Rooted in Lies

by Kasia Chojecki

  "Good morning," he said casually. "Aren't you a ray of sunshine?"

  "It was a good morning," she said pointedly. "Don't you have somewhere to be?"

  He smiled. It was one of those arrogant, lazy smiles he undoubtedly used to charm all the women to get what he wanted. She rolled her eyes.

  "As it happens, I don't." Nick leaned back against the railing, watching her.

  "I guess all those YouTube videos do make themselves."

  "You know," he said. "That's the beauty of being your own boss. I happened to do my work in batches, so I don't have to work every day."

  "So, you're going to sit here, lounging like a lizard all day?"

  "Well, I can think of several things that could keep me busy."

  Ava wasn't going to let him bait her. But something clicked.

  "I think I'm going to regret this. No, scratch that. I know I will," she said as the idea popped into her head. "Tell me, how are your research skills?"

  "Stellar," he told her. "I used to work in marketing. Research was my life. Why?"

  "I require a temporary assistant," she said, surprising herself. "Since you seem to be loitering around most of the time, I figure you have time on your hands."

  "Maybe, I do."

  "It pays," she said. "If you're interested in a temporary gig, that is."

  Nick considered her offer. He could use some excitement. "When do I start?"

  "Be back here in an hour."

  ***

  Nick was familiar with Stan's house as the layout was almost identical to his parents' house. However, Stan's home was filled with old wooden furniture, travel mementos from various digs he had worked on and lots of pictures. Books were scattered across the house, on shelves, tables and every available surface. The place always reminded him of a den where an old professor, or an adventurer, would have stored all his treasures and memories.

  He didn't know why he accepted Ava's offer. He didn't lack for clients, but he was bored. Truth be told, he didn't know anything about true crime podcasts or any podcasts in general. Sharon's disappearance always intrigued him, and he wanted to find out what really happened to her.

  Ava's office caught him off guard. A large wooden desk occupied the centre of the room. Three computer screens and a laptop formed a neatly organized row in the middle. Stacks of files occupied every surface of the desk, with pens, pencils and notepads scattered throughout.

  There were files in boxes against the wall. And what a wall it was. Ava set up a board with Sharon's pictures, newspaper clippings, timelines and scribbles on sticky notes. It was all meticulously organized and a little disturbing.

  "This is some setup," he said as she walked in behind him. "Kinda got that serial killer vibe, don't you think?"

  "No, I don't," she said dismissively. "This is where we'll be working, so if that's a problem, you should tell me right now."

  This was once Sharon's room. Ava chose it as her office years ago. Over time it was remodelled and updated to suit her needs. It worked because it faced the back of the house and offered a quiet space for her to work. Although she would never admit it, the room helped her feel connected to the woman she barely knew.

  "I'm good," he said as he picked up the framed picture of Sharon from the desk. This is exactly how he remembered her. Always smiling. She could make anyone feel as if they were the most important person in the world. "I knew her, you know."

  "You did?" she asked.

  "Yeah. I would see her around. After you two moved in with your grandparents, she would sometimes come over and talk to my parents. She was always nice to me and the other kids on the street."

  Something flashed in her eyes, but it was gone just as fast as it appeared. She looked remarkably like the woman in the picture. It was a bit spooky.

  "What exactly do you need me for?" he asked as he set the frame back on the desk. "You didn't exactly give me a job description."

  "Make sure you give me your contact info, and I'll send it to Lori, my producer," Ava explained as she pushed a notepad and a pen towards him. "She'll send you the necessary paperwork. As for the job, I need someone to help me with my research, putting the info together, stuff like that."

  "Ah, so like a glorified secretary," he said as he wrote down his contact information. "Do you also expect me to get you coffee and make your appointments while I'm at it, too?"

  "Very funny," she smirked at him. "I can get my own coffee, thanks. Normally, I would need help researching public records, databases, old files, court documents, and things like that for the cases I'm working on. But right now, I need someone to help me dig through Sharon's case."

  She gestured towards the boxes lined up against the wall.

  "These are things people left at the makeshift memorial where her remains were found. I'm also waiting for the police reports from the original case and whatever else they have. I need to go through it all, organize and hopefully, find something useful that will tell us who killed her and why."

  "I have several upcoming commitments that I need to take care of," Nick said. "They won't take a lot of time, but they need to be done. If you're cool with that, it works for me."

  "Great," she said, relieved. "Any other questions?"

  "Yeah, there is one thing I'm curious about," he said. "Why do you always refer to her as Sharon? Not mom."

  "I don't remember her," she said after a pause. "In so many ways, she's a stranger. I only know her from what others tell me about her."

  When Nick didn't say anything, she added, "According to my shrink, it's called compartmentalization. It is how I dealt with the loss and the abandonment issues."

  "I'm sorry, that must have been tough," Nick said. He couldn't even fathom what it felt to lose a parent.

  "Years of therapy have helped," she said, shrugging her shoulders.

  "No doubt," he agreed. "So, where do we start?

