“No, it still shows the same location.”
Colin skidded the car to a screeching halt in the rest area. The three jumped out, eyes darting around. The place was empty. Not a single car.
Isabel drew her gun as she circled the small building that housed the restrooms and then entered the women’s side. Colin checked out the men’s, with his gun held close to his thigh.
Emily, keeping her weapon low, methodically searched behind trees and around the vending machine kiosk. The three of them scoured the entire rest area, looking for signs of anyone, but the place was eerily empty.
“Are you sure you sent us to the right place?” Colin asked the tech.
“The monitor shows that’s where the signal is coming from.”
They began frantically searching for the device, scanning the ground, rechecking the restrooms, looking on and under the picnic tables, around the vending machine kiosk, in the grass, at the curbing.
Isabel looked in one of the trash bins and dug around in the garbage. “I found it!” she yelled as she uncovered the cell phone. Pulling on a latex glove, she plucked it out of the garbage and waved it in the air as Emily sprinted toward her. “It’s still on. Looks like the kidnapper wanted us to find it.”
Emily studied it closely as Isabel held it out to her. “Oh great. It’s a burner phone, untraceable.”
“Maybe, if we’re lucky, the forensic lab can lift some prints,” Isabel said. “I’ve got a few evidence bags in my purse.”
“You really think they’d be stupid enough to handle it without gloves?” Emily asked.
Isabel pulled a thick paper evidence bag out of her shoulder purse and dropped the phone into it. “We won’t know until we try.”
“No one’s here.” Colin got back on the line with the tech as he monitored from the Murphy home. “But we did find the phone. It looks like a disposable. We’ll drop it by Nelly’s lab.”
“Now what?” Emily asked Colin, after he stuck his phone back in his pocket.
“We go back to Murphy’s place after we get that phone to Nelly.” He motioned to the women to get back in the Jeep. “Remember, Ernie said he had some info for us on Mitchell.”
Isabel’s eyebrows raised with a quizzical expression. “Who’s Mitchell?”
Chapter 5
On the ride back to the luxurious company apartment, Emily filled Isabel in on Jake Mitchell and his suspected involvement in the case. By the time they reached the building, the Governor and his entourage had left, but there were still a number of policemen and sheriff’s deputies there.
“Mr. Murphy is holed up in the study with his attorney,” Ernie reported, “trying to get the two million dollars together.”
“I hope he can do it,” Emily said with reservation. What would happen to Elise if her husband was not able to raise the amount the kidnapper demanded in time?
Ernie handed Colin a folder. “Here’s the stuff I uncovered on Jake Mitchell. Is he a suspect?”
“He could be.” Colin opened the file. “Or at least a possible accomplice.”
“Well, guys, it’s been fun,” Isabel said. “Now that the Governor is gone, I think I’ll head back to my office.” She gave Emily a sideways hug. “Let me know if you need anything else.”
“I will.”
Isabel leaned close to Emily and spoke in a low voice. “I mean that—anything.” She waved a hand in the air as she walked out the front door.
Emily’s gaze followed her until the door shut. The word anything echoed in her mind. Was Isabel saying she’d be willing to help no matter what, even if it could get her in trouble?
“Hey, Emily,” Colin drew her attention. He was intently scanning the pages when she turned her gaze toward him.
“It looks like Mitchell was telling the truth about the ex-wife.” He briefly glanced over at her before he focused back on the folder. “He’s got a couple of kids in Arizona, and this report shows he spent some time in prison there for Involuntary Manslaughter.”
“What did he do?” she asked.
“According to this, he accidentally killed a man in a bar fight,” Colin replied.
“He could be our guy, but…” Emily paused as her mind continued to consider other scenarios.
“But what?” Ernie asked, seeming impatient for her to finish her thought.
“Well, on one hand, he did say he needed money for back child support. If he wants to see his kids again, he just might be desperate enough to try pulling off something like this. But on the other, he seemed to care about Elise, at least enough not to want to hurt her.” Emily’s gaze briefly shifted to the closed door of the study down the hall. “I wonder if the mister knew about Jake.”
