The Bone Forest Read online

  “Ain’t that the truth.” Wren swallowed. Fifteen years ago, there had been two sets of serial murders. The FCL murders and at the same time, Lucas John Jackson had been stalking women in the area. And then, after all of that had died down, Oscar Robinson had started killing teenage football players in Maryland, just across the river. People joked this was the serial killer capital of the world these days.

  Wren had heard about the bodies of the little girls, of course.

  She’d tried to convince herself that it hadn’t factored into her decision to come back to this place, because what kind of person moves in because murders are happening?

  A psychotic person.

  A disturbed person.

  A person who might share more with Vivian Delacroix than DNA.

  But she didn’t want to think like that, so she pushed the thoughts away.

  “Sorry,” said Reilly. “I didn’t mean to bring up…” He folded his arms over his chest. “That is, I’m sure this is all a bit of a sensitive subject for you.”

  Wren let out a chuckle. “Oh, they told you who I was. Was it Jim McNamara?” She peered over Reilly’s shoulder. “You know, when he was in high school, he wrecked his truck out on his daddy’s farm, and he tried to cover it up by claiming that one of us from the Fellowship stole it and did it.”

  Reilly raised his eyebrows. “Listen, McNamara’s a little rough around the edges—”

  “He’s a peach,” said Wren, smiling widely at him. “They all are, the, what’d you call them? The local boys. As you can imagine, we all get along great.”

  Reilly looked down at his feet, as if he was embarrassed. “Well, I’ll make this as quick and painless as I can, Ms. Delacroix.”

  “Too late,” said Wren.

  He winced.

  She took pity on him. He was a nice-looking man, after all, and he even seemed nice. She shouldn’t give him a rough time just because of her high school battle scars. Besides, everyone had high school battle scars, even the kids who’d been on the homecoming court and lettered in track. She bet Reilly had a few of his own. “Listen, I’ll tell you what I saw. The body’s laid out presentationally. It’s been well cared for. That denotes some sense of respect. What she’s wearing, those aren’t her clothes. He dressed her for the occasion. She’s important to him in some way. So, this was all planned, and it’s all highly symbolic. I’d think that even if it weren’t for the position of her arm and leg. You’re probably looking for a man in his late twenties to early forties. He could be married or in a relationship of some kind. He’s connected to the Children in some way, or else he’s done some kind of extensive research on them—”

  “Whoa,” said Reilly, holding up a hand. “Hold on, you’re going a little too fast for me.”

  “Sorry.” She looked down at her palms. Turned them over and looked at her fingernails. “If you want me to write it down—”

  “So, you were at the FBI Academy? You’ve obviously got some training in profiling.”

  She looked up to meet Reilly’s eyes. He had huge brown eyes, kind brown eyes, eyes that made a girl want to unburden all her troubles. The way he was looking at her, she thought he’d surely understand her. He was good, this Reilly. She bet he was dynamite at getting confessions. “McNamara knows about that too,” she said dully. “Of course he does. Everyone knows everything about everyone else in this town.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “It’s none of my business. I shouldn’t have asked.”

  “It’s true,” she said. “I was at the Academy at Quantico. But I left.” She gestured around. “I couldn’t pass up the lucrative opportunities of giving tours.”

  He raised his eyebrows, and now she could see the questions written on his face. But to his credit, he didn’t ask any of them. Instead, he turned the subject back to the dead girl, which was what was important, after all. “You said that these weren’t her clothes.”

  “No, she’s dressed as an initiate into the Fellowship,” said Wren. “That was what we had to wear, those flowing black pants and shirts. I had an outfit like that.”

  “Right, because you were raised in the cult.” He winced again. “In the, um, religion.”

  “You can call it a cult.” She shrugged. “That’s what it is.”

  “Right.” He nodded. “And the way she’s posed? I’ve been searching online to find some idea of the significance of that, but so far, I’ve come up with nothing.”

  “When my mother would prepare her army to go out and do her bidding,” said Wren, “she’d have them lie down like that, feet to the fire, and they would meditate on the glory of the Crimson Ram and the glory their actions would bring to him and to David Song. She called it the readiness pose.”

  “So,” said Reilly, “someone connected with the cult.”

  “Yeah,” she said.

  “And the stuff about his being in a relationship or married?”

  “Well, he’s clearly an organized killer. He’s taken the time to plan this out, and it’s all very deliberate. I’m sure that you haven’t been able to find any physical evidence linking him to the crime. No DNA or fibers from the trunk of his car or anything like that.”

  “Nothing,” said Reilly. “But what does that have to do with being married?”

  “It’s about control,” said Wren. “He can hide what he is. He can blend in. He could convince a woman to be with him.”

  “Right.” Reilly nodded. “Yeah, okay, I can see that.” He rubbed his forehead. “Listen, do you think I could call you if I had some other questions about this or some of the other victims?”

  She tried to tell him that she wasn’t really interested in being involved, and that she just wanted her privacy, but what came out instead was an eager sounding, “Sure thing. Anytime.”

