?” Austin asked, slowing for a crosswalk and looking for traffic before bolting across the intersection.

Barker sighed. “We just don’t have the officers for that. There are too many little roads around here.”

Austin picked up his pace, still making his way to the sheriff’s office. “I’ll be there in a couple minutes. If there are any neighborhood organizations or volunteers, or anyone—get them.”

“Half the town’s already heard what’s going on,” Barker replied. “People are calling in tips or stopping by with information. This place is a madhouse.”

“Good,” Austin said. “Keep them around. We’re going to have to do a search of the whole area.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Blindfolded in the back seat of what she assumed was Eve Zwart’s car, Lucy cursed under her breath. How had she let a forty-something-year-old pregnant woman and an unathletic Hollywood producer get the drop on her?

When she turned to face Eve, her shock had lasted only a second or two. But that was enough. She’d taken one small step toward Eve, her eyes momentarily leaving Marty Adams. That was all it took. Adams struck her in the back of the head with a hard forearm, knocking her forward onto the desk. From there, he grabbed both of her wrists as Eve charged from the front. Before she’d known what was happening, she was in a headlock from behind, while Eve moved around the side of the desk and bound her wrists with duct tape.

First of all, how had she not been more prepared? More on alert? More…

She cursed again.

“Quiet back there!” Eve shouted.

“It’s not going to do any good to yell at her,” Adams said. He was the voice of reason—if there was one in this mess.

It was no use beating herself up now, Lucy thought. She needed a plan. She could tell they were on a dirt road somewhere outside of Mill City. They’d only been driving for a few minutes, but she felt the transition from pavement to bumpy dirt, and she could hear the little pebbles and rocks kicking up behind the car.

Lucy needed to calm down, find a way out of this. She took a deep breath and grew as still as possible, trying to take in every detail—every bump in the road, every sound, and more importantly, every whispered word between Marty Adams and Eve Zwart. After a minute or two of silence, Adams broke it.

“There. Do you see those lights?”

“Of course I see them,” Eve snapped.

“What are we going to do?” Eve asked, her voice tense.

Adams let out a long sigh. Then in a louder voice, he called back to Lucy. “Lie down in the back seat, now.”

Lucy had already decided not to put up a fight. She’d realized fairly quickly that these were not seasoned criminals. These folks were closer to the kind of inept, haphazard criminals you might find in a Coen Brothers movie. In fact, Adams reminded her a bit of William H. Macy’s character in Fargo—in way over his head.

If she just followed orders, he’d make a mistake.

She lay flat in the back seat. They must have been trying to head to the airport and had seen police lights there. Or maybe a road block. The car turned again, the road growing even more gravelly and uneven.

After about five minutes, she heard Eve speak up. “What about there?”

“What the hell are we going to do there?” Adams responded, exasperated.

“We’re going to stop,” Eve said firmly. “We’re going to think this through before someone sees us. And we’re going to call him.”

When they took off the blindfold, Lucy knew immediately they were in an abandoned mill. The smell hit her first—damp wood, oil, and the musty scent of decay. The air was cool and stale, as if it had been trapped inside for decades. She glanced around. The walls were made of weathered, splintering timber, some planks bowed inward, others missing entirely, leaving jagged gaps where the outside light leaked through. Rusted metal beams stretched across the ceiling, remnants of the machinery that once powered the mill, now covered in dust and cobwebs.

The floor beneath her was uneven, scattered with debris—rotting wood, broken tools, and piles of sawdust that had long since lost its scent. A faded sign hung crookedly near the entrance, the paint chipped and unreadable. Along one side, large windows were cracked and dirty, some shattered completely, with shards of glass still clinging to the frames. Rusted conveyor belts snaked through the place, leading to hulking, silent machines that probably hadn’t moved in decades.

The sound of some unseen water dripping into a puddle was like torture.

“What do they know about this in town?” Adams demanded as Lucy blinked, trying to adjust to the light.

“I know less than you,” Lucy said. “I’ve only been here a few days.”

“I mean about me.”

Lucy held his gaze. “But they know everything.” Truth was, she didn’t think Adams was high on anyone’s suspect list at the moment.

Behind Adams, Eve was frantically dialing and redialing a phone number, waiting for it to ring a few times before hanging up and trying again. The clicking and soft hum of the phone’s tones joined the dripping water, becoming a strange, tortuous symphony.

“They shut down the airport,” Adams said to Lucy. “What will their next move be?”

Lucy thought about whether to answer honestly. Part of her wanted to rub it in, to dance in this bastard’s face—metaphorically speaking, of course. But then it struck her, which it probably should have before. This man, who appeared to be a nerdy, bumbling Hollywood producer, had been the one who’d beaten the video editor to death. And for what? Probably because she’d threatened to turn him in, or found evidence he didn’t want found.

Evidence of what, though?

When she’d been apprehended, all sorts of thoughts about the case had gone through her mind, but they’d quickly dissolved into a desire to survive. Now, staring into this man’s face, that desire was as strong as ever. She needed to stay alive. And not just for herself anymore—and not just for Jimmy.

“If they have enough officers, they will block whatever roads they can, looking for your car or for Eve’s car,” Lucy said, carefully measuring her words. “If they know she’s around... I don’t know if they know that or not.”

Marty Adams reached for a wrench lying on the nearby table and held it up as though he might strike her. His eyes were dark, the veins on his neck bulging.

“What is our best way to escape this state?” he growled. “Give me a clear and correct answer or this comes down on your temple.”

“I can’t reach him!” Eve shrieked, her voice rising to a pitch that grated on Lucy’s ears. She’d grown frantic, every bit the stereotypical woman who lost her cool under stress.

Exactly the kind of woman Lucy wasn’t.

Lucy kept her eyes on Adams, but her mind raced. One of the theories she had hit upon earlier was that Eve and this producer were having an affair. She cursed herself for not digging deeper into the records from the fertility clinic, for taking Eve’s word too easily about her affair with the bartender back in Poulsbo. Now that she thought about it, everything felt off.

Who was “him”? Could it be the producer? Maybe he was more involved than she’d originally suspected.

But then Adams said something that changed her mind immediately.

“You have service, right?” Adams snapped. “Perhaps it’s something about the international call from the new cell phone.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

Sheriff Barker’s small office was exactly as chaotic as he’d warned. Every local officer had been called in, along with some from the highway patrol, temporarily assigned to the small town to help out.

After forcing his way through the crowd, Austin pulled Sheriff Barker into the only place that wasn’t crowded with people: the bathroom.

“I’m thinking Eve may be involved in this,” Austin began. “I think she may have been having an affair with Marty Adams. They probably conspired to kill our beloved author. Think about it. Eve gets more money—inherits the whole estate. Meanwhile, his books are all over the bestseller list, and I’m sure that’s going to make him a lot more money. Make her a lot more money. Plus, the publicity for the show will make Adams more successful. Hell, they probably have a plan to buy a house in Malibu together. Remember what the agent said? Theodore Oliver—Eve is now his client. She probably has some fantasy that her husband was holding her back in her writing career all these years, and she got the ultimate revenge.”

Austin walked over to the sink, splashed cold water on his face, and dried it with a brown paper towel.

“I got another threatening call from Oliver earlier,” Barker said. “I let him talk and talk to see if he’d hang himself, but he didn’t. Whatever’s going on here, I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s involved, but I don’t think he can help us much at this point.”

There was a quiet knock at the door, and a woman’s voice came through, “Sheriff, are you in there?”

It was Sarah, Sheriff Barker’s assistant. Austin pulled open the door, and she looked away, unsure if she should be staring into the men’s bathroom.

“It’s okay,” Sheriff Barker said. “What is it, Sarah? We’re just having a meeting in here.”

“There’s an article,” Sarah said, frowning. “You know how you were fretting about how we didn’t find a body? Didn’t find any evidence in the bears’... you know?” She held out a small tablet computer and Austin took it.

As Sheriff Barker read over his shoulder, Austin read the article from The Oregonian.

