The bad guy

When Sally found Gilly, she said they had been driving "for 2 weeks straight.. Not even straight, zig-zagging all over the place."

My guess, he knew the police were looking for him.. So they were on the run without Gillian even aware of it. That probably added to his explosive temper.

Hallet had Sally's letter, so he knew that Gillian had a sister, and where she lived... Add in the spell Sally cast, he admitted the case wasn't even the reason he came to see her.

He would have shown up at the house anyway, it just happened to be after they killed him.


This is all my speculation... I don't know if it's brought up in the book, I haven't read it.

All what the previous poster said along with the fact that the police had Jimmy as a suspect in the disappearance of a missing woman (named Phoebe Snow) so they weren't originally looking into HIS murder (since they didn't even know he was dead) but the Phoebe Snow case