John rises from his task. “Skull hasn’t been in this shallow grave for long,” he says.

Terry nods his understanding. Matt glances at him. “We found somebody’s buried treasure,” he says.

“Some treasure,” Terry replies.

Frances had already informed them that the remains in the armoire had been in that location for years. “We can assume that she was killed in the house,” she had said. “And hidden inside the wardrobe.”

“It appears possible,” Frances says now, cautiously, always hesitant to make statements prior to full investigation, “that we’ve got a match.”

“So,” Matt says, “at some point recently the killer moved the head, hid it here.”

A van filled with a television news crew pulls up as close as possible considering the number of visitors’ cars parked in the area.

“Trouble,” Terry says.

“Like bloodhounds,” Matt agrees. “If they make a connection between the two murders, they’ll be screaming serial killer.” He stalks off in their direction. Terry is confident that the team of media clowns won’t get near them.

What kind of person did this? A sociopath, Terry thinks. Superficially, sociopaths are charming, pleasant, easy to like. But covertly they are hostile and cunning. Lies roll easily, smoothly enough to even pass lie detector tests. Terry sifts through the knowledge stored in his brain. Sociopaths harbor deep-seated rage, an inability to feel remorse, a view that other people are nothing but targets.

Terry would rather deal with a rabid dog. At least he’d know what he was facing.

The news crew is setting up near their van. Matt returns to the group, stands with his back to them, concealing as much as possible from the camera lens. Terry does the same.

“There’s more,” a digger says, exposing a white plastic bag.

Gloves, bags, pictures. Minutes elapse before the plastic bag is opened and the contents exposed.

Not a hammer, but oddly, a metal doll’s head. The head is old, with painted yellow hair and blue eyes, chipped and fading.

Before the doll’s head is completely revealed, Terry senses that Matt isn’t next to him any longer. He is some distance away, talking on his phone. Terry approaches, notes that his friend has lost his composure. He is pale, shaky. Terry’s never seen him this way.

“They’re out of town,” Matt says, ending the call, his voice ragged likes he’s just run a five-kilometer race in record time. “They’re safe.”

“Who?”

“Gretchen and her mother. I just talked to Caroline. They’re not in Phoenix.”

Terry’s aware of Matt’s feelings for Gretchen. He knows about some of their personal conflicts, about the Birch connection to this case.

“What’s wrong with you?” Terry asks, seeing that his friend is extremely agitated, pacing, sweating.

“I recognize the doll’s head,” Matt says. “It was in Caroline’s car. After the accident, I pulled it out and gave it to Gretchen. Which means that whoever buried the skull and doll head was inside the Birch house yesterday.”

“Are you sure?”

But Matt isn’t listening. He’s making another call.

“Send a car over to the Birch house,” Matt barks into the cell phone. “I want twenty-four-hour surveillance. Stop anybody going in or coming out.”

Matt is on a roll now, he has his composure back, but he’s reactive rather than proactive, never the best place to be. Terry doesn’t like defense, preferring to play his games offensively. Matt’s the same way.

“We have to step up the search for Andy Thomasia,” Terry says.

Matt agrees. “We also need to find the missing son,” he adds. “Richard Berringer better surface soon, either as a live body or on a death certificate.”

“We’ll get them.”

“Damn! The nerve to break into Gretchen’s home and take the head.”

Terry glances toward their team. “A doll head buried in a grave and a doll body in a wardrobe inside the Swilling house. Bet they’re a match.”

Yes, this killer fits another classic sociopath characteristic.

They like to live on the edge.

Terry runs his eyes over the gravestones, suspicious of everyone, all the people coming and going, visiting the dead. He stares at the handful of spectators.

“If he touches her,” Matt says under his breath, “I’ll kill him with my bare hands.”

33

Gretchen and Nina slid through the door into the dilapidated house.

“We’ve been waiting for you,” the woman had said. What was that all about?

Nina had hung back, concerned about entering. She’d sputtered about the bad aura permeating the building, but followed Gretchen inside after calling Caroline on her cell to let her know where they were.

The other part of their team would continue with the search and meet them back at the museum in approximately one hour.

The living room smelled of talcum powder and mothballs.

“I’m Nora Wade,” the woman said, showing them to a flowered sofa covered in yellowed plastic. “This is my mother, Bea.”

Most of the mothball smell seemed to be coming from the old shriveled woman sitting in a matching upholstered chair in a corner of the small room. Heavy drapes on the windows were pulled shut. A lamp on an end table supplied the only light.

Gretchen gave Nora her warmest smile before she said, “Our doll club is renovating the Swilling home, and we’re searching for history on the house and the Swilling family members. We are looking for neighbors who may have known them.”

A knowing look passed between the other two women.

An affirmation that they knew the family? “Did you know them?”

Another look at each other before Nora nodded.

Wonderful. They’d found someone from the old days who might be able to help.

“Would you like some tea?” the mother, Bea, asked. Her voice was so low that Gretchen had to strain to hear her.

Gretchen shook her head.

“No, but thank you,” Nina said.

“What did you mean,” Gretchen asked, “when you said that you had been waiting for us?”

Nora sat down on the edge of the sofa close to Gretchen. The heavy fragrance of talcum powder came from her. “We weren’t waiting specifically for you, but it was only a matter of time before people started wondering about that family and the house. You couldn’t have been inquiring about any other. Besides, we’ve seen you in the neighborhood. You’re the ones who are restoring the Swilling house.”

“Please tell us what you know.”

As it turned out, Nora Wade’s mother had lived her entire life in the home they were in at the moment. Gretchen didn’t think a single piece of furniture had been replaced during all those years. And the drapes must have been drawn to keep natural light from exposing layers of grime and the sorry condition of the furnishings. Dust danced in the lamplight.

“I remember when Flora disappeared,” Bea said, speaking slowly and softly. Gretchen again strained to hear. “The family had so many tragedies, one right after another. You’ve known families like that, I’m sure, where everything goes wrong for them.”

“Yes, I have,” Gretchen said.

“The family had a long history of mental issues, but Richard had the most serious of the lot. Rachel was one year younger than Richard, and he hated her from the day she was born. He was a willful, jealous child, and when Rachel was ten, he tried to smother her with a pillow.”

“Shocking,” Nina said.

Gretchen and Nina exchanged concerned glances. If psychic ability ran in families as Nina believed, then Gretchen had a little of her own and was feeling it now. It wasn’t warm and fuzzy. She felt as cold as one of Aunt Gertie’s Michigan winters, as if her veins had turned to ice and were slowly freezing her arms and legs.

“His mother stopped him in time,” Nora said. “But he became more and more dangerous as he grew. Richard started along his violent path in the same way many people with mental problems begin. He was horribly cruel to animals. His poor sister would tell the most awful stories about him.”