The Vanishing at Opal Creek: How Authorities Fumbled the David Dierdrick Zwart Investigation

By Sarah Whitfield

It has been nearly two weeks since acclaimed mystery author David Dierdrick Zwart disappeared during the filming of a reality television show near the Opal Creek Wilderness. The case, which initially gripped national headlines as a potential murder, has taken an increasingly perplexing turn as law enforcement continues to fumble in what now appears to be a far more complex situation than they were prepared to handle.

Zwart, known for his best-selling crime thrillers, was believed to have died in what police first described as a “suspicious fall” while filming on location for Alone in the Forest, a competitive survival series. Despite the immediate classification of the case as an accident, local authorities in Marion County have been investigating it as a murder, though they are yet to recover a body or produce any compelling evidence that Zwart was, in fact, murdered.

In fact, many in the community are beginning to wonder if the police should have been investigating a very different kind of case.

No Body, No Crime?

From the start, the investigation into Zwart’s disappearance has been dogged by missteps. The sheriff’s department, working alongside out-of-state investigators, began investigating the incident as a homicide after discovering what they described as “inconsistent blood patterns” at the scene. Yet, no further evidence has materialized to support the murder theory. For days, investigators have scoured the forest and interviewed cast and crew, but their efforts have yielded little more than speculation.

“The only thing we know for sure is that David Zwart is gone,” Sheriff Barker told a staff member, who shared the story with The Oregonian anonymously.

Yet, as details of the case—or lack thereof—have emerged, many observers, including law enforcement experts, have raised serious concerns about whether the police have been focusing on the wrong narrative.

“It’s shocking that after a week of investigation, we still don’t have a body or definitive proof of a crime,” said Dr. Harriet Lawson, a criminologist and retired investigator. “The fact that they’ve dug so deeply into a murder theory without considering other possibilities—such as an abduction, disappearance, or staged vanishing—shows a shocking lack of imagination and flexibility.”

Rumors Run Wild

Meanwhile, the vacuum of clear information has led to an explosion of rumors and amateur sleuthing on the internet. Message boards have lit up with unsubstantiated reports of Zwart being spotted outside the country. In one of the more popular conspiracy theories, an anonymous poster on a crime forum claimed to have seen Zwart in a café in Prague, alive and well. Another rumor, originating from Reddit, suggests Zwart staged his own disappearance to fuel publicity for an upcoming book release—a sensational idea, but one that resonates with a public increasingly frustrated by the lack of answers.

None of these rumors have been substantiated by credible sources, but their very existence points to a troubling issue: in the absence of real transparency and investigative breakthroughs, the public is left to fill in the gaps on their own.

“It’s like the police are stuck in neutral,” said a source close to the investigation, who asked to remain anonymous. “They’ve been so focused on proving it’s a murder, they’ve ignored other possibilities that might explain what happened to Zwart.”

Should This Have Been a Missing Person Case?

In any high-profile investigation, there are bound to be challenges, but the handling of the Zwart case raises serious questions about police competence. Why, for instance, have authorities been so slow to pivot to a broader investigation that considers the possibility of abduction or even a voluntary disappearance? Zwart had been vocal in recent interviews about his disenchantment with both the publishing industry and America, leading some to speculate whether he might have orchestrated his own vanishing act to escape the pressures of fame.

“Frankly, if this were a missing person case, the tone of this investigation would have been completely different,” said Lawson. “They would have searched for him in international databases, flagged his passport, followed his financials. But instead, they’ve poured resources into finding a murderer when they don’t even have a body.”

The Clock is Ticking

The most damning critique of law enforcement’s approach is simple: time is running out. Every day that passes without new developments makes it more likely that Zwart—whether alive or dead—slips further out of reach. If this truly is a case of a disappearance, the early days are critical, and the authorities have already lost precious time pursuing a murder theory that may have no basis in fact.

What remains undeniable is the fact that a man, a well-known public figure, has vanished, and his family, fans, and community are left with nothing but uncertainty. The police may soon have to face an uncomfortable truth: they should have been treating this as a vanishing all along.

For now, David Zwart’s fate remains as much a mystery as the novels that made him famous.

PART 3

THE UNSEEN HAND

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

Austin’s emotions ranged from rage to mild anger, to confusion, and finally, to a reluctant acceptance as he read the article. There wasn’t a shred of concrete evidence in it, yet it raised questions Austin should have been asking all along.

He handed the tablet back to Sarah, then turned to Sheriff Barker.

“No way,” Barker said. “No way. There’s no way he survived that fall, and why would he even...? And who is their anonymous source? I promise that no one in the office leaked it.”

“Their ‘source’ was probably a drunk at a bar in Portland,” Austin said. “And let’s not speculate. Let’s figure out if there’s anything to this, and I think I know where to start.”

He pushed his way through the throng of people and found a quiet spot outside, leaning against the town’s small movie theater. He called Samantha, the tech expert back at the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Department.

“Question for you,” he said after a brief hello. “You know the case I’m working on, right?”

“Yes,” Samantha replied. “Kendall and I have been chatting about it and following it online.”

“Any chance you’ve seen an article from The Oregonian?”

There was silence for a few seconds. “I’m just pulling it up now. Hold on.”

Austin waited. He knew she was a fast reader, the kind who preferred to scan for the major points rather than read word for word. After a few more moments, she said, “Okay, I got the gist of it. How can I help?”

“The online rumors,” Austin said, shaking his head. “I can’t believe I’m asking you to look into this, as I am, well, an actual detective. But is there any way to find any signal in all that noise? Probably ninety-nine percent of it is BS. Maybe a hundred. But if there’s anything worth looking into, I need to know ASAP.”

“On it,” Samantha said.

“What are you going to do?” Austin asked.

“You actually want me to explain it?” Samantha asked.

Austin thought for a moment. “No, I don’t. I know you understand what I’m looking for.”

“I do.”

He hung up and returned to the office.

Austin paced anxiously, waiting for a call back from Samantha. But instead, his phone buzzed with a call from Jimmy.

“Eve hasn’t been back to her house or condo or whatever for at least twenty-four hours,” Jimmy said. “And she hasn’t stolen any more dogs recently.”

“What?” Austin asked, confused. “She stole a dog? Was it the dog her husband gave away?”

“Never mind,” Jimmy said quickly. “I spoke with a couple of neighbors. They haven’t seen her. No answer at the door. We did a wellness check, and she’s not there. Not only that, a couple of her drawers were emptied out, and there are no suitcases anywhere in her apartment. Any chance she fled?”

“There’s a very large chance that she fled,” Austin replied.

“I’m not going to stay here,” Jimmy said. “I’m coming down.”

“I can’t stop you, but I promise we’re doing all we can. Right now, multiple teams of volunteers are searching the neighborhoods and the woods surrounding Mill City. Airports are shut down, everything.” Austin paused. “Hello?”

Jimmy had already ended the call.

Leaning against the wall, he took in the scene around him. Officers, along with volunteers, were busy taking tips, which were pouring in quickly now that the story had gone statewide. Amid the crowd, Austin noticed a pregnant woman standing at a phone, calling all her neighbors to warn them to be on the lookout for Marty Adams and possibly Eve Zwart.

The sight sparked an idea. A pregnant woman. Eve’s high-risk pregnancy... Maybe that was the key.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

Austin pulled Sheriff Barker into the men’s room again, and this time Sarah didn’t hesitate to join them.

“Did Eve’s attorney ever send over the rest of the paperwork from the fertility clinic?” Austin asked.

Barker looked confused.

“I’m... she did,” Sarah said. “It all checked out.”

“Plus,” Barker reminded him, “your people already confirmed that she was there.”

“I know,” Austin said, “but… print them out, please.”

Sarah turned and hurried away.

“What are you getting at?” Sheriff Barker asked.

“Hold on,” Austin said, pulling out his phone. He dialed Jimmy and could hear from the background whoosh that he was in a car.

“Where are you?” Austin asked.

