State of Life: A Mystery Thriller Novel (Virgil Jones Book 12)

by Thomas Scott

  Virgil held up his hands. “Okay, sorry. Just asking. And listen, don’t be offended by my next question, but the social media sites won’t be able to trace this back to us, will they?”

  Becky and Wu and Nicky all looked at each other. Then Wu, sounding exactly like an Asian Valley girl, said, “Like, oh my God…”

  Ross looked at Virgil, and said, “While the computer whizzes are doing their thing, what are me and Rosie supposed to do?”

  Virgil gave him a fake grin. “The same thing Murt and I are going to be doing. Follow me.”

  Everyone was following Virgil as he walked into his office, and once there, he stopped so quickly that they all practically bumped into each other. “Your brake lights aren’t working,” Rosencrantz said.

  “What is it?” Murton said.

  Virgil spun in a circle, then pointed. “The files I dug out of the archives. They were all stacked right over there next to my desk. But now they’re gone.” He turned to Murton. “Did Becky take them?”

  Murton shook his head. “I doubt it. I’m sure she would have said something. Let me run back and ask her, just to make sure.”

  Thirty seconds later he was back. “She not only didn’t take them, she said she never saw them in your office.”

  Virgil scratched the back of his head. “What the hell?”

  “You’ve been running on empty for a few days now,” Rosencrantz said. “Are you sure you put them in here?”

  “Of course I’m sure,” Virgil said. “Ross saw them.”

  Ross was nodding. “He’s right. They were here.” Then he let a smile form on his lips. “I bet I know where they are.” He took out his phone and sent a quick text.

  Two minutes later Lawless walked into Virgil’s office holding a banker’s box. He looked completely exhausted. He set the box on Virgil’s desk, glanced at Ross, and said, “I was just about to bring this up to you guys.” Then to Virgil: “I’ve been up all night. After you left yesterday, I didn’t have anything to do, or anywhere to be, so I thought I’d take a preliminary look at the old files. The rest of them are still down in the lab.”

  Virgil looked at the box on his desk. “Did you find anything?”

  Lawless’s eyes were bloodshot and resting at half-mast. He yawned, then rubbed his face with both hands. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I did.” He removed the lid from the box and pulled out a single sheet of paper. “These are my notes from one of the old cases. The original notes are still right here in the box, but I wanted to summarize everything.”

  “Tell us,” Virgil said.

  “I will, but I’ve got to sit down. If I don’t, I’m going to fall over.”

  Everyone grabbed a chair, and they arranged themselves in a little semicircle. Lawless took his notes and walked them through his discovery. He looked at Virgil, and said, “The last MCPD case your father worked as sheriff of Marion County was back in 1990.”

  “That’s right,” Virgil said. “It was just before he retired.”

  “We were still in sand-land,” Murton said.

  Virgil nodded. “I remember him telling me he was going to retire so he could take care of Mom. That’s when we found out how sick she was.”

  “He was personally involved in a missing child case when he retired,” Lawless said. “The new sheriff took over, but the case eventually went cold. The victim disappeared during a cross-country meet at one of the Marion County parks.”

  Virgil’s eyes widened, then he turned and looked at nothing for a few seconds, his mind suddenly racing. What were the words his father had used? He was examining his past mistakes and running down some clues? Then he remembered the girl at the park down in Jamaica…the one who’d asked him for an apple, then disappeared, leaving a single shoe in the middle of the path.

  Lawless cleared his throat, then went on with his report. “Anyway, as I said, the case went cold, and the only evidence ever recovered was—“

  “A running shoe,” Virgil said. He looked right at Lawless, and said, “Was the victim’s name Mary Adams?”

  Lawless visibly swallowed, then said, “Yes. And you’re right about the shoe. How did you know?”

  Virgil ignored the question and ran down to the conference room.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Virgil burst into the room so fast he scared the hell out of Becky. She spun her chair around, and said, “What’s going on? Is the building on fire, or something?”

