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“What do you hope to find?” the computer expert asked.
“What could a second pair of eyes hurt?” Keith countered.
Agent Chen studied her civilian counterpart for a moment or two. “I will see what I can do,” she said abruptly.
Battle of the nerds, Kimberly thought. “Other questions?”
“What next?” the sheriff, Hank Smithers, asked.
“We go to Niche,” Kimberly replied. “Expand the search grid around the first set of remains.”
“You think there might be others,” the sheriff said.
“Jacob is a suspect in the disappearances of five other women. Lilah Abenito isn’t the only victim, just the one who was found first.”
“Shh... rimp,” the sheriff muttered, editing his curse nicely.
“There may indeed be more graves,” Kimberly continued. “Also, the forensic anthropologist is working on narrowing the time of death to give us a tighter investigative window. Meaning recovering additional pieces of the skeleton would help.”
Sheriff Smithers nodded. “I can get us a dog team, as well as local searchers. There are people in the area who know those woods like the backs of their hands.”
“Perfect. Then, computer aside, we’re looking at old-fashioned groundwork. Checking property records. Circulating Ness’s photo. Fifteen years is a long time—”
“Not in my county,” the sheriff interrupted. “What it lacks in size, it makes up in memories.” He glanced at D.D. “I’d work on that accent if I were you. And for the love of God, don’t mention you’re from the North.”
Kimberly honestly couldn’t tell if the man was joking or not. But she figured D.D. didn’t care one way or the other.
“If Jacob was in the mountains, how’d he get there?” Kimberly continued now. “Does he own a vehicle we’ve never discovered to go with this property we never found? Does he have an associate, maybe a personal connection in the area who helped him out? We need to be flashing Jacob’s photo to motel owners, bartenders, retail clerks. If he was staying in a local cabin, he’d have to come to town for food, booze, drugs. Before, we were searching northern Georgia. Now, we have a town. Let’s hope that leads to the break we’ve been waiting for. Any questions?”
No one raised a hand. With a final nod, Kimberly closed up her binder, signaling the meeting was over. She’d just risen to standing when Flora spoke up.
“How sure is this Dr. Jackson that the remains belong to Lilah Abenito? You said the skeleton isn’t even complete...”
“In addition to facial recognition, Dr. Jackson was able to match a childhood injury from Lilah’s medical file to a healed break on the skeleton.”
“Okay,” Flora said.
Kimberly eyed her suspiciously. “What do you mean by that?”
“I’m going to meet Lilah Abenito,” Flora announced. “Best place to start, right? With the victim?”
Then, without awaiting permission or approval, Flora got up and left.
