Closer Than You Think

by Karen Rose

  ‘Just concentrating.’ Looking around, Faith realized that she was alone in the room. ‘What happened to the forensic guys?’ Two of them had been camped out, cataloguing everything they found on their top-to-bottom search of the house.

  ‘On break. Maybe you should take one too, Faith. Why are you on the floor?’

  Faith rubbed her eyes, sore from staring both at her computer screen and at the fine print of the Foundation’s recipient list. ‘It’s easier to spread my papers around me.’

  ‘Have you found anything?’

  ‘Yes.’ And it frightened her. ‘We—’

  ‘Wait. Before you go on, I have a few updates for you. Corinne is out of surgery and stable. Same with your cousin Stone. Marcus is still in surgery and it’s less positive. He was shot in the lung protecting Corinne.’

  ‘What were my cousins doing there?’

  ‘Did Tanaka tell you that we have your uncle Jeremy in a room for questioning?’ Isenberg went on, ignoring her.

  ‘No.’ Her heart sank. ‘You still think he’s guilty?’

  ‘I don’t know. I do know he didn’t re-abduct Roza, because I was with him no more than a half-hour after it happened and it’s a two-hour drive from the cabin to his ex-wife’s home. But we’ve thought he was working with a partner, so that doesn’t prove his innocence.’

  ‘Why were Stone and Marcus there?’ Faith repeated firmly. ‘Don’t ignore me, Lieutenant.’

  Isenberg sighed. ‘Stone was there looking for their brother – Mikhail – who is Jeremy’s son too. Mikhail was found in a grave with the locksmith and the Earl Power tech. We think he surprised the killer, who wanted to hide in the cabin. Marcus was there because Stone texted him for help after Corinne stabbed him with a kitchen knife and then beaned him with a shovel. She thought he was her abductor. I still don’t know whether she was wrong. Stone fits the description of the man who came through your bedroom window in Miami, Doctor.’

  Faith pressed her fingers to her temples. ‘Wait a minute. You’ve got Jeremy in an interview room while two of his sons are in the hospital and one is in the morgue? Really?’

  ‘Really. And he’ll stay there until we’re satisfied he’s not the killer of the seventeen women in your basement.’

  ‘Plus a dozen other people,’ Faith said, chastised.

  ‘We’ll hold him until we can get Bishop and Novak together in the interview room, and then we’ll see. Now, tell me what you’ve found.’

  ‘Okay. Dr Washington had identified three of the seventeen victims – two of whom were scholarship recipients from the Foundation – Susan Simpson and Wendy Franklin. We got another seven names from the jars and five of them were on this list. So far I’ve found five more names on the Foundation list of women who have been reported missing. Three are blondes. That’s his MO, yes?’

  ‘Yes.’ Isenberg sat on the floor beside Faith. ‘But I heard you muttering “no, no, no” as I was walking up to the front door. Why?’

  ‘Because I’m seeing a pattern. I wanted to look at more names before I brought this to you.’ Faith tilted the page on which she’d been making notes so that Isenberg could see. ‘The victim he kidnapped in Miami, Roxanne Dupree, wasn’t a scholarship recipient. She went missing the day after the van tried to run me off the bridge. Corinne and Arianna were taken the day after he burned my old apartment building down.’

  Isenberg’s brows lifted. ‘Go on.’

  ‘This victim, Katie Badgett, was taken the day my grandmother’s will was read.’

  ‘O-kay,’ Isenberg breathed. ‘Very interesting pattern.’

  ‘It goes on.’ Faith pointed to another name in her handwritten notes. ‘Virginia Dreyfus was reported missing the week after I had a really bad car accident.’

  ‘You had a car accident?’

  She nodded. ‘Three years ago, I lost control of the wheel. At the time, I thought I’d fallen asleep, but now I’m wondering if that’s not too coincidental, what with all the other car accidents in this case – my uncle Jeremy, the woman who bought my Prius.’

  ‘Now you’re wondering if all these women were taken because your would-be killer was frustrated when you didn’t die.’

  ‘Yes. I don’t know why anyone would have wanted me dead three years ago, though. It’s after my first run-in with Combs. He was in prison at the time. I’ve been racking my brain as to anything else that happened, but I can’t think of a reason.’

