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  “I made this kid the scrapper he is today,” said Bullard. “But you know what we called this guy when he played hockey for me?”

  “Coach, seriously!”

  “It definitely wasn’t ‘Wonderboy’!” Bullard chuckled.

  At least Coach didn’t share the “Pylon” nickname. Maybe he believed he’d already succeeded by getting under Pepper’s skin…

  Pepper’s day nurse bustled in—a large middle-aged woman with a Jamaican accent named Rebecca.

  “Dr. Keith will be here in a minute,” said nurse Rebecca. “So, your friends’ll have to say goodbye for now.” Her tone clarified this wasn’t up for debate.

  Coach Bullard just grinned and did something stupid with his eyebrows, leering over at the nurse. Then he gave Pepper the thumbs-up. What a character.

  “You hear about the missing guy on the news? Dennis Cole?” asked Bullard.

  “What about him?” asked Pepper.

  “About he’s dead. The police just found his body in the Big Red Yard, near where the Greenhead Snatcher kept his lawn stuff. I saw Randy Larch downstairs, and he told me.”

  Dead! A wave of sorrow flood Pepper’s body. And probably dead because of the information he had given him. Pepper had hoped against hope Dennis Cole was alive. Just like with the missing girls.

  “I bet you twenty bucks that guy was the Snatcher’s partner,” said Bullard. “Maybe the Snatcher killed him so he wouldn’t have to split the ransom money.”

  Pepper wished his old coach would shut up with his half-baked gossip. What did he know? Why was everyone suddenly an expert?

  Delaney gave Pepper a polite kiss on the forehead and smiled at him sadly. “Goodbye,” she said, then left.

  Gus Bullard began to follow her.

  “Coach?”

  The man turned.

  “I think you’re wrong about Dennis Cole being part of the kidnappings. And another thing—you were a lousy coach. I hated playing for you, just like everyone who wasn’t one of your favorites. And any success I have up at Harvard? It’ll be in spite of you.”

  Pepper heard a gasp from the elderly lady in the next bed.

  Bullard’s face turned red, and he was about to say something when the doctor knocked and entered. He stared at Bullard expectantly.

  “His dad must be pretty disappointed by him,” Bullard said to the elderly woman, shaking his head. Then he left too.

  Good fucking riddance.

  Pepper felt a surge of adrenaline. He knew his old coach had tried to hurt him with the last remark, but he’d failed.

  Pepper was proud of himself for finally standing up to his old coach. Fuck him. He wasn’t letting that guy push his buttons anymore.

  The doctor poked and prodded him, then delivered some crappy news. He said Pepper absolutely couldn’t get out of the hospital yet. Probably first thing in the morning, if he didn’t run a temperature.

  Pepper made a fist with his good hand. He was trapped in a personal hell—stuck in this damned hospital while the clock kept ticking on the two Emmas.

  He had to be able to do something…

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Pepper was still suffering in his hospital bed that night, a little after nine.

  Not so much suffering from his gunshot wounds. The nurse had given Pepper enough of the good stuff to keep his pain in check. He was lying in bed torturing himself about everything which had gone wrong that week.

  The two Emmas were still missing, time to rescue them was running out, and he had killed the only man who knew where they were.

  Of course, the real cops—local, state and federal—were still frantically looking for the girls. His dad had promised him that. Pepper couldn’t do much from the hospital, but he was still full-on haunted by the situation. So he lay in bed, brainstorming.

  Where would Flammia have put the girls?

  He made a mental list:

  It had to be somewhere no one else could accidentally access.

  It had to be somewhere Flammia could come and go without drawing attention.

  It was probably somewhere he was very familiar with, in New Albion or a neighboring town.

  Which pointed to, well…hundreds of places. Pepper didn’t know enough about Leo Flammia to narrow it down further.

  The unfriendly face of State Detective Dan Miller peered around the curtain, interrupting his thoughts.

  “Ryan! I have a few follow-ups in our investigation of last night’s incident,” said Miller, skipping any pleasantries. How are you feeling? Are you doing any better? Nope, none of that.