“Speeding toward Oregon, where do you think?”

“Turn around,” Austin said. “I’m sorry, but turn around. When Lucy gets found, it will be by someone here, and before you even have a chance to cross state lines. I need you to go to that bar in Poulsbo, find the man Eve claimed she was sleeping with. Ask about his family medical history. You will get an email from Sarah with the Mill City police. That will tell you what to ask.”

“I—what?” Jimmy stammered.

“Jimmy, you just have to trust me. I care about Lucy a great deal, too.” With that, he hung up, knowing Jimmy would do as instructed.

He met Sarah halfway across the crowded room. She handed him five or six printed pages.

“Email this stuff to Jimmy Jules at the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Department,” Austin instructed, “or to Samantha and tell her to give it to Jimmy. Their info is on the website of the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Department.”

He grabbed the papers and hurried back to the bathroom, shutting the door behind him and leaning on it so no one would join him.

It didn’t take Austin long to find what he was looking for. Assuming the documents were authentic, Eve Zwart had indeed been at the clinic when she’d said, a fact which he’d already accepted. He had no doubt she was going to be a mother.

But it was information about the father he was after.

Medical Report

Patient Name: Eve Zwart

Report Date: 10/05/2024

Facility: Northwest High-Risk Pregnancy Clinic

Attending Physician: Dr. Amelia Warren

Patient ID: 847563

Reason for Visit: Patient presents for a 16-week high-risk pregnancy evaluation. The patient has expressed concerns due to her age and family medical history, and seeks genetic counseling and further evaluation to ensure the health and safety of her unborn child.

Partner Information: The patient has declined to provide the name or birthdate of the father. However, relevant medical history from the partner’s family was disclosed during the consultation.

Partner’s Family History:

- History of Down syndrome present on the paternal side (partner’s maternal uncle diagnosed at birth).

- Cystic fibrosis present on the paternal side (partner’s cousin diagnosed in early childhood).

- Both of the partner’s parents passed away from lung cancer in the early 2000s, noted as likely linked to smoking.

Patient’s Medical History:

- No known history of genetic disorders.

- Mild hypertension treated with medication.

- No history of diabetes or gestational diabetes.

- Patient reports no current symptoms aside from mild fatigue.

Pregnancy History:

- None

- No complications reported in current pregnancy as of the date of this visit.

- Regular prenatal care has been maintained with no abnormal findings in prior ultrasounds.

Assessment and Recommendations:

1. Genetic testing has been recommended due to the patient’s age and family history on the partner’s side.

2. The patient has consented to a non-invasive prenatal test (NIPT) to screen for chromosomal abnormalities, including Down syndrome and cystic fibrosis.

3. Further detailed ultrasounds will be scheduled at 20 weeks to monitor fetal development.

4. Lung cancer in both of the partner’s parents raises concerns about potential environmental or hereditary factors, but this is less likely to affect the current pregnancy.

Next Steps:

- Await results from the NIPT.

- Schedule a follow-up appointment in 4 weeks for continued monitoring.

- Discuss further genetic counseling if desired by the patient.

Notes: The patient expressed reluctance to share more information about the father, citing personal reasons. However, all relevant medical history has been provided for a thorough assessment. The patient understands the importance of genetic testing and is compliant with recommendations.

Dr. Amelia Warren, M.D.

Northwest High-Risk Pregnancy Clinic

The implications of what Austin was putting together in his mind were staggering, but at the same time, his mind had gone clear. “Sheriff Barker,” he called from the doorway of the bathroom, “anyone here who works at the library or is into mystery books?”

“I... actually, yes.” Barker pointed at the pregnant woman Austin had seen earlier. She was still working the phone lines, and Barker walked across the room and got her to come over.

Austin asked, “Have you read any novels by David Dierdrick Zwart?”

The woman shook her head. “I haven’t, but actually I run the town’s mystery book club. We meet in the library once a month. We had put one of his books on our list for next month. I know some of the other members have already read him, though.”

“Are any of them here?” Austin asked.

“Most of them are on the older side. Some are home. Mary works over at the library on weekdays as a volunteer.”

“Gather any of them that you can, please,” Austin said. “This is important. Get every single book by him that you can from every location. I need you to look over the books—the end notes, the acknowledgments, anything. Maybe interviews he’s given that you can find online. I need you to find anything you can about his medical history or his parents’ medical history. Clues he might have put into books, maybe something he mentioned in a reader note. Anything.”

She considered this for a moment. “I… I don’t know…” She looked up at Barker, unsure.

“Austin knows what he’s doing,” Barker said. “Please do it, and call us immediately if you find anything.”

With that, she turned and headed out of the office.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

For the next hour, Austin went from phone to phone, from volunteer to officer, and back to Barker, trying to piece together what was going on. Part of him wanted to rush out and look for Lucy himself, but he knew he was more useful here. At least for now.

One call claimed to have seen them leaving town and heading east, but the car that had been described, when pulled over, carried three others and definitely not Lucy. There had been no sight of them at any airport or bus station, and no officer had reported seeing them either.

It was a call from Jimmy that offered the next piece of the puzzle.

“Hello,” Austin said, picking up the phone.

“I found that bartender. Started asking about his family history. Said his parents didn’t die of cancer, and he doesn’t know anything about Down syndrome or cystic fibrosis or any of that. His dad’s still alive, and his mom died when he was a little kid. He doesn’t know anything about their family history. He’s estranged from most of them.”

That confirmed Austin’s suspicion. Eve had lied about the father of her child.

“There’s more,” Jimmy continued. “I showed him a picture of Eve, and he recognized her right away but didn’t even know her name. He called her ‘that lady who always orders sweet drinks like daiquiris and mai tais and talks about how she can’t wait to live in the Caribbean.’ I pressed him hard. And unless he’s an Oscar-winning actor who just hasn’t been discovered yet, he was telling the truth. He barely knows her and definitely was not carrying on an affair with her.”

Austin gritted his teeth and struck the wall with an open palm. How could he have been so stupid? As a detective, he was used to people lying to him, but they almost always lied in ways that made them look better, not worse. So when Eve had admitted to having an affair with the bartender, he had bought it hook, line, and sinker.

“Thanks, Jimmy. I know you want to come out here, but please stay put for now.”

He hung up the phone and returned to the conference room, but something caught his eye out the window. A woman in her late seventies or early eighties with long gray hair and a pleasant face was hurrying down the road toward the station, carrying three or four books in her arms.

Austin hurried out to meet her. “Any chance you’re with the book club?”

“Are you the detective I’m supposed to talk to?”

“I am. Thomas Austin.”

“Well, fine then. I’m Donna Crist, and I’ve read all of his books. Truly one of his biggest fans. Although I did meet him when he came to do a signing in Portland, and I have to say, he was not the most pleasant fellow. I got there early so I could sit in the front row, and I heard him talking to one of the staff members at the bookstore. You know, a teenager who sets up the chairs and puts up the signs for the events. Some kid who probably made $15 an hour. Anyway, Zwart was complaining that his Diet Coke wasn’t cold enough and then lectured the kid about how soda is better in Europe, and I don’t even know what the hell he meant by that. Anyway, his books are still great, despite the fact that he’s a terrible person. Personally, I can separate the art from the artist if you know what I mean.”

Austin was growing impatient. “What did you find?” he demanded.

“In his tenth book in his mystery series, he made a whole self-referential plot about a murdered author. At the end of the book, in the acknowledgments, he mentioned that most of the personality and history of the author in the book was fictional. He didn’t want readers conflating the character in the book with his real self. Although, to be fair, the character in the book, as unlikeable as he was, was probably a better person than the real author. But that’s neither here nor there. The point is he mentioned at the end of the book that both of his parents had died of cancer.”

“Let me see that,” Austin said.

She handed him a copy of the author’s tenth novel.

Author’s Note:

It’s a rare and often misunderstood burden to live with the kind of brilliance and insight that I’ve been blessed—and cursed—with. Few people can comprehend the weight of artistic genius, much less the personal tragedies that have shaped my work.