  ‘Let it go for a little while,’ Isenberg advised.

  Easier said than done. ‘Does Jeremy know about his son?’

  ‘Yes. I told him myself. About all of his sons.’

  ‘I feel like I should say or do something to help him.’

  ‘I’d like you to talk to him, but wait until Deacon and Bishop get back so they can observe.’

  Faith sighed. ‘But what if he’s not guilty? You know he didn’t take Roza. What if Marcus dies while you have Jeremy waiting in an interview room? Can’t you let him go to the hospital to be with his sons and just keep him under guard?’

  ‘He may have tried to kill you, Faith. He may have killed dozens of people.’

  ‘He may not have.’

  ‘Your marshmallow heart is going to get you killed someday.’

  Faith shrugged. ‘Maybe. But I’d rather stay open and risk being hurt than close myself off the way I have been for the last . . . well, almost forever. Please consider it.’

  Isenberg rolled her eyes. ‘Okay. I’ll consider it.’

  ‘Then I’ll keep on task with the list to see if there are any more possible matches between the Joy scholarship recipients.’

  ‘I can help with that. The team of clerks I mentioned when you were at Novak’s desk? They’ve been crunching through this list all day. I can have them compile a list of the dates that any of the missing women disappeared and you can look them over.’

  ‘That would be helpful, thank you. This is tedious work.’

  ‘Well, it’s not out of the goodness of my heart. I want this case solved. To that end, Corinne gave us some valuable information on Roza and her mother. Roza was likely born in the basement, which is why we haven’t found anything in the missing children database.’

  ‘Oh my God. That poor child. And her mother died here? Oh my God, Lieutenant.’

  ‘I know. Roza told Corinne that her mother named her father as Eric Johnson.’

  ‘Common name.’

  ‘I know,’ Isenberg said again. ‘She also said that her mother and aunt were taken at the same time. Her mother’s name was Amethyst Johnson. She was known as Amy. To make it even more complex, Amethyst may have been from Canada. She used to call her daughter “Roza with a zed”. Oh, and Roza’s full name is Firoza. But according to my team of clerks, there is no Amethyst Johnson on the list, so she might not have been a Foundation recipient. But I still want everyone looking at the information, in case there’s a name that could be a variation or misspelling of Amy.’

  ‘Or . . . Amy might not be the Foundation recipient. Her sister might have been. He took Arianna because she tried to save Corinne. Maybe he took Amy because she was with her sister or tried to stop her sister’s abduction. Amethyst is not a common name. Did you ask your clerks to look for other names that had to do with colors, or purple specifically?’

  ‘No, I didn’t, but I will. That’s very good thinking.’

  ‘Now Firoza is also a very uncommon name,’ Faith said. She typed it into her laptop’s search screen and felt a spurt of excitement. ‘And it connects. Firoza is a kind of turquoise.’

  ‘And Amethyst is a gemstone,’ Isenberg said with satisfaction. ‘Nice.’

  ‘Arianna thought Roza was eleven or twelve,’ Faith said. ‘If she really was born in the basement, he would have taken Amy and her sister at least eleven or twelve years ago.’ She ran her finger down the list until she got to the scholarship recipients from that time period. ‘No Amethysts, but we do have a Jade. Jade Kendrick,’ she said, typing the name into the national Missing Pe
rson database.

  ‘Not listed,’ Isenberg said, leaning over to look at Faith’s screen.

  ‘Let’s see if she’s out and about on social media.’ Faith did another search and came up with nothing. ‘Her mailing address was Chicago when she was sent her scholarship letter. Her application would likely list her parents’ names. I’ve already asked Henson for the files, but his secretary said they had to search for them in the vault. I’ll call again, but they may need someone to push them.’

  ‘You try first,’ Isenberg said. ‘If they do any dancing, I’ll cut in. Put it on speaker.’

  Faith dialed Henson’s number and Mrs Lowell answered. ‘Is Mr Henson Senior in?’

  ‘No,’ his secretary said. ‘If you’re calling about the files, we are still working on it. The policeman who’s been standing in front of the office all day is frightening my clients. Calming everyone down is taking time I could be using to get your files.’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t realize there was a policeman waiting.’ Faith looked at Isenberg, who only shrugged and grinned. ‘Can you give him what you have so far? I can send him back for the rest. That way I get my files and you get a break from soothing the frightened clients.’

