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My gaze catches on rings and necklaces in different metals as he turns it slowly.
He sighs softly. “I’m going to have to open the jar and look through the contents.”
“We need to try to match these to missing persons, right?” Spencer asks.
“Pretty much.” E.A. puts the jar down and opens it.
He carefully extracts a ribbon.
It’s baby blue in color and there’s a silver heart-shaped ring attached to it, as well as a dark lock of hair. There are numbers on the end that look like a date.
“Echo,” E.A. says. “Start writing the dates down, along with the details of the ribbon. Color, hair color, details of personal item. I need a list we can use to start searching.”
Echo grabs a notebook and gets started.
E.A. places each ribbon down on a sheet of blank paper when he’s done looking it over for additional details.
“What about that?” Spencer asks, pointing out a thick black mark on the ribbon, on the opposite side from the date. “Does it mean anything?”
E.A. looks and checks the other ribbons. “I don’t know yet. Log it as a black mark, Echo.”
“Toshi,” he says, looking up. “Can you hack into Anchor West’s systems and see if there are any meetings listed under any of the dates we have. Not just meetings with Harlan. Meetings with anyone. Make me another list. Give me times, as well as names, and whatever the meeting was listed as.”
“I’ll get right on it,” Toshi says, going into Spencer’s office.
“You think the dates are the dates they were sold?” Spencer asks.
“It’s a start,” E.A. says. “I would know if I had my mother’s ribbon, but since she’s the only victim I’m sure about, we don’t know anything for sure yet.”
“What do the colors mean?” Echo muses.
“Different clients,” E.A. says. “I could be wrong, but there are a lot of different colors. If it was a code for something else, I feel like there would be less colors involved.”
“Can I have a pair of gloves?” I ask E.A.
He hands me the box. I take a pair out and slip them on. They’re on the big side, but I can work with that. I take the second jar out and look at it under the light.
My heart sinks when I don’t see E.A.’s mother’s locket, but I notice something else that makes me want to immediately open the jar. I get another piece of paper and keep it separate from E.A.’s.
“Jar two,” I state, as I carefully reach inside and take out a baby blue ribbon. “Exhibit number one. Spencer, do you want to write this list?”
He nods and looks around before Echo opens a drawer and passes him a fresh notepad and pen.
I put the baby blue ribbon against the first one from E.A.’s jar. “It’s exactly the same color as exhibit number one from jar number one. More recent date. The fifth of October last year. Dark hair, pink crystal navel ring. No black mark.”
“I wonder why it’s the same color,” Spencer says.
“Maybe we’ll work that out.” I shrug.
Toshi comes back into the room. “Where’s the list I supposed to be checking?”
Echo hands him a page that has five dates on it. “Start with these.”
He puts jar one, page two at the top of his fresh page.
There are at least a couple dozen ribbons to work through.
We take care and go slowly, examining each piece of jewelry, hoping for inscriptions that mark them out as more unique. Toshi adds meeting info to each date. It’s a process, but I can tell it’s going to get us somewhere. I just have no idea where.
