by Mary Stone
About the case, she added quickly.
Dropping the phone into her handbag, she went through a mental checklist of essential items—her phone, wallet, badge, weapon—and then scooped up her keys and made her way out into the summer morning.
The sun was blanketed by a layer of clouds, and to the west, the sky darkened with the first hints of the forecasted storms. Gray daylight glinted off the lenses of Noah’s aviator sunglasses as he turned them over in his hand. His gaze was fixed on the horizon, but as soon as she stepped onto the lot, his green eyes flicked to her.
“Mornin’,” he greeted, stifling a yawn with one hand.
“Did you sleep like shit too?” she asked as she pulled open the passenger side door of the red pickup.
He only managed a nod in response as he yawned again.
“It’s stress, probably.” With a sigh, Winter squeezed her eyes closed and rubbed her temples.
“Maybe we should ask Autumn if she’s got any recommendations. She’s a double expert when it comes to stress, you know? She’s a grad student, which is stressful, and then she’s a clinical psych major.” He glanced to her and offered a noncommittal shrug.
“That’s not a bad idea,” Winter muttered as she fastened her seatbelt. “But that’s part of what I wanted to talk to you about. I think she’s involved in this John Doe case we’re working.”
Eyes going wide, he shot her a questioning look as he turned the key over in the ignition. “Involved? How?”
She wanted to know what was going on, but the vision hadn’t been forthcoming. Winter took in a deep breath to push past the sudden bout of impatience. “I had a headache. You know, one of those headaches.”
He opened his mouth, but before he could speak, she held up a hand.
“I’m fine. Honestly, compared to some of the other ones, this wasn’t even really that bad. Plus, I was sitting on my bed when I lost consciousness, so I fell onto a pillow instead of the floor.” She emphasized her point with a sarcastic smile.
She wasn’t worried about herself. She’d dealt with these visions for years, and right now, she was concerned for her friend.
It was a strange feeling, she thought suddenly.
For the first chunk of the Douglas Kilroy investigation, her actions had been driven as much by a lust for revenge as worry for the wellbeing of others.
Winter wasn’t proud of her motivation in those months, nor did she like how she had behaved toward her friends and colleagues. Maybe the whole Machiavellian attitude worked for Aiden Parrish or Sun Ming, but manipulating people to get what she wanted was not Winter’s scene.
How in the hell those two had ever sustained a romantic relationship for anything longer than a week was beyond her comprehension. At the thought, she felt a twinge of irritability. The feeling bordered dangerously on envy, and she pried herself from the introspection and glanced to Noah.
“A vision?” he surmised.
“Yeah.” Winter nodded. “It was weird. Not that any of them are normal, so to speak, but this one was like I was skipping through time to watch different events.”
As they pulled out of the parking lot, she walked through each scene she had viewed, and she spared no detail. For all she knew, what seemed trivial to her might have struck someone else as important.
And she was right.
By the time she finished the recollection, they had pulled into the drive-thru of a Starbucks. Noah was clean-shaven, and Winter could swear she watched most of the color drain from his cheeks as she went through the memories.
As he rolled down the window to give the barista their orders, he looked like he had just come face to face with a ghost.
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered, raking the fingers of one hand through his dark hair.
“Yeah.” Winter sighed and leaned against the headrest. “You remember the vision I had with Kilroy’s victim, Officer Delosreyes? During that one, it was like I was her, like I lived through that trauma just like she had. This one was almost the same way. I mean, I didn’t see it through Autumn’s eyes, but I was right there, and I felt every single thing she did. When she was scared, so was I, and when she hit her head on the edge of that coffee table, it hurt.”
“Yeah, I remember that. And I think what we should do right now is try to set aside a lot of that. Set aside the knowledge that her parents are a couple serious, high-grade pieces of shit, and just try to figure out what the stuff you saw has to do with the John Doe case. Because if she’s a target here, we need to take care of that before we can even really think about all the rest of it. Not trying to sound like a dick, either. Because, believe me, I’m not about to just forget about the rest of it.”
“Me neither,” Winter all but spat. “But you’re right. I agree completely. We need to figure out what she’s got to do with this case first so we can make sure she’s safe.”
“She hit her head, right?”
“Right. And if I hadn’t known she was still alive, I would’ve thought that it had killed her.”
Noah inched closer to the pick-up window. “Traumatic brain injury, right?”
“Right.” She saw the connection already, but she didn’t interrupt him.
“John Doe and Jane Doe both had traumatic brain injuries too. From what the ME said, the injuries were older. And he said that they’d undergone surgery for those, plus the surgery that the killer, or at least we assume the killer did before they overdosed them on morphine or whatever in the hell it was they used to kill them. So, since they were able to keep these people alive after a damn brain surgery, we’re looking for a brain surgeon, right?”
Winter stared at him. “Do you think…?” It was like the rest of the words were stuck in her throat.
“That doctor you saw,” he finished for her. “Yeah. Dr. Schmidt, right? Schmidt is a common name, and we don’t know where the hospital was.”
