Emily Kenyon 01 - A Cold Dark Place

Nick, we might find Jenna”
    “We’ll find her,” she corrected. She looked down at her latte, trying hard not to cry.
    Jason spoke to fill the awkward silence. “Anything more off Shalimar Patterson’s computer? Jenna’s Mac?”
    “Not a goddamn thing. Both girls use something to avoid spyware, viruses, and all the rotten stuff out there. I can’t even tell what sites she visited. She must have cleaned it just before the chat with Batboy.”
    “Nick. Nick Martin.”
    “Right, Nick.” Jason hesitated a moment. “I know I’m just a deputy around here,” he said. “But I did call the Spokane ME about the Martin case. For an update. I know it isn’t my job, but you and the sheriff were so busy with Jenna stuff. Are you mad?”
    Emily sighed and leaned forward. She even managed a little smile. Despite all that was going on Jason Howard was still doing his job. That was good. She regretted how she’d chewed him out at the crime scene. It was like shooting the Easter Bunny.
    “That’s good, Jason. Did they have anything for us?”
    The young man pulled up a chair. He tried to temper his excitement, but he was bursting with the news.
    “Yes, they did. They told me that the victims had probably been tied up before they were shot”
    With those words, Emily found herself back at the crime scene. The bodies had been such a mess. So battered by the debris of the tornado, she doubted that outside of the gunshot wounds there’d be little in the way of forensics. But this was good. This was real information.
    “Bound? Then murdered?” she asked. Her bloodshot eyes widened. She looked down at her cup, already empty. She hadn’t even remembered drinking it, let alone sucking it down as she apparently had.
    “Yup. That’s what she said. Paperwork’s on its way. Some sick puppy really did a number on that family. They were held captive, like animals. Maybe he tortured them, too. Maybe he made them really, really suffer.”
    Sick puppy. The term was not only at odds with the deed, but it lessened the truth of what the killer had done. A puppy doesn’t rage. A puppy doesn’t do the unthinkable. But a Batboy just might.
    Emily’s thoughts swung back to Jenna. It was like Jason Howard had slammed a door in her face. He didn’t mean it. But she wondered why it hadn’t dawned on him that the socalled sick puppy was Nick Martin. And that the sick puppy might be holding her daughter.
    Jenna! Where are you?
    “I’m going over to the high school,” she said, abruptly rising. “I need-we need every bit of information we can get about Nick.” She drummed her fingertips on a manila folder on her desk.
    Inside was a copy of Judge Crawford’s subpoena for all of Nick’s school files.
    Wednesday, 3:25 P.M.
    As she walked from her car to the school’s administration office, Emily Kenyon was acutely aware of the looks of concern coming at her from in every direction. Kids she didn’t know, but who probably knew Jenna and why her mother the cop was there, were fixated on her. They stared, mouths slack jawed. Only one had the courage to come forward, a boy of about sixteen. He had tiny white shells strung on jute around his neck. A chain dangled from his belt loop to his pocket. He’d been fighting acne and the smell of the ointment he used was heavy.
    “Sorry ‘bout Jenna. She’s a good girl,” he said.
    Emily nodded. She could have said something, but she just had no words. Her silence seemed to make the boy step back. He looked suddenly insecure and awkward.
    “Everyone liked her,” the boy added, looking down at the ground.
    “Likes her,” Emily finally said, correcting his tense. “I’ll find her. She’ll be home. She is a good girl.”
    “Yup. Just wanted you to know.”
    Emily swung from mom to detective mode. “Who are you?”
    “Kev Bonnets,” he answered, this time, looking her in the eye.
    “Do you know my daughter?”
    He shifted his weight and looked down. “Not really. But she’s talked to me a few times. Nice. Always nice to everyone”
    “Do you know Nick Martin?”
    “Hell, I mean heck no. The guy’s a freak”
    Emily stared hard at the boy. His blotchy face. His gangly arms. He was only a notch above Nick Martin on the lowest rung of the high school’s social ladder. Yet in his own somewhat earnest manner, he was trying to help.
    “It’s been awhile since I was here, but all of us have had our turn being a freak,” she said. “That’s just the way high school is, or