“How’d that make you feel?”
“You know the answer to that, but the horrible fuckin’ feelin’ didn’t last long. Soon enough I felt free. Like I had dodged a bullet. And even from the very beginning, I felt grateful she didn’t embarrass me in front of all those people at New Year’s. That was good of her.”
A student trying to see in the door bumps into it and Josh turns toward it, then glances at his watch. “I’ve got to start my class. I’m already late.”
“Just a couple more quick questions. Where were you the night she went missing?”
“Where she was supposed to be—the war protest in Atlanta. I didn’t know she wasn’t coming until I got a call from her on the bus when we were about to leave. I had called her several times. She finally called me back . . . but only to say she wasn’t coming.”
“Did she say why?”
“Family emergency, she said, but I could tell she was lying. I knew a little better by then.”
“What’d you think it was?”
“Figured she was meeting someone. We saw each other even after she said she couldn’t marry me. Not as much. Far more casual. Far more as friends. But when she called that day, I told her I didn’t even want to do that anymore. I ended it with her right then and there and . . . have always felt guilty. Wondered if I caused her to do what she did, if I . . . could have been responsible for what happened. Maybe if I hadn’t done what I did, she . . . wouldn’t have been where she was and . . . wouldn’t have wound up . . . dead.”
“How do you think she died?” I ask.
“I have no idea. None.”
“I mean by her own hand or someone else’s.”
“Oh. I don’t know. She was such a . . . mystery. Sometimes . . . she was so different. It . . . it really depends on which Randa she was that night. But my guess is . . . someone got her. I know she felt like killing herself sometimes. She even talked about it occasionally, but . . . I don’t know, I think it was mostly just talk. I think it far more likely she met the wrong man or randomly ran into him. ’Course it might not have been random at all. He could’ve been following her.”
Something about the way he says this last line makes me think it might be an activity he’s had some experience with.
127
“Tonight we’re joined by Toby Collins of the Barstool Detective podcast,” Daniel says.
“Toby has a popular true crime podcast,” Merrick says. “Unlike ours, where we take one case and work it for an entire season—or until it’s solved—Toby does a new case every three episodes.”
I’m driving home from Gulf Coast State College, making my way through Panama City toward Highway 22. It’s dusk and all the taillights and headlights are a little brighter before the backdrop of evening.
“But that doesn’t mean he isn’t able to go in-depth,” Daniel says. “He’s known for digging deep into the cases he features.”
“Right,” Merrick says. “And that’s why he’s joining us here tonight—because of how deep he went into the time right before Randa went missing. Welcome, Toby.”
“Good to be here. Thanks for having me. I’ve really been enjoying your show. You guys have always been interesting and . . . easy to listen to, but . . . adding Nancy was genius. In fact, one of the reasons I agreed to do your show tonight is to see if I might steal her away from you.”
They laugh.
I only have a few more shows before I catch up to where the podcast is currently, then I’ll have to wait a week between episodes like everyone else who’s listening live. Of course, I hope we’re able to close the case before very many more shows are made.
“That’s very sweet, Toby,” Nancy says. “Tell you what . . . as soon as we solve Randa’s case we’ll talk about it. How’s that?”
“Well let me see what I can contribute to getting this thing solved.”
“Toby has really delved into the events leading up to Randa’s disappearance,” Merrick says. “And some fascinating theories of why she was where she was and what may have happened to her.”
“What do you think happened to Randa?” Nancy asks. “Just in case you were thinking about burying the lead.”
“Well, obviously I don’t know,” he says. “Mine are just theories like everybody else’s, but I try to tie them all to actual, provable facts. So let’s start there. Here’s a fact: Randa’s car had almost a full tank of gas in it when she went missing. And the doors were locked.”
“And what conclusions do you draw from those facts?” Daniel asks.
“I know a lot of people do, but I don’t believe Randa had any intention of harming herself. You don’t fill up your car with gas if you plan to commit suicide. And she had to stop and fill it up pretty close to where she wrecked. So . . . you see . . . that’s just an opinion . . . but it’s tied to a fact. Now . . . it’s entirely possible I’m misinterpreting the facts, but . . . there it is.”
“What do you think her car being locked means?” Merrick asks.
“That she intended to come back to it.”
“So you think she locked her car because she was planning to come back,” Nancy says, “but then she met with foul play?”
“Or accidental death,” he says.
“Just seems like we’d have found her remains by now,” Nancy says. “Especially if she had met with an accident.”
“I know—and that bothers me too. There are so many holes and unexplainable mysteries in this thing. We may never know what really happened. It’s what makes it so interesting to me.”
“So . . . we know Randa stopped for gas not long before she got in the wreck and went missing,” Merrick says. “Do we know where? Do we know of any other stops she made?”
