It took me about thirty minutes to get out to the lake and a bit longer to find the exact location where Nicole and the Senator’s car had been found. I drove around for about ten minutes before I found the crime scene, still cordoned off with caution tape and police barriers, although no one was present.

I parked in a gravel lot off the main road and walked the short distance down the slope, ducked beneath the yellow police tape, and took a few moments to soak in the area. It was green, peaceful, and quiet. I couldn’t help but wonder what it had been like for Nicole that night. Had she died here at the lake? Or was she dead by the time her body was dumped?

The water’s edge was murky brown and bits of debris lobbed up and down against the soft dirt and sand where the land met the lake. From there, I paced the area within the police tape until I found the marks in the dirt. It was difficult to find at first, but the tire tread quickly became visible as I discovered the first row of thick curved divots leading down from the main road nearer to the water.

Knowing that I was standing near the spot where Nicole’s body must have been dumped affected me. My hands shook as I pulled out the photos I had taken from Owen’s desk and lay the close-up shot of the tire down against the ground. I tilted it left, then right, and stared hard at the two patterns. There was no doubt about it. They were a match.

I went back to the Chronicle for a few hours that afternoon and managed to get most of my actual assignments finished. Wayne didn’t seem particularly bothered by my lack of productivity. He seemed happy just to have me preoccupied with something other than the McClinton case. Little did he know.

My nerves were shot and I was on edge as I sat at my desk mulling over what my trip to the lake had confirmed. What I couldn’t seem to figure out was if the Senator was present and aware of his car being taken to the lake the night of Nicole’s death, or if someone else had used it and abandoned it. It seemed unlikely that he would be foolish enough to use his own car to commit a murder, then leave it at the scene of the crime. He also had witnesses that were willing to testify that he was out of town the night it happened.Which made it more likely that someone had stolen his car and used it to dump Nicole after she died elsewhere. A part of me considered the possibility that maybe there was no foul play involved at all. Maybe poor Nicole had died accidentally and one of the kids at the party just panicked, grabbed the Senator’s keys, and dumped the body near the lake. But then there was the fact that the body had been completely drained of blood, yet no blood had been found at the scene. There was a possibility that the McClintons weren’t actually out of town and that their witnesses were simply covering for them. There were still too many possibilities and unexplained questions. I needed an eye-witness.

As soon as five o’clock came around, I beelined back to my apartment to make some additions to my wall of evidence. I also realized that I’d better find a way to return the crime scene photos to Owen’s office before he realized they were missing.

I stood looking at the wall of maps, notes, clippings, and tried to see the big picture but it was all just a jumbled mess. There was nothing left to do, so I decided to give it a rest for the day and prepare something to eat, but I realized the fridge was empty. Looking at the clock on the stove, it was certain that all the restaurants and even the local grocery store would be closed soon. Maybe it was the combination of stress and hunger, but I suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of frustration. I had abandoned my life in Boston to pursue this story, and now I was letting what little life I had left fall to pieces. My frustration turned to anger and, in a fit of self-loathing, I turned back to the wall of clippings and notes and ripped it all down, shoving it all into a cardboard box. Looking at it all gathered in one place, I decided I would take it all to the lake, toss it into a fire pit, and burn it.

As I roamed the apartment in search of matches or a lighter, I happened to notice there was a message waiting for me on my answering machine. I pressed the button and heard Misty’s cool sultry voice as I dug through drawers filled with plastic forks, napkins, batteries, and everything a person might need apart from a source of fire.

“Hey, Kelly. It’s me, Misty. Um, you said we could hang out tonight, so I was just checking to see if you might want to meet me at the Drift later. I’ll be there around 10. If I don’t see you, maybe I’ll swing by and see if you’re around. Okay, bye.”

