The Missing Mistress

by Thomas Fincham

  As they ate, they shared what they knew. When they were done, Holt leaned back and said, “Governor Bartlett also received an envelope?”

  “Yep, it was in his car,” Callaway replied. “The photos showed him with Lana Anderson.”

  “I found one in Becker’s car. The photos were of his wife and children.”

  “I think it’s the same people behind both cases.”

  Holt pondered the possibility.

  “And I think it all somehow links to Parish Holdings,” Callaway added.

  “How?”

  “Becker worked for Parish Holdings as their lawyer. Bartlett is on a board to vote on a project Parish Holdings is bidding on. I also believe Lana Anderson was hired by Parish Holdings to sway Bartlett’s vote in their favor.”

  “It’s all circumstantial evidence, I’m afraid,” Holt said.

  “Okay, but at least it gives us something to work with.”

  Holt was silent. He then asked, “Do you still have the security footage?”

  “I do.”

  “Give it to me.”

  Callaway sighed. “It won’t do you any good. I’ve gone through it already.”

  “I’m sure you have. But we have technology at the Milton P.D. that can tell us who else came to the apartment building.”

  “Okay.”

  Holt got up. “Thanks for the meal.” He paused and then said, “If Fisher found out we had lunch together, she’d think I’ve gone soft on you.”

  Callaway gave him his best smile. “Have you?”

  Holt scoffed. “Just don’t mention this to her. Ever.”

  EIGHTY-SIX

  Viggo was unnerved when he saw the private investigator sharing a meal with the detective.

  What are they discussing? he thought.

  He could not tell, and it was gnawing at him.

  Viggo had been following the private investigator in the hope he would lead him to Lana Anderson. But so far, the private eye was as lost as he was. In fact, it looked like he was chasing his own tail.

  The private investigator thought he would find something in the security camera footage. Viggo had been through that as well.

  They were at a dead end.

  Maybe the detective wanted to know what Trevor Donley had said to the private eye. After all, they were seen together at the apartment building.

  Viggo’s eyes widened. Did Donley tell the private eye about Bartlett?

  No. That can’t be.

  A man did not lie when facing a loaded gun. And Donley swore he told no one.

  Viggo had seen the private eye snooping around outside Bartlett’s office, but he had lost him when he went back inside the building.

  Did Bartlett speak to the private eye? If that was so, it would be damaging to their plans.

  Parish would explode if he found out.

  Viggo regretted not taking control of the situation sooner. He should have gotten rid of Becker before he made a big spectacle of his death. Viggo would have buried his body where it would never be found.

  He did not have time to do that with Donley.

  Donley had caught him off guard. He wanted to blackmail Viggo regarding Bartlett and Viggo was left with no choice but to take immediate action.

  He was certain the detective was not on to him about Donley’s death.

  Viggo was careful. Even on such short notice, he felt he had committed the perfect murder.

  He left nothing behind that would incriminate him.

  There were no fingerprints. No security footage capturing him leaving the parking lot. The shell casing the police must have found by now would lead them to a gun registered to a dead man in Arizona.

  Viggo carried a variety of weapons with him, and they were all purchased from the black market. He had a guy in Miami who connected him to sellers.

  The gun he had used to kill Donley was deep in the Milton River.

  Donley’s death would forever remain a mystery.

  Even then, Viggo felt uneasy. He had a way of sensing danger, something he had picked up while working for the crime boss. Everyone had a target on their backs. You did not know who would betray you. Or worse, you did not know if the next bullet would come from a friend or foe.

  Viggo had survived for so long by trusting no one.

  If Parish got caught, Viggo would pack up and disappear. Just like he had done when the crime boss went down.

  Once the heat was over, he would reappear months later in some other city. He would then make his services available to the highest bidder.

  Right now, though, he would abandon following the private eye and focus his attention on the detective.

  He was far more dangerous than the private investigator.

  EIGHTY-SEVEN

  Fisher sat on the sofa and took a deep breath. After Casey had stormed out on her and locked himself in his bedroom, Fisher had heard crying coming from behind the door.

  She knew the entire ordeal was taking a toll on him. She could see it in his eyes. Even when he tried to brush it off, his attitude came across as false.

  Casey’s inner demons were coming to the forefront. She had seen them when Jacob had died. He acted erratically. His emotions were all over the place. One moment he was happy with not a care in the world, and the next moment he was sobbing like it was the end of the world.

  It broke her heart to see her baby brother like this. She wanted to knock on the door and tell him everything would be alright, but she was not sure how.

  The evidence against him was mounting.

  Witnesses had seen Casey with Miranda hours before her body was found. Vincent Lum had even taken photos of him with Miranda at the motel.

  Fisher could see how the prosecutors would spin this case. As a figure of authority, Casey had lured Miranda on false pretenses to go to the motel. When she refused his advances, he took her to Leaside Forest Park to convince her that he had made a mistake and for her not to tell anybody. When that did not work, he killed her and dumped her body on Pine Trail.

