She Once Vanished, page 4
Zachary had assumed by all the sun-kissed pictures of Elysse, Dain, or Elysse and Dain together that they had come from California. Instead, they were apparently from Oregon, which didn’t get nearly the same number of hours of sunshine as the California coast.
And not just Oregon, but a small town near Grand Rapids that showed up on a Google search as being one of the poorest zip codes in the state. Elysse had grown up in poverty. The rise to being one of the most famous social media influencers in the country would have been twice the shock. How would someone who had grown up in that kind of squalor feel when sudden success had lifted her out of obscurity?
Had it been too much for her? Had the money and fame been too much for her to handle? Even without the stresses of a “passionate” relationship, she had been turned into something that must have been totally foreign to her.
Was that what she had been running away from six months ago?
And what she was running away from now?
7
Even though Kenzie’s house had become Zachary’s permanent residence, visiting the Petersons always felt like going home. Zachary had never lived with the two of them. He had lived with Mr. Peterson and his former wife for only a few weeks around his eleventh birthday. He had kept returning there for visits or to develop his latest pictures in Mr. Peterson’s darkroom until Lorne and Lilith had eventually separated and divorced. It had not been an amicable breakup. Mrs. Peterson’s discovery of her husband’s preferences had apparently been quite a shock.
After the breakup, Mr. Peterson had lived on his own for some time before he and Pat had gotten a place of their own. The “roommates” had kept their relationship low-key and even now were not demonstrative in public. They had been together more than twenty years and Pat had become a fixture in Zachary’s life as well; a broad-shouldered, nurturing man who seemed to succeed at whatever new projects he tackled.
Zachary stepped into the warm, fragrant house, a smile coming to his face, genuinely happy to be there. He and Kenzie hugged Lorne and sat down in the living room to chat while Pat put the finishing touches on something cheesy and comforting in the oven. Zachary’s nose twitched like a rabbit’s at the smell of garlic and toasting bread. He drank in the scent and sighed.
“So what are you working on?” Lorne asked Zachary, switching from his shallow discussion with Kenzie about her work in the medical examiner’s office to Zachary. He didn’t have the same appreciation for autopsy talk as Zachary.
“You remember Elysse Allan?” Zachary asked, “The young woman who disappeared for a week and showed up later in the Grand Canyon?”
“Sure, of course,” Mr. Peterson nodded. His round face was wreathed in smiles, fringed with short, white hair. Somehow, he kept getting older when Zachary wasn’t looking. “What about her?” His face grew serious. “She hasn’t been hurt, has she?”
“No. No, nothing like that. But Elysse’s boyfriend—her ex-boyfriend—doesn’t believe her story about what happened while she was missing, and he wants me to see what I can find out about what really happened to her.”
“He doesn’t believe what, exactly?”
“He doesn’t believe she just decided to go back to the Grand Canyon. Which, you must admit, was a pretty bizarre thing to do. He thinks something else was going on, and he wants to know what that was.”
“Something else like what?”
“He hasn’t put it into so many words, But I think he suspects that she was coerced into doing what she did. Someone forced her or maybe even kidnapped her.”
“What evidence does he have of that?” Kenzie demanded, her voice rising as if outraged by the thought.
Zachary hesitated, considering her reaction. Was Kenzie angry because a woman’s story had been deemed untrustworthy by a man? Or was it the idea of an abduction? Kenzie was struggling with the trauma caused by her own abduction a year earlier. Zachary knew it colored the way she thought about other crimes, the way she had felt about Christmas this year, and the way she interacted with her father and even Zachary.
“I think it is more Dain’s gut feeling than anything concrete,” he told Kenzie slowly, feeling his way through the explanation. “I think that the way she changed following her disappearance worries him and has him convinced that it was not as simple as her just driving back to the Grand Canyon for some sightseeing. Sightseeing at a venue they had been to just a week or two before.”
“Well, that’s strange behavior, but it isn’t proof that she was lying about what happened to her.”
“No,” Zachary agreed. “Dain doesn’t have proof of anything. That’s why he asked me if I would investigate it. He is looking for some evidence of what happened to her. He’s worried about her.”
“Then he should focus on his relationship with her, rather than assuming she is lying and hiring someone else to prove it.”
Zachary nodded slightly. “Of course. But he can’t work on his relationship with her. She broke up with him before disappearing. She won’t answer phone calls, texts, or messages. She’s completely cut him off.”
Kenzie nodded knowingly. “And you don’t wonder what he might have done to deserve that kind of treatment? Why is she treating him like a stalker? Why is he acting like one?”
Zachary shifted uncomfortably. “I can’t answer any of those questions yet. I need to talk to Elysse. If she tells me that he’s stalking her and harassing her—that will change the way I deal with this case.”
“How you’ll deal with it?” Kenzie echoed, “You wouldn’t just drop it?”
“I don’t know yet. Maybe getting Dain the information he is looking for will ease his anxiety, and he will back off. Maybe he needs professional help. I don’t know.”
“It would be one thing if she was the one who hired you to find out what happened to her,” Kenzie said, “but the boyfriend hiring you? The ex-boyfriend? I just don’t trust him. He should leave her alone. It doesn’t have anything to do with him.”
