She Once Vanished, page 28
“If I send you the links to a few crowd-sleuthing forums, do you think you could set up accounts and make some posting for me? And then… monitor whatever comes in on them.”
“I’d be happy to,” Walter declared. “What’s the case?”
“I am trying to identify a criminal. I have a picture. But I need to find out who he is. I already know where to start, but it will take a lot more time than I have. If I can get this guy… a young woman who has been held against her will for months will be very happy.”
“Oh, dear. Well, that is incentive, even if boredom were not.”
Zachary explained about the man who had kidnapped Elysse. Until now, they had been unable to guess his motive for abducting Elysse, but now Zachary thought he knew.
“Okay.” Walter sounded thoughtful. Zachary thought he was probably writing down notes of what Zachary had told him. “So you’ll send me the sites you want this picture posted to. I’ll ask for any other pictures of him and find out if anyone knows who he is or where he came from.”
“Right. I have an idea of what we’ll find, but I need as much corroboration as I can get.”
“You got it,” Walter agreed. “I’ll do everything I can. And I assume this is… urgent. ASAP.”
“Yesterday, if possible,” Zachary agreed.
Walter chuckled. “That’s the kind of deadline I’m used to. Well, Lisa will thank you for keeping me out of her hair for a little while. I think she’s been a little… aggravated having me around so much lately. Oh, you know she tries to be nice about it. I have always been welcome here; that didn’t change when we divorced. But having me underfoot constantly is a bit of a problem. It’s a big house. I stay out of her way as much as I can. But we had never planned for me to be here full-time. Neither of us is equipped to handle it. We are both very… independent people.”
Which was probably much of the reason they had gotten divorced in the first place. As Kenzie had described her childhood years, Walter had not been home a lot. He had mostly lived in Montpelier, working at the Capitol during the week and only returning home for weekends and holidays. They had divorced when Kenzie had graduated and been traveling away from home. Not much had changed in Lisa’s and Walter’s relationship.. Walter still returned to what was considered the family home when he needed to be in Burlington or wanted to spend time with his ex-wife or daughter.
But part of selling the story of Walter’s serious illness was his not being able to take care of himself anymore, or at least not for a long period of recovery time.
“We could get you one of those big puzzles to put together,” Zachary told Walter. “Give you something to do.”
“Oh, please, no,” Walter groaned, “I never could stand the things. I’ll take your crowd sleuthing over jigsaw puzzles any day.”
“Hey Zachy,” Heather greeted, answering the phone. “Are you back home or still on your road trip?”
“I’m back. Anything worrisome while I was gone? Anything I need to take care of right away?”
“I think everything is in your task manager. No emergencies. How was the trip?”
“Pretty good. I’m glad I went. I did a lot and learned a lot that would have been impossible to figure out from here. And I think Kenzie needed to get away for a while, too.”
“She didn’t want to extend it for another day or two? I figured once she was away from the office, she would want to take a bit more time. She’s been working so hard since Dr. Wiltshire broke his hand.”
“Well, I think we would have stretched it out another day or two, but something came up here… the photographer that you gave the name of our hotel…?”
“Kristy Echols,” Heather said promptly.
“Yeah. Kristy. She was killed.”
Heather gasped. “No! Oh, no. That’s terrible. Do you think it was related to the case? Is there any indication who it was?”
“I’m worried that it might have been. She had some other information to share with me, a theory, and she was killed before she had a chance. But I think I figured it out. And if she was killed by the guy who kidnapped Elysse… then I’m going to catch him. We’ll put him behind bars. Protect Elysse, help her to get her life back. We can’t do anything for Kristy… but we won’t let her death be in vain.”
“Kidnapped her?” Heather repeated.
“She was kidnapped and terrorized. Her disappearance was not just Elysse taking a little vacation.”
“And you think you know this guy’s identity?”
“I will soon.”
Heather’s voice was thick with concern. “You need to be careful! I’m worried about this, Zachary. If this guy has already killed one person… you need to be careful. You can’t just go jumping into this.”
“Like I always do?”
“I didn’t say that.” Neither of them said anything for a minute, then Heather laughed. “But yes, that’s what I meant.”
“Once I have his identity, I’ll go to the police. Let them take it from there.”
“Why don’t you give them what you have right now? Let them identify the guy and take him down.”
“I need more. The police were involved from the start, but they think Elysse was just taking a trip. That she was gone voluntarily. To prove what happened to her, I need more.”
“Can’t she just tell them the truth? It seems like she’s the one who is responsible for them thinking that she was missing voluntarily. That’s what she told them.”
“Because she’s afraid. He has her under his control. He broke her and she’ll do whatever he says to. She’s afraid of what he could do to her and what he could do to her family. If they don’t arrest him or don’t keep him in custody until he can be convicted and sent to prison for the rest of his life, he could still harm her or her family.”
“Yeah, I guess she has reason to be concerned about what he could do if he’s still on the outside. But how are they supposed to do that if she won’t tell them anything to put him behind bars?”
