When All the Girls Have Gone

by Jayne Ann Krentz

  He had been a terrified ten-year-old kid and he had not been alone. There were seven other children with him. They had all been locked in the old barn for the night. Quinton Zane always locked them up for the night.

  Zane said it was for their own protection. He said it was to help them overcome their fears. He said it was to make them strong.

  But what they really feared was Quinton Zane. He was the real-life monster in their world; the young, charismatic, terrifying leader of the cult.

  On the night that shattered Max’s childhood forever, Zane told his followers that he’d had a vision in which he would soon disappear. And he did—but not before he had triggered a series of explosions that set fire to the buildings in the compound, including the barn where the kids slept.

  Max and the others awakened to find themselves locked in a structure that was in flames. And then, as they huddled together in the middle of the barn, frozen in terror, aware that they were going to burn alive, a hero arrived to rescue them.

  Anson Salinas, the chief of police of the nearby town, had used his vehicle to smash through the old barn door. He leaped out from behind the wheel, rounded up all eight kids, crammed them into the SUV and roared out of the blazing barn. Moments later the entire structure came crashing down.

  Several of the adult members of the cult perished that night. Max’s mother was one of them.

  Ultimately the social workers were able to track down relatives for five of the eight kids. But three boys—Max, Cabot Sutter and Jack Lancaster—were all officially orphaned.

  They had gone home with Anson Salinas the night of the fire because there was nowhere else for them to go. And in the end, they had stayed.

  When it became clear that they were all headed for the foster care system, Anson had pulled some strings, twisted a few arms and completed the paperwork that made him a licensed foster parent.

  Max cranked up the computer again and took another look at the data he had collected on the two murder victims and the three women who had been raped. Why had Louise Flint considered them so important she had hidden the file in a suitcase in a storage locker?

  Now there was a connection to another rape victim—Jocelyn Pruett.

  There was always a pattern. It was up to him to find it.

  After a while he closed down the Louise Flint file and opened the one that he always checked before going to bed—the one labeled Quinton Zane.

  He knew that each of his foster brothers also kept an open file on Zane. They rarely discussed the contents of the files with anyone outside the family. In the past, others, including his ex, had labeled the three of them obsessed and accused them of being paranoid. There were times when Max figured the critics were probably right.

  He and his foster brothers had each paid a price for their pursuit of the ghost of Quinton Zane. In his case, the obsession had almost gotten him killed on his last case at the agency. It had destroyed his career, and his marriage had gone down in flames—collateral damage. He was well aware that as far as his former colleagues and his ex were concerned, he was no longer merely obsessed, he was burned out. They were convinced that he was at high risk of seeing patterns where none existed.

  No one at the agency wanted to work with an obsessed, paranoid individual. No smart woman wanted to be married to one.

  Over the years he and Cabot and Jack had pulled up occasional rumors, whispers and hints that indicated Zane was still alive. But they had never been able to nail down anything substantial. They had never found enough to reveal a pattern.

  He closed the file and checked his e-mail before he powered off the computer. His in-box was empty except for the one e-mail that had come in a month back. He still could not decide whether to archive it or dump it into the trash, so he just let it sit in the in-box.

  The message consisted of only two sentences and a signature.

  Please be advised that you are not to contact me again. If you ignore this request, I will direct my attorney to take legal action against you.

  It was signed Davis Decatur.

  His biological father.

  CHAPTER 12

  Charlotte awoke to the ringing of her phone. For a few beats the reality of the gray light of dawn meshed with fragments of a dream in which she walked through a series of empty, fog-filled rooms searching for Jocelyn.

  The phone rang again.

  Jocelyn. Maybe she was calling to check in at last.

  She pushed the covers aside, swung her legs over the side of the bed and grabbed the phone. The screen name read Cutler. For a split second she didn’t recognize it. Then she remembered that Max had given her his card and she had entered his name and number into her contacts list.

  “It’s a little early,” she said.

  “We have another problem,” Max said.

  It occurred to her that he sounded as if he had been awake for some time. She tightened her grip on the phone.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Jocelyn Pruett is not at the convent on St. Adela.”

  Something inside her went very cold. She stood up quickly.

  “How can you possibly know that?” she asked. “There’s no phone at the convent. Jocelyn said her own phone would be off the whole time because there would be no cell service and no Wi-Fi available.”

  “Are you sure of that?”

  “Yes. Look, last night I sent a text to Jocelyn on the off chance that she might have found a way to check her messages. I told her I had some bad news about Louise. There was no response.”

  “How did Jocelyn book the retreat?” Max asked.

  “She used a travel agency that specializes in various kinds of exotic trips and retreats. They book vacations all over the world that focus on yoga and meditation experiences—that kind of thing.”

  “I just got off the phone with the chief of the St. Adela police department. He was very helpful. I told him we had an emergency on our hands and that we had to get in touch with Jocelyn Pruett immediately. He sent one of his officers out to the convent.”

