The Three Beths

by Jeff Abbott

She felt sometimes that if Broussard and whoever was sending her father threats could have seen her parents for just five minutes of their life together, they would know her father was innocent.

  Instead she pretended she wasn’t lying to him. “They were fine. I need to go to another meeting. Not sure when I’ll be back.”

  “I saw you in the driveway. You came home in workout clothes.”

  “One of my meetings was with a gym manager. All sorts of needed phone apps in fitness and healthcare.”

  He watched her and he, she guessed, decided to believe her. “All right then.”

  “The police found some DVD they can’t open in my car with Mom’s name on it,” she said.

  “I know. They asked me about it.”

  “What’s on it?”

  “I don’t know. It’s probably something left over from her work. They’ll crack it open and it will be nothing and they’ll be embarrassed.” His voice was firm.

  “Dad. Are you sure?”

  “I don’t know what it is, Mariah, I promise you.”

  “They want us turned against each other,” she said.

  “Yes,” he said. “And that can’t happen.”

  “Do you want any lunch?”

  “No. I ate already.”

  “All right.” She closed the door.

  She went to the kitchen, ate a quick sandwich, and decided to change her approach when she went to talk to Andy Candolet. She really would treat it as a business call. And she tried a series of searches on Lizbeth while she ate: looking for her on the FIND BETHANY page, on Bethany’s Faceplace page. Nothing.

  She needed the woman’s last name.

  If Ahoy and the writing group turned into dead ends, she’d call it quits, but an unappealing thought had crept into her mind: two missing Beths. What if she couldn’t find this Lizbeth? Would she be the third?

  * * *

  There were a number of big trucking and transportation companies south of downtown Austin; they brought goods from the ports of Houston and New Orleans. She turned in at the entrance for Ahoy Transportation. She saw several eighteen wheelers and a bevy of smaller trucks, all with a smiling cartoon anchor painted on the side. AHOY FOR SHIPPING, the motto read beneath. She parked in a long line of cars in a spot marked for visitors and went into the main office.

  Behind the reception desk sat a woman in her seventies, frowning, reading a People magazine. She studied Mariah with bright eyes and a piercing gaze, seeming to take in and analyze her clothes and her nervousness and her face with a single sweep.

  “Help you?” she croaked, as if she couldn’t be more disinterested.

  “Hi. I was looking for Andy Candolet, if he’s in.”

  The woman turned a page of People and said, “He might be. He might not be. Did you have an appointment?”

  “I did not, but I’d be happy to make one.”

  “What you selling?”

  For a moment she thought she’d try to say she was a friend of Julie’s, but that would be a lie, and she’d decided to treat this like an actual business call. “I’m an app and website developer.”

  “I’m sure that means something to somebody. Call and make an appointment.”

  This woman took being a gatekeeper seriously. Mariah set her mouth in a determined line and put on her most professional tone. “I do web design and interfaces for mobile apps. When the big national rideshare services were temporarily banned in Austin, I wrote the web interfaces for the local companies that tried to replace them. I’m used to designing apps that include security, transportation, and scheduling, and I’m cheaper than the big firms.” She just needed to get past this woman. “If I can just have five minutes with him…” She handed the woman a business card with MARIAH DUNNING APP DESIGNS on it.

  “That is one hundred percent fascinating,” the old woman said. “Let me see if Andy’s available to get as excited as I am.” She raised a phone, punched a button and spoke quietly, reading Mariah’s name off her card, and glanced again at Mariah. She hung up. “He said give him just a few minutes.”

  “I appreciate your kindness. May I ask you what you transport here?”

  “How I love lunch hour and covering the desk,” the woman said. “It lets me interact with the public.” She put down her People magazine. “We move whatever needs moving, sweetheart. It tends to be lots of produce, and then consumer goods from the factories down in Mexico, and what gets shipped in from the coast.” She raised an eyebrow. “You don’t research your possible clients?” But to Mariah’s surprise, she softened the rebuke with a little half-smile.