“I’m hoping… that once I identify him, we’ll be able to prove that he killed Kristy, not just that he was responsible for kidnapping and terrorizing Elysse.”
“Why would he do something like that? Was he just obsessed with her? I worry that this is what happens when kids put all their information online. A psychopath like this guy sees it and decides to…?”
Heather had kids who were young adults, and Zachary was sure she must worry about everything that could happen to them. She had lived most of her life in fear and, while she was doing better now, she was still a mom with all those fears. They had caught the man who had stolen her childhood, but there were more people like him. Too many more of them. People like Elysse’s psychopath, who targeted strangers and took away their lives, even if they didn’t kill them.
“In this case,” Zachary said slowly, “it isn’t random, but it isn’t like any other case you’ve ever seen. I don’t want to say too much about it yet. But yeah… he’s a lowlife, and we need to make sure we’ve got enough evidence on him to put him behind bars permanently. There can’t be any mistakes or technicalities that will set him free.”
“So you didn’t just call me to find out if anything happened while you were gone.”
“No.”
“What have you got for me?”
“I have a company that I need you to gather all the information you can about. It might be hard to get past all the PR, but I need to dig down and get more than just their annual financial statements and CEO’s message.”
“Okay. Maybe Grant can help me with some of that.”
Heather’s husband was an accountant. Zachary didn’t know what kind of accounting he did or whether he would enjoy digging into all a company’s records like Zachary was suggesting. But they would take whatever help they could get. Grant was very devoted to Heather. Zachary was glad she had someone looking out for her and helping her. Heather deserved every bit of pampering and attention.
He gave her the details on the company. It wouldn’t be hard for her to find the basics. But he didn’t know how much else they would be able to pull together to show what had happened over the past year or so.
“And I need all the pictures you can give me of employees of the company. Everything from upper management on down. Corporate headshots, pictures of company picnics, whatever we can get. I might need to surveil them to get pictures of the people who have never shown up in their literature, but we’ll start with what’s already available.”
“You want me to save the pictures for you in a subfile for the project? Then you can just review them as I find them.”
“Yeah. But message me whenever you save a new batch. I want to see them right away.”
“Okay, will do. You don’t have a sketch or description of the person you are looking for?”
“I need everyone you can get, I’ll want to show them to witnesses to see if anyone else was involved in this. I’ll send you a couple pictures of the guy I know we are looking for. And I guess I should tell you we have another operative doing some work for us,” Zachary told Heather.
“What? Who?” She sounded a little offended that he would assign someone else work on the case. He probably should have told her before he did it. Made sure that she was okay with it. But it was too late for that now.
“Kenzie’s dad. He’s got cabin fever, not being able to leave the house… after his stroke.” Zachary decided he’d better stick with the official story and not let on that Walter was actually in perfectly good health.
“Oh, I didn’t know. Poor Kenzie. That couldn’t have been easy, right in the middle of everything else. When…?”
“Just recently.” Zachary didn’t want to give a particular timeframe. “But he’s starting with rehabilitation, physiotherapy, whatever. And he can do some computer work.”
“That’s great. And there’s enough to go around. It isn’t like I need to support a family on my paycheck. I’m mostly just doing it for fun.”
“And you do a really good job. I’m not trying to replace you. Just giving him something to do too… spreading the work out.”
“So what do you have him doing? I should add his tasks to the project as well so we can keep track of everything being done. And you should charge out his time too.”
Zachary explained the task he had given Walter: find any more pictures taken of the man from the Grand Canyon and posted on social media.
“That’s going to be quite a project.”
“That’s why we’re crowd sourcing it,” Zachary agreed. “And it will save me some eyestrain…”
“I suppose you don’t have anything to do now that you have assigned us all your grunt work.”
“There is still plenty for me to do. And Kenzie, too, for that matter. She’s doing the postmortem today.”
“Oooh… maybe you’d better buy her some flowers.”
It wasn’t such a bad idea.
64
As was usually the case when Kenzie had been doing autopsies in the afternoon, she was late getting home. When she arrived, she wanted a shower before she was ready to face dinner or the rest of the evening. She knew that Zachary would want to hear all about the postmortem findings on Kristy Echols and paused before heading toward the bathroom.
“We’ll talk about it at supper, okay? I just need to wash away the sweat and smell before I get into it.”
“Take your time,” Zachary told her, “I know you need it.”
She gave him a wry grin. “Do I smell that bad?”
Zachary sniffed the air. “Not from here,” he said with a smile. “But maybe you shouldn’t get too close.”
She snorted and retreated to her bathroom sanctuary to rinse off the rest of the day. Zachary got up from his spot on the couch where he had been working and went to the kitchen. Kenzie hadn’t said she had anything particular in mind for supper, and he wanted to make sure he had something ready for her. The easiest thing would have been to order in from one of their favorite restaurants. But they had been on the road for several days and had been eating fast food or restaurant food that entire time. Kenzie would really appreciate something homemade.