  ‘Well, there are several boxes,’ Lowell said tartly. ‘I hope you have storage room.’

  ‘I’m sure the police can make room at the station. Thank you, Mrs Lowell. Getting those files could mean life or death for a young girl still being held hostage.’

  ‘Oh no.’ Lowell’s irritation disappeared. ‘Oh my. I had no idea. I’ll get the policemen what I’ve pulled together so far and you’ll have the rest of the files by morning.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Miami, Florida, Wednesday 5 November, 4.30 P.M.

  Detective Catalina Vega looked away from the two-way mirror as her LT entered the observation room, closing the door behind him.

  ‘Is Combs’s girlfriend ready to talk?’ Davies asked.

  ‘I think so,’ Cat answered. ‘Charging her with accessory to murder did the trick. The problem is, I haven’t found a single non-circumstantial piece of evidence to tie Peter Combs to our homicides. I can’t even find anyone who’s seen him in over a month. So unless Paula Boza gives me something, I got nothin’. And her slimy shyster lawyer knows it.’

  ‘The team in Ohio said that Combs might not even be involved in the mess they’ve got up there,’ Davies said. ‘Maybe he’s not involved in the mess we’ve got down here either. Maybe you haven’t found any evidence simply because there isn’t any evidence to find.’

  Cat shook her head. ‘They haven’t ruled him out at all. What they said is that if he was involved, it was as a recent accomplice to a killer who’d been at it for a longer period of time. A killer who might have used Combs’s hatred of Faith Corcoran to his own benefit. I need to know who that might have been.’

  ‘Okay, so what do you have?’

  ‘I’ve got an eyewitness who saw a white van in the parking lot of the grocery store where the Prius was parked. It had a sign for an auto repair business, just like the van the Cincinnati team found putting a tracker on Corcoran’s new vehicle. It doesn’t link the van to Combs, but now we have ties to the Cincinnati crimes from both the murder of Gordon Shue and Sunday’s vehicular homicide. There’s no question that they’re connected.’

  ‘Does he know that?’ Davies asked, pointing to the slimy shyster.

  ‘I don’t know. He might know it connects to Faith on some level. He’s slimy, but smart. Corcoran’s name has been in the news as the owner of the house where “an undisclosed number” of bodies were found. The articles name her as Faith Frye, because that’s how she’s listed on the deed. This guy was Combs’s trial attorney, too, four years ago. If he does know, he’ll ask for dismissal of Paula’s possession charge in exchange for information, but the DA won’t budge.’

  Davies was studying Paula Boza closely. ‘What does she do for a living, Cat?’

  ‘She’s a nail tech.’

  ‘Hm. How does a nail tech get her hands on a half-kilo of coke to begin with?’

  ‘I had the same question. It may be the only opening we have. She says it’s Combs’s, but also denied that he’s had any access to her car since the attacks on Faith Corcoran began. Her prints were found on the bag, though. She says she must have touched it when she was feeling around for her phone that she’d dropped.’ Cat rolled her eyes. ‘I mean, really.’

  ‘Go shake something out of her. That Cincinnati lieutenant has been calling me every hour. We’ve got two in the morgue, one a child. They’ve got six, plus seventeen buried in a basement. Every time Isenberg calls, the number goes up. Get the girlfriend to talk.’

  ‘No pressure,’ Cat murmured, taking a deep breath before strolling into the interview room and sitting down across from Peter Combs’s girlfriend. A second-generation Cuban-American, Paula Boza might have been a model, but hard living had aged her. Jail hadn’t helped.

  Her WASP lawyer leaned back in his chair, bored. ‘What’s this about, Detective?’

  ‘Well, Mr Green, I’m looking for something and I think your client knows where it is.’

  Paula’s nostrils flared, but she smiled back sweetly. ‘What are you looking for, Detective?’

  ‘The rest of the coke,’ Cat lied. From the corner of her eye she caught Green’s surprise. Paula didn’t react at all. ‘I have it on good authority that there was a whole kilo, not half.’

  ‘Somebody’s lying to you then, chica.’ Paula said with a shoulder swagger. ‘I didn’t even have half a kilo. Those drugs did not belong to me.’

