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“I know he’s going to have a few deputies in plain clothes, too.” Finn stood up and stretched, and Jessica wondered, not for the first time, how all his female students managed to concentrate in class.
He swiveled around to a filing cabinet and swung back, holding out two small votive candles in jars. “One for you. Someone from the Women Against Violence Against Women came through the offices today handing these out for the vigil.”
“Someone will have lighters down there?”
“I’m sure of it.” He emerged from behind the desk and lifted his jacket from the hook on the back of the door. “Let’s do this.”
When they exited the front of Waverly Hall, they joined a surge of people carrying candles and signs. Some of the girls were already crying. Jessica gritted her teeth, preparing for a rough night.
People were walking around with lighters and Jessica and Finn held out their candles to join the sea of lights bobbing on the quad. The sheriff’s department took the stage first, and Detective Morse’s distinct red hair blazed from the center of the group.
As she and Finn staked out a place at the edge of the crowd, a deputy approached Finn.
“Professor Karlsson, can we please have you join us on stage again? You don’t have to speak this time, but you’re a popular professor and the students will feel comfortable seeing you up there with all us cops.”
Finn opened his mouth and turned to Jessica, but she nudged him. “Go ahead. You’ll probably have a better view of all the attendees up there. If I spot someone suspicious, I’ll text you.”
“Meet me back at my office when this is all over.”
She watched Finn’s back as he and the deputy made their way to the stage. Then she cupped the candle in her hand and scanned the crowd. Even without high heels, Jessica’s height allowed her to see over a lot of heads—not that there was much to see. Many people wore hoodies, the ovals of their faces dimly illuminated by the candles in their hands.
When Detective Morse tapped the microphone, Jessica swiveled her attention to the stage. Finn stood behind Morse along with several other people—both civilian and law enforcement. An Asian couple stood to the side of Morse. Their faces, masks of shock and grief, flagged them as Missy’s parents.
Jessica studied the other expressions and found another couple with the same hollowed-out look on their faces. She recognized Matt Flemming from the online articles she’d looked up, but his appearance tonight bore little resemblance to the confident and powerful businessman who smiled in his pictures. Position and money might help speed up an investigation, but they could never bring back his little girl.
Jessica blinked back her own tears and tried to tune in to Morse’s speech. He repeated much of what he said theother day about staying vigilant and keeping off the trails by the creek. He advised women to travel in groups and report any suspicious activity. Same stuff women had been hearing for years. When were the cops going to catch this guy?
Apparently, that thought had occurred to other women as well. A few disgruntled voices in the crowd yelled questions as if Morse were conducting a press conference. Shouts rang out asking for accountability. For suspects. Status on Deke Macy.
Jessica actually felt bad for the guy, whose face was turning the same color as his hair. She knew firsthand the deputies didn’t have many leads. Their one good suspect had alibis. But the crowd wasn’t having it.
People from the back surged forward, nudging Jessica into the person in front of her as someone stepped on her heel and apologized. This could get ugly.
Her cell phone buzzed in her pocket, and she pulled it out. Had Finn had enough? When she glanced at the display, her blood ran cold. An unknown number.
She tapped the text with her shaky thumb, and her breath hitched in her throat when she read the message.Getting rowdy
She didn’t need to ask the sender’s identity.Are you here?
I was. Took a break from the crowd with a friend
Her heart beat so hard, it rattled the buttons on her jacket. She texted him a flurry of questions.Where was he? Who was he with? Had he hurt anyone?
A throng of people rushed toward the stage, hoisting signs and screaming for answers. Someone bumped herelbow, knocking her phone to the ground. She dropped down to retrieve it, and then crawled away from the mob to the perimeter.
She blew out her candle and rolled onto the damp grass. On her knees, she held her phone close to her face, watching the bubbles on the display, waiting for his answers to her queries.
Art garden fountain maybe u won’t be too late this time
Jessica staggered to her feet, jerking her head toward the stage. Finn, his head dipped, was in conversation with Morgan’s father. Jessica waved her arms at him to get his attention, but more people and their signs got between her and her view of the stage.
She stabbed at Finn’s phone number in her contacts. It rang three times and rolled over to voicemail. She shouted into the phone. “Come to the Art Garden.”
She then grabbed the nearest person and yanked his arm. “Come to the Art Garden with me. There’s another woman in danger.”
The man shook her off and raised his fist at the stage. She tried getting the attention of another man, but if he could even hear her, he didn’t seem interested in what she had to say.
As she started running along the side of Waverly Hall, she fumbled with her phone, forwarding the unknown caller’s text to Finn. She wound up in the smaller quad where Finn had chased the spy. She headed for the walkway that led to the Art Garden, a garden filled with sculptures that fronted the fine arts building.