  “Where’s Detective Chin?” Pepper asked.

  “Don't worry about her. Worry about me.”

  Great. Without his partner, Miller was even more of a dick.

  Miller turned on a handheld recorder. “I need you to tell me about Leo Flammia. How long have you known him?”

  “What? I don’t know him. Never saw him before yesterday.”

  “We got a tip from someone who saw you and Flammia together on Tuesday…the morning after the messed-up ransom drop. So now’s the time to come clean. When did you first meet Leo Flammia? How did you become his partner in the kidnappings?”

  What? “That’s totally false. I never even saw the guy until yesterday evening when I pulled him over. That’s it. Whoever’s telling you otherwise is a liar. And I’m not talking to you anymore without my lawyer.”

  Miller clicked off the recorder. “I’m not buying the coincidence, Ryan. Maybe you weren’t in the van with him, grabbing the girls. But it explains why he got away clean with the money during your ransom drop. And how he escaped at the Bailey house. Yeah, you thought I don’t know about that coincidence too? You’ve been hanging around the edge of this situation ever since Emma Bailey was snatched. Too many coincidences to fool me.”

  “You’re nuts.”

  “Yeah? I drove by to see if your lady friend Delaney Lynn backed up your story about where you were going when you ran into the brown van. She didn’t answer at her apartment, so I talked to her landlord to see if he had her phone number. Do you know what he said?”

  Pepper was at a loss. “No idea.”

  “He said she’d put a note under his door this afternoon, giving notice. It said she was moving immediately to Nashville, Tennessee. That she’d be back in two weeks for her other stuff.”

  What? Pepper’s head was reeling. Delaney left for Nashville without him? Without even saying goodbye?

  She’d been upset about the Harvard thing, absolutely. But he thought they’d gotten past that.

  She had seemed pretty good when she saw him six hours ago…other than when he disappointed her by not giving her the news he’d hinted at before the brown van incident. Of course, their conversation had gotten cut short when that asshole Coach Bullard had interrupted them. She’d seemed a bit quiet when she said goodbye. However, he’d never have guessed in a million years she was about to leave town alone.

  Delaney had even told him she didn’t want to go to Nashville by herself. What had changed? Had the brown van incident freaked her out more than she’d said? She knew he’d killed a man last night—was that it?

  Pepper closed his eyes, shocked and sad and pissed off.

  At that low moment, a loud knock came from the doorway. Followed by someone who said, “Damn!”

  Fester Timmons appeared around the curtain. Mirrored sunglasses and all. He looked panicked when he saw State Detective Miller. He quickly regrouped.

  “Gentlemen,” he nodded, massaging his hand.

  “Sir, you need to wait outside,” said Miller. He pointed his badge at Timmins.

  “Roger that,” said Timmins, and gave a little salute. As he left, he said back over his shoulder, “Pepper, we need to touch base about the, ah…case. When you’re free? I’ll hit the cafeteria.” And Timmins left.

  Unbelievable.

  The detective was still looking toward the hallway. “Friend of yours?” Miller asked.

  “No. More of an
acquaintance.”

  “Not a cop, right?”

  “No.”

  “Whatever case your acquaintance was talking about, it wasn't the Greenhead Snatcher investigation, right? Because we made it crystal clear you shouldn’t have any further involvement in that case, correct?”

  Fucking Fester Timmins. Every time Pepper was forced to lie, he was digging a deeper hole for himself.

  “He’s nobody,” said Pepper.

  “Again with the lies. Well, I promised you I’d nail you to the wall if you came near the Snatcher investigation again. And I meant it. So keep it up, kid. When I come back, I’ll bring nails and a hammer.”

  Pepper waited a few minutes after Miller left, in case the detective was eavesdropping from the hallway. Unfortunately, Pepper’s elderly roommate was asleep, so her TV wasn’t blaring.

  He picked up his cell phone and called Delaney. It rang five times, then clicked to a recording, so Pepper left a message asking her to call him.