Shit, I had forgotten I agreed to meet up with Misty tonight but, at that moment, the last thing I wanted was to go hang out at the Drift. Then again, even though the food they served was garbage, it was still food in the most technical sense. The Drift was also probably the only place I was going to be able to get a book of matches at that hour. Maybe I was rationalizing, but it seemed like the Drift was the only logical place to spend the evening. I promised myself I’d get some food, stay for maybe one beer, bum some matches or a lighter from someone, and go to the lake after to make a fiery sacrifice to appease any god or gods that could show me what to do next.

I showered and puttered around my apartment for a bit, then loaded all the materials from the story into my car, and made the short drive to the Drift.

As usual, the place was dark and peppered with the usual crowd. I knew I’d been drinking there far too often as the regulars hardly glanced up when I walked in. I saw Misty sitting at a booth in the back which was strange because she normally sat at the bar. I stopped to order some fries and my usual Miller at the counter before heading back to sit with her.

“Hey stranger,” I said grinning, a flutter of warmth going through me as I took the seat across from Misty. As difficult as some of our conversations had been recently, I did really enjoy spending time with her. After everything I’d been through that day, it would be nice to have a bedmate too. “So, where’ve you been hiding?” I asked her.

“Hi,” she said, looking a little tepid as she swallowed down the last of her beer.

I rubbed my foot up against the side of her leg and lay my hand on top of hers on the table. She looked down at our hands for a moment before slowly pulling it away.

I frowned and very quickly realized Misty was not in a flirtatious mood. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, everything’s okay. I just wanted to talk to you about something. Um, that’s why I wanted to come over last night.”

I could sense something heavy in Misty’s voice mashing her down. I wanted to ask her what she had been up to the last few days, but she seemed completely uninterested in casual conversation. Her eyes were far away and that mischievous glint was gone. I leaned back and kept my hands to myself.

“Oh. Right. Well, tell me then. What’s up?” I drank a little too much beer at once but there was a tension in my throat that caused an awkward cough.

Misty fidgeted with her empty bottle. Her eyes jumped back and forth between her hands and me a few times. “Um... I thought you should know that... Sivene. She... she saw what happened to Nicole. That night at Lake Carmi.”

I bit down hard on my bottom lip as a chill swept through me. Her words hit be like a car wreck and, for a split second, I felt dizzy.

“What the fuck—” I exclaimed a little too loudly before bringing the volume down. “What the fuck are you talking about?” I realized my tone might scare her off, so I tried to keep my cool. Not only was I dumbstruck by Misty’s revelation, I was a little annoyed because it was clear to me then that Misty and Sivene were still seeing each other. But it all made sense why Misty had gotten so defensive with me before when I asked her about the possibility that Sivene might have seen something. I tried to shake off the wave of unpleasant feelings and nodded for her to go on.

“Like I told you before, Sivene is...well, she’s complicated, okay? I found out that she doesn’t just run off for no reason, you know? She... it makes sense why she did that night and-and I believe her.”

I blinked. Misty was being far too vague and I still wasn’t even sure why she wanted to tell me any of this. It was hard not to chuckle a bit when she referred to her girlfriend’s situation as “complicated.” If I had a quarter for every time some girl referred to her romantic situation as complicated, as if there were any other kind.

“Complicated, how?” I asked. “Because, Misty, you’ve gotta understand how this sounds to me right now. It sounds like Sivene had something to do with what happened to Nicole and you know it.”

“She didn’t, Kelly. I promise you that. I...I could prove it, maybe.” Misty insisted, and she sounded genuine.

“Prove it? Maybe?” I chuckled, bitterly. “Misty, c’mon. Do you hear yourself? What’s the point of telling me all this? Look, I thought we were hanging out tonight and––”

“Have you ever heard of the Hound of Cold Hollow?”

I stared blankly at Misty, completely taken aback by this sudden swerve in our conversation. “The werewolf legend or whatever? Yeah, I’ve heard of it.” I shrugged. “So what?”

“Well, I know it sounds stupid or crazy, but a lot of people here really believe in it, but they don’t say anything because – don’t laugh, okay, seriously – people think it protects them,” she said.

