A Reagan Keeter Box Set: Three page-turning thrillers that will leave you wondering who you can trust

by Reagan Keeter

  “There wasn’t anything in them that made you think Kate had a problem with Elise?”

  “Didn’t seem like it. In one of those letters, she even offered Elise a job when she got out. Why do you keep asking if someone had a problem with her? Did something happen?”

  “I’m not sure,” Anita said.

  “She’s missing?”

  Anita didn’t answer.

  “Well, I’ll tell you this. I didn’t see no problem between them in those letters. But they wasn’t right to me. Some stranger writing you in jail and offering you a job? This ain’t Disney World.”

  No, it certainly was not.

  These letters sounded like something Anita would need to find out more about if she could. For now, she thought it was best to focus on the things Julia might be able to help her with. “What did she tell you about her life? Did she mention any names? Tell you about anybody she was hanging around with before she was arrested?”

  “Not much. There was this one guy she mentioned a couple times.”

  “What’d she say about him?”

  “She told me they’d been working together. She said they mostly hit the tourist areas over by the lake.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What do you think I mean?” Julia shook her head. “You don’t know very much about your sister. She said they did all kinds of stuff, but what worked best for them was a variation of The Ring. She didn’t tell me much about the specifics, though.”

  Anita didn’t need the specifics to know that sounded like a con. She wondered if there might be a connection between it and the fake ID. She pulled the piece of paper Ryan had given her out of her pocket, unfolded it, and held it up to the glass. “Do you know anything about this?”

  Julia leaned in, squinting so she could read it. Then her eyes widened and she smiled, showing all her teeth. “He does good work.”

  “Who?”

  “This guy. Think she said his name was Hawk or Hank. I’m not sure. Said he runs a studio called Clix. Mostly does family portraits. You know, baby pictures and crap like that. But she told me if I ever need a fake ID, he’s the guy to go to. I thought it was more BS.” She leaned in to take another look at the ID. “I guess not this time.”

  Anita put the piece of paper back in her pocket. “So what else can you tell me?”

  “I’ll tell you how The Ring works for another hundred bucks.”

  “Do you know how it worked?”

  “I know how the original version works.”

  Anita hung up the phone. She’d let Julia think she was running the show for long enough. Talking about things that didn’t directly relate to Elise’s life was pointless. Besides, armed with the name Clix, she had everything she needed. She could feel it.

  As she got up, Julia banged on the glass. She looked annoyed. Don’t forget the money, she mouthed.

  Anita thought about nodding, assuring Julia she’d follow through on her end of the deal. But why lie?

  Anita waved goodbye.

  Julia flipped her the bird and pounded on the glass harder.

  Jacob Reed

  Jacob sat in his rented Ford Focus outside Aubury High. The bell would ring any minute and teenagers would come barreling through the double doors in front. He’d seen Alice in pictures online, but with hundreds of kids pushing through those doors at the same time, he might miss her if he wasn’t alert.

  Alice exited the building wearing a blue-and-red flannel shirt Jacob recognized from an Instagram photo and a large pair of sunglasses. She was in lockstep with a friend, a blonde who was shorter than Alice and clutched a pair of books to her chest as if they could shield her from the world.

  The girls headed toward a parking lot off the side of the building. Jacob eased the Ford around the corner so as not to lose sight of them. They got into a white Volvo that looked new. Alice’s friend took the driver’s seat.

  He followed the girls from the school to a McDonald’s, where they met with other students. Jacob parked on the other side of the restaurant. He ordered McNuggets and a Coke, and sat with his back to their booth. He was far enough away that he didn’t draw attention but close enough to hear most of their conversation. They talked a lot about boys and teachers. Nauseating teenage stuff. Alice mentioned the Fresh Sync concert tonight.

  Jacob knew she was going from her posts online. There must have been a dozen or more across Facebook and Twitter, most of them linking to videos of the band’s hit songs, full of emojis and exclamation points.