  Then he texted her a similar message.

  How far had Delaney gotten on her way to Nashville? What was her plan? Goddamn it.

  Pepper was completely frustrated now. He had to get out of this hospital. Everything in his life was slipping away while he lay in bed. And so much of what had gone wrong was pretty much all his own fault, starting with the fate of Emma Bailey and Emma Addison.

  I wish I’d died instead of the Snatcher, Pepper thought. Law enforcement would have forced their location from Flammia, and they’d already be getting care.

  Pepper needed to get out of the hospital. He was fed up. He had to do something!

  He remembered his dad had a briefing sheet about Leo Flammia in the Greenhead Snatcher case file in his filing cabinet. An electric tingle shot up his neck. Was the answer to the girls’ whereabouts on that sheet? Or at least a clue which would get him closer to the truth?

  So he decided. Screw Detective Miller. Screw his personal consequences—loss of his hockey scholarship? Prison time? A wrongful death lawsuit?

  No, he really didn’t have any options. He dialed Angel’s number. His best buddy, the one guy Pepper could always count on…

  Time to break out of this joint.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Pepper painfully slid into the passenger seat of Angel Cavada’s old Camry.

  “Thanks for picking me up,” he said. Then he filled in Angel on his plan.

  Angel rubbed the back of his neck. “Not that I wouldn’t love to get our poor hands on the hundred-thousand-dollar reward… But mano, you’re a freaking hero. Why not leave this to the cops?”

  “Hero? I killed the guy who knows where the Emmas are. I’ve got to do something.” Pepper told him about everything that’d happened since Angel’s earlier visit. The appearances by Delaney Lynn and Coach Bullard. The reappearance by Detective Miller, who basically accused Pepper of being part of the kidnappings. And the shocking news about Delaney leaving town.

  Angel whistled. “Do you realize how boring it’ll be around here when you head off to the damned Ivy League?”

  Pepper laughed. “I just want to take a peek at my dad’s file on Leo Flammia. Hopefully, that’ll give us an idea where to look for the Emmas. I’ve got a maximum of two hours before the nurses’ shift change and someone notices I’m gone. I really don’t want Detective Miller to learn I went AWOL. We need to move fast and I’ll need a little luck, back at the hospital.”

  Pepper was wearing clothes his dad had brought to the hospital on his last visit. They were meant for Pepper’s official discharge. He didn’t know what they’d done with his ripped and bloody police cadet uniform. Taken it for evidence? Or had they burned it? His hand with the missing fingertip was heavily wrapped in gauze, but otherwise, he looked practically normal.

  They had about a thirty-minute drive to New Albion. Pepper called Delaney’s cell number again. She didn’t answer—it dumped straight to voicemail. This time he didn’t leave a message. Why was she ghosting him? Was she blaming him too for causing the two Emmas to die a slow, lonely, painful death by starvation or lack of water?

  To take his mind off Delaney, Pepper recapped for Angel everything he knew about Leo Flammia. Which wasn’t very much. Pepper’s subconscious was still itching at his brain—there’d been something important about the dead van driver in the file which might lead them to the two missing Emmas. He hoped.

  “I keep trying to figure out the connection between the two Emmas,” said Angel. “But I don’t see one. Maybe the two Emmas were a random coincidence? And the other girl he’d snatched when you stopped him, she’s way younger and has even less in common with the Emmas.”

  Angel was talking about Leslie Holbrook, who was only nine years old. Tall for her age, but quite an age difference from the two Emmas, who were sixteen and seventeen.

  “The police found a journal at Flammia’s house which talked about taking the girls away to be his wives,” said Pepper. “Somewhere off the grid. So why grab a nine-year-old?”

  “If you try to understand sickos, you’ll be confused for the rest of your life. They don’t get out of bed for the same motivations as the rest of us. Their wires are crossed.”

  “Then what motivates you?” asked Pepper.

  Angel laughed. “Me? That I’ll be a rich son of a bitch. My other car will be a Ferrari, but I’ll keep this Camry for driving you around.”

