"It's complicated." The man ran his hand through his hair. "Okay, I talked to her a few times. What's the big deal? I never saw her once she left here. There were a few things to iron out, like some items I'd left at her town house. A tie I was missin'. Stuff like that."

Ramsey reached into her jacket's inner pocket to retrieve a copy of Frost's cell phone LUDs. "Well let's count those calls. Between March eighth and the week before her death, I come up with . . ." She pretended to tally, as if she didn't have the exact number branded on her mind. "Thirty-seven. Over three dozen times you had to talk to Cassie about 'stuff.' " She paused a beat. "That's a lot of ties."

Sanders sent a wild look in Matthews's direction, but the agent was surveying him expressionlessly. "I couldn't admit that I'd talked to her," he pled. "If Sarah found out Cassie and I were still in touch, she would have hit the roof."

"What happened, Quinn?" Ramsey asked rancorously. "Couldn't decide which sister you wanted after all? Or did all the excitement of the chase sort of disappear once Cassie removed herself from the mix?"

"Yeah-no!" The man sank into his desk chair. "I mean, I thought I wanted Sarah. But later . . . I couldn't stop thinkin' about Cassie, y'know? And everythin' we'd meant to each other."

"And you started to think maybe you'd made a mistake breaking things off with her. Sarah's rushing you to the altar, and you stop and think, hey, is this really what I want?" The sympathy was back in Matthews's voice. "That's understandable."

"And maybe Cassie wanted to use you to get back at her sister."

"No." Sanders looked at Ramsey with dislike. "Maybe we talked about gettin' back together at first, but when I didn't break things off with Sarah right away, Cassie wouldn't discuss it anymore. It was just . . . I missed her, y'know?" He hunched his shoulders, managing to look miserable. "And I think she missed me, too. Or at least, she missed havin' someone she knew to talk to. So we'd talk, that's all. Totally innocent."

"So innocent that you called her from this number instead of your cell phone, so your current fiancee wouldn't find out."

Sanders swallowed hard. "She wouldn't have understood."

Ramsey gave a feral smile. "See, now I think you've underestimated Sarah. I'll bet she would have understood perfectly ."

"You can see how this looks, Quinn." It was Matthews's turn to work the man, his voice persuasive. "If there's more you haven't told us, now's the time to come clean. The more you try to hide, the worse it is for you in the long run."

Sanders slumped in his chair, scrubbing his eyes with one hand. "I know this looks bad, but you have to believe me. One of the reasons we kept talkin' is because she was spooked. She thought someone might be followin' her."

Her derisive snort couldn't be contained. The younger man's head came up, and he glared at her. "See I knew you'd blow it off, but it's true. And she was really creeped out by it."

"Couple problems with that, Quinn." Ramsey hooked a straight-backed chair with her foot and dragged it close enough to sit in. "One is you never mentioned this mysterious stalker until your neck's in a vise. And two, no one who knew her in Kordoba can back you up. She never mentioned being afraid to anyone there."

"But she did in Lisbon." He was eager now to make them believe him. "I couldn't mention it earlier because I'd have to admit we had kept in touch. She moved to Lisbon from here after we broke up. And about a month after she got there, she said some guy tried to pick her up at a restaurant. She gave him the brush-off but said she'd see him around at random times, watchin' her. And after she'd been in town a couple months, she woke up and saw someone trying to break in through her bedroom window."

A tight frisson of rage fired through Ramsey's veins. "Convenient that your memory cleared up once we've caught you in a pile of lies."

"I didn't tell you before because there wasn't really anythin' she told me that would help, you know? And if Sarah found out we were speakin' . . ."

"Yeah, you said. She wouldn't understand." Ramsey regarded him with disgust.

"I can prove there was someone she was afraid of. She reported that window peepin' incident to the police." He looked from one of them to the other. "There'd be a record of that, wouldn't there?"

Ramsey easily kept up with Matthews's stride as they made their way to their respective cars. "Powell was right. He's a lying-ass dog."