  Fresh Sync was a pop band Jacob didn’t care for. He was all about the classics. Pink Floyd. The Beatles. Queen. Real music. But he knew enough about the band even before perusing Alice’s posts to name some of their hits (and, like he had at the bank, sing some of their lyrics). It was hard to turn on the radio these days without hearing something by the quartet.

  Alice was sometimes quiet for long periods. But since she couldn’t leave without walking right past him, Jacob wasn’t worried about where she might be. When she and her friend broke off from the group and returned to their car, he did the same.

  He’d gathered from the conversation that the two girls would go together to the Bowards Arena tonight and meet more of their friends there. That was okay with him. The bigger the group got, the easier it’d be to see them in the crowd.

  They drove from the McDonald’s to a nearby mall. Jacob kept his distance, watching them as they went into Forever 21, Charlotte Russe, and H&M. The girls seemed like good kids. He wondered if he might have a daughter like Alice someday.

  When they stopped by Urban Outfitters, which was more Jacob’s speed, he followed them in. He was some fifteen years older than Alice, but looked half that and hoped to use it to his advantage. He browsed through stacks of tee shirts while the girls selected items to try on.

  Finally, Alice’s friend disappeared down a hall leading to the dressing rooms with a large stack of clothes draped over one arm.

  Jacob’s plan for Alice involved two steps. This was his opportunity to implement the first one. He pulled his cellphone out of his pocket and held it to his ear, pretending he’d received a call. He meandered across the store, getting ever closer to Alice, keeping his attention on the clothes. Just a shopper talking to a friend. Once he believed she couldn’t help but overhear him, Jacob provided his imaginary caller a glowing review of Fresh Sync. “Best band out there. No, really. Without a doubt. I saw them in Denver last year. Man, I can’t even begin to tell you what a good show that was.”

  He bumped into Alice and, feigning surprise, dropped his phone. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said with a smile as he scooped it up. “I didn’t see you there.”

  “It’s okay,” she said, and he noticed she was smiling too, or at least half-smiling.

  He kept his eyes fixed on hers for a couple of seconds. He wanted to make sure she remembered his face. “I was—” He pointed to the phone. “I should’ve been paying attention to where I was going.”

  “It’s fine.”

  “All right, well, thanks.” Jacob grinned and waved. Another seemingly innocuous gesture that helped to ensure she’d remember this exchange later. Then he pressed his phone to his ear, started talking about Fresh Sync again, and walked away.

  Jacob worked his way toward the exit at the same slow pace. He returned to his rental in the parking garage and watched the Volvo. An hour passed. He pulled the photo of Chris and his girlfriend out of his back pocket. He imagined himself in Chris’s place, the woman a little less sleazy. He imagined a pair of kids just outside the frame, family dinners, Chris helping his son with homework.

  An engine started up, and he looked over to see the Volvo pulling out of its spot.

  Jacob followed the girls to Alice’s home and parked at the end of the block. Here, with only residential traffic, he couldn’t get too close.

  Alice got out of the car. She grabbed her backpack from the rear seat and slung it over both shoulders. Her friend drove off. Jacob put his car in park and waited
.

  Alice Parker

  Alice had received three phone calls and two texts from Catherine asking where she was. She hadn’t answered any of them. She was out having fun and wasn’t going to be bothered. At the front door, she hunched forward a little. It was uncomfortable, but she loved to get under Catherine’s skin. She hadn’t called Catherine “Mom” since the divorce.

  She entered the house, heard Catherine’s voice before she saw her.

  “Where have you been?” Catherine bellowed, stepping from the living room into the foyer. Her hair was pinned up like it usually was and in a way that Alice thought must take hours. Her wrinkle-free blouse was tucked into wrinkle-free pants. Everything was perfect. Alice didn’t know why she bothered. It wasn’t like Catherine had a job. She lived on Liam’s money.

  “Chill out, Catherine.”

