To my surprise, Ryan agreed to stay with Jade until I returned. Apparently, the two of them had bonded while the rest of us were going through the files. While the others grabbed their coats and left, I pulled Ryan aside and gave him my cell phone number.
“You see or hear anything suspicious—anything at all—you call me immediately. No matter what it is. Got it?”
Ryan nodded. “Got it. But you don’t really think that the killer will come here, do you? He’s never made contact with any of the victims’ families before. That we know of, anyway.”
I thought of the odd noises and the open door in the kitchen last night, along with that creepy sensation of being watched. I’d done a thorough sweep of the backyard before breakfast, but I hadn’t found any evidence that anyone had been lurking outside the house. Still, I didn’t want to leave Jade here alone. Someone had drawn my spider runes on a dead girl, and I didn’t want Jade to be the next victim.
“Better to be safe than sorry,” I said.
Ryan nodded again and went into the kitchen to check on Jade, who was brewing a fresh pot of coffee. She might not like the strong chicory brew, but apparently, any coffee was better than no coffee at all.
Thirty minutes later, I steered my car up a steep driveway only a couple of miles from Fletcher’s place. And just like there, the gravel driveway snaked up to a sprawling home perched on top of a rocky ridge. Unlike Fletcher’s old ramshackle house, which was an odd mishmash of tin, brick, and stone, Mosley’s abode was a brand-new construction of gleaming glass, dark wood, and gray river rock that gave it the look and feel of a rustic cabin. If a rustic cabin could be several thousand square feet and feature a pool, a hot tub, and a tennis court.
Up ahead, Finn parked in the paved driveway in front of the house and got out of his car. I pulled in behind him and did the same. Together, the two of us approached the mansion. A breeze gusted over the ridge, bringing the smell of fresh sawdust along with it.
“Not what I expected,” I said.
“Mosley has to deal with people all day every day at the bank. He used to live in a luxury apartment in the city, but folks would drop by his place at all hours. He finally decided that he wanted to leave work at work. That’s why he built way out here in the middle of nowhere,” Finn said. “Plus, after his wife, Jane, passed away, I think that he wanted to get away from all the memories in their apartment. He’s only been moved in here a couple of weeks.”
“Well, you’d certainly have to work to find this place,” I said.
Finn grabbed hold of the metal knocker and let it thump against the front door. Several seconds later, the door opened, revealing a thoroughly miserable-looking individual.
He was a dwarf, right at five feet tall, with a thick, stocky body, who was wearing a pair of dark blue plaid flannel pajamas and matching slippers. His wavy silver hair stuck up in crazy tufts, and a deep pillow crease ran along the left side of his head, from where he’d been napping. His hazel eyes were dull and watery, although his nose was a bright red spot in his face. He was carrying a half-empty box of tissues like it was a life preserver that would keep him from drowning in a sea of snot.
I’d never seen Stuart Mosley look so disheveled, unkempt, and all-around sickly before. Whatever cold, flu, or sinus infection he had was really doing a number on him, further convincing me that he’d had nothing to do with Elissa’s disappearance. People who felt that miserable didn’t go around kidnapping other folks. They didn’t have the energy for it.
“Hello, Finn,” Mosley rasped, congestion making his voice even deeper and throatier than normal. “And I see that you brought a guest. Ms. Blanco, welcome to my humble home.”
“You probably wouldn’t say that if you knew why I was here,” I replied.
Mosley held up a finger. His eyes watered, his nose crinkled, and he let out a violent sneeze that had both Finn and me stepping back.
“I knew I should have brought some hand sanitizer,” Finn muttered. “And a mask.”
Mosley ignored his snide remark, plucked a tissue out of his box, and blew his nose as violently as he’d just sneezed. He stuffed the used tissue into the pocket of his pajama pants and gestured for us to come in.
The inside of the house continued the rustic cabin motif, with lots of stone floors, exposed wooden beams overhead, and floor-to-ceiling windows to take advantage of the sweeping views from the top of the ridge. Mosley shuffled down a hallway and into a living room before collapsing onto a large sectional sofa. Tissues littered the coffee table in front of the sofa, along with bottles of half-drunk ginger ale, empty cough drop wrappers, and several open boxes of over-the-counter medication. The entire room reeked of sharp, minty menthol, and I spotted several open tins of ointment lying on the floor in front of the sofa.
The common cold was one of the few illnesses that Air elementals just couldn’t heal. At least, not very well. So it was one of those things that you just had to suffer through, and it looked like Mosley was suffering plenty.
He pulled a blanket over his lap and settled himself back against the couch cushions. “So what was so urgent that you two drove all the way out here to see a sick old man?”
“I want to talk to you about Joanna, your great-granddaughter,” I said.
He blinked. “How do you know about . . .” His voice trailed off, and his face hardened. “What’s wrong? What’s happened? Have you finally found the son of a bitch who killed her?”
I shook my head. “No. But he’s kidnapped another girl. Someone you know. Elissa Daniels . . .”
I recapped everything that had happened and everything that we thought we knew about the Dollmaker. Mosley sneezed, coughed, and blew his nose the whole time I talked, but I knew that he was listening to every single word.