  ***

  They sorted through the boxes of cards, poems, and notes left at the site for the next few hours. They organized everything in neat piles with neatly written notes and sorted them alphabetically. Everything was then documented and entered into a spreadsheet that was then saved to the cloud.

  As they worked, Ava updated him on the investigation and her meeting with Detective Burnett. She needed Nick to familiarize himself with as many details on the case as possible before the police reports arrived.

  "Something about this whole thing still doesn't make sense to me," Ava said between bites when they finally took a break for lunch. They opted for pizza at Nick's suggestion, which significantly raised her opinion of him.

  "What's that?"

  "Based on everything that I've been told, Sharon was meticulous about keeping records. She kept notes. She was a planner."

  "So?"

  "So, where did it all go?" she said. "If she was planning to steal three million dollars and disappear, she must have made notes. Plans. She would have developed an escape plan. Written it down somewhere."

  Nick considered the question as he ate. "Maybe she hid it somewhere nobody would find it? Or maybe she destroyed everything?"

  "I've thought of that," Ava glanced at the wall as she tapped her pencil on the desk. "But how do you steal three million dollars and not leave a trace somewhere? Where is the money?"

  "A secret Swiss bank account?"

  "I haven't found a trace of one, and neither have the cops." She set the pencil down and crossed her arms. "Clearly, she didn't run away with the money as she's been dead all this time."

  "Maybe whoever killed her stole it from her. Or, had her steal it for them and killed her when she handed it over?" Nick suggested.

  "I guess everything is possible," she agreed, then added, "Burnett thinks she might have been blackmailing someone."

  "I guess that could work too," he agreed. "Blackmail gets tricky, but it's definitely less messy than embezzlement."

  "Is it?"

  "Well, yeah," Nick said as he wiped the pizza sauce off his hands wit
h a napkin. "Think about it. You find something juicy that someone else doesn't want the world to know. So, you approach them and offer a deal. For the right price, I'll keep what I found to myself. You tell them how much and how often you want them to pay you, and now you've got a nice, steady income stream."

  "And what if they don't want to pay?"

  "I'd say it depends on the incriminating information," he said. "People are likely to pay up. That's why all these online scams are so popular. You know the ones. You get an email that says someone hacked your computer and will reveal all your secrets to your family and friends. Unless, of course, you pay, preferably in Bitcoin, to make it all go away."

  "That's a possibility," she agreed as he laid it out. "Fewer chances of others finding out, and you don't really have to cover any tracks. It's not like the person you're blackmailing is likely to come clean, so nobody else has to know. But, according to my grandfather, Sharon was straight as an arrow."

  "Do you always tell your parents everything?" he pointed out. "Everyone has secrets. Maybe she was blackmailing someone. Maybe she did find something she was going to expose. Or, maybe she got mixed up with the wrong people and got in over her head?"

  As skeptical as Nick was, he had to consider that maybe Sharon was just that. Honest to a fault. He wasn't exactly the best person to judge a woman he knew briefly as a kid. But if she was innocent, someone made damn sure that she looked guilty.

  "I guess Stan knew her better than either one of us, so we could both be wrong." He stared at the wall and the picture of the woman at the centre of it all. "But, what if there never was any money?"

  "What do you mean?" she asked.

  "The missing money. What if it's just a smokescreen?" he said. "Somebody wanted her gone and made sure she went away. Permanently."

  Ava got up from her chair and walked up to the board. She was missing something, and she couldn't put her finger on what it was. The money was always at the centre of Sharon's disappearance, even if there were many unanswered questions about it. It always came down to money.

  "If it wasn't about the money," she said, "then what was it about?"

  "Something worth killing for."

  "Even if there was no money, she was killed because of what she found or had," Ava said as she considered his words. "It still could have been related to blackmail, embezzlement or both."

  Chapter 5

  "How is your new assistant working out?" Lori asked. She was immaculate as always, dressed in a hot pink dress that picked up the colour in the frames of her eyeglasses. Today, her hair was a coil of braids that framed her stunning face to perfection.

  "Huh? Oh, Nick," Ava said absently and shrugged. "Adequate."

  "That's not a glowing review."

  Ava paused for a moment. Nick was surprisingly good at the job. He was thorough, organized and very good at research. They managed to sort through all the documents, conversations with Sharon's friends and coworkers, the newspaper clippings and reports she had collected over the years.

  "Okay, maybe adequate doesn't cover it," she said begrudgingly. "So far, he's better than I expected, but that doesn't mean there isn't someone out there who is better."

  "He seems nice," Lori said. "Why don't you like him? You hired him, so how bad can he be?"

  "I don't know," Ava admitted. "He's got that arrogant smugness about him that annoys me. But, he was close and available. Plus, my grandfather likes him. He'll do for now."

  "Right," Lori nodded. "I look forward to meeting him then."

  "Can we get back to business now?"

  They went over the numbers of the new season of The Missing Voices. The downloads and subscriptions were up, and so were the revenues. That made everyone happy, especially since true crime podcasting was a very saturated area. Ava's show had a solid listener base before she joined forces with Odyssey. Still, the extra resources helped drive engagement across social platforms and spread the word.

