Where the Lost Girls Go

by R. J. Noonan

  “Back in your lean days.” Martha smoothed down some of the curls on the top of his head like a doting lovebird. I couldn’t tell if this was an act for Omak and me or simply a cloying public display of affection, but it made me wonder what their relationship was really like behind closed doors.

  “It was a lot harder on Candy.” The author tipped his head into one palm. “I’ve lost both of them now.”

  “Mr. Jameson,” Omak interrupted, “we can’t be sure the deceased was your daughter, not until we have a positive match from the lab.”

  “A DNA test.” The author shook his head. “A miserable wait.”

  Martha Jameson’s face creased with a sour expression. “How long will that take?”

  “Most genetic tests take twenty-four to seventy-two hours,” I said. “I know it’s a long time to wait, but you can’t be sure your daughter was driving that car until we’ve made a positive identification. We only need to collect a few things here, maybe her hairbrush or toothbrush, and we’ll rush them to the lab.”

  “And there’s always dental records,” Kent Jameson said flatly. When Omak squinted, the author added, “I’ve written my share of mysteries. I know the basics of forensics. Teeth and large bones don’t burn to ash. Not even in the cremation process.” He heaved a sigh. “I can’t believe I’m saying these things about . . . about my own daughter.”

  “If the DNA testing is inconclusive, we’ll consult a forensic odontologist,” said Omak.

  “In the meantime, is it foolish to hope that it’s not her?” Fresh tears filled Kent Jameson’s eyes.

  “It’s possible that the person driving that car was not your daughter,” I said.

  “Well.” Kent sniffed. “That’s something.”

  “It is.” Martha squeezed his arm. “We can hope and pray.”

  “Did you see her leave the house?” I asked.

  Martha shook her head, eying me coldly as Kent answered, “I was over in my writing space.”

  “I’m wondering who else had access to the car,” I said. “Does anyone else have a key?”

  Martha’s mouth puckered in scorn. “A few people have access, but no one on our staff would take one of our cars without asking.”

  “Sweetheart, wait.” Kent touched her knee. “There are other possibilities. Your assistant, Talitha. You let her use your car, and she knows where we keep the keys.”

  “Once. I let her use the Mercedes once when hers was in the shop.”

  “And what’s Talitha’s last name?” I asked. “Is she here now?”

  “Talitha Rahimi. She left hours ago.” Martha squinted at me. “And I don’t appreciate being grilled in my own home after hearing such awful news.”

  “We’re trying to figure out who was driving your car.” There was no hint of apology in Omak’s voice as he jumped in. “And where do you keep the keys?”

  “In the main garage,” Kent answered. “There’s a key box on the wall by the door, and the keys are tagged by brand.”

  “I hear you’ve got a nice collection,” the lieutenant said.

  “I dabble.”

  “You don’t work on them yourself?” Omak asked.

  “Not anymore. When I was a teenager, my brother and I used to drop in engines. We’d change the oil and the belts. You could do that work yourself on old cars. They gave you space to get your hands in the hood. But now, who has the time? I’ve got a good mechanic.”

  Omak pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. “How many cars you got out there?”

  “Five. Well, five if you include the VW. Some of them are typical rich-man rust buckets, but I’ve got a Chrysler Turbine car and a ’66 Yenko Stinger Corvair. I’ll show you some time.”

  “Some other time,” Martha said. “It’s late, sweetheart.”

  “I forget that the rest of the world isn’t nocturnal like me.” Kent scratched his jaw. “I’ve always been a night bird. It’s my writing time. But I’ll be useless tonight. In limbo, with my baby girl. Limbus infantium. We try to convince ourselves that we have moved on and evolved, but we don’t ever truly escape the unbaptized self.”

  His words sank in the air, stones in a pond too murky to fathom.

  “We’ve taken enough of your time.” Omak rose and stood at attention. He nudged me out of my seat with a glance, like a chastising granny. “We’ll collect what we need from your daughter’s room and head out.”