“Yeah, Autumn grew up in Minnesota, but for procedures like that, sometimes people get life flighted pretty far away from where they were when they got hurt.”
“We don’t have enough for a subpoena.” Thoughtful gaze fixed on the windshield, he tapped the steering wheel with an index finger. “Could we just ask her?”
“How?” Winter held out her hands as she shook her head.
There were only a few people alive who knew about her sixth sense and her visions, and one of them was bound by a Hippocratic Oath. As much as Winter liked Autumn, and as much potential as she saw for the future of their friendship, she could not take the risk.
Not only would revealing her so-called ability put her career in jeopardy, but there was a real chance that Autumn would think she was insane.
To her relief, Noah needed no elaboration. “Good point.”
“I feel bad about it, but I can’t think of another way. We need to find out who Dr. Schmidt is. And you’re right, we don’t have enough for a subpoena, especially not for medical records. But we can look through what we do have, and then we can get enough for a subpoena.”
“If we look hard enough, we might not even need a subpoena.”
21
The search for background information about Autumn Trent started out slow and tedious. For a student with a massive amount of loan debt, Autumn’s credit score was good. In fact, Winter thought it might have been higher than hers.
Her academic record was spotless—she had been on the Dean’s List for every semester of her undergrad. Autumn had graduated with “highest distinction” after she wrote an honor’s thesis about bystander intervention. A couple years ago, she’d been awarded her Juris Doctorate, and once again, she had been at the top of her class.
None of the school records were news to Winter. She and Autumn had engaged in plenty of discussions about their respective college careers.
A list of addresses and potential relatives gleaned from public records indicated that Autumn’s adopted father had passed away, and that her adopted mother, Kimberly Trent, still lived in Minnesota.
Again,
Winter already knew about Autumn’s adopted parents.
Before they were even twenty-four hours into their search, Winter and Noah had hit a dead end. They didn’t know the surname in which Autumn had been born, and despite sifting through at least seven different databases, they hadn’t even found a clue to point them in the right direction. Her adoption records were sealed, and all they could discern was that she had been thirteen at the time.
There were Child Protective Services records, but they were closed up even tighter than the adoption documents. Other than the fact that Autumn was labeled “victim” in each case, they weren’t even given a date or a year when the events had taken place.
When they left the office on the first day, Winter had been sure they would come back in the morning with a refreshed perspective. She was sure they would find something.
But when they departed on the second day, her conviction had begun to waver.
Concocting a series of lies so she could ask Autumn about her past was an absolute last resort. But as Winter dropped down to sit on her couch, she figured her time would be better utilized by coming up with a believable cover story.
The idea left a sour taste in her mouth, but she would rather lie to her friend than watch her get hurt, especially if she knew she could have prevented it.
A clatter sounded from the wooden coffee table as the screen of her smartphone lit up the shadowy living room. She spotted Noah’s contact picture as she leaned forward, and she swiped the answer key before the device had a chance to buzz again.
“Hey,” she greeted. “What’s up?”
“I’ve got something.” His breathing was labored, and she wondered what he had been doing.
“About the case?”
“Yeah. Is it cool if I stop over?”
“Of course.” She pushed herself out of her seat and started toward the kitchen.
“Good, because I’m already here.”
When he rapped his knuckles against the nearby door, she couldn’t help but laugh.
Flicking the deadbolt, she pulled open the door and stepped aside to give him room to enter. He had abandoned the black suit and blue tie he wore to work that day in favor of gym shorts and a worn band t-shirt.
“Nirvana?” she asked, furrowing her brows to flash him a puzzled glance. “You don’t strike me as a Nirvana type of guy.”
“There you go stereotyping me again,” he huffed with feigned exasperation. “I listen to everything, thank you very much.”
“Kurt Cobain did lead us out of the darkness of the hair band era.” Winter grinned at him. She couldn’t stand ‘80s hair bands, and Noah had been subjected to a couple of her tirades when they accidentally came across Poison or Def Leppard on the radio.
“They’re not all terrible, I’m telling you. You’ve got to have an open mind sometimes, Winter.” With one of the matter-of-fact looks he had perfected over the last year, he produced a silver laptop from beneath an arm. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to use this to pull up a ten-hour loop of ‘Unskinny Bop.’ I found something about our case.” When he paused, she didn’t miss the flicker of guilt behind his green eyes.
“About Autumn.” She kept her tone gentle, but she was relieved to know that she wasn’t the only one who felt like an asshole for snooping around in their friend’s past.
“Yeah.”
“You want something to drink?” Winter jerked a thumb over her shoulder as he dropped down to sit in the center of the couch.
“Sure.”
“Okay, what do you want?” she prodded.
Shrugging, he glanced up from the computer. “Surprise me.”
As she made her way to the refrigerator at the end of the galley kitchen, she entertained the idea of pouring him a mug of Southern Comfort.
She went so far as to open the cupboard where she kept the coffee cups before remembering why he was here in the first place. He was here so they could rip open their friend’s dark past in hopes they would be able to connect her to a serial killer who happened to be a brain surgeon.
Her stomach dropped, and she wondered if she should pour herself a mug of Southern Comfort.
