Page 58 of Shadow Justice

Sharla Mapes.

Nell Truett.

Hoyt Sullivan.

Holly’s fingers tightened on his arm until her nails dug through his sleeve. “They were jurors,” she whispered.

Reid kept reading the list, all twelve names suddenly rearranging the case into something deeper than Sanctuary, the loyalty card, and the cup in Hoyt Sullivan’s mouth. These people hadn’t been chosen because they’d walked into Holly’s shop.

They’d walked into Holly’s shop and become visible to someone who remembered what they’d done in a courtroom years ago.

And it looked like that someone was Hopper Shaw.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Holly blinked and read the names again. “I can’t… I can’t believe it.”

Reid sat at her breakfast bar with the laptop open in front of them, one hand braced beside the trackpad and the other still under Holly’s fingers, where she’d grabbed him when Emma Shaw’s name appeared above the list of jurors. His sleeve was wrinkled beneath her grip. She made herself let go, though her hand didn’t seem to know what to do once it was empty.

On the screen, the scanned page sat crooked and grainy with the names that swirled in her head: Warren Ackles. Sharla Mapes. Nell Truett. Hoyt Sullivan. All four names were there, ordinary black type on a page that suddenly made nothing ordinary.

“They were jurors,” she said again, as if repeating it might make the idea arrange itself into something less terrible.

Reid copied the file link and attached it and Jasper’s full package to a message for Claire. “This is the case Granddad described. Emma Shaw was the victim. Hopper Shaw has been in Sanctuary, visible on camera more than once while victims were there.”

“You think it’s him?”

“It’s circumstantial, but it sure looks like it.” Reid sent the message, cc’ing Jasper.

His gaze came to her then, direct and steady enough to keep her from spinning too far away from herself. “With what we have right now, Hopper Shaw is the obvious suspect.”

The words should’ve made her feel better. Not because she wanted Hopper to be guilty, but because a suspect meant they were one step closer to stopping a killer.

Instead, the thought of Hopper sitting in her shop with his back to the wall and his big hands wrapped around a coffee mug made her chest tighten. He’d always looked wounded more than dangerous, but maybe that was because she had blinders on when it came to her customers.

Reid’s phone rang, and he answered on speaker after one glance at the screen. “Claire.”

“I got the file.” The agent’s voice sounded professional, but the tension beneath it came through clearly. “Emmet and I are going to pick up Hopper Shaw for questioning.”

Holly grabbed onto Reid again. “Pick him up as in arrest him?”

“Question him,” Claire clarified. “We have enough to talk to him formally.”

Holly heard muffled movement in the background, a car door, voices low and distant. “Stay with Holly, Reid. Don’t go looking for him.”

Reid’s mouth flattened. “Be careful. If he’s our killer, he’s dangerous.”

Claire made a sound that might’ve been agreement or mild exasperation. “I’ve handled serial killers before.”

Reid pinched the bridge of his nose. “And the other jurors on the list?”

“Working on contacting them and proceeding with possible protection, if they’re willing. I’ll update you when I can.”

The call ended, and the apartment returned to the hum of the refrigerator, Blue’s snoring, and the uneven pulse of Holly’s own thoughts. “What if he didn’t do it?”

Reid placed his hand over hers. “Then we need him cleared, because if someone is framing him, that person is still out there.”

Through the kitchen window, she could see the tops of buildings along Main Street, the edge of the mountains, the ordinary Sunday morning going on as if the ground under her life hadn’t cracked open.