Vanished (12 page)

There was a lock on the shed doors, but it was really basic. Evelyn glanced behind her. Seeing nothing, she reached into the messy bun she’d made after getting the call about Lauren and pulled out a bobby pin. Bending it straight, she shoved it into the lock and fiddled until the latch popped free.

She reminded herself that this was a bad idea, but opened the door, anyway, and stepped into the shed. Taking out her cell phone to use as a flashlight, she looked around the little structure.

It was the cleanest shed she’d ever seen. The floor was neatly swept, every tool in its place on shelving units. A wheelbarrow that looked brand-new stood against the back wall. Lined up next to it were a set of shovels that practically sparkled, although the worn handles showed they’d been used.

She angled her cell phone around, looking for anything that would tell her if Darnell stalked and abducted children. On the top shelf, she spotted three rolls of duct tape and several neatly coiled piles of rope. Some of the rope was of a size that might be handy for bundling yard debris; others were more suitable for something like restraining small victims.

But it was hardly unusual. Plenty of people used rope and duct tape, most of them for perfectly legitimate reasons.

The only thing she’d learned from Darnell’s shed was that he was neat and orderly, very deliberate and careful. The fact that those were all qualities shared by the Nursery Rhyme Killer didn’t mean they were the same person.

Hell, Walter Wiggins was neat and orderly to the point of obsession, too.

Just as she’d decided to give up and get out of Darnell’s yard, the door to the shed was yanked open, and a light flashed in her eyes.

Evelyn instinctively went for her weapon, but froze as a harsh voice yelled, “Police! Hands up!”

She raised her hands toward the ceiling, dread squeezing her chest. What the hell had she done?

“I’m with the FBI. My creds are in my pocket.”

The cop kept his weapon leveled on her, but lowered his light, and Evelyn blinked until the spots swarming in front of her eyes disappeared. In their place, a portly uniformed cop with a deep scowl filled her vision.

“Reach for your identification slowly.”

Everything about his tone told her he wasn’t inclined to give her any professional slack. As she handed over her creds, she hoped she hadn’t just handed in her career.

He studied them, then raised his eyebrows. “What are you doing here, Agent Baine? We got a call about a trespasser.”

Evelyn glanced past the cop, toward Darnell’s house. Did he have a sensor system in his yard? How had he known she was here? “Who called?”

He holstered his weapon, ignoring her question. “Let’s go. You can ride with us to the station.”

“I’m consulting on a case with the Rose Bay PD,” Evelyn said quickly. “I was here to talk to this resident and I heard a...”

“You’re really going to try the suspicious-noise bullshit on me?” the cop interrupted. “And I know exactly why you’re here. That’s the station you’re supposed to report to, not Treighton. Someone from the Rose Bay PD called us, said they’d gotten the report of trespassing. The caller mentioned you by name, Agent Baine.”

Then it was definitely Darnell. Evelyn felt her lips curl as she stepped out of the shed. “You knew I was with the Bureau when you pulled your weapon on me?”

“Hey, the report could’ve been wrong. Can’t be too careful.”

Biting back a sharp response, Evelyn said, “I’m parked just down the street. I can get myself to the station.”

“Fine. But you’d better report there or it’s my ass.” He gave her a fake smile. “And if that happens, I won’t be inclined to do you any favors when I write up my incident report.”

“It won’t be a problem,” she told him as she headed for her car, cursing the entire way.

What was she going to find at the station? Tomas was already pissed about what she’d done at Walter Wiggins’s house. She was in Rose Bay at their request. Would he send her home because of this?

And if he did, would her boss make sure this was her last case?

Eleven

“Y
ou came back.”

The whispered words were so quiet Evelyn almost didn’t turn around as she walked into the station. When she did, Noreen Abbott was standing by the door, looking like she was on her way out.

Her dark hair was wilted against her face, her bag tugged down her shoulder, a bag that was obviously full of work, and dark smudges lined her eyes.

“Yeah, just to talk to Tomas for a minute,” Evelyn said, hoping Noreen didn’t know the real reason she’d returned to the station at three-thirty in the morning.

“No, I mean, back in Rose Bay.”

“Oh. Yes.” Even though Noreen wasn’t a police officer, she was so involved in the case she probably knew Evelyn had been an intended victim eighteen years ago.

“You don’t remember me,” Noreen said softly.

Did Noreen remember
her
?
“Sorry. No. I think we were a few years apart in school.”

“We were. I was just in kindergarten when your friend disappeared. But it’s stamped on my memory.”

“Oh.” Of course it was. The child abductions had torn apart all the illusions Rose Bay had about being a safe, close-knit community. And even though a kindergartner wouldn’t have known any real details, Evelyn would’ve stood out, the only girl of mixed race in the entire elementary school.

She glanced toward Tomas’s office, where the light was still on. “Tomas is waiting for me.”

“Sure. No problem.” Noreen nodded, looking at her feet. “Anyway, it sounds like you’re really getting into this guy’s head. We all appreciate it,” she added as she turned and pushed open the door.

With a sigh, Evelyn headed in the other direction.

