The Hour Before Dark by Douglas Clegg

seven. At the most.”
    “He would’ve hated that,” she said. “Tweezers out to pick up hair samples. Blotting blood trying to find evidence. I can’t imagine all the gory details.”
    “It’s procedure,” Joe said, glancing at me with a slightly bewildered expression. “Unfortunately, the weather hasn’t helped any of this. The police tape has blown away twice already, and between the snow falling and melting, I’m not sure we’re going to have much luck. Finding anything in the perimeter beyond the building, is, well...” He splayed his hands, a gesture of futility. “Pretty soon, we’ll just have some additional informal interviews with neighbors, and each of you, of course.”
    “Interviews?” Bruno asked. “That’s it?”
    “There’s a lead investigator, and she’s got to find out if anyone saw anything. Anything at all.”
    “I don’t feel very safe,” Brooke said.
    “The killer—or killers—may well have already left the island,” Joe said. He took his time saving this—he was being careful with his words. He seemed to watch Brooke’s face equally carefully. “This person is on the move.”
    “He could have easily killed me,” Brooke said. “The doors weren’t locked. If he wanted something, he would’ve come and taken it. He just wanted to murder someone. That’s my guess. He’s some insane sociopath.”
    Joe seemed about to say something, but then held back.
    Bruno nodded gravely, looking at the tattered Persian rug on the floor instead of at our sister. “Brooke, it could even be someone here. Someone who lives here. Maybe someone who didn’t like Dad.”
    “Do you think so, Joe?” Brooke asked, fixing what I’d term a sharp and terrible look on Joe Grogan, as if he had failed her just by being there. “You think Carson did it? Or Ike Doone?” Her voice rose a bit. “Or me? Do you think I killed him and sat in his blood for hours, thinking about my hideous act?”
    When Bruno next spoke, his voice seemed small, like a child’s who has been scolded. “I didn’t mean that. I didn’t.” Joe glanced at me, then at Bruno, but averted his gaze from my sister. He was overpowered by her. I had an inkling of why. They’d had an affair. I could smell it at ten paces. They had some broken chemistry between them. It was as if they were talking about one thing, but meaning another. It felt like it. Like they had too much intimacy. Joe and Brooke. The way they both seemed uncomfortable in each other’s presence. I didn’t know this for sure, but something about the chief of police sitting there in the chair. He sat in that chair before. He has been in Hawthorn more than a few times. Holding the cup of coffee in the saucer. Nearly relaxed, but a strange underlying tension. It all seemed too familiar. Brooke seemed too hostile toward him.
    “The investigators have gathered what evidence they could,” he said. “But it’s still too soon to not keep going over every detail.”
    “What about DNA?” I said, not really knowing what I asked.
    “Samples already went down to some labs in Connecticut. It may take some time to determine anything. But we’ll get whoever did this. Don’t worry.”
    “I feel unsafe,” Brooke said. Her eyes filled with glassy tears. She reached for a tissue in a dispenser near her elbow. Blew her nose.
    “Do you have any ideas?” I asked. “It takes a while to go on-and off-island. There’s the coast guard. How hard is it to—”
    Joe’s face turned grim as he cut me off. “Every cop from here to Boston is formulating theories. They’ll keep scraping for evidence they might’ve missed. Your father didn’t seem to have enemies. There haven’t been reports of strangers on the island since before the end of October. Even the logs on the ferry for the past three weeks—all accounted for. This is a tough one. We’ll crack it. Maybe if we’re lucky, the killer had his own boat and drowned during the storm.”
     
    As bloodthirsty as it may