she pulled to a stop in the deserted parking lot, she glanced around. “Not many people out today.”
He let his gaze drift over the pavilion and nodded. “It’s almost Christmas, Grace, and the temperature is in the thirties. Not a good day to be having a picnic in the park.”
Her face flushed, and she smiled. “Yeah, I guess I’m so excited about finding the cache that I wasn’t thinking.” She took a deep breath and reached for the door handle. “I guess there’s no use waiting. Let’s go.”
They climbed from the car, and Alex waited until she had joined him. He held the GPS unit so that she could see it and pointed toward the line of trees at the back of the pavilion. “It looks like we need to go there. I hope your caller thought it was too cold to get very far away from the pavilion.”
She smiled and pulled her coat tighter. “You should have been born in the tropics. You never did like the Memphis winters.”
The memory of the two of them building a snowman in the yard of her home when they were about ten years old crossed his mind, and he smiled. “That’s not true. I like some things about winter. Low temperatures don’t happen to be one of them.”
“Then let’s get this hike over with as quickly as we can.”
Together they set off toward the trees in the distance. They didn’t speak as they entered the Old Forest State Natural Area of the park and ducked under some low-hanging bare tree branches. Within minutes they’d walked so far they could no longer see the pavilion. Alex plodded along, his feet growing colder by the moment, and kept his eyes on their coordinates.
Finally, he held up his hand. “This is it.”
Grace stopped, propped her hands on her hips and looked around. “It has to be around here somewhere. It could be at the base of one of the trees or partially hidden under a rock. It can’t be underground but somewhere that can be easily found.”
Alex pointed to the right of where they stood. “I’ll take the area over here, and you take the opposite side.”
She nodded and turned away from him. For the next few minutes they inched their way around the area as they inspected the trunks and bases of the trees. Alex turned rocks over and inspected each low-hanging branch to see if anything was perched there. He had just finished replacing a large rock he’d picked up when Grace called out. “I have something here.”
He jumped to his feet and arrived at her side just as she pulled a small box out of a hole that had rotted away at the base of a tree trunk. She stood and held up the small container. “Here it is.”
“It’s not a very big box.”
She shrugged. “It’s not always about the size. It’s about what’s inside.”
Grace loosened the string tied around the box, pulled the top off and found a small sealed envelope lying on top of a folded piece of paper. She slid her finger beneath the flap to unseal it and shook the contents into her hand. Her eyes grew wide, and she gasped at the sterling-silver ring that fell into her palm.
Alex leaned closer and frowned. “What is it?”
Grace swallowed and struggled to speak. She held it up for him to see. “It’s a friendship ring.”
“Does this have some special meaning for you?”
She nodded. “Yes, Landon gave it to me for my sixteenth birthday.” She pointed to the top of the ring. “He picked it out because it was designed with the infinity symbol across the top with our two birthstones set in it. He said it would always make me think of him.”
Alex looked at the ring again, then back to her. “Then what’s it doing here?”
“I don’t know. When Landon and I quit dating, I gave him the ring back. He had changed so much I didn’t want anything to remind me of him. He told me someday I would want to come back to him, and until then he was going to wear the ring on his pinkie finger. Every time I saw him in the hall at school he would have it on and would hold up his hand for me to see.”
Alex frowned. “Do you think he might have been wearing it when he died?”
“After his body washed ashore, I asked his father if he was wearing the ring. I wanted to keep it to remember him by, but his father said it wasn’t on his body. Do you think the killer could have taken the ring off his finger and kept it all these years?”
Alex shrugged. “It’s possible. Some killers like to keep some item from their victims. But why would he want you to know he had this ring?” He glanced at the box she still held. “What is that in the bottom of the box?”
She pulled the paper out and unfolded it. “It’s a note.”
Alex eased closer. “What does it say?”
“‘Good afternoon, Miss Kincaid. Congratulations on solving the puzzle and finding the first clue in your quest to discover how Landon really died. I thought you might like to have the ring I’ve kept all these years. As you know, it meant a lot to Landon. Now you must decide if you want to find out how I got it. If you want to know, then you must solve the next clue in hopes it will bring you the answers you desire. Does your search end here, or are you tempted to continue? The next move is yours, but be prepared for whatever may come.’”
Alex pulled the note from her hand and scanned it before he looked at her. “Is there nothing else inside?”
She glanced back in the box and pulled out another folded sheet of paper. “Here’s something.” She opened it and rolled her eyes in disgust. “It’s a Sudoku puzzle.”
“What? Let me see that.” He glanced over the printed grid. “I see he’s left the instructions for you at the bottom. Once you’ve solved the puzzle, you’ll find the coordinates to the next clue in the sixth line across.” He scanned the page for a moment before he looked back at Grace. “He’s giving you clues instead of telling you what you want to know. I don’t like this. He’s taunting you, Grace. You need to stop this right now.”
She shook her head. “But we have to keep looking into this, Alex. This guy knows something, or he wouldn’t have this ring. He has to be the killer.”
Alex shook his head. “Not we, Grace. This is getting out of hand. First he gives you an anonymous call, then he sends you a puzzle to find his hidden message, and when you do, there’s another clue that threatens you. This guy is setting you up for something bad, and I don’t like it. This is a matter for the police.”
She glared at him. “No, I’m not giving up. I’ve been trained to follow a story wherever it goes. I’ll keep working on this whether you help me or not.”
“Grace, you’re not listening to me. This is for your own good. I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
She snatched the note out of his hand and whirled. “I’m not going to get hurt. And I’m not giving up.” She glanced over her shoulder as she stormed back through the forest.
He watched her go and shook his head in dismay. Yesterday Grace had accused him of being stubborn, but when she set her mind to something, she wouldn’t give up. He kicked at a clump of dirt on the ground and took a deep breath.
She