When she walked into Tomas’s office, he lifted his head and glared at her with bloodshot eyes. “Sit.”

“I’m sorry...”

“Just sit.”

She did, her nerves jangling.

“Darnell Conway called me tonight, Evelyn. You’re damn lucky I was still here when the call came in, because he demanded I get someone down there to escort you off his property or he was calling the Treighton cops and the FBI directly.”

Pounding a fist on his desk, Tomas jumped to his feet. “I don’t have the manpower to waste on this kind of shit! I should’ve let him make an official complaint to the FBI, but damn it, we need a profiler here.”

He pointed at his door, toward the bull pen. “My veteran officers—the ones I
already
have problems with because they aren’t thrilled to have me as their supervisor—are looking for any reason to get rid of you. And you just about handed it to them. When they hear about this, and believe me, they will, you’re going to lose what little ground you’ve gained.”

Losing steam all of a sudden, he sank back into his chair. “You want to explain what the hell you were thinking?”

“Darnell Conway is—”

“You know what?” Tomas held up a hand, shaking his head. “Never mind. I don’t want to know. Just don’t do this again, or I’ll have to tell BAU we can’t work with you. I won’t have illegal searches on my watch, Evelyn.”

She nodded, cringing a little as she met his furious and exhausted gaze. “I understand.”

And she did. Normally, she was one hundred percent by-the-book. She liked having boundaries, knowing precisely what she could and couldn’t do. She even liked the paperwork that came with her cases, assuring that every last detail was documented and the chain of evidence was always intact.

She’d screwed up, big-time. And the hell of it was, she couldn’t be certain she wouldn’t do it again if she thought it could lead her to Cassie. If there was any chance it might spare Brittany and Lauren whatever hell Cassie had gone through after she’d been stolen away.

“It took me twenty minutes to convince Darnell Conway not to press charges,” Tomas said.

“It won’t happen again,” she promised, hoping that was the truth.

“Fine.” Tomas waved his hand at the door, still looking disgusted with her. “Get out of here. I need you fresh tomorrow. What we’re doing now isn’t getting us anywhere. We need more from you.”

Did she
have
more? Evelyn squared her shoulders, well aware that she’d have to come up with something. “Okay. I’ll see you in the morning.”

As she left his office and walked back through the quiet station, Jack Bullock stopped her, concern on his face.

Evelyn knew she looked like hell, but he looked even worse, as if he’d been up way longer than she had. He also stank, and she wondered if he’d been wading in the marsh waters.

She must’ve grimaced, because he said, “Sorry. We don’t send civilians into the truly awful search areas. I haven’t had time to change. But I’ll tell you, late night in a sewer is a fucking sight better than talking to scum like Walter Wiggins.”

Evelyn nodded, although she was surprised at just how deep his hatred of Walter went. It almost felt personal. “You didn’t know any of Walter’s victims, did you, Jack?”

“What? No.” He cracked his neck, rubbed a hand over his eyes. “None in DC, anyway. But I have to wonder what he’s done here in Rose Bay that we just haven’t uncovered.”

He started to walk past her, then stopped. “What are you doing here? I thought you went back to the hotel?”

Evelyn felt herself flush. “I’m going there now.”

“Okay.” Jack squinted at her. “You learn anything new on Wiggins?”

“No.”

He scowled. “Is Noreen still here? I want to see if the search parties were ever near Wiggins’s house. Maybe he found a way to use them as cover.”

“She just left.”

“Damn. I was hoping to catch her.”

Evelyn glanced at her watch. “Jack, it’s practically four in the morning. Why are
you
still here?”

“There are two kids missing, Evelyn. I’ll sleep when we find them. And Noreen may look like a little mouse, but she’s tough as hell. If she’s not here working, I’ll bet she’s at home going through the search party information.”

Noreen
did
seem to be carrying a bag full of work as she’d left the station. “Did she know one of the original victims?”

“I doubt it. She was a baby back then. But her sister might have known Cassie. I think Margaret was in your grade.”

“Really?” Evelyn shook her head. “I don’t remember her.”

“Oh, well, she was gone by then. But that’s—”

“Gone?” Evelyn interrupted. Did Noreen Abbott have a sister who’d died? Could she have an older male figure in her life looking to save other girls that age?

Jack’s lips twitched and he rolled his eyes. “Gone as in moved to Texas, Evelyn. Jeez. Noreen’s parents got divorced. Her mom and sister moved away. Poor Noreen was stuck here with Earl.”

“Earl? Is that her father?” Was a child leaving town enough of a trigger? Probably not, Evelyn thought.

Jack looked like he was working particularly hard not to show his exasperation in his voice, but it was written on his face as he said, “Yes, Earl Abbott, Noreen’s father. Don’t get all excited on me. Earl’s dead. He’s not out there abducting kids.”

Evelyn’s shoulders slumped. “Oh.”

“Took forever, too.”

“What?”

“For Earl to die. He was sick a long time. His brother, Frank, moved in with them, to help take care of him, but once Noreen hit eighteen, boom! Frank moved out, and it was all on Noreen. The girl is smart as hell, and she gave up college, gave up everything, to look after her father. So, my dad hired her. Last year, Earl died and poor Noreen was left with nothing. And yet, you’d never know it. She’s a solid worker.”

