Cold River - Carla Neggers [23]
“No one knew we had two killers in our midst. Guilt will eat you alive, Sean,” Hannah said, her voice deathly quiet. “Believe me, I know. Don’t let it.”
Sean suddenly was aware of the afternoon shadows and the lavender shade of the sky as dusk slowly settled over the mountains. His life in California almost seemed to belong to another man, not to him.
“I’m glad I didn’t witness Melanie or Kyle’s deaths, or see their bodies.” Hannah seemed to draw herself in against the cold as the heat seeped out of the truck. “If I’m going to be a prosecutor, I have to learn to steel myself to what I’ll have to see.”
“This was different. You met them. They tried to frame Devin for stalking Nora Asher and stealing from her, the café, the lodge.”
“Melanie was attractive and personable. I never would have pegged her as a killer.”
“That’s what she and Rigby counted on.”
“Her own people killed her. Right here.” Hannah shook her head as if she were telling herself she had to stop now, before she could spin out of control. “Rigby was already dead. Jo figured out that Melanie was Rigby’s partner, but whoever triggered the bomb in her car didn’t necessarily know that. It wasn’t why she was killed. Nora and Devin were still alive. Melanie had screwed up, and she had to die.”
Sean stayed where he was behind the wheel. He saw the tremor in Hannah’s lower jaw. Next, her teeth started to chatter. Her eyes were wide, focused, he knew, not on the present but on the images of what had happened five weeks ago.
He reached over to her and touched her elbow. “Hannah. Breathe.”
His words, his touch, seemed to penetrate whatever was coming at her, and she exhaled and turned to him. “Sorry. Every day’s better, but I still…”
“I know,” he said softly.
“The police have cleared everyone who was at the lodge when Melanie’s car exploded. The killer could have had a spotter, but why make two calls when one would do? This is a practical, calculating killer.”
“It’s also one who will take tremendous chances if necessary.”
“A man? A woman? A team?”
Sean shook his head. “I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t even guess.”
Hannah looked out toward the mountains in the distance. “Even up here, it’s easy to go unnoticed. Who’d remember a car parked on the side of the road, or a cross-country skier out enjoying the first snow of the season? Make a discreet call and…mission accomplished. Melanie Kendall is dead.”
Sean saw his opening and took it. “What if whoever’s behind this network had an accomplice here in Black Falls? An unwitting accomplice, perhaps. Someone who was used or manipulated into helping to set off the bomb.”
Hannah shifted her gaze from the view, her pale blue eyes reflecting a hint of the lavender in the sky. “Do you have anyone in mind?” she asked, her self-control back in place.
“I don’t.” His eyes narrowed on her. “What about you?”
“It’s your theory,” she said, “not mine.”
“You’re letting the police run the investigation, aren’t you, Hannah? You’re not a prosecutor yet.”
Her look was unreadable now. “I’m familiar with who does what in a criminal investigation.”
She pushed open the door and climbed down out of the truck. Sean nodded back toward his brothers. “A.J. and Elijah will want to know you’re all right after going up to Pop’s cabin. They know being up there can be emotional. Why don’t you come into the lodge with me and we all have a drink?”
“I really can’t,” she said, grabbing her pack, snowshoes and ski poles.
Sean leaned across the seat, ready to charge after her. “Hannah, what did you figure out up there?”
“That I should have done a better job of protecting my brother.”
“You have a law degree. You’re smart. You see everything. It’d be natural to have questions—”
“Yes. Devin almost getting killed definitely sparked questions.”
Her arms loaded, she shut the door with her knee and made it to her car without dropping a snowshoe or poking an eye with a ski pole. She