“We do,” Toby says. “I was gonna start at the beginning and go chronologically, but why don’t we do just the opposite. Since we already started with the car, let’s work backward from it. She stopped at a Racetrack gas station on Tyndall Parkway and filled her car up. She went inside and used the restroom, but didn’t purchase anything but the gas. The station is on the outskirts of Panama City on Highway 98, not far from Tyndall Air Force Base and about twenty-five miles from the scene of her accident.”
“Is there surveillance footage?” Merrick asks.
“I believe so, but I haven’t seen it. No one in the press or public has.”
“That’s so close to where she went missing,” Nancy says. “I never knew it was that close. Someone could’ve seen her there and followed her—maybe even caused her wreck.”
“Yeah,” Daniel says. “That seems far more likely than a killer happening upon her at the scene.”
“It’s one of the theories that fits best to me,” Toby says.
“Wouldn’t you like to have the files and evidence the police has?” Nancy says. “I feel like we could solve it if we did. I’d love to see the surveillance footage and . . . well, everything.”
“Gulf County Sheriff’s Department doesn’t inspire confidence,” Toby says. “That’s for sure.”
“Well, it was very different back then,” Merrick says. “It’s a new department. New sheriff. New lead detective.”
“That’s right,” Toby says, “you have a connection to the sheriff. I forgot. Sorry.”
“I’m just saying I bet they reopen the case, and if they do I’m betting they’ll have different results.”
“I sincerely hope so,” Toby says. “Okay, backtracking further back, we know Randa stopped in Destin to get food and go to the bathroom. This is based on receipts and witness accounts. As far as I understand there is no surveillance footage. Before that, before leaving Pensacola, we know she went to an ATM not far from the UWF campus and took all but two dollars out of her checking account—a sum of about four hundred and twenty dollars. And I understand there is surveillance footage of that.”
“What time of day did she leave?” Daniel asks.
“That’s interesting,” Toby says. “She packed her car and left campus pretty early that mo
rning according to witnesses in her dorm. And her ATM withdrawal was early too—before eight. And the receipt from the restaurant in Destin is around eleven. So if she wrecked her car at almost ten that night . . . that means it took her—”
“Eight extra hours,” Nancy says. “Where was she? What happened in all that time?”
“My guess is we’ll never know,” Toby says.
128
“Exactly,” Toby says. “Did she break down somewhere else? Meet someone? Take a detour? What?”
“That’s a lot of missing time,” Merrick says.
“Here’s another thing,” Toby says. “She volunteered at a suicide hotline in Pensacola, but she had the night off because she was supposed to be traveling to participate in a protest in Atlanta that day. But . . . at some point during the day she disappeared, she called the supervisor and told her she’d be able to work after all because she wasn’t going to the protest. But then she never showed up.”
“That’s so . . . strange,” Daniel says.
“So we know she intended to be back for work that night,” Nancy says.
“Unless that was a ruse of some sort,” Toby says. “Some people believe she did several things like that because she didn’t want people to know what she was really doing, didn’t want to be found after she did it.”
“Do we know why she backed out of the protest?” Nancy asks.
“She told the organizer that she had a family emergency to attend to,” Toby says.
“And we know for sure she has no family near where she wrecked or farther in that direction?” Daniel asks.
“Never been able to find any. And a lot of people have looked. If she would’ve continued on the direction she was headed, she would have gone through Port St. Joe, Apalach, Eastpoint, Carabelle, and ultimately Tallahassee, passing the roads to Cape San Blas and St. George Island along the way.”
“And all those places have been thoroughly checked?” Merrick asks.
“I believe so,” Toby says, “but can’t be certain. I know both of her parents and other family members who’ve been interviewed said she had no family in any of those places and they didn’t know of any friends or acquaintances.”
“Where the hell was she headed?” Nancy says.
“That is the question,” Daniel says.
“One we don’t have an answer to,” Toby says. “Not yet, anyway.”
“Now, Toby, you’ve said you believe Randa died by either accident or foul play, that she was most likely murdered. But there are facts that paint a different picture, evidence that could cause reasonable people to draw other conclusions, right?”
“Absolutely. We know Randa was a special person and that she always appeared to have everything together, but that she struggled with some depression. I think that’s why she was drawn to the helpline. So I’m not saying it’s impossible that she was on her way to hurt herself in some way—though why she was out there and where she was headed I can’t imagine, if that be the case. Why not just do it in Pensacola or at least somewhere closer or some place that had significance to her?”
“For those who believe she wished herself harm,” Daniel says, “what is the evidence? What do they point to?”
“Her history of depression, anxiety, and other issues,” Toby says. “Most of which was never seen by even those close to her. Really took some digging to uncover. Her erratic behavior in the days leading up to her disappearance. The fact that she was out in this place so far from where she was supposed to be and no explanation can be found. And, most convincing of all, the fact that she had a piece of garden hose and a roll of duct tape in her backseat, and the hose was just the right length to reach from her tailpipe to just inside her window.”
“That’s all pretty compelling,” Daniel says. “Am I wrong to say that, Nancy?”