  “Thank you for your time. I’m sorry for your troubles.” I bowed to them respectfully before I could catch myself, but it was more like a yoga Namaste. Kent was lost in turmoil, but his wife seemed to be relieved we were wrapping things up. I took advantage of that. “I just have one other question,” I said. Actually, I had plenty, but the lieutenant seemed to be in a rush to end the interview now. Maybe Kent Jameson’s roller-coastering grief was getting to him. “Who else knows the location of the key box?”

  “Our handyman, Carlos Flores, for starters, and our ranch manager, Andy Greenleaf. Andy takes care of the alpacas and Lucy’s horses.”

  “Okay.” I wrote the names in my notebook. “How about women? Who, besides Talitha, works or lives here?”

  There was a housekeeper named Juana Lopez who did not live on the premises; Martha had seen her leave in her truck earlier that evening.

  “No, it wasn’t Juana, and probably not Talitha.” Jameson’s voice cracked with a new wave of emotion. “You can do your tests. I’ll hold my breath till you’re done, but in my heart, I know it was Lucy. We had a fight earlier, a bang-out shouting match, and she stormed off to her room. She must have waited until I went to my office. With my music up, I wouldn’t have heard the car leaving, even if she tore down the driveway in the Ghia.” He winced as a fresh wave of emotion reddened his face. “It’s my fault. I sent her flying out of here like a bat out of hell.”

  “Kent, no. Don’t say that.” Martha gave his arm a gentle shake. “You don’t know for sure that she took the car, and if she did, it’s certainly not your fault.”

  “Of course she took the car. She learned to drive a stick in the Ghia. She loved that car.” He wiped tears from one cheek and pushed out of the chair. “I need some fresh air.” He nodded at Omak. “Walk with me, Lieutenant. Give an old man a few minutes of distraction, and I’ll show you those cars and the lay of the land.”

  I watched them go, hoping for an invitation that didn’t come, though Omak did pause at the door just long enough to issue an order: I was to collect DNA samples from Lucy’s room.

  “Is this your first case?” Martha asked.

  “Yes. Is it that obvious?”

  “It’s just that Officers Garcia and Brown usually come out here when there’s police business, and I know most of the cops in town. And they know me because I deliver cookies during the holidays. Besides that, you look so young and eager.”

  “I’m older than I look. But I don’t think youth will hinder my community service.”

  “With any luck, you’ll grow into the job.”

  Her words echoed the lukewarm support I heard from my mother, but coming from Martha, there was an underpinning of insult. As if I wasn’t capable of being a cop.

  I smiled, sizing her up.

  Clearly she didn’t know that I had already tasted the adrenaline rush of a superhero.

  In my summers as a teenage counselor at Camp Turning Leaf, I had saved lives in quiet but significant ways. There’d been some drama—plucking three kids from the lake and stopping one kid from overdosing on opioids and another from going into anaphylactic shock. But mostly I had discovered an innate ability to draw people out and stay calm in a crisis. Corny, I know, but I had learned that I had a gift for helping people. The afterglow of these events had left me cloaked in strength, compassion, and commitment and given me the drive and inspiration to make it through the police academy.

  I belonged here; I was made to be a cop, and I was not going to be deterred by an imperious prima donna like Martha Jameson. “I need to get started with the evidence,�
�� I said politely. “Sorry to bring you this upsetting news.”

  Martha pushed to her feet wearily. “I’m going to make some tea.”

  Glad to see her go, I headed outside. The patrol car was stocked with plastic containers, bags, and paper sleeves to collect and inventory evidence. There were special cylinders to collect syringes and paper bags for blood storage, but I didn’t think I’d need any of that. I grabbed some inventory bags and a pair of rubber gloves and headed back inside, past Martha in the kitchen, who seemed to have forgotten that I was on the premises. It would be better to work without someone looking over my shoulder.

  With its stuffed animals, knickknacks, and posters of wild animals with goofy captions, Lucy’s room was cloying. My eighteen-year-old sister, Hannah, would have deemed it “so junior high” and signed Lucy up for the Justin Bieber fan club. There was even a little vinyl pencil case on the desk in the shape of Hello Kitty, my nemesis. “So adorable,” my friend Natalie used to say. “And always happy, like you.” Was that my demeanor: vapid and cheerful? Really? That was what my friends thought of me? It was like walking down the street and seeing my own reflection for the first time in a shop window. I did tend to smile, but I had a lot more going on intellectually than a vacant feline cartoon.

