“I’m looking.” Huck stepped up the stairs and over the blood to twist the knob. “Locked.” He turned around and kicked back, his boot hitting square by the knob.

The door flew open.

Huck drew a flashlight from his pocket and shone it inside. “One room, no furniture. There’s a bathroom off to the side, door open, vacant.” He shut the now-damaged door and sidestepped the blood, jumping down to the snow. “You were right. They didn’t go inside.”

Even so, the techs could process the scene. “Perhaps the killer has been here, the same way he broke into the other victims’ homes. He does like to infiltrate their spaces.” Right now, she didn’t know. “I promised her she’d be safe.”

“Hey.” Huck settled a heavy hand on her shoulder, his gaze dark. “This wasn’t your fault and you know it. She should’ve been safe with an FBI agent, and she should’ve been safe in the middle of the day, according to this killer’s pattern. Let it go, Laurel.”

He was correct. Her phone rang and she pulled it from her pocket. “Hi, Nester.”

“Hi.” He sighed. “I have bad news.”

Her heart lurched. “Walter?”

“No. Sorry. Not Walter. He’s headed into surgery right now. It’s Christine Franklin.”

Laurel started walking back toward the body, her gaze slashing to each side in case the murder weapon was close. “What about her?”

“The hospital administrator just sent over all the information I requested, including anything Dr. Franklin had written lately. I was thinking articles for medical journals and such, but apparently she contributed lifestyle articles to the hospital newsletter each month as part of her new promotion. It’s distributed online and is even accessible to the public.”

Laurel stopped walking. “No. Do not tell me—”

“Yep. She wrote about how important it was to take time off and recharge one’s batteries, giving her new cabin by the river as an example. Anybody stalking her probably knows about the newsletter, since she’s been writing pieces for it for the last six months. She even included a picture of the place she was buying. The cabin is painted white, correct?”

Laurel’s head hung. “Correct.”

* * *

What a completely crappy day. Huck Rivers drew a beer out of the fridge and popped off the top, tipping his head back and finishing the entire bottle in large gulps. The still-wrapped bag of burgers from the Dairy Dumplin’ sat on the counter, but he couldn’t drum up hunger. He tossed the empty bottle in the trash and fetched another, turning to pad in his hole-riddled socks to the sofa. The fire already burned hot across from him, and he planted his feet on the old coffee table and stretched out.