The words were barely out of Emily’s mouth when Patrick and his attorney emerged from the study. “Detective Andrews, I’m glad you’re here. You’ll want to hear this. You too, Ms. Parker.”
“What is it?” Emily asked with eagerness.
“I was just on the telephone with the manager of my bank, and he informed me that Elise came into the bank yesterday afternoon and withdrew everything we had in our personal checking and savings accounts.”
“How much did she get?” Emily asked.
“Almost fifty thousand dollars.” Patrick glanced at his attorney. “Fortunately, she doesn’t have access to my other accounts, or whoever has taken her could have forced her to withdraw that money, as well.”
“Russell Gray,” the attorney said, extending his hand to Colin.
“Detective Colin Andrews.” Colin shook the man’s hand. “And this is my consultant, Emily Parker.”
Mr. Gray shook Emily’s hand as well. “Consultant?”
“I’m a private investigator, but on occasion I’m hired by the Paradise Valley Police Department as a consultant, an extra detective you might say, on a case-by-case basis.”
“I see.”
Emily returned her attention to Patrick Murphy. “So, you think she was forced to take the money out?” She recalled Elise’s sister had said Elise had been thinking of leaving her husband. Perhaps she was cleaning out the accounts as part of her plan to disappear.
“Of course. Why else would she have done it?” the attorney asked.
Emily remained silent, content to keep her thoughts on that to herself for now.
“My guess is,” Patrick said, “they broke in, ransacked the house, and then took her with the intention of making her get them money, but the fifty thousand dollars wasn’t enough, so they kept her and now they’re asking for the ransom money. Perhaps they assumed she would have come out of the bank with a lot more.”
“The ransom was an afterthought,” Emily said.
“That’s certainly a possibility,” Colin said. “Maybe not part of the original plan.”
“What I don’t get is, why would she go into the bank alone and withdraw the money and not say anything?” the attorney asked. “She easily could have told the security guard or the bank manager to call the police and then stayed in the bank until they arrived.”
“Unless they gave her some incentive—something they were holding over her.” They would have to check the bank’s security video. Maybe there would be clues. She pulled out her cell to leave herself a note to check on that.
Emily’s breath caught. She suddenly realized she’d gotten so busy with the case she hadn’t noticed she had not heard back from the daughter, even after leaving three voicemails. “You said she has a daughter at college. Kaitlyn, right?”
“That’s right,” Patrick said.
“That would certainly be enough incentive,” Colin said. “Maybe they know about Kaitlyn, where she lives, what she looks like. Maybe they threatened to kidnap her if Elise didn’t go along.”
“You know, I haven’t been able to reach her,” Emily admitted. “I left messages, but she hasn’t called me back.”
“Have you tried to contact her, Mr. Murphy?” Colin asked.
“No, I haven’t.” He answered defensively. “We don’t e
xactly get along. When Ms. Parker said she would call her, I assumed she had,” he said, seeming to throw the blame back on Emily.
“Mr. Murphy, I need you to give Kaitlyn’s contact information to my officer right away.” Colin motioned Ernie over. “Her full name, address, phone number, email.”
“Yeah, Boss,” Ernie said as he stepped up.
Colin put a hand on the officer’s shoulder. “Ernie, we need to find Elise’s daughter. Mr. Murphy will give you all her info. Get ahold of the local police there and have them check on her, make sure she’s okay.”
“Will do.” Ernie and Patrick wandered off toward the kitchen.
Patrick stopped abruptly and turned back. “Another thing. The bank manager said our account shows Elise withdrew some cash at the ATM too, out in front of the bank, earlier in the day. Don’t you think that’s strange?”
Colin cocked his head with a slight frown. “Yeah, that is strange.”
“We’ll head down to the bank,” Emily said. “See if we can get a look at the security video, inside and outside of the bank.”