“It has everything to do with him,” Zachary countered. “It affected him too. People thought that he had killed her. He was branded a murderer, and the people who don’t believe she is really alive still think that. He can’t just go about his business as usual. He is recognizable. People are following him, attacking him, harassing him. Her story doesn’t clear him from wrongdoing. The people who think this was all just a PR stunt believe he was in on it. They think he whipped the fans into a frenzy just to get a good media storm. A lot of people still don’t believe that he is innocent.”
Kenzie sat back, thinking about that.
“Well, it sounds like he’s in a difficult situation,” Mr. Peterson offered.
“Yeah, he is. He’s a pariah now because of something that wasn’t his fault. He’s trying to rebuild his life, but… it’s difficult. Nearly impossible. Wherever he goes, people are going to recognize him. And think that he’s some kind of showman or media hog. He can’t go back to the house they lived in together in Oregon. He’s bought a house in Vermont, isolated so he won’t run into fans.”
“If he hired you because of that, because he wanted to clear his name and get back on his feet again, I could understand that,” Kenzie said slowly. “I couldn’t fault him for that. But that isn’t what he’s doing. He’s hiring you because of her, because he wants to… be her hero or get back together with her. And what happened is really none of his business. Or yours.”
Kenzie had used this line before. That something he was investigating was none of his business. Zachary didn’t want to argue with her in front of the Petersons, but he didn’t like being called out as someone who just stuck his nose into other people’s business for the heck of it.
“I was hired to do this, so it is my business.” He scratched his chin and wondered whether he had remembered to shave before leaving the house that morning. “I try not to take cases that are… unethical in any way. Taking pictures of adulterous partners meeting someone else, but no skin, and not just stalking random women. Helping corporations with security leaks, but not helping them to get private employee information or to conduct industrial espionage. Catching fraudulent insurance claimants, but not helping people fool their insurance companies.”
“And what is your justification for finding out whether Elysse told the truth? How does that do anything but blacken her name? She didn’t do anything illegal. Stalking her just because her ex thinks she is lying and wants to catch her…”
“I’m not stalking her. Investigating, interviewing, and surveilling are not stalking.”
Kenzie shrugged, indicating she didn’t think there was much difference.
“Everyone ready for dinner?” Pat asked, coming out of the kitchen with a towel draped over his shoulder. He had probably heard the discussion and was hoping to break it up before things got too heated. Zachary was happy to drop the discussion. He suspected Kenzie’s objection had more to do with her level of anxiety being high due to the memory of her own abduction than with Zachary actually doing anything unethical, harmful, or dangerous.
“It smells heavenly,” Kenzie told Pat with a genuine smile. “I don’t know how much longer I can sit here smelling it and not eating. My stomach is going to digest itself.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound very pleasant,” Pat told her with a laugh. “Why don’t we do something about that? Come on over to the table. Everyone. I’ll bring in the soup to start.”
Zachary hoped the garlic bread would be brought out with the soup. In fact, he didn’t care about the soup, as long as he got the garlic bread.
8
During the meal, Lorne’s phone vibrated, prompting him to take it out to check the screen. Then he slid it back into his pocket, making apologetic noises.
“Sorry about that. I’m determined not to let the things run our lives, but it seems like there is no way to keep up in the modern world without one, and the more you use it, the more attention it demands.”
Kenzie and Zachary nodded. Zachary was used to the rule about no phones at the dinner table, a prohibition that he and Kenzie tried to follow as well, despite demanding jobs that could result in either being called away during a meal.
“You can’t even seem to be able to do things like setting up a doctor’s appointment without one,” Kenzie agreed. “It’s gotten to the point where anyone without a phone is considered an old fogy or anti-technology. Everyone assumes you will have one in your pocket and are open to being contacted any time, night or day.”
The others nodded ruefully.
“It’s a tool,” Mr. Peterson said, “but sometimes it feels like they are running us rather than the other way around. And those social influencers… I’m just learning about this; I guess it has been a big thing for a while, and I never knew about it. People who are paid to talk about brand names or who have millions of views when they post a picture of their lunch. I guess the rock stars of yesterday are now the TikTok or Instagram influencers. Each generation has its heroes.”
Kenzie looked at Zachary, but he didn’t say anything about Elysse, so she left it alone.
“Can you imagine trying to raise kids now?” Pat asked Lorne. “When you had foster kids, it was just a matter of keeping them from monopolizing the landline or wanting to watch TV at bedtime. Now… they all have their own phones, which double as entertainment boxes. You can’t separate them; they’re practically surgically attached.”
“A lot of foster kids won’t have them,” Mr. Peterson said, dabbing his mouth with a satiny cloth napkin. “Parents can’t afford them, kids are cycling in and out of the home, and who will pay for or keep track of their phone plans? Some will buy their own if they have after-school jobs, or social workers might give them a prepaid phone to keep in touch, but many foster kids won’t have them, especially if they are moved around a lot.”