  It took no time at all to bag and inventory the items from Lucy’s bathroom—the hairbrush and toothbrush. Closer inspection revealed nail clippings in the trash can under the sink, and I collected them in a bag, hoping that this victory was worth the gross factor. My mother’s voice clamored in my mind: I didn’t raise you to pick through strangers’ garbage.

  With enough for my DNA test, I looked through a few drawers, wondering if I might find a suicide note or at least some unhappy ramblings about Lucy wanting to end her life. After all, she’d raced out of here after a fight with her father, and there’d been no skid marks on the road, no sign of braking. Suicide was a possibility.

  The top drawer of her desk contained her wallet and a junk collection of tangled friendship bracelets, ear buds, earrings, coins, and ChapStick. Her license was in her wallet. The photo showed long brown hair and a smile glittering with braces. Sweet and mousey.

  One drawer contained a pile of scattered photos. I recognized the girl with the round dark eyes and sable hair in various lengths. Lucy Jameson’s head seemed large for her thin body, and those eyes . . . big eyes, like in those odd paintings. I noticed that she was the only girl in many of the photos, except for one pale-faced girl with wheat-colored hair. Where were Lucy’s friends? And why weren’t any of these photos framed or pasted up in a giant collage like the one covering my sister’s wall? I labeled a bag and sealed the photos inside. One fat drawer contained a French workbook and booklets of assignments for a physics class. Probably from homeschooling. Although they probably wouldn’t help, I put them in the box.

  The bottom drawer contained a glittery mask, nail polish, and ticket stubs from concerts in Portland and a few notes from her friends—girlfriends with names like Genesis and KT and D-Dawg. These were declarations of friendship, eternal support, and a deep understanding of what it’s like to “feel like the world is caving in on you.” Again, very junior high. Still, I collected the items in an evidence bag, marking down exactly what drawer I found them in. The academy instructors had hammered that lesson home: voucher everything. Once you left the scene, the integrity of your evidence became weaker.

  After I’d combed through the drawers and closets, I picked up the stuffed green dragon Kent Jameson had knocked to the floor. So many stuffed animals. Most were pristine—their fur shiny and smooth, barely a nap on them—except for two worn creatures: a round turtle with a pilly knit shell and a brown bear with a round head and a flat body that looked like someone had literally squeezed the stuffing out of it. Closer inspection revealed that the turtle had a hard bit of shell inside, like a cardboard box. I examined his flippers and found a zipper that ran from head to tail. Ah, yes. I remembered these. Animals that came stuffed with PJs inside.

  Except that Mr. Turtle contained a notebook. A diary of sorts, writing in a rough hybrid of printing and script. The penmanship wasn’t flowery, but here and there the author made capital letters into stars. A quick scan revealed a few poems and lofty observations of clouds and haunted tree limbs, but it would take me a while to peruse these pages. I added the notebook and the fuzzy turtle to the box of evidence.

  Out in the great room, Martha was reclining with her knees to her chest, a Pendleton blanket woven with navy, turquoise, and red wool over her legs. A mug was clasped in her hands, but her eyes were closed.

  Deciding to let her sleep, I moved quietly to the door.

  “Did you find everything you need?”

  Her voice surprised me. “Yes.” I turned back to her, lowering my box to the floor and reaching into a bag. “I found these photos in her room. Is this Lucy?” I pointed to the dark-haired waif.

  “That’s her. Her most recent haircut. She kept going shorter and shorter until that boyish cut. I don’t think she’s a lesbian, but she seemed to enjoy sporting the look.” She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and pressed a fist to her mouth. “Am I supposed to talk about her in past tense? Dear God, I don’t know what to do.”

  As if a switch had flipped, the snappish Martha Jameson had turned into a genuinely worried parent. Maybe she realized that she’d been blaming the messenger.