“Not at all,” she says. “We just have to remember that there may be other reasonable explanations for every single one of those things. It’s very difficult to know what another person is thinking and it’s very easy to reach the wrong conclusions when looking at things the wrong way from the outside.”
“No question,” he says. “We have to keep an open mind about everything and try to look at all of it from every imaginable side.”
“True,” Merrick says. “Now . . . Toby . . . something happened on campus, actually in Randa’s dorm the day before she disappeared . . . that you and a lot of other people believe had a huge impact on her leaving and acting the way she did—and explains what she may have been doing out in the middle of nowhere all alone. Can you tell us what that was?”
“A young woman named Chelsea Sylvester overdosed in Randa’s dorm. It’s not conclusive whether it was intentional or accidental, but she was a friend—or at least an acquaintance of Randa, and there was talk among the young women who lived in the dorm that Randa had something to do with it—either supplied her with the drugs, was there when she took them and/or took them with her, or even had some sort of suicide pact with her and this was how she followed through.”
This is the first I’m hearing of this. There is nothing about it in the file, and I haven’t heard anyone mention it.
I pause the podcast and call Reggie.
“Did you read the entire Randa Raffield file?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“Was there anything in it about a connection she may have had to a young woman who died in her dorm, Chelsea Sylvester?”
“No, nothing. Never heard of her—let alone a connection to Randa. Where’d you hear—”
I tell her about the podcast.
“I guess I need to start listening to the damn thing,” she says. “I’ll ask Merrick about it and call you back.”
“Have you watched all the surveillance footage?”
“Yeah. Quality is low. Why?”
“Were you looking to see if someone was following her?”
“Sort of. I’m tellin’ you . . . it’s hard to see much of anything on the recordings.”
“I’ll watch them tonight.”
“How’d you make out with the professor?” she asks.
I tell her. “Do you know if his alibi was ever verified?”
“No idea, but even if it was, we need to check it again.”
“Probably gonna need some help chasing some of this down,” I say.
“Sure. Whatever you need. Hell, I can do some of it myself.”
129
When Anna and I arrive at Sam and Daniel’s new place in Barefoot Cottages with bags of groceries, we find Sam undergoing physical therapy and learn that Daniel, Merrick, and Nancy are upstairs in their new home studio recording another episode of In Search of Randa Raffield.
We tell the day nurse she can go ahead and leave, that we’ll keep an eye on Sam until Daniel comes down.
When she is gone, I unpack the bags and put things away while Anna begins to make dinner.
The kitchen, dining nook, and living room all occupy one large open area. Sam’s therapy is taking place on a massage table in the living room, so we are able to observe the work the therapist is doing with her while we make dinner.
The cottage is relatively small, with everything close together. A door off the living room leads to the master bed and bath, while on the opposite side a half bath beneath the stairs is also the laundry room.
The beachy decor gives it the feel of a vacation rental instead of a permanent home.
Sam’s therapist, a short, trim, dark-haired, hairy man, is patient and kind but firm, and seems to be pushing her just the right amount.
I’m amazed at the progress she’s making. And I’m not the only one.
“Sam, you’re doing amazing,” Anna says. “Your strength and determination are an inspiration.”
Sam attempts to say something but what comes out is unintelligible.
She’s a small woman—both short and petite—even smaller since her injury, with just shorter than shoulder-length blond hair, large blue eyes, and pale white skin. She’s an agen
t with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and was injured while we were working a case together.
The prognosis her doctors have given her for a complete recovery from the gunshot wound to the head she suffered isn’t good, but her doctors don’t know her the way we do. My money is on a full recovery—or at least enough of a recovery that she and I will work another case together one day.
When her therapy is over and she is exhausted, her therapist and I help her back into her bedroom and the hospital bed awaiting her there. Next to it is the single bed Daniel sleeps on—what little sleeping he does between checking on and caring for her.
When we have her situated, she looks up at me, gives me a partial smile, then shoots me with a thumb and forefinger gun.
I shoot her back with one of my own and our eyes lock for a long moment.
“Better save your bullets for the bad guys,” I say. “We’re gonna have some catching up to do once you’re back in the saddle.”
She nods intently and narrows her eyes.
By the time her therapist and I prepare to leave the room, she is fast asleep.
I leave the door open—not only so we can keep an eye on her but so she can be a part of what’s going on out here.
The therapist leaves and I help Anna finish dinner. A short while later, Daniel, Merrick, and Nancy bound down the stairs excited about the show they’ve just recorded.
“I think that was our best yet,” Merrick says.
It’s obvious from his energy and bearing that he is the leader, the driving force behind the show.
“Me too,” Nancy says.
“When do we get to hear it?” Anna asks.
“From the smell of that dinner you’re cooking, anytime you want,” Daniel says as he steps over and looks in on Sam.
Daniel and Merrick are around the same age—early forties—but Daniel is darker, quieter, more reserved.
“John, Anna, this is Nancy,” Merrick says.
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