  “Yeah?” He smiled. He was even more attractive with that smile. “Great. And if you think of anything else, anything at all, you should call me.” He pulled out a card and handed it over.

  She took his card. “You know, maybe if I could look at the files or have some time with crime scene photos, I could be of some help.”

  He arched an eyebrow at her. “Look at the files?”

  She jammed his card into her pocket. What the hell was she saying?

  * * *

  Wren was sure that she was going to have to go to the police station to make a formal statement, but Reilly simply made her go over what she’d said again, recording it into his phone, and then told her she could go.

  She stayed.

  She watched them take pictures and string up caution tape. She watched them bag up the body finally and load that poor little girl into the back of a police van to take to the morgue. There, they’d do everything they could to figure out who had done such a thing.

  Wren would probably have nightmares about that little girl tonight.

  She had nightmares before joining the FBI Academy, but they only got worse with all the case studies and with going to jail to interview serial killers behind bars. The way those men weren’t even the least bit sorry for what they had done? It was all nightmare fodder.

  If she thought leaving would have made the nightmares better, she might have left, but she knew the damage was done, so she stayed and watched it all.

  Finally, the house was closed up tight and all of the police officers drove off.

  One of them, a woman who looked vaguely familiar, maybe someone from high school, stopped to talk to her and make sure she was okay. “You need a ride somewhere?” she asked.

  Wren assured her that she was fine. She turned and started into the woods. There was a path back here that wound through the woods and onto FCL property. It was that path that Garrett, Lexi, and the others had probably taken the night of the murders. Wren couldn’t be sure. No one ever talked about that part when they were confessing. They didn’t explain their route to the Walker household.

  But Wren had been at the bonfire that night. She had been lying on the ground in the readiness position, arm and leg maki
ng triangles against her body. Foot pointed at the fire, thinking thoughts about the glory of the Horned Lord. She’d been ten years old, old enough to be initiated into such things according to David Song. He was the leader of the cult, and he had the enlightened idea that girls who started to menstruate were now women and could be married off.

  But before Wren could reach the path, someone else appeared on it, materializing out of the darkness. She stopped short. “Hawk?”

  Hawk Marner tucked his chin-length hair behind his ears. His lips parted. “Wren?”

  She squared her shoulders. She hadn’t been avoiding him since she’d gotten back, not exactly. She’d just tried not to be anywhere that she thought he would be. It was years ago now, all of it, and she had been so young. There was nothing to be embarrassed about. Except she was acutely aware that her face was growing hot, and she was glad of the darkness to hide it. “What are you doing out here?”

  He rubbed the back of his neck, his movement fluid, masculine. He was as wiry as ever, but he’d filled out in the ensuing years. God, how long had it been? Nine years? That long? He looked good.

  She remembered why she’d been so enamored with him as a teenager. But now she was a grown woman, and he still seemed so… well, what had he done with himself? Nothing, near as she knew. He still lived on the compound, and he only got by doing the same sort of odd jobs he’d done when he was twenty. From Kimora, she’d heard that he still drank it all away too.

  But, hell, maybe she shouldn’t throw stones, what with this glass house she was living in and all.

  “I, uh, I heard there was another body,” he said. “Little girl?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “I found her.”

  “Young as the others?” he said.

  She nodded.

  “I remember when you were that age.” He looked her over now, his gaze almost greedy.

  She got a strange tickle at the back of her neck, crawling down her spine. “Hawk? Why are you here?”

  He shrugged. “No real reason. Didn’t think you’d be here. It’s been a long time.”

  She swallowed, and her mind was racing. That profile she’d provided to Reilly, it could fit Hawk. Well, there was the bit about the relationship. She knew Hawk wasn’t married, and Kimora said he didn’t have a girlfriend. But Hawk could have been married if he’d wanted. Lord knew the women in the Children threw themselves at him all the time. She remembered when she’d been jealous. But maybe it had all been for the best.

  Hawk… the things he’d been through. He’d been sent out by Vivian on more than one occasion. No one had ever mentioned him when they were making statements to the police, though. Hawk had never been connected to any of the murders, but he’d been there. He would come back sometimes and talk to her about the things he’d seen.

  She grimaced. “You getting a charge out of the police looking at your handiwork?”

  “What?” He made a face, like something smelled bad.

  “Just tell me,” she said. “Did you do this? Are you doing this?”

  “Doing what?”

  “Killing these girls,” she said. “You know, if I were running this investigation, I think you’d be my number one suspect.”

  He took a step back. “Well, it’s nice to see you again, too, Wren.”

  She shoved her hands into her pockets, and she was blushing again, this time out of shame. Why had she gone at him that way? Even if he was the murderer, telling him she suspected him was probably the worst move she could make. It would only put him on guard. And he wasn’t the murderer. She had been too long under those case files back at the Academy. It had made her crack. Now, everywhere she looked, she only saw the worst possibilities. “I’m sorry,” she muttered. She pushed past him, heading for the path.

  He followed her. “Hey, seriously, why would you say that?”

