by Robin Mahle
“Got it. So what did you come up with?” She sat down.
“Well, if that was Chloe’s folk’s house when she was in school, it isn’t anymore. In fact, no one lives there.”
“When did they sell it?”
“Doesn’t look like they ever owned it. It was a rental for some time. Now it’s just empty. The owner is someone out of Ohio. I’ll keep working that angle, but I can’t say if it helps us now, in our present situation.”
“Nothing back from the coroner for an ID?” she asked
“Afraid not. Poor girl’s body was so disfigured. Hell, he says they just got all the concrete off her. He doesn’t know if he can pull prints. Her fingers suffered pretty bad chemical burns. Damn near bare bones now.”
“For God’s sake,” Riley replied. “There has to be something more we can do, Captain.”
Ward pulled up and leaned over his desk, arms folded atop it. “Look, you know I hate asking you this kind of stuff, but a case like this…I’m starting to feel a little desperate for answers.”
“You want me to go to the rental house and see if I pick up anything?”
“Damn if I hate asking, but—yeah, that’s what I’m asking.”
“If it helps us to figure out who this girl is, then I’ll do it. I don’t have a problem with that and I wouldn’t expect for you to either.”
“It’s just. I know how it can—get to you sometimes.”
“Well, I’ll deal with that. I want to know who our victim is and who would’ve wanted her dead.”
“The house is vacant.”
“You want me to go now?”
“Take Pruitt with you. Bayliss is coming here for an update. Unless you want me to put him off and I can go with you?”
“No, but I’d rather go by myself.”
Ward regarded her. “Out of the question. I won’t have one of my officers out there alone. No, you go with Pruitt and let me know what you find.”
Riley nodded and returned to the bull pen, looking to Pruitt. “We’re heading out.”
“Wait? What?”
“Captain wants us to check out an address. He thinks it might have something to do with the Jane Doe.”
“Oh, okay. I’m ready. Let’s roll.”
The house was buried behind overgrown trees and shrubs, but it was a house Riley recognized almost immediately.
“Oh my gosh.” She put the patrol car into park and stared at the house.
“What? You get something already?”
“No, it’s not that. I recognize this house from when I was a kid. I didn’t pick up on the address. I guess it hadn’t occurred to me, but seeing it now...”
“So, what is this place to you?” Pruitt asked.
“After that night. You know…”
“The F4,” he added.
“Yeah. Well, my parents started sending me to a shrink. They thought it would help me cope with the gift. It had gotten really bad there for a while and it caused a lot of pain. Not just for me, but for a lot of people. Anyway, the doctor; she lived here, worked out of her house. I came here a couple of times a week for therapy. Wow. That was a long time ago.”
“And did it help?”
Riley looked at him. “Not really.” She pulled the keys from the ignition and started out the door. “Let’s check it out.”
Ethan joined her on the pathway toward the front door. “Um, not to state the obvious here, but how do we plan on getting in?”
“Ward said the current owners, who live in Ohio, had their management company drop off a key and leave it under the mat for us. So it should be,” she checked under the mat, “right here.” Riley retrieved the key and inserted it into the lock.
Upon opening the door, a waft of penned-up musty odor spilled out.
“Geez, this place reeks.” Ethan crinkled his nose as he followed Riley inside.
“Captain said it’s been empty for a long time. Don’t know why the owners haven’t been able to re-rent it or sell it. It’s just sitting here rotting away.”
“Well, just do your thing so we can get the hell out of here. I don’t want my uniform smelling like this crap shack.”
Riley pursed her lips. “It’s not that bad. Just start looking. I don’t know if I’ll get anything, but it’s better if you leave me alone for a few minutes.”
“Okay. I’ll start at the back and work my way up. You—just do your thing.” Ethan started down the hall toward the bedrooms.
Riley looked around. She remembered the office was on the right, next to the family room. It wasn’t a particularly large home, but at the time, when she was just a kid, it seemed pretty big. Bigger than hers anyway. She walked through to the family room. The place was completely empty—no furniture, no pictures, utterly void. This wasn’t going to be helpful. It was always easier if she had something personal to look at, to touch. But as she continued through the vacant home, it was starting to feel as though she wasn’t going to get anything and that they would be back at Square One.
It appeared as though the office had been used for another purpose by the last family who lived here. Could’ve been a game room or a rec room of some sort. It was definitely not an office anymore. Riley remembered built-in bookcases with tons of books on the shelves. All that was gone now. And she was getting absolutely nothing. Zilch. “Damn it. Come on. Chloe, you gotta help me here. I can’t find out what happened to you unless you can show me something.”
“You say something?” Ethan peeked his head through the arched opening.
Riley spun around “Huh? Good Lord, you scared me. Don’t sneak up on me like that.”
“Sorry. Just thought you’d be interested in something I found.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Come on back, I’ll show you.” Ethan started back into the hall toward the bedrooms.
Riley followed closely behind.
“It’s in here.” He entered one of the rooms. “The master is that one down there. This looks to be a secondary room.”
