The Girl With No Name

Chapter Thirty-Six

Gretchen arrived ten minutes later, sliding into the backseat of Josie’s Escape along with a blast of cool air. Noah recounted their meeting with Eric Dunn and Gretchen scoffed. “Charming,” she said.

“Did you get anything else from the phone?” Josie asked.

“Not much. It’s a burner. He called the hotel, like I told you, five times in the last week. Call history only goes back a week. The only other numbers he called were three other burner numbers. I can trace the cell providers but no names or other identifying information about their owners.”

Noah turned his body toward Gretchen. “If we know the providers, we can get the phone companies to ping them and get their location within a few feet.”

“Only if the GPS is turned on,” Josie said. “Otherwise you’d have to use triangulation. If these guys are smart, they’re not going to have the GPS activated.”

“Triangulation would still give you their location within a couple of miles,” Noah pointed out.

“So we’ll find more of Dunn’s men,” Gretchen said. “How do we know he wasn’t calling the goon squad in the penthouse with Dunn?”

“Because,” Josie said. “As Dunn was so anxious to point out, Twitch was no longer working for him.”

“Which is bullshit,” Noah said.

“Twitch was on another team. The team that took the baby and attacked Luke. Think about it; if anything goes wrong, Dunn can always claim he had no knowledge—that it’s ‘not his concern’ what these guys do after they leave his company.”

“Something must have gone wrong,” Gretchen said. “Or else Twitch wouldn’t need to call the hotel, right?”

A fluttery feeling began in Josie’s stomach. “Maybe not. Maybe that’s how he checked in. Dunn probably pays the concierge to lie if asked what room the calls went to. Even if we could prove the calls went to the penthouse, Dunn can just make something up: Twitch was begging for his job back, something like that. We can’t prove the content of those conversations even if we can prove they took place. I think it’s worth a try to locate the other phones.”

“Text me the numbers,” Noah told Gretchen. “I’ll call dispatch and have them ping them. If that doesn’t work, I’ll write up the warrants to have the providers triangulate them.”

Gretchen bent her head to her phone and began typing. Noah’s phone buzzed three times in succession.

“How many people does Dunn have with him?” Josie asked.

“A team of four,” Gretchen answered. “That’s all the staff at the hotel has seen. If there’s another team, they’re off-site, like you said.”

“How about the sperm bank?” Josie asked. “Get anywhere with them?”

Gretchen pocketed her phone and pulled her notebook out of her jacket pocket. She flipped a few pages. “No,” she said.

Noah laughed and motioned toward her notepad. “You needed your notes to remember that? What’s it say in there?”

Gretchen smiled good-naturedly. “It says that I talked to a woman named Diana Sweeney, a receptionist slash intake associate, and that she told me that she couldn’t give me any information—either about the investigation into the mix-up or about the other donor. I told her I’d get some warrants written up, and she said it would take their legal department seven to ten business days to process them.”

“Wait a minute,” Josie said. “What did you say her name was?”

“Diana Sweeney,” Gretchen repeated.

Noah said, “You know her?”

“I might,” Josie answered. “Noah, go back to the station. Get on the phones. Then I want you to check on Misty—see if she’s ready to talk to us. Then check if there’s been any progress in the search for Conway, and get someone to take Twitch’s photo around to the hotels and motels to see if anyone remembers him staying there while he was in town—in case we don’t get anywhere with the phones. Gretchen, I want you to stay on Dunn until I get back.”

Gretchen tucked her notebook back into her pocket and started to get out of the vehicle. “You got it, boss.”

Noah looked at Josie. “Where are you going?”

“To have a talk with Diana Sweeney.”