Of course, it would have been better if Zachary had thought this through earlier in the day, because when he opened the fridge, he found it pretty bare. He should have gone shopping to pick up some fresh produce and other ingredients.
He waffled about whether to order takeout. It would be better than nothing, and Kenzie wouldn’t want to wait while Zachary went to the store.
He checked the freezer and cupboards and decided he had enough to work with. If Kenzie wasn’t satisfied, she could fill up on ice cream, or they could go out for dessert or some other treat.
Zachary had told Kenzie to take her time in the shower, so he knew he would have at least half an hour to prepare, and that seemed like plenty.
Kenzie eventually returned to the kitchen, curly hair still damp, her cheeks flushed, and dressed in her comfy jammies. So they would not be going out anywhere for dessert. The smell of the warming soup and bread filled the kitchen. Kenzie looked at the table, already set, and wandered over to the stove to give Zachary a hug and peek into the pot.
“That smells delicious. I thought you might order in.”
“Did you want me to?” Zachary suddenly doubted himself. Maybe he should have gone with that initial inclination.
“No, not particularly. We’ve been eating prepared food all week. It’s kind of nice to have something homemade.”
“Sorry, there isn’t a salad. I didn’t think about needing groceries earlier.”
“We can do without salad one day. There are plenty of veggies in the soup.”
He had warmed up one of the “handcrafted” soups she liked to get at the grocery store. They were full of chunks of locally sourced produce and came in fancy glass jars with raised curlicues framing the vintage-style label.
Zachary himself preferred a good old can of chicken and stars, but he was making the dinner special for Kenzie, not warming something up for his own solitary lunch. When he was at home, he could have a can of soup for lunch every day of the week if he wanted, though Kenzie warned him he should be watching his sodium intake.
“And you warmed up some bread?”
Zachary opened the oven door with a flourish to check on the loaf of French bread he had pulled from the freezer, thawed for the first few minutes, then split and spread with butter and garlic. If Kenzie got her special soup, he could have garlic bread. And it went with soup, so she couldn’t accuse him of making it just because it was his favorite food. A puff of warm air washed over him. The garlic bread looked perfect, the butter melted and the loaf starting to get golden brown around the edges. Zachary carefully took it out and set it on the counter.
He had forgotten to put soup spoons on the table, but everything else was in order and, in a few minutes, they were both sipping the surprisingly good soup and dipping their crusty garlic bread into it. Soup wasn’t such a bad way to get his vegetables. Kind of like spaghetti, without the noodles.
“So, the results of the Kristy Echols postmortem,” Kenzie said after a few bites of soup followed by approving noises.
“Yeah. Dr. Cook figured it was strangulation?”
“Yes. That will be the cause of death.”
“Murder.”
“Yes.”
“Was there anything else? Anything interesting or unusual? Unexpected?”
“We sent off tox screens and all of that to the lab. They will take a few weeks to be processed, but I don’t expect them to find anything. Maybe some alcohol, her prescriptions, but there wasn’t anything to indicate she’d been drugged.”
“Any blows to the head? Signs of a struggle?”
“She fought back, but it was all over pretty quickly. I sent nail scrapings to the lab with a request for them to speed DNA processing in case she scratched him. We might get lucky there. But unless this guy is already in the system, we’re going to have to find a way to identify him.”
“I’m already on that.” Zachary told her about the assignments he had given Walter and Heather.
Kenzie laid down her spoon and sat back, thinking about this. She grinned.
“I love that you’re putting Dad to work for your own purposes. And if it helps him find something to do and helps Mom put up with him, that’s great. And I think he’ll be able to help you. He’s always had his causes and has been willing to go to… almost any lengths to help them. Just be careful that he doesn’t take an assignment like this further than you wanted him to, or use…” She looked up at the ceiling, fishing for the appropriate word, “more controversial methods to get answers. If you want to be able to take it to the police…”
Zachary nodded slowly. In his drive to find out who the man threatening Elysse was, he had forgotten about some of the finer points of Walter’s personality. Walter had manipulated Zachary to get what he wanted on other occasions.
He had given Walter clear instructions on getting the information he needed, so he didn’t think there was any danger in his going too far with that. But if Walter decided to use other means to try to “help” Zachary get the information he needed, it could be a problem.
Walter’s decision to get involved with the Russians had proved to be a misjudgment on his part, and he didn’t normally fall into that trap. Walter was an incredibly successful lobbyist, and he didn’t get that way by making a lot of mistakes. His judgment was good and he was capable of thinking several steps ahead of his opponent and putting together very complex plans to get what he wanted.
Zachary would have to make sure that Walter understood he wasn’t to go rogue on any assignment Zachary offered him. He would need to get permission before he decided to go off in his own direction.
“What are you smiling at?” Kenzie asked.
“Just… the thought of me telling Walter not to go off the rails. That he needs to be able to follow my instructions exactly.”
Kenzie chuckled. “You mean because you would never do such a thing yourself? I can just see the two of you both going off like hounds after a quarry—in opposite directions. One of you is going to have to be a stabilizing influence.”