  Mariah forced a sheepish look onto her face. “You’re right, I should have. I apologize to you and to the editors of People.”

  To her surprise the old woman laughed. For one moment. Then the steely gaze returned.

  And then a man entered the reception area from a hallway behind the woman. Mariah’s first thought was he looked like he could audition for Clark Kent. Tall, broad shouldered, athletic build, with dark hair, blue eyes, and very old-fashioned black-framed glasses. He wore a white polo with the smiling Ahoy anchor logo on it and navy slacks. He gave Mariah a shaky smile and said, “Mariah Dunning? Andy Candolet. Sorry, it’s a crazy day, but I can give you ten minutes.” He seemed to study her face for a moment. He took Mariah’s business card from the woman, who had jabbed it at him as if it were radioactive. He pocketed it.

  “Have we met before?” Mariah asked. His searching look and his slight air of nervousness made her ask.

  “No, I don’t think so,” he said, smile suddenly bright. “Let’s go talk.”

  “Thank you for your help,” Mariah said to the old woman.

  “Highlight of my day,” she answered, flipping a page.

  Mariah followed Andy to another office module in an opposite corner of the transportation bay. His office was cluttered: stacks of files on his desk, the corkboard behind him filled with pictures of Ahoy employees at gatherings, a number of “certificates of accomplishment” that looked like they’d come from the laser printer, a whole set of lanyards and credentials she recognized as from corporate conferences, hanging like little banners.

  Lots of photos of himself, posing with people Mariah guessed were clients or customers or vendors, always smiling.

  “My aunt Claudette dislikes working the reception desk,” he said with an easy grin as they sat down. “But she owns the company, so we must suffer her charms.”

  “But she’s so good at it,” Mariah said, and he laughed. “I understand you run security around here.” She was trying to place why his face had engendered a reaction in her the first time she’d seen it in the photo. She was sure she’d never met him; she would have remembered, she thought. But there was something…his name or his face.

  “Yes.”

  For a moment she nearly said, “I worked out with your girlfriend a couple of hours ago,” but she thought if he didn’t know of her immediate interest in Bethany she might learn more. He hadn’t reacted to her name. Julie, busy with her clients, must not have called him yet and told him about meeting Mariah.

  “What’s your specialty with apps?” he asked.

  Fine. Keep it businesslike. “Well, I can code for RFID-compliant tracking,” she said. She knew a little about transport apps, just from having read, but she wasn’t confident she could fake her way through this whole interview. “I’ll be honest, I’m not as experienced, but I’m cheap and I’d do the work at a very attractive price.”

  “We’re a good-size company, Ms. Dunning. We don’t normally hire freelancers for mission-critical work.” He said this without malice. Behind the glasses his eyes were very blue.

  “Of course. I was also thinking your drivers might like an app completely customized for them. One that took data from map, truck stop, and traffic apps and presented them exactly the data they need, when they need it.” She lowered her voice. “It could also report back to you. Where they’re stopping, how often they’re stopping, if they make an unsch
eduled stop or route change. Is theft a problem with your shipments?”

  “Not generally,” he said. “I turn thieves over to Aunt Claudette.”

  She laughed then got serious. “Or one that could be modified for internal security. If you have problems with internal accounting, or embezzlement.” This is what Julie said Bethany had been accused of here. He didn’t react or blink.

  “You got a portfolio?” Andy asked.

  “Online.”

  “Show me,” he said, “come around here.”

  But he didn’t really scoot his chair that far from the keyboard. She bent close to the keyboard, aware of his physical proximity, ignoring it.

  She typed in her website, going to her work samples page. “As you can see, I’ve done a number of websites for service-oriented industries. I can build both front and back end, and I can tie into whatever database or mobile apps you use.” She stepped back from the computer and let him look at the portfolio. This was dumb. This wouldn’t work. But he clicked through, taking several minutes to look at her designs and her work.