  Fisher knew that was the furthest thing from the truth. It was Miranda who had lured Casey to the motel. It was she who had told him to take her to Leaside Forest Park. And it was she who had started acting inappropriately in the car, so much so that Casey had no choice but to leave her behind.

  Fisher could not confirm the last part, but so far Casey’s story had checked out, so she had no reason not to believe him.

  She wished she could find a way to help him get out of this nightmare.

  She also knew, even if he was found to have not committed the crime, the stigma from what happened would linger for a long time. He might never get another opportunity to teach again. Not in Lockport, nor anywhere else in the country.

  Casey might turn out to be not guilty of killing Miranda, but he was guilty of being alone with a sixteen-year-old girl outside the safety of her school. Teachers are supposed to be protectors, not predators. And people would not let him forget his error of judgement.

  Fisher believed there were other ways Casey could have dealt with Miranda’s attempt at blackmailing him. He should have spoken to another teacher, perhaps even taken it the school principal. Instead, he chose to handle the matter on his own.

  She understood why he did. He was afraid the truth of what happened to Jacob would come out. He feared that truth would tarnish a career he so loved. As it turned out, his career would forever be stained by the events at Pine Trail.

  If things got worse, Fisher would help him relocate. Perhaps even to another country. When they were younger, Casey talked about living in South America, specifically, Argentina. He thought the girls there were beautiful.

  Fisher knew it would not be a bad place to start a new life. Casey could teach English. He would be great at that. Maybe Fisher might join him until he settled down. And maybe, when the storm had cleared, and people’s memories were preoccupied with something else, he might be able to return to the States and recreate a new life for himself.

  Fishe
r shook her head. She was getting too far ahead of herself. There were a lot of things that had to happen first before Casey could even contemplate moving away.

  She heard a buzzing noise. She realized it was coming from Casey’s cell phone, which he had left on the coffee table.

  The phone buzzed again, and then again.

  Fisher looked over at his bedroom. He was probably still inconsolable.

  I should give it to him, she thought. It might be important.

  She reached over to pick up the phone.

  Her fingers swiped the screen and unlocked it.

  Casey was careless when it came to security. He would always leave his keys in his car, leave the doors to his house unlocked, and it seemed he had not password protected the data on his cell phone.

  She grabbed the phone.

  A thought popped in her head, one which had been nagging her for some time.

  I better not, she told herself. Casey would never forgive me if he found out I’d been going through his phone.

  But as his older sister, it was her duty to do whatever she could to help him. He was crumbling right before her eyes. She worried he might fall apart the same way he did when Jacob had died.

  She sighed and began scrolling through his cell phone.

  EIGHTY-EIGHT

  Callaway was in his office. He had given Holt the security footage. He hoped Holt would have far more luck than he did.

  He was not sure what he should do next.

  He had looked everywhere, and he was no closer to knowing where Lana Anderson was.

  Maybe I might not be able to earn my fee, he thought. Maybe I should accept the fact that some cases might never be solved.

  Wherever Lana Anderson was, she would likely never be found.

  He suddenly felt parched. He knew the feeling; it came whenever he was at the end of his rope. And this was exactly that.

  He had no leads. No person of interest. Nothing.

  All he had was that Lana Anderson had left her apartment building, taken a taxi across town, and was last seen entering Parish Holdings Inc.’s office tower.

  Who did she go to meet there? Was it R.J. Parish? If so, then what happened after?

  There was no record of her leaving the building.

  Callaway knew where his thought process was leading him.

  Lana Anderson could be dead. And she could have died at the hands of R.J. Parish.

  The office tower must have several exits, a couple of service elevators, and at least one loading dock. It would not be difficult to dispose of a body in the middle of the night.

  When the thirst got the better of him, he left the office and went to the nearest bar. He ordered a drink and sipped it slowly. He was not going to overindulge like he used to. He knew what that did to him. On top of being drunk, his behavior sometimes got out of hand. There were too many fights where he had ended up with a broken nose, a swollen cheek, and, not to mention, a bruised ego.

  He was not going to show up at Patti’s house looking like that. He wanted her to know he was a changed man.

  He took another small sip, enough to satisfy his urges, when he spotted two men talking at the other end of the bar. They were both dressed in business suits. One was blond, and the other was bald.

  The bald man said, “How did you manage to get a tightwad like McKenzie to give you a raise? I’ve been sucking up to him for years and never once did the guy even consider giving me a raise.”

  The blond man grinned. “That’s your problem. You were too concerned about trying to please the man. What you had to do was make him realize he needs you more than you need him.”

  “How?” the bald man asked.

  “Simple,” the blond man replied. “I stormed into his office and told him I was going to a rival company.”

  “You had an offer?”

  The blond laughed. “Of course not. But he didn’t know that.”

  “So, you lied?” the bald man asked, clearly shocked.

