MARA VANCE's Arc

Chapter 3 of 6

The second name led Mara to a second dead end. The address on the transfer card was gone. Where the coat's new owner once lived, Mara found a flat lot of broken brick and weeds. A city crew had leveled the whole block years ago. Luna sniffed the rubble and found nothing. Twenty years old, and the trail ended in dust. Mara stood on the empty ground and stared at the card. Somewhere, these people had scattered. She had no idea where. A boot crunched behind her. She turned. A tall constable pushed through the weeds, coat buttoned crooked, badge tilted on his chest. It was Sterling McPherson. Mara's stomach dropped. She had watched him ruin two crime scenes with his own two hands. He grinned and stuck out a paw. "Vance! Heard you were sniffing around the old ward. I know this ground. Grew up three streets over." "You know where the people went?" Mara asked. She kept her voice level, though she wanted him gone. "Course I do." Sterling scanned the lot, proud. "When the city tore this block down, they moved the families to the harbor row. Every last one. My aunt got a room above the tavern." He pointed vaguely at nothing. Then he crouched and grabbed the transfer card from her hand to read it. His thumb dragged across the wet ink. A name smeared into a gray blur. "Give me that." Mara snatched it back. The last name was still readable. The address line was ruined. She breathed slow. Sterling looked at his thumb, puzzled. "Sorry," he said. "But you don't need the paper. I told you. Harbor row." Mara drove to the water with Luna in the back seat. The harbor tavern leaned against the dock, its wood salt-stained and gray, warm light in every window. Old fishing families still filled the rooms above it. She showed the smeared card to the woman behind the bar and read the last name aloud. The woman's face changed. "Him," she said. "He rented the room over the kitchen. Kept to himself. Wore a blue coat, winter and summer." Mara's pulse jumped. Luna stood up straight. "Where is he now?" "Gone. Left maybe three months back. Didn't say where." The woman leaned close. "But he still gets mail here. Comes for it. I've got a name on the parcels. A different name than the one you said." Mara set both hands flat on the bar to steady them. Three months was not twenty years. Three months was warm. The killer had shed one name and put on another, and that new name sat behind this counter, waiting for him to walk in. "Show me," Mara said. The woman reached under the bar. Sterling's smeared card had cost her the old address. But the harbor had given her something better. A name the killer used today, and a place he would return.