“A kid’s room,” she said.
“Yeah. I was searching for something, but as you can see, the place is empty.”
“Right, that’s what I’m seeing too.”
“Except for this.” He pulled open the closet door. “I don’t know if this’ll spark anything for you, but I thought you should come take a look for yourself.”
Riley peeked inside the small walk-in closet. “What am I looking at?”
“Behind the door.”
She pushed the door to reveal the backside. “Posters.”
“Yep. Looks like whoever lived here liked Ed Sheeran.”
Riley studied the poster of the young British singer who peered longingly at the camera to melt the heart of any teenage girl who hung it in her room. “Well, I can see how this was missed when the movers came.”
“That’s what I figured, behind the door and all. So, you getting anything from it?”
“Just give me a second. It’s not like it just happens.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’ll give you some space.” Ethan stepped out of the room.
Riley continued to peer at it. “Was this yours?” she whispered. “I like his music too. And he’s not bad-looking. Not exactly my type, but handsome enough.”
She placed her hand on the poster and closed her eyes. Scenes flashed in her mind’s eye. Two girls sitting on a bed in this very room, laughing, giggling, doing what young girls do. Teenage girls. But Riley couldn’t tell if one of them was Chloe Dawson. Even from the school photo, these girls just didn’t seem to match.
“Come on, Chloe, help me out,” Riley pleaded.
The scene changed. A girl stood at the closet, staring at the clothes, wondering what to wear. It was her. It was Chloe. Riley knew this without a doubt.
The girl turned to Riley, as though she saw her clear as day standing in the room. Riley flinched.
“You have to stop him,” the girl said.
“Who? Are you Chloe?”
“Stop him be
fore he hurts anyone else.” The girl began to fade from view.
“No. Wait. Chloe. Who hurt you? What happened?” But the image was gone. Riley opened her eyes and stepped out of the closet. She turned to see Ethan reappear in the doorway.
“What happened? I heard you talking.”
“It was her. I’m sure of it. I saw other girls, but then her. Maybe the others lived here after she did, I don’t know. But that was Chloe Dawson. And she’s the victim.”
“How can you be sure?”
“I just am.”
5
Inside Captain Ward’s office, Riley and Ethan waited for a response from their superior as he studied the images of the house from which the two had just returned.
“And you’re sure it’s her? Chloe Dawson?”
“I saw her, Captain,” Riley said. “As plain as I see you now. It was her. And she saw me. She told me I needed to stop him.”
“Stop who is the question,” Ward continued.
“Yes, sir. But now we can go back to the coroner and have him compare Chloe’s records against the Jane Doe. There’s no doubt in my mind that it will be a match.”
“What do you think, Pruitt? Do you agree with Riley?”
“I don’t have what she has, sir. But I’ll tell you one thing, when I see her confidence is unshakable, I don’t question it further.”
“I suppose not.” Ward pulled up in his chair. “I’ll make the call to the coroner. The question now is, given that she’d been away from Owensville for two years, why come back to town and who did she come back for?”
“If we find that out, Captain, then we’ll most likely know who the killer is,” Riley replied.
“Let’s keep doing the legwork on Chloe Dawson then,” Ward added, dismissing the two officers.
Riley and Ethan returned to the bullpen when Ethan asked, “how do you want to plan this out?”
“Once we get confirmation of her identity from the coroner, we’ll want to make contact with her parents. Now that we have the old lease agreement, tracking them down should be pretty straight-forward. ” Riley returned to her desk. “I’m going back to the high school.”
“What for?” Ethan asked.
“To get copies of the yearbooks for the years Chloe attended. I want to know who her friends were and if any of them are still in Owensville. If they are, she might’ve come to see one of them.” She grabbed her things. “I’ll be back soon. Do me a favor and let the captain know?”
“Will do.”
Riley was out the door, once again, and headed back to the school, her second visit in as many days. Only this time, she wasn’t going to see her brother. No more favors could be asked of him. She’d relied on Dillon far too often in the past. Maybe that was the job of the older brother, or maybe she’d taken him for granted. Either way, Riley needed to take charge of this investigation. The question of the identity of the dead girl had been resolved, at least in her mind, the formalities still being worked out. But that wasn’t going to stop her from getting to know Chloe better. Someone in town had to know her, and Riley needed names.
The school was just ahead and Riley pulled into the student drop-off area. She parked her patrol car and stepped out, heading toward the administration office. While on-duty, she kept her hair pulled back in a short ponytail. Her uniform rested on her frame in a rather bulky manner, which was enhanced by the holster belt. But unlike her younger years, Riley no longer felt uncomfortable in her skin. She’d long ago stopped worrying that she wasn’t thin enough or pretty enough, because in light of what she’d seen in her few years on this planet, and especially the last fifteen, it was completely inconsequential.
The secretary behind the desk buzzed Riley in as she waited at the doors. “Well hello again, Officer Thompson. Are you here to see Mr. Thompson?”
“Afternoon. No, ma’am. I’m here for another reason.”
“Oh. I see. Well, what is it that I can do for you today?”