  Charlotte closed her eyes. “I’m an idiot. I never even thought about contacting the local cops.”

  “You’re not an idiot. You would have come up with the idea eventually. Yesterday you were still trying to wrap your head around Louise Flint’s death.”

  Charlotte opened her eyes. “Thank you for making excuses for me. Are you certain Jocelyn isn’t on the island?”

  “As certain as I can be without getting on a plane to St. Adela.”

  Charlotte sank back down onto the edge of the bed. “Oh, my God.”

  “The sister in charge informed the officer that, yes, Jocelyn Pruett had booked a monthlong retreat and, yes, she had arrived and checked in on schedule.”

  “What?”

  “But she checked out the following day.”

  “Crap.”

  “Evidently she could not tolerate the lifestyle.”

  “No kidding.” Charlotte brightened. “Maybe she checked into a beachfront hotel instead.”

  “The sister didn’t know where Jocelyn went, only that she was gone. And before you ask, no, Pruett is not staying at any of the local hotels. The police chief looked into that possibility.”

  Charlotte breathed deeply, allowing the implications to sink in.

  “Jocelyn never meant to stay there at the convent,” she said. “She intended to disappear all along.”

  “That’s how it looks,” Max agreed. “Evidently she planned to remain invisible for at least a month, but she didn’t want you, or anyone else, apparently, to worry about her.”

  Charlotte was tempted to take his crisp, impersonal tone of voice as a sign of heartlessness, but something told her that it was just evidence of business as usual for Max. Finding answers was what he did for a living. As far as he was concerned, he was simply updating her in the most effici
ent manner possible so that he could get on with his job.

  “She bought the ticket to St. Adela and went so far as to actually check in to the convent so that anyone who tried to search for her online would be satisfied that she had traveled to the island,” he said. “Most people would assume that she was where she was supposed to be.”

  Charlotte gripped the phone very tightly. “Most people like me, you mean. But you took matters a step further. You checked with the local police. Why didn’t I think of that?”

  “You didn’t call the St. Adela police because, until yesterday, there was no reason for you to think that your stepsister wasn’t where she said she would be,” Max said.

  So now he was reading her mind, too.

  “But you automatically assumed that Jocelyn probably wasn’t where she was supposed to be, is that it?” she asked.

  “I didn’t assume anything one way or the other. I just like to verify details whenever I can.”

  “So my stepsister really has gone off the grid.”

  “Looks like it. If she wants to get in touch with you without using her phone, there are ways. Burner phones. Public library computers. But she hasn’t done that.” Max paused very deliberately. “Right?”

  The realization that he didn’t entirely trust her hit her like a small electrical shock. Then she got mad.

  “No, Jocelyn hasn’t gotten in touch,” she snapped. She paused. “Do you think she knows that Louise Flint is dead?”

  “If she disappeared because she’s running scared, it’s logical that she would keep track of what’s happening back here in Seattle. I think it’s safe to say she is aware of Louise’s death, yes. Whether or not Jocelyn suspects that her friend was murdered, I can’t say.”

  “Trust me, Jocelyn will assume that Louise was murdered. She certainly won’t believe that her best friend OD’d.” Charlotte shot to her feet again, her hand clamped around the phone. “Oh, God, do you think that Jocelyn is . . .”

  She couldn’t bring herself to say the word, but Max evidently had no problem with harsh realities.

  “It’s possible she’s dead,” he said. “But I think it’s unlikely. Dead bodies have a way of surfacing.”

  She flinched and then told herself that was probably Max’s way of trying to sound reassuring.

  “The way Louise’s body showed up, you mean?”

  “Yes.” Max paused briefly. “At this point it looks like Jocelyn has gone into hiding. The fact that I haven’t been able to find her yet is a good indication that she knows what she’s doing.”

  “She’s very tech savvy.”

  “That’s obvious. What about the other members of her family? Is there anyone else she might have contacted?”

  “There is no one else,” Charlotte said. “Her father died years ago. She has no brothers or sisters. Her father married my mother when Jocelyn and I were in our teens. The question is, who is she hiding from?”

  “Maybe from the person who murdered Louise Flint,” Max said.

  “I was afraid you were going to say that.”

  Charlotte gazed blankly out the window.

  “Are you still there?” Max asked after a while.

  She swallowed hard. “Yes. Yes, I’m here. I’m just having trouble trying to process all this. If you’re right, it means Jocelyn was keeping some huge secrets from me.”

  “Yes.”

  “She was trying to protect me.”

  “Think so?”

  “She’s always been that way. Almost from the start.”

  “I don’t want to be the one to spoil your image of your stepsister,” Max said, “but there are other reasons why she might have kept you in the dark. It might be herself she’s protecting.”

  “No,” Charlotte said. “If she’s keeping secrets, it’s because she doesn’t want to drag me into whatever is going on.”

  “I’ll find out what happened to your sister,” Max said. “It’s what I do.”

  “Well, you’re not doing it alone, remember? I’m part of this thing.”

