Threads of Suspicion(122)
“I needed this non-work evening. We both did, right?”
He held her close and gently kissed her. “What do you say I pick you up around six tomorrow evening at your hotel, assuming your case hasn’t moved to a solution before then? We’ll have dinner, and you can choose the movie. I don’t suppose I could get you to wear that red dress again?”
She laughed, lightly punched his arm. “Not a chance. But the rest of it is a deal.”
She so wanted to find the courage to say yes to this man. His world wasn’t hers, but he was. She thought she could learn to manage the occasional party and charity event because they were part of his life. He had already shown her he was comfortable with her friends, and seeing him with David and Maggie was reinforcing that. Tonight she felt the kind of peace she wanted for her life. God was showing her what a good thing felt like, and it seemed as though it was here.
She slipped into her car and buckled the seat belt, waved goodbye.
Twenty-Two
Evie mentally rearranged her work board as she drove to their ad hoc office early Saturday morning. Jim Ulin. Lynne Benoit. An unnamed concert traveler. One of those three held the probable answer to Jenna Greenhill’s disappearance.
Today would be marked by interviews with people who knew Jim, finding those in the neighborhood who might be able to corroborate his story about walking Jenna home. He’d admitted to a fistfight with someone named Rick. She would chase that lead down, find out what had triggered the fight, understand when and how Jim reverted to violence. She would speak with adults who had watched Jim grow up, his friends, see if frustration with being stuck in the neighborhood, unable to attend college, had been gnawing at him. Jenna might have pushed Jim’s buttons there if it was a sensitive point.
She wanted David with her when she sat down with Jim once more. If any part of his story was fabricated to protect himself, to protect Lynne, they should be able to find the weak spots. She couldn’t help but like Jim, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t have killed Jenna or been involved in covering up what happened to help Lynne.
Focusing on the unnamed traveler mostly meant sifting through those on the rope line last night—isolate faces in the right age range, get the FBI to run facial recognition against DMV records, run those names against their multitude of other lists. It would mean hours of work on the video, though the task itself was straightforward. Looking at faces, coming up with names, running background checks, and then hoping somebody surfaced as a person of interest.
Satisfied with the plan for the day, she headed into the office, whistling under her breath. She had dinner and a movie with Rob to look forward to. Until then, she had a case to push to a conclusion.
“Hey, Evie. You’re in early after a late night.”
She nearly bobbled the box of muffins in her hands, not expecting to find David already here. “I didn’t see your car.”
David approached from the break room, coffee mug in hand. “I caught a cab over at four a.m. I didn’t trust myself to drive. Had a crazy thought—or maybe dream—I wanted to run down.”
“How crazy?” She opened the lid on the muffins and offered him breakfast.
He selected the blueberry one, nodded his thanks. “Do you think our traveler would select a new victim from that rope line? Consider it to be a Maggie event of significance, mark out his victim, pickpocket her driver’s license?”
A dagger hit her heart as she winced. “It hadn’t even crossed my mind that he might think that way. It’s hard to lift a license when people are bundled up in coats and gloves . . . but yeah, to lift a wallet from a purse, that could happen.”
“The thought hit me hard enough it wouldn’t let me sleep. I’ve been looking at the security video.” He motioned to the conference room.
“You should have called me. I would have come in and helped.”
“No use both of us losing sleep if the idea didn’t go anywhere. It was just crucial enough I wanted to check it quickly.” He gestured to the projection screen, where tiled photos were on pause. “We’ve got four camera angles from five p.m. to midnight. I ran one view at speed just to get a sense of how many people come and go, and most are there at the rope line for upwards of an hour. So I’m estimating the number of people is going to be around fifteen hundred. I’ve run it at three times speed, looking for a pickpocket, and come up empty—that dropped my stress level considerably. I’m in synchronized mode now, running all four camera angles together. I’m saving faces in the crowd, those who might be the right age—anyone mid-twenties to mid-thirties.”