The annoyance on his face turned pensive. “Honestly, Evelyn, we’ve got all our officers, plus the CARD agents and you. But at the end of the day, it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s Noreen who identifies this asshole from the search parties. You should talk to her, too.”

Evelyn tried not to be insulted by his unsolicited advice.

He let out a loud yawn, then told her, “Well, I’m heading home. You should get some rest, too. You look like you’ve been skulking around people’s property without a warrant.”

He pivoted and stalked toward the door before Evelyn could figure out if he’d been talking about Walter Wiggins or if he already knew about Darnell Conway.

And if Jack knew, the rest of the station wouldn’t be far behind. Her credibility would be completely shot.

She followed slowly in Jack’s wake. She’d come here so certain this was her chance to finally discover what had happened to Cassie. But with every day that passed, she felt that the truth was further and further out of her grasp.

* * *

Evelyn drove around to the back of the hotel and parked under one of the huge live oaks. As she turned off the engine, exhaustion hit so hard it felt like too much effort to get out of her car and walk to her room. The stress of looking for Cassie and the frustration of trying to lock in on one definite suspect were wearing her down.

She wished Kyle was here. He wouldn’t care if she woke him in the middle of the night. But he was gone, off surveilling some group the FBI thought could be a threat. With his job, it would be anything. Possible terrorism, a cult with suspected rampant child abuse, a group who’d shown too much interest in bomb-making techniques.

Usually, Evelyn loved her job, so much that it had been her whole life for too long. Usually, she felt she was making a genuine difference, getting some of the most dangerous minds off the streets, saving untold numbers of future victims. Preventing others from going through the hell she’d felt when Cassie had gone missing. The hell she still felt.

But sometimes, like now, it was overwhelming. As if she wasn’t stopping
enough
crimes.

At times like these, she needed her grandma’s voice. Even locked in the throes of her worsening dementia, her grandma was her rock. Evelyn actually had the interior light on and her cell phone in hand before she remembered it was after four in the morning.

She was about to drop it back in her bag when she realized she’d missed a text message. From the time stamp, the call had come in while she was at the police briefing about Lauren’s disappearance. The little girl had gone missing seven and a half hours ago, but it felt like much longer.

Her name had become part of a litany in Evelyn’s head of the Nursery Rhyme Killer’s victims. Penelope, Veronica and Cassie from eighteen years ago. Brittany and Lauren now. Would any of them ever come home?

Shaking aside the morose thoughts, Evelyn opened the text, and her heart rate kicked up. It was from one of the FBI’s documents experts. Shortly after she’d arrived in Rose Bay, she’d convinced Tomas to send him the notes from eighteen years ago, along with the note left at Brittany’s house.

The notes were typed on computer paper, but a documents expert could analyze a lot more than handwriting. They had specialized knowledge in deconstructing word usage and sentence structure that could tell them if the same person had written the notes.

Would he agree with her that this was no copycat?

She opened the text.

Word choices and structure are inconclusive. However, paper is the same type, from a brand that went out of business seventeen years ago. Strong likelihood this note was written on paper from the same ream—or at least the same batch—as paper from original notes.

The chances of a copycat having a ream of paper from the same batch as the original abductor were so slim they weren’t worth calculating. Which meant she was right. It should have comforted her, but somehow it didn’t.

Evelyn stared through the windshield into the darkness. With her interior car light on to read the note, she couldn’t see very far. The low-hanging Spanish moss dangling off the live oak she’d parked under swayed lightly in the wind, casting bizarre shadows.

The way she was feeling, she expected the sky to suddenly open up, rain to drench her car and lightning to flash overhead. But everything stayed still and calm, except for her building frustration.

Trying to suppress it, Evelyn reached for her door handle just as her side window shattered, and specks of pain flared across her cheek. An instant later, a loud bang burst in her ear.

Instinct kicked in and Evelyn dove down sideways, one hand stretching up to switch off the interior light even as her other hand unhooked the seat belt and then grabbed for her gun.

Someone had just shot at her.

And if the shooter had better aim, he could have killed her. Bullets were supersonic, meaning that by the time she’d heard the crack, it was too late.

Her heart beating an erratic tempo, Evelyn wrenched her SIG Sauer awkwardly out of its holster. She tried to ignore the blood spattered on her hand, let her racing adrenaline block the pain in her face.

She had nothing to aim at as she slid lower in the car, trying to make herself a smaller target. Where the hell had the shot come from?

Her side window was spider-webbed with cracks, a big hole at the height of her head if the shooter had aimed a few inches over. It was too hard to tell the angle of the shot.

There were plenty of hotel windows with a line of sight down into her car. If the shooter was in one of those, could he still see her?

Evelyn tried to even out her breathing, to shrink lower against the floorboards, as people inside the hotel woke, opening windows and calling out.

Had someone called the cops, scaring off the shooter?

Or was he still there, waiting to get her back in his crosshairs?