Page 20 of Vanished in the Mist
Shanna began furiously typing on her computer.
Kaden sighed. “You don’t plan on stopping, do you?”
“Nope.”
“I didn’t think so. Guess I’ll hang around, too, to keep you out of trouble.”
She rolled her eyes and continued typing.
“What are you doing there?” he asked.
“Jumping to conclusions and letting my theory lead me instead of the evidence.”
“Isn’t that what we’re not supposed to do?”
She stopped typing. “Yes. We’re short-cutting, remember? Seeing where we can go with what we have. Two teens from the same school in a tiny town go missing or are murdered within days, weeks, or months of each other depending on the medical examiner’s conclusions about Tristan Cargill’s time of death. We’d be idiots for not thinking they could be related. O’Brien thinks the same thing. You heard her.”
“She’s also part of the same police force that hasn’t found Tanya and wouldn’t have found John Doe on their own. Emulating them and jumping to conclusions doesn’t sound like the right way to go here, at least not based on your earlier cautions.”
Her face heated. “I hate having my own words thrown back at me.”
“Then you’re really not going to like this. I have a theory too.”
“Okay. What is it?”
“We already discussed how odd it was that so many of the school’s recently graduated seniors were out here. What if the killer is one of them?”
She glanced around, a chill going down her spine. “I couldn’t even begin to pick one of them as a suspect. They’re all so young, innocent looking. But it’s not like killers go around with an M tattooed on their foreheads so we can pick them out.”
“That would make it too easy,” he teased, then motioned behind her. “Maybe we can do one of those shortcuts you mentioned and talk to someone who likely knew all the other teens, including Tanya and Tristan.”
She glanced over her shoulder. A young brunette was standing off on her own by a thick oak tree, her hand to her throat as she watched the divers at the lake.
“The prom queen,” Shanna whispered. “The most popular girl in school. She had to know both of our victims.”
“Looks like she’s leaving.”
“Watch my laptop.” Shanna jumped up and hurried after the departing girl.
Chapter Ten
“This was a bad idea.” Kaden shifted on his feet and leaned against the porch railing of Cassidy Tate’s cabin. “We’re wasting time we could be spending following other potential leads while waiting for a prom queen who isn’t going to show.”
“Her name is Peyton Holloway. She’ll show.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Because of the deal I made with her by the lake. She was extremely agitated to be seen talking to me after I was seen talking to the police. I left her alone only after she promised to come here.”
“And you believed her?”
“Since I warned her that I’d pressure the police to bring her in for questioning if she didn’t, yeah, I’m pretty sure she’ll be here.”
“Brutal.” He grinned.
“Whatever works. As nervous as she was it seems as if she may know something. I just hope it’s a lead that will take us to Tanya.”
He straightened away from the railing. “Looks like we’re about to find out. That’s the blue Mazda she drove earlier coming up your driveway.”