  ‘Damn,’ Cat said. ‘I always thought Peter was a liar. So . . . no other drugs?’

  Paula’s lips curved with genuine humor. ‘No, Detective,’ she said.

  She knows I haven’t talked to Combs. Because she knows where he is? Cat leaned forward. ‘He warned me you’d say that.’

  ‘And why would he tell you that, Detective Vega?’ Paula asked, amused.

  ‘Because he was flipping on you,’ Cat said using her ‘duh’ tone. ‘In exchange for leniency on his own charges.’

  ‘She’s lying to you, Paula,’ the attorney said. ‘Peter wouldn’t do that, even if they were charging him with anything. Which they’re not. He would’ve called me.’

  ‘Of course she’s lying,’ Paula said, irritated now. ‘She hasn’t even talked to Peter.’

  Okay. ‘You sound sure, Paula,’ Cat said softly. ‘How can you be so sure?’

  Paula pursed her lips. Looked away. Busted.

  ‘Well, it doesn’t really matter. Whether it’s half or a whole kilo, possession charges are gonna make the attempted murder charge that much more believable to a jury.’

  Paula rolled her eyes. ‘That’s ridiculous. I never tried to kill anyone.’

  ‘He said you’d say that too. He’s gonna have some pretty hefty charges against him and he’s saying you were with him all the way. Three counts of murder, four counts of attempted murder. And then there’s the arson.’ Cat made a face. ‘You know what they say – once a firebug, always a firebug. Um, then there’s the vehicle tampering, the B and E, and . . . no, that’s it.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Paula insisted. ‘You’re insane.’

  ‘No,’ Cat said soberly, ‘but the abuelita who lost her daughter and her grandson is probably feeling pretty insane with grief at the moment.’

  ‘Wait,’ Green said. ‘You’re talking about that car that crashed on Sunday. The one that was tampered with. You can’t put that on my client. She was here at the time. In custody.’

  Cat snapped her fingers. ‘You know, you’re right. But she was out for all the others.’

  ‘What others?’ Paula cried, managing to sound both furious and bewildered.

  ‘All the attempts on the life of a woman named Faith Frye.’

  ‘That puta?’ Paula’s face mottled, red with temper. ‘The one that turned him in for raping that kid he never even met? She’s your sour
ce? She’s a bigger liar than you are. Dios,’ she spat. ‘She was stalking him! She framed him with that picture! The picture that she took! He lost three years of his life and that bitch walked away scot-free.’

  Cat’s heart skipped a beat. There had been no picture mentioned in the trial transcripts. Everyone had assumed that Peter Combs had been angry because Faith had reported him AWOL from his session. Cat herself had until Agent Novak had hinted otherwise the night before.

  She hesitated for a split second. Should she push Paula on the photo or the murder charge? She decided on door number two and sent up a prayer.

  ‘You must love him very much,’ she observed quietly. ‘Everyone else deserted him.’

  ‘I did,’ Paula said, breathing hard. She blinked three times, in rapid staccato. ‘I do.’

  I did. Cat was officially on mental tiptoes. ‘And yet here he is,’ she said pityingly, ‘throwing you under a bus for attempted murder. Some men just don’t appreciate a good woman. I almost hate to see you go down for this, Paula, but Dr Frye’s accusations are very convincing.’

  Paula’s eyes were smoldering fury. ‘Specifically what murder is that puta claiming that Peter and I attempted?’

  ‘In early October, Dr Frye was nearly run off a bridge by a white van. The passenger opened her window and fired at Dr Frye’s car. Dr Frye said the gun was held by a woman. With really nice nails, all decorated. Like yours, Paula.’

  That last part wasn’t true, but it could have been. And it worked.

  Paula’s eyes grew wide and furious. ‘She’s lying!’ she exploded.

  ‘Paula,’ Green cautioned.

  ‘And then,’ Cat continued calmly, ‘that same white van was seen near a Toyota Prius belonging to a young mother of three, hours before she lost control on the interstate, killing herself and her little boy. The Prius belonged to Faith Frye up until just the day before. She’d sold it on the down-low, hoping Peter would finally stop following her.’ Cat ambled around the table, stopping behind Paula’s chair, leaning in to whisper in her ear, ‘So you see, I can tie you to the same van that had a hand in killing that mother and her precious son.’