He Kills Me, He Kills Me Not

away.”
    Riley let out a low whistle. “Man, that sucks.”
    “Yeah, it does.” Logan pulled one of the folders toward him and flipped it open.
    “What kind of rookie mistake?” Pierce asked. He sat with both elbows on the table, no longer interested in the files or boxes.
    Logan’s gut churned. He didn’t want to talk about this, but he wanted that folder, and it would be a lot faster finding it with Riley and Pierce’s help than by himself. Looking for other similar cases wasn’t exactly a ruse, but it was close.
    “I pulled over a white van on a routine traffic stop. I’d probably remember that van to this day even if there hadn’t been a murder. It had writing all over the back doors, quotes from scriptures twisted into different meanings. The one I remember most was, “Do unto others before they do unto you.”
    Riley stumbled and dropped the box he was carrying. “I’m okay,” he called out as he reached down to retrieve the box.
    “You were saying?” Pierce urged.
    “I pulled the van over because it didn’t have a license plate. It had a piece of cardboard in the tag holder that read “lost tag.” I was walking up to the driver’s door when a call came in about a murder, two blocks away. I waved the driver off before I even got to his door, and went to the scene.”
    Pierce studied him for a moment. “Let me guess. The killer was the one driving the van.”
    Logan nodded stiffly. “I had a bad feeling about that van. My internal radar was going nuts from the minute I saw those twisted scriptures and the black curtains in the back windows. I knew in my gut something was wrong. He’d been driving too carefully, like he had something to hide. But even if I hadn’t been suspicious, I should have radioed back to the murder scene to see if there was a description of a getaway vehicle. Standard procedure. If I’d followed the rules I would have known I’d just pulled the suspect over.”
    “How certain are you the killer was driving the van?” Pierce asked. “Maybe someone saw the van near the hotel when the body was discovered and assumed—”
    “There was a witness. A maid at the motel saw a man run from the room. She was too far away to give a good description of him, but she saw him get into a white van that matched the same description as the one I’d pulled over, right down to the scriptures.”
    The quiet in the room was palpable. Logan glanced over at Riley. He was standing next to a stack of boxes with a thoughtful expression on his face. Before Logan could ask what that expression meant, his cell phone rang.
    He answered and listened quietly to Officer Karen Bingham, his hand clenching into a fist as she reported what had been found.
    “We’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” Logan said. He flipped his phone shut and shoved his chair back from the table. Pierce and Riley looked at him expectantly.
    “They’ve found the primary scene where Carolyn O’Donnell was killed.”
    B efore evil had invaded her world and changed her life forever, Amanda used to visit the cemetery once a week and leave a dozen roses on her parents’ graves. It took two years of therapy and a philandering brother-in-law to give her the courage to move back to Shadow Falls and resume her weekly visits.
    But she’d never brought roses again.
    Instead, she brought pink carnations. She’d read somewhere that pink carnations meant you missed someone and that you would never forget them. That seemed appropriate. And since the number seven was supposed to be lucky, she always placed seven carnations on her mother’s grave, seven on her father’s.
    And seven on Dana’s.
    Knowing the killer was back, Amanda had debated not coming to the cemetery for her weekly visit. But her parents had devoted themselves to her and her sister, Heather. If it weren’t for the plane crash that had unexpectedly taken their lives, Amanda had no doubt they would have continued to support her and help her. The least she could do was put fresh flowers on their graves.
    And she owed far more than that to Dana.
    Besides, she should be safe. The two plain-clothed policemen who normally sat outside her house had followed her here. One of them was getting out of his car to keep watch over her as she walked through the cemetery. She gave him a small wave to let him know she appreciated his protection. Then she walked up the slight hill to Mr. Reynolds’ flower cart where she always bought her flowers.
    The vendor smiled and