  Oddly enough, Virgil took her question seriously. “No. Everything is fine.” Then he pointed at the screen, and said, “Listen, I don’t know that much about what you guys do with the computers and all that, but I’ve got a hard connection between these girls, and one of my dad’s old cases. Her name was Mary Adams, and it was one of the last things he was working on before he retired.”

  “Didn’t he retire back in the 90s when you and Murt were still in the Army?” Becky said.

  Virgil was nodding rapidly. “Yes, yes, but the girl went missing from a cross-country meet right here in Marion County. Those three girls on the screen were athletes. We know for a fact that they all ran cross-country. It was right there in front of us the whole time.”

  Becky was skeptical. “Was she also a good student, a single child, and worked at a part-time job? Because if that’s the case, it’s really not new information.”

  “I’m getting ready to look at the entire file in a few minutes, so I don’t have those answers, Becks. But I do have a strong gut feeling that if you pulled up the information from all the other girls, you’ll find at least some of them were runners too.”

  “We can certainly do that, Jonesy,” Becky said. “But I don’t think the victim from your dad’s case will help us that much.”

  Virgil suddenly felt a little deflated. “Why not?”

  “Two reasons: Kids back then didn’t have cell phones like they do now, and, we’re trying to find out who’s been taking them based off of their social media accounts. Facebook and Twitter weren’t born yet. MySpace wasn’t even around back then.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Becks. I’m simply saying keep doing what you’re doing, but do it with an eye toward the one thing that connects my dad’s old case with the more recent ones, and that’s cross-country runners. That’s how we’ll find this guy.”

  Nicky and Wu were listening in, and Nicky agreed with Virgil. “He’s right, Becky. At the very least, it will narrow our search parameters enough that we won’t be looking at a week or more to get the data. We could have it in a couple of days. Maybe less.”

  Virgil pointed a finger at Nicky and said, “Do it.”

  Virgil ran back to his office, and when he got there, he found everyone was gone. So too was the banker’s box that contained the Mary Adams case file. He made his way down to the lab, where he found Lawless and the rest of his team all peering at a running shoe that sat on one of the tech’s workbenches.

  He squeezed in, and said, “Is that the shoe?”

  “Is it ever,” Murton said.

  “How does it help us?” Virgil said.

  “If you’d have stuck around for a minute, you’d already know,” Ross said.

  “He’s right,” Rosencrantz said. “You missed the best news of all.”

  “Well, not to sound too impatient about it, but as the leader of the MCU, how about someone bring me up to speed?”

  “I don’t think you can say, ‘not to sound too impatient about it,’ then sound totally impatient about it,” Rosencrantz said.

  Virgil jerked his thumb at Ross, and said, “You’ve been hanging out with this one too much. Now spill it, will you?”

  “We’ve got DNA,” Lawless said. “There was a single spot of blood on the laces. I was able to get enough for a sample. If you can find your killer, we’ll be able to get a match.”

  Virgil clapped him on the back. “That’s great work, Chip. Really great. Listen, you look like you’re about to drop. Go home and get some sleep.”

  Lawless looked so relieved Virgil thought
he was about to be hugged. “Thank you,” Lawless said. Then he left the lab without saying another word.

  Virgil grabbed the Adams case files and they all headed back to his office.

  Virgil looked at Ross and Rosencrantz, and said, “Go back to the conference room and start going through the files where any of the other missing girls were cross-country runners. When you’ve got those separated, I want you to do three things. First, start putting a timeline together of when their last meet was, and compare that with the date of their abduction.”

  Ross was taking notes as Virgil spoke. “What else?”

  “Get the names of their coaches, because we’ll want to talk to each of them. I know some of these cases go pretty far back, so the coaches might not remember much, but it’s worth a shot.”

  “And then?” Rosencrantz said.

  “Once you’ve got that list put together, we’ll divide it up, and start doing the legwork…again. Murt and I are going to go through the Mary Adams file, and then we’ll hit the coaching staff of all the schools. They know something, I’m sure of it, even if they don’t know they know.”