  He leaned back and he said, “Here’s the challenge for you. Your stuff looks really glossy. The people I work with don’t care about gloss. They just want to know when their product arrives or when it reaches a certain stage or why their trucker is behind schedule. They want data, plainly presented.”

  “I can write simple interfaces. I pretty much accommodate whatever style the customer wants.”

  “Can you now?” he said. His smile broadened in confidence, and she braced herself for the flirting to start. Sometimes it did when she went cold-calling for business, and she’d gotten good at eviscerating such expectations. “Well, I’ll tell you, the vendor I’ve worked with the past two years is good, but they have been painfully slow on updates. So, I’m open-minded to working with you.”

  “Give me a chance to show you what I can do.”

  “OK. I have another appointment in ten minutes, but I would like to talk to you some more about this, especially that customized app you mentioned. Because this app you wrote here”—he pointed at one of the samples on the screen—“I could see us adapting something like this…”

  She was listening but then everything changed. Because of the big corkboard display behind him, full of photos and banners. She cast her eye quickly over it and saw something that made her stop. Made her think. She’d been collecting possible clues like shells on the beach, but now they needed to be threaded into a necklace. Tied. And she saw one way.

  He was one of those guys who kept the name tags and lanyards from his conference travels. They were all stuck on the corkboard wall behind him, in among the pictures of himself with his customers. The corkboard was probably there as insulation from the outside noise, the rumble of arriving and departing trucks. But she could see several of the lanyards in a clump, with Austin WebCon on the badge. It was a huge software conference in Austin, attracting thousands, joined with a music and a film festival. The last five years, according to the badges, he had been there.

  WebCon. Her mother went every year. Had Bethany gone as well if Andy Candolet did? Had Jake Curtis, as an entrepreneur?

  Andy was still talking. “Are you calling on all the transport companies?”

  “No, just you so far.” Then she went for it. “I got a business card a few years ago from someone here at Ahoy, at WebCon in Austin. Do you ever go?”

  “Oh, sure, every year. It’s a blast. And exhausting.”

  “I’m trying to remember the name on the card…maybe…Beth? Bethany?”

  The smile wavered, barely, and then he let it vanish. “Bethany Curtis. Yeah, she used to work for us.”

  “Oh, yes, that’s it. I lost the card and didn’t remember the person’s name, just the company. Ahoy. I mean, it’s so friendly and easy to remember.”

  He seemed to study her for an extra moment, as if trying to divine if she had an agenda. She wondered if the press or the curious had contacted him much in the days after Bethany vanished. “Yeah, well, I’m the person to talk to, not anyone else. I’m happy to entertain a bid. We could talk about it over drinks. Tonight, maybe? I know a good place near here.”

  His hand moved to the small of her back. His smile went slightly crooked. It was confident; he knew he was good-looking. But he’d been so professional a few moments before, it was as if he’d given in to impulse. She made the words come out of her mouth while she thought about breaking his fingers. “I have some other calls to make. Maybe we could start with that custom app. Give me an idea of the scope of work, and I could work up a bid before we have drinks.” She moved away, escaped his touch. He didn’t reach again, still smiling as if thinking, No harm, no foul.

  “I could make some notes on the scope of work this afternoon and email them to you,” he said. His voice still pleasant, neutral.

  “Great.”

  “Thanks for stopping by.” Neither offered a hand to shake.

  “I’ll text you about meeting.” His phone rang but he moved to escort her out, to put his hand again on the small of her back again, and she hurried ahead of him, saying, “That’s fine, I can see myself out. I’ll talk to you soon.”

  He nodded and answered the phone, his mild gaze still on her.

  She closed his office door behind her, feeling sour and angry. She hurried out to the reception area, and his aunt Claudette glanced up at her, having moved on from People to Us. “So nice of your nephew Andy to talk to me,” Mariah said, hoping there was no sarcasm in her voice.

  “Grand-nephew. He’s a bore, but I have to be nice. He’ll pick out my nursing home.”