“I was wondering if the school retained copies of old yearbooks. Specifically, within say the past five to seven years?”
“As a matter of fact, we do keep copies of the previous ten years in the library. Anything older than that would be in the archives at the district office.”
“Don’t suppose I could go take a look at them?” Riley asked.
“I don’t see why not. You remember where the library is?”
“I sure do. Thanks very much.” Riley left the main office and walked through the halls of her former high school. It hadn’t changed much since she graduated some seven years ago. And she remembered exactly where the library was located. She’d spent a lot of time there. After learning to control her gift, she started to read books about telepathy, clairvoyance, which in this library was limited, but it was all she had access to at the time. Of course, now she just ordered books off of Amazon if she wanted to read something. Not that she had much time for that anymore.
Inside the library, everything was as she remembered it. In fact, the computers still looked to be the same as they were seven years ago—yikes. Maybe once this new plant came online and added lots of jobs, tax revenues would help improve the school. If not, perhaps she should help host a fundraiser to get these kids some decent learning tools.
“Good afternoon, officer. Can I help you with something?” The school’s librarian was new. The lady Riley remembered had passed away a few years ago. This woman was much younger, perhaps only in her thirties.
“Yes, I’m Officer Riley Thompson. I was just in the front office and inquired about yearbook copies.”
“Certainly. They’re just over there along the back wall, second shelf from the bottom.”
“Thank you.” Riley made her way to the back of the room and spotted the books. She retrieved the years in question and made her way to a nearby table.
The books were laden with dust, and as she opened what would have been Chloe Dawson’s senior yearbook, Riley blew off the grime and combed through the pages for the girl’s name inside.
The senior photos were in alphabetical order, which made the search easy. Riley picked out Chloe’s picture almost immediately, but that wouldn’t tell her the whole story. She needed to know what clubs the girl belonged to, what groups of friends she sat with in the cafeteria. These were the things she needed to unearth in order to know more about this girl who turned up dead, forced to eat liquid concrete.
Riley continued to peruse the pages of the yearbook. She checked the drama club. No luck. The varsity cheerleaders. Still no luck. It wasn’t until she spotted the girl standing behind a table displaying homemade baked goods that she figured out Chloe’s interests. It was the Glee Club. Chloe was a singer and they’d been raising money with a bake sale. The idea made Riley feel somehow worse. That the girl perhaps aspired to be a singer someday and now that day would never come.
With her phone, Riley snapped pictures of the pages in the yearbook along with whoever was with Chloe at that bake sale. A few other random pictures had been taken around the school grounds where the kids hung out before or after class: the lockers, the common areas. And she jotted down the names of the students who appeared to be her friends.
In the earlier yearbooks, only a few images of Chloe appeared. None included any extracurricular activities. Maybe she joined Glee Club in her senior year. A question to raise to Pruitt. When had Chloe’s family moved to Owensville? Why had they rented? Riley couldn’t ignore a possible family connection to Chloe’s death either. Right now, they couldn’t afford to overlook anything.
When Riley arrived back at the station, she noticed Jacob’s car. “Damn.” He always had a way of taking Riley by surprise. And while that was endearing when they were younger—and dating—it was not the case now. Especially when she was working a homicide investigation and was vulnerable to his presence.
She pushed open the door and stepped out of her car. There he was, smiling sheepishly, knowing he shouldn’t keep showing up at her place of employment, dragging
along the baggage he brought with him. As she approached the entrance, she began, “Hey, you’re back.”
Jacob held the door for her as they entered the station. “I was hoping we could grab some lunch? Is this a bad time?”
Riley caught Ethan rolling his eyes as they walked inside. “We are pretty busy right now, Jacob.”
“Right. Yeah. Well, how about dinner? I’d really like to talk to you, Riley—please.”
She caved in to his will, as usual. “Sure. Dinner would be fine.”
Jacob’s spirits appeared raised by the acceptance of his invitation. “Great. Okay. I can pick you up at your place around seven?”
“Sure. I really need to get back to work, but I’ll see you tonight, seven o’clock.”
“Great. I’ll see you then.” He turned to Ethan. “See you later, Ethan.”
“See ya, sport.”
After Jacob left, Riley looked at Ethan. “Sport?”
“After what that guy did to you, you’re going to have dinner with him?”
“He left town, like most everyone else. Can’t blame him for trying to better himself.” She was convincing herself of this, more than anything. “Besides, it’s just dinner. Calm down, I’m not marrying him.”
“Not yet,” he muttered.
“Anyway, on to more important things. I have the names of the kids who I think hung around with Chloe Dawson back in school. I found them in a lot of the yearbook photos together. We should see if any of them still live in town. How’d you fare with the background check?”
“Prior to their move to Owensville, the parents lived in Indianapolis. Her father, David, and mother, Elizabeth, both worked in the medical fields. I don’t know why they moved around or came to Owensville, for that matter. I did find what I believe is a current address. They live in Muncie. That’s all I have right now.”
“Did you let the captain know you found her parents?”