"Just because he lied about not talking to her doesn't mean he's lying about everything." The agent sent her a pointed look. "Easy enough to check out. If she filed a complaint, there'd be a record of it."

"Wouldn't prove a damn thing." But she was already thinking about it. Worrying at the ramifications like a dog with a bone. They'd gone through Frost's life in Kordoba thoroughly. And once they'd traced her to Memphis, Matthews had been similarly methodical there.

But had they missed something important by not being as painstaking with the places she'd lived in between the two towns?

"I'll let Powell know I'm sticking around here with you," she said. "Maybe if we go at Sanders again tomorrow, we might be able to convince him to voluntarily let us look at his financials as a show of good faith."

"More likely he'll lawyer up if we hit him too hard," Matthews warned.

"Possibly. Which makes it all the more critical to get info from him before then. Maybe if he thinks we're going to let Sarah know about his continued interest in Cassie, he might be more forthcoming." They'd have to tread gently there. Matthews was right. They'd pushed Sanders to his limit today.

"I'm heading back to the motel." The agent stopped by his car, a black four-door Crown Vic. "If the report exists, we can always get a copy by fax."

"Let me see what Powell has to say. Once we finish up here, I wouldn't mind swinging through Lisbon on my way back to Buffalo Springs."

"Really?" Matthews looked considerably more cheerful. Ramsey figured he thought he was going to get stuck with that duty, too.

"Yeah, I'd like to poke around." From the victim's financials, she could glean her old employer, her landlord, even her former hair stylist and nail salon.

"Fine by me. I'll catch you later."

Ramsey got in the Ford, sending the TBI agent an absentminded wave. She was ninety-eight percent certain that Sanders was sending them on a wild-goose chase. He wasn't exactly racking up points for honesty.

Inserting the key, she started the ignition. She wasn't going to overlook anything that might bring them closer to the killer, no matter how remote the chance might be. Grimly, she checked her mirrors and headed off the lot.

Cassie Frost had been let down by those who were supposed to love her most. Ramsey figured she owed the woman at least this much.

The sun was almost straight overhead by the time Dev made it back to Rose Thornton's place. He gathered the equipment he'd need from the trunk of his car, and with a sense of deja vu, headed off toward the woods fringing the old lady's property.

All the while, he kept a wary eye on the door of her cabin. Although there were some experiences he wouldn't mind repeating, having buckshot removed from his ass wasn't one of them.

The late start was courtesy of his lack of sleep the night before. Dev was normally not a late riser, but once he'd returned Ramsey back to her place, he'd laid sleepless for a long time, wondering if he could have played it any differently.

The answer to that had been evasive, so he'd fallen into a restless sleep about the time the birds had started waking. And had woken surly and out of sorts as a result.

There was nothing that cured surliness like buckling down to work.

So he spent a couple hours setting up and getting those control measures to compare to last night's readings. And then sat contemplating the results, his mind racing.

Because the readings today were well within the normal range.

The outdoor temperature would be expected to be warmer, of course. He'd need to take another reading tonight at the same time he and Ramsey had been here. But the EMF meter should read the same today as it did last night if the previous elevated reading were due to power lines. Trouble was, they were in the normal range, too.

Intrigued, Dev rocked back on his heels. He'd need to do a bit more investigation, but his attention was caught, no denying it.

He shot a considering look at Rose's cabin. It looked quiet. If she were up and around, he hadn't seen her. Hopefully his luck would continue to hold. Because come dark, he was going to be back here to see if the readings compared to last night's.

In the meantime, he had some local history to bone up on. It would, he hoped, as he placed his equipment carefully back into their bags, take his mind off the woman who had hovered at the edge of it for most of the day.

He was slamming the lid of his car's trunk when his cousin pulled up beside him in the department-issued Jeep. Rounding the car, he went to the passenger side of the other vehicle. Mark buzzed down the window.

"Hey." Dev bent down to rest his forearms on the opened window, peering inside. "I'm gonna get me a job like this someday. Spend my days ridin' 'round the county, duckin' out of my responsibilities at the office."