  “I shouldn’t have. I’ve lost it, Hawk. Really, I can’t be around people anymore.” Wasn’t that why she’d come here? Because she knew that she’d be isolated? She picked up the pace, even though the slope of the path went uphill.

  He caught up to her, put a hand on her shoulder.

  She shook him off as if he burned her.

  He held up his hands in surrender.

  She sucked in a noisy breath. “Please. I’m trying to get out of here. It’s been a rough night.”

  “You want to talk about it?”

  “With you?”

  “You don’t really think I would kill little girls.”

  “Part of me does,” she said. She shrugged. “I don’t know. I think I’m just broken.”

  “Well, ain’t we all.” He let out a soft, helpless laugh.

  She opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

  He shoved his hands into his back pockets, and his light gray eyes were so startling in the darkness, and he looked dreamy to her, like he had when she was sixteen, and he’d been twenty-two. How old was he now? Thirty? No, thirty-one. “I thought you got out of here, little bird. I thought you were doing okay.”

  “I did too,” she said, sighing. “But, uh, yeah, not so much.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  It was late, and Reilly should have gone home, because there wasn’t much else that he could do right now. They wouldn’t be doing an autopsy on the body until the morning, and it would probably only tell him all the things that the other three bodies had told him.

  They’d identified the victim.

  It hadn’t been hard, considering that little Vada Walker had been reported missing two days before. He knew that her parents had feared the worst with the murders. They would have had to. When he thought about getting the news that their little girl was gone, he got sick to his stomach.

  Vomiting seemed like the only appropriate response to all of it.

  It went against the very nature of things. Parents didn’t have to bury their children. Not their little girls.

  But he was distracted from thinking those kinds of thoughts by the realization that he was a complete idiot. He wasn’t sure why it had taken the association of the last names for him to see it, but now it was obvious.

  Vada Walker was the great niece of Michael Walker, whose house the little girl had been found in. And now that he was looking back over the victims thus far, they were all related to the original victims of Vivian Delacroix and the Fellowship. Austyn Campbell, the first victim, was the second cousin once removed or something of Adrian Campbell, who’d been shot to death back in 1998, the FCL’s first victim. Kailin Wilson was Georgia Wilson’s niece. Georgia had been killed during the Walker Massacre in 2004. Ingrid Moore was related to Hannah Moore, another victim of the Walker Massacre.

  He wasn’t sure why he hadn’t seen it before, but he hadn’t been thinking of the Vivian Delacroix case. Why should he? It was over and buried. Clearly, this was connected. The murderer was recreating it in some sick, sad way. He didn’t understand all the angles of it yet, but he was going to figure it out, and he was going to find this bastard. He was going to lock up the killer for the rest of his life, and all of this madness was going to end.

  No more dead little girls. No more horror. Reilly had to stop it.

  Which brought him to Wren Delacroix. She knew the cult, and she had the background in profiling.

  Reilly had some training himself, although the kind of things that they gave local police was pathetic. More often than not, cops wanted to think they knew everything about serial killers because they’d watched a few movies. But Reilly had taken it seriously. He had even bought himself a textbook on it once, but he was ashamed to admit that he hadn’t made much headway into it. It had been so dry, the language so full of jargon. He hadn’t understood half of what he read.

  Lopez appeared in the doorway to Reilly’s office. “Hey, you’re burning the midnight oil.”

  Lopez was his captain, even though he technically worked outside the purview of his local department. The task force covered the tri-state area, the eastern West Virginia panhandle
and parts of northern Virginia and eastern Maryland.

  The task force was a bit of sleight-of-hand put in place to shuffle off cases that couldn’t be solved into some other territory’s percentages. This way, even if a crime occurred in Maryland, it didn’t count against the current sheriff or mayor, because it was now the purview of the task force. Difficult cases, like serial killers, were perfect fodder for the task force.

  The original task force had tackled the FCL murders, and had originally brought two other serial killers to justice. Then there had been a period of time of relative quiet, and eventually the task force was disbanded.

  Only recently had they reformed, and Reilly had to admit they weren’t giving him a lot to work with. For the departments in the tri-state, the task force meant they had the cases off their plates and they no longer had to worry about them. He was sometimes frustrated that they didn’t seem more concerned about his case getting solved.

  Then again, serial killer cases could drag on for long periods of time while officers got lost in the weeds of going through every person in the area who drove a beige Volkswagen Beetle named Ted. For instance.

  Reilly stood up. “It’s not even 10:00. Nowhere near midnight.”

  Lopez laughed. “True. Listen, this case is heating up. We’re thinking about moving you.”

  “You mean it’ll be easier to forget that the task force even exists if no one walks past us in the office?”

  “I mean that you’ll be closer to the action if you go out to the old task force headquarters.”

  “In West Virginia?” said Reilly. “I thought they turned that into a dance studio or something.”

  “It went belly up,” said Lopez. “Anyway, they were renting the building from the local government, and it’s open. You’ll benefit from being closer to the crimes.”

  “Do I have a choice?” said Reilly.

  “No,” said Lopez cheerily.

  Reilly sighed. “They want my office for Vice, don’t they? Vice is always scoping out my office.”