The Watcher

Sanders brought Griff a cup of coffee immediately and said, “Breakfast will be served momentarily.”

Griff motioned to the table. “Ladies.”

He waited until each of them had taken a seat and Barbara Jean had positioned her wheelchair in front of a place setting before he sat down at the table.

He turned to Maleah, on his left. “Have you received any information this morning?”

Sanders placed a canned cola and a straw in front of Maleah, who popped the lid and inserted the straw before replying. “Actually, some info came in overnight. I haven’t printed it out yet, but I can give you a rundown from memory.”

“What sort of information?” Nic asked. “About the two victims?”

Maleah nodded. “With only their names and the basic info on both women, I was able to get quite a bit of personal information. The Web has made everyone’s personal life an open book.”

“Other than similarities in the way they were murdered, did the two women have anything else in common?” Griff asked.

“Hmm … I suppose the answer is yes and no. There’s nothing in their backgrounds to connect them. They were born in different states, lived in different states, and were, we assume, abducted in different states. Different religions—one Catholic, one Methodist. Kendall Moore was a pure WASP—white, from an upper-middle-class family. Gala Ramirez’s parents migrated from Mexico before she was born and were dirt poor.”

Sanders placed the casserole dish on the table so unobtrusively that Nic and the others barely noticed.

Griff glanced on the other side of Maleah where Barbara Jean sat. “Are you sure you want to sit in on this discussion?”

She nodded. “Yes, I’m sure. If Cary Maygarden had a partner, I want to know everything about the man. After all, we can’t be a hundred percent sure which one of them killed my sister, can we?”

“Cary Maygarden fit your description of the man you saw,” Griff reminded her.

“I know. It’s just … just …” Her voice quivered and then trailed off into silence.

Sanders set the tray of scones on the table, walked over to stand behind Barbara Jean, and curled his fingers gently over her shoulder. Nic spied his actions in her peripheral vision, but neither she nor anyone else looked directly in Sanders’s direction.

“Okay, so you’ve told us how Gala Ramirez and Kendall Moore were different,” Griff said. “Tell us what they had in common.”

All eyes turned to Maleah. “Well, to start with, they were both brunettes. Both of them were born and raised in Southern states, assuming we, as many people do, consider Texas a Southern state.”

“Is that it?” Nic asked.

“There is one other thing—both women were athletes. Gala Ramirez was a tennis pro and at only twenty, her career was just beginning. She had a good chance of becoming a national champion,” Maleah said. “And Kendall Moore, who was twenty-nine, held an Olympic silver medal as a longdistance runner.”

Silence.

No one spoke. A ticking clock and the distinct sound of breathing prevented the room from being absolutely quiet.

“Athletes, huh?” Griff reached out and spooned a large helping of the casserole onto his plate. “This could mean that he switched from beauty queens to athletes for his victims in the new game.”

“Possibly,” Nic said.

“Was either woman married? Have children?” Griff asked.

“Both were single,” Maleah said. “No children.”

Nic stated the list of similarities. “Brunette, unmarried, no children, Southern, and more specifically an athlete. Do y’all know how many women that description fits?”

“Thousands.” Maleah flipped back the cloth covering the scones and retrieved the one on top. The scent of cinnamon and sugar permeated the air. “Maybe tens or hundreds of thousands of women, depending on your definition of an athlete. That could be anyone from an Olympic gold medal winner to a woman who plays softball for her church team.”

As Nic and Barbara Jean served themselves and Sanders took a seat at the opposite end of the table from Griff, the discussion turned from the two murdered women to the trip to Ballinger, Arkansas. And by the end of the meal, Nic had gained a new insight into Griffin Powell. As much as she disliked him and as badly as she hated to admit it, everyone else at the table seemed to like and respect Griff. He treated the others with an easy warmth and cordiality usually reserved for friends, which led her to believe that he considered them more than employees and that they felt the same.

Twenty minutes later, Griff slid back his chair, dropped his linen napkin on the table, and stood. “If you’re packed and ready, we can leave by eight,” he told Nic.

“I’m ready to go whenever you are.”

“Good.” He eyed the cup she held. “Finish your coffee. I have a couple of phone calls to make. I’ll meet you in the foyer in ten minutes.” Not waiting for a reply, he walked out of the room.

Nic drank the remainder of her coffee hurriedly, then excused herself and went upstairs to brush her teeth, finish packing, and make one phone call of her own.

Josh Friedman answered his cell phone on the third ring. “Hey, good looking, what are you doing up so early while you’re on vacation?”

Josh had been a member of the BQK task force she’d been on for several years. They were presently in the same squad working out of D.C. and under SAC Douglas Trotter’s command, who took orders from the ADIC, the Assistant Director in Charge.

“Officially, I’m still on vacation,” Nic said. “For now, I don’t want Doug to know anything about what I’m doing unofficially.”

Josh let out a long, low whistle. “I don’t like the sound of that. What are you up to and is it going to get you into trouble?”

“Yes, it could get me in trouble.” She hesitated telling Josh everything. God, was he going to get a laugh at her expense. If anyone on earth knew how much she detested Griffin Powell, it was Josh. He’d had to listen to her curse the man’s very existence on a fairly regular basis while they were on the BQK task force.

“I’m listening,” Josh told her.

“If you laugh, so help me—”

“Now, why would I laugh at you? Unless you’ve gone off and married Griff Powell—my God, Nic, you haven’t—!”

“Of course not!” Nic sucked in a deep, courage-building breath. “But I am with Griff.”

“You’re shitting me, right?”

“Swear to me that you’ll keep this under wraps until I find out more.”

“More about what?”

“You know my theory about there being two BQ killers? That supposedly unprovable theory that I’ve shared only with you and Doug, the theory that Griffin Powell and I both believe to be true?” She added hastily, “And it’s the only thing that man and I share. Get that straight here and now.”

“Good God, don’t tell me that you and Powell are off on some wild-goose chase to prove your theory.”

“He called us,” Nic said.

“Who called you? And is that the royal us or are you referring to you and Powell?”

“The second BQ Killer called me on my cell phone yesterday and he called Griff, too. He phoned us only minutes apart. He all but admitted to both of us that he’d been the second BQ Killer. He told us he has begun a new game. And he gave us both a clue.”

“Crap! Are you kidding me?”