“The rest of the night was a bit foggy,” Jill continued. “I hooked up with this guy-I don’t even know his name.” Tears started again. “I can’t believe I did that, just anonymous sex, and I didn’t know him. We went back to his apartment and did things I barely remember. I felt sick for days, but Alanna was dead.”
“Was there anyone at these parties who you knew? By name?”
“Not really-I mean, I might have known names that night, but I don’t remember.”
“What about someone who Alanna talked about who you didn’t know?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Someone Alanna mentioned as inviting her to the parties?”
She shook her head.
“What about her cousin?”
“Whitney.”
“Whitney Andrews?”
“I don’t know, she has a different last name. I only met her a couple times.”
Suzanne made note and asked, “What about a boyfriend? You’d told the detective that Alanna wasn’t seeing anyone specific. Was that true?”
“She didn’t have a boyfriend.”
“What about someone who showed her more interest than she wanted?”
“Alanna liked it when guys flirted with her. I know it makes it sound like she was a slut, and maybe she was kind of, but you didn’t know her, and I don’t want people thinking bad things about her.”
“I don’t think anything bad about Alanna or any of the other victims. My job is to find out who killed her and put him in prison for the rest of his life. Who Alanna was or what she did is not important to me beyond relevance in this case. What about an ex-boyfriend?”
“She had one guy in high school, Zach Correli, who was a year older than us. He went to college in Maine. When they broke up, I don’t think she was heartbroken, and neither was he.”
But it was something Suzanne needed to look into. If Correli wasn’t in New York when Alanna was killed, it should be easy to prove.
“One more thing,” Suzanne said. “Did Alanna have a job? Someplace where she might have met someone you didn’t? Maybe volunteer work, or part-time. Detective Panetta didn’t have anything listed except that she was a full-time student.”
“She didn’t have a job while in college. I worked part-time on campus for my scholarship. Her parents had a college fund for her. She’s never really been broke.”
“Last thing. This might be a little hard, but I’d like to show you the pictures of the other three victims, to see if you know them.”
She showed the photos to Jill one by one. There was no recognition until she saw Jessica Bell. “She looks familiar. She’s dead?”
“Last weekend.”
“Oh, God.”
“Do you know who she is?”
Jill shook her head. “She just looks familiar. Maybe I had a class with her, or I saw her somewhere.”
“Maybe at the Halloween party?”
“Maybe.” Jill frowned. “I honestly don’t know.”
“That’s okay. You did great, and I really appreciate your honesty.” Suzanne put the photographs back in the folder, then took Jill’s hands and squeezed them. “Don’t live in the past. I know you harbor a lot of regret and guilt. But I can tell you that it’ll eat you up if you let it. I think you should go to that Pennsylvania college. Alanna wouldn’t want you stuck in limbo.”
Suzanne handed Jill her card. “If you remember anything else, or just want to talk, call me.”
She left, and because she was in Hamden she stopped by the Andrewses’ house two blocks from where Jill lived. At first she thought no one was home, then a woman in her seventies answered the door. “Yes?”
“Hello, I’m Special Agent Madeaux from New York. I’m sorry to bother you, but I was in town and had a question.”
The woman’s face clouded. “About Alanna?”
“Yes, ma’am. Actually about her cousin, Whitney.”
“Whitney.” The woman sighed. “Is she in trouble?”
“No, not that I know of. But I was told that she and Alanna were close and I haven’t spoken to her yet regarding Alanna’s murder. Do you have her current address and phone number?”
“Yes. Wait here, please.” She closed the door. Several moments later she returned with a piece of paper with shaky writing. Whitney Morrissey, Brooklyn, and a number. “I don’t have her address, but her mother told me she was living in Brooklyn now. She’s an artist, very good, too. Goes to art shows all the time. But it’s a hard way to make a living.”
“Thank you for this.”
