He Kills Me, He Kills Me Not

realized she’d climbed her front steps, with no assistance, and was standing by the front door watching him.
    He shook his head and couldn’t help but grin. Sadie had fooled him into thinking she was a feeble old woman.
    She winked and returned his smile.
    “You said you weren’t surprised Kate was murdered. Why is that?”
    “Because of that boy that lived next door to her. I always worried he’d go after her again someday.”
    “Again?”
    She nodded. “He was sweet on her and she tolerated him because he was her boyfriend’s brother. I guess she felt sorry for him, too. He was never quite right in the head, got teased horribly by the other kids. Didn’t have many friends.”
    “What was his name?”
    “Tom. Tom Bennett.”
    The name didn’t sound familiar to Logan. He turned to ask Pierce to call in the name, but Pierce was already walking to the car with his cell phone to his ear.
    “What happened, Sadie, that made you think Tom might go after Kate someday?”
    “The last summer she was here, she and her boyfriend, David, took a walk in the woods and Tom tagged along without them knowing. They disappeared for three whole days. Everybody was looking for them.”
    Three days . The same amount of time the killer always kept his victims before killing them. When Sadie paused, Logan encouraged her to continue her story.
    “Tom’s father found them. They’d gone exploring, got lost. Apparently they didn’t get along too well, everybody being scared and upset and trying to find their way home. Kate got mad at her boyfriend, blamed him for getting them lost. She told him she didn’t want to see him anymore. I guess he tried to change her mind. He gave her a wild rose he found growing in the woods, but one of the thorns cut Kate and she threw the flower at him. That’s what set Tom off.”
    “Set him off? What did he do?”
    “I guess he had a crush on Kate, and when she broke up with David, Tom got this crazy notion in his head that she’d want him. He tried to kiss her and touch her where he had no business touching. I guess he scared her. She hit him with a rock. When the boys’ daddy found them, he had to take Tom into town and get him stitched up. Kate had laid open his face from here,” she touched her right temple, “to here.” She ran her finger down the side of her face to her chin.
    The same cut the killer left on his victim’s faces.
    The same jagged scar that marred Amanda’s face.
    “H ey, pipe down, everybody. I can’t hear Pierce.” Special Agent Nelson waved at the other officers and detectives in the squad room until he was satisfied with the noise level before cradling the phone back to his ear.
    Riley paused, his fingers curled over the keys of his computer, where he was typing up his handwritten notes from another interview he’d conducted that morning. He looked over at Nelson, two desks away.
    “Yeah, I got it,” Nelson said into the phone. “Bennett. Tom Bennett. I’m keying the name in now.”
    One of the uniformed officers called across the room. “I know a Tom Bennett. He’s one of the mechanics in the garage. Is that the guy Pierce is looking for?”
    A sick feeling settled in the pit of Riley’s stomach. His fingers curled into fists and he cursed beneath his breath. He shoved back from his desk and hurried across the room to the bank of elevators.
    “Hey Riley? Where ya going? Pierce has a hot lead to follow up on,” Nelson called out.
    “I’ve got a hunch,” Riley called out.
    The elevator door opened and he stepped inside.
    E xcitement pulsed through Logan, and he was impatient to hear what, if anything, Pierce’s men could come up with on a search for Tom Bennett in the FBI databases.
    “You’ve been a tremendous help, Sadie. One more question. Did Kate wear her hair long when she lived here?”
    “I can do better than answer that question. I’ve got a picture of little Kate. Come on in and I’ll show you.”
    Logan motioned to Pierce to let him know he was going inside. Pierce waved back, still on the cell phone, pacing back and forth beside the Mustang.
    Though small, the inside of the house was as neat and tidy as Sadie herself. She led the way through the living room to an upright piano tucked into the corner. Both the top of the piano and the wall above it were full of pictures in varying sizes. She lifted an eight by ten silver framed picture from the piano and handed it to him.
    “That’s a picture of a church picnic back when