The Will Trent Series 5-Book Bundle Page 50

  Faith figured that was her cue. She told him about Gabe and Tommy, the girlfriend who might have gone to Westfield. As she spoke, she figured she should come clean and told him about shouldering Tommy into the hallway. She also told him about Victor Martinez’s comments, though she held back the embarrassing parts for the sake of her own dignity.

  Instead of railing her for assault and battery against Albertson, Will asked, “What are there, around fifty bars in Buckhead?”

  “At least.”

  “I guess it’s worth a try calling around to see if we can find her,” he said. “I hate to say it, but at this point, a girlfriend who might have gone to the same school as Emma and Kayla and who’s dating a friend of Adam’s is the only lead we’ve got to follow.”

  Neither one of them had to vocalize the obvious: every hour that ticked by made it harder to find the killer, and less likely that they would find Emma alive.

  He started pressing numbers on his phone. “Someone called while I was talking to the parents,” he explained. “Put the incident with Albertson in your report, then put it out of your mind. We’ve got much bigger problems to deal with right now.”

  A cream-colored Lexus sedan pulled up while he was listening to his messages. Faith saw Amanda Wagner behind the wheel. She must have been the one who left the message, because Will told Faith, “They found Kayla Alexander’s Prius at a copy center on Peachtree. There’s blood in the trunk, but no sign of Emma. Security camera’s fuzzy, but at least it was working.”

  He pocketed the phone as he walked toward Amanda’s car, rattling off orders for Faith. “Call in a couple of units to help you canvass the dorms. Maybe somebody else knows more about Adam. Search his things, see if there are any more pictures of Emma. Take out anything his parents don’t need to see. Go back at that Gabe kid if you think it’ll work. If not, give him the night to stew. We can both hit him tomorrow.”

  She tried to process all of this. “What time do we start?”

  “Is seven too early?”

  “No.”

  “Meet me at Westfield Academy. I want to screen the staff.”

  “Wasn’t Leo—”

  “He’s not on this anymore.” Will opened the car door. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  Faith opened her mouth to ask him what the hell happened to Leo, but Amanda started to pull away before his butt hit the seat. Faith saw that Will’s jacket was still on the Mini’s hood and waved for them to stop, but Amanda either didn’t see her or didn’t care. Faith supposed the good news was that she was still on the case. The bad news was that she was definitely still at the scut-work level. She was probably going to be here until three in the morning.

  Leo was the first casualty. Faith would be damned if she’d be the second.

  She checked Will’s jacket and found a handful of latex gloves. She also found something far more curious: a digital voice recorder. Faith turned over the small device in her hand. All the letters had been rubbed off from use. The screen said there were sixteen messages. She guessed the red button was record, so the one beside it would have to be play.

  Her cell phone rang and Faith almost dropped the recorder. She recognized Jeremy’s number and looked up at the second floor of Glenn Hall. She counted five spaces over and found him standing at his window, watching her.

  He said, “Isn’t it illegal to go through somebody’s pockets like that?”

  She put the recorder back in the jacket. “I’m getting really tired of dealing with smart-aleck kids who know their legal rights.”

  He snorted.

  “Answer a question for me: if you didn’t have your key card, how would you get into the building?”

  “Press the handicap button.”

  Faith shook her head at the situation. So much for tracking people who’d been in and out of the dorm. “So, do you need pizza money or your laundry done or are you just making sure I don’t come up there and embarrass you in front of your friends?”

  “I heard about that kid,” he said. “It’s all over the dorm.”

  “What are they saying?”

  “Not a lot,” Jeremy admitted. “Nobody really knew him, you know? He was just some guy you passed in the hall on the way to the toilet.”

  She heard the sympathy in his voice, and Faith felt a tinge of pride that her son showed such humanity. She had met the alternative and it wasn’t pretty.

  He asked, “Do you think you’ll find that girl?”

  “I hope so.”

  “I can keep my ear to the ground.”