“I know what they said about my granddaughter-but I’m not going to remember that. Alanna was a sweet girl. She never hurt anyone. Never. She played cards with me every Sunday night.” Tears welled in the lady’s eyes. “I have fourteen grandchildren, and Alanna is the only one who always remembered my birthday.” She looked sharply at Suzanne. “You don’t know who hurt my granddaughter, do you?”
“Not yet, ma’am, but finding out is my number one priority.”
TWELVE
When Sean and Lucy left Washington at seven in the morning it was raining steadily. As they drove north, the rain slacked off, and by the time they hit the New Jersey border it was nothing but scattered showers and occasional gusts of wind. They were on 495 heading east toward Manhattan and Lucy couldn’t help but stare at the approaching landscape of skyscrapers.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t been to New York City,” Sean said.
She shook her head, awestruck.
“And how long have you lived in D.C.?”
“Six years. But I’ve been busy.”
“I wish the weather had been better so I could fly you in. It’s even better from the sky.”
Lucy felt she already knew New York from movies and television, but the sheer vastness of concrete and roads and buildings leading up to the city was overwhelming. The closer she got to Manhattan, the more she marveled at the ingenuity. She also felt apprehension about the population. “Aren’t there eight million people here?”
“That’s in the entire city, and I think it’s about 8.5 million now. Manhattan is under two million, but has the highest density.”
“And you know this off the top of your head.”
“Useless trivia,” Sean said.
Though D.C. was dense, it didn’t have miles of towering buildings, a seemingly never-ending concrete city. The architecture of New York intrigued Lucy: Some buildings were simple and bland, others old and ornate. New and old, big and small, all pushed together into something that should have been ugly but was surprisingly beautiful.
“This isn’t our weekend away,” Sean said.
She glanced at him. “I know.”
“Just want to make that clear. Though we’ll probably be here all weekend, it’s business, not pleasure.”
Lucy didn’t say anything because they were entering a tunnel. She grabbed Sean’s thigh.
“What?”
“I don’t like tunnels.”
“You take the D.C. Metro all the time.”
“It’s not the same.”
She didn’t tell him why. She didn’t want to remember being chained in the hull of a ship, not knowing where she was going, not being in control. Being raped had been only the worst part of the trauma of those two days. Fears she’d never imagined had planted themselves in the hours before the vicious attack, growing exponentially until she thought she’d lose her mind before she died. Now, while she kept her emotions under tight control, the fears sat dormant until times like this, when she was trapped in a long tunnel deep under the Hudson River.
“This is the Lincoln Tunnel,” Sean said, putting a hand over one of hers. “Truly a feat of engineering. Three tunnels servicing around 120,000 vehicles a day.”
“I know what you’re trying to do. I’ll be okay.” She swallowed. “I would appreciate it if you’d keep both hands on the steering wheel.”
Sean turned on the stereo and pressed one of the six numbers. A CD slipped into p
lace and Led Zeppelin burst through the speakers.
“It’s been a long time since I rock and rolled,” Sean bellowed with Robert Plant.
A car braked suddenly in front of them and Lucy bit back a yelp. Sean downshifted so quickly she didn’t see him take his hand off the steering wheel. She thought she heard him mutter, “Asshole,” but with the loud music she wasn’t sure.
Three minutes later they emerged from the tunnel into traffic. Sean maneuvered as if he had been a New York City cab driver in a previous life.
Lucy had learned in the short time she’d been involved with Sean that his car was an extension of himself, and she resisted the urge to ask him if he knew where they were going. He had customized his GPS, which he trusted as if it could drive the car without him.
Lucy had been impressed with the architecture from their approach, but now she was truly in awe, tilting her head to see as much as possible. It took them fifteen minutes to reach the Upper West Side, where Columbia University was located. Sean pulled over in a loading zone outside a huge church. Lucy stared. “I’ve heard of this place-that’s St. John the Divine.”
“If we’re here on Sunday, maybe you’ll want to go to church there.”
