Once Gone. Blake Pierce

mind.

      The biggest difference was the weather. Back then it had been mid-December, and bitterly cold. A thin blanket of snow covered the ground.

      Go back, she told herself. Go back and feel it.

      She breathed deeply, in and out, until she imagined she could feel a searing coldness passing through her windpipe. She could almost see thick clouds of frost forming with her every breath.

      The naked corpse had been frozen solid. It wasn’t easy to tell which of the many bodily lesions were knife wounds, and which were cracks and fissures caused by the icy cold.

      Riley summoned back the scene, down to every last detail. The wig. The painted smile. The eyes stitched open. The artificial rose lying in the snow between the corpse’s splayed legs.

      The picture in her mind was now sufficiently vivid. Now she had to do what she’d done yesterday – get a sense of the killer’s experience.

      Once again, she closed her eyes, relaxed, and stepped off into the abyss. She welcomed that lightheaded, giddy feeling as she slipped into the killer’s mind. Pretty soon, she was with him, inside him, seeing exactly what he saw, feeling what he felt.

      He was driving here at night, anything but confident. He watched the road anxiously, worried about the ice under his wheels. What if he lost control, skidded into a ditch? He had a corpse on board. He’d be caught for sure. He had to drive carefully. He’d hoped his second murder would be easier than the first, but he was still a nervous wreck.

      He stopped the vehicle right here. He hauled the woman’s body – already naked, Riley guessed – out into the open. But it was already stiffened from rigor mortis. He hadn’t reckoned on that. It frustrated him, shook his confidence. To make matters worse, he couldn’t see what he was doing at all well, not even in the glare of the headlights which he directed at the tree. The night was much too dark. He made a mental note to do this in daylight next time if he possibly could.

      He dragged the body to the tree and tried to put it into the pose that he’d envisioned. It didn’t go at all well. The woman’s head was tilted to the left, frozen there by rigor mortis. He yanked and twisted it. Even after breaking its neck, he still couldn’t set it staring straight forward.

      And how was he to splay the legs properly? One of the legs was hopelessly crooked. He had no choice but to get a tire iron out of his trunk and break the thigh and kneecap. Then he twisted the leg as well as he could, but not to his satisfaction.

      Finally, he dutifully left the ribbon around her neck, the wig on her head, and the rose in the snow. Then he got into his car and drove away. He was disappointed and disheartened. He was also scared. In all his clumsiness, had he left any fatal clues behind? He obsessively replayed his every action in his mind, but he couldn’t be sure.

      He knew that he had to do better next time. He promised himself to do better.

      Riley opened her eyes. She let the killer’s presence fade away. She was pleased with herself now. She hadn’t let herself be shaken and overwhelmed. And she’d gotten some valuable perspective. She’d gotten a sense of how the killer was learning his craft.

      She only wished she knew something – anything – about his first murder. She was more certain than ever that he had killed one earlier time. This had been the work of an apprentice, but not a rank beginner.

      Just as Riley was about to turn and walk back toward her car, something in the tree caught her eye. It was a tiny dash of yellow peeking out from where the trunk divided in half a little above her head.

      She walked around to the far side of the tree and looked up.

      “He’s been back here!” Riley gasped aloud. Chills surged through her body and she glanced around nervously. Nobody seemed to be nearby now.

      Nestled up in the branch of a tree staring down at Riley was a naked female doll with blond hair, posed precisely the way the killer had intended the victim to be.

      It couldn’t have been there long – three or four days at most. It hadn’t been shifted by the wind or tarnished by rain. The murderer had returned here when he’d been preparing himself for the Reba Frye murder. Much as Riley had done, he had come back here to reflect on his work, to examine his mistakes critically.

      She took pictures with her cell phone. She’d send those to the Bureau right away.

      Riley knew why he’d left the doll.

      It’s an apology for past sloppiness, she realized.

      It was also a promise of better work to come.

      Chapter 9

      Riley drove toward Senator Mitch Newbrough’s manor house, and her heart filled with dread as it came into view. Situated at the end of a long, tree-lined drive, it was huge, formal, and daunting. She always found the rich and powerful harder to deal with than folks further down the social ladder.

      She pulled up and parked in a well-manicured circle in front of the stone mansion. Yes, this family was very rich indeed.

      She got out of the car and walked up to the enormous front doors. After ringing the doorbell, she was greeted by a clean-cut man of about thirty.

      “I’m Robert,” he said. “The Senator’s son. And you must be Special Agent Riley. Come on in. Mother and Father are expecting you.”

      Robert Newbrough led Riley on into the house, which immediately reminded her how much she disliked ostentatious homes. The Newbrough house was especially cavernous, and the walk to wherever the Senator and his wife were waiting was disagreeably long. Riley was sure that making guests walk such an inconvenient distance was a sort of intimidation tactic, a way of communicating that the inhabitants of this house were far too powerful to tangle with. Riley also found the ubiquitous Colonial furniture and decor to be really quite ugly.

      More than anything else, she dreaded what was coming next. To her, talking to victims’ families was simply awful – much worse than dealing with murder scenes or even corpses. She found it all too easy to get caught up in people’s grief, anger, and confusion. Such intense emotions wrecked her concentration and distracted her from her work.

      As they walked, Robert Newbrough said, “Father’s been home from Richmond ever since…”

      He choked a little in mid-sentence. Riley could feel the intensity of his loss.

      “Since we heard about Reba,” he continued. “It’s been terrible. Mother’s especially shaken up. Try not to upset her too much.”

      “I’m so sorry for your loss,” Riley said.

      Robert ignored her, and led Riley into a spacious living room. Senator Mitch Newbrough and his wife were sitting together on a huge couch holding each other’s hands.

      “Agent Paige,” Robert said, introducing her. “Agent Paige, let me introduce my parents, the Senator and his wife, Annabeth.”

      Robert offered Reba a seat, then sat down himself.

      “First of all,” Riley said quietly, “my deepest condolences for your loss.”

      Annabeth Newbrough replied with a silent nod of acknowledgment. The Senator just sat staring forward.

      In the brief silence that followed, Riley made a quick assessment of their faces. She’d seen Newbrough on television many times, always wearing a politician’s ingratiating smile. He wasn’t smiling now. Riley hadn’t seen so much of Mrs. Newbrough, who seemed to possess the typical docility of a politician’s wife.

      Both of them were in their early sixties. Riley detected that they’d both gone to painful and expensive lengths to look younger – hair implants, hair dye, facelifts, makeup. As far as Riley was concerned, their efforts had left them looking vaguely artificial.

      Like dolls, Riley thought.

      “I’ve got to ask you a few questions about your daughter,” Riley said, taking out her notebook. “Were you in close touch with Reba recently?”

      “Oh, yes,” Mrs. Newbrough said. “We