Kathleen Long - Christmas Confessions

And then it hit her.

Postcards.

She’d never so much as flipped through the contents of the post office box that morning. She’d been so taken aback by the detective’s visit and the harsh reality of his disclosure she’d forgotten about today’s mail.

Abby retraced her steps to the living room and dipped her hand inside the large pocket of her coat. Today’s stack of cards hadn’t been quite as cumbersome as those in recent weeks. Perhaps the onslaught of submissions that had followed the People magazine article was finally tapering off.

Maybe now business would return to usual.

She checked the thought immediately. Business as usual did not include an apparent murder confession.

Abby sank into her favorite chair and flipped through the cards one by one, reading each message before she studied the accompanying graphic.

I never told my father I loved him.

Abby’s heart ached as she studied the apparently scanned image of a scribbled crayon drawing of a house and tree on the reverse side of the card.

I cheated on my bar exam.

The submission featured a store-bought, glossy image of a lush tropical resort.

Apparently this particular confessor didn’t suffer remorse. Abby laughed and moved on.

She shouldn’t have ignored me.

Simple black type on a white label.

No postmark.

Abby choked on her laughter.

She dropped the card into her lap and reached for her gloves. She pulled them from her coat pocket and slipped them over her fingers before she reached for the card again, this time turning the simple card over.

Surely she was overreacting.

This card couldn’t be the same, couldn’t be another confession, another photograph of some poor girl who’d thought she had a shot at a modeling career and ended up dead.

Abby held her breath, gripping only the edges of the card as she turned it over.

A beautiful young woman looked back from the black-and-white shot. She smiled, and yet her eyes hinted at something other than joy. In them, Abby saw nervousness…and fear. Had she known she was in danger at the moment this shot was taken?

The coffee Abby had shared with Dwayne churned in her stomach as she turned back to the message, reading it again.

She shouldn’t have ignored me.

Dread gripped her by the throat and squeezed even as the bright white lights twinkled through her sheer curtains from the bushes outside—an ironic juxtaposition of holiday present and past.

Abby carefully placed the card on an end table and reached into her coat pocket again, this time in search of Detective Grant’s business card.

Her own words echoed in her brain.

What if he doesn’t send a second card?

She’d been so sure of herself, even after the detective’s explanation of the case and the killer’s cruelty.

Detective Grant had been equally sure, and he’d been correct in his prediction.

He will. He will.

Little did the detective know the second card had been in her coat pocket even as he’d spoken.

Abby dropped her focus to Jack Grant’s business card and studied his cell phone number.

The man had traveled all the way from Arizona to Delaware to chase a single lead. She had to admire him for that.

Then Abby took a deep breath, reached for her phone and dialed.

Jack pulled his rental car to a stop in front of the quaint townhouse. Small white lights twinkled from the short hedge lining the home’s oversized windows.

Figured Abby Conroy would have holiday lights.

Based on the tone of her voice when she called, Jack’s earlier visit had served to snap her out of any holiday cheer she’d been experiencing.

Jack unfolded himself from the car and headed toward the door. Around the side, she’d said.

Dark sidewalk. Isolated entrance.

The woman was nothing if not a picture of what not to do when devising personal security.

She’d provided him with her home address, but Jack had already been able to ascertain that information without so much as pulling a single departmental string.

He’d tracked her by working backward from her postcard confession site through the registration database and public contact information he’d pulled online.

If Boone Shaw—or anyone, for that matter—decided to target Abby Conroy, nothing about the woman’s life would make finding her a challenge.

Now that Jack had had time to stew on the information he’d received, he was certain Boone Shaw had gone underground for a reason.

Shaw had never vanished so thoroughly before, and even though he’d never been picked up on any sort of charge during the eleven years since the trial, he’d left a trail.

Until now.

Business dealings. A new photography studio. Credit card and mortgage debt.

The man had led a normal life, a full life, a life he didn’t deserve.

A calm sureness slid through Jack’s system as he headed toward Abby Conroy’s door.

There was always a chance Shaw wasn’t the person physically sending the cards, but Jack had no doubt he was responsible. Somehow.

The man had killed Emma, just as he’d killed Melinda Simmons and the others.

Jack had seen it in Shaw’s eyes the day they’d pulled the man into custody along with the piles of so-called modeling shots he’d accumulated during his time as a photographer.

The man had been guilty—a sexual predator with a camera. And his victims had been only too willing to pose, believing his promises of bright futures, bright lights, big dreams come true.

“Can I help you?” A thirtysomething man wearing only a pair of jeans, sneakers and gray sweatshirt stepped into Jack’s path.

Jack’s hand reached automatically for his weapon before he remembered he’d left his service revolver back in Arizona, part of the agreement he’d struck with his chief.

The weight of his backup weapon in his ankle holster provided comfort, but reaching for the gun didn’t fall under the subtle category, nor was the move necessary.

The ghost of Boone Shaw had Jack jumping like a rookie.

Besides, the man before him was more than likely nothing but a neighbor, someone suspicious of a man approaching Abby Conroy’s door.

Jack couldn’t fault him for that, but he could ask questions.

Jack measured the man, from his feet to his face. “A bit cold to be outside without a coat, isn’t it?”

“I spend a lot of time over here.” The man’s dark eyes shifted, their focus bouncing from side to side, never making direct eye contact. “With Abby,” he added, as if use of her name would prove something to Jack, somehow put him in his place.

Jack extended his hand. “Detective Jack Grant. I’m here on official business.”

The other man blinked, his expression morphing from aggressive to vacant. “Dwayne Franklin. Abby and I have a…relationship.”

Jack doubted the validity of the man’s statement based on his inability to make eye contact.

If anything, the man was a neighbor who thought he had a relationship with Abby Conroy—yet another security issue Jack planned to talk to the woman about.

Jack flashed his shield, and the man uttered a quick good-night as he headed toward the house next door.

Abby pulled the door open, having apparently heard voices.

“Detective Grant?”

“You might as well start calling me Jack.” He jerked a thumb toward the neighbor’s house. “Does your neighbor make a practice of lurking outside your house?”

A crease formed between Abby’s brows and Jack noted her coloring seemed paler than it had been that morning. “Dwayne?”

Jack nodded.

“He hung the lights for me earlier. He was probably checking his work.”