“It’s Episcopal, not Catholic, but I’ve heard it’s exquisite. They recently renovated it.”
“How about this-when you’re done talking to Jessica, I’ll meet you here. I hope to be back from Brooklyn before the rush hour, but if not, this place looks big enough to keep you entertained.”
Lucy glanced at the alarming mass of traffic around them. “You mean this isn’t rush hour?”
Sean grinned, then kissed her. “Be careful, Luce. We don’t know exactly what’s going on. Let me know what you find out.”
Driving to New York, they’d agreed that Lucy would go to Jessica’s apartment, talk to her if possible, or if she wasn’t there, talk to her neighbors. She also planned to show Kirsten’s photo around and find out if anyone had seen her this past week. Sean would head to Brooklyn and check out the Clover Motel, since Kirsten had called there the day she disappeared. Both would be on the lookout for Trey. Sean had enhanced and printed a photo of Trey off the high school website so Lucy was familiar with his appearance.
“I plan to return in less than three hours, but if something comes up and I’m following a lead, stay here,” Sean told her.
“I’ll be just fine. I’m not helpless.”
“Helpless? Hardly.” He kissed her. “Just be careful.”
“You, too. Even Rogans aren’t invincible.”
Sean put one hand to his chest in mock disgust. “That’s a nasty rumor to spread.”
She smiled and put her hand on the door.
“One more thing.” He reached into his pocket and took out a leather business card holder.
“What’s this?” She opened it. Inside were Rogan-Caruso-Kincaid business cards with the gold embossed logo of a sword and shield in the corner. Her name and phone number were printed in the center. “What? How?”
“My computer. I had a few sheets of blank cards printed when Patrick and I had our cards made. I thought if you need to hand them out, it would look more official. You’d be amazed what people tell private investigators.”
“Thanks.” She didn’t know what to think. She didn’t work for RCK, but seeing the makeshift cards was a visual reminder that she hadn’t gotten into the FBI and had no real identity.
“Hey, they’re supposed to be a good thing, not make you sad.”
She smiled. “They’re great. Thanks.” She put them in her satchel and put the strap over her neck and across her chest. “Three hours, meet here at the cathedral. Check.”
Lucy got out and watched Sean pull into traffic.
Weather permitting, D.C. was a walking town, but New York was D.C. times a hundred. More people, more buildings, more traffic. Lucy looked at her phone and the map she’d retrieved of the three square blocks immediately around her. Jessica’s apartment was on the right, a block and a half straight ahead down West 112th Street. Lucy wished she had more time to enjoy her first trip to New York City, but maybe after they found Kirsten and got her home, she and Sean could come back for a weekend.
It wasn’t as if she had anything else to do.
“Stop it,” she muttered. She took a deep breath and resolved not to feel sorry for herself. She hadn’t been an FBI agent when she’d helped trap pedophiles for WCF or when she’d analyzed cold cases for the Arlington Sheriff’s Department. She could help Sean and Patrick find a runaway now, because nothing had changed in her.
She kept telling herself that, because deep down she didn’t believe it.
Jessica’s seven-story apartment building had a fire escape going up the side like in the movies, and Lucy spent a few minutes looking up and wondering what the view would be from the roof. While Lucy had a fear of confining places, she had no fear of heights.
But figuring out how to get to the roof wasn’t in the cards now. She suspected that, for security reasons, the fire escape could be lowered only from above, and even if she stood on a parked car she couldn’t reach the bottom rung of the ladder.
The building had a small entry with mailboxes and call buttons. She couldn’t go upstairs without having a key or being let in by a tenant. Of course, if Sean were here, he could probably bypass the electrical system, but Lucy preferred more clearly legal methods. If Jessica wasn’t here, she might be able to get in through a neighbor.
She pressed 406, Jessica’s apartment. When she didn’t think anyone was going to answer and was about to try another bell, a breathless female voice said, “Hello?”
“Jessica?”