With a sigh, she pried open the stainless-steel fridge and retrieved two bottles of beer. Autumn had recommended the seasonal brew, and now Winter and Noah were obsessed.
“Thanks.” Noah accepted the bottle from her outstretched hand and took a quick swig.
“What did you find?” she asked as she dropped down to sit at his side.
“Her name.”
Winter tightened her grasp on the cool glass. “Her last name?”
“Yeah. She and her adopted parents changed it at the same time they officially adopted her. Her last name before then was Nichol, and her parents were Regina Petzke and Jeffrey Nichol. And their records.” Shaking his head, he left the observation unfinished as he opened a new window. “I didn’t spend very long on them before I came over here, but from what I saw, neither of them were good people.”
“Her mom looked really young,” Winter put in.
“Sixteen.” Noah tapped a few keys. “And her dad was nineteen when she was born. So, based on the age you thought Autumn was when you saw her, I looked through his criminal record. The dude dropped off the face of the planet after the state pressed charges. And I mean, he really dropped off the face of the planet. Didn’t leave so much as a breadcrumb behind when he did.”
“Fuck him,” Winter muttered.
Noah nodded. “Hopefully, he got eaten by a shark or sucked up by a tornado or something. I found the date that it happened, April twenty-third, 2002. Little less than a month before Autumn’s eleventh birthday. And that’s when I called you to tell you I found something.”
Winter reached for her notepad. “Now, we look for news articles and other reports from that day. There ought to be something out there that’ll mention which hospital they took her to.”
“And then we look up their personnel records and find the woman you saw.”
“And then we’ve got a suspect, right?”
He paused to offer her a noncommittal shrug. “I don’t know about that. I mean, obviously we’ll know she’s a suspect, but I’m not sure how we explain that to anyone else. Especially Autumn.”
Winter hesitated before she made the next suggestion. She knew he wouldn’t like the idea, but at this point, she figured they were desperate enough that he would still agree.
“We can take it to Aiden,” Winter finally said, then held up a finger. “I know, but before you say anything.”
Propping both elbows on his knees, Noah shifted his green eyes to hers. “You’re right,” he started. “No offense because I know he’s your friend, or mentor. Whatever. But the guy’s manipulative as shit. If anyone’ll be able to come up with something to use for us to talk to Autumn, it’ll be him.”
Though Winter’s first inclination was to protest, she stopped herself before the words had formed on her lips.
Well, he wasn’t wrong, was he?
“All right,” she replied. “Yeah, something like that. I’m going to go get my laptop so I can help.”
Though they spent over an hour sifting through the records of the hospital, the time was minimal compared to the two days that had yielded no useful information.
Winter was the first to locate records for the surgical staff during the month of April in 2002, and as soon as her eyes had settled on the familiar blonde woman, she took in a sharp breath.
Noah’s attention snapped over to her laptop screen before she even announced her finding.
“That’s her.” Winter gently tapped the woman’s picture with an index finger. “Dr. Catherine Schmidt. Pediatric Neurosurgeon. It says she only worked there for a couple more years after 2002.”
“I’ll see what I can find in the FBI databases.”
Her fingers were already moving. “Okay, I’ll see what I can find online.”
A silence enveloped them, but it was broken within a matter of minutes as Noah heaved
a sigh.
“What?” Winter asked, pulling her focus away from the screen and over to her friend. “Did you find something?”
“Yes and no,” he muttered. “You said she only worked there for a couple more years, right? So, she would have left there about fifteen years ago. As luck would have it, all her records left right along with her. No utilities registered in her name, no cell phone, no car, nothing. She just disappeared like she was never even there to begin with.”
“Did she have any family? Anyone else we could follow to maybe get to her?”
“No. She’s divorced, but her ex-husband died last year of natural causes. Her parents are both gone too. Cancer in both cases.” Running a hand through his hair, he flopped back in his seat and groaned. “It’s one dead end right after another.”
“Do you think she could have died too?” Winter suspected she knew the answer, but they were grasping at straws.
“If she did, it happened off the grid. No records of anything. It’s just, one day she was there, and then the next.” He paused to snap his fingers. “She was gone.”
“Our luck, huh?”
With a dry chuckle, he nodded. “Pretty much.”
“You should take a break.” Winter waved her hand toward the kitchen. “Get yourself another beer and kick back for a little bit. I’ll keep looking.”
Eyebrow arched in feigned suspicion, he returned his laptop to the coffee table. “Do you want a beer? Is that why you think I should take a break?”
Despite the strain from a frustrating, morally questionable search into Autumn’s past, Winter laughed at his dripping sarcasm.
“It’s not,” she managed, “but yes. I’d appreciate it.”
Flashing her a grin, he pushed himself to stand. As he made his way to the kitchen, Winter returned her focus to the search.
When she first caught the glimmer of red, she thought the screen of her laptop might have been acting up. The computer wasn’t even a year old, and if she had to jump through a series of hoops to get a replacement due to a manufacturer’s defect, wouldn’t that just be the icing on the damn cake?
