The Psalmist by James Lilliefors Read Free Book Online

caliber” of tourist to Tidewater.
    But the old guard had been quietly wary of him from the start and never made life easy for him. There were invisible layers of tradition in this county, Luke had discovered, as mysterious at times as the ways of a religious sect. Each of the three bayfront projects that Pynne tried to build had failed, costing him huge losses of money and prestige. Each time Pynne went before the county zoning boards—­boards that routinely approved Nayak projects—­he was asked to scale back his plans or to make numerous changes. In the last case—­a boutique luxury condo/hotel with a restaurant he wanted to call “Jackson’s”—­the delays ultimately led the state to file fraud charges against him after Pynne accepted deposits for units that were never built. He eventually repaid the deposits, but by then he’d worn out his welcome.
    Toward the end of his years in Tidewater, Jackson Pynne had, improbably, adopted Luke as a friend. By then his frustrations with the zoning process and the “old boy” network had made him an angry man, cutting him off from nearly everyone else in the county. Sometimes he’d show up at the church unannounced and rant to Luke about the ­people who had “screwed” him, using his colorful nicknames for zoning board members—­Baby Huey, Mr. Magoo, and the kraut, among them. Charlotte claimed Luke had a weakness for underdogs, and by then Pynne’s whole life seemed to have become a long shot. Luke tried to find the good in ­people, and there was a lot of good in Jackson Pynne, even a sense of nobility at times. There was also a deep yearning for something more meaningful in his life, which was probably what had drawn him to Luke. Jackson was a strange amalgamation of traits, which didn’t seem to mesh well.
    Â­People used to say, “Something strange happens every time Jackson Pynne comes to town.”
    Remembering the sentiment, Luke felt a chill race through him.

 
    Chapter 5
    T HE DEBRIEFING MEETING of the Homicide Task Force was scheduled for eleven-­thirty at the Public Safety Complex. It left Amy Hunter time to drive into town and talk with Louis Gunther, Robby Fallow’s attorney. But she called ahead, and was told that Gunther wasn’t in the office on Wednesdays this time of year.
    Just as well, Hunter thought.
    This case wasn’t about Robby Fallow, she was certain of that. The Tidewater killing was sophisticated and remarkably clean, in a way that didn’t yet make sense, but that almost certainly eliminated the Fallows as suspects.
    Investigators talked about a forty-­eight-­hour rule on homicides. Forty-­eight hours after the victim was discovered, detectives should know what kind of case they had. But Hunter didn’t believe in those kinds of rules. In a case like this, without witnesses, the circumstances of the crime were like a heavy fog that had drifted in from the bay. You worked in the fog until it began to clear, however long that took. The idea that it should happen in forty-­eight hours was just an excuse for lazy cops. On Wednesday morning the fog in the church killing was still impenetrable. There were no good leads on the victim’s identity, or on the killer’s. And the way the woman had been left, posed in a rear pew as if praying, felt not only like a challenge, but a taunt. A puzzle left for Hunter to solve.
    Also, the case had tabloid potential, she knew, because of the numbers carved into Jane Doe’s right hand, which was why Hunter wanted to make sure that this detail was kept from the media for as long as possible.
    Complicating the case was the unspoken conflict with Sheriff Calvert. This was the first Tidewater County homicide since commissioners had taken away his authority. Hunter would have to work around that.
    She was thinking about Jane Doe’s eyes as she walked down the bright corridor to the