“What’s up?” Kim Pershing asked from her desk several feet away. Bill was sitting right behind him, too, and Ramsey felt the other man’s stare boring into his back. Just because his workaholic mentor had recently succumbed to love didn’t mean Ramsey was going to follow suit. His and Bill’s personal lives were completely different.
“I’m not sure,” he said. But he knew it wasn’t good.
“Something to do with one of your missing-child cases?”
They shared any and all information to do with current cases. As a team, any of them could be called in to work any of the cases assigned to their squad.
“Yeah,” he said, itching to get up and call Lucy. “Out of jurisdiction.”
“Something to do with that young lady you had in here a while back?” Bill asked.
“She’s a detective,” he said, hoping his peers would take the hint and leave him the hell alone.
“So you said.”
“In Aurora, Indiana, didn’t you say?” Kim asked.
“Yes.”
The other woman looked hurt and Ramsey wanted to swear again.
“You give her rain checks, too?”
He couldn’t believe Kim had said the words in front of Bill. And didn’t want to hurt her further, either. He liked her. Respected her. Enjoyed working with her.
“Nope. But I would have if she’d asked me to do anything outside of work.” They were going to a wedding together that weekend, but Frank Whittier was going to be there. They would definitely be working. Everything he and Lucy did together pertained to work.
“You really meant it when you said you don’t date cops.”
“Yep.”
She tilted her head, the red curls falling over one shoulder to cover her breast. “Why is that?”
“Slow morning, Pershing?” Bill harrumphed from behind him.
“What we do here could mean the difference between life and death. We have to stay completely focused.” Ramsey answered Kim because he liked her and respected her and he wanted to be able to continue to enjoy working beside her. “Emotions are messy. The two don’t mix.”
A small smile formed at the corners of her mouth and Ramsey considered himself forgiven for any past hurts where she was concerned. He waited only long enough for the call to come through from the forensic team down at the tunnel— and then he was out of there.
He had Lucy on the line before he’d exited the building.
“What was the deal?”
“Wakerby had information on an unsolved cop murder from thirty years ago. Kept the news to himself to use as collateral if he ever ended up in jail. He told the D.A. what he knew in exchange for bail.”
It was worse than he’d expected. Foregoing his car, Ramsey headed around the block and down the street where, a couple of miles farther, the ocean beckoned. “So he’s out?”
“He will be. On a bracelet. As soon as they confirm his info. Amber was able to get that much out of the deal. But he’s obviously pretty confident he’s going to beat the charges or he’d have saved the info for a plea deal.”
He’d already reached the same conclusion. “Or he’s planning to skip.”
The bracelet made it harder, not impossible.
“Either way, it’s not good news.”
“I just heard from the experts down in the tunnel. The department paid for the search, by the way. The team came up with nothing but theories.”
“Anything new?”
“No, just scientific measurements and estimations to lead them to believe exactly as we do that Claire was removed from the area through the east end of the tunnel. The park has been there more than thirty years. It went in before the houses in the area. They took a sample of the water to match against any evidence we might find that was postabduction. Some of the microscopic residue found in that water will be indigenous to that tunnel so anyone or anything that’s traveled through it could bear traces of the residue.”
“Anyone who’s still carrying residue for twenty-five years would also be carrying one hell of a stench.”
He laughed. On the job. But quickly sobered. “I think I might have enough to get a warrant to search Colton’s home.” The day was sunny. Unseasonably warm for mid-November in Massachusetts. And his suit coat was still not enough to take away all of the chill in the air.
“His truck?”
“And all of his belongings.”
“What about Frank Whittier? Are you going to try for another out-of-state warrant to get into his house?”
“Yes, but since I know it’s unlikely that I’ll get approval before the wedding, I’m going to wait until next week to put in the request. The Whittiers think they’re free and clear. We stand a better chance of finding out something at the wedding if they continue to feel safe.”
“It will be a little trickier to get a judge to issue against Frank since Jack established his alibi.”
He walked faster. Harder. Keeping himself warm. “But once I establish reasonable cause on Jack, I can possibly discredit his alibi enough to at least get the warrant.”
“You’re closing in on this one, Ramsey.”
He was starting to feel it, too. But at the moment, he had something more pressing on his mind.
“I’ve been waiting to hear about the bone.”
“They found enough bones in the area to call it a skeleton. Less than two years of age. At least fifteen years postmortem. They don’t think it’s Allie. We might know more later tonight.”
Her words were deadpan. Because she was in complete control? Or so fragile she was clamping down on all emotion?
“I put in a call to Lori,” she continued with complete professionalism and absolutely no indication in her pronunciation that she’d had a mouth injury just two days before. “I asked her to run Claire’s DNA again and to check it against Frank Whittier’s. I just need you to get a sample of Frank’s DNA to her.”
Ramsey had the sample in evidence. “What are you thinking?” He’d do what she asked without hesitation; he just wanted to be along for the ride.
