Page 13 of Closer Than You Know (Vera Boyett #2)

Thursday, March 6

Boyett Farm

Good Hollow Road, Fayetteville, 6:30 a.m.

Vera stood in the shower until the water started to cool.

Dragging herself from the bed this morning had required enormous effort. Although she was confident the whiskey had helped her go to sleep and stay that way, she wasn’t sure the resulting hangover was worth it.

Her head felt stuffed with cotton, and that distant ache suggested it was only going to get worse.

She shut off the water and climbed out. Moving slowly to avoid contributing to the nausea threatening, she used the towel to squeeze and rub her hair partially dry, then swab the dampness from her body before hanging the towel over the side of the tub.

The steamy air in the room made breathing even more difficult. Never again would she drink like that on an empty stomach.

She walked to the sink and reached for her hairbrush. Her gaze snagged on the fogged mirror. Words were written on the steamy glass.

I’ve missed you, Detective

Vera stared at the mirror, squeezed her eyes shut, and then looked again just to make sure she hadn’t imagined the words staring back at her. She squeezed her eyes shut once more. Not possible. If she was lucky, it was a hangover hallucination.

But it wasn’t ... the words were still there. Her heart thumped harder and harder.

Her first instinct was to reach out and smear them away, but the deeply rooted cop training wouldn’t allow the move.

This was the Messenger’s MO. His wording ... but that was impossible.

Where the hell was her cell phone?

Her mind replayed her movements after dragging out of bed ... the window. Closing the door behind her to hold in the heat and steam, she rushed back to her room and grabbed the phone from the window ledge where she’d left it last night.

“Don’t be dead,” she muttered.

Five percent. Thank God.

She hurried back to the bathroom and snapped a photo of the mirror. Luckily, the foggy glass around the words kept her reflection from the photo. Having Bent or anyone else see her bare breasts was ...

“Stop.” She grabbed her towel and hurried back to her room. She stuck the charging cord into her phone, left it on the bedside table and went in search of clothes. Her usual fare. Jeans. Tee and sweatshirt. She tossed the items onto the unmade bed and dug for underthings. As quickly as possible she dried her body and dressed.

She sat down on the bed, and while she dragged on her socks, she called Bent.

“Morning, Vee.”

“I need Conover at my house.” With her socks on, she picked up the phone, took it off speaker. “Someone was in my house while I was gone yesterday.”

“You okay?”

Big breath. “Yes.”

“Is it possible there’s someone still in the house?”

The idea only then settled like an elephant on her chest. “No.” She relaxed as the details of last night cleared in her mind. “I don’t think so. I set the alarm when I came in and checked the house. A window was open, so I think someone had been in here but left before I came home.”

No need to mention the other unlocked window. It was possible it had been unlocked for weeks or months. But that cop instinct of hers said she’d been right last night about why it was open. Which meant, she kept to herself, that someone could have come in again last night. Damn it.

“Where are you?” Movement rustled in the background on his end.

“In my room.”

“Lock the door. Pull something—anything in front of it. I’m sending the nearest unit to you, and I’m on my way. I’ll call Conover en route.”

Vera ended the call. She wasn’t sure if she’d thanked him or even said goodbye. Her gaze settled on her bedroom door. She blinked. Considered her options. No way was she hiding in here.

She grabbed her phone and slid it into her back pocket and walked out. Moving quickly, soundlessly, she checked the other bedrooms. Clear. On her way toward the stairs, she paused at the bathroom door, stared at the words now melting on the mirror. Couldn’t be what it looked like. No. Way.

Not possible.

She swallowed the lump lodged in her throat and moved on. To the count of ten, she stood at the top of the stairs and listened. Nothing save the ticking of that old grandfather clock in the entry hall that she forgot to wind up more often than not. Her gaze surveying left to right, she started down the stairs. Room by room she searched. Living room was clear. Library and bathroom too. She eased into the kitchen ... clear.

Thank God. She so needed coffee right now.

Then again, she supposed someone could have been hiding somewhere she’d failed to look last night. Set up the message and hung around to see her reaction.

“Not his style.” The serial killer known as the Messenger would have gotten in, left the words for his victim, and gotten out. No deviation. No hanging about with a vic in the house. He did not take those sorts of risks. But leaving notes on mirrors like this was his favorite method of delivery.

Stop. Where the hell had that thought come from anyway? The Messenger was in prison. Had been for a dozen years. Vera shook herself. Last night’s overindulgence had obviously rattled her brain.

She dismissed any further thoughts about that part of her past. Not going there.

Someone—maybe someone related to the Time Thief case—was messing with her head. Couldn’t be anything else. Finding information about her biggest cases during her tenure with the Memphis Police Department was easy enough to do on the internet.

Satisfied with her assessment, she prepared a pot of coffee versus a single cup. Conover and Bent might want coffee as well. Besides, she doubted one cup would get her through this hellacious morning.

8:30 a.m.

Vera watched as Conover reached for his bag of tricks in the middle of her bathroom floor. “So, what’s the verdict?” she asked.

He looked from Vera to Bent and back. “Without giving you the exact type or brand, I’d say laundry detergent. Maybe from your own laundry room, since that’s where the window was opened. But, as you know, I can’t be sure of anything until I’ve run all the necessary tests. I’m basing my preliminary assumption on the scent and the oily feel of the residue that was on your mirror.”

Whatever hope Vera had held out that it would be some other substance, like plain old alcohol, deflated. The answer Conover had given fit the MO she didn’t want to think about. But the Messenger was an old case that could not possibly be back in her life. No way. Even the idea was implausible. The memory of Elizabeth bringing it up echoed in her head. Had to be a coincidence.

