Savich said, “Let me add that these six are the only ones we know about so far, all of them from the Bay Area. There could be more, out of the area, even out-of-state, but I personally tend to doubt it, because we’ve discovered that each of the women who disappeared knew Kirsten. They weren’t strangers to her.
“Mr. Lansford, as Agent McKnight said, not all of them were grown women. Annie Sparks was only sixteen years old when she went missing. She attended Mount Elysium High School in San Francisco, shared a biology class with Kirsten. Would you like to hear about the other five women who were almost certainly victims of your stepdaughter?”
“No! Listen, you can’t be sure about these other missing women—girls—not really.” There was no more heat in Mr. Lansford’s words. He scrubbed his face with his hands. “I simply can’t imagine that she would do such a thing, over and over—and enjoy it.”
Coop had wanted to dislike this man, but the shock and despair he saw in his eyes was painfully real. Even the lawyers were trying hard not to show their horror. Mr. Lansford’s aide, Mr. Buff Tan, hadn’t moved an inch since assuming his nearby guard position. “You are in no way to blame, Mr. Lansford,” Coop said. “We know you married her mother twelve years ago, which would have made Kirsten twenty-one years old, an adult. What would be helpful is if you would give us your impressions of Kirsten, any personal information you think could help us find her.”
Lansford began to pace the suite’s living room, his lawyers hovering close, wanting to object, but to what? Then, with perfect timing, one of the lawyers said, “There is nothing Mr. Lansford can tell you that would be of any assistance in finding her. After all, as you said, she was already an adult when he married her mother. As he has already said, he rarely saw her. She was nearly a stranger to him.”
Lucy said, “Tell us about her birthday, Mr. Lansford—you gave her a black Porsche, right?”
Lansford stopped pacing and slowly turned to face her. “How do you know about that?”
Coop said, “Your sister-in-law, Sentra Bolger, told us.”
He looked ready to spit. “Sentra? That idiot woman, you can’t believe a word she says, she’s nuts, and it’s worse because she’s good at it, she’s very convincing.”
Lucy said, “Yes, she is convincing. Surely your wife told you when we interviewed Sentra, we believed her to be Kirsten’s mother and your wife, Elizabeth Mary Lansford?”
“Yes, yes, but she said Sentra refused to tell her anything about her conversation with you, only that Sentra had said she’d kissed you off.” He nodded at Lucy and Coop. “You two were with her on Friday night?”
Lucy said, “Yes, we were, and believe me, Sentra was very up front, very believable at playing both your wife and Kirsten’s mother. About Kirsten’s birthday—Sentra told us Kirsten was charming to you, unusual for her, according to Sentra. She told us Kirsten was very pleased with your gift of the Porsche. Sentra was there, wasn’t she, sir?”
“Yes, she was, not that I wanted her there, but Elizabeth believed it would be a good idea because she is, after all, Kirsten’s aunt, and Elizabeth wanted Kirsten’s family around her. Bruce”—Lansford nodded toward Mr. Buff Tan—“was there as well. Listen, Sentra loves to play roles. She could be Lady Macbeth one minute and then segue easily into Lady Gaga.”
Coop asked, “Why did you buy her such an expensive present, Mr. Lansford?”
Again he ran his tongue over his lips.
One of the lawyers said, “A father’s gift doesn’t have to justify a price tag, Agent.” Almost in the next breath, the lawyer cleared his throat. “Ah, what I meant to say is that even a stepfather, related only by marriage, a man who had nothing at all to do with any of her upbringing, can give a splendid gift, Agent McKnight, as a loving gesture to his wife.”
Lansford said, not looking away from Coop, “Shut up, Cox. Listen, Agents, you want the truth? Here it is—I could barely tolerate Kirsten. She was cold and weird and generally unpleasant, and, as far as I could tell from all the years I knew her, she didn’t have a single friend, didn’t go on a single date with a man, and despised her mother. But then again, I rarely saw her; her mother, either. So was she always like this? A loner? Always creepy? I don’t know, but it sounds right.”
Lucy said, “Then why the Porsche, Mr. Lansford?”
He waved them over to one of the beautiful sofas. “Sit, all of you, sit.”
Cox opened his mouth again, but Lansford waved him to silence. “I gave her the Porsche because her mother—although she didn’t say anything about it to me—wanted desperately to see her daughter. I knew the only way to make Kirsten come over, the only way to make sure she’d be pleasant, was to do something big, like the Porsche. That’s why I gave it to her.
“Now, Elizabeth told me who Kirsten’s father was when I asked her to marry me, when Kirsten was nineteen. Elizabeth didn’t ever want me to question that she’d kept the truth from me on purpose if, somehow, I found out about Kirsten’s parentage. I tell you, I couldn’t believe it at first. I mean, Ted Bundy, that horrific monster—no, I couldn’t believe it, didn’t want to believe the woman I loved had actually slept with that psychopath. I didn’t want to know any of the particulars, and that was fortunate, since she didn’t want to talk about what had happened between the two of them.
“As I said, Kirsten was nineteen at the time. I’ll tell you, even before I knew who Kirsten’s father was, I didn’t want to be around her. Like I told you, she was always sullen around me, obviously didn’t want me near her mother, although she was just as sullen, just as unpleasant, to her mother. She obeyed her mother only when she felt like it. Then she’d turn on a dime—she’d become the nicest girl you can imagine, all smiles and hugs and charm, like at her birthday party. And yes, this was always connected to something her mother or I did for her. You can be sure I gave marrying Elizabeth a lot of thought after she told me about Kirsten.
“But you see, I loved Elizabeth, loved her to my bones, and she loved me. However, she put me off for another two years until Kirsten was twenty-one, out of the house, and on her own, and I wouldn’t have to be around her. Then we finally married.
“I will be honest. I knew that if Kirsten’s parentage ever came out, my businesses would suffer and we would be hounded by the media, but I didn’t see how it ever would come out. Elizabeth told me Bundy never knew about the child, so who would tell?”
Lucy said, “Sentra told us you didn’t know about Kirsten’s parentage.”
He snorted, a curiously charming sound. “I repeat, Sentra’s nuts. She’s a liar. She likes to cause problems, to give her sister grief. What if Elizabeth hadn’t come in before you left? You’d still believe you’d spoken to Elizabeth, wouldn’t you?”
“Very likely,” Coop said.
Lucy asked, “Do you know who told Kirsten her father’s identity?”
Lansford sighed. “It had to be Sentra. But why?” He snorted, waved a hand. “Am I an idiot, or what? It’s Sentra we’re talking about here, and that crazy witch would do anything, and for no good reason. I think it’s only because they’re twins that Elizabeth can’t seem to distance herself from Sentra, once and for all.
“I know Elizabeth certainly never told Kirsten who her father was, though she told me Kirsten asked her often enough when she was a little girl. Elizabeth simply told her that her father was dead, and that came true, soon enough, in that Florida electric chair.
“Elizabeth said when Kirsten was twenty-five she became even more secretive from one day to the next, even more unpleasant to her—in fact, she simply cut her out of her life. Elizabeth wanted desperately to believe it was simply another phase, but she said she knew in her heart Kirsten had found out about Bundy.