  “I remember why I knew this company name. I met someone who used to work here. Bethany Curtis.”

  Claudette stared. “Did you now?”

  “I take it she doesn’t work here anymore.”

  “Our poor Bethany. She’s dead. I mean. We think she’s dead.”

  “How awful. What happened?” Mariah feigned shock.

  “She took off to Houston and disappeared a year and a half ago. No one has heard from her.” Claudette’s voice went low. “That girl is dead, if you ask me.”

  “Did you know her well?”

  Claudette stared at her for five seconds, then said, “Do we ever truly know another person?”

  “I guess not,” Mariah said. “It was nice to meet you.”

  “Was it? Bye now.”

  Mariah felt dizzy. She turned and walked out into the sunlight. Got into her car, revved the air conditioning to blow on her face, to calm her thoughts. She looked up at the front window of the building. Claudette, on the phone, standing and watching her.

  Telling someone on the phone her license number.

  She could see the old woman’s lips reading it off, T-L-J-6-9-0-7, her gaze right on Mariah’s—well, her dad’s—car.

  Startled, she started up the car and backed out, driving faster than she should, nearly colliding with a truck turning in. She roared off down the road, saw a diner with half-empty lot, wheeled in hard and parked.

  Andy was at the same conference. Same as Bethany, same as her mother. He handled security for an interstate transportation concern; her mother sold network security software to corporate clients. It wasn’t beyond the pale that they could have met at WebCon. It could mean nothing. But it was the only thread, the only possibility.

  Her phone rang. Sharon Blevins. They’d exchanged contact info on their phones before she’d left today.

  After exchanging hellos, Sharon said, “Julie said you talked to her. She called me.”

  “I did. And I just talked to Andy, but I didn’t tell him that I knew you, and I think I found a connection to my mom’s case. A thread to follow. It’s not much. But do you know if Bethany ever went to a conference here in Austin called WebCon?”

  “That’s the big one downtown every spring? Yes. She did. She complained about the crowds. She went with Andy, and Jake had to go, too, for his company.”

  Thousands of people were there. May
be they never met. But maybe they did. A pattern, waiting for her, waiting to be found. “Thank you, we’ll talk soon.”

  She called her dad. “A couple of years ago, do you remember if Mom went to WebCon, you know, that really big conference downtown?”

  “Um…I think she did. She worked the booth for Acrys Networks at a bunch of trade shows. Why?”

  “A prospective client I met with today thought maybe he’d met her there. Asked me if we were related.”

  “Oh. OK. It’s awkward when people ask about the case.”

  “I just wondered.”

  “Her office would know. I had my own responsibilities then. My own client meetings. I didn’t always pay attention to her schedule.” He sounded exhausted.

  “Are you OK?”

  “Yes. Are you going to ask me this every time we talk?”

  “Possibly.”

  “All right, sweetheart.” Something in his voice. Something scared her. The thought of him being attacked. That could not happen. She had to protect him.

  “I’ll be home later,” she said.

  18

  W​ITH MARIAH GONE, Craig finished installing the second small motion-activated camera, tucked in a corner of the garage. One camera faced the driveway, another the front door. Both could film at night. If the note leaver returned, Craig wanted to be able to see him or her.

  And do what in response? Well, it depended.

  Stranger? Report to police.

  Neighbor? Well, it might be fun to post the video to the neighborhood’s Faceplace page. Humiliate the tormentor. It would send a message to the neighborhood as well. If it was local kids, then he’d send it to both the police and the parents.

  He had thought of doing this when the harassment first started, after it became clear there were no suspects but him…but he hadn’t. He knew it would have won him no friends. He bore it. He endured it, for Mariah’s sake.

  In the days after Beth disappeared, friends and neighbors had brought food, sat with him, held his hand, brought comfort and prayers…until the police made it clear he was under suspicion.

  He had been out of his office, with no alibi, during the time Beth vanished.