Though much of what you read in the preceding pages was a fictionalized author not based on myself, one biographical detail is accurate. For those unaware, both of my parents died tragically of cancer in the early 2000s, a loss that continues to ripple through everything I create. Their deaths left me with a profound understanding of life’s fragility and the depths of human suffering, which I channel into every novel. While most authors merely skim the surface, I’ve lived the kind of pain that gives my work its incomparable depth and emotional weight.

Frankly, I’ve risen from the ashes of my own misfortune. Despite the challenges and the heavy responsibility of my mind, I remain committed to delivering works of unparalleled brilliance to my readers. It is no exaggeration to say that few, if any, writers today can match the breadth of my experience, nor the raw emotional truth that flows from my pen.

Good God, Austin thought. He was even an arrogant bastard in his acknowledgments, where most authors take the opportunity to thank their readers and those who helped them along the way.

He handed the book back to Donna, now certain of one thing: David Zwart was the father of Eve’s child. In the midst of their bitter divorce, they’d reconciled long enough to conceive a child.

And Austin was fairly sure they’d conceived a lot more than that.

CHAPTER FORTY

Austin stood by the window of the sheriff’s office, gazing out at the street. His phone lit up with Samantha’s name.

“Alright, Austin, I think I’ve got something,” Samantha started, her words sharp, eager, and excited, almost like she was reporting a breakthrough in one of her video games. “So, I’ve been digging into the online posts. At first, it looked like random internet noise, but when I really started paying attention, I noticed something weird—five different accounts, all posting similar stuff, almost too similar. All of these were praising David Dierdrick Zwart like he was some kind of literary messiah.”

Austin leaned against the window frame, focusing now, trying to keep up.

“First off, all these posts are coming from burner accounts—different usernames, no profile pictures, no personal info—but the language, Austin, it’s practically identical. Listen to this one from a user named ‘BookLover1976’: ‘David Zwart is the most brilliant, misunderstood author of our time. Rising from nothing, his work reflects the raw human experience like no one else can. Critics just don’t get it, but readers who truly understand literature know his genius.’“

Austin grunted. “Sounds like something he’d write about himself.”

Samantha laughed. “Exactly! And here’s another one, this time from ‘TruthTeller2021’: ‘Zwart’s books changed my life. He’s not just an author—he’s a visionary, someone who rose from nothing to become the voice of a generation. People will talk about him long after the critics fade into irrelevance.’“

Austin rolled his eyes. “So, what? You’re telling me this guy’s been posting about himself?”

“Exactly, but here’s where it gets interesting,” Samantha said, her enthusiasm rising. “I checked the IP addresses for each of these accounts—not something you can do through the front door, obviously, but there are tools for this kind of thing. All of these accounts are posting from the same block of IP addresses. And guess where they’re all coming from?”

Austin squinted, waiting for it.

“A hotel,” she continued. “A very specific hotel in the Caribbean. The ‘Island Breeze Resort,’ to be exact. I pulled up the metadata—time stamps, geolocation, everything. It’s all matching up. He’s got at least five different accounts, all using burner phones, but the IP addresses ping from the same damn hotel Wi-Fi.”

She paused, as if giving Austin a second to digest.

“So, what you’re saying is he’s hiding out in a tropical paradise, faking his own death, and writing fan fiction about himself?” Austin said, half-disbelieving, half-annoyed.

“Pretty much!” Samantha said, unable to hide her amusement. “And get this—here’s another post from a user called ‘ReaderRealist42’: ‘Zwart is a genius, and when the world finally realizes that, they’ll all regret doubting him. It’s no wonder that his tragic and untimely death have resulted in him finally dominating the bestseller lists, as he deserved to do all along. He’s overcome more than anyone knows, from poverty to loss, and he will be remembered as the greatest storyteller of our time.’“

Austin shook his head, glancing out the window again. “Unbelievable.”

“And here’s the kicker,” Samantha said, excitement growing. “This isn’t just random praise—it’s strategic. He’s planting seeds. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think this guy was a martyr. He’s creating his own mythology while sitting on a beach sipping cocktails. The IP addresses don’t lie, though. He’s been there, at that hotel, for at least the last ten days.”

“How can you be certain it’s him?” Austin asked.

“I mean, I’m not 100% certain, but I used an AI to compare the sentence structure patterns of the posts I read you, and a dozen more, to his published work. It was a dead on match.”

Austin smiled faintly. “He thought no one would figure it out, but maybe he’s not the genius he thinks he is.” Austin exhaled, running a hand through his hair. “Alright, send me everything you’ve got. I’ll get Barker to start the paperwork to get the hotel to talk. We might finally have our missing author.”

“On it,” Samantha said, her voice still buzzing. “I’ll have everything to you in ten minutes.”

As he hung up, he took one last look out at the quiet street. David Zwart, hiding in plain sight, crafting his own legend from a tropical island.

The arrogance. The audacity. The stupidity.

Or maybe he wasn’t that stupid after all, Austin thought. Running through the entire case in his head, it occurred to him that he wasn’t even sure Zwart had broken a single law. Maybe he had broken a contract with the television show by leaving the set early. But what had he actually done that was illegal? Maybe there was a fraud statute they could get him on, or conspiracy, assuming he’d deliberately faked his own death, but Austin didn’t know for sure. Simply leaving a television show and flying to the Caribbean, then posting nonsense with a few burner accounts, wasn’t illegal. But that didn’t mean they weren’t going to arrest him.

He walked outside and paced up and down the street. The afternoon was giving way to evening, and the night was growing cold. A faint drizzle started, but that didn’t bother Austin. It had been a hot summer, and something in the rain felt good.

Even though Ridley Calvin had become governor, he kept his personal cell phone, and Austin was one of the few people who had the number. He sent Ridley a text asking if he had a moment to talk, and ten minutes later, Ridley called.

“Just between meetings,” Ridley said. “What’s up?”

“You probably haven’t heard but…” He could barely bring himself to break the news. Lucy had been Ridley’s protégé. And his friend. “Lucy is missing.”

“No,” Ridley replied, his voice dropping. “Does this have anything to do with that case in Oregon?”

Austin leaned against the wet brick wall, the soft rain falling steadily around him. “It does, and I need your help. Fast.”

“Anything,” Ridley said. “Anything. You want me to come down there? I’ve got some bill signings coming up, but I can blow that off. Damn, I miss you guys.”

“No,” Austin said, “but I have a question for you. Does the FBI keep offices throughout the Caribbean? They usually have an officer or two in most major cities, right?”

“They call them legal attachés,” Ridley said, “but they basically just hang out until they’re needed. It’s not an official office or anything.”

“I hate to ask,” Austin said, “and you know I wouldn’t if it wasn’t important.”

“Please,” Ridley interrupted, “anything.”

“You have any contacts you can call?”

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

The beach had been crowded the last couple of days, but today he had it mostly to himself. The waiter, a young man wearing black shorts, a white collared shirt, and a name tag that read “Brian,” set the strawberry daiquiri on the little table next to him.

He waited as David Dierdrick Zwart took a long sip of the cocktail. It was too sweet. Zwart looked up at the young man, who appeared to be waiting for a tip.

“It’s too sweet,” he said.

“Oh... oh,” the young man stammered.

“Brian, is it?”

“Yes, Mr. Franklin, and I apologize about the daiquiri. Could I get you something else, perhaps?”

“Let me play out a little hypothetical for you, Brian. Let’s say I send this daiquiri back and ask for a piña colada. You bring it back, and you wait there with that smug look on your face, expecting a tip. And I think the piña colada’s too sweet, too, so I don’t give you a tip and send it back. Then, frustrated because you’ve lost out on tips and I’m wasting your time, you go get me another drink. Maybe this time I order something simple. A rum and coke. You can’t mess that up. But you spit in it, because that’s what stupid waiters do, right? Meanwhile, you tell your boss I’m a problem customer. Word gets around the resort, and people stop opening doors for me or treating me with the respect I deserve. So no, Brian, I don’t want you to get me something else. I’ll just drink this overly sweet daiquiri and blame you and your bartender when I get diabetes. If you’re still waiting for a tip, don’t.”