  “It’s difficult,” I said softly. “You know, there’s something else I want to ask. I know I have a million questions. But I’m wondering, what did they argue about? Lucy and her father?”

  “I didn’t hear all the details—I left the table to make some tea—but Lucy was wasted and Kent was trying some tough love. He’s usually a pushover, but he’s begun to see that something has to be done. He’s been trying to reel her in and get her to do something with her life. He was expressing concern over her lack of purpose. Her smoking and drinking.”

  “Sounds like a typical argument between a teenage girl and her parents.” I tried to sound conciliatory. “And Lucy is seventeen?”

  “Almost eighteen.” Martha’s lips thinned in disapproval. “But lacking in maturity. She dropped out of high school, supposedly to be homeschooled, though she has zero motivation.”

  “Who teaches her?”

  “She used to have a tutors, but she fired them one by one, insisting she could work independently. Our Lucy is a young rebel without a cause. She thinks she knows it all and pretends to reject society, but it’s so easy to make that claim when you have it all. Lucy lives in a comfortable little bubble. So do I, for that matter, but at least I admit it, and I’m grateful for the things I have. I held down two jobs for many years, put myself through nursing school, waited in the rain for buses because I couldn’t afford a car. So it’s hard to see someone so young without an ounce of motivation. Such an annoying spoiled brat.”

  A brutally honest assessment of the stepchild who had probably died tonight, but then sometimes grief brought good and bad memories simmering to the surface.

  “But I can’t say those things in front of Kent. He’s blind to the realities of his daughter. He was trying, but now . . . it may be too late, and I’m really worried about . . .”

  The thud of heavy footsteps on wood halted our conversation as the men returned.

  “I’m exhausted,” Kent announced. “Too fidgety to stay still, too tired to do my walking.” He collapsed on the sofa, and Martha left her chair to tuck her blanket over his lap. “What are we going to do, Martha?”

  She took his hand and lifted it to her lips, that nonverbal language of a couple, two people who still adored each other. The lieutenant told them we would return in the morning to interview their staff. “And please, if anything occurs to you, give me a call. Or let us know if Lucy returns. You never know with teenagers, right?” He gave them a card, and we headed out.

  The night air seemed colder here on the hill as we made our way out to the lieutenant’s Jeep.

  “Whi
le we’re here, let me just walk you around the lane.” Omak’s voice was a husky rumble in the night. “Chances are, you’ll be back tomorrow.” The sky had cleared, and scattered stars framed a wedge of moon that cast a silver sheen on the paving stones of the path. The lieutenant pointed out the buildings and cottages as we made a quick circle. I listened carefully and tried to memorize the layout of the little village. The guest houses and pool house here, the garages and clubhouse there. An indoor horse ring beside the path to the barn where they kept horses and alpacas. And, of course, Kent Jameson’s writing studio and Martha Jameson’s office.

  “Her office is as big as his,” I observed as we reached the end of our tour.

  “I suppose she’s got to manage the empire,” Omak said. “And she coordinates their charity foundation and donations. They do a lot for the community.”

  “They built our soccer fields when I was in junior high,” I said, immediately realizing it underscored the fact that I was a young rookie. Soccer fields! I sounded like a ten-year-old. As we approached the car, I added, “The Jamesons have always been generous.” I pulled out of the clearing and started prioritizing in my head. First get the DNA samples to the lab. While at forensics, check on the body at the morgue. Then, back at the precinct, get the evidence to the property clerk and check to make sure the car had been transported properly.

  “While I was off with Jameson, the chief called again,” the lieutenant interrupted my mental list. “He’s pulling out all the stops on this one, so the pressure’s on. I called in the medical examiner and lab tech so we can get things going. But the chief is worried about letting a rookie handle the case.”

  I swallowed, my throat growing dry at the prospect of watching my first investigation slip through my fingers. In a department the size of Sunrise Lake, we don’t have specified detectives. Instead, officers on patrol usually catch any cases that they handle during their shifts. Since all the officers are trained in investigative procedures, we’re all qualified to lead a case. “I’d really like to hold onto this case, Lou. I’m not afraid to talk to the Jamesons, and I know the procedure.”