  “Got some idea of where you want to start?” Max asked.

  He didn’t sound sarcastic or arrogant. He sounded curious and interested, as if he was paying close attention.

  “During the night I suddenly remembered that note that Louise put into the envelope with the keys that she mailed to Jocelyn.”

  “What about it?”

  “Louise said that her hard copy of the file was in the storage locker and that it wasn’t online.”

  “Which implies that your stepsister has a hard copy, as well,” Max concluded. “Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Exactly.”

  Max was quiet for a few seconds. “Any idea where she might have stashed it?”

  “Jocelyn keeps most of her important records and files online. But she also maintains one very old-fashioned storage system—a safe-deposit box.”

  There was a short silence from Max’s end of the connection.

  “We’d need a key,” he said finally.

  “I’ve got one,” Charlotte said. “I’m the only person she trusted completely.” She realized with a shock of horror that she had used the past tense. “I mean, I’m the only one she trusts. Okay, she obviously doesn’t tell me everything, but she trusts me.”

  “I understand,” Max said. “We’ll find her.”

  She was surprised by the oddly gentle current in the dark tide of his voice. He made the statement sound like a vow. But she also noticed that he didn’t go beyond that. He didn’t offer hope that Jocelyn was alive. He just promised to find her.

  Max Cutler was not the type to make a promise he was not sure he could keep, she decided. On the other hand, something told her that if he did make a promise, you could depend upon him to walk into hell to fulfill it.

  Then again, she had been wrong about men before. Brian Conroy was Exhibit A.

  “I’ll call my boss and tell her that I’ll be late getting in to the office,” she said.

  CHAPTER 13

  Charlotte emptied the contents of the grocery sack on top of the dining bar that divided the kitchen and living room areas of her apartment. Together she and Max studied the items—a road map of the state of Washington, three legal-sized envelopes marked with initials and a larger envelope that appeared to be stuffed with papers or documents.

  The contents of Jocelyn’s safe-deposit box.

  Neither of them had wanted to go through the box in the vault room at the bank, so they had dumped the items into the grocery sack. Charlotte had clutched the sack with both hands during the short drive across town to her apartment. She had felt as if she was holding a bag of snakes—afraid to open it and at the same time knowing she could not throw it away.

  Max flattened both palms on the table and studied the materials scattered across the surface.

  “Another road map of Washington,” he said. “Let’s start with that.”

  He unfolded the map. Charlotte looked at the red and yellow circles.

  “Same towns,” she said. “Including the two towns in which the two women supposedly OD’d.”

  Max picked up the envelopes and opened them.

  “Same data that we found in the envelopes in Louise’s carry-on,” he said. “Duplicates of the obituary notices and the rape reports. Also some handwritten notes indicating that drugs were involved in all five cases.”

  Charlotte studied the notes. “These were written by Jocelyn, not Louise.”

  “So they were keeping duplicate files, just as Louise indicated.”

  Charlotte looked up. “They obviously did some of the research online, but when it came to creating a file that included their notes, they kept everything in hard copy. Why?”

  “In the modern age, the only safe way to hide something is to do it the old-fashioned way—keep the data in hard c
opy only. The three rapes occurred over the course of several months within the past year. The two drug-related deaths are more recent. One was mid-August. The other was late September.”

  He picked up the large envelope and let the contents spill out onto the table. A number of newspaper clippings, documents and notes landed in a pile.

  Charlotte selected one of the clippings and picked it up. For a split second the significance of the headline did not register. When it did, she sank down on the nearest chair.

  “I knew Jocelyn had kept the important documents, but I hadn’t realized she kept so much material.”

  She handed the clipping to Max. He read it quickly, frowning in concentration.

  “‘Local college student reports assault,’” he read. “‘Unidentified assailant escapes.’” He set the clipping aside and picked up one of the documents. “It’s a copy of a police report of your stepsister’s rape. It says that she could not provide a description because the assailant blindfolded her and held a knife to her throat.”

  “Yes.” Charlotte picked up another sheaf of papers. “It’s a list of names. There must be two or three hundred of them.”

  Max took the pages from her. “These are all male names. A few have been crossed out. Some look like they were added to the list at different times.”

  “I think it must be Jocelyn’s list of all the possible suspects,” Charlotte said. “I wonder how she compiled it.”

  “The rape occurred on the Loring College campus. Maybe she used the college yearbooks to assemble a list of suspects.”

  “Yes, of course. I never thought about that. She was convinced from the start that her attacker was a student. It’s a small college and it was even smaller at the time.” Charlotte contemplated the contents of the envelope. “All these years we thought Jocelyn had moved on. And she let us believe it.”

  Max’s eyes tightened a little. “We?”

  “Our family. Me. She let us think that she had put it all behind her because she knew we were worried about how the attack had affected her emotionally. But all this time she was keeping the horrible newspaper clippings and that list of names in her safe-deposit box. It wasn’t like any of those things would ever do her any good.”