My one hope was to find something to tell me her real name and then see if Mark recognized her real name or if she had a connection—however slim—to a case he’d worked. He hadn’t recognized her, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t related to someone he’d helped put into prison or someone who hadn’t gotten the justice they felt they deserved. She wasn’t from this area. The connection might even be from something back before Mark returned to Fair Haven. She might have come here seeking revenge.
That didn’t tell me how Troy and Chief McTavish fit into all of this, but finding a link between Isabel and what was happening would get us headed back in a direction where we could prove Mark hadn’t been behind it.
My chest suddenly felt full, and my eyes burned. I turned on my hazard lights and pulled over to the side of the road.
I didn’t want Isabel to be involved. I liked her.
I’d visited her quite a few times while she created my maple syrup cupcake, and she’d shown me how she came up with new flavors. Even before that, I’d always stood and talked for a few minutes when I bought something from her truck if she wasn’t swamped with customers.
One time I’d been there, she’d replaced a cupcake free of charge for a girl who’d dropped the one she bought as she was walking away. Another time she’d helped out a mom who was tight on money but wanted a special cupcake cake for her daughter’s thirteenth birthday.
Neither of those things seemed like something a brutal murderer would do.
Then again, I’d been deceived before. Isabel also didn’t smile nearly as much as someone who worked around sweets should. That could point toward something in her past that still haunted her—something for which she wanted vengeance.
I put my car back into drive and headed for Sugarwood.
I had to find out Isabel’s real name, either to clear her or to find a link between her and the three men. She might be using a different name for some other reason. Hopefully not one that would require me to reveal her real identity to the police—like that she had a warrant out for her arrest in another state.
And if I was doing this—if I was really going to break into Isabel’s truck—I had to do it on my own. Even though I wasn’t going to take anything other than pictures, breaking into her truck was trespassing at best. Anyone who spotted me could assume I meant to steal her truck. I wasn’t going to put someone I cared about into that position if we were seen. Besides, I couldn’t think of anyone who wouldn’t try to talk me out of this except Elise, and the stakes were too high for her if she got caught breaking into someone’s vehicle.
It shouldn’t be dangerous, at least. If I waited until midnight, her truck would be empty. She’d have gone home for the night, and I’d have plenty of time before she came back to start the truck for the next day.
All my hours spent studying lock picking on the Internet should even let me get in without damaging her truck. I wouldn’t have the skills to jimmy the actual driver’s or passenger’s door, but the door on the back of the truck that she’d let me in the other day had an old handle—she’d said so herself when she’d been worried about the draft.
All I needed to know was where she’d parked. Isabel had a tendency to leave her truck where she planned to run it from the next day rather than taking it back to wherever she stayed.
But I knew how to find out where it would be.
I waited until I stopped my car in front of my house and pulled out my phone.
I’d like to meet first thing Monday morning to talk flavors, I texted her. Where can I find you?
On Sunday night, when I pulled into the gravel parking lot, Isabel’s truck hunched in the darkness right where she’d said it’d be.
This location was one of the most isolated she’d chosen yet. It was one of the small lakeside lots that could only accommodate a couple of cars. Two or three picnic tables—I couldn’t tell exactly how many in the shadows cast by the trees—rested in a clearing to the right. In the summer, it’d be a beautiful picnic spot overlooking the lake.
I turned off my car, hit the button that turned off my dome lights so the interior lights wouldn’t come back on when I opened the door, and waited to make sure no one had spotted me pulling in. If an officer on patrol had seen me make the turn or saw my lights when I exited, they might follow me to check. They could think my car belonged to kids who’d come here to do things they shouldn’t or someone who was lost or having car trouble.
I’d have an awfully hard time explaining my presence if they came to check and found me picking the lock on Isabel’s truck.
The cold crept into my feet first, making my toes ache, and then into my hands, straight through the gloves I’d chosen. I’d selected them because they were thin and I hadn’t wanted bulky gloves impeding my ability to jimmy the lock. Major miscalculation. If I got much colder, my fingers would either be too numb or shaking too hard to manage the lock.
I climbed out and scurried over to the door that went into the body of the truck. Waiting in my car had given me one benefit. My eyes had adjusted better to the dark than they would have if I’d gotten out immediately.
The lock was exactly the type I’d remembered. Isabel should look into having it upgraded. Any amateur who wanted to rob her could easily pop the lock if I’d figured out how from studying online.
Of course, knowing how to do it and being able to do it were two entirely different things.
I worked at the lock for long enough that my nose started to run and my lips felt dry and ready to crack. I stopped long enough to blow my nose.
One more try and I’d have to give up.
The lock popped open. Thank goodness. At least I’d be able to get out of the wind, and once I was inside, I’d use my cell phone light to search.
I tugged the door open and hopped up the stairs. I drew the door closed behind me, shutting out most of the moonlight and blinding me in darkness until my eyes adjusted.
And I wasn’t cold anymore.
The inside of the truck was much too warm.
A cold line of metal that had to be a knife pressed against my neck in the same spot where Troy had his throat slit.
“I was hoping I was wrong about you,” Isabel’s voice said out of the darkness. “How much do you know?”
14
A searing pain formed in my chest where my collarbones met, and my own heartbeat filled my ears.
I’d been an idiot. I missed the signs. The way Isabel always had me come to her truck. The way she always parked her truck in isolated locations. The little camping heater she always seemed to have set up.
Isabel—or whatever her name really was—lived in her truck. It wouldn’t have mattered when I tried to break in. She would have caught me no matter what.
And now I was very likely going to die, my neck slit just like Troy’s. Because there was no other reason for her to be holding a knife to my neck than that she played a role in what happened and she knew I’d figured it out. Most people would call the police if they thought someone was attempting to break into their home or vehicle. They wouldn’t lie in wait to ambush them.
At least if I vanished tonight, Mark couldn’t be blamed for it. He was still in a cell at the Fair Haven police station, and he wouldn’t be released until tomorrow.