  “I wouldn’t call it a lie, but more of a pressure tactic,” the blond man replied.

  “What if he called your bluff?”

  The blond man shrugged. “Sure, he could have. But the alternative was working the same job for the same money. I didn’t want to keep doing that.”

  “I never thought of that.”

  The blond man leaned in and said, “If you want something, you have to walk straight in there and ask for it.”

  The bald man stared at his co-worker in awe.

  No kidding, Callaway thought. That’s like one of the oldest proverbs in life.

  He sipped his drink some more.

  An idea popped in his head.

  He put his drink down, left some money beside it, and got up from the bar.

  On his way to the door, he stopped by the two men and said to the blond, “Thanks for the suggestion, bud,” and walked out.

  EIGHTY-NINE

  Holt was inside a windowless room at the Milton P.D. The Cybercrimes Unit had the most advanced and powerful computers in the department.

  The technology officer seated behind a massive computer screen said, “We can run the footage at twice the speed and the system will still recognize the images and match them with a database of millions of individuals.”

  Holt had brought the security camera footage Callaway had given him. He was hoping the department’s facial recognition software might tell him if anyone of interest had shown up at the building around the time Lana Anderson disappeared and the time Trevor Donley was murdered.

  Holt was familiar with how the technology worked. The software identified a person through multiple methods, such as analyzing the contours of a face, the distance between a person’s eyes and nose, the structure of their jawline, etcetera, and it tabulated that information within a fraction of a second and fed it to the database of prospective individuals.

  It was awe-inspiring technology, but also scary.

  Criminals could be identified far more quickly and accurately, but privacy advocates argued that such technology was an invasion of people’s personal data.

  Most people never give their consent for their images to be used for commercial purposes, but that was exactly what was happening.

  Major department stores were using the technology to analyze each shopper that walked in. Apart from being notified if someone was a known shoplifter, the companies also knew how many times someone came into the store and what their purchasing habits were. The technology then gave the companies the ability to target the individuals with specific product ads and promotional materials they knew the individuals would be interested in.

  Holt did not want to dwell too much on the technology’s benefits and drawbacks. Right now, he needed it to help him recognize the people who entered then exited the apartment building and see if they had any criminal record.

  It was not the most precise way to narrow his search, but it was the only one he had right then.

  An image would pop up on another computer screen when the software got a hit. Rebecca Estes had dark hair, a sullen face, and she was charged with a hit-and-run. Aaron Ganos had limp hair that was parted from the middle, his face was long, and he was charged with sexual assault. Damon Burrell had small eyes and a round face, and he was charged with robbery. Ashley Bower had curly hair and expressive eyes, and she was charged with fraud. Viggo Radovic had jet black hair, pale skin, eyes as black as coal, and he was charged with assault and battery.

  “Stop,” Holt said. “Go back and pause it.”

  The technology officer froze the image on the screen. Viggo Radovic was leaving an elevator. He was dressed in a black suit and his eyes were narrow, almost slits.

  Holt went back to the other screen with Radovic’s bio. He was born in Serbia and even served in the Serbian Army. He immigrated to the United States almost a decade ago. The charge of assault and battery was in New Mexico when Radovic had nearly killed a man over a spilled drink at a bar.

  Why does he look familiar? Holt
wondered.

  He suddenly remembered what Emmanuel Fenton had told him about catching someone snooping in Becker’s office. His exact words were:

  “He was dressed in a black suit. I remember his skin was whiter than white, but it was his eyes that gave me the chills.”

  Holt’s own eyes narrowed.

  Was Fenton referring to Viggo Radovic?

  As Holt stared at Radovic’s image, he could not help but think he was.

  NINETY

  Callaway stared up at the glass and steel building. This was the second time he had been here, but the effect had not worn off on him. The office tower glowed in the afternoon sunlight.

  The head office of Parish Holdings Inc. was on the top floor. Callaway had decided to take the advice of the blond man at the bar. He was going to storm into Parish Holdings and demand to speak to R.J. Parish. He wanted to catch him off guard, see how he handled being questioned under pressure. He might even manage to get something out of him.

  The only way to find out was to act.

  It was not the best plan, but it was one he could execute right this minute. He hated to sit on his butt and wait for something to happen.

  He entered the lobby and walked straight to the elevators. When an elevator became available, he went in. The doors were about to shut when a hand appeared out of nowhere, causing the door to retract.

  A woman entered. She was older, with graying hair, and she wore a floral-patterned dress that reached down to her ankles. She was carrying a duffel bag that was far too heavy for her.

  She smiled at him as a way of apologizing for forcing her way into the elevator. He smiled back to say it was no problem.

  She got off on the fourteenth floor.

  The doors shut. He took a deep breath to control his composure. His plan could only work if he played it cool.

  He got off on the top floor and was confronted by a glass wall. The words “Parish Holdings Inc.” was stenciled on the door.

  He went up to a woman seated at the front desk.