All the Pretty Girls - J. T. Ellison [133]
“Meet me in the clearing. Come see your children die.”
Fifty-Two
Taylor and Baldwin were sifting through Reese Connolly’s life. His small two-bedroom bungalow in West End was simple, clean and held few clues as to the nature of the killer who lived within its walls. A dig was going on in the backyard. Marcus had spotted freshly turned earth, and further investigation showed six perfect mounds, one laid out next to another with flawless symmetry. The first grave held a decomposing woman’s hand. Very carefully, the remainder of the mini graves were being excavated.
Taylor’s cell rang, and she sighed as she stopped, reaching for the phone, clicking it on. Even the most mundane task was exhausting. She wasn’t prepared for what she heard when she answered.
Quinn Buckley was hysterical, screaming into the phone. Taylor tried to calm her, to no avail. She gleaned only a few tidbits of information from the call—that Quinn’s children were missing, and that Quinn had been instructed to go to the spot they’d been playing the day she and her sister were kidnapped. Taylor remembered from Quinn and Whitney’s file that it was behind their parents’ old place, out on Belle Meade Boulevard.
The homicide team split up. Taylor and Baldwin headed to the park. The drive took only ten minutes. Reese’s West End home was easily accessible to the main roads and they sailed through the dark night without trouble.
Taylor and Baldwin were tense and alarmed. Not speaking, each attuned to the other, they got themselves emotionally prepared. When children were involved, sometimes the results could be heartbreakingly bad. They had both seen the tumult that came into play with domestic violence. If what Quinn said was true, they would need to focus as much of their energies as possible to get the children out safely.
They pulled onto Belle Meade Boulevard, Taylor counting down the addresses until they located the home that had belonged to the Connollys when the girls were children. They pulled into the entrance, struck by the house in front of them. Quinn had mentioned the house had sold recently but was unoccupied. A stroke of luck, the new tenants weren’t there to contend with.
Taylor backed out, then pulled to the side of the Boulevard, right down the street from Quinn’s, and cut off the lights on her car. The moon was full, making the shadowy world before them shimmer. She and Baldwin jumped the fence and carefully made their way up to the house. There were two cars before them in the circular drive.
Taylor recognized the bottle-green classic Jaguar that had been parked in Quinn’s driveway. The other car she wasn’t familiar with, a black soft-top Jeep Wrangler. She radioed in the plates. The car was registered to Reese Connolly.
It was time, then. All the leads, the missteps, the death over the past two weeks would be decided in this last moment. Reese Connolly’s last stand against the world. And he was doing it with two innocents at his side.
Taylor and Baldwin crept around the side of the house, silent in the darkness. Surprise was their only chance to help Quinn and her children. Reese didn’t know they would be here, ready to take him into custody. Or worse, if warranted.
“How do you want to do this?” Taylor asked, eyes adjusting to the darkness. The moon was giving off enough light to help them.
“Let’s take it slow, go through the woods. With any luck, Quinn was overreacting. Let’s get in there, see what there is to see. Maybe nothing will have to be done.”
Taylor’s hand slid the familiar route to her Glock, stationed at the ready on her hip. She unsnapped the holster strap, heard a corresponding snick from Baldwin, two feet to her right. She signaled to him in the shadows, motioning for him to go ahead. She broke out a flashlight, covered the edge with her free hand so they wouldn’t be seen and moved through the gloom into the backyard of the house.
“Through there,” Baldwin whispered, pointing to a small opening in the woods. “That should be the