Zwart put his sunglasses on and stared out at the water. He’d been having a great time, but the call from Eve had screwed everything up. Eve had screwed everything up, in fact. He cursed himself for loving her so much. The last time they had spoken, she promised to call back within an hour, but she never stuck to her time commitments. He was the kind of guy who could wake up at 2 AM out of a deep sleep and somehow know what time it was to within five minutes without looking at a clock. Eve, the woman he loved despite himself, could be staring at a clock and still be twenty minutes off.

His cell phone rang. He’d gone through two per day since arriving in Bridgetown, the capital of Barbados. This was his last one. Eve should have arrived that day, but everything had gotten screwed up.

“What’s going on?” he said, not giving her a chance to say hello and not saying hello himself.

“We don’t know what to do. The airport was shut down. Somehow, they figured out something. I don’t know what they know, but⁠—”

“Calm down,” he interrupted. “Where are you exactly?”

“We’re in an old abandoned mill about ten or fifteen minutes outside of town. We had to grab one of the officers. She was on to us.”

Zwart sighed. The way she casually said they had to grab one of the officers made his stomach churn. He wrote about detectives for a living. One thing he knew was that cops responded differently when one of their own was at risk. All officers were trained to use deadly force before being given their weapon, but he knew from research that they were more likely to use it when an officer’s life was on the line. He wasn’t going to tell his wife this, though. She would get frantic and panic. He often lied to her just to keep her calm.

“Okay,” he said. “It’s not a big deal. Here’s what you need to do. Is Marty there?”

“It’s Marty’s fault in the first place. He shouldn’t have even been in town after what he did to that girl⁠—”

“Never mind that,” Zwart said. He paused and took a long sip of his daiquiri, feeling his chest relax slightly as the rum hit his system. He’d been on edge ever since hearing about the video editor. The plan was never supposed to involve any real violence, and certainly not murder. But apparently Marty hadn’t had a choice. “Tie her up and leave immediately. You do not want to be anywhere near her when they find her. Get out of the state. That will make things easier. Head to Washington, and when you’re there, have Marty call me. I’ll figure out a way to get a private flight out of the country. One that won’t show up on any records. Do you understand?”

“Yes, but... baby, you know I love you, right? This is almost over. The books are at the top of the charts. We’ll be rich forever. Theo is thrilled as he’ll be rich, too. Soon we’ll be drinking daiquiris together—mine with rum and yours virgin, because of the baby. Everything will be okay. But you need to leave the officer and get out of there.”

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

Austin knew that it would take Ridley some time. The FBI had a hundred urgent cases on their desk at any given time, and as urgent as this one felt to Austin, the truth was that apprehending an arrogant author somewhere in the Caribbean—who perhaps hadn’t even broken any laws—was much less of a priority than finding Lucy and capturing the bastards who had taken her. So he decided to cut David Dierdrick Zwart out of his mind and move on.

Leaving the bathroom, he found Sheriff Barker.

“A little bit of news,” Barker said. “We got an anonymous tip that they were in a house out on Mill Creek Road. Checked it out, and they weren’t there. Not sure if it was just kids playing a prank or what, but we’ve now ruled out the whole west side of town.”

“And the airport?” Austin asked.

“We’ve had that locked down. They definitely weren’t there.”

“Let’s say they went to the airport, saw a police presence, and bolted from there,” Austin suggested. “Where would they go? Where would you go?”

Barker thought about this for a moment. “If I saw a police presence at the airport, no matter how small, I wouldn’t turn back toward town. I’d keep going.”

“Where does the road lead?”

“It follows the curve of the river down by where a few of the original mills were.”

“Are any of them still in operation?” Austin asked.

Barker shook his head sadly. “This town used to be booming. Not anymore.”

“So where does the road lead?” Austin pressed.

“That’s just the thing,” Barker said. “It turns into a dirt road and leads to a series of logging roads and abandoned mills, but it doesn’t actually have any outlet.”

“It doesn’t connect to the freeway or anything?” Austin asked.

Barker shook his head again. “Nope, just dead ends out there.”

“Can we take your car and check the area?”

“We already have people out in that general direction. A search crew is looking through the woods. Volunteers.”

“Good. Let’s get them on the phone as we drive.”

Lucy had been able to hear portions of Eve’s call, but much of it had been too muffled to make out the exact words. Still, she got the gist quickly. Tied up on a wide beam, she watched as Eve made her way across the large, open room, getting right in the face of Marty Adams. Eve whispered something in his ear, and they both glanced at Lucy. Then, without another word, they hurried out.

Just like that, they left her.

She wriggled her wrists against the duct tape, but it wouldn’t budge. As bad as they were at most things, they knew how to tie someone up. Tilting her head back to examine the beam she was tied to, she tried to gain some leverage and give it a quick kick, but it didn’t move. Things were built differently when this place was built, she thought.

Next, she ran her bound wrists up and down the beam as hard as she could, trying to create friction between the wood and the duct tape. For five minutes she did this, then ten, but they’d used at least five layers of tape, and it wasn’t cutting through.

She heard a door creak and looked up, expecting to see Eve or Marty Adams. But it wasn’t them.

It was Chloe, the young teenager.

Her first instinct wasn’t to ask to be saved, but to get the girl out in case the others came back. “Get out of here.”

“Were they in a red car?”

Lucy nodded.

“I watched them leave. They went down the road, then circled back, then went down another. They’re lost. I’ll call the police.” Chloe began dialing, then looked up at Lucy. “Those people are fools. They don’t know these roads don’t go anywhere. They have to turn around and go back through town if they want to get out of here.”

“How did you find me?” Lucy asked.

“There’s a search party looking everywhere in the woods. I know this area because I come here listening for birds.”

The door creaked again. This time, it was Adams.

Seeing Chloe, he ran at her full speed, lowered his shoulder, and knocked her back, sending her cell phone flying onto the floor.

Chloe huddled in the corner, pulling her knees tight to her chest.

“Who the hell are you?” Adams demanded. Then, without waiting for an answer, he barked, “Don’t answer that.”

Eve hurried in after him, and when she got over the initial shock of seeing a teenager standing there, she stomped on Chloe’s cell phone, crushing it under her heel.

Adams grabbed one of their burner phones, which they must have absent-mindedly left on an empty gas tank in the corner.

“We need to call David again,” Eve said, her voice tense.

Marty Adams’ face reddened instantly. “Don’t say his name,” he snapped.

Lucy put two and two together. She’d already suspected it, but now she knew for sure. The author had never been dead. This had all been an elaborate plot, probably to sell more books.

“We’re not calling David,” Adams insisted.

“You know,” Chloe interjected, her voice steady despite the situation, “you can’t get out of here down that road. You’re going to have to go back through town.”

“What... what do you mean?” Eve stammered, her confidence faltering.

“Logging roads,” Chloe said calmly. “I’ve walked them my whole life. You’ll just wind up at dead ends, no matter which way you go through this forest. The only way out is back past the airport. Back past the town. And you won’t make it.”

Lucy almost smiled. “There’s no way out of this. The best thing you can do now is cut us free and give yourselves up. If not to us, walk out of here with your hands up and surrender to the search party when you find them.”

She could see the panic rising in their faces. Eve glared at Adams, her voice venomous. “You really screwed this up, Marty. I told David we never should have trusted you.”

Adams opened his mouth to respond but stopped short, his face a mix of frustration and fear. “Tie her up next to the cop,” he ordered. “We’ve got to go back the way we came.”

Eve hurried over after grabbing an extension cord and a roll of duct tape. But when she was halfway through tying Chloe next to Lucy, Marty Adams did something unexpected.

Walking slowly backwards, eyes on Eve, he left.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

Barker pulled over and Austin hopped out of the car when they spotted a small group of people.