  When Ava ran The Missing Voices on her own, she averaged between six to ten episodes a season, with two seasons each year. Each episode took about thirty hours to produce, which often took up more time than she wanted. When Lori's company took on the production, they increased the number of episodes to fifteen. Now that a team took on most of the behind-the-scenes work, Ava could do what she did best, tell stories of those that no longer have a voice, and promote the podcast.

  "Since you're in Toronto," Lori said. "How do you feel about doing an event there to promote the show? You know, the group you've met with in the past?"

  "I think that can be arranged."

  "Great. The team is still sorting through all the emails from listeners and forwarding you the important ones," Lori said. They received thousands of emails from listeners, ranging from tips related to the featured cases and theories to fan mail. "We have also narrowed down a list of cases for the next season based on your notes," Lori continued. "Once we have that finalized, I'll get the preliminary research started."

  More listeners also meant more requests to find missing loved ones. While Ava wanted to help them all, it was impossible to cover every single case. Having a team to sort through all the requests made the process more efficient and guaranteed to keep them busy for years.

  Ava cross-checked her own notes and confirmed tentative dates.

  "I'd like to tackle them based on location," Ava said. "There are a few in Colorado and a few others on this side of the border in Alberta. It would be easier to get all the info all at once instead of flying back and forth."

  "I don't think that will be a problem," Lori agreed and made some notes herself. "Do you have any preferences for where you want to go first?"

  "Not really," Ava said. "I can go to either one. Maybe once we have an idea of what information is available, it'll be easier to narrow down. Meanwhile, I'll keep you posted about the event."

  "Sounds good, Ava. I'll be in touch."

  Ava reached out to the event organizer and copied Nick on all the correspondence. She followed up with several leads and made several inquiries about Sharon's case. As per his word, Detective Burnett provided copies of reports on her mother's case, including those from the original investigation.

  Burnett also provided contact information for the former investigator, Frank Mitchell. Without wasting any time, Ava picked up the phone and called him. He didn't pick up, so she left her name and contact information, asking him to get back to her. Until she heard back, she was going to get more acquainted with Frank.

  ***

  "So, explain this to me again," Nick said as he drove. "Why don't you have a driver's license?"

  "I never needed one," Ava said. She didn't have to explain herself to him.

  Nick looked over at her with a dubious look on his face. "You never needed one? How do you get around?"

  "I grew up in Toronto and London. Both cities have transportation infrastructure that makes it easy to get around," she said. "Why would I need a car?"

  "Having a car and knowing how to drive are two different things."

  "I know how to drive," she told him defensively.

  "Then why don't you have a driver's licence? Surely, you've been to places where there are no subways, busses and streetcars. How do you get around then?"

  "By hiring drivers," she said impatiently. "Ones that don't ask a million questions that are none of their concern."

  "Whatever you say, boss," he laughed. She clearly lacked a sense of humour. "So, what's the story with this guy we're going to see?"

  Ava opened the file on her lap and flipped through the information she printed out earlier.

  "Frank Mitchell," she said. "The original investigator on Sharon's case. His notes on the investigation are pretty sketchy. According to what he wrote, nothing in Sharon's life indicated that she was involved in something shady. Family and friends didn't see any changes in her behaviour. Nor did she confide in any of them about anything that worried her."

  "Is that it?" Nick asked. "There has to be m
ore."

  "Well, he does mention something about the money, but it's more of a side note."

  "Did he do any actual investigating?"

  "Depends on how you look at it," she said. "I don't think he put a lot of effort into narrowing down exactly when Sharon disappeared. My grandparents filed a report after we got back from the cottage. That's only a few days, let's say three or four, during which she could have gone missing."

  "Did he ever consider that something could have happened to her?

  "That's definitely something I want to ask him," Ava said. "But according to my grandfather, he didn't spend too much time chasing any other angles."

  "This whole case doesn't really make sense. A woman goes missing, and they don't automatically think that something might have happened to her? Where does the money fit in?"

  "All good questions," Ava agreed. "Again, not something I can answer. Burnett made some notes here. Essentially what he says is that Walker, Sharon's boss, never filed any reports about missing money. Burnett couldn't find any information indicating that Mitchell had a forensic investigation done on Sharon's office computer, her bank accounts or the company's. No trace of the money that supposedly went missing with the woman who masterminded the whole operation."

  They drove in silence. Sharon's case, seemingly open and shut, proved to be anything but. It was built solely on the assumption that she stole the money and fled. Yet, there was no money trail.

  "That's a pretty huge leap," Nick said as he navigated the road. "From a missing woman to three million dollars that may or may not have been missing with her. How do they even put the two together?"

  "I think there was a note somewhere in here," Ava said as she searched for the page, she had in mind. "The only evidence of money is a short statement from the bookkeeper, Debbie Styles. Styles claimed that small sums of money were siphoned from the gallery's accounts over time, to a tune of just over three million."

  "What does that have to do with Sharon?"

  "She was the one in charge of the accounts. Accounts payable, receivables, fundraising. Things like that."