“Maybe we’ll get lucky and it’ll tell us something,” Colin added.
“Like what?” Patrick asked.
Emily’s pursed her lips. “Well, I have heard of thieves coming up behind someone at an ATM, holding a weapon on them and making them withdraw all they can from it. That could be how this whole thing started.”
“Maybe,” Colin agreed. “If the thief, or thieves, figured out she was worth a lot more than the few hundred she got for them from the ATM, they might have forced her to give up her home address. All they’d have to do is rifle through her purse and find her driver’s license.”
“The bank’s security footage might show if that’s the case. And if those thugs thought they could get her to clean out your accounts, the crime could have escalated from there,” Emily added. She remembered hearing about a doctor in the news a couple of years back where the criminals made his wife go to the bank and clean out their accounts while they held the daughters hostage. Then they killed her and her daughters and set the house on fire.
“Oh, Elise,” Patrick groaned, an expression of anguish twisting his features.
“Now, Mr. Murphy,” Emily laid a sympathetic hand on the man’s arm, “let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We don’t know yet what has happened.”
“Then find out!” he demanded.
“That’s what we’re trying to do,” Emily shot back between clenched teeth.
“Patrick, stay calm,” his attorney advised. “Let them do their job.”
Emily understood the husband was upset. Who wouldn’t be under these circumstances? But screaming in her face wasn’t going to help anyone. She took a deep breath to calm herself before speaking again. “You work on getting that cash for the drop tomorrow, and Detective Andrews and I will head down to the bank before it closes.”
She and Colin moved toward the door. “We’ll let you know what we find.”
~*~
When Emily and Colin entered the bank, they were immediately approached by the bank manager. Colin had phoned him on the drive down.
“I have the security footage you requested, Detective,” the manager said. “It’s good to see you again, Mrs. Parker. I wish it was under better circumstances.”
“You know this guy?” Colin whispered to Emily.
“I have a safe deposit box here, remember?” she said in a low voice, before replying to the man. “Yes, it’s good to see you again too, Mr. Johnson.”
Actually, the safe deposit box had been her late husband’s, where he had kept his secrets hidden from her—various passports, wads of cash, a mysterious photo. After his death she had discovered the stash and over time uncovered who he really was. She had decided to keep the box and the suspicious items safely sequestered away for now.
“Detective Andrews and I both appreciate your help.” She gave Mr. Johnson a little smile.
“Mr. Murphy too, I hope.”
She nodded. “Yes, him too.” Obviously the man wanted to make a good impression on the bank’s wealthiest customer.
A satisfied grin spread across his face. “Follow me.” He turned and led them to a secure door. After swiping his key card through the receptor, the little red light turned to green. The lock clicked and he pushed the door open.
In a back room, Mr. Johnson had had his assistant manager queue up the video from the previous day. “There are quite a few hours of video to run through. Just be aware that we do close in one hour.”
“Can we get a copy of all this to take with us?” Emily asked.
“Sure. I’ll send my assistant manager in to take care of that for you.”
Emily took a seat in front of the monitor and Colin pulled up a chair next to her. Mr. Johnson pushed the play button before leaving them alone.
They watched for a few seconds, then Emily pushed the fast-forward button until she recognized Elise on the screen.
“There she is!” Emily rewound a few minutes of footage so they could get Elise walking up to the ATM, hoping to see someone in the background they might recognize. She was wearing the same things she’d had on at the appointment she’d had earlier that day with Emily to plan the wedding—same clothes, same jewelry.
“Colin, look!” Emily said, pointing to the screen. “She’s trying to say something into the camera.”
Colin leaned closer. “Yeah, but what is it?”
Emily rewound it.
“Help me,” Emily relayed, concentrating on reading the woman’s lips, “but I can’t make out the rest.”
“Play it again.”
She played it over three more times until she figured it out. “I’m being held hostage. That’s what she’s saying, I’m being held hostage.”
