“She around?” It was clear Warren wanted to interview her.

“Nah,” the sheriff said. “We put them up in a hotel for the time being. We already interviewed her anyway. She didn’t hear anything except a knock on the door.”

Warren looked back down at the body, his eyes studying every inch, carefully making sure he hadn’t missed any important details. He put on a set of gloves, inched closer to her face, and pushed away some strands of hair. Tara moved closer, and she could see the bluish color of the woman’s cheek.

“Looks like she fell, most likely when he shot her,” Warren said as he got back up onto his feet. “No fingerprints?” he asked.

The sheriff shook his head. “Only hers on some trees over there.” He nodded back in the direction of the forest. “Whoever it was covered their tracks well.”

Tara stood up and her eyes moved to the trees. They were about three miles north of the town of Hanover, where blood was found on the trail, believed to be from the couple. If they all passed through Hanover, that would be the best place to start, but she already knew it was unlikely since the woman in front of them was hiking from Maine.

“No way she hiked into Hanover, right?” Tara asked.

The sheriff shook his head. “She was heading that way, but never made it.”

Tara nodded with disappointment. “Anyone spot the couple in town?”

“Yes,” he began. “A man who owns a hiking store in town…couldn’t get any leads out of him though…don’t think he knows anything.”

A silence fell around them before Warren asked, “Well, didn’t you have something else to show us?”

The sheriff’s face morphed into the tight expression he had when they first arrived. He motioned for them to follow him as he moved down the stairs.

Tara followed behind him and Warren. She knew that whatever it was, it was something the sheriff believed they needed to see for themselves. They followed him across the lawn, parallel to the trail of blood, until they stood at the edge of the woods.

Tara’s eyes fell on the dark forest and she felt a coolness sweep against her as the scent of pine needles flooded her nostrils. She could see where the brush was forcefully pushed apart. Pine needles and broken branches littered the ground, and she felt a shiver up her spine knowing that it was where the victim pushed her way through, where she most likely had a moment of hope as she reached the lawn and saw the house.

Sheriff Russo walked through the brush and they followed behind, the forest becoming all that surrounded them. Tara could almost hear it—the woman’s frantic footsteps crunching the leaves beneath them, her panicked breathing. It always seemed strange to her how thin the line between life and death was, that a woman stood where she was hours earlier, and now lay lifeless. Tara felt sick to her stomach at the thought as she continued to move around the trees, following the splatters of blood on the ground.