Page 77 of The Witch’s Orchard

“Did you know him?”

“Who?”

“Sheriff Kerridge.”

“No, not really. I remember him because I was a teenager at the time and teenage boys tend to harbor a healthy fear of law enforcement, but my memory is that everyone respected him. Loved him, even.”

“That’s what Susan McKinney said,” I tell him. “Apparently they were pretty close.”

We sit in silence for a while as he goes back to the file.

“There was a plumber here that day too,” he says eventually. “The day Molly was taken. There’s a note scanned in here from the FBI with the business card stapled to it obstructing the name on the paperwork.”

I remember what Deena had said about talking to a plumber on her way out.

“Dwight Hoyle,” I say. And I relay what Mandy had told me. That he’d been sent there to fix a pipe and that he had to give a statement about what he saw that day.

I put my hands to my face and recall what I’d seen only hours before. Dwight Hoyle’s half-melted face. His wife screaming. The flames and black smoke engulfing me.

“Annie—”

I shake my head, my hands still mashed into my cheeks.

“I tried to talk to them. I went to their house the first day I was here. I’d hoped to get him to tell me anything he hadn’t mentioned to the police, but now we don’t even have his damn statement. God… I wasat their house.”

“I know. I’m sorry—”

“It’s not your fault. It’s just this whole case is like one big knot. Normally, I don’t mind taking my time to untangle things, but with Jessica still missing and Molly dead, I’m… I’m at a loss. I’m out of my depth, AJ.”

I rub my eyes. They’re gritty with lack of sleep, and I wince at the sensation of sand rolling over my eyeballs.

“Annie—” AJ says softly, squeezing my shoulder. “You’re doing everything you can.”

I let out a long breath, and some of the tension drops away.

His hand runs up to the back of my neck and I sigh as the side of his thumb caresses the base of my scalp. “You can’t solve this case in one night.”

I grumble.

“Not even with help from an expert sheriff’s deputy like myself.”

I grumble some more but I’m smiling now.

I turn toward him and lean into him like a cat, rest my head against his warm palm.

“Time for bed,” AJ says.

“Would you like to come?” I ask him.

“Oh yes.”

TWENTY-SIX

THE NEXT MORNING, I’Malready in the kitchen, drinking a glass of water, when Leo calls a little before dawn. I pick up the phone before it has much time to buzz.

“Hey, Leo,” I say softly.

“What’s with the whisper—you got someone over?” he asks, chuckling in that deep, velvety way he has. “You manage to find the one person in that hick town worth a good lay?”