River of Bones by Dan Padavona (books you need to read TXT) 📕

it invited the light inside, whether it was sun or moon. Tonight, it left him exposed.

He interlaced his fingers behind his head. His mind raced and wouldn’t allow him to fall asleep. Through the window, he could see the guest house with one light shining inside the bedroom. LeVar was still awake. The teenager almost died today when LeVar’s past came back to haunt him. Though Thomas fretted over the boy, he also needed to consider Naomi and Scout. As long as the Harmon Kings sought revenge on LeVar, Naomi and Scout would be in the line of fire.

He kept his Glock on the bed stand tonight. Loaded and ready.

After speaking with Darren, he’d copied the web address for the security camera footage. Now he flicked his phone out of hibernation and checked the cameras. He had to hand it to Scout. Blanketing the backyard with cameras was a smart idea. The high-definition camera yielded a crystal clear view of the guest house.

If only he’d caught the person breaking into LeVar’s house. The man had been too fast, outrunning LeVar and escaping through the park before Thomas hemmed him in.

Satisfied the criminal wasn’t coming back tonight, Thomas set the phone aside and closed his eyes. Twenty minutes after he drifted asleep, the shrill ring of the phone jolted him upright. Confused, he stared at the clock before answering.

“Shepherd,” he said, reaching for the water glass beside the bed.

“Sheriff Shepherd, I’m sorry to bother you at this ungodly hour. But my team had a breakthrough with your Jane Doe.”

It took a moment for Thomas to recognize Dr. Astrid Stone. He hadn’t spoken with the forensic anthropologist since Tuesday. He swung his legs off the bed and set his bare feet on the floorboards, squinting after he switched the bedside lamp on.

“I’m listening.”

“Now that we’ve reconstructed the skull, we compared Skye Feron’s dental records with our Jane Doe.”

“Go on.”

“Teeth, Sheriff, are among the body’s hardest structures. They preserve well and provide us with vital clues about a person’s identity. Your Jane Doe has what we call a class 2 malocclusion.”

“An overbite.”

“Very impressive, Sheriff.”

“What does that tell us?”

“Jane Doe is not Skye Feron. Feron’s dental records show she wore braces in elementary school to correct a crowding issue. But the braces came off in ninth grade. The girl never had an overbite.”

Thomas ran a hand through his hair.

“So who did we dig up below Lucifer Falls?”

“That remains a mystery. But it isn’t Skye Feron.”

* * *

The damn cop hadn’t budged in over an hour.

Paige Sutton peeked between the living room curtains. The night held too many secrets, too many places to hide. After the county sheriff informed her a state trooper vehicle would park outside her house, she’d felt some measure of relief. Finally, the police were taking the matter seriously. Now, they just needed to find her friend. Forty-eight hours had passed since anyone heard from Justine. A pall blanketed Paige. Something terrible had happened. It was all spinning out of control again, just like six years ago, when Skye vanished on a night eerily similar to this one.

The cruiser slumbered beneath an oak tree with long branches that brushed the curb like the claws of some ancient devil. She made out the officer’s silhouette and little else. He was probably asleep. She waved to the man and whipped the curtains shut after he didn’t respond. To hell with him. She’d considered bringing him coffee or something to eat.

Sitting on the couch, Paige couldn’t relax. Not with the window behind her. She swiped through her phone, hoping against hope that Justine would message Paige and let her know she was safe. Then she gave up and moved to the recliner, wanting an unrestricted view of the door.

Something brushed against the house. A scraping sound like claws dragging across a tombstone. She sat up and moved her eyes from one window to the next, then to the stairs. The memory of the break-in clung to Paige, made her jump at every sound, every shadow. One more glance out the window. No movement inside the cruiser. If the trooper had seen someone, he’d already be in pursuit of the suspect.

She chided herself. If she lost her mind over every noise, she’d never sleep tonight. Returning to the chair, she pulled a blanket over her bare legs and curled up with her feet tucked beneath her, the notebook computer in her lap and pumping warmth through her shivering body. She opened the Wolf Lake High School alumni website and snooped around in incognito mode, as she always did. Nobody needed to know she was here, reading the comments, searching for messages targeted at Paige and Justine.

It didn’t take long before Paige found another angry post from Webb-WLHS. Who did this woman think she was? Nobody named Webb had graduated with Paige’s class. The woman was an impostor, a troll looking to stir up trouble. Paige had done some digging after contacting a friend who worked for the county. Dawn Samson had a cousin named Cathy Webb. The woman moved outside Wolf Lake the summer someone took Skye. Was Cathy Webb the person who broke inside Paige’s house and left the friendship bracelet? How did she come upon the bracelet, if she wasn’t responsible for Skye’s disappearance? It didn’t add up. If anyone wanted to avenge Dawn, it was Alec Samson, the bitch’s brother. But he’d vanished too.

Now someone wanted to terrorize Paige and make her pay for her rivalry with Dawn. The same person had taken Justine. And Skye? Maybe it was time Paige paid Cathy Webb a visit and showed the woman she wouldn’t be intimidated.

Paige scrolled through the woman’s posts. The heat leapt off the screen. Cathy Webb blamed Paige and Skye for Dawn’s suicide, as if a little harmless ribbing could push a girl to kill herself. Post after post of unsubstantiated rumor and hearsay. Yes, Paige would pay Cathy Webb back for her personal attacks. The woman couldn’t hide