Teddy found the whole thing disturbing as he mulled it over. Haunting and perhaps even ghoulish. The notes had been posted in the newsgroup before anyone knew the outcome. Before anyone knew that Valerie Kram was dead. From what he’d just read, it was apparent that she’d come from a tight knit family and had no reason to run away. The money in her savings account hadn’t been touched, and her car was found in the lot where she parked to go jogging. According to her roommate, Kram hadn’t discussed any personal problems with friends or given any indication she wanted to leave home. Although the police considered her missing and registered her name and photograph on the FBI’s National Crime Information Center database, they hadn’t been investigating her disappearance as a possible kidnapping or murder. Friends and family had been interviewed, the bike path scoured with the aid of cadaver dogs. A witness who saw her jogging had been located, but no evidence was found indicating foul play.
Teddy got out of the chair and into his coat. Jill turned toward him, her brown eyes gently searching his face.
“They stopped looking for her,” she said.
He shook it off and grabbed his briefcase, the frustration welling up into his chest. It came down to man power, he thought. And the lack of a single tangible lead, made all the worse by the fact that adults turn up missing every day. In Valerie Kram’s case, they’d found her after the war was over. They’d been too late.
EIGHTEEN
Teddy walked in on Nash’s assistant. She was seated at her computer and concentrating on the screen, but didn’t seem to mind the interruption. They’d met in the hall yesterday, and when she recognized him, she flashed a genuine smile and shook his hand, introducing herself as Gail Emerson. Teddy thought she might be about fifty, but couldn’t really tell because her attractive appearance remained so youthful. Her hair was a mix of different shades of blond. Her eyes were blue and smart, but somehow easy and warm.
“He’s expecting you,” she said, glancing at the door. “Would you like a cup of coffee?”
Teddy looked at the fresh pot sitting on the table by the window, thanked her but shook his head. He didn’t need any more caffeine right now. On the drive over, he’d stopped at the post office and bullied his way into an early morning meeting with Holmes’s supervisor. The clock was ticking. And Teddy was trying to determine what Holmes had been doing on the day Valerie Kram disappeared. October 26 had been a Wednesday. The supervisor could barely speak English but seemed to be able to read. Although the man wasn’t pleased with Teddy’s visit, he went through the employment records and verified that Holmes checked in at 6:00 a.m., worked his usual nine-hour shift and punched out at three that afternoon without incident. According to what Teddy had read, Valerie Kram vanished at dusk. Nothing he learned from Holmes’s supervisor even hinted at a possible alibi.
He stepped into the office. Nash was standing over the jury table puffing on an early morning cigar. When he looked up, his face seemed a little pale.
“It’s worse than we thought,” he said.
Teddy noted the concern in Nash’s voice. As he moved closer, Nash handed him a sheet of paper. It was a missing persons bulletin pulled off the national computer database. The same flyer on Valerie Kram that ADA Carolyn Powell had shown him yesterday at the boathouse. Below Kram’s picture was a complete physical description along with the date and place she was last seen. Teddy didn’t understand Nash’s concern until he glanced down at the jury table. There were two more flyers. The dates were different, and so were the names.
“After I pulled Kram’s sheet,” Nash said, “I broke down her physical description and went back a month. Then two months. This is what came up.”
Teddy set the flyer down beside the others, struck by the similarity of their faces. Though their individual features varied to some degree, there could be no doubt that they shared the same overall appearance and style. It was a certain kind of beauty, but not the brand manufactured on a model’s face in a fashion magazine. Instead, their radiance emanated from beneath their skin. Each one of them looked like they had something more to do in life than primp before a mirror or plan their next visit to a plastic surgeon. The word soul came to mind.
Teddy noticed a calendar on the table. “What are you doing with that?”
“Checking lunar cycles,” Nash said. “There aren’t any. The kidnappings are occurring at random. Four weeks apart, then two weeks. Darlene Lewis was murdered six weeks after that. It started last September.”
“Did you call the police?”
“Not yet,” Nash said. “I think we need to consider what’s in Oscar Holmes’s best interest. We need time to begin a profile of the killer and think this through.”
Teddy’s eyes moved back to the flyers on the table. He reached into his pocket and fished out his cigarettes. As he lit one, he tried not to let the shock he was feeling show. The victims were adding up. The horror.
“They could be twins,” Teddy said. “You mean to tell me that the police aren’t already aware that something’s wrong?”
“If I had to guess, I’d say they were, Teddy. But you need evidence that a crime’s been committed. You need something to go on. Darlene Lewis’s murder set this in motion. Until two days ago there was no sign of foul play or we would’ve heard about it. Finding Valerie Kram’s body indicates a trend and gives the investigation speed.”
“I want you to see something,” Teddy said.
He pulled the murder book from his briefcase and opened it on the table, pointing to the letter he received in the mail without touching it. Nash leaned closer and began reading. When he was finished, he examined the envelope and smiled at the return address. 45 Somebody Street.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to get used to these,” Nash said. “We both will.”
“What about fingerprints?”
“If it’d make you feel any better, you should turn it over to the detectives working the case. Did you touch it?”
“I didn’t know what it was at first.”
“Send it in anyway. I’ve received hundreds over the years, but it’s never gone anywhere. Some have prints and others don’t. The trouble comes in matching the ones that do to a name and a face. John Q. Public, or should I say Colt Forty-five. I keep mine in a file in the drawer.”
Nash was trying to make him feel better, but it wasn’t working. As he watched Nash open a cabinet, he stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray. Then Nash handed him a plastic bag along with a pair of tweezers from the top drawer of his desk. In a way he felt like he might be overreacting. Nash had made it sound like death threats went with the job and that there would be more to come. At the same time, he felt a certain degree of terror as he pinched the note with the tweezers and read the words I’m watching you for the second time that morning. He dropped the note into the bag, then the envelope. As he placed them in his briefcase, Gail walked into the room with a sheaf of papers. Nash’s eyes went glassy as he looked at her.
“I’m sorry,” she said, passing them over. “They started last January. I went back two years. This is all there is.”
She left the room, closing the door behind her. Nash laid the sheets of paper out on the jury table, one after the next. It was another series of missing persons bulletins off the NCIC database. Teddy flinched as he saw the faces, counting them while Nash arranged them by date. There were eleven. Darlene Lewis’s murder made it twelve. Every one of them looked as if they’d been born of the same mother and father. As Teddy stared at them, it felt as though they were staring back.