“All were young. None older than thirty,” Emily said. “Half were natives, the other half transplants from various states. One has an Illinois connection.”
“The barber,” Branch said. “Frank Mahoney. His grandfather hailed from Springfield.”
The sheriff snapped his fingers. “Didn’t Zee Reynolds have kin here, too?”
That detail Emily didn’t remember. She leafed through her notes of the interview with the next-door neighbor, Donna Chen.
“You’re right, Sheriff,” she said. “Zabrina’s from Milwaukee, and her family’s still there. But Zabrina’s maternal grandmother, Leila, was born and raised in Chicago.”
“That’s two Illinois connections,” Marty said, looking at Emily with the doll eyes he used in breaking gang-bangers. It made her enormously uncomfortable. “Every department is sending its complete case file. We’ll know soon if there’s others.”
“Matchsticks, noses, cuts, and age,” Cross said. “Maybe Illinois. Based on that, and only that, you still believe it’s a serial?”
“Yes,” Emily said, feeling her neck tighten like during her fight with Marty. “I do.”
“Me, too,” Cross said. “Anyone think different?”
Nothing but headshakes.
4:15 p.m.
The Executioner tilted his head, hooked the fishing line between his molars, and gentled the blade down his throat. Pretended it was raw oysters, so it’d go down easier.
The tiny handle bumped the uvula. He didn’t mean to do that - it triggered his gag reflex. He hacked, whooped, and spit.
He fished out the knife, blew his nose, swallowed some Robitussin.
“You think this is easy,” he laughed, “you try it.” Bowie looked amused.
4:29 p.m.
Branch handed over the case faxes. “Each victim is the grandchild of an Illinois resident,” he said. Cross put on gold wire rims, read fast.
“So Emily was right,” Cross said. “It’s a serial, and it’s here.”
“Afraid so.”
Cross flipped back a few pages. “None of the grandparents were neighbors,” he noted.
“Scattered throughout the state,” Branch said, tapping his copy. “Rockford to Cairo, Chicago to Moline. Nothing in common other than being grandparents of our victims.”
Cross swiveled out from behind his desk. “How did they earn a living?”
“Teacher, barber, farm-equipment mechanic, and security guard,” Branch recited. “Short-haul trucker, auto dealer bookkeeper, graphic artist, two housewives, and an airline pilot.”
“Social and economic circles,” Cross said, “that probably didn’t intersect.”
“My assumption, too,” Branch said. “We’re checking at the friend and family level.”
Both knew that would take forever.
“What about the number of victims?” Cross tried. “Does that suggest anything?”
“Baseball teams have nine players,” Branch said. “Can’t think of anything else. Of course, nine’s just the deaths we know about. Might be more.”
Cross’s snort said he agreed. “Let’s try the matches, then,” he said. “Two in every murder.”
“Always in pairs,” Branch said, holding index and middle fingers together. “Always burned.”
“Hidden in the room where the victims were found.”
“Which wasn’t apparent from a quick glance. You had to look to find them. OK, we’ve got pairs. Hidden. Burned. Not raw wood, but burned . . . burned . . . ah.”
Cross waited as Branch worked out the gaps in his leap of logic.
“This is about the electrocution,” he said, thumping the cane.
“Explain,” Cross said, leaning back.
“‘Burn’ is the key,” Branch said. “The killer burns matches. We burn prisoners. The electric chair burns flesh. The chair’s made of wood. So are the matches.” He rose, limped the room. “I think our killer’s leaving this string of bodies as a message to us.”
“Or to the governor?” Cross said. “Since it’s his show?”
“Or even to Emily,” Branch said, “given her fame from two years ago.”
“Whole lot of conclusions to draw from two tiny matches,” Cross pointed out.
“I know,” Branch said. “But everything that happened in the rest of the country is being duplicated here. The same exact week we’re burning a killer.”
“Too much coincidence to be one,” Cross said, tapping the faxes. “We’ll proceed with the assumption the serial spree is tied to this execution.”