“They’re part of the search party,” Barker said. “You go talk to them and I’ll head a little deeper into the woods, check on the other search party.”

Jogging up to them, Austin asked, “Have you guys seen anything? Found anything?”

They shook their heads sadly. But as they did, he recognized one of them—it was the biology teacher, Margaret. She locked eyes with him. “Least I can do,” she said quietly. “I still feel terrible.”

“Time to get over it,” Austin said, his voice firmer than usual. “We’ve got more important things right now.”

“Chloe,” Margaret continued. “She was part of our search party... and she disappeared.”

“What do you mean she disappeared?” Austin asked, his concern spiking.

Margaret looked flustered. “She wasn’t taken or anything... she just wandered off. That’s how she is. She heard a bird and followed it, while we were looking under some brush. She headed down that way toward the river. Toward the mill.”

Austin’s pulse quickened. “Have you searched the mill yet?” he demanded, his voice sharper.

“No, that’s where we’re headed,” Margaret answered.

“Wait here,” Austin ordered, not waiting for a response. He took off at a full sprint toward the mill. Leaving the brush behind, he crossed over the small dirt road and looked down toward the river. The old mill stood about a hundred yards away, its silhouette eerie through the drizzle in the fading light.

Weathered and worn, its timber walls faded to a muted gray, streaked with patches of rot where the rain had seeped in over the years. Rusted metal gears jutted out from the crumbling structure, relics of its industrial past. Broken windows revealed dark, empty spaces inside, while thick vines of ivy snaked up the walls, their leaves a deep green against the dull wood. The roof sagged, caving in at one corner, and the surrounding underbrush had started to creep toward the foundation, blending the mill into the dense trees that surrounded it.

A red Ford sedan was parked out front.

Lucy waited until Chloe was partially tied up, but still had one hand free. “I hate to break it to you,” she said casually to Eve, “but I think your ride just left without you.”

Eve’s face showed incomprehension. “Shut up,” was all she said.

“Okay,” Lucy said, “I think you’ll be a little surprised when you go back out.”

A car started out front and peeled off. Eve turned, finally comprehending.

“That bastard,” she said, looking back and forth for half a second between the door and Chloe. She dropped the duct tape and turned to run.

Lucy took the opportunity to swing her foot out and trip her.

Eve came down face-first, crashing into the floor. Her cheek gave a sickening crunch, but, to Lucy’s surprise, she wasn’t knocked out.

Austin spotted movement near the mill’s entrance—a figure stepping out. It was Adams. Their eyes locked for a split second. Adams’s expression flashed from surprise to panic, and without hesitation, he bolted for the red Ford. Gravel crunched under his shoes as he yanked the door open and threw himself inside. The engine roared to life, and the car lurched forward, tires spitting dirt as it sped down the rough, narrow road.

Austin took off after him, his boots pounding against the hard-packed earth. The distance between them grew with every second, the car kicking up a cloud of dust that blurred his vision. He pushed harder, his breath ragged, but Adams was too far ahead. Realizing he couldn’t close the gap, Austin skidded to a stop and dropped to one knee.

He pulled his sidearm, exhaled slowly, and lined up the shot.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

Lucy gritted her teeth, feeling the tension in her bound wrists as she strained against the rough beam. Chloe, tied up next to her, was in no better shape. Her arms were mostly pinned, but Lucy could see her fingers flexing, trying to find any purchase.

Eve, dazed but scrambling to get back on her feet, was just out of reach, a few feet too far for either of them to do anything.

But Lucy wasn’t giving up.

Eve pushed herself up onto her knees, clutching her cheek and letting out a pained groan. Lucy knew she had seconds before Eve would make another run for the door. In a quick, desperate move, Lucy extended her leg out, using the strength in her core to push herself toward Eve. Her foot brushed Eve’s ankle, but it wasn’t enough. She twisted her body and kicked out again, this time locking her foot around Eve’s calf.

Eve let out a surprised yelp, trying to pull away, but Lucy had her. She tightened her grip with her leg, twisting hard, pulling Eve off balance and dragging her closer.

Chloe, eyes wide, kicked out with her free leg, managing to catch Eve’s other foot. Together, they worked in silent coordination, their legs doing what their arms couldn’t.

Eve kicked back wildly, catching Lucy in the side, but Lucy didn’t let go. Wincing in pain, she adjusted her position and locked her ankle firmly around Eve’s leg. Chloe followed suit, using her own legs to pin Eve down.

“Stay down!” Lucy grunted, twisting her legs to keep Eve off balance. Eve flailed, her kicks growing weaker as she realized she was outmatched. Eventually, her energy gave out, and she slumped back against the floor, breathing hard, unable to get up.

It wasn’t a clean victory, but it was enough.

The first shot missed its mark.

Austin adjusted, steadied his aim, and fired again. This time, the bullet found the rear tire. The car swerved violently as the tire blew, rubber shredding off and leaving Adams fighting for control.

The vehicle skidded sideways before grinding to a halt, its back end sagging.

In the distance, Austin saw Sheriff Barker’s cruiser tearing up the dirt road toward them, lights flashing. Adams staggered out of the car, hands raised, as Barker slammed the brakes and jumped out.

The sheriff moved in fast, pinning Adams against the hood and cuffing him with practiced efficiency. Austin stood, brushing the dust from his jeans as he walked toward them, heart still pounding from the chase.

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

Fifteen minutes later, Austin sat on the back bumper of an ambulance next to Lucy, watching as a paramedic examined Chloe while Margaret looked on. When the paramedic pulled Chloe aside to ask her a few questions, Margaret pulled Austin away from the ambulance and asked in a hushed tone, “Do you think she’ll be okay?”

From what Lucy had told him, she hadn’t received much physical damage, and as for the psychological damage, well, that was above Austin’s pay grade.

“She’ll need a healthy supportive environment, maybe some therapy,” Austin said. “Stability, school, you know, that kind of thing.”

“I called her father,” Margaret said. “He said whatever trouble she was in was her trouble. He was drunk, I think. Didn’t seem like he even cared.”

Austin clenched his fist. “That bastard.”

“He’s worse than a bastard,” Margaret said. “I think he’s abused her. I’ve even asked her privately, but she won’t say anything about him. She’s afraid.”

Austin considered this. “If I speak with Sheriff Barker and it’s all above board and legal, could she stay with you for a few days? Maybe a few weeks?”

“As long as she’s not allergic to cats. I have a clowder.”

Austin cocked his head. “How many is a clowder?”

“For me, six,” Margaret said, smiling faintly. “They’re all named after different kinds of birds. Sparrow. Falcon. Kestrel. Finch. Tanager. And Starling.”

Austin didn’t know what to say. All he could manage was a pleasant, “Nice.” But he offered up a warm smile. He knew Chloe would love that. “Let me talk to Sheriff Barker. See what I can do.”

He strolled over just as Barker shoved Eve into the back of his police car. Marty Adams was already cuffed in the back.

Just as Austin was about to pull him aside, Eve looked up and met his eyes. “What happens to pregnant women in jail?” she asked.

Austin frowned. “It depends on the jail. States are required to offer medical care to all inmates. Pregnant inmates get taken care of, too. Everyone can understand that the transgressions of the parents are not the fault of the baby.”

Her face looked pained. “This baby needs to have a good life. It’s going to be a genius, like its father.”

Austin shook his head and was about to leave but couldn’t help himself. “After all this,” he said, “you still think he’s a genius?”

She considered this for a long while. “You’re never going to find him,” she said.

“You mean at the Island Breeze Resort? We’ll never find him there?”

Eve’s face went through a series of twisted contortions, as though only now realizing that, all these years, she’d been living a life of fiction, not fact.

“You really do love him, don’t you?” Austin asked. “Everything you said, all the stuff about affairs, the whole public divorce, all of it was a show, and this was the endgame? To disappear in the Caribbean as his books dominate the bestseller lists?”

Eve nodded. “We love each other more than anyone else can know. It was us against the world, and we won. At least at first.”

