Page 93 of The Girls in the Snow

“Mommy?” Quick footsteps sounded on the stairs, and then Bailey rounded the corner. He hurried to his mother. “Mommy, what’s wrong?”

Amy’s body shook with sobs.

“Mommy?” The little boy’s voice trembled with fear. “Mommy!”

Amy slowly sat up, tears running down her face and dripping off her chin. She took a deep breath and drew Bailey into her arms. “Mommy’s really sad about Madison, honey.”

“Me too.”

She pressed her forehead to Bailey’s. “Why don’t you come upstairs and have a camp out with me tonight?”

“Okay.” Bailey glanced into the kitchen. “What about Daddy?”

“Don’t worry about him. It’s just you and me tonight.” Amy took his hand.

As soon as they left the room, Nikki nodded at Miller and then went into the kitchen where John sat, drinking whiskey straight from the bottle.

“The fuck do you want?”

“Justice,” Nikki said.

“Then find out who killed Maddie, because I sure as hell didn’t do it.”

“Oh, I will,” Nikki said. “And I won’t stop until I have the truth about everyone you’ve hurt.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

She could shatter his perfect nose in a single, well-placed punch. A knee to the groin would put him on the floor. Nikki would stand over John with all the power, just as he’d probably done with her father. “I’m talking about my parents. Mark’s innocent. Their killer has had twenty years of freedom, but his days are numbered. I will bring him to justice.”

He sneered at her. “You’re delusional.”

“You’re a sexual predator who’s assaulted his last woman.”

“Get out of my house.”

“No problem. See you soon.”

She glanced at the table next to John’s chair as she made her way through to the living room and back to the front door.

Miller had bagged up the broken pieces of the stein.

Forty

Nikki’s yawn nearly split her head open. Across the big conference room table, Liam didn’t look much better. He stared at his tablet, his eyes drooping. He’d delivered the bagged stein to Courtney at the lab last night and hung around while she processed it, hoping to at least have fingerprint confirmation. But since the stein was in so many pieces, Courtney had to piece it back together in order to get a full print. She’d promised to have something for them this morning.

Liam stirred his coffee. “Did you sleep last night?”

“Not really.” Nikki had replayed the confrontation with John a dozen times, trying to remember every little nonverbal cue and wondering if she was being objective or seeing what she wanted to see. She still wasn’t certain.

“Taking the cup from his house—how much is that going to hurt us in court?” Liam asked.

“He threw it at me,” Nikki said. “Technically it’s evidence in the assault of an FBI agent.”

“I have to admit, I wasn’t sure how you were going to make it work. But you were right about the drinking. And damned if you don’t know how to push a person’s buttons.”

Nikki cracked a smile. “Years of practice, my friend.”

Liam shoved the tablet away from him. “Even with the algorithm, I can’t narrow down enough names to figure out the initials. There are just too many factors.”