"Bite me," Mark suggested pleasantly. "You haven't punched a clock since you worked for old man Hanly at the soda fountain back in high school. And all you did then was give free ice cream to all the pretty girls that came in."

The memory had Dev smiling. "Hanly took it out regular from my paycheck, too. Finally had to quit when it got to where I owed him more than he paid me." He'd held other jobs since then, of course. But all had lacked the appeal that came from the research and writing he did now.

Mark looked past him toward Rose's cabin. "You always did like to live dangerously. Does Rose know you're out trompin' 'round her property?"

"Haven't seen her this mornin', but Ramsey and I spoke to her last night." He neatly sidestepped the question. "Can't say that she's changed much."

"You talked to her? Well, that's one thing off my list for today. I was gonna check on her. Folks have mentioned she hasn't been to town lately."

"She'll probably outlast us all."

Mark eyed him shrewdly. "What were you doin' with Ramsey out here anyway?"

"She saw some lights near the woods night before last, and we came to check them out. Saw them again last night and went to follow them. Had a run-in with Ezra T." Dev recounted the incident, finishing with, "Have to say, I was pretty surprised. Didn't figure on him bein' the violent sort."

The sheriff frowned. "Can't say as I like the sounds of that." He appeared to mull it over for a few moments. "Makes me wonder if Duane and Mary are seein' to it that he takes his medication regular. That's one of the conditions of them keepin' him at home, I know. I'll make it up there sometime today and have a talk with them."

"Probably wouldn't hurt." But Dev's mind was somewhere else. "You get a lot of poachers in these parts?"

Mark gave a shrug. "Always have some. More trappers than anythin' else. That might account for the lights you saw. Some guys settin' or checkin' their traps for the evenin'."

"Probably was," Dev agreed. He wasn't near ready to discuss what he thought the lights could be. There was a lot more evidence to collect before then.

He knew his cousin. He wasn't any more open than Ramsey to "evidence" he couldn't see or hear or touch.

But Dev was beginning to believe that he just might have stumbled on a site of genuine paranormal activity.

"Sonofabitch."

Catching the curious looks from nearby diners, Ramsey lowered her voice as she continued the cell phone conversation with Agent Powell. "How much is the policy worth?"

"A hundred grand. The insurance company in Memphis contacted the local police when they heard of Frost's murder. We just got word. Looks like Sanders took the policy out on Frost a year ago last fall."

Well before their breakup. She thought of Sanders's business and wondered if it was doing as well as the man would have them believe. "Smells like motive to me."

"Damn straight. Since it's the weekend, I had Jeffries contact a judge in Memphis. When I get there, I'll swing by and pick up the signed warrant. I've already talked to Matthews and told him to wait for me."

"I'm still here, too. I'll stay until you . . ."

"No, I want you to head to Lisbon and check out Sanders's story about the police report Frost made. See if you can line up any other verification. People she might have confided in. If this turns out to be another hole in his story, we can use it to nail him."

More than a little deflated, Ramsey agreed. "I'll let you know what I find out."

"This doesn't shake his alibi, of course." Powell sounded as revved as she'd ever heard him. "But Sanders wouldn't be the first to hire someone to off a loved one for that kind of money. We'll know a lot more when we get hold of his financials."

"Speaking of financials, can you check the log of Frost's transactions? I'm looking for names that might be a landlord, salon, favorite restaurants." She got a pen and paper from her purse and wrote down the information Powell read off for her on the back of her napkin.

The call ended moments later, and Ramsey put the list she'd made in her purse. Looking at the half-eaten sandwich on her plate without interest, she signaled the waitress for the check.

Her enthusiasm for the task ahead had waned considerably in light of the recent news. It would be cynical to think that the TBI agents were rushing to take control of what could only be construed as their best lead yet in the case.

