And Mason had to be experiencing the same.

The pace had rocketed in the Bridge Killer case and no one wanted to pause for sleep or to eat. They grabbed food on the run and kept following leads. Right now this old Yamhill County murder case with the similar elements was their biggest find.

A door swung open. The detective strode in and set a large file box on the table. Detective Jensen Kenner looked ready to retire within the next few years. His hair was white with a matching thick mustache. His florid face spoke of years of stress and poor diet. But his gaze was razor-sharp. Zander was relieved by his first impression; this was a seasoned cop who missed little.

The men shook hands and made introductions. Zander noticed Kenner took a hard look at Mason, as if he could tell the case was personal. Mason wore a face of stone, but his eyes reflected his personal pain. The detective opened the box and dug out a three-ring binder. “There’s your book.” He handed it to Mason.

Zander mentally raised a brow. Most cops would have handed it to him, assuming the FBI to be the leader on the case, especially when one of its agents was missing. Kenner had been astute enough to observe that Mason needed to see the murder book.

The murder book encapsulates the paper trail of a murder investigation. Photographs, autopsy reports, forensics reports, and all the investigator notes. The file box was packed with supporting material, but the key pieces were in the binder.

“What do you remember?” Zander asked, starting with a broad question. He wanted to know what stuck out most in the detective’s mind.

Kenner shoved his hands in his pockets and looked out the window. “I remember a lot that I wish I’d never seen. The first sight of that poor girl hanging from the bridge still haunts most of my nights. I hadn’t ever seen anything like that.”

Zander nodded, the Bridge Killer’s recent victims fresh in his mind. He wouldn’t be losing those memories anytime soon.

“Primary suspect?” Mason asked, flipping though some photos.

“We looked real hard at a transient for a while. He’d been camping in the woods a few miles from where we found her. A real nut job. He stole whatever he could get his hands on, but I never saw any murderous tendencies in him. The community was focused on him. An outsider, you know. People never want to believe that one of their own could be a murderer.”

“You cleared him?” Mason asked.

“Nothing tied him to the crime other than location. And I looked him up after you called. He’s been dead ten years.”

“Maybe we should go check that bridge,” Mason stated.

“It’s gone,” Kenner answered. “Whole thing collapsed a few years ago. County was under fire for not replacing it, but they just didn’t have the funds.”

“Who else did you look at?” asked Ray. “Surely you had more suspects than just one transient.”

Kenner slowly shook his head. “I’ve never had more of a dead-end case. She’d been dead for three days by the time we found her. It’d rained hard all three days, and a lot of trace evidence was lost. She was reported missing by her employer. She’d been working as a cook at one of the local camps in the woods.”

“Camps? What kind of camps?” asked Zander.

“You know. Run by ecology nuts. They take kids out into nature for a week or two. Take away their cell phones, TVs, and showers and teach them about the water cycle and forest.”

“You mean outdoor schools,” commented Ray. “Both my kids spent a few days when they were twelve at outdoor schools. I think one of them was in this area. They loved it. Came home talking about how to protect the environment.”

“That’s the type. We’ve got a half dozen in the area. Most of the school districts in the Portland area send their kids out here to attend. The campgrounds are also leased to other groups. Sometimes churches or special interest groups.”

“She died in late June,” said Mason, studying a page. “Were the outdoor schools happening at that time?”

Kenner held his hand out for the book. Mason passed it over, and Kenner sped through a few pages. “We found her in a location that was within three miles of two different camps.” He stopped at a page and ran a finger down to the bottom. “One of them was hosting a church retreat for families and the one she worked at was holding a science camp for teens. A rocket camp.”

Alarms went off in Zander’s brain, and Ray shot up out of his chair.

“Rocket camp?” Mason whipped his head to meet Zander’s and Ray’s gazes. “We need to see everything you have on it.”

26

Ava breathed through her nose, fighting to stay calm. The duct tape Troy had placed across her lips helped her keep her screams inside, but made it hard to breathe. Derrick was terrified. From behind the ball gag, he’d tried to reason with the killer, his words unintelligible. He’d kept repeating one word that’d sounded like “oy.” Was the killer named Roy?

The killer had referred to Derrick as Rick. Did he have the wrong man? Or was the name just shortened?

She tucked away the portion of her brain that wanted to cry and hide. She needed to focus and figure out how to get away. She didn’t want to be the next victim.

The killer glanced at her occasionally. He kept saying she’d be at peace soon. Her mind had grabbed that sentence and sprinted full speed ahead. “At peace” means “dead.” She had to get out.

Derrick had been tied to a table made of boards to keep him from fighting back. The killer had laid a twelve-inch metal circle with a daisy pattern on the table and moved Derrick on top of it. There’s the source of the blanching on the bodies. She caught her breath. Did that mean Derrick’s death was imminent? Did he expect her to watch?