He had a list, and he’d be crossing the names off.
One by one.
He paused at the door and glanced back at the judge. The oblivious fool.
I’ll be seeing you.
Maybe he’d let the bastard die with the robe still on. Seemed fitting. The robe—the job—would be what killed him.
The SUV braked just outside of the small cabin that sat on the edge of the swamp. Lauren climbed out of the vehicle, and her heels immediately sank into the mud.
Gritting her teeth, she trudged forward, or, rather, she went as far forward as Anthony would allow. He threw up his hand, blocking her, while the two other marshals he’d introduced her to earlier, Jim O’Keith and Matt Meadows, made their way toward the cabin.
“It looks abandoned,” she whispered. It looked that way because it was. Once upon a time, the cabin had belonged to Jon Walker. After his arrest, the place had been left to rot…and rot it had. The wood was falling down and the windows were smashed in.
The word BUTCHER had been spray painted across the front door—a door that swung open. She could see bricks and rocks strewn across the sagging front porch.
Folks in the area hadn’t exactly taken kindly to finding out that a serial killer had been using their swamp. Right after Walker’s arrest, the place had even been set on fire. The wood in the back and near the roof was charred, and maybe it was her imagination, but she could almost swear she still smelled ash.
Jim and Matt slid inside the open door.
Her gaze darted to the left. To the right. Trees twisted and concealed, hiding the murky green water that she knew wasn’t very far away.
“No sign of any other vehicles, at least, not since the rain,” she murmured as her gaze slid over the muddy stretch that passed for a dirt road. The only tire tracks she saw were from the marshals’ SUVs.
So Walker hadn’t returned to his little home away from home.
I’m surprised someone didn’t come back and finish burning this place to the ground.
The victims’ families had sure been angry enough to do it.
And the little cabin—the dark husk that remained of it—was eerie. Dark.
Dangerous.
“Clear!” Jim’s voice came from inside, and Anthony finally stepped back so that they could head toward the cabin.
Jim met them on the porch. “There’s no sign of anyone inside.” He was young, probably in his midtwenties, with dark-blond hair and eyes that seemed a bit nervous.
Behind him, Matt Meadows was still doing a sweep of the area. She’d met Matt a time or two over the years. Quiet, intense, the African American marshal seemed the exact opposite of Jim. There wasn’t anything nervous about Matt—the guy was too controlled for nerves.
“We’ll start a sweep of the perimeter,” Matt said as he turned toward the bald cypress trees that dipped toward the murky water. Heavy moss hung from the trees, drooping toward the dank earth.
Anthony nodded. “I’ll finish the search in here.”
The others slid past them.
There wasn’t much to search in the charred remains. Two rooms. No furniture. Dirt. Mold. Decay.
“This is where it started,” Lauren whispered as she crept carefully around the cabin. This place. With its wooden walls and small rooms. They’d found Walker’s tools in this cabin. The sharpened knives.
The trophies.
Walker had kept trophies from his kills.
Her gaze lit on a heavy chunk of wood that had fallen near the left wall.
“No,” Anthony said, “it didn’t start here.”
The certainty in Anthony’s voice had her glancing over at him.
“This is just where it ended. Where it should have ended.” His eyes narrowed, but his gaze wasn’t on her. It was on the wood near her feet. “Where did that come from?”
“It must have fallen—” But she broke off because she’d just looked up and realized that there weren’t any missing roof slats from above them, and the wall beside her was charred, but not broken. The wood was broken to the left, way across on the other wall, not in that spot.
His hand closed around her arm and Anthony pulled her back. Then he bent and carefully slid the wood, maneuvering it so he could see underneath it.
She peered over his shoulder.
Something gold glinted in the light.
Gold…
“We’re gonna need Detective Voyt and his men out here,” Anthony said as his fingers tightened around the wood.
“A necklace.” She could see it clearly now. Thin, delicate. A woman’s necklace.
“Maybe it’s nothing, just something left by some kid, but—”
“It’s not.” Her voice was sad and certain. She could see the locket on the end. A locket with a rose in the center. Karen’s locket. “It’s hers.”
His head whipped up, his eyes blazing. “Karen’s?”
A nod.
“You’re sure about that?”
Dead sure. “She was wearing it the last time I saw her alive.”
In the next instant, he was pulling her from the cabin. “Don’t touch anything else!”
She knew the drill. Evidence was there—evidence they didn’t want to contaminate because the cabin wasn’t nearly as abandoned as it looked.
Before, Walker had kept his trophies there.
Now that he was back in town, it seemed he was back to his old tricks. He’d killed Karen, then brought his trophy back to the cabin.
It looked like some habits died very hard.
As soon as they exited the cabin, Anthony had his phone out. She listened to him make the call. He was asking for a tech team and telling Paul to get there ASAP.
Then he broke off.
She looked at him, and saw that his gaze had turned back toward the trees that led to the lake.
“We need you now,” he snapped into the phone and ended the call. His gaze lit on her. “Stay behind me.”
He pulled out his gun.
“The killer could still be here.”
Her heart slammed into her chest. She crept behind him as they edged toward the line of twisting trees.
“There are old paths all through this place,” Anthony muttered. “If you’re coming by car, you have to take the dirt road. But you don’t have to get here by car.”
He slid through the trees. One hand locked around her wrist while his other hand remained tight around his weapon.
The trees bent overhead, blocking out the sky and sending faint streams of sunlight trickling over them. It was summer in Louisiana, which meant that it was already hell hot. Sweat began to bead on Lauren’s skin. Every foot or so, her dang shoes got stuck in the mud, so she jerked them off and held them in her free hand.