The whole concept was ridiculous. Could. Not. Be. Him.

She nodded at Conover. “I understand.”

Conover looked to Bent. “You want me to lift prints from the window?”

“And this door.” Bent nodded toward the bathroom door.

“Will do.”

Vera headed for the stairs. The frustration building inside her was not something she wanted Bent or Conover to witness. So maybe not only frustration. More like shock, worry, fear . Damn it, she hated feeling this way. No matter what she told herself, some flaw in her reasoning wouldn’t let go of the remote possibility that yet another part of her past was back to screw with her.

Bent was right behind her as she took the final step and turned toward the kitchen.

“You want to explain to me what’s going on?”

More coffee wouldn’t help, so she stalled a few feet from the kitchen doorway. Food damned sure wouldn’t provide any relief, either, so no need to go to the kitchen. She wasn’t a stress cook like Luna. She’d always thought she wasn’t a stress drinker like Eve, but then last night had seemed to disprove that conclusion.

Vera opted to go to her mother’s library rather than stand in the entry hall and have this unavoidable conversation. “I’d made detective,” she began. “Thirteen years ago. The chief really wanted me on the admin side, but I was determined to be an investigator. Reluctantly, he caved, and I was assigned to the homicide division. Being at the bottom of the food chain seniority-wise, I always got the shit tasks and cases. The ones no one else wanted to deal with—meaning the routine stuff. The easy-to-solve, ‘anyone can figure it out’ sort. But then a few months later, I arrived at a routine scene that changed everything.”

Why the hell was she even talking about this? The person—whoever left that message—could NOT be him.

“The Messenger.” Bent’s jaw worked for a moment. “That’s how you got involved with the case.”

Just hearing him say the name made her gut clench.

“I made an impression pretty quickly.” Vera nodded. “The first message I received from him was left on the mirror in my bathroom—like this one. My apartment was a low-end one, so breaking in wasn’t difficult. He used laundry detergent to write the words on the mirror so that when I took a shower, the steam covered the glass save for where the detergent was—revealing his message to me.” She blinked, took a breath. “ I see you, Detective. ”

Biggest mistake of his fucking life. Vera was the one who figured out who he was and nailed his ass.

This is not him. Nope. Can’t be.

“I was stationed in Europe during that time,” Bent said, “but I followed both you and Eve on social media. The bastard’s in prison, right?”

“He is.” Vera reminded herself to keep her cool. She did not want Bent to see her lose it. “This morning, while I waited for you to arrive, I called a friend in Memphis, who confirmed it for me.”

Riverbend Maximum Security Institution was in Nashville. Not nearly far enough away to suit Vera. When she’d been in Memphis, at the time of his sentencing, she’d been glad he would be hundreds of miles away from her.

But now that she was back in Fayetteville ... he wasn’t nearly far enough away.

Why was she still thinking about him? She ordered herself to stop.

“Tell me about him.”

But Bent kept wanting to hear more ...

Vera took a breath. “If it’s okay with you, I’d like to hold off going there until there’s reason to. Anyone could have read about him and decided to do this. I haven’t exactly been a local favorite. And if someone who’s holding a grudge knows I’m helping on this case, it may have stirred up those feelings.”

“For now,” Bent allowed, his expression stony. “But if anything like this happens again, we are going there.”

“Thanks.” With effort, Vera pushed the worries about the writing on her mirror aside. “Did Conover have any news on Owens’s shack or Nolan’s apartment?” Bent had already told her there was no news on Nolan Baker, but he hadn’t been specific as to the case overall.

“There were no prints at all on the newspaper clippings in the bedroom,” Bent told her. “But the poster-board drawings were covered with Owens’s prints. There’s still a lot to go through from the shed out back and in the shack itself. As for Nolan’s apartment, nothing so far that we didn’t expect. His prints. His parents’. No word back yet about his laptop. Nothing unexpected on his cell phone.”

There hadn’t been any calls to or from Teresa Russ on his cell phone. Vera had checked. No voicemails either. Thank God.

“There were prints on that window at the old hospital where the blind was removed and then on the one where it was installed.”

Vera perked up. “Seriously?”

“Seriously. No match yet. Conover and I were at the old hospital when you called.”

“Sorry.” She folded her arms over her chest. “I could have waited ... I just got spooked.”

“Never wait, Vee. Always trust your instincts.” Bent put a hand to her back and ushered her toward the entry hall. “You should eat and have more coffee.”

He knew her too well. “That would mean I’d have to cook.”

“I’ll cook. An omelet sound okay? Assuming you have the fixings.”

She scoffed. “Why don’t I go grab a few things from my greenhouse garden?”

A grin tried to make an appearance, but he kept it at bay. “Let me have a look in your fridge.”

While Bent figured out if there was anything to prepare, Vera wandered to the laundry room, where Conover was now focused on the window over her washer and dryer.

He glanced at her. “You should have better locks on these windows.”

Yeah, she had an idea for that. “You’re right. I’ll take care of that today.”

She had a lot to do today. Dropping by the hardware store for a new power drill and some long screws for securing the windows was first on her agenda. Next, she intended to get in touch with Teresa Russ. Then she would follow up on leads related to Nolan Baker—not that she had any, but she planned to find at least one today. If the Time Thief’s MO played out per usual, Nolan would be released tonight.

But Vera had a bad feeling about that. Maybe the message she’d found on her mirror this morning was the reason that nagging sense of doom wouldn’t fully dissipate. Her instincts were humming.

Some would say it was a sure sign she needed to brace herself because something bad was coming.

Vera didn’t think so. She was pretty sure it was already here.