Bree gunned the engine.
Fifteen minutes later, they parked in front of the small bungalow. Matt scanned the large lot. Woods provided privacy—but also isolation.
They stepped out of the vehicle.
Deputy Collins stood next to her patrol car. “I walked around the house. All the doors are locked. I looked in the windows but couldn’t see anyone.” She gestured toward Todd’s SUV. “The hood is cold.”
So the SUV hadn’t been driven recently. Matt and Bree went to the front door. Bree knocked and pressed the bell. The ring echoed inside the house.
The front door was solid steel. They went around back and climbed the steps of a wooden deck. The rear door had nine panes of glass set into the top half. Matt cupped his hand over his eyes and peered inside. Dark and empty. The house felt vacant, and he knew before setting foot inside that Todd wasn’t here.
The locks were dead bolts—not easy to pick. Bree pulled out a collapsible baton and used the handle to break a pane of glass. She reached through the hole and unlocked the door, then led the way inside straight into the kitchen.
“I’ll check the bedrooms.” Matt headed for a short hallway. No Todd in the main bedroom or attached bath. No keys or wallet on the dresser. The second bedroom was also empty. Matt checked the closets. No Todd. There were times when he hated being right.
Collins ducked into a half bath.
They met back in the living room. By the front door, a bowl sat on a small table. Matt peered inside. “Did either of you see his keys or wallet?”
Bree shook her head.
“No,” said Collins. “Yet his vehicle is here.”
“I don’t like this.” Matt scanned the surfaces of the furniture.
“Me either,” Bree agreed.
Through a window, Matt spotted a shed in the backyard. “Did you look in there?” he asked Collins.
“No,” she said.
Matt went out the back door. He crossed the yard and opened the wooden door. Nothing but lawn tools and equipment. Bree was walking around the house. Matt followed her.
She stopped in the side yard, staring at the ground.
“What?” he asked.
She held up a hand in a stop gesture. “Don’t move.”
Matt froze. Something silver flashed in a small pile of dead leaves. “His keys.”
Bree squatted and leaned closer to the ground. She pointed to a few spots on the grass. Dark red blotches the size of quarters. “And blood.”
Matt’s sense of discomfort shifted into a blaring alarm.
Straightening, she surveyed the ground. “We need to search the area.”
From ten feet behind them, Collins said, “I’ll call for additional units.”
“Watch where you step,” Bree called. “Blood is hard to see out here.”
Matt pulled out his phone. “Cady is probably at my place. I’ll have her bring Brody over. He’ll find Todd faster than fifty deputies.”
“Collins, bring evidence markers back with you!” Bree shouted to her deputy.
With her gaze on the ground, Collins rushed toward her vehicle.
Matt dialed his sister’s number.
She answered on the second ring. “Yes?”
“Todd’s gone missing. Would you bring Brody to his house?” Matt gave her the address.
“Oh, n-no!” Cady stammered. “Of course. I’ll be there ASAP. Do you know what happened?”
“No. Not at all.” Ending the call, Matt spied another spot of blood about five feet away. “The grass is crushed here too.”
Collins returned with another deputy in tow. She handed Bree a small stack of yellow evidence markers.
Bree set one next to the original splotches of blood and the second group Matt had found. Crouching, she examined the nearby ground.
Matt glanced at the neighbors’ houses. He turned back to Todd’s house and scanned the facade. “I don’t see any surveillance cameras on Todd’s house, and we’re too far away to trigger the motion sensor on his doorbell camera, but let’s check with the neighbors.”
“On it.” The other deputy strode toward the house across the street.
Matt went back into Todd’s house and grabbed a dirty T-shirt from the laundry hamper.
Bree continued to search the grass for more blood. By the time Cady arrived with Brody, she’d found a spot on the driveway ten feet away.
Cady let Brody out of her minivan. “I brought his working harness too.” She handed it to Matt.
He crouched in front of his dog and fastened the harness. Brody snapped to attention. Matt let him have a long sniff of the T-shirt, then gave him the command to find.
The dog ignored the blood spots. He raised his nose, seeking a scent on the air. Then he surged ahead, walking in a spiral. Expanding the circles, he headed toward a thick patch of underbrush. His head dropped, and he took a deep sniff of the foliage.
With complete faith in his dog, Matt let him do his thing. Brody needed little guidance.
Looking back at Matt, he sat and barked.
“He found something.” Matt moved forward and crouched. “Does anybody have a flashlight?”
Bree rushed forward. She shone a light on the underbrush. Something glimmered. “There! Collins!” she shouted. “I need an evidence marker. Bring the camera.”
Collins hurried to her patrol car, then back to the brush. She snapped a picture, placed the yellow triangle on the ground, then snapped another before stepping back.
Bree pulled on a pair of gloves and reached into the thicket. When she sat back on her heels, a silver watch dangled from her finger. “Does anyone know if this is Todd’s?”
Matt leaned in for a better look. “I don’t think so. Todd’s watch is black.”
Bree pulled an evidence bag from her pocket and dropped the watch into it. She glanced at Collins. “Keep looking here. See if there’s anything else.”
Collins pulled a flashlight from her duty belt and shone it into the brush.
Brody, satisfied they’d found the evidence he’d sniffed out, stood and pulled on the leash. Matt followed, the tension in the leash radiating through his bones.
“Where’s he going?” Collins asked.
“No idea, but he’s never wrong.” Matt let Brody work. “You’ll learn to trust your dog.”
Brody surged ahead, leaning into the harness. Every dozen feet or so, he paused, smelled the air, and adjusted his trajectory. He was keen on whatever smell was in his nose.
“There’s a path through the underbrush.” Bree pointed to a trail of broken twigs and crushed grass.
They walked through the woods between Todd’s house and the neighbor’s, until they reached the road. Brody stopped and growled. Matt spotted a smear of blood on the weeds at the edge of the blacktop. From the underbrush to the street, two long lines were scraped into the dirt.
“Drag marks,” Bree said.
Matt nodded, his sense of urgency building.
Nose down, Brody shuffled to the pavement. He raised his head and sniffed in several directions, then sat and whined.
“Good boy.” Disappointed, Matt rubbed his ears. “The trail ends here.”
“They took him away by vehicle.” Bree stood in the road and looked hard in each direction.
Matt pointed to the shoulder of the road, where the earth was soft. “We have tire tracks.” Which would be useful only when they had a vehicle for comparison.
Bree reached for her phone. “I’m calling forensics to get those cast. They can give Todd’s front yard and the woods a second look.”
They returned to Todd’s driveway.
Cady, who had been leaning on her minivan, shifted forward. “Did you find him?”
Matt shook his head.
Cady nodded toward the evidence markers on the grass. “That’s blood, isn’t it?”
Matt didn’t want to worry her. He knew she liked Todd, and suspected Todd liked her back. If her asshole of an ex-husband hadn’t made Cady man-and-relationship-shy, something would probably have developed between them by now. Cady might be his little sister, but she wasn’t a child. As much as he hated to deliver the bad news, she deserved the truth. “Probably.”
She nodded and put a knuckle to her mouth.