“But you got greedy,” Austin pointed out, “and now… well, I just hope the courts are able to get the proceeds from his books and give them to Lila Luna’s family.”

Sheriff Barker shut the door, leaving Marty Adams and Eve Zwart alone in the back of the car. Austin turned toward him. “I want to talk with you about Chloe,” he said quietly, “I think she’s being abused. Her biology teacher, Margaret, over there—she called her father, and the guy didn’t even want to come out here. Which is probably a good thing because she thought he was likely drunk.”

Barker closed his eyes tightly and shook his head. “Small towns,” he muttered.

“I’m wondering,” Austin continued, “is there any legal way to allow Chloe to stay with Margaret? I think she’d want to, given the go ahead. But she’s scared of her father, and for good reason, I’d bet.”

Barker considered this, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “There’s a way, but it has to be done right. We’d need to involve Child Protective Services. If Chloe’s in danger, they can conduct an emergency assessment. Since Margaret is willing to take her in, CPS could place her in a temporary guardianship while they investigate. It’s not permanent, but it would get Chloe out of her father’s house and into a safe environment for now. We’d have to file a report to kick it off, though, and it’ll take a bit of time.” He paused, glancing over at Margaret and Chloe. “If you think she’s really in danger, I’ll call them in and start the process. They can expedite things in a case like this, but it’s up to Chloe to agree to it. Otherwise, we can’t just pull her out of her home without her consent unless there’s immediate, obvious harm.”

Austin nodded, relieved that there was a path forward. “Let’s do it.”

It took over an hour of convincing, but eventually, Austin’s reasoning won out. A report was filed with CPS, and Chloe agreed to stay with Margaret while the situation was investigated further. Austin got Sheriff Barker’s word that he would do everything in his power to make sure Chloe never spent another night with her father.

Night had fallen, and only the headlights from the vehicles lit the forest and the old mill. As Austin was about to join Lucy and head back to the bed and breakfast for some much-needed rest, a text came through on his phone. In stark contrast to the darkness around him, the image on his screen was of a brightly lit beach, with white sand and the bluest water he’d ever seen. But it wasn’t the beach that grabbed his attention.

It was the figure standing in the sand: David Dierdrick Zwart.

The photo was from Ridley, with a note explaining the situation.

My friend in the FBI called a former agent in Barbados who now runs a private security company. Sent his assistant over. Is this your guy?

Austin smiled.

He absolutely is, he replied via text. If you can, have him keep an eye on Zwart until we decide on the next step.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

Jimmy arrived first thing the next morning with a box full of donuts from their favorite bakery in Poulsbo. When he heard what had happened the night before, he called in a favor and had the opening crew arrive at 3 AM to give him the leftovers from the previous day.

The truth was, they had plenty of food. The owner of the bed and breakfast had put together two large tables and laid out a feast fit for a king—bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs, hard-boiled eggs, two kinds of toast, bagels with cream cheese, juices, jams, and even fresh-baked peaches and cream muffins.

After giving Jimmy a kiss on the cheek and a playful punch in the arm, Lucy sat back down next to Austin. Jimmy took a seat across from her. Also at the table were Sheriff Barker, Chloe, and Margaret, who had had a peaceful night together and even decided to get another cat. The owner of the bed and breakfast had wheeled in a television, and Austin spent the last five minutes figuring out how to cast the video Samantha had sent him from his phone to the TV.

When he finally entered the code correctly and the screen flickered to life, he pressed play and immediately paused it.

“This is from our tech person back in Kitsap County,” he explained. “She put together a supercut of all the footage from what happened in Barbados.”

Austin already knew that Zwart had been arrested, but he wanted everyone to see the moments unfold together.

Austin hit play, and the first video flickered to life. It showed David Dierdrick Zwart lounging on a sun-soaked beach, his pale body sprawled in a chair, a half-empty daiquiri next to him. His sunglasses reflected the water as he gazed lazily out at the ocean, oblivious to the world around him. The video switched to what looked like footage from a handheld cell phone, shaky and slightly grainy, perhaps taken by another resort guest. Zwart was now sitting up, leaning forward with a scowl on his face as he pointed angrily at a young resort worker, jabbing his finger toward a tray of drinks.

The video cut abruptly to hotel surveillance footage. Zwart was in the lobby, pacing and making wild gestures as he appeared to berate the front desk staff. His gestures were sharp and exaggerated, his frustration boiling over. The staff behind the desk remained stoic, barely looking at him. Zwart slammed a hand on the counter before walking out of the frame.

The footage then shifted to a wide-angle surveillance camera showing the entrance of the hotel. Several uniformed officers entered the lobby, followed by a tense scene as they approached Zwart. He resisted at first, pulling away, but they quickly grabbed him, pinning his arms behind his back. The officers moved swiftly, shoving him toward the entrance, where he was handcuffed and pushed into the back of a police car.

The screen transitioned to a roadside view, taken from a passing car, showing Zwart inside the police car as it sped down a tropical highway, palm trees flashing by.

The final clip came from another cell phone camera, capturing Zwart being led into the police station. He looked disheveled, his eyes darting around, his bravado gone. The officers shoved him inside the building, disappearing through a set of double doors.

Austin let the video play to the end before glancing around the table. “My hunch,” he said, leaning back in his chair, “is that despite being a miserable bastard, Zwart’s not going to let his wife rot in prison and take the fall for this.”

He glanced at Lucy, then over to Sheriff Barker, who’d been waiting to break some news of his own. “Marty Adams has already confessed to the murder of Lila Luna Lopez,” Barker said. “He said, and I believe him, that Eve had nothing to do with that. Lopez dug up evidence that Adams was in the area on the morning of the murder. Apparently there’s audio of he and Zwart plotting.”

“That’s good to hear,” Austin said. “My bet is that Zwart will cop to orchestrating the whole plan.” If he was right, he wondered what that meant for Eve. Could she get out with just probation or a suspended sentence? Maybe. But that wasn’t his department. His job was done—he’d brought them in.

There was a long silence, but finally, Chloe spoke up.

“Why?” she asked. “Why did all of this have to happen? I mean, what actually happened?”

Jimmy chuckled. “Ahhh… innocence.”

Austin gave Jimmy a quick side-eye. He hadn’t been trying to make fun of her, but it still came off as a bit condescending.

“Here’s the deal,” Sheriff Barker said. “The show’s producer, Marty Adams, partnered with the author and his wife to fake his death. The idea was to do two things at once: get a massive increase in interest in the show while also making Zwart a national literary figure. We all know that artists are appreciated more after they die. He just wanted to be around to soak up the appreciation. And when it didn’t come as he expected, he started spreading it online himself.” Barker paused, watching Chloe absorb the information. “But nonetheless, he was right about one thing. Sales of his books took off. It was all to make money.”

Jimmy said, “You really think he’ll take all the blame?”

Lucy scowled at him. “Wouldn’t you take the blame for me?”

“Well,” Jimmy said, “setting aside the fact that we would never be this stupid, and even if you were this stupid, our morals might kick in at some point. No, I wouldn’t take the blame for you. The law’s supposed to treat everyone equally.”

“Even if I was pregnant and about to have your baby in prison, you wouldn’t stick up for me?” Lucy shot back.

Jimmy’s face turned red. “I thought we weren’t telling people.”

Lucy’s freckled cheeks reddened as well. “I didn’t—I was speaking hypothetically.”

Austin laughed between sips of coffee. He set his mug down. “I think your secret is out. The rumors have been flying. Congratulations, Lucy, and you too, Jimmy... I mean, I guess.”

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

Hansville, Washington

Ten Days Later

“So, what do we have here?” Sy asked.

Austin breathed in deeply, smelling the fresh thyme, rosemary, and wild mushrooms all encased in a buttery crust. “This is going to be our new signature dish,” he said. “Chicken and Chicken of the Woods and Dumplings. A Washington twist on a beloved American classic. Locally foraged mushrooms with chicken, peas, carrots, celery—all in a rich gravy and topped with pastry.”