  “Don’t call me that!” Catherine snapped. “I’m your mother.”

  Alice rolled her eyes and headed toward the stairs. Tommy was sitting on the landing halfway up, holding onto the balusters and looking down at her.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “To my room. Where do you think?”

  “Get back here.”

  Ugh. What now? Alice didn’t have any interest in what Catherine wanted, but since she knew Catherine would follow her upstairs, her voice getting increasingly shrill as she demanded her daughter’s attention, Alice decided it was best to get the conversation over with. She stopped, one foot on the bottom stair and a hand on the banister. “What do you want?”

  “Could you come into the living room, please?”

  “Fine.” Alice shrugged out of her backpack and followed Catherine into the living room, where she saw David standing by the fireplace.

  “You look good,” David said.

  If Alice had given any thought to David’s comment, she would have decided it was a lie. She most definitely did not look good. In fact, she made a point of not looking good. But Alice hadn’t seen much of David since her parents’ divorce, and the only thought she could manage was, Something’s wrong. There was also the look on his face, a kind of worry and exhaustion that would have alarmed her in any environment. But here, where he did not belong, it troubled her even more.

  “Your mom tells me you talked to Liam last night,” David continued.

  “Yeah. So what?”

  “What did he say to you?”

  If Catherine had been the one asking, Alice would’ve told her it was none of her business. But since it was David, and since David wouldn’t be here looking like he did without a good reason, she tried to remember. The truth was, “Not much.” They’d talked about school, mostly. Alice had asked Liam about the murder, but all he told her was that it was a mix up. She hadn’t believed him. She’d pressed him for details. But he hadn’t given her any, so what else was there to say?

  David took a step closer to Alice. “Are you sure?” he asked, perhaps with more intensity than he meant to.

  It scared Alice. “Yeah. Why? What’s going on?” Then she thought about the phone number Liam had given her. It was for emergencies only, he’d told her. Why did he need a number just for emergencies? She’d wondered about that at the time, then decided that any strange behavior should simply be chalked up to the stress he was under. Now, with David here, she wondered about it again. “Did something happen to him?”

  “Maybe you should sit down,” Catherine said.

  “What happened? Is Dad okay?”

  “We don’t know,” David said. “The police revoked his bail and he took off. We need to find him. I need to convince him to turn himself in. Running like this is not going to do him any good.”

  With that, Alice did sit down. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Dad wouldn’t do that.”

  “He did,” Catherine said.

  Alice shot her mother a hateful glare. “Of course you’d believe that.”

  “It’s true,” David said. “I was there when it happened. When you talked to him last night, he was already on the run. So if you know anything at all about how I can find him, it would mean a lot. He’s running because he’s scared, and he needs me right now to talk him down.”

  Suddenly the emergency number made sense. Liam had dumped his phone and was using one of those cheap pharmacy mobiles. Alice had seen it happen often enough in movies.

  “I came across some important information,” David continued. “It will clear his name.”

  Alice nodded slowly as she took in the news. She wasn’t surprised David was out there trying to help her father. “He gave me a phone number. He said it was for emergencies only. You can reach him on that.”

  “What?” Catherine snapped. “You didn’t think to tell me about that last night?”

  “He gave it to me. If he wanted you to have it, he could have given it to you.”

  “Can I have it?” David asked.

  “It’s in my room. I’ll go get it.” Alice stood up and climbed the stairs to the second floor.

  “What’s going on?” asked Tommy, who was sitting on the landing and holding onto the balusters like they were prison bars. “Is Dad okay?”

  “He’s fine,” Alice said. While she wasn’t so sure that was true last night, she believed it might be now. She went into her room and grabbed a Mead spiral notebook off her desk. It had “English” scrawled across the front in black magic marker. She flipped to the last page, where her dad’s number was written in the lower-right corner. The rest of the sheet was covered in doodles, mostly flowers and unicorns, that she had drawn during her teacher’s last long-winded lecture. Before she tore it out, removing only enough of the paper to capture the number, she copied it into her phone. She went downstairs and handed the slip of paper to David.