But Ramsey had been born cynical. She'd also worked enough investigative teams to know how the politics worked. If there was a break in the case, the local law enforcement would close ranks. That way they could bask in the resulting glory of successful resolution of a high-profile investigation.

Being used to it, though, didn't mean it didn't suck.

When Dev arrived at the Historical Museum and found Shirley Pierson working as the day's volunteer, he was tempted to skip this leg of the research and head straight to the library.

The woman hadn't been friendly since he'd bloodied her son's nose for him in the summer he'd been ten for calling him Killer's Kid. In those days, he'd had more temper than restraint, and the woman had never forgotten it. There'd been a loud phone conversation with his granddaddy as a result, and then a lecture from Benjamin on the virtues of turning the other cheek.

He didn't have enough cheeks to pacify Shirley. Based on a few things he'd heard over the years, Ira Pierson had only been repeating what he'd heard at home.

"Well, bless your heart, I can't imagine what the likes of you would be wantin' here, Devlin." With the skill of a true southern gentlewoman, Shirley covered the insult with enough sugar to almost obscure the sting.

"Ms. Pierson." Mindful to this day of his granddaddy's lecture, he kept his tone pleasant. "How's the family?"

"Fine. You might be interested to know that Ira is a writer, too. A real writer," she stressed. "Just last month he had a short story published in Country Home and Heart magazine."

He offered a bland smile. "I'll bet you're real proud. Tell him I said hey."

Her mouth pinched together tightly. "I'm afraid I'm terribly busy. Perhaps you could come back another day."

Since the place was empty, and it didn't look as though the woman had been doing anything more strenuous than dusting the exhibits, he knew he was getting the brush-off. And had a fleeting moment to understand how Ramsey had felt when Donnelle had treated her similarly.

Undeterred, he held his ground. Sending a glance around the place, he said, "That's fine, I won't be a bother. Just point me in the direction of any information regardin' the town's foundin' father, and I'll be out of your way." If her lips tightened any further, he observed, they'd disappear completely.

"I'm afraid I can't help you."

"Okay." He headed into the next room. "Don't mind me. I'll just poke 'round on my own."

"I really can't have you touchin' anythin'." He heard her scurrying after him. "The guidelines here are quite strict. Visitors aren't to handle any items without supervision."

He halted and turned to face her, irritation bubbling. "What do the guidelines say about volunteers who refuse to help town residents when they come in here?"

Her tone went regal. "I swear, Devlin Stryker, you didn't learn those manners from your mama."

The inference was clear. "No, ma'am, I didn't. Turns out I learned very little from her over the years." He didn't bother to keep the edge from his words. "Now 'bout that information . . ."

With a sniff, Shirley swept by him, leaving him awash in the unmistakable scent of Chanel No. 5. It'd be difficult to say which of them was more out of sorts over the exchange.

Two hours of poring over the cramped writing in century-old journals was enough to have his eyes burning. He hadn't brought his glasses, and he really required them to read. As a result, his eyes felt like he'd spent the last couple hours in a sandstorm.

With a harridan at his back.

Shirley hadn't grown any more accommodating as the time went on, but she had eventually stopped hovering and had attended to her other duties, leaving him alone for stretches of time. He found himself skimming large parts of text that recorded in painstaking detail daily life in these parts a century ago. Making candles and soap. Tanning animal hides. Curing meat.

And prayer. There was lots and lots written regarding prayer services and "daily devotions," whatever the heck that meant.

Dev leaned back in his chair and consulted the notes he'd written. He'd thought about using his microrecorder, but with Shirley fluttering around, he'd decided to handwrite the notes.

From everything he'd read so far, Rufus Ashton had been regarded with near godlike status from the writers of the journals. However, given that each of the journal authors had shared the Ashton name, he had to figure in a certain amount of familial bias.

Among the man's accomplishments noted were the start of the first church, the quarry, the original bank in town, and the first general store. Even in these days, he'd be regarded as something of an entrepreneur. He couldn't find any reference to the man's original home or what had brought him to Buffalo Springs, but he did find the date of his death. That gave him a place to start.