week interviewing killers, and all that talk and travel had taken its toll. But it would be worth it in the end, he hoped.
After drying his face, Nick exited the bathroom and then the prison itself, relieved to be free of its walls, its bars, its unrelenting grimness. His mood brightened enough that he could muster a whistle. A little “Folsom Prison Blues” in honor of his location.
The good mood—and the whistling—lasted only until he reached the parking lot, where an unexpected visitor waited for him.
Captain Gloria Ambrose, his boss at the Pennsylvania State Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation, leaned against the unmarked car that had shuttled her there. She hugged herself for warmth until she caught sight of Nick. Then her arms dropped to her sides. The move was vintage Gloria—always trying to look tougher than she really was.
“How did you find me?”
“You made an official request to speak to a prisoner of the state,” Gloria replied. “So finding you was easy. I should be asking you why you’re interviewing prisoners when you’re supposed to be on vacation.”
Nick was on vacation. At least officially. And what he did during his time off was his own business.
“Just tell me what’s going on,” he said irritably. “I know there’s a reason you’re here.”
Even more, he knew what that reason was. Gloria didn’t even need to tell him. Her presence alone spoke volumes.
“He struck again.”
“Where?”
“A town called Perry Hollow. It’s about forty-five minutes from here. The rest of your team is already there.”
“I assume you want me to join them,” Nick said.
Gloria, who was done with being cold, opened the car’s rear door and slipped inside. “That’s entirely up to you,” she said, sneaking a glance at the gray-walled prison rising behind Nick. “You are still on vacation.”
She closed the door, leaving Nick alone in the frigid wind with one question still unspoken. He was about to rap on the car’s window, but it lowered before he had the chance, revealing Gloria’s stern gaze.
“And no,” she said. “I won’t tell anyone about your extracurricular activities. But next time you say you’re taking a vacation, do it. You can’t keep pushing yourself like this, Donnelly. It’s not healthy. You really need to learn how to let go.”
Nick drove to Perry Hollow in the company of the Rolling Stones. Nothing was better for a road trip than Jagger’s tremulous voice and the band’s relentless sound. Nick propelled himself along the highway to the strains of “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” “Gimme Shelter,” and “Brown Sugar.” By the time the band was showing some sympathy for the devil, he had reached Perry Hollow, where a devil of a different stripe had just claimed one of its residents.
He found the crime scene easily enough. On the outskirts of town, it was the place with the most people gathered there. The entire road was closed, forcing Nick to stop his car on the hard shoulder.
Sitting in his car, he surveyed the scene. On one side of the barricade was a crowd of curious onlookers. They craned their necks and talked among themselves, their faces all displaying the same shell-shocked look. On the other side of the police tape was a mix of sheriff’s officers and state troopers. They, too, stood around and chatted while looking as stunned as the bystanders.
The only people in the crowd unfazed by the situation were the only three faces Nick recognized. And that was because they worked for him.
Tony Vasquez was the first to spot Nick as he flashed his credentials and ducked under the police tape.
“You made it,” he said, lifting the brim of his campaign hat. A full-time state trooper and part-time bodybuilder, he was the only task force member who wore a uniform. It sure as hell made him look intimidating, which Nick knew Tony liked. But he also wore it with a certain amount of pride. Only 2 percent of the state’s troopers were Hispanic. And Tony was one of the best. With stats like that, he had every reason to be proud.
“We placed bets on if you’d show up or not,” he said. “I won.”
“How much?”
“Twenty bucks from Cassie and the chance to bench-press Rudy.”
“Well done, Vasquez.”
Rudy Taylor, the bench pressee, was nearby, kneeling before a patch of ice on the side of the road.
“Is this where he was found?” Nick asked.
Rudy nodded. “But he didn’t die here.”
“How can you tell?”
“No blood. No struggle. Just the box he was dumped in.”
Stump short and toothpick thin, Rudy Taylor was considered the odd duck of the team. His size didn’t help. Neither did the bowl haircut that made him look like a grade-school science club president. But he was the best crime scene technician they had. Rudy could survey a scene for five minutes and find ten things a whole team had missed after looking for an hour.
“What about tire marks or footprints?” Nick asked.
Rudy stood and stomped the frozen ground for effect. “There’s not too much of that on this ice. I did find something in the snow over there.”
He pointed to a footprint a few feet away. It was marked with a yellow evidence tag.
“You wax it?” Nick was referring to impression wax. Sprayed from a can, it let them make impressions in the snow without destroying the footprint itself.
“Yeah,” Rudy said. “It belongs to the first responder.”
“Where’s the body?”
“The medical examiner took it away fifteen minutes ago.”
The answer came from the last member of Nick’s team—Cassie Lieberfarb. She stood behind him, a state police baseball cap pressed onto her frizzy orange hair. On her feet were the bright green galoshes she always wore in the field. She called them her profiler boots.
“How was Florida?” she asked, her eyes zeroing in on Nick’s face.
“Hot and sunny.”
“Then where’s your tan?”
Nick shrugged. “I used sunblock. Now back to the murder—who’s the victim?”
“Caucasian male,” Tony said. “Mid-sixties.”
“Just what our guy likes,” Cassie added.
“When is the autopsy?”
“At four.”
Nick compiled a list of things that needed to be done that day. He and Cassie had to examine the corpse before the autopsy started. While they did that, Rudy would supervise the collection and examination of evidence. Tony would wrangle