“It protects them?” I said, wondering if Misty had lost her mind. “The werewolf protects people?

Misty looked at her beer again and nodded. “Yeah, from, uh…well, from witches and, maybe, sometimes even vampires.”

I laughed out loud then, but before I could tell her that I thought she had lost her mind, the word ‘vampires’ caused a visceral reaction in my body. I thought of Nicole’s body, drained of blood, bobbing up and down on the lakeshore. “Misty,” I said much more quietly, shaking my head. “You can’t be serious. You can’t seriously be suggesting that––”

“The McClinton family has been associated with witchcraft for, like, hundreds of years. I told you that! Kelly, please, just hear me out.”

“Christ, Misty. Do you hear yourself? Your girlfriend killed someone and you’re making up some wild story about fucking werewolves and witches to defend her.” I was getting upset, not only at the fact that Misty would go to such lengths to keep Sivene out of trouble but also at the possibility that she might truly be insane. I wondered if I could trust anything she had told me since I moved to Cold Hollow.

“Kelly, I swear to God I’m telling the truth,” Misty said, still not raising her voice. “You can think whatever you want about me,” Misty said. “But Sivene didn’t kill Nicole.”

I couldn’t understand how she could stay so calm when, just days ago, she stormed out of my place for even suggesting that Sivene might know more than she was letting on.

“Well, what do you want me to do now, Misty? What do you expect me to do with this information? Because, from where I’m sitting, there’s nowhere I can go with this. Your girlfriend is a werewolf? That’s what you’re saying? A werewolf witnessed Nicole being murdered but didn’t commit the murder? I hate to say this, but your story makes you sound, well…completely fucking insane.”

“Kelly, there’s something that you don’t understand about Cold Hollow. I know that it doesn’t make sense to you, but people believe in this stuff, okay? And just because you don’t believe me, doesn’t make it untrue.”

Misty’s calm was starting to piss me off. She had somehow kept a straight face throughout this entire conversation. “And just because people believe in werewolves doesn’t make them real, Misty.”

Misty was getting frustrated then. “You know, I don’t even know why I bother talking to you. You only believe what you want,” she said, and started gathering her things as if she were going to walk away.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I said, grabbing her wrist in hopes she would sit back down. “Okay, okay. Listen, you’ve got to understand, this is a lot to process.” I took a deep breath. “You know, I really thought you just wanted to hang out tonight,” I scoffed, sat back, and crossed my arms over my chest.

Misty looked crestfallen. “Kelly, I’m your friend. Please, just give me the benefit of the doubt on this. I’m just telling you what I know.”

I liked the feel of her hands on my arm, but something caused me to pull away. I leaned in close then so no one would else could hear us. “What do you know? Misty, you’re feeding me bullshit. That’s what I know.”

“It’s not bullshit, Kelly. Sivene is––”

“As far as I’m concerned, Sivene is a suspect. Okay?” And as I said the words, it occurred to me; that’s why Owen won’t talk to me about the case. He knows I’ve been spending time with Misty and that Misty’s girlfriend – or ex-girlfriend, or whatever – is a suspect, and probably Misty was too for that matter. I laughed at myself a little then and shook my head. “You know, Misty, I get that you want to defend Sivene. Hell, I even respect you for it. But I wish you had enough respect for me to make up a better story.”

Misty looked genuinely hurt. “I do respect you, Kelly, and that’s why I’m telling you this. Think about it. I know it sounds insane. What would be the purpose of telling you something like this?”

By then I was done listening. “I don’t know. I have no idea. But vampires? Werewolves?” I stood up then, grabbed one last handful of fries, and walked out of the Drift without looking back. I wanted to scream. I was so confused. So frustrated. And the worst part about it all was that part of me actually thought that it kind of made sense. After all, Nicole’s body had been drained of blood.

In a fit of anger, I kicked over a metal trashcan outside the bar, and shouted down the empty street, “Is everybody in this town fucking crazy?” The worst part is that I felt like I was really only asking myself.