The girl didn’t say anything, but the door buzzed and Lucy entered and walked upstairs.
A petite brunette stood in the doorway of apartment 406. She wasn’t Jessica Bell, unless Jessica used a completely different photo for her Party Girl profile.
“Hi, I’m Lauren, Jessie’s roommate.” The girl bit her lip, then said, “I’m sorry you haven’t heard, but Jessie’s dead.”
Lucy must have looked like she was in shock, because Lauren invited her in. “Can I get you some water?”
“No, thank you,” Lucy said. “I’m Lucy Kincaid, and-”
“I’ve had so many people calling, now that the police released her name. I’m sorry you had to hear it like this. Were you in a class with her?”
“No, I don’t know Jessica personally,” Lucy said.
Lauren frowned, so Lucy pushed on. She handed Lauren one of her RCK cards and said, “I’m looking for a runaway who was friends with Jessica. I was hoping that Jessica would know where she is.”
“A runaway?” Lauren asked, skeptical.
“Yes.” Lucy took out a paper that Sean had printed with two photographs of Kirsten, her senior portrait and a more glamorous picture of her from the Party Girl site, though it wasn’t risque. “Have you seen her in the last week or so?”
“Ashleigh,” Lauren said. “She stayed here a couple of times when I went home to visit my parents.”
The excitement of being right gave Lucy a thrill. “What about last weekend?”
Lauren shook her head. “Jessica was killed by the Cinderella Strangler last weekend. At least, that’s what the police think. It’s awful.”
“The Cinderella Strangler?”
“You had to have heard, it’s been in the papers for months. The killer takes a shoe. It’s weird, and I didn’t really think about it, but now that Jessie’s dead, it’s so real, and much scarier.”
“I’m from Washington,” Lucy said, tapping the address on the business card. “What did the police say?”
“They don’t know anything, at least that’s what the newspapers said. No leads, nothing.”
Lucy had a hundred questions about the murders, but Lauren wasn’t the right person to ask. Instead, she said, “Do you have a paper I can see?”
“No, I read it online. The Post had a big thing on the murders yesterday.”
“I don’t know. I don’t have classes on Friday and usually leave by noon to go home. I’m not really into the weekend scene here. Jessie was more into the parties and stuff. But Jessie’s friend Josh knows Ashleigh. He told me the police talked to him about Jessie, because Josh sometimes goes out with her. They weren’t really dating, but he’s been so upset about what happened he hasn’t left his apartment since Wednesday. I made him a tray of tamales. I was going to bring them up, but I feel kind of weird.”
“I can do it for you,” Lucy said. “I need to talk to him. Ashleigh might be in trouble, and I need all the information I can get to find her.”
“Was she out with Jessie Saturday night?”
“We think so, or they were supposed to meet.”
“Oh, God, that’s awful.”
Lauren handed Lucy the tamales, and directed her to Josh Haynes’s apartment on the top floor. She walked up the stairs while pondering what could have happened last Saturday. What if Kirsten had seen her friend murdered? Her message could have been so odd because she was still in shock. Or if she’d been drugged, she might not know what she had seen. But if the killer saw her, he might be looking for her.
She had to talk to Sean, but first she needed to get up to speed on the murders and talk to Jessica’s boyfriend. She stood in the hallway outside Josh’s apartment and used her phone to search for the article Lauren had mentioned. She read it carefully, committing the details to memory.
Four young women, two of whom had been students at Columbia University, appeared to have been killed by the “Cinderella Strangler,” who suffocated them and took one of their shoes. There was no mention of sexual assault, but the paper also didn’t state that the victims hadn’t been sexually assaulted. The police traditionally held back key details from the media and public in order to prevent copycats and help them know if they had the real killer when they found a suspect. Lucy was surprised the detail about the missing shoe had been released. She would have held that back. Perhaps the sexual assault wasn’t revealed because of the manner of death or specific violence done to the body.
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