“So we came here hoping that you might know something about the killer,” I finished. “Anything you can remember, any detail, no matter how small, might be helpful.”
Mosley pointed over at the fireplace mantel. “You can see Joanna for yourself.”
I got up and looked at the framed photos. Young, blond, pretty, nice smile. I recognized Joanna Mosley from the pictures I’d seen in her murder file. The photo in the center of the mantel had been taken at a graduation ceremony, and Joanna was wearing a dark blue cap and gown. She had her arms around her grandfather’s shoulders, and both of them were beaming into the camera.
“She was a wonderful girl,” Mosley said. “Smart as a whip. After she finished her MBA, she was going to come work for me at the bank. But of course, that never happened.”
This time, the water in his eyes had nothing to do with his cold, and he had to clear his throat before he could continue. “I assume you’ve seen the police reports?”
I sat back down on the couch. “I have.”
“Then you know that Joanna was having dinner with friends at Underwood’s. They were all going to a concert and were running late, and she stayed behind to pay the bill. She left the restaurant to walk to her car a few blocks away, and that’s the last time anyone saw her.” Mosley closed his eyes. “The police found her body two weeks later near the restaurant.”
He didn’t say anything else, and for several seconds, the only sound was his raspy, congested breathing. He opened his eyes and cleared his throat again. “Joanna moved here from Cypress Mountain to go to college. She stayed with Jane and me in our apartment in the city. It was such a happy time for the three of us. The whole thing . . . it broke my wife’s heart. Mine too. It sent Jane to an early grave.”
I glanced over at Finn, who gave me a helpless shrug. He didn’t know what to say to comfort his boss any more than I did.
Mosley blew his nose again and looked at Finn. “Go to my office. You’ll find a cardboard box in the corner. Bring it in here, please.”
Finn left the room and returned a minute later with a box that was eerily similar to the ones that Silv
io had stacked up in Jade’s office this morning. Finn nudged aside some of the mounds of tissues, careful not to actually touch any of them, and set the box on the coffee table.
“Go ahead,” Mosley said. “Open it.”
Finn pulled the lid off the top. Together, the two of us went through all the files and photos inside, while Mosley slumped on the couch across from us. Much of the information was the same as it had been in all the files we had on the other victims, right down to how useless it was.
“I did everything in my power to find the bastard who murdered my granddaughter,” Mosley growled. “I bribed the cops to devote more manpower to the case. I brought in experts to examine all the evidence, what little there was. I even hired a profiler to try to learn more about the son of a bitch. Nothing worked.”
I flipped through the files, scanning through all the information, photos, and reports. Mosley was right. He’d left no stone unturned in his search for Joanna’s killer, and he’d kept meticulous notes of everything, including the hefty bribes he’d doled out. Private investigators, scientific experts, retired FBI profilers. He’d hired all those and more. Mosley had even had an independent forensic lab examine the traces of makeup left on Joanna’s face. I made a mental note to show that file to Ryan when I went back to Jade’s house. Maybe he’d be able to make more sense out of it than I could.
A thought occurred to me, and I set the last file aside. “Did you ask Fletcher to help you with this? Was this one of the many favors the two of you did for each other?”
For a moment, a brief smile lifted Mosley’s lips. “Of course I asked Fletcher to help me. Who better to track down a killer than an assassin like the Tin Man? But he didn’t find anything either. Not before he was killed.”
This time, my eyes were the ones that watered. Finn’s too, but we both blinked back our memories of Fletcher and his own brutal murder inside the Pork Pit.
“I’m sorry that I can’t tell you anything else,” Mosley said. “Elissa is a wonderful girl. She doesn’t deserve what’s happening to her. Neither did Joanna.”
I gestured at the files. “Can we take these with us? It’s a long shot, but we might find something useful if we compare them with the files we have on the other victims.”
“Take it all. If you think there’s even a remote chance that you can find Elissa, take it all.” Mosley blew his nose again. “And if there’s anything that I can do to help, anything at all, just say the word. Anything I can do for you, I will.”
“A favor from one of the most powerful men in Ashland? Careful,” I drawled. “I might just take you up on that.”
Once again, that faint smile flickered across his face. “My favor does come with one condition.”
“What’s that?”
His hazel eyes hardened, and he leaned forward and stabbed his finger at me. “You kill this son of a bitch. With no hesitation and absolutely no mercy. You do that, Gin, and you’ll get all the favors you want from me.”
“Is this the same deal that you made with Fletcher?”
“Yes.”
“Then I accept.”
“Good.” Mosley leaned back against the cushions again. “What are you waiting for? Get out of here, and get to work.”
I snapped off a salute to him. “Yes, sir.”
Mosley harrumphed at my salute, but a small smile lifted the corner of his mouth.
Since Mosley was out sick, he asked Finn to go to First Trust to check on a few things, while I grabbed the box of information on Joanna’s murder. Once that was done, we left the dwarf to his cold and miserable memories.
Finn watched me slide the box into the front passenger’s seat of my car. “Now what are you going to do?”
“I’m going back to the scene of the crime. The last crime, anyway.”
