Compared to the other shots, this one seems quiet. I see the light extinguish from his eyes. His body goes limp instantly. Silence falls on the room. I can hear the old clock on the wall ticking as its second hand chugs along. The peace that fills me is almost blissful. But I can’t take the time to let it sink in.
I turn away from the bodies and walk out of the house, locking the back door before I pull it closed. I stand on the porch. Everything feels different. The night air is pleasantly cool and damp. The sky is clear, the stars bright pinpoints on its inky blackness.
I am reborn. I have a lifetime ahead of me. With his death, I can put the horrors of my past aside and move on.
Ironically, I feel no regret.
Only relief.
But even as I tell myself it is finally over, disagreement tugs at me. I peel the gloves from my hands. I’ve taken plenty of precautions. I’ve left no fingerprints. I contemplate leaving the murder weapon behind. It’s his, after all. But I put it in my pocket with the balled-up gloves. I take no chances.
Just in case this isn’t the end of my troubles, but the beginning.
CHAPTER TWO
Sheriff Bree Taggert turned onto the rutted lane and stopped her vehicle in front of an old farmhouse. A neighbor had called for a wellness check. As Bree assessed the property through her windshield, she could see why. Weedy pastures and run-down structures painted a desolate landscape. The front-porch supports leaned to the right, as if a hundred years of relentless winds had battered them into submission. The land immediately around the house needed mowing, and the meadows beyond were waist high.
She reached for her radio to let dispatch know she was on scene. “Sheriff Taggert, code eleven.”
Bree climbed out of her vehicle. The house stood on a slight rise, giving her a decent view of the farm. Up close, the structures looked even more neglected. Someone was clearly trying—but mostly failing—to keep the place going. Peeling paint, missing shingles, and broken fence boards evidenced age, hard use, and poor maintenance. The house might have been white once upon a time but had been stripped to a bare, forlorn gray.
A large barn sat behind the house. The weather-beaten exterior still showed faint traces of deep red. The fencing around two large pastures had mostly collapsed. A smaller grass enclosure next to the barn had been recently repaired. In it, a dozen goats milled around the muddy area near the gate. Bree didn’t know much about goats, but the animals seemed restless. Chickens roamed freely. She spotted a few cats slinking around the barn door.
Something was off here. She could feel it—an undeniable wrongness hovering in the air between the agitated goats and the pecking chickens. According to tax and motor vehicle records, Camilla Brown, age seventy, owned the property and resided here, but the goats, chickens, and cats were the only signs of life. The place had a vacant feel, much like the abandoned farm down the road from Bree’s.
Her gaze swept across the horizon. From an acreage standpoint, the farm was large, but the nearest neighbor was at least a half mile down the road. Did Ms. Brown live all alone out here? She was elderly. Was she no longer able to maintain the farm? Had she suffered an accident or medical emergency? Was she somewhere on the farm, hurt—or worse?
Bree called both the landline and cell number on record for Ms. Brown. When no one answered, she left messages.
The thought of finding Ms. Brown’s body depressed Bree, and she almost wished she hadn’t volunteered to take the call. But her deputies were always busy, it was near shift change, and the farm was on Bree’s way home, so it had made sense for her to handle it. Plus, after an afternoon of negotiations over renovation and expansion plans for the sheriff’s station, she’d wanted to escape the office like a prisoner newly granted parole. The plans were exciting. They were adding a locker room for her new female deputies, plus new holding cells and other sorely needed general updates throughout the station. But bureaucracy gave her a throbbing pain behind her eyes.
It was only Tuesday.
Bree turned at the sound of an approaching engine. A pickup truck rattled up the drive and parked next to her SUV. An elderly man climbed out, looking spry for his age, which she estimated to be at least seventy. Skinny and bowlegged, he dressed in jeans and a plaid shirt like an old-movie cowboy. His face was as wrinkled as a piece of foil that had been crumpled into a ball and smoothed back out.
“Sheriff.” He touched the wide brim of his hat. “I’m Homer Johnson. I live on the next farm. I called you.” He nodded toward the house. “Drove by the place earlier and saw the goats outside. Camilla usually brings them in by four. Chickens should be in by now too. She’d never leave them out past dark. They’ll be coyote food. I tried calling her and banging on the door. She won’t answer her phone, and her door is locked. She never locks up during the daytime.” Homer seemed to have thought of everything.
“When did you see her last?”
Homer squinted at the setting sun. “I saw Camilla at church last Sunday. She never misses, and neither do I. This is the first time I’ve been by since then. But I’m worried. Camilla is a widow, and like me, she’s getting up in years. She had one of those mini strokes last year. Had to sell off a bunch of her goats ’cause she couldn’t keep up with the work.” He sighed. “I feel for her. I’m struggling with the same thing. At least my boy is involved in the business and we still turn a decent profit.”
“Do you have a key to her house?”
“No, ma’am. If I did, I wouldn’t have called you.”
“Let’s see what’s going on.” Bree started toward the front walkway. Dead leaves crunched under her boots. Though early September was still warm, the leaves of a mature oak tree in the front yard had already begun to turn and fall. Winter was just around the corner in upstate New York.
Homer followed her. They went up the porch steps.
Bree stopped on a welcome mat and thumped on the door. “Ms. Brown? This is the sheriff. Please come to the door.”
The house remained quiet. In the background, goats bleated.
“I already did that.” Homer scowled. Worry deepened his crow’s-feet into craters.
“We have procedure to follow.” Bree couldn’t just break into a house.
The front door was solid wood, with no glass panes and a dead bolt. Gaining entry here would require a battering ram.
As if reading her mind, Homer said, “No one uses the front door.”
“Let’s try the back.” Bree descended the steps and started around the house, standing on her toes and peering in windows as she walked, but all the curtains were drawn. The most she could see were narrow slashes of dim rooms where the drapes didn’t quite meet.
Homer strode at her side. They rounded the back corner of the house and turned to look at it. A rear porch spanned the back, mirroring the one in front.
“She never closes her curtains either.” Homer propped his hands on his hips. “Leastways not the downstairs ones. The weather’s been nice this week. The windows should be open. Mine are.”
So were Bree’s. She went up the back-porch steps and knocked. No one answered.
“I’m going to check the barn.” She jogged down the wooden steps, a growing sense of urgency quickening her pace.
Homer kept up with her as she crossed the weedy backyard and passed an open chicken coop. The big birds squawked and scattered. The goats ran in circles, bleating and stomping, as Bree passed their pen.
She went to the heavy double doors and rolled one side open. The interior was less barn and more commercial milking operation and was better kept than the rest of the property. Milking machines were elevated on a raised platform. She peered through a doorway into another room that contained large stainless-steel tables and refrigerators. The equipment might be a little dinged up, but everything was immaculately clean.
“Hello?” Bree called. “Ms. Brown? This is Sheriff Taggert.”
The goats bleated louder, as if trying to get her attention.
Bree turned away from the empty barn and inclined her head toward the goats. “Are they normally this agitated?”