“It smells amazing,” Sy said.

Andy came up behind them and placed three small plates on the table. “And here are the vegetables.”

“Vegetables?” Sy asked, turning her head.

“Austin sent me a text,” Andy replied. “Told me to come up with some vegetable side dishes, and here they are.”

“So what is all this?” Austin asked, eyeing the dishes skeptically. He had nothing against vegetables, but they didn’t make him salivate the way the pot pie did.

“All Pacific Northwest inspired. Roasted root vegetables with maple and rosemary glaze. Grilled asparagus with lemon and hazelnut vinaigrette. Fresh arugula salad with end of the season cherries, goat cheese, and toasted almonds.” Andy winked at Sy. “And we’re counting on you to come up with wine pairings for all these new dishes.”

“My pleasure,” she said, digging into the asparagus.

Austin had taken a full week off, spending most of his days with Sy. When she was across the state for her internship, he’d spent more time than ever with Run at the beach. To Austin’s surprise, Andy had already dropped out of his master’s degree program, telling Austin that while he loved literature, learning Latin and Greek was where he drew the line. Instead, he’d doubled down on his love for cooking. With Austin’s permission, he’d developed a new series of menu items, including the pot pie, which Austin had written the first draft of.

Now, after their two-mile walk that morning, Run curled up under the table as Andy brought out a never-ending stream of food. They’d started with a New York City-style egg sandwich, complete with a dash of hot sauce. Next they’d sampled a Pacific Northwest-inspired charcuterie board.

Even Run had gotten her own dish: a healthy, dog-friendly treat that would appear on the menu as a free item—two per dog who comes in with their person: Run’s Buns. Her Favorite Peanut Butter Bites in the shape of a corgi.

As Sy ate, Austin looked out the window, watching a cruise ship heading up to Alaska from Seattle. Summer was over, fall was in the air, and he wouldn’t be seeing as many cruise ships heading north after this weekend.

Much of the last week had gone the way Austin expected. Zwart had taken the blame for the plot, claiming he’d forced his wife to go along with it and that she was entirely innocent. And, in some ways, she was. The morning he’d “fallen,” Eve had indeed been at the fertility clinic. Zwart and Adams had set it all up.

Placing six heavy wool Hudson Bay blankets on the ledge under the cliff’s edge, they’d ensured that Zwart would have a safe landing spot when he made the initial fall. Apparently, they felt that for the video to be convincing, he needed to actually slip and fall. Adams had been able to edit out the blankets and fake the final shot, the final fall from the cliff, shot as it was from drone footage high above. The sound effects had been easy to add. And getting Zwart out of the country had been equally easy, especially with the fake passports provided by their other accomplice, Theodore Oliver, Zwart’s literary agent. Oliver had been missing for a week, but was found three days earlier hiding in an upstate New York farmhouse.

In the last few weeks, Zwart’s books had generated hundreds of thousands of dollars in sales, and apparently, Oliver had over two million dollars in offers for Zwart’s unfinished and unpublished works. But those deals were swiftly shut down when local police in New York pulled the rug out from under him.

They didn’t put much of a dent in the food, but Austin managed to try everything. He had a few suggestions to refine the dishes, but they were all quite good and would all end up on his menu.

He felt he was moving into a new phase in his life. He had settled in with Sy, added some vegetable dishes to his menu. And the previous night, when he couldn’t sleep, he’d even spent some time browsing the website of the Kitsap Humane Society, fantasizing about adopting another dog. As though she could read his mind, Run stood up under the table and rubbed her cheek on his leg. He handed her another peanut butter treat, which she munched on, then lay back down.

Maybe he would hold off on getting another dog for now. After all, Run was the jealous type.

That reminded Austin—he hadn’t given Sy the gift yet. Reaching under the table, he pulled out a small blue bag wrapped in tissue paper and handed it to her. She carefully unwrapped the gift and pulled out the small statue.

“Wait, I think I know who this is,” she said, examining the figure. “Is this Siduri?”

“Yes,” he said.

“The alewife who lives by the sea and offers wine to Gilgamesh.”

“Just like you,” Austin said. “You’re my Siduri by the sea, Sy. You’re always reminding me to enjoy my life. I’m grateful to you.”

“This is one of the most thoughtful gifts anyone’s ever given me.” She examined the deep blue statue for a long time, turning it over in her palms and tracing the grooves in the carving with her fingertips, a smile slowly spreading across her face. “Thank you.”

She looked down, and when she looked back up there were tears in her eyes.

“What is it?” Austin asked.

“These last few months have been amazing, Austin.”

“They have,” he agreed.

“I can see myself getting used to this long term,” she said, her voice soft.

“I can, too,” he replied.

Then they sat in silence, letting the moment settle around them. Austin didn’t remember the last time he had felt so comfortable and close to another person, and he had the feeling that—in this very moment—he had everything that he cared about near. He wanted to tell Sy that he fell in love with her every day and would like to keep falling in love with her every day for a long, long time.

Run, who was sleeping on her side under the table, roused. She gave a ‘whuff’ and then yawned loudly as she arched her long body into a stretch that took the shape of a crescent moon. Her activity lifted Austin out of his thoughts. She rolled over onto her other side and settled back into stillness to continue her nap. The Run Bun treats she’d eaten had taken their soporific effect.

“So what do you think of the food?” Austin asked Sy. “Andy will ask me later, and I want you to be honest.”

“It’s all really good. I’m excited about coming up with wine pairings, but…” She trailed off.

“But what?” Austin asked.

“Well, I won’t be tasting quite so much wine for a while.”

“Why? Did something go wrong with the internship?”

Sy looked down at the table. “It’s not that,” she said.

“What then?” Austin was stumped.

“I’m pregnant,” she said without looking up.

—End—

Thanks for reading! If you’re enjoying my Thomas Austin books, you won’t want to miss Book 11: The Secrets of Second Beach.

A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR

Thanks for reading!

Thomas Austin and I have three things in common. First, we both live in a small beach town not far from Seattle. Second, we both like to cook. And third, we both spend more time than we should talking to our corgis.

If you enjoyed this book, I encourage you to check out the whole series of Thomas Austin novels online. Each book can be read as a standalone, although relationships and situations develop from book to book, so they will be more enjoyable if read in order.

And if you’re loving the Thomas Austin series, check out my new series of fast-paced Pacific Northwest mysteries: FBI Task Force S.W.O.R.D.

I also have an online store, where you can buy signed paperbacks, mugs, t-shirts, and more featuring Thomas Austin’s lovable corgi, Run, as well as locations and quotations from all my books. Check that out on my website.

Every day I feel fortunate to be able to wake up and create characters and write stories. And that’s all made possible by readers like you. So, again, I extend my heartfelt thanks for checking out my books, and I wish you hundreds of hours of happy reading to come.

MORE D.D. BLACK NOVELS

The Thomas Austin Crime Thrillers

Book 1: The Bones at Point No Point

Book 2: The Shadows of Pike Place

Book 3: The Fallen of Foulweather Bluff

Book 4: The Horror at Murden Cove

Book 5: The Terror in The Emerald City

Book 6: The Drowning at Dyes Inlet

Book 7: The Nightmare at Manhattan Beach

Book 8: The Silence at Mystery Bay

Book 9: The Darkness at Deception Pass

Book 10: The Vanishing at Opal Creek

FBI Task Force S.W.O.R.D.

Book 1: The Fifth Victim

Book 2: We Forget Nothing

Book 3: Widows of Medina

Standalone Crime Novels

The Things She Stole

ABOUT D.D. BLACK

D.D. Black is the author of the Thomas Austin Crime Thrillers, the FBI Task Force S.W.O.R.D. series, and other Pacific Northwest crime novels. When he’s not writing, he can be found strolling the beaches of the Pacific Northwest, cooking dinner for his wife and kids, or throwing a ball for his corgi over and over and over. Find out more at ddblackauthor.com.