“Lucy is my cousin. She’s been staying with me for the past week,” Cass told her. “Sunday night, she was attacked.”

“By this killer?” Annie tapped on the photos.

“We believe so.”

Before she could say anything else, Rick touched Cass on the arm and said, “Tell her what Lucy told you.”

“He called her Jenny,” Cass said. “Repeatedly. He called her Jenny the entire time.”

“Wait, wait.” Annie held up both hands to stop them. “Start from the beginning. Who is Jenny?”

“Jenny was my mother’s name.”

“Your mother… who was murdered that summer.”

“Yes.”

“Before or after the other killings?”

“Before.”

“Cass…” Rick touched her arm. “I think you need to tell her the whole story.”

“Is this necessary?” The chief stared at Rick.

“I think it is. Annie?” Rick sought her input.

“I agree. If Cass is in agreement…?”

Cass nodded.

“Let’s start by you telling me everything you remember about the day your family was attacked.” Annie paused, then asked, “Cass, may I record this interview? I’d rather be concentrating on what you’re saying instead of having to take notes.”

“Absolutely, do.”

Annie took a small recorder from her bag and placed it on the table between her and Cass. After the initial introduction and the asking and granting of permission to record, Annie repeated the question.

“Cass, can you tell us what you remember about the day of the attack on your family? What is the first thing you remember?”

“I woke up early-the sun wasn’t up yet. I went into the bathroom and it was still dark, but I heard my father downstairs. He was taking a charter out that day, so he’d be gone long before dawn. I stood on the top step and was going to go down to the kitchen to ask him not to take the last brownies with him-we made them the day before, Mom and Trish and me. Well, Trish didn’t do a lot, she was only four…”

“How old were you, Cass?” Annie asked.

“I was six. I’d turn seven later that summer.”

“Okay, go on.”

“I was going to go downstairs, but then I heard the back door close, and I knew I’d never catch up with him. My dad was very tall and he walked really fast. By the time I’d have reached the kitchen, he’d have been in the car and backed down the drive, so I just went back to bed. My sister and I had started summer camp that week, and I was excited about going, so I couldn’t fall asleep. I was still awake when my mother came in to get me up.”

“What were you excited about?”

“Oh, just the whole camp thing. It was different from my everyday. One of my friends was having a birthday party that afternoon. It was going to be a picnic on the beach. And I was still all revved up from the day before. The bird sanctuary had been officially opened, and we’d spent the entire day there.” Cass paused momentarily, remembering. “My mother drove us in the morning-we stopped to pick up Lucy. She was my age and my best friend. When camp was over for the day, Lucy’s mother-my Aunt Kimmie, my mother’s sister-picked us up and drove us home.”

“What time was it, do you remember?”

“After lunch. Sometime around two.”

“When you arrived home, did you go directly into the house?”

“Yes. Well, that is, Trish went in first. The minute we pulled up in front of the house, she jumped out and ran for the door, crying because Aunt Kimmie was going to take Lucy and me to the party, and Trish hadn’t been invited. She ran into the house before I was even out of the car.”

Cass swallowed hard and Rick left the room momentarily. Through the open door, they heard the thump of a can of soda being ejected from the machine outside the conference room. He returned in an instant and handed the can of Diet Pepsi to Cass, the tab already popped.

“Thank you.” She took a long drink. “Thanks.”

“What happened next?” Annie asked.

“Lucy and I got out of the backseat. I went up to the house. It was so quiet…”

“Wait a minute. Lucy got out of the car with you?” Rick asked.

“Yes.”

Rick frowned. “I don’t remember seeing her name in any of the reports I read. Did she go into the house?”

“No.”

“Where did she go, if she didn’t go with you? Did she just stand there by the car, waiting?”

“I think…” Cass tried to recall. “I think she might have gone into the backyard. I think she said she was going to wait on the swings. You saw them, they’re still there, in the yard. To the far right of the house.”

He nodded.

“Anyway, I went inside. I heard something on the second floor, so I started up the steps. It all happened so fast after that. I saw… I saw Trish. He threw her.” Cass’s hands began to shake. “He just picked her up and threw her, like a doll.”

“This is all in the file. Does she have to go through this?” Chief Denver protested.

“I’m afraid so, Chief.” Annie took over again. “Cass, you saw him?”

“No, no. I didn’t see him. I wasn’t looking at him, I was looking at my sister. She had flown through the air… and I was wondering how she was doing that. I ran up the steps and he grabbed me.”

“From which direction?”

“I don’t know. I only remember being surprised. I don’t know where he came from. He started stabbing at me then… with the knife.” Cass fought to control herself, and Rick moved his chair closer to hers but did not touch her.

“Then you saw his face.”

“No. No, I didn’t. I’m sure of that,” she protested. “I think I blacked out after the first time he cut me.”

“Now, all this time, your cousin, Lucy, was outside, playing on the swings?”

“I guess she would have been, yes.”

“Did anyone talk to her about what she might have seen?” Annie directed the question to the chief.

“No. No reason to. We found the killer in the garage.” Denver ’s jaw tightened. “The girl was in the backyard when we got there.”

Annie’s attention returned to Cass. “What happened next?”

“I don’t know. Chief, you would know more than I.”

“Mrs. Donovan-Cass’s aunt-started to wonder where her niece was. She got out of her car and went into the house to find out what was taking so long. She stepped inside and heard some sound-she described it as a soft moaning sound-from the kitchen. She went in, and found Wayne Fulmer-he had a room in one of those old motels out along Route Nine, hung around town most days- Wayne was crying, sitting on the floor next to Bob Burke’s body. His hands and clothes were covered in blood. According to Mrs. Donovan’s testimony, she started screaming, ‘My God, what have you done?’ And Wayne, he started screaming back at her, ‘No, no, not me. Not Wayne.’ Then he ran out the back door, and she went upstairs, screaming for her sister. She found you where you’d fallen,” he nodded to Cass, “on the steps.”

“Who called the police?” Annie asked.

“Someone driving past saw Wayne running down the road, covered with blood. By the time we got there, he had run back into the Burkes’ garage to hide, that’s where we found him.”

“Was the knife recovered?” Rick asked.

“We found it on the floor at the bottom of the steps.”

“Prints?”

“The handle and blade were so slick with blood, we couldn’t get a print.”

The chief slanted a glance in Cass’s direction to see her reaction, but there was none.

“When you questioned him about why he was there, what did he tell you?” Rick asked.

“Said he’d run into Bob down at the marina an hour earlier and that Bob told him he’d had a big catch, that if he stopped by the house, Bob would give him some fish.”

He began to fiddle with his glasses.

“You have to try to understand how this hit the community. Everyone in town knew and liked the Burkes. Bob’s family lived here before there was a town. Nothing like this had ever happened in Bowers before. As far as I knew, nothing like this had happened anywhere around here. It left everyone speechless. Everyone was up in arms when the news leaked out about us finding Wayne hiding in the garage. That we had had that murderous scum living right here in Bowers Inlet, walking our streets… well, people were pretty outraged. But relieved, you know, that he’d been locked up.”