“That maybe Frank is Claire’s biological father. Rose was married at the time Claire was born—naturally she’d put her husband down as her child’s father. But what if she and Frank had already been seeing each other? And what if she’d told him, just before Claire was abducted, that she was breaking things off with him, that she didn’t want to marry him? She sure was quick to persecute him after the fact—and to terminate the relationship. Maybe he’d planned to take Claire all along, but the plan went bad when Cal reported having seen her in Frank’s car.”
He was still a mile from the ocean and cold as hell. With one hand in his pocket, he turned back toward his car. “But if he was going to go to all of the trouble of stealing his child, wouldn’t he also try to raise her?”
“Maybe that was the original plan. He could’ve planned to hide her away with the intention of hanging around through all the interrogations, playing the part of the grieving stepfather and then, by the time the case went cold and he and Rose were at odds he’d cut his losses, take Cal and go. And meet up with whoever had Claire. If there was another woman, he’d then pretend Claire was her daughter and take the child on as his own—like a stepdaughter. If he wasn’t a suspect, no one would be looking at him anyway. It would seem that he’d just moved on with his life. Except that Cal skipped school, saw Claire in his dad’s car and told the police before Frank cold stop him.”
“He’d have to have a pretty convincing explanation for Cal about why Claire was suddenly living with them and they weren’t telling her mother she’d been found.”
“Look at how many cases we see where a child remains silent. It wouldn’t have been far-fetched for Frank to believe he could scare Cal into silence or convince him that Rose was somehow bad. Or gone. Even killed. In a car accident or something. How would a seven-year-old boy know any differently? Then Cal skips school, sneaks home, sees Claire in his dad’s car. He talks to the police before Frank gets t
o him, and the gig is up. Except that Frank already has Claire stashed away someplace.”
Ramsey’s blood started to heat up. So much so that he slowed down his pace. “Right. Cal had asked if he could stay home that day. Begged, from the way I understand it. And Frank had been adamant about the boy going to school.”
“Yep. The police talked to Cal before Frank even knew that the boy wasn’t in school. Before he’d been informed that Claire was missing. Before he could get to Cal to convince him not to tell the police what he saw.”
“You might be on to something, Luce. Great work.”
“I just got to thinking about what you said about Jack being a blackmailer. What if it’s both? What if Frank has his original plan. He waits until Cal leaves for school, Emma’s in her room getting ready and Rose is on the phone. Then he takes Claire. Jack sees him with Claire, thinks nothing of it at the time. Then Frank’s plan is foiled. Jack sees it on the news, remembers noticing the child and tries to blackmail him to keep silent, and Frank agrees to pay with the caveat that Jack help him hide Claire away until he can figure out what to do. Obviously if he’s a suspect, he can’t get back to Claire later. He would have known at that point after his plan fell apart, that no one had ID’d Jack’s truck in the area.”
Ramsey walked, but was no longer seeing his surroundings. “And Jack just happens to know about Gladys Buckley,” he takes up. “He hears Frank’s troubles and offers to get Claire into a good and loving home. Frank has to think of Cal now, too, about what will happen to his seven-year-old boy if he goes to prison. He figures that at least this way both of his children are being raised in good and loving homes—”
“Or maybe, when Jack approaches Frank he gives him no choice. Maybe part of the blackmail is that Frank turns over Claire so that Jack can sell her to Gladys, and Frank agrees for the very same reasons you just gave.”
“We may be on to something here, Lucy.”
“I think so, too.”
“I’ll get the sample on its way to Lori within the hour.”
“I’ll text you the address and let her know it’s coming.”
“Good.”
“Okay.”
Things were getting awkward. His butt was cold. And he was low on patience.
“I’m looking forward to seeing you.”
“Yeah, me, too.”
He still felt awkward. Worse, he didn’t mind feeling awkward if she’d look at him the way Kim Pershing did.
And that was why Ramsey hung up without saying another word.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
L ucy knew the second that she walked into work on Wednesday and Lionel, Todd and Amber Locken all watched her come toward them that something bad had happened.
“What?” she asked, dropping her purse on the top of her desk. Todd wasn’t supposed to be there. He wasn’t on shift. She was.
“Come into my office, Lucy,” Lionel said. Like an automaton she walked into his office, not sure who was following her. Just Lionel?
It was Lionel and Todd. Todd was the last one in the room and shut the door behind him.
“Have a seat,” the plainclothed captain said.
She did. And wondered why they hadn’t just had whatever conversation they were about to have in the squad room. It was obvious Amber Locken knew what was going to happen, and she was the only other one on their small team of four.
Lionel stood behind his desk. Todd sat beside her. All neat and proper like. Protocol was protocol.
Her gray pants weren’t her favorite. She should have worn her favorite.
Lionel picked up a file.
The whole morning had turned into a slow-motion film.
“What’s up?” Her voice sounded surprisingly normal.
Lionel hesitated. She had a doctor’s appointment in an hour, to get her stiches out. If Lionel didn’t hurry up, they might have to postpone this little meeting until after lunch.
Lucy was just thinking that she liked the sound of that when Lionel interrupted her with, “We identified the body you found.”
“And?” She was fine, sitting there. All professional and fine.
“It’s Allie, Luce. I’m so sorry.”