  “No, you will not,” she countered. “You’re going to school to learn how to be an engineer, not a cop.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with being a cop.”

  Faith could think of several things, but she didn’t want him to know. “I should go, honey. I’m going to be here late.”

  He didn’t hang up. “If you wanted to do some laundry …”

  She smiled. “I’ll call you before I leave.”

  “Hey, Mom?”

  “Yeah?”

  He was silent, and she wondered if he was going to tell her that he loved her. That was how they trapped you, after all. You walked the floor with them and cleaned up after them and took all the grief and the noise and the swarthy Latin men who looked at you as if you had horns, and then they hooked you back in with those three simple words.

  Not this time, though. Jeremy asked, “Who was that guy you were with? He didn’t look like a cop.”

  Her son was right about that. She picked up Will Trent’s jacket to lock it back in the car. “Nobody. Just a guy who works for your aunt Amanda.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The Copy Right copy center was on the street-level floor of an ancient three-story building. It was one of the few structures on Peachtree Street yet to be torn down and replaced by a skyscraper, and the entire building had an air of resignation, as if at any moment it expected to be razed. The high-volume copy machines, made visible through the plate-glass windows by harsh, fluorescent lights, gave the place a dystopic, science fiction feel. Bladerunner meets Kinko’s.

  “Shit,” Amanda hissed as the uneven road scraped against the bottom of her car. The asphalt was patched with heavy metal plates that overlapped like thick Band-Aids. Pylons and signs blocked off an entire lane on Peachtree, but the construction workers were long gone.

  She sat up, gripping the wheel as the car bounced onto the ramp leading to the parking deck. Amanda pulled up behind a crime-scene van and put the car in park.

  “Seven hours,” she said. That was how long Emma had been missing.

  Will got out of the car, adjusting his vest, wishing that he had his jacket even though the promise of night had done nothing to alleviate the sweltering heat. One of the employees of the Copy Right had seen the abduction alert on television. He had spotted the car while taking a cigarette break and made the call.

  Will followed Amanda down the gently sloping ramp that led to the parking garage behind the building. The space was small by Atlanta standards, maybe fifty feet wide and just as deep. Overhead, the ceiling was low, the concrete beams hanging down less than a foot from the top of Will’s head. The second-story ramp was blocked off with concrete barriers that looked as if they had been there a while. A service road ran off the back, and he saw that it was connected to the adjacent buildings. Three cars were in a blocked-off area, he assumed for employee parking. The floodlights were yellow to help keep mosquitoes at bay. Will put his hand to his face, feeling the scar there, then made himself stop the nervous habit.

  There was no gate for the parking lot, no booth with an attendant. Whoever owned the lot relied on the honesty of strangers. The honor box by the entrance had numbers corresponding to the spaces. Visitors were expected to fold four single dollar bills into a tight wad and shove them through tiny slits by way of payment. A slim, sharp piece of metal hung on a wire to help people cram in the money.

  Amanda’s heels clicked across the concrete as they walked towa
rd Kayla Alexander’s white Prius. A team had already surrounded the car. Cameras flashed, evidence was sifted, plastic bags were filled. The techs were all suited up, sweating from the unrelenting heat. The humidity made Will feel like he was breathing through a wet piece of cotton.

  Amanda looked up, surveying the area. Will followed her gaze. There was one lone security camera up on the wall. The angle was more for catching people going into the building than watching cars parked in the lot.

  “What have we got?” Amanda asked.

  She spoke softly, but this was her team and they all had been waiting for her to ask the question.

  Charlie Reed stepped forward, two plastic evidence bags in his hands. “Rope and duct tape,” he explained, indicating each. “We found these in the trunk.”

  Will took the bag of rope, which appeared to be unused clothesline; there was a plastic tie around the neatly folded line. One side was faintly red where the fibers had wicked up blood. “Was it coiled up like this when you found it?”

