“And if you don’t tell them, will we be putting more women at risk?” Cass asked. “Isn’t it better if the public knows what’s going on, so they can protect themselves better?”

“I think we can let them know that another woman has been killed by what appears to be the same person. That alone should let women know they need to take care; we can address the issues of safety with the public without adding to the hysteria by sensationalizing this more than it has to be.” Denver tapped his fingers quietly on the arms of his chair. “And of course, the summer season recently opened.”

“You get a call from the mayor, or something, like how this is going to be bad for business?” Spencer asked.

“This isn’t Amity, Spencer, and I think I can safely say our killer isn’t a great white shark.” Denver stared at him coldly. “I only bring it up because our population will triple by the end of the month. Which will give him a greater selection of victims to choose from.”

“Which means we have to do everything we can to find him, and stop him,” Cass said, then shook her head. “Stupid statement. It’s obvious we have to find him before he kills someone else.”

“To that end, Burke, I want you to get with Tasha and go over everything she has. And I want you to get Lisa Montour’s car down to the garage and have it gone over with a fine-tooth comb, especially that tire.”

Cass tapped Spencer on the shoulder. “You coming?”

Before he could answer, Denver spoke up.

“No, he’s not. And close the door on your way out, Burke.”

Cass paused at the doorway and looked back over her shoulder. Spencer’s neck had turned beet red and Denver ’s eyes were beginning to narrow as he focused on the detective who remained seated.

“Was there something else, Burke?” the chief asked.

“No, I just…”

“Close the door on your way out.”

Cass did as she was told.

She returned to her office and dialed Tasha’s number, wondering what was going on between Spencer and the chief. Whatever it was, it hadn’t appeared that either one of them was happy about it. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Spencer that quiet, or the chief so tense. Her instincts told her it had more to do with Spencer’s attitude than with the recent homicides.

Well, if anyone could adjust someone’s attitude, it was Denver.

Forty minutes later, Cass had left voice mail for Tasha, called Carol Tufts and asked if she had the key to Lisa Montour’s car, and arranged for Helms to meet her at Lisa Montour’s apartment.

That done, Cass left the station, walking out the side door just as Jeff Spencer’s wife pulled into the parking lot and stopped by the front of the building.

Within seconds, Jeff came down the sidewalk, a box in his arms. He balanced the box on one knee while he opened the rear door and slid the box across the seat before getting into the passenger side.

Puzzled, Cass stood on the steps and watched as the car left the lot on two wheels.

Well, shit, she thought. That doesn’t bode well.

“You on your way to pick up that car, Detective?”

She turned at the sound of the chief’s voice.

“Yes, I’m meeting Helms there. I spoke with our vic’s roommate. She said the car keys are still on the hook inside the front door, where Lisa left them.”

“Good. I’m on my way to the mayor’s office to go over what little we know before the press conference he decided to call. Want to trade places?”

“No thanks.”

Denver started to walk past her and she touched his arm.

“Chief, Detective Spencer just…” She pointed to the street.

“Ex-detective Spencer. He’s no longer with the department.”

“What?” Her jaw dropped.

“His choice. He’s going back to Minnesota or Michigan…”

“ Wisconsin.” She supplied the name of Spencer’s home state.

“Whatever,” Denver grumbled. “His wife hates it here, she hates the beach, she misses her mother, she misses her sister, she hates that he’s at work all the time, she hates that she has no friends here, the baby’s always sick, he’s never around to help her…”

He paused. “Did I miss anything?”

“If you did, it probably doesn’t matter.”

“I knew there was something going on there, his attitude has changed over the past month or two. So we had to have a chat. Told him that I need him to be on the case, one hundred percent, you know, we have a killer here, we need his full attention and if he can’t give it to us, he needs to rethink his career choice.” He paused again. “Apparently he had already done that. He’d applied for and was offered a job at a police department fifteen miles from his hometown.”

“So he’s leaving? He’s just walking out?”

“Easier for some than for others, I guess. So, yes, to answer your question, he took accrued vacation, sick days, and personal time and is probably, as we speak, packing to leave, if his wife hasn’t already done that. He starts his new job on the first of next month.”

“Just like that?”

“Hardly just like that, he’s had this planned for weeks. To give him the benefit of the doubt, he did say he’d planned on giving his notice early in the week, but we found the first body. Then the second.”

“I thought he seemed a bit off,” Cass said, recalling the way Spencer had held back and let her take the lead, not just that morning, but at the crime scene earlier in the week. “But I figured maybe he was just tired. You know, so much going on around here all of a sudden, and they have that new baby.”

“Well, he’s taking that new baby and leaving us holding the bag.”

“Did you ask him to stay for a few more days?”

“What would be the point? Mentally, he’s already out of here. Might as well let him go. He wouldn’t be much use to us anyway, not in the state of mind he’s in right now.”

Cass thought back to that morning, when Jeff had been late getting to the crime scene, and had been pretty much ineffective even after he arrived.

“So, I guess it’s you, me, and a couple of uniforms against our boy, Cass.”

Denver walked down the steps and didn’t turn back until he reached his car.

“Finish up with the car and with Tasha, then go on home and get some sleep. You never know what tomorrow will bring.”

Her newly found enthusiasm for healthy living having been inspired a few weeks earlier by a visit from an old friend of her father’s who happened to be a holistic physician, Regan Landry added a banana to the skim milk, yogurt, and assorted powders in the blender and hit the Pulverize button. The little appliance whirred noisily while she found a glass and searched for a straw. She hit Stop and a blessed silence followed. She poured her breakfast into the glass and sat down at the small round kitchen table and opened the newspaper. Bored after a few minutes of skimming the headlines, she searched under the paper for the remote control and turned on the television that sat on the counter across the room.

She changed the channel, searching for her favorite morning show, This Morning, USA. Once she found it, she turned up the volume and resumed her cursory scanning of the New York Times. An article about an upcoming auction of American antiques at Sotheby’s caught her eye, and she’d just gotten to the sampling of early Pennsylvania furniture when something on the screen caught her attention. She reached for the remote and increased the volume.

“… certainly of interest to anyone having plans to visit the New Jersey shore this summer,” Heather Cannon was saying.

The screen split, half now occupied by a man in a police uniform who looked uncomfortable in front of the camera.

“I feel your pain,” Regan muttered.

“Chief Denver, with the finding of a third body there in Bowers Inlet, the reports coming from the South Jersey area are telling us that the signs all point to the likelihood that this is the work of a serial killer. Can you confirm that?”