She nodded. It was okay. Really. Not sure if she spoke out loud, she nodded again. She’d been prepared for this moment for a long time. The chances of Allie being found at all, after being gone so long, were minuscule. That she’d be found alive even less so.
She opened her mouth to speak and nothing came out. Coughing, she tried again and managed, “Cause of death?”
“Hard to tell for sure, but…are you sure you want to know this?” Lionel asked. And then, sitting down, he said, “Of course you do. The skull was broken, severely crushed.”
“He bashed in her head.”
“Someone did.”
“He did it,” Lucy said, clearly, succinctly. “He is going to pay for this, Lionel.”
“I’m already on it, Luce.” Todd spoke for the first time. “We’re bringing back all the dirt that surrounded the body. We’re going to go through every single grain until we find some of that bastard’s DNA. If he scraped a finger and left even a small piece of skin or a drop of sweat on any of the bones… You sweat when you dig. Chances are some of it dripped. We’re cleaning the bones now. We’ll find something.”
“We’re thinking maybe the rape took place in the same area. If we could question your mother we might…”
Lucy shook her head. “Not now at any rate.” She’d just lost Allie. She wasn’t going to lose Sandy, too.
“How sure are you that the bones are Allie’s?” They didn’t have her sister’s DNA. And Allie hadn’t broken any bones prior to having been abducted. There were no identifying marks or any dental records.
“We matched the DNA from the bone samples to your mother’s DNA. Which they had for the rape case. The match isn’t conclusive, but there are enough similarities to make a legal positive ID.”
She nodded again. Unless Sandy had had another baby who’d been buried in those woods, the body she found was Allie’s.
“You did amazing work on this one, Lucy. You’re a good cop.” Lionel was clearly at a loss for words. But if she heard those words again, she was going to puke.
She was tired of hearing what a great cop she was.
She wanted to be more than a good cop.
What she’d wanted was a happy ending to a lifelong quest. She’d wanted her mother to be healthy. She wanted to find the joy that everyone else seemed to take for granted.
And they’d just nipped that one in the bud.
“M iller? There’s someone outside asking for you.” Bill’s voice came from behind Ramsey late Wednesday morning. His associate was coming back into the office from a homeinvasion call.
“Who is it?” Ramsey asked, not looking up from the list of phone numbers he was perusing. Jack Colton’s personal cell-phone calls. He was in possession of a warrant to go through the man’s truck and apartment, too. He just had to find him, first.
And didn’t like the fact that he couldn’t. Colton wasn’t answering his cell. Ramsey didn’t believe for one second that that was a coincidence.
“Cal Whittier. He says you know him.” Bill didn’t know him. Because Cal was one of the cold cases Ramsey was pursuing on his own time. He kept up his share of the team work. And his team left him alone to do the rest without complaint.
Ramsey had thought, a time or two, that Bill might have been willing to help him a bit with the cold cases, on his own time, too. He might have asked, if he hadn’t met Lucy.
“I know him,” Ramsey said, putting the pages in front of him back in their folder, and locking the information in the top drawer of his desk. He grabbed his navy suit coat—the only suit he hadn’t dropped at the cleaners that morning—off the back of his chair, tightened the tie he’d loosened, tapped on Bill’s desk as he passed by and went out to greet the son of one of his prime suspects.
“Lucy, you’re sure you’re okay?” Amber stoo
d beside Lucy’s desk, her eyes filled with more compassion than Lucy had ever seen.
“I’m fine.” She was writing up a report on the dig from the other night. The discovery of the bone.
She’d tried to call Ramsey, but he hadn’t picked up. And that was just as well.
Todd had gone home and Lionel was in his office with the door closed, which left the two women alone.
Pulling her chair over, Amber sat down at the side of Lucy’s desk.
“Listen, there’s a fine line between having what it takes to do the job, and going nuts to do the job.”
Lucy didn’t want to hear it. She was not going nuts. And if Amber thought she was going to convince her she had a screw loose, then she could save her breath.
“You’re a woman, Luce. You deal with things differently than a man would. That’s okay. It doesn’t make you any less capable as a cop.”
Where, a second ago, Lucy had been ready and able to speak her mind loud and clear, she suddenly couldn’t speak. She looked at Amber and prayed that she wasn’t going to cry.
Amber’s hand covered hers. “We’ve got a tough gig here, holding our own with the men whose ability to do the job isn’t questioned beyond physicals and test scores. If we show emotion, we’re weak.”
If Lucy showed emotion it scared Sandy to death. Unless it was hurt feelings from liking a guy who didn’t like her back. Or fear of the first day of school.
“But the truth is, Lucy, what makes us a valuable asset to the team is the differences we bring to the investigations. You, in particular, your ability to understand people, to get inside and know what makes them tick, that’s a real talent, Lucy. Most of us just guess based on personality profiles and experience, which is all good, but you…you’ve got an edge on us that makes any team you’re on lucky to have you.”
She listened. And she believed. She just wasn’t sure how much she cared at the moment.
“But if you lose your ability to feel, your femininity, the nurturing that comes so naturally to you, you’re going to lose that edge.”
Maybe. And maybe that was as it should be. Maybe she wouldn’t always be a cop. Maybe she just didn’t know who she was at the moment.
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