  Charlie gave him a look that asked if Will really thought he was that stupid. “Just like that,” he said. “No fingerprints on either one.”

  Amanda surmised, “He came prepared.”

  Will handed back the rope and Charlie continued, “There was a patch of blood in the trunk that matched Emma Campano’s blood type. We’ll have to check with a doc, but the injury doesn’t seem life threatening.” He pointed to a semicircle of dark blood in the trunk. Will guessed it was about the same size as a seventeen-year-old girl’s head. “Based on the volume of blood, I’d say it was a nasty cut. The head bleeds a lot. Oh—” He directed this toward Will. “We found microscopic sprays of blood in Emma Campano’s closet above the urine you found. My guess is she was either kicked or punched in the head, causing the spray. We cut out the Sheetrock, but I’m not sure there’s enough to test.” He added, “Maybe that’s why he didn’t need to use the rope and tape. He knocked her out before removing her from the closet.”

  Amanda apparently already assumed this. “Next.”

  Charlie walked around the car, pointing to different spots. “The steering wheel, door panels and trunk latch show faint streaks of the same blood we found in the trunk. This is classic glove transfer.” He meant the abductor had been wearing latex gloves. “As for the trash, we’re assuming it came from the owner.”

  Will looked inside the car. The keys dangled from the ignition slot just beside what looked like a toggle knob that served as the gearshift. There were go-cups and empty fast-food bags and schoolbooks and papers and melted makeup and sticky spots of spilled soda and other items that indicated Kayla Alexander had been too lazy to find a trashcan, but nothing else that stuck out.

  Charlie continued, “We got a positive on body fluids in the seats. Could be blood, urine, sperm, sweat, sputum. The seat material is dark and there’s not much, but it’s something. I’m going to cut out the patches and see if we can soak something out of them back at the lab.”

  Will asked him, “The blood on the outside of the car was Emma’s only?”

  “That’s right.”

  “So he would’ve changed his gloves from the time he was in the Campano house?”

  Charlie considered his answer. “That would make sense. If he was using the same gloves, then Adam and Kayla’s blood would also be on the car.”

  Amanda asked, “Wouldn’t it have dried in the heat?”

  “Possibly, but the new wet blood would release the dried blood. I would expect to see some cross-contamination.”

  “How are you sure the blood is Emma’s?”

  “I’m not, really,” Charlie admitted. He found a roll of paper towels and tore off a strip so he could wipe the sweat off his face. “All I can go by is type. The blood we found on the car is O-positive. Emma was the only one in the house that we know of who had that type.”

  “Not to question your methods,” Will began, then did exactly that. “How do you know for sure that it’s only type O-positive?”

  “Blood types don’t get along well,” Charlie explained. “If you put O-pos with any type A or B, then you get a violent reaction. It’s why they type you at the hospital before they give you a transfusion. It’s a simple test—takes only a few minutes.”

  Amanda piped in. “I thought O-positive was universal?”

  “That’s O-negative,” Charlie told her. “It has to do with antigens. If the blood types aren’t compatible, then red blood cells clump together. In the body, this can cause clots that block vessels and bring about death.”

  Amanda’s impatience was clear. “I don’t need a science lesson, Charlie, just the facts. What else have you found?”

  He looked back at the car, the team collecting evidence and putting it into bags, the photographer documenting each empty McDonald’s cup and candy wrapper. “Not much,” he admitted.

  “What about the building?”

  “The top two floors are empty. We cleared them first thing. I’d guess no one’s stepped foot up there in six months, maybe a year. Same with the parking area upstairs. The concrete barricade has been there for a while. My guess is that this place is so old, it wasn’t built to handle newer, larger cars so they closed it off to prevent collapse.”

  Amanda nodded. “Find me if anything else comes up.”