  “We’re going to get this straightened out fast,” he said. “This will all be behind us soon.”

  Liam Parker

  Liam hadn’t been able to reach Jacob and didn’t want to leave a message. You never knew who might hear it. Probably not the police, but what if they did? For the time being, there was no harm in being a little paranoid.

  He would call later. Or so he thought until Anita told him she had the name of the guy who’d made Elise’s fake ID. Armed with that information, additional calls to Jacob seemed unnecessary.

  The conversation with Hawk/Hank was one Liam would have to have on his own, Anita said. She’d spent much more time getting in and out of the prison than she’d expected and had to go to work. “I’ll meet you at the diner at noon tomorrow and we’ll get back to it. I think we’re getting close to something,” she said, right before she hung up.

  Clix was properly called Clix Studio, as indicated by the name over the shop’s door, and appeared to be a one-man operation. Although there was a lobby, there was no receptionist. Liam had an unobstructed view of a photographer shooting a mother and her baby against a roll-down backdrop of a park. As far as he could tell, there was no one else present.

  The photographer, with his long gray hair pulled into a ponytail and a Fisher-Price rattle in hand, glanced over and said, “Have a seat. We’re almost done here.”

  “No problem.” Liam had already decided to wait until they were alone to ask his questions.

  The photographer turned back to his subjects. With his finger on the camera’s shutter button, he shook the rattle and made cooing sounds to draw the baby’s attention. He told the mother to “Smile!” and “Hold the baby a little higher, if you can.”

  When the session ended, he cashed the woman out and said, “That baby is one of the best I’ve ever had.”

  Liam thought it was a lie but the mother looked pleased. She thanked the photographer and left. Chimes strung to the door jingled on her way out.

  “Now, what can I do for you?” the photographer said to his prospective client.

  Liam got up and approached the counter separating the lobby from the studio.

  “You know, you look familiar.”

  “I get that a
lot,” Liam said, which wasn’t true. He suspected the photographer recognized him from the newspaper or an online article about the murder. That was not something he needed the photographer thinking about, so he barreled forward with his first question. “Is your name Hank?”

  The photographer’s smile faltered. “No. Why?”

  “Hawk?”

  “It’s Frank.”

  The name sounded enough like the one he was looking for that Liam figured this had to be the right guy. Time to try out the tactic he had settled on. “Elise sent us to see you.”

  “Elise who?”

  “Dark hair. Skinny. Big blue eyes. You’d remember her.”

  “Doesn’t ring a bell.”

  Liam pulled his phone out of his pocket and showed him the picture of the ID Anita had sent him. “You recognize this?”

  Frank went pale. “I think you’re in the wrong place.”

  “I don’t think so,” Liam said with a courage he wouldn’t have expected. But he was scared and tired and, dammit, he needed some answers. “I’ll bet in that room back there”—Liam pointed at the only closed door he saw—“there’s all kinds of things that would interest the police, isn’t there? Maybe a blue screen? A computer? Whatever it is you need to make a fake ID these days. If they’re not there, they’re somewhere around here, aren’t they?”

  Frank instinctively looked over his shoulder at the door, which confirmed to Liam he was correct. “Look, I’m just trying to make a living. You think glamour shots and prom pictures are enough to pay the bills around here?”

  “I just need some answers.”

  Frank considered this, held up a finger. Wait a second, it said. He walked around the counter, locked the front door, and turned the open sign to closed. “What do you want to know?”

  “Why did Elise have you make this ID?”

  “I didn’t ask. Sometimes they tell me. Like they need to justify it or something. Usually that’s the kids, though. The ones looking to buy booze or get into a club. But she and that guy she was with, they were pretty quiet when they came in here.” Frank squinted and wagged a finger at Liam. “I swear you look familiar. Why is that?”