"That will be the quickest," the sheriff agreed. "We can check with all the motels and realtors for a single guy renting a room, a condo, or a house; in this area, we tend to get more families and groups than singles, so it ought to narrow the field. I'll get my people on it."

"It's a start, anyway." Riley offered the folder to Leah. "Want to take a look?"

"Pass. Wouldn't know what I was reading anyway."

Riley smiled and returned the folder to Jake. "Not much we didn't already know. White male approximately forty to forty-five years old, tortured and then decapitated. No tox-screen results yet. Estimated time of death was between two and six A.M. Sunday night. Or Monday morning, rather."

"Does that help?" Leah wondered.

"Not really. Not without more to go on. Jake, may I see all the paperwork you've got on any of the other possibly related crimes this summer? The arson, vandalism, whatever else you have."

"Of course." He was all business now, the foray into her personal life seemingly forgotten. "Looking for a common thread?"

Matter-of-factly, she said, "If there was one, your people probably would have seen it. Unless it's occult-related. Those can be very subtle, and I wouldn't expect most cops to pick up on them."

"But you would?"

"Maybe, maybe not." She shook her head. "Sorry to sound vague, but I haven't had a chance to do any research yet; until I work up a list of possibly related occurrences and try to figure out what they have in common, research is tough and fairly useless. The occult is a broad topic."

With a sigh, Jake said, "Yeah, I did an Internet keyword search using human sacrifice. You wouldn't believe some of the shit that came up."

"Oh, I'd believe just about anything." Riley's voice was dry. "But I'd rather start at the beginning, not with the end result."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that the preparations for an occult ceremony are every bit as important as the eventual outcome, possibly more so."

Leah got it first. "So if you find something out of place in the prep work, you'll be more inclined to believe the occult…elements…were used as a smoke screen."

"Exactly."

Jake was frowning. "That's what you think? Seriously?"

"I think it's possible."

"You've been listening to Ash."

"Actually, I think he's convinced this murder has nothing to do with the occult. I'm not quite ready to rule it out just yet."

"I'm glad to hear that," Jake said. "Thought I'd have to waste a lot of time arguing the possibility."

"I'm always open to possibilities," Riley said. "There are usually plenty of them, and this case is no exception. Maybe it's a garden-variety murder dressed up to look like something else. Or maybe it really is something else."

It was Leah's turn to frown. "Wait a minute. You said there wasn't much in the autopsy report we didn't already know."

"That's what I said."

"So there was something. Something you didn't expect?"

"One small thing," Riley agreed. "The stomach contents."

Jake looked at the closed folder he'd placed on the table, then back at Riley, his brows lifting. "What about them? We don't have the tox screen yet, so-"

"So we don't know if he was drugged or poisoned. Yeah. But what we do know is that his stomach was full of blood. And it wasn't his."

Chapter 10

Riley bent to pick up a charred bit of wood and straightened, turning it in her hands. "The house was under construction when it burned?"

"Not much more than a shell," Jake confirmed. "The roof was on, and it was mostly closed in, but that was it."

"And it was being built by a construction company, not an individual."

"Yeah, a big company bought up a shitload of land on the island a few years ago, when one of the original owners finally sold out. They've been building on lots ever since. Usually have two or three houses going at the same time. Big crew."

"Insurance?"

"What you'd expect. Nothing excessive." Jake shrugged.

"And nothing crooked that I could find. They build a house and then sell it, to either an individual, a co-op, or one of the properties groups that own rentals. Business as usual around here."

Riley dropped the charred wood and absently brushed her hands together. "And your fire marshal is sure it was arson?" She was behaving as though this was her first visit here, although she had to assume that she'd been here to this site at least once before, and unbeknownst to the sheriff. This fire had, after all, been one of the unusual occurrences to rouse Gordon's suspicions this summer.

So it only made sense that she had come here at some point. She might even have found something here to deepen-or erase-her own suspicions, for all she knew.

She didn't remember.

"An accelerant was used," Jake replied. "And not something common, like gasoline or lighter fluid. I don't have lab results on just what kind, but we're sure of that much."

"Anything else we're sure of?" The question was straightforward and not at all sarcastic.

"Not a whole hell of a lot. Happened in the middle of the night, closer to dawn, really. Report called in by a neighbor who was up early to take his dog out. The fire was well under way, and nobody was seen here or running-or driving-away from here."

Riley frowned at the blackened pilings intended to support the house well above the sandy ground as required by code and the only parts of it still upright and recognizable. Around the base of the massive timbers were mounds of charred wood, some of them waist high, where the building had caved in on itself while burning.

"What're you thinking?" Jake asked.

She wished she knew. There was something very familiar about this, but she didn't know what it was. Or even why it was. Maybe it just looked familiar because she'd stood here before, studied the debris of this fire before.

Or maybe it was something else.

"Riley?"

Why do I get the feeling it's something else?

"I guess the fire marshal sifted through all this stuff," she said, more to be saying something than because she had any real doubts.

"Twice. And then I had a closer look myself-early yesterday, as a matter of fact. Except for signs of that accelerant I mentioned, neither of us saw anything that didn't belong here."

Riley looked at him with a frown. "Then why do you have this fire lumped in with the other unusual occurrences? Fires happen. Arson happens." Thinking of the earlier conversation with Leah, she added, "Even in paradise. And burning a building doesn't play a part in any ritual I know of. So why do you believe this might have had something to do with occult practices?"

He sighed. "Well, there was one unusual thing here. The fire marshal didn't notice, or at least didn't put it in his report. And I only found it yesterday. Haven't even had the chance to tell Ash, if you want the truth."

"Found what, Jake?"

He led the way through the mounds of rubble toward the beach side of the property, saying over his shoulder, "The company wants to clear all this and start rebuilding, but their insurer's investigator apparently wants to take a look and won't cut them a check until he does. Supposed to be here by the end of the week. Otherwise, all this'd be cleared out by now."

An awful lot of things appeared to be happening-or were supposed to happen-by the end of the week, Riley thought, conscious of a new prickle of unease. As if a clock were ticking off the moments until…something. She didn't know what. Or whose clock it was.

Or even if it mattered, dammit.

But all she said, calmly, was, "I'm not surprised the insurer wants to take a look, if an accelerant was used. I gather it was one of those rare policies that actually covers arson, but only if no evidence points to the company?"