Sense of Evil - Kay Hooper [27]
“Oh, hell, I was hoping we could narrow down the possibles at least a little bit.”
Hollis said, “The universe never makes it easy, remember? Probably the only people we can even begin to rule out are those who have lived continuously in Hastings during the last fifteen years at least. And I mean continuously: no vacations longer than, say, two weeks; no going away to college; no out-of-town visits, no day trips fitting the right time periods.”
Mallory grimaced. “Which is just not possible. Even those of us who've lived here our whole lives tend to go away to school or travel or something. And day trips? Lots of good shopping in Columbia, Atlanta, other places within a day's drive.”
“I was afraid of that,” Isabel said with a sigh.
With a nod, Mallory said, “That sort of thing is so common I doubt we could find anybody who was absent or took weekly day trips out of town during those six-week stretches specifically, not without questioning every soul in town and probably not then. Who remembers specific dates from years ago? And like I said, people travel on vacations or for business, go away to school. I was away in Georgia three years finishing college. It was four for you, wasn't it, Rafe?”
“Yeah. And I went to Duke, in North Carolina.” He sighed. “It's like Mal said, we've all traveled, been away from Hastings, most of us more than once. And people do take regular day trips, even out of state, for shopping or business. I get the feeling this isn't going to help us narrow the list all that much.”
“Probably not,” Isabel agreed. “Although if we get lucky enough to find a suspect or two, we have some concrete questions to ask . . .”
Hollis didn't intentionally tune out the discussion. She didn't want to; despite the repetition of details she already knew, she was still new enough to the investigative process itself to find it interesting, even fascinating.
She wasn't even aware at first that Isabel's voice had faded into a peculiar hollow silence. But then she realized the discussion around her had gone distant, deadened. She felt the fine hairs on her body rise, her flesh tingle.
It was not a pleasant sensation.
She looked around the table at the others, watching their mouths move and hearing only a word now and then, muffled and indistinct. And they themselves appeared different to her. Dim, almost faded. They seemed to be growing ever more distant moment by moment, and that frightened her.
Hell, it terrified her.
She opened her mouth to say something, or try to, but even as she did, a new and unfamiliar instinct urged her to turn her head toward the doorway. Again without meaning to, without wanting to, she looked.
Standing near the doorway was a woman.
A blond woman.
She was clearer than the people around Hollis, brighter somehow, and more distinct. She was beautiful, with perfect, delicate features. Her hair was burnished gold, her eyes a clear, piercing blue.
Eyes fixed on Hollis.
Her lips parted, and she started to speak.
A chill swept through Hollis and she quickly looked away, instinctively trying to close the door, to disconnect herself from the place from which this woman had emerged.
It was a cold, dark place, and it terrified Hollis.
Because it was death.
Mallory rubbed her temple again. “Okay, back to what sets him off. What sets him off?”
Isabel answered readily, if not too informatively. “Something specific, but we don't know what that is, at least not yet. The gaps between his killing sprees can and might be explained by his need to get to know these women.”
“Might,” Rafe said. “But you aren't sure?”
“I'm sure he has to feel he knows them. For whatever reason, they can't be total