  Virgil and Murton began going through the Adams case notes. Most of it was typed up, but the file also contained notebook pages that Virgil recognized as his father’s handwriting. A number of black and white photographs showed the general area where the meet was held, the trail where Mary’s shoe was discovered, then a few close-ups of the shoe itself, with an evidence marker sitting next to it.

  “According to these notes, the coach for the Ben Davis team back then was a woman named Susan Banner,” Murton said.

  Virgil brought up Google and got the phone number for the Ben Davis school. When he called and asked for Susan Banner, the woman who answered the phone informed him that she’d retired years ago. Virgil thanked her, then hung up. He pressed the intercom button on his desk phone and said, “Hey, Becks?”

  Becky’s voice came right back. “Yup.”

  “Can you get me an address and phone number for a woman named Susan Banner? Last known place of employment was Ben Davis High School.”

  “When do you need it? Wait, never mind. I already know the answer. Give me five minutes.”

  While they were waiting, Virgil looked through the case notes, and said, “You know what I’m not seeing here?”

  “What’s that?”

  “The name of the other team, and the name of their coach. Why didn’t Dad include it in his report?”

  “Didn’t you tell me that he said he was examining his past mistakes, or something like that?”

  Virgil nodded. “Yeah, I did. I’m wondering if this was one of them.”

  A few minutes later the intercom buzzed, and Becky’s voice came through the speaker. “Jonesy? You guys still in there?”

  “Yeah, Becks. What do you have?”

  “I just sent you a text with Susan Banner’s phone number and address. Looks like she retired to Madison, Indiana…not the county, the town down by the Ohio River.”

  “Okay, thanks. Murton and I will probably be gone for the rest of the day. Tell Ross and Rosencrantz to keep digging. They know what we’re looking for.”

  “You got it, Jonesy. Send Murton in before you leave so I can give him a smooch.”

  Murton gave his brother a wink, then got up and left the room. Virgil took out his phone and called Cool. “Hey, Motherfucker, we need to aviate. And to demonstrate my gratitude for your participation in said aviating, I’m willing to come to the airport this time.”

  “You must be at the MCU, huh?” Cool said.

  “Yeah.”

  “When and where, Boss?”

  “Madison, Indiana,” Virgil said.

  “Madison County up north, or the town by the river?”

  “The town. We’ll need a rental car waiting at the airport down there. How soon can you be ready to go?”

  “Half hour okay?”

  “Perfect,” Virgil said.

  Thirty minutes later Virgil and Murton turned into the Million-Air parking lot, went inside, and found Cool and Bell waiting for them.

  Virgil tipped his head, then said, “Hey, Bell. Didn’t know you’d be joining us.”

  “I’ve got a flight test coming up, and I need the practice. Hey, Murt.”

  Murton said hello, then Virgil glanced at Cool before turning to Bell. “When you say practice…”

  Bell waved him off. “I’m working on my instrument rating. I’ve already passed the written test, but the flight test is coming up pretty soon, so I’ve got to be ready for that. Don’t worry…for you guys, it will be a regular flight.”

  “What do you mean when you say, ‘for you guys?’” Virgil said.

  “You worry too much, Jonesy,” Cool said. “Are we going or not?”

  “Maybe we should drive,” Virgil said. “The weather looks a little iffy.”

  Bell shook his head. “It’s not iffy, as you say. It’s cloudy. That’s why I’m going along. I need to fly in the clouds using only the instruments, as opposed to looking out the window.”

  “What’s wrong with looking out the window?” Virgil said.

  Murton shook his head, opened the door, and climbed inside the helicopter. “Stop being such a control freak and hop in, will you? It’s not like you know how to fly the damned thing.”

  Virgil took a seat next to Murton, and said, “Yeah, but that time when we were heading into Freedom, I pushed on one of the levers and saved us.”

  Murton frowned at him. “That’s one way of looking at it.”

  Virgil shrugged. “Whatever. I’m just going with what Cool told me.”