  Freaking Angel. “How’ll you get rich?”

  “I have some business ideas cooking,” Angel assured him. “That reward for finding the Emmas would give me a great start. It’s up to a hundred grand. We split it fifty-fifty and we’ll be rolling in cash. You can get your shitty truck fixed. I can quit the pizza delivery, pay the whole nut for my business classes at Cape Cod Community College. Hopefully have a little left over for my first venture…maybe a Cuban restaurant. This part of the Cape would be perfect.” Angel rambled on, getting more excited about his ideas for the future.

  They reached the police station and parked on a dark side street. Angel stayed behind in El Diablo. Pepper stepped out into the hot summer night, possibly the warmest night that month. It felt good, being out in the real world again. He snuck to the station’s back door and used his keycard to swipe himself in.

  Pepper was about to sneak into his dad’s office when he heard snoring. Long, loud and thick.

  After making sure the hallway was empty, Pepper peeked into the office to confirm he was out of luck. Sergeant Weisner was asleep with her feet up on his dad’s desk. Her chair was rocked back to the edge of tipping over.

  And completely blocking Pepper’s access to the filing cabinet. He could imagine crawling under and around her, the drawer squeaking open, and Weisner waking up to find Pepper practically in her lap. The mayhem which would follow that nightmare scenario would make all his earlier troubles—including getting shot—seem small and manageable.

  Pepper retreated down the hall to his little drunk tank office. He didn’t turn on the light, not even after he closed the door. How long could he wait here, hoping Sergeant Weisner would wake up and go back to wherever she needed to be, other than his dad’s office?

  He texted Angel: 10 min.

  While killing time before he would check on Sergeant Sleeping Beauty again, Pepper booted up his computer and the monitor lit up the room. Shit… He hoped no one would see the glow of the monitor under the closed door.

  He tried to log into the department network using his dad’s username and password. It didn’t work; his dad must have changed his password. And now there would be a record of his failed login attempt, if anyone checked.

  Beautiful.

  Pepper opened his own draft database. It wasn’t close to complete yet, but it had a lot of little bits of data—thousands—from over seven years of cases in New Albion.

  In the search box, he typed Flammia.

  Two files popped up: a report file from nine years ago and Pepper’s mock case file.

  He opened the first file. It was a report rela
ted to Leo Flammia being fired from the New Albion School System from his position as a janitor at New Albion High School. A background check at the beginning of his second year of employment showed he had a criminal record which prevented him from being employed by the school system.

  An officer was present when Leo Flammia was fired. He’d warned the man that if he returned to the school property, they would charge him with trespassing. The report said Flammia hadn’t acted angry and had caused no problems when leaving the premises. There was no report of any further incident.

  So, not much.

  Next, he opened his own mock file in the database for the Greenhead Snatcher investigation—all the notes he’d accumulated during the past week. His interviews with the Bailey and Addison families. His conversations with Dennis Cole. His encounter with Flammia when he’d popped out of Mason Bailey’s closet and run him over…

  Quite a week, but the info didn’t take up a lot of space. He began reading.

  Footsteps echoed down the hallway and Pepper held his breath as they seemed to slow outside his door. Was the glow of his computer monitor visible under the door? Would someone think that was weird and open the door?

  Would he be in a whole new level of trouble?

  After an interminable pause, the feet walked away.

  Pepper slowly let out his breath with relief. He needed to leave, ASAP.

  He printed out the report file and his mock case file. They totaled only five pages. He grabbed a manila file folder from his desk and opened it to put in the printouts.

  But two pieces of paper were already in the folder. The first was covered in small handwriting. Pepper recognized it as Zula’s writing. This must be the results from her research on Scooter McCord and his alternate name. Which didn’t matter now, so he didn’t read it. Then he took a quick look at the second piece of paper and was shocked.

  The light of his monitor showed he was holding a death certificate. The name on the certificate was Alastair McCord. It indicated that the person died twenty years ago in Brewster, not far away on the Cape. And that the person was eleven years old when he died!