Her Silent Cry

Thirty-Two

Oaks arrived at police headquarters a half hour later, looking more exhausted than ever. Large bags drooped under his eyes. Creases covered his suit. Josie pulled him into the first-floor conference room and briefed him on the John Bausch situation. Swiping a hand over the gray stubble on his chin, Oaks sighed. “Whoever this guy is, he’s been planning this for a while.”

“I think we should run with this,” Josie said. “Release his photo to the press as a person of interest. We’ve only got him in profile, but it might be worth it. Violet Young saw him up close. We could have her work with a composite artist.”

“I’ll get one over to the school to talk with her. In the meantime, we’ll use what we’ve got. We’ll crop out the kids and put something together,” Oaks agreed.

“That brings me to my next concern,” Josie said.

“Which is what?”

“This guy has Lucy. We know she’s alive—or at least she was earlier today when the kidnapper called from Wendy Kaplan’s phone. Lucy’s photo has been all over this city, on the television, on social media. The volunteers even had fliers made and tacked them up all over the place.”

Oaks nodded as Josie spoke. He leaned a hip against the conference room table and crossed his arms over his chest. “You want to know where he’s keeping her?”

“If he was keeping her at a hotel or motel, someone would have seen her by now.”

“But not everyone would report it,” Oaks pointed out. “Especially in some of the less savory establishments. Do you have some people who can shake down those places and see if they can turn up anything?”

“Yes,” Josie said. “I also think we should have some teams look at hunting cabins in the area. The outskirts of Denton are pretty rural. Lots of cabins in remote areas that are not being used this time of year. If I were trying to stay off the radar and hide a little girl whose face was plastered everywhere, I’d think about finding someone’s shuttered hunting cabin or camping out in the woods somewhere. I can ask the state police and sheriff’s office to help check them out. County-wide.”

“I can have some of my people help with that. We should check any campsites as well,” Oaks said.

The sound of the door creaking open got their attention. Mettner poked his head in. “Boss,” he said.

“Josie,” she corrected, knowing it would do no good.

“We figured out who the tweed jacket guy is—he’s a psychologist in private practice here in Denton.”

“Did anyone interview him?” Josie asked.

“I talked to him. He said he came to offer his services to anyone who might need them, free of charge.”

“Does he have an alibi for the time that Lucy went missing?”

Mettner scratched his temple. “No. Says he was home alone Sunday, reading.”

Josie and Oaks looked at one another.

Mettner said, “You want me to bring him in?”

“Not yet,” Josie said.

“You want eyes on him?”

Oaks said, “We’re already running pretty thin. Tell you what—I’ll have my team do a background check on him. See if they can turn up any red flags. You’ll see if you can find any connection between him and the Ross family.”

“You got it,” Mettner said.

“I’ll ask Amy and Colin about him. What’s his name, Mett?” Josie asked.

“Bryce Graham. I’ll text you guys my notes on him with his address and all that.”

“Thanks, Mett,” Josie said. Once he left, she turned back to Oaks. “Did your team get anywhere with any of the neighbors in Wendy Kaplan’s development?” Josie asked.

Oaks shook his head. “Nothing of any substance. One woman thinks she remembers seeing a white pickup truck driving around the development earlier today but nothing more than that. But we have no way of knowing whether that’s related to Wendy Kaplan’s murder or not. It could have been anyone. Without a make, model or license plate, that lead is a dead end. None of those people had exterior cameras.”

“I’m not surprised,” Josie said.

Oaks raised a brow. “I am. Where I come from, everyone has a camera outside of their house.”

“Well in Denton, the crime rate is pretty low, believe it or not. People don’t see the need for them.”

Oaks still looked baffled but continued on with his briefing. “We’ve got what we believe is the killer’s DNA both under Kaplan’s fingernails and on one of the broken pieces of ceramic mug. There’s a chance that Kaplan wounded him during the struggle.”

“You’ve got his blood?”

Oaks nodded. “We believe so. We’ll test it along with the skin under Kaplan’s nails and compare it to the skin found under Jaclyn Underwood’s fingernails.”

“But even if it matches and you can put him at both crime scenes, you already said there wasn’t a hit on the DNA found under Jaclyn’s nails. So that doesn’t help us find this guy.”

“True,” Oaks conceded. “It will only help the district attorney if we catch this bastard and he gets prosecuted.”

“Then we keep working every angle,” Josie said.

“There’s something I need you to do now though.”

“What’s that?” Josie asked.

“I need you to talk to Mrs. Ross again. The list we talked about earlier?”

“Of people who are close to her?”

“Yes, that’s the one. There’s no one else on it.”

“What?” Josie said.

“The nanny and Kaplan were the only people she saw regularly, she claims.”

“Two people?” Josie said.

Oaks said, “It’s not that big a stretch given what we already know about her. Every person we’ve talked to has said the same things: she’s quiet, keeps to herself. Isolated. Distracted.”

“I know, that’s true, but the kidnapper is going to target someone else to make contact with the Ross parents, and we need to figure out who that person is ahead of time so we don’t have another murder on our hands.”

“I think you’re our best bet to get it out of her,” Oaks said. “In the meantime, I’m going to put some units on the mothers you and Mettner interviewed. I know they told you that she wasn’t close with them, but it’s all we’ve got.”

“Good call,” Josie said.

“I’ll also have my team double back on Amy’s background check to see if there’s anything we missed. Maybe dig deeper.”

“Great,” Josie said. “I’ll head over to the Ross house.”

Once outside, she took her phone out and texted Trinity:

Anything yet?

The response came back within seconds.

I’m working on it. I’ll let you know as soon as I have something.