Caden opened the box and sifted through the pictures and other items. At first, he didn’t see anything that caught his attention. They were just things that someone had stuck in a keepsake box. But the closer he looked, the more intrigued he became—especially of the one with two people he knew. Ava Jackson as a child sitting in a swing and her father pushing her. What in the—
“Sorry.” Zane returned with a bottle of water. “Had to find some Motrin and blow my nose. Seriously, how can your nose feel stuffed completely full and when you blow it, noth—”
“I don’t need the details, dude.” Caden nodded to the tablet Zane still held in his other hand. The box could wait for now. “Let me see those pictures from the Houston crime scene again, will you?”
Zane pulled them up. “Why?” He popped a cough drop.
“Scroll through them. I’m looking for something in particular.”
His partner swiped one picture after another.
“There,” Caden said. “Stop.”
“What do you see?”
“The same picture on that end table in the Baileys’ home that’s over there on the mantel.” He pointed, then enlarged the photo for details. “There.” A do-it-yourself Christmas photo in a small black frame sat on the stone mantel next to others like it. An antique clock behind the pictures ticked away the minutes. He stepped forward. “But look, there’s a space next to it like another picture is missing. Now, look back at the picture Daria sent us. Same space next to that one?”
Zane raised a brow. “Yes. Exactly. You and that memory of yours,” he muttered. “Okay, then. It’s possible family number one and family number three knew each other and had the same photo that the killer took. Could family number two know one and three? But how? Or is that a stretch? Is there any evidence in family number two’s home to suggest a connection? Did they have the same pictures? Or were they pictures that the killer just liked and have no connection at all?”
The questions came rapid-fire, Zane not necessarily expecting immediate answers, but Caden said, “If family number two had the same picture, they didn’t have it out.” He scrolled through the crime scene photos from family number two. No spaces between pictures to suggest one was missing. “It could be any kind of a connection,” he said. “Could be a college fraternity or sorority. We also have to look at both spouses’ connections to each other.”
“Let’s watch the footage. Maybe that’ll help.”
Caden tapped the link to the footage. Zane watched over his shoulder as it began to play.
The picture was clear.
As was the barrel of the weapon aimed at the family.
Unfortunately, the killer’s face was not.
Beyond the gun, seated on the couch, were the staff sergeant, his wife, and the two younger children. All four of them looked terrified. Mingled with Michael Fields’s terror was fury. He appeared to hold himself still only out of fear for his family.
“That’s freaky,” Zane said. “I feel like I’m watching this from his point of view.”
Caden paused the video, turned, and pointed to the wall behind them. “That camera up there in the corner near the molding. It almost blends right into the wall. The killer might not have realized it was there.”
“I don’t know. He keeps his back to it.”
“You think he wanted us to see the footage?”
“Who knows, man. Let’s get this over with and watch to the end.”
Caden ignored his anxiety at what he knew was coming and pressed Play. Daria’s captions popped up on the screen.
“I’ll give you whatever you want, just let them go,” Fields said. He stopped speaking and seemed to be listening. Then his lips moved once more. “You want me to say what?”
The tip of the gun turned on his wife. She cowered over Brian and Fields held up a hand, yelling, “Stop! I’ll say it. ‘Trusting a liar will only get you killed.’ There. I said it. Now, let them go.”
The gun jerked. Four times. And it was over.
But no. It wasn’t.
The gun flew back into the room and landed on the floor just within range of the camera. A foot appeared in the frame for a brief second before disappearing. For the next ninety seconds, the footage simply revealed the family on the sofa. Then the killer returned. He walked from the foyer, his back still to the camera, and went to the mantel to snag the now missing picture.
Caden blinked, swallowing hard. “Mickey must have made