CHAPTER FOUR
Veronica had never imagined a moment like this—a client actually choosing her over her dad. Mars Investigations had always been a united front, even when she was technically just the receptionist. She and Keith had always worked together, parceling out cases for efficiency’s sake but backing each other up whenever needed. It never occurred to her that, at some point, the model might breakdown. And she wasn’t sure how she was supposed to feel about it.
For a moment, she faced the closed door, her hand still lingering on the knob. Then, pasting a cool, businesslike smile on her face, she turned around to face her potential client.
“So what exactly can I do for you?” she asked, moving briskly to her desk and taking her seat. She picked up the yellow legal pad from the blotter and clicked her ballpoint pen.
“I’m here to investigate a claim made against one of our clients,” Hickman said. His posture was stiff and straight, his pale hands motionless in his lap, like a pair of gloves. “What do you know about hospitality insurance, Ms. Mars?”
“Hospitality? As in hotel coverage?”
“Exactly. We offer hotels and resorts protection in cases where an accident, or some kind of mismanagement, has left them liable for damages. As you can imagine, that’s a big risk in the hospitality industry. Nearly three million people stay in US hotels every night. There are a lot of moving parts; a lot of opportunities for things to go wrong. And with $150 billion in sales per year, a lot of people—some less than scrupulous—are looking for a piece of the pie.”
“So you cover the hotel when someone’s feeling litigious,” Veronica said.
Hickman gave an almost indignant snort.
“It’s not quite that simple,” he said. “We have to investigate the claim first. Determine if the hotel was at fault, and if so, to what extent. Then decide whether it’s more cost-effective to fight it out in court or just settle.”
Veronica put down her pen. “So what exactly do you need from me?” she asked.
The man shifted slightly in his seat. “A nineteen-year-old woman was found in an empty lot on the edge of town on the morning of March seventh of this year,” he said. “She was…well, she was in terrible shape. She’d been…violated.”
“Raped,” Veronica said mechanically. She didn’t have patience for euphemisms.
“Yes. Raped, and beaten half to death. The police found DNA evidence, but it doesn’t match anyone in their database. Back in March she claimed she didn’t remember anything. She couldn’t provide a description of her attacker, and said she didn’t know how she’d gotten to the lot. All she remembered was arriving at the Neptune Grand the night of the attack.”
Veronica nodded. This was, of course why Petra Landros had recommended her. Petra owned the Grand, and in March the hotelier had hired Veronica on behalf of the Neptune Chamber of Commerce. Two girls had gone missing during Neptune’s lucrative spring break season, and Neptune’s local business owners had wanted Veronica to find them before the tourist dollars dried up.
“Was she a guest?”
Hickman shook her head. “She’s a local. She was just drinking in the bar that night.”
Veronica frowned. “I don’t understand. The Neptune Grand is one of the most monitored locations in town. They’ve got security cameras at every entrance. If she left with her attacker, one of those cams would’ve caught it.”
“Well, that’s the problem,” Hickman said. “The video cameras show her arriving. They show her sitting in the bar for about an hour. They show her disappearing into a stairwell at about eleven forty-five. And then she just vanishes.”
“Vanishes?”
“She never shows up on camera again. She goes into the stairwell at eleven forty-five, and the next morning at seven o’clock she’s found half naked in an empty lot miles away. No sign of what happened in between.”
Veronica tried to bend her mind around this story. It was impossible to sneak out of the Grand. Or it should have been.
“Then a few weeks ago, the victim suddenly—some would say conveniently—got her memory back,” Hickman said, an edge of exasperated scorn in his voice. “She gave a description of her attacker that perfectly matches that of Miguel Ramirez, a former laundry-room employee of the Neptune Grand. According to her lawyer, that explains how no one saw her leave. He says her attacker was able to smuggle her out using his knowledge of the hotel’s layout.”
“And your problem with that story is…?”
“The problem is, her alleged attacker was deported last month after getting caught in an ICE bust. No one seems to know where he is now, so there’s no way to get a DNA sample. And now the victim is suing the Grand for three million dollars. Her lawyer claims the hotel showed criminal negligence in hiring undocumented workers.”
“So what am I being hired to do?” Veronica asked slowly.
“Well, either the victim is telling the truth and someone attacked her somewhere on hotel grounds and then snuck her off-site past the cameras,” said Hickman. “Or she’s lying, and she managed to leave undetected and was attacked elsewhere. We need you to find out how she left that hotel, and with whom.”
Outside, night settled over the warehouse district. Sounds rose from the street: shouts, laughter, and car horns, window-buzzing dubstep. In a nearby live music club, mic checks and tune-up chords from electric guitars set off ragged cheers.
Hickman was making little effort to hide his skepticism about the girl’s story. And Veronica understood why. The details—at least the ones he’d seen fit to share—didn’t add up.
But her own memory tugged at the corners of her mind, insistent and furious. She’d been sixteen the day she’d staggered into the Balboa County Courthouse in a torn white dress. Shaking from head to foot, she’d sat across from then-Sheriff Don Lamb and had told her story. How she’d gone to Shelly Pomroy’s party the night before. How she’d woken up in a strange bed without her underwear, aching and humiliated. How she couldn’t remember anything else.
She could still recall with cinematic clarity the conversation in Lamb’s office. The way the sheriff leaned back in his chair, leering across the desk. Her struggle to stay composed as he repeated questions, trying to catch her in contradictions. Lamb’s voice, his tone of cold, unvarnished contempt: I’ve got not a shred of evidence to work with here but that really doesn’t matter to your family, now does it?
She looked down at the open file folder on her desk, the pictures of the girl’s ravaged and broken body on top. Someone had done this to her. And so far, he’d gotten away with it.
“Okay,” Veronica said steadily, holding out her hand. “I’ll do my best to find out what happened to this girl.”
Hickman’s soft, dry palm was in hers then, and they shook.
“Excellent,” he said.