“So how did he strike you? When he first came in?”
“Well, see, I didn’t really notice him until he found me. He was the kind who blends in—just a regular guy.”
“When did he come in?”
“Day before yesterday. I was open that night, which I do sometimes when I’m working on a doll in back. Stayed open until nine o’clock.”
Nine o’clock: three to four hours after Jessica Parris was last seen.
Laura told him she’d be back with a photograph of the dress Jessica Parris had worn, in case he recognized the style. “In the meantime, if you remember anything else about this guy, please call me.” She handed him her card.
As she crossed the street to her car, she finally got hold of Buddy Holland.
“Where are you? I’ve been looking for you.”
“Running down some things on my own.”
And avoiding her, she thought. “We need to compare notes. I’m headed up to take some plaster casts on West Boulevard right now, but—”
“I’ll meet you there. I’m going up there anyway.”
“You are?”
“I just talked to Dave Parris. Thought it would be a good idea if we took a look at the girl’s room. Unless you’re too busy.”
11
The window to Jessica Parris’s room was open, sunlight pouring in along with the warm summer air. It was clear from the posters on the wall that Jessica favored Josh Hartnett, Shakira, and Nelly. Laura had done stupid things in her teenage years, but worshipping a guy who wore a Band-Aid on his cheek wasn’t one of them.
Someone had written all over Jessica’s sheets with permanent markers: “Stay cool!” “You’re my best friend ever.” “You and Cary are the coolest people I know.”
“Her friends wrote those things,” Mrs. Parris said from the doorway. “We had a slumber party and they helped her decorate her room.” She hugged herself as if by doing so she might hold herself together, her nervous gaze straying to Buddy Holland, who was poking around the room as if it were a garbage dump. “Do you need anything else?”
Laura said, “I notice she doesn’t have a computer. Do you or your husband?”
“No. We’re not computer literate around here. Excuse me. I have to check the cookies.”
A dresser drawer screeched as Buddy opened it with latexed hands.
Laura looked up sharply. Holland returned her look, eyes devoid of all expression. She’d seen that look before, had used it herself. Cops who detested each other still had to work together, so they did it with as few words possible, just enough to get the job done. No one did cold as well as a cop.
Laura said, “No computer in the house, but she probably has access to one at school. You really think CRZYGRL12 has something to do with the Internet?”
“Could be.” Then he did something she didn’t expect: volunteered. “Let me check it out. I know my way around the Net pretty well. If she’s there, I can probably track her down.”
It was the longest speech she’d ever heard from him. “What would you do?”
“Check out Internet Relay Chats, see if I can find her there.”
Laura seized on the one word of the three she understood. “You mean chat rooms?”
“Uh-huh.” He didn’t elaborate. “You want me to or not?”
She nodded. “I think you should.”
A photograph on the dresser top caught her eye—Jessica and a young man she assumed was Cary Statler. Jessica was pretty in a short denim skirt and halter top. Statler was a skinny, sleepy-looking kid in a black t-shirt and dirty-looking jeans. His hair looked like a pineapple top.
Buddy had gone back to searching, rummaging through a make-up caddy, then moving on to a velvet-lined box holding her earrings, bracelets, and anklets. A tinny sound as an anklet hit the floor. Doing it to annoy her.
“Buddy.”
“What?”
“Why don’t you interview Mr. Parris?”
Shrug. “Fine with me.”
He snapped off his gloves and left the room.
The stillness contrasted with all his banging. Now maybe she could get a feel for the girl.
Jessica had a thing for girly stuff: Flavored lip gloss; smiley-faced colognes with names like Cool Diva and Cha Cha Chica; and at least a dozen tubes of Sungirl—sun care products with glitter.
Laura looked at the photo again, wondering what about it nagged her.
It would come.
She looked through the dresser drawers and closet: Blue jeans, peasant blouses, halters, clogs. Jessica’s underwear was neatly folded in her dresser drawers. Bikini underwear in pastel colors, a couple of bras—Victoria’s Secret type stuff. They looked sophisticated for a fourteen-year-old girl, at least the fourteen-year-old girl Laura had been. A different era. She found a few homework assignments jammed into a bookshelf, most of the answer spaces blank. Round handwriting with hearts to dot the ‘i’s. No diary, unless Jessica kept it in a secret place. No books other than schoolbooks and the Harry Potter series, which was lined up in the bookcase like those leather-bound classics people displayed for show. Laura couldn’t say for sure, but she doubted that Jessica had cracked one of them.
Lots of stuff. Laura had read somewhere that tweens—eight to fourteen-year-olds—had so much discretionary income and expensive tastes that they drove the whole economy. Not just the US economy, but the world’s.
She noticed a newspaper clipping from a modeling agency tucked into the frame of the dresser mirror. Mrs. Parris had told her Jessica had wanted to be a model or a rock star.
Now she would be neither.
Laura walked into the kitchen, where the smell of baking cookies was overwhelming. Mrs. Parris fluttered back and forth through the sunny kitchen like a bird trapped indoors, her movements increasingly frantic.
“How are you doing?” Laura asked.
Mrs. Parris checked the heat on the oven. “We’re okay. I mean. It’s horrible, but …” She wiped a strand of red hair from her eyes.
“I’m sorry, but I have some more questions.” Laura set her mini-cassette recorder on the kitchen counter.
“I know you have to ask your questions. We want to find the guy who did this.” She said this last brightly.
“Mrs. Parris, do you know if she used a computer at school?”
Her brow wrinkled. “I think so.”
“She never talked about it? You know, texting her friends?”
“I wouldn’t know email from a hole in the wall. I’m not the least bit technical.” She stared at the oven. “Jessica loved to bake cookies. That’s why I’m doing it today. Kind of in her memory.”
“Where’s Cary?”
“Cary?” Linda Parris looked stunned.
“Her boyfriend. Doesn’t he live here?”
“Oh.” She floundered for a moment, as if she’d dropped a thought and had to consciously pick it up again. “We’re kind of like his foster parents, even though there’s nothing official. You must think that odd, but it really isn’t. He needs us. We love him as if he’s our own son.”
“He and Jessica were boyfriend and girlfriend, though?”
“I know what you’re thinking. We had very strict rules, her father did. Cary lives in our travel trailer out back. Not in the house. But he’s a nice boy.”
“Were they sexually active?”
Defiance. “Yes. I found out about that a couple of months ago. And you know what I did? I marched her down to Planned Parenthood and got her birth control pills. You might think I’m a bad mother, but I did what I had to do, and I didn’t want our child having a child.”
“I’m not judging you, Mrs. Parris.”
“Please don’t say anything to her father. He’d have a fit if he knew.”
Laura thought that he probably did know. “I see no reason to tell him. So you don’t know where Cary is?”