Izzy would request the files for the case once she got back to Rockport. Even if the cops had marked it suicide, they still would have taken pictures of the scene, of the cuts.

As a psychiatrist, Charles could have drugged them all; he had access and knew how to use the medicine to make his victims docile, compliant. It could explain the neatness of the deaths.

But not the reason he’d involved Monroe. The drugging meant there was some forethought. Even if Asher had witnessed something like Charles harming Bix, even if he’d then run off to tell Monroe all about it, it still felt like a leap for Charles to kill his own daughter over it. He probably would have been able to convince her it was a misunderstanding. Children were primed to believe their parents, no matter how outlandish the lie.

Killing someone, planning to do it, not just snapping in anger, took a cold, calculating person to pull off.

Had Charles Bell been that man?

A long, rude horn brought Izzy out of her own haze, and she jerked the wheel too far to the right to overcompensate for where she’d drifted into the trucker’s lane. The rumble strips protested, the dullness of the sound reverberating in the confines of the car.

Izzy breathed out a curse as she righted the Honda into the center of the lane. Her hands had gone shaky where she clutched the wheel, her knuckles white against the sandy-colored leather.

At the next neon sign advertising gas, she pulled off the road. She popped into the minuscule convenience store and bought the largest size of coffee they had, not caring that it was chunky and tasted of burned toast. Caffeine was crucial.

When she was back on the road, she didn’t let her mind drift again. Or mostly not. She was still trying to figure out Charles. He fit better than most, although she hadn’t written off Cash covering up for Earl. Was Sammy Charles’s point of contact on the island? Is that how the man was still pulling the strings, even when not physically there?

The British voice once again sliced through the frustrated scream in her own head. She’d be in Cooperstown in ten minutes.

With one hand, Izzy reprogrammed the coordinates to find a place to stay in the next few miles. She looked back to the road, squeaked out a distressed sound, and turned just in time for the driveway of a hotel.

The A in the VACANCY sign flickered, but the place didn’t give her murder vibes and she doubted she could really do any better at this point, so she got a room for the night.

Barely looking up from his newspaper, the old, portly gentleman working the front desk shoved two plastic cards at her and pointed down a long hallway, grunting as he did.