The Hunted Girls by Jenna Kernan (best book club books for discussion txt) 📕

“The what?” asked Skogen.

“It’s a songbird. A bright red songbird… winters in South and Central America, but it’s here now.” She paused, pressing a hand to her chest as she gasped, the air rasping as she exhaled. “Their song is wonderful.” She pinched her eyes shut, lying still as she whispered. “I’m working on a story for a national magazine. The spring migration.”

“Your sister told you this?”

“Well, I remembered the assignment. But not the drive down here or anything else until after the attack.” Her brow knit and she folded her hands across her middle. “It’s like a big fuzzy mess.”

“Where did you stay?” asked Skogen.

Tolan shook her head. “A hotel? I don’t know.”

The FBI could run her credit cards and figure out where she had been. But it was troubling that Tolan didn’t remember.

“Maybe my sister will know. She’ll be here soon. I spoke to her this morning. But I don’t remember much of our conversation.”

Tolan’s doctors described her condition as retrograde amnesia resulting from the head trauma. Whether her memory would return was anyone’s guess.

Nadine knew it would be best for Tolan if it didn’t. Some blank spots were better never filled in.

“Do you remember the capture?” Special Agent Skogen asked.

“I’m sorry. I don’t.” She rubbed the back of her head. “There’s still a lump.”

“What’s your first memory?” asked Nadine.

“Waking up in that cage!” Tolan shivered. “I was so thirsty. There were two padlocks on the door, the kind with the key. And it rained. I drank all I could, but I was shivering. Couldn’t get warm.”

“What time of day was this?” asked Skogen.

“Before sunup.”

Yesterday morning, Nadine remembered, she had awoken to rain and there was a violent storm midday. Had that cloudburst saved Tolan’s life?

But if today was her first memory, that meant Tolan had lost the memories of five days of captivity. Nadine wondered if hypnosis might offer some answers.

“And you saw your captor?” asked Skogen.

“Not at first. I woke up naked and covered with mosquitoes. I freaked then, trying to get them off me. I was bleeding from my arms and back. The doctor said it looked like he beat me.” She dragged the hospital gown down over her shoulder to show an example. “Then I saw I was in a cage. My head was splitting. I swear, it felt like my skull was fractured.”

“When did you see the man?” asked Skogen, notepad out.

“I heard someone chuckling and turned to see this guy. He was laughing at me. I knew then what was happening. That he wouldn’t help me. I could see it in his face. He was so happy to have me like that.” She dropped her gaze as her breathing accelerated.

“You’re safe, Linda,” said Nadine, keeping her voice low and calm.

“What if he comes back?”

“These sorts of predators hunt in a territory. They don’t target specific women,” said Skogen.

Vague and not completely accurate, thought Nadine, but perhaps comforting. She said nothing to contradict but made a note to speak to Skogen. Lying to her might be best in the short term, but Tolan needed to up her guard.

“We have an artist coming to help you make a sketch of your attacker. It’s very important that you try to remember all the details you can,” said Skogen.

“You know what I do remember? My sister telling me not to go alone. But I was carrying, and I thought…” Her words trailed off. “He almost killed me.”

Skogen spoke up. “Did you say you were carrying a firearm?”

“Pistol. Yes. In my camera bag.” Her hands went up and her mouth dropped open. “My cameras! Did you find my cameras?”

“No. Just you, Ms. Tolan,” said Coleman.

She was crying now. The loss of the cameras seemed to be her final blow.

Skogen redirected her.

“Do you know where that pistol is now?”

She gave him a bewildered look. Tears coursed down her cheeks. “With my lenses, I guess. It was all together in my bag. I don’t know.”

Her confusion appeared genuine and heartbreaking. Nadine glanced to Skogen, who seemed oblivious to Tolan’s obvious distress. Was he so fixed on his investigation he was indifferent to what this woman had suffered?

“Is it registered?”

“The gun? Yes. Oh, yes. I took the class and everything.”

Skogen sent one of the agents out to investigate the missing firearm.

Over the next hour, Skogen asked a series of questions, circled back a few times and came up with a vague description of a white man who wore large mirror glasses and a cap. Tolan described his clothing as the sort a hiker would wear. Light nylon shorts, athletic T-shirt and hiking boots.

In other words, not dressed as a hunter. That surprised Nadine, but then… his attire was perfect camouflage for a man hiding from other humans. He was average height, weight and size. He was male, likely white, tanned or possibly Latino, and dressed like every other hiker, kayaker and bird-watcher in the forest.

The only distinctive feature was his voice. Linda described it as feminine and higher in pitch than most men.

Nadine’s mind went immediately to the man at the adventure outfitters. The one she had felt sorry for and who had an odd high tenor to his voice. Simon Kilpatrick, the underachieving man-child who couldn’t find a job except at his parents’ business.

“Agent Skogen, could I see you outside for a moment?”

They stepped into the hospital corridor together.

“We met someone with a high, female voice.”

WEDNESDAY

Nadine spent the morning with Linda Tolan, whose memories had not returned despite hypnosis. If the part of her brain that stored memories had suffered damage from the blow, the issue was not psychological repression but brain injury. Nadine feared that they would not retrieve any more useful information from this third victim.

Skogen’s team had taken Simon Kilpatrick into custody last night. Most of his people had been at the wilderness outfitters all day executing the search warrant. She had arrived at the sheriff’s office in the afternoon in time to sit in