There were a lot of things that Zachary had lacked as a foster child, constantly being moved from one home to another. He could just imagine how isolating it would be if all the kids at school had phones of their own and he did not. It had been hard enough making friends when he got moved so often. Not being a part of their communication channels would make it impossible. Those who didn’t have phones of their own would be permanent outsiders.
“Glad I didn’t have that to deal with on top of everything else.”
They had an enjoyable evening, despite any anxiety or opinions about Zachary’s ethics in accepting Dain’s money to try to find out what had really happened to Elysse when she had disappeared.
Zachary spent some one-on-one time with Mr. Peterson, showing him his new digital camera with all its fancy new features, including the ability to share or post photos using a Wi-Fi connection with his phone.
After Lorne and Pat retired to bed, Kenzie and Zachary sat up for a while using their phones or computers until Kenzie started yawning, and they both agreed it was time to try to get some sleep. Cuddling Kenzie in his arms, Zachary nuzzled her curly hair, inhaling the scent of lavender shampoo, sweat, and everything else that combined to form a scent that was uniquely Kenzie in his mind.
“How are you doing?” he asked softly, in case she were already falling asleep. “Is everything okay?”
Kenzie shifted, snuggling more deeply into his embrace, and sighed, letting out a long breath.
“I’m sorry for being so grumpy lately. I know it must seem like I can’t even have a civil conversation these days.”
“No,” Zachary assured her. “That’s fine. You’re stressed, that’s all. I just want to know if you’re okay.”
“I’m just fine. Really. I’ll get over whatever this is. Get some more sleep or exercise and it will all smooth out… I’ll be back to the usual chill and fun Kenzie…”
“Dr. Boyle was going to give you some recommendations for therapists. Did you ever follow up with any of them?”
“No. I still have them. I just… don’t feel like therapy is the solution to my mood. It isn’t like I don’t understand why I feel the way I do. It’s just not something that talking about is going to change.”
“It can still help just to get it out in the open, even if there isn’t anything you can do to change anything. Dr. B can suggest a psychiatrist who could prescribe meds for you if there is something that will help you. A mild antidepressant or antianxiety prescription. Or sleep aid if you think you’re still not getting enough sleep.”
“Look who’s talking,” Kenzie mumbled.
She was the one who always told Zachary to take his prescribed meds or sleep aid, and he had a hard time accepting when he needed to. She had preached the miracles of modern medicine, but now that she might need to take something, she was fighting it.
“Taking a prescription doesn’t mean you’ll be on it for the rest of your life,” he reminded her. “Some people only need to take them for a little while to get through a rough patch. There’s nothing wrong with needing to take a prescription.”
He kissed the top of her head. She was the one who had told him all those things. She probably didn’t appreciate having them preached back at her.
Kenzie snorted, signaling that she did, in fact, recognize her own words.
“Here I thought you were not listening,” she told him.
“I always listen. Well, if I’m not distracted by something else. I just don’t always… follow directions well.”
“No. I can see Joss’s point when she complains that you go to her for advice, listen to what she has to say, then completely disregard it and do whatever you want.”
“Well, I…”
He knew it was true. He caught himself doing it sometimes, even when Joss didn’t point it out. He would go to other people for advice or feedback and then decide based on his instincts together with what he had learned, but that frequently meant going off on his own path rather than following any of the suggestions that had been given to him. Joss, his oldest sister, was the one most likely to call him out on it, while everyone else tried to be tactful and patient and not point out this flaw.
“I know…” Kenzie said, “You gotta be you.”
“Well, yeah. I couldn’t be anyone else,” Zachary agreed.
“I would have thought that you would have learned how to follow instructions in foster care,” Kenzie murmured. “Didn’t your families have strict rules and lines of authority? And the institutions you lived at must have been pretty strict.”
“I told you from the start that I was incorrigible,” Zachary reminded her. Though he said it jokingly, the word his mother had branded him with still hurt. You are incorrigible. You will never do what you’re told. You will never change. “I think having different rules at different homes just encouraged me to make up my own and not worry about what anyone else said. There obviously wasn’t just one way to do things. And if I learned one system, I would just have to unlearn it at the next place I went to.”
“Mmm-hmm.”
She sounded close to sleep. Zachary didn’t think he’d be able to carry on the conversation much longer.
“What about you?” he asked. “Did you always follow Lisa’s and Walter’s rules?”
He didn’t think that her parents had been big disciplinarians. They hadn’t been abusive. But Kenzie and her late sister Amanda had probably had a long list of rules they were expected to follow. Walter and Lisa were loving parents, but they were also very aware of society’s expectations of them and the rules that the people of their class had to follow.
“I was a pretty good kid,” Kenzie admitted. “Tried to follow all the rules. I helped take care of Amanda when she was sick and didn’t hit my rebellious phase until later in life because of that.”
It had been during her twenties as she tried to find her place in her socialite mother’s world, not in her teens when they had all been consumed with keeping Amanda healthy. After Amanda’s death, Kenzie had really rebelled against her father—who she partly blamed for Amanda’s death—and had gone to medical school and become a pathologist. Working with dead bodies was not exactly considered proper in Lisa Cole Kirsch’s social circles.
