“Disturbing emails, letters,” David agreed, “people we profile as budding stalkers. Security keeps photos on those we know are the most dangerous to her.”
“If he’s a devoted fan, he’s likely written Maggie.”
David considered that. “The most disturbing mail is kept for a lot of years on the assumption the person is either already a problem or will be one in the future. We’ve been updating the threat file for the ones living in Chicago, particularly given her planned return to live here. So I can get a current list of security worries. But if he’s killing women and being careful about leaving a trail, he’s not going to be sending creepy mail—‘I want to kill for you, Maggie’ and the like. We already would have been on it. Names going at least nine years back, I know them.”
“The admiration ones—softer tone, ‘I love your music, I’d follow you anywhere,’” Evie suggested.
“Okay, I’m catching what you mean. She gets a lot of that kind,” David confirmed. “Those notes don’t get saved unless an obsessed tone comes through. But maybe we can source names. A thank-you letter goes out to people who write her, and those envelope addresses must be generating from a database. We can run the correspondence names against all three of these case files—Jenna, Tammy, and Virginia—and maybe a name turns out to be common in each.”
“Another solid place to start looking. He follows Maggie’s concerts, he likes Maggie’s music, he’s ninety percent likely to be in her fan database too.”
“It’s a massive list, but I’ll get you those names.”
Evie tried to get a better picture of how the guy might show up. “I think he would reach out to Maggie, share his admiration of her music. He doesn’t want to draw attention to himself, wouldn’t come across as a threat but as a devoted admirer. ‘I’ve been to all your concerts, I love the way you sing, I play your music all the time.’ Like that. But he isn’t choosing women who look like her, he isn’t going for her physical type, so this may not be an actual Maggie obsession. He’s probably not going to have a room turned into a shrine for her, her pictures all over the walls. It’s the style of music, the lyrics, the event, the concert gathering—it’s the combination of her music and fans that sparks his interest.”
“Which narrows it down to every male attending her many concerts, but I see where you’re going here,” he said. “I think you’re right that he’s not Maggie-obsessed—she’s just the forum, the draw. The crowd that shares his enjoyment of her music is his hunting ground. I’ll see if we can source names and addresses for those who ordered concert tickets from the band’s website. That data probably goes back at least a decade, since her accounting firm is fanatical about keeping income-and-expense records in pristine shape. The music world is mostly a cash business, one that gets audited frequently. Most orders are for two to ten tickets. If we look for single-ticket purchasers, for these specific dates in history, maybe we get lucky.”
Evie heard some much-needed hope in his voice. “Make some calls to her accounting firm, maybe we get very lucky,” she suggested. “I’ve heard that band groupies try to be at every concert. But someone nine years ago, when the band was just getting its footing, and him being at these three specific concerts in Chicago, Wisconsin, and Indiana? That’s not going to be a long list.”
“Let’s hope he ordered tickets off the band’s website for at least a couple of them,” David said. “I’ll make the calls, then tell Wisconsin PD we’re on our way. Thanks, Evie. A good idea.”
She waved toward Ann. “Joint idea. Ann’s been educating me on the music business, what a concert is actually like.”
David smiled. “I promise to take you both to enjoy one of Maggie’s, show you the real deal from the backstage preconcert prep to switching off the lights when it’s all over. A great experience. Maybe not so great the next couple of dozen times you try to go from beginning to end.”
They all laughed, and David and Evie gathered up items for their trip north.
Milwaukee was colder than Chicago, people were friendlier, and the case that had brought them here was even more incomprehensible than Jenna’s disappearance. But Evie now had enough details from Tammy Preston’s life to reach some possible conclusions.
As they returned to David’s SUV beside the candy store where Tammy occasionally had worked, she tucked her notebook back into her pocket and put some of those thoughts into words.