  Murton laughed. “I seem to remember you saying something like, ‘So, I’m a pilot now,’ and Cool saying, ‘sure, keeping thinking that.’” Then, before Virgil could respond, Murton continued with, “I am one hundred percent certain he was being facetious.”

  “Facetious, huh?” Virgil said. “What did you do, sign up for a word of the day course, or something?”

  “I know my words,” Murton said.

  “Then why didn’t you use jocose instead? That’s Latin from ‘jocus,’ which is where the word ‘joke’ originally came from.”

  Like that…all the way down to Madison.

  The rental car was waiting when they arrived and Virgil told Cool and Bell that they’d probably be back in an hour or two.

  Twenty minutes later, after two wrong turns and a little confusion with the nav system that kept trying to reroute them around some road construction detours, they finally arrived at Susan Banner’s house, only to discover she wasn’t home.

  Murton looked at Virgil and said, “I’m not trying to be too critical here, but maybe you should have called before we left.” Then to drive home his point, he added, “No jocose.”

  But Virgil, who was sometimes as lucky as he was good, pointed to the car that was turning into the drive, and said, “Who says I didn’t? I called while you were smooching Becky goodbye. We’re just a little early.”

  Susan Banner parked her car, got out, and walked over to Virgil and Murton. “Hello, gentlemen. Are you the state detectives?”

  “Yes, we are,” Virgil said. “I’m Detective Virgil Jones, and this is my partner, Murton Wheeler. As I said on the phone, we have some questions for you regarding the disappearance of Mary Adams. May we come in?”

  Banner unlocked the door, led them inside, and they all took a seat in the living room. “I could make coffee if you’d like,” she said. Banner was a severe-looking woman who appeared to be in her mid to late sixties. She had short gray hair, and wore a comfortable-looking tracksuit. There was an edge in her voice when she spoke, one that seemed to be habitual rather than intentional.

  “Thank you, but that won’t be necessary,” Virgil said.

  “I hope you’ll excuse me for saying so, but it’s about time somebody took up Mary’s case again. After all these years I’m surprised anyone has bothered.”

  “We’re looking into Mary’s disappearance as
part of a larger investigation,” Murton said.

  Banner crossed her arms, and said, “So in other words, if someone else hadn’t gone missing, Mary’s case would still be gathering dust.”

  Virgil leaned forward and put his elbows on his thighs. “I won’t lie to you, Mrs. Banner…you’re probably right. It’s the nature of the beast in law enforcement sometimes. Cases go cold. No one likes it, especially the cops who can’t capture the person or persons responsible for the crime. But every once in a while, new information comes to light, and when it does, we follow up on it to the best of our abilities. That’s why we’re here today.”

  “So, how can I help?” Banner said.

  “Take us back to the day Mary disappeared,” Murton said. “Tell us exactly what you remember. Even the smallest of details could be significant…”

  Chapter Thirty

  Banner took them back, and spent thirty minutes going through her version of events. Virgil and Murton both took notes, asked clarifying questions, and prompted her to explore different parts of her memories the day Mary Adams went missing.

  When she was finished, almost as an afterthought, she tipped her head just so, looked directly at Virgil, and said, “I know it’s a rather common name…Jones, but if I’m not mistaken, the Marion County Sheriff at the time was named Jones. He was there that day. Do I have that right?”

  Virgil nodded at her. “Yes, you do.”

  “Any relation?” Banner said.

  “My father.”

  “Well, I’m certain he’ll be pleased to know that you’re looking into this situation.”

  Virgil looked away for a split second, and Banner caught it.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “Has he passed?”

  “Yes, ma’am, he has,” Virgil said. “But I believe that your statement is true. He will be pleased.”

  There was a brief moment of awkward silence, then Virgil said, “All of the information you’ve given us today will be a tremendous help.” Then he lied a little, as if the feelings of a dead man had to be protected. “One of the things that happen in cases like this is that over time, information can sometimes get misplaced.”