“We don’t know we have no viable leads.”
“Look, Ralz may be Junior’s errand boy, but he knows what he’s doing. If he couldn’t find Nolan three years ago, chances are it’s a lost cause.”
Vega reared back like she’d been pushed.
“Tell that to his mother.”
“Hey,” said Cap. “I don’t like it, but I know that’s how it is. You do too,” he said quietly.
“So what if it is related to the girls? Then it’s not just an exercise.”
“No evidence either way,” said Cap.
Then, suddenly, he looked discouraged.
“But we have to explore every branch of the tree,” he muttered.
“Explore every branch of the tree?” said Vega. “Did you see that on a motivational poster?”
Cap glanced back and forth between her and the road.
“I’m sorry, Vega, are you making a joke at my expense? Do you actually have a sense of humor?”
She ignored him, tapped her knuckles against the window, said, “I think we have to put both cases side by side and see what the connection is. Nobody writes an email like that without a motive.”
“Fine,” said Cap. “When we’re in bed with Junior and Traynor and Ralz we can ask for the file on Nolan. Until then can we focus on WT?”
“Sure. Can you think about more than one thing at once?”
She was honestly not trying to be difficult.
Cap seemed to know that and said, “Why, sure.”
The very corner of his mouth turned up, and Vega thought if that corner ate all its vegetables, one day it could grow into a real smile.
—
They found Jamie Brandt in front of a Kmart talking to a blond woman in a windbreaker with a Fox 29 logo on the back. There was a man loading equipment into the back of a van, and a small group of people handing out flyers. The sun was just about down.
A tall, older woman who Cap thought had a slight hunchback came up to them.
“So,” she said to Vega, indignant. “Any news?”
“Not yet,” said Vega, who seemed to know her. “We need to talk to Jamie.”
“Who’s the we?” the woman said, nodding to Cap.
“Max Caplan,” said Cap.
“This is Jamie’s mother, Gail White,” said Vega to Cap. Then she turned to Gail and added, “I’ve hired him as a consultant. He’s a former police officer.”
“Good thing you’re a former,” said Gail. “Talk about a bunch of ignorants. Your IQ probably went up fifty points when you walked out the door.”
Cap couldn’t help smiling. He liked Gail White.
“I’ll get her for you. She just did an interview with Hallie Summers from Fox in Philly. She’s just trying to make her cry again, asking her the same dumbass questions.”
Gail seemed to be one of those people who said things without expecting or needing a response. She left then and went to Jamie, who saw Vega and Cap and started to run, saying something in haste to the woman from the news.
“What is it, anything?” she said.
She was puffy eyed and her skin was dry, flaking around her temples and her mouth. Her hair was wet from the rain—she didn’t have an umbrella and didn’t seem to notice. Cap knew the hours were stacking up on her, and soon she would take the slow turn from despair to mourning.
“No,” said Cap. “But we have to check something with you. Will you step over to my car?”
“Yeah, Maggie made these,” she said, handing them soggy flyers.
On each were the most recent school photos of Kylie and Bailey, their stats and the word “MISSING” at the bottom of the page.
“Kylie did have a diary. She kept it at Cole’s house,” said Cap.
“What, really? Where…where is it?” she said, panicky, stretching her neck so she could look into Cap’s car.
“We gave it to the police, but we have pictures.”
Cap held his umbrella over the women as Vega showed Jamie her phone, the image of the last page of the diary. Jamie squinted. Her breath sped up.
“That’s her writing. That’s how she does letters.”
“Good,” said Cap. “Do you know who WT is?”
“No,” she said. “Maybe a boy in her class?”
“We checked the class list,” said Vega. “Only one ‘W’—Wesley McPherson. No WT.”
“Anyone come to mind? William, Walker, Wayne?”
Jamie pressed her hand to her forehead, as if she were applying a compress.
“No, I can’t think of anyone,” she said. “Fuck, why can’t I think of anyone?”
“It might not be an obvious person. We’ll check everyone in the school, every class, teachers.”
“The police are following their leads too.”
“You think this WT had something to do with it?” said Jamie.
“It’s an idea. She wrote some notes about him in the diary too.”
Vega scrolled so Jamie could see the initials.
“Shit,” she said. “Who the fuck is he?”
Cap’s phone buzzed, and he handed the umbrella to Vega and stepped away. He saw Em’s name come up, and he picked up.
“Em.”
“Hey, Cap, can you meet?” said Em under his breath.
“Yeah, when?”
“Fifteen minutes, the luncheonette?”
“Yeah. Everything okay?”
“Yeah. Got something for you.”
Cap heard something different in his voice. When Em had first started at the department, he’d been all cocky frat boy, maybe a little too enthusiastic when pinning and cuffing a suspect, calling the rest of the guys bitches when they went home early from drinking after a second shift. If they needed someone to sit on an amped-up PCP freak, they’d send Em, who didn’t care if he got black eyes and chipped teeth before holidays. Then he got his girlfriend pregnant. Then she was his wife and she got pregnant again, the second time with twins. Then Em was tamed because it was simple, Cap knew, because he had the fear, because he had three kids and a wife and a whole life he could fuck up.
But just now he heard it—the old Em, the one who made a prank call to Junior and pretended to be a hooker.
“Oh yeah?” said Cap, smiling into the phone. “Can I have a hint?”
“It’s bigger than a breadbox.”
“Great. See you soon.”
Cap hung up and looked back to the women. Jamie stared at the image of her daughter’s phantom handwriting on the phone; Vega met Cap’s eyes and saw something there. She sniffed, a fox sniffing out a jackrabbit.
—
Vega ran a napkin over a smear of ketchup left on the table by the previous customer. She sat next to Cap in a booth, and Wiley Emerson was opposite them, breathing heavily and perspiring. Rain streaked up the window next to them.
“Here you go,” said Em, sliding a white envelope across the table toward Cap.
Vega placed her palm gently on top of it, intercepting it, and picked it up, opened the flap. Cap raised his hands in surrender. All you.
“I didn’t include the ones that didn’t see anything, or from the Kmart or anything. These are just the people from the parking lot.”
“Three,” said Vega.
“That’s it. It was a slow day over there, I guess.”
“Are they consistent?” asked Cap.
“More or less. One of the witnesses is an eighty-something man; some of his stuff doesn’t make sense, but there’s a type there. You’ll see it—Caucasian male teenager, baseball hat and sweatshirt.”
“Car?” said Vega.