“Northern Aggression?” Finn asked. “Why? The cops searched that whole place last night. Bria said they didn’t find anything.”
I slammed the car door shut with far more force than necessary. “Because we still have fuck-all nothing, as you so eloquently put it.”
Understanding flashed in his green gaze. “You’re getting desperate.”
I sighed. “Of course I’m desperate. I don’t want to go back to Jade empty-handed. I can’t. We all know that this guy could kill Elissa at any second. And if I don’t find something, some small clue, some tiny thread to follow, that’s exactly what’s going to happen. Sooner rather than later. And then, he’ll kidnap another girl and do the same thing to her.”
Finn slung his arm around my shoulders and gave me a hug. “We’ll find this guy, Gin. We just need a little more time. Something will turn up. You’ll see.”
I forced myself to ignore the frustration surging through my body and smile back at him. “Yeah,” I said, lying through my teeth. “You’re right. We’ll find him.”
• • •
We said our goodbyes, and Finn headed downtown to First Trust bank, while I drove over to Northern Aggression. It wasn’t quite noon yet, and all the lots around the club were empty, except for a single black Mercedes parked on the street a hundred feet away from the main entrance. The car had probably been left behind by someone too drunk to drive home last night, but I still raised my phone, zoomed in, and snapped a photo of the license plate.
I got out of my car and scanned the area, but everything was quiet, and I was all alone. It was far too early for the staff to be here, and I didn’t see Roslyn’s car either. She was probably still at home, sleeping in after dealing with the police late last night. So I wandered through the parking lots, not so much looking for clues as just soaking up the peace and quiet and going over everything that had happened. Thinking about everything that I knew about the Dollmaker and how I might find him before he murdered Elissa.
No realizations bubbled up in my mind, so I finally walked around the side of the building, turned the corner, and strode out into the middle of the cracked, dirty asphalt.
The three Dumpsters still marked the spot where I’d found Lacey Lawrence’s body, although they’d been pushed apart and off to one side of the parking lot so that the police could better examine and process the scene. The cops had dutifully strung up yellow crime-scene tape all around the empty metal containers and the space between them, but the winter wind had torn most of the tape loose overnight, and the strings fluttered weakly in the steady breeze, like butterflies trying to escape a spider’s sticky web. All of the garbage from the surrounding trash cans had been bagged up as potential evidence and taken to the police station last night, but the air still reeked of sour beer, rancid food, and cigarette smoke.
Despite the stench, I did a slow, methodical search of the entire area, peering into each and every one of the trash cans, standing up on my tiptoes so I could look into the Dumpsters, and crouching down and examining the spot where I’d found the girl’s body. I even inspected all the cracks in the asphalt in the entire parking lot, just in case anything had slipped into one of the jagged openings.
Nothing—absolutely nothing.
All the garbage was long gone, and no blood stained the pavement where Lacey Lawrence had been found. I didn’t find Elissa’s purse, phone, or anything else that might have belonged to her, the dead girl, or the Dollmaker.
Disgusted, I got to my feet, lashed out, and kicked an empty beer bottle with a broken neck that had somehow escaped Bria and Xavier’s garbage pickup last night. The bottle hit the side of a metal trash can and exploded on impact, showering the pavement with sharp shards. I looked around, searching for something else to break, something else to take my anger, disgust, and worry out on—
Skitter-skitter.
I froze, my gaze darting over to the trash can. But the bottle was as still and broken as before, the shards of glass gleaming in the weak sunlight. So what had made that noise?
Or who?
I palmed a knife, darted
forward, and crouched down beside that closest trash can, making myself as small and invisible as possible. Goose bumps rippled up and down my arms, but they weren’t from the cold wind. No, this particular sensation meant only one thing.
Someone was watching me.
My gaze darted from one side of the parking lot to the other, but I saw the exact same things as before. Cracked asphalt, empty trash cans, yellow crime-scene tape, a tall shadow at the corner of one of the Dumpsters—
Wait a second. That shadow hadn’t been there before.
My eyes narrowed, and I focused on the shape, but it was just a slender shadow, a patch of pavement a shade darker than all the rest. It didn’t tell me anything about whoever was lurking back there.
But someone was lurking back there, I was sure of it.
I crouched down a little more, but the angle was wrong, and I couldn’t look underneath the Dumpster to see his shoes. I didn’t know exactly who was back there—if it was the Dollmaker or some other enemy—but if he wouldn’t come out and face me, then I’d just sneak up and stab him in the back.
Still holding my knife, I got to my feet and crept forward, making as little noise as possible, and headed toward the far right side of the Dumpster, at the opposite end from where the shadow was. I kept my gaze on the shadow the whole time, but it didn’t move, not even an inch. Whoever was back there was as good at waiting as I was.
I reached the front corner of the Dumpster, but the shadow still hadn’t moved. The only sound was the wind whistling through the parking lot, the cold gusts of air continually kissing my cheeks.
I drew in a breath and slowly let it out. Then I raised my knife and charged around to the back of the Dumpster.
Empty—the space behind the container was completely, utterly, depressingly empty.
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