He has a vague memory of seeing the one Joe mentioned, about the girl who died. Most websites have information about the murderer and his subsequent trials and execution; because the murder happened a decade ago, there are only two news stories online from the time of the killing. Colin clicks a link with a photo, and covers his mouth with a cupped hand to keep from crying out when he sees her face.
Her hair is brown, her features less glasslike, but it’s her. Beneath the photo is a story from the Coeur D’Alene Press. Monday’s arraignment of accused serial murderer Herb August Miller, who is being held for the killing of seventeen-year-old Lucia Rain Gray as well as seven other teens over the past eight years has been continued to June 1.
Prosecutors allege the 42-year-old former headmaster of Saint Osanna’s boarding school outside of Coeur D’Alene stalked Lucia for several weeks prior to the murder. The murder of a teen at his school indicates Miller, who previously only selected victims far from his home state, was growing increasingly confident in his ability to evade law enforcement. Miller allegedly invited her to his cabin, drugged her, and took her to the woods, where he slit her throat before cutting open her chest. In what is now believed to be his gruesome trademark, Miller then removed her heart.
Police found Miller attempting to bury the body on a trail beside the school after a young boy saw him carrying a struggling girl into the woods. The boy alerted a staff member, who called 911.
“This is a killer we’ve been hunting for eight years and who has caused unspeakable heartache to many families across the country. It’s possible he would have simply carried on at the school if it hadn’t been for the bravery of the young boy in finding help,” Coeur D’Alene sheriff Mo Rockford said at a press conference early Friday. “The capture of Herb Miller is a huge weight off the minds of national law enforcement, and this community owes a debt of gratitude to the boy and the staff for making the prompt call.”
Miller has been indicted on seven counts of first-degree murder. The state is seeking the death penalty in light of the gruesome aggravating torture and mutilation factors. Seventeen-year-old Gray was the youngest victim of Miller’s killing spree.
This isn’t the first round of tragedy for the school, which was built on a burial site for settlers moving west and which lost two young children in a fire two days after the school opened in 1814. Saint Osanna’s has been struck by tragedy regularly over the years, with its proximity to the woods, glacial lakes, and harsh elements resulting in a number of student and visitor deaths.
Colin stops, closing the window on the screen before anyone sees what he’s reading. “Lucia Rain Gray,” he says aloud. He lets his heart take over every sensation in his body, pounding relentlessly in his chest and throat and ears. Lucy was telling the truth.
Colin doesn’t see her all day. She doesn’t show up for history, and she’s not outside at lunch. He doesn’t find her anywhere on campus, and he grows more frantic as he circles buildings and checks every classroom. He tells himself he’ll stop looking after this preliminary search but gives that up after gym, dressing quickly so he can scout the woods bordering school before seventh period.
Days go by, and Jay tells him that she’s stopped coming to his English class, too. The desk she sat in that first day stays empty. Colin doesn’t understand why that feels like a punch to the stomach. If this situation is as crazy as he keeps telling himself, then why does he even care? Why does he keep rubbing his palm, trying to remember what it felt like to touch her? Why does he want to do it again?
He wants to remember: Her skin was warmer than air, but not by much. Her eyes change, like ripples in a pond. She’s never cold, even with the strongest wind outside. Except for a pencil on that first day, he’s never really seen her touch anything. And even that looked hard, like she had to work at keeping it between her fingers. Her eyes, when she asked about Joe, changed colors as he watched, from deep gray to an aching, honest blue.
He considers leaving campus to try and find her but has no idea where she even goes when she isn’t here. Does she vanish into thin air?
By Friday night, Colin has the same feeling he gets when he doesn’t ride his bike for a long stretch—antsy and like something is growing inside him and pushing his vital organs into a tiny corner in his chest. He’s worried that Lucy has left, but he’s even more worried that she’s simply evaporated. That she reached out to him and his rejection somehow sent her away. He takes his bike to the woods, riding the narrow trails along the rickety boards he and Jay propped there years ago. He hops boulders and streams, crashes down hills. He beats himself up until he’s bruised and sore. He does everything he can to clear his mind, but nothing works. He eats dinner and tastes nothing. The heat in his dorm room feels claustrophobic, oppressive.
Sitting on his bed, he thumbs through a bike magazine before tossing it to the floor and flopping backward, fists to his eyes.
Across the room, Jay pauses his repetitive bouncing of a tennis ball against the wall. “Do you have any idea where she is?”
“No. The last place I saw her was . . .” His words fade away as he registers that maybe it doesn’t matter where he saw her last. Maybe what matters is where this started for her.
“Colin?”
“I think I might know. I’ll catch you later.”
Jay glances out the darkening window, concerned, but
keeps any objections to himself. “Just be careful, man.” Colin takes off down the path toward the park, headed for the strip of chain-link fence that he and Jay busted when they were freshmen, which probably hasn’t even been discovered by the groundskeepers. It leads directly to where he thinks Lucy awoke by the lake.
The trail is only about a mile long, but he’s practically frozen by the time he gets there. Now that he knows at least some of the legends might be true, Colin feels and instinctive shudder of fear as he nears the water. Once the sound of his sneakers on the gravel quiets, it’s eerily silent. The idea that Lucy could be sitting out here alone makes his hands shake in a way that has nothing to do with the cold. Or maybe it’s because he’s afraid she’s not here at all.