“I think you’re right,” Colin said. “She looks pretty scared.”
“Terrified,” Emily agreed. “Here, let me play it one more time in slow motion, see if there’s anything else on the screen we missed.”
As the video began to slowly replay, Colin hollered, “Freeze it!” He pointed to a spot on the side of the screen. “There. Look.”
She wrinkled up her nose and frowned at the screen. “Looks like part of a man’s arm, I think.”
“Can you make that area larger?”
“I’ll have to open it in a different program. Give me a minute.” Emily worked the keyboard, then selected a section and enlarged it.
“There’s a tattoo on it,” Colin said. “I’ve seen that tattoo before somewhere.” He thought for a moment. “Jake Mitchell. It was on Jake’s arm when we chased him down at the health club.”
Chapter 6
As they headed back to the Serenity Health Club, hoping to catch Jake still there, Colin received a phone call from Nelly.
“Can you stop by for a minute?” she asked. “I have a few things I’d like to show you.”
“We’ll be there in five,” Colin replied.
Before long, Colin and Emily made their way through the county office and filled the doorway of the forensics lab, waiting for permission to enter. “Hello, Nelly. What’s up?”
Nelly was standing in front of her mass spectrometer and she turned to greet them. She was young and petite with blunt-cut black hair and large horn-rimmed glasses, wearing a white lab coat and blue latex gloves.
“Hey, guys. Come on in, just don’t touch anything.” She pattered over to her computer and brought up a few images on one of her oversized monitors.
Don’t touch anything? Emily felt like a child being given instructions by her mother as they wandered through the china and crystal displays at the big department store in her hometown. “Yes, ma’am.” She crossed her arms as a gesture of keeping her hands to herself.
“What do you have for us, Nell?” Colin asked.
“I tested the drops of blood that were discovered on the area rug in the family room, as well as a bloody paper napkin that was found in the kitchen trash. They were from the same person and I was able t
o find a match in the national database.”
“Who is it?” Emily asked eagerly.
“Sullivan.”
A full-screen photo popped up on the monitor, looking more like a mug shot than a driver’s license photo. “Maggie Sullivan.”
Emily’s mouth dropped open as she eyed the photo and shot a quick look in Colin’s direction. “Maggie Sullivan?” How could their friend Maggie be involved?
“That’s right,” Nelly went on, “and some of the prints we lifted belonged to her as well. Why? Do you know her?”
“There’s gotta be some mistake.” Emily looked to Colin for his agreement. Why would Maggie’s DNA be in the national database? And why the mug shot?
Colin shrugged, appearing surprised as well.
“I don’t make mistakes,” Nelly replied flatly.
Colin put an arm around Emily’s shoulder. “There could be a number of reasons the blood is Maggie’s. We’ll figure it out. At least it tells us it wasn’t Elise’s blood. That hopefully means she hasn’t been harmed.”
“She didn’t look hurt in the video, just frightened,” Emily said.
Colin turned his attention back to Nelly. “What else?”
“The prints and lipstick on the wineglass are Elise Murphy’s, which we suspected, but the shards of glass from the broken goblet didn’t result in anything usable.”
“We have a good idea who was drinking the other glass of wine,” Emily said, thinking about Jake having admitted to spending the night with Elise.
“I found hair and prints in the bedroom that did not belong to Elise Murphy, her husband, or to Maggie. They belong to a…” Nelly looked down at her notes, “Jake Mitchell.”
Emily and Colin eyed each other.
“I’m not surprised,” Colin said. “They were, let’s say, friends with benefits.”
“I see.” Nelly raised her brows. “Well, one more thing. I can’t say for sure, but the crime scene appears to have been staged.”
“Why do you think that?” Emily asked.
Nelly held up an eight by ten photo of the family room. “See that leather sofa? There’s no way that sofa flipped back from a kidnapper struggling with Mrs. Murphy, I don’t care how big he was. It’s just way too heavy to go over that easily.”
The Betrayal of Lies Page 5