  She headed toward the building, Will trailing behind her. “Barry didn’t find any discarded gloves,” she told him, referring to the chief of the canine unit. “This afternoon, the dogs were able to find a trail from the Campano house to the woods at the end of their street, but there were too many scents and they lost the trail.” She pointed to an area directly behind the garage. “There’s another path back there that goes into those same woods. It would take ten minutes to get to the Campanos from here if you knew what you were doing.”

  Will remembered what Leo had told him earlier. “The girls were skipping last year until the neighbor across the street told Abigail that Emma’s car was in the driveway. They could’ve started parking here to avoid being told on.”

  “But Kayla’s car was parked in the driveway today,” Amanda pointed out.

  “Should we recanvass the neighbors, see if they remember anything?”

  “You mean for a third time?” She didn’t say no, but reminded him, “It’s all over the news now. I’m surprised no one has talked themselves into seeing something.”

  Will knew that was often a problem with eyewitness testimony, especially when the crime involved children. People wanted to help so much that their brains often came up with scenarios that didn’t actually happen. “What’s the kid’s name—the one who called in the Prius?”

  “Lionel Petty.” She pressed a red button by the door. A few seconds passed, then there was a buzz and click.

  Will opened the door for her and followed Amanda down a long hallway that led to the Copy Right. The air-conditioning was a welcome relief from the stagnant heat in the garage. Inside the store, signs hung from the ceiling with cartoon smiling pens writing out helpful directions. The front counter was covered with reams of paper. Machines whirred in the background, swirling out sheets of paper at incredible speeds. Will glanced around, but couldn’t see anyone. There was a bell on the counter and he rang it.

  A kid poked up his head from behind one of the machines. His hair was a mess, as if he’d just rolled out of bed, though his goatee was neatly trimmed. “Are you the cops?” He walked toward them, and Will saw that he wasn’t really a kid. Will would have put him in his late twenties, but he was dressed like a teen and he had the round, open face of a child. Except for the receding hairline, he could have passed for fifteen. He repeated his question. “Are you guys with the cops?”

  Will spoke first because he knew from experience that Amanda’s style of rattling off questions and demanding quick answers didn’t exactly lend itself to eliciting information from strangers. He had to raise his voice to be heard above the machines. “You’re Lionel Petty?”

  “Yeah,” he answered, smili
ng nervously at Amanda. “Is this going to crack the case?” The slow cadence of his voice had a slight lilt to it, and Will couldn’t tell if the man was just that laid-back or had smoked a little too much weed. “I’ve been watching it on the news all day, and they’ve been showing the car, like, every five minutes. I couldn’t believe when I checked out for a smoke and looked up and there it was. I thought maybe my brain was making it up because what’re the odds, right?”

  “Petty,” a disembodied voice called. Will moved down the counter. He saw the lower half of a body sticking out from a copy machine. “Did you clock out like I told you?”

  Petty smiled, and Will saw the crookedest set of teeth he’d ever seen on a man. “So, not to be crass or anything, but is there a reward? ‘We can’t say no at Campano.’ They live in Ansley Park. The family must be loaded.”

  “No,” Amanda answered. She had figured out who was in charge. She asked the kid under the copier, “Where’s the tape for the security cameras?”

  He crawled out of the machine. There was a splotch of ink on his forehead, but his hair was neatly combed, his face clean-shaven. He was about the same age as Petty, but he lacked the other man’s boyish features and stoner charm. He wiped his hands on his pants, leaving a faint trail of ink. “I’m sorry, we’ve got a ten-thousand-booklet run due first thing in the morning and my machine just jammed up.”

  Will glanced at the guts of the copier, thinking that its gears and cogs reminded him of a wristwatch.

  “I’m Warren Grier,” the man offered. “I pulled the tape as soon as your guys got here. You’re lucky. We swap out the same two cassettes every day. If you’d shown up tomorrow, it probably would’ve been recorded over.”

  Will asked, “Do you have a problem with theft around here?”

  “Not really. The construction makes it hard to get in and out of the building. About ninety percent of our clients never see us. We deliver out to them.”

  “Why the security camera?”