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a case. But there was really nothing to say about this one yet. The body had just been found that morning, after all.
Riley took a magazine out of her bag and tried to read, but she couldn’t focus her attention on the words. Having Jenn sit across from her quietly like that was too distracting. Instead, Riley just sat there pretending to read.
The story of my life these days, she thought.
Pretending and lying were becoming all too routine.
Finally Jenn looked up from her computer.
“Agent Paige, I meant what I said at the meeting with Meredith,” she said.
“Pardon?” Riley asked, looking up from her magazine.
“About being honored to work with you. It’s been a dream of mine. I’ve followed your work ever since I started at the academy.”
For a moment, Riley didn’t know what to say. Jenn had said much the same thing to her before. But again, Riley couldn’t tell from Jenn’s expression whether she was sincere.
“I’ve heard great things about you,” Riley said.
As noncommittal as it sounded, at least it was true. Under different circumstances, Riley would have been thrilled at the chance to work with a smart new agent.
Riley added with a weak smile, “But I wouldn’t get my expectations up if I were you – not for this case.”
“Right,” Jenn said. “It’s probably not even a case for the BAU. We’re liable to fly back to Quantico tonight. Well, there will be others.”
Jenn turned her attention back to her computer. Riley wondered whether she was working on the Shane Hatcher files. And of course, she worried anew that she shouldn’t have given Jenn that thumb drive.
But as she sat there thinking about it, she realized something. If Jenn had really meant to double-cross her by asking for that information, wouldn’t she have used it against her already?
She remembered what Jenn had said to her yesterday.
“I’m pretty sure we want exactly the same thing – to put an end to Shane Hatcher’s criminal career.”
If that was true, Jenn really was Riley’s ally.
But how could Riley be sure? She sat there considering whether she should broach the subject.
She hadn’t told Jenn about the threat she had received from Hatcher.
Was there really any reason not to?
Might Jenn actually be able to help her in some way? Maybe, but Riley still didn’t feel ready to take that step.
Meanwhile, it seemed downright weird that her new partner still called her Agent Paige while insisting that Riley call her by her first name.
“Jenn,” she said.
Jenn looked up from her computer.
“I think you should call me Riley,” Riley said.
Jenn smiled a little and turned her attention back to her computer.
Riley set her magazine aside and stared out the window at the clouds below. The sun was shining brightly, but Riley didn’t find it cheerful.
She felt terribly alone. She missed having Bill around to trust and confide in.
And she missed Lucy so much that she ached inside.
When the plane taxied into the Des Moines International Airport, Riley was able to check her cell phone. She was pleased to see that she’d gotten a message from Mike Nevins.
Bill’s here with me right now.
It was one less thing to worry about.
A police car was waiting outside the plane. Two cops from Angier introduced themselves at the base of the boarding steps. Darryl Laird was a gangly young man in his twenties, and Howard Doty was a much shorter man in his forties.
Both had stunned expressions on their faces.
“We’re sure glad you’re here,” Doty told Riley and Jenn as the two cops escorted them to the car.
Laird said, “This is whole thing is just …”
The younger man shook his head without finishing his thought.
These poor guys, Riley thought.
They were just regular small-town cops. Murders were surely few and far between in a small Iowa town. Maybe the older cop had handled one or two homicides at one time or other, but Riley guessed that the younger one hadn’t been through anything like this before.
As Doty started to drive, Riley asked the two cops to tell her and Jenn whatever they could about what had happened.
Doty said, “The girl’s name was Katy Philbin, seventeen years old. A student at Wilson High. Her parents own the local pharmacy. Nice girl, everybody liked her. Old George Tully came across her body just this morning when he and his boys were getting ready to do the spring planting. Tully’s got a farm just a short way out of Angier.”
Jenn asked, “Any idea how long she’d been buried there?”
“You’ll have to ask Chief Sinard about that. Or the medical examiner.”
Riley thought back to what little Meredith had been able to tell them about the situation.
“What about the other girl?” she asked. “The one who went missing earlier?”
“Holly Struthers is her name,” Laird said. “She was … uh, I guess she is a student at our other high school, Lincoln. She’s been missing for about a week. The whole town had been hoping she’d just turn up sooner or later. But now … well, I guess we’ve got to keep on hoping.”
“And praying,” Doty added.
Riley felt an odd chill when he said that. She couldn’t begin to guess how often she’d heard people say that they were praying that a missing person would turn up safe and sound. She never had the impression that prayer helped one way or the other.
Does it even make people feel better? she wondered.
She couldn’t imagine why or how.
It was a bright, clear afternoon when the car left Des Moines and headed out onto a wide highway. Soon Doty exited onto a two-lane road that stretched over the slightly rolling countryside.
Riley felt a strange, gnawing feeling in her stomach. It took her a few moments to realize that her feeling had nothing to do with the case – at least not directly.
She often felt this way whenever she had a job to do in the Midwest. She didn’t normally suffer from a fear of open spaces – agoraphobia, she thought it was called. But vast plains and prairies stirred up a unique kind of anxiety in her.
Riley didn’t know which was worse – the sheer flat plains she’d seen in states like Nebraska, stretching out as far as the eye could see, or monotonous rolling prairie like this, the same farmhouses, towns, and fields seeming to appear over and over again. Either way, she found it unsettling, even a little nauseating.
Despite the Midwest’s reputation as a land of wholesome, all-American values, it somehow didn’t surprise her that people committed murder here. As far as she was concerned, the countryside alone would be enough to drive a person crazy.
Partly to get her mind off the landscape, Riley took out her cell phone to text her whole family as a group – April, Jilly, Liam, and Gabriela.
Got here safely.
She thought for a moment, then added …
Miss you all already. But I’ll probably be back before U know it.
After about an hour on the two-lane highway, Doty turned the car off onto a gravel road.
As he kept on driving, he said, “We’re coming up on George Tully’s land now.”
Riley looked around.