“Okay, that should be enough. Just give me a sec.”
It takes a while for her to log onto thePost’s secure server and bring up LexisNexis. But once she plugs in the few things I know about Dorothy, the top search result appears to be the winner:
Full name: Ross, Dorothy Lilian.
Date of birth: 2/1997 (Age: 25).
The whole report is five pages—quite short, from what I remember of these. Erika downloads a PDF and emails it to me.
“Is this the real reason you wanted to have lunch?” she asks when she’s done.
“No!” I lean away from the table in shock. “Not at all. It didn’t even occur to me.”
“Mm hmm.” She narrows her eyes. “Well, whatever the case, I hope you find what you need.”
I race the five blocks back to Buzz as fast as I can without looking like a total psycho, ignoring the blisters screaming from my heels.On the way, I tear through my inbox, most of it non-urgent. But I do respond to an editor atImbibewho wants to interview one of my distillery clients about some new cocktail trend.
When I’m finally enclosed behind the glass of my office, I open the PDF, my heart raging. The defunct cell number and Gmail address that I already have for Dottie are listed first. Then comes a Georgetown University email address that obviously won’t do me any good now, and three additional phone numbers, all 850 area codes—the Florida panhandle, the internet tells me.
I lean in closer to my screen, sipping in fast, shallow breaths, and scroll down a little further to her address history. The most recent entry is for the Georgetown apartment that she must’ve shared with Chloe; earlier, she appears to have lived in a dorm on campus. And before that, she lived at two different addresses in Pensacola. I quickly Google both of them. One belongs to the management office of a trailer park. The other belongs to a small rambler with peeling powder-blue paint.
I make my way to “Potential Relatives”—often a useful section of these reports, in my limited experience, when it comes to finding people who don’t want to be found. I see both Pensacola addresses there, too. The trailer park is listed next toRoss, Jessica Lynn (Age 44),and the blue rambler belongs toRoss, Patricia Dorothy (Age 68). Dottie’s mother and grandmother, I’m betting. I don’t see a father.
The other parts that I thought might hint at Dottie’s whereabouts are out of date. The most recent entry under “Employment Locator” is a Mexican restaurant in Georgetown from her college years, and her only voter registration, also from her time in DC, is categorized as inactive.
But there is one thing, toward the very end of the report, that stops me. It’s under “Criminal Filings.”
In August 2020, Dottie was charged with a misdemeanor for driving with an expired license—in Morgan County, West Virginia.That was a year and a half ago. But it’s the most recent location I have for her.
Jordana approaches right as I’m opening the site for Morgan County’s local court. I expand the Rivière media dinner spreadsheet to full screen just in case, giving her a quick smile. When she keeps going, I put in my earbuds so I can pretend I’m on the phone whenever she passes again.
The courthouse website looks like something from the AOL days of the internet; I can practically hear the dial-up sound. I click around a bit to be sure, but the result is what I expect: I can’t access digital case files here. This is the kind of place that makes you come in person.
Jordana returns—I pause my fake typing and pretend to laugh at the very witty thing that the fake client on the other end of my fake call has just said; then I give her another smile and a wave. She nods back.
To keep her off my scent, I speed through a little actual work, responding to meeting invites and adding comments to a couple of Slack chats. TheImbibeeditor has gotten back to me with the list of interview questions I requested. They look easy enough, so I forward them to the client with my recommendation to do it:Seems like a fun opportunity! Lunch soon?
That should hold me for a while. Now it’s time for some real phone calls. The first of the three 850 numbers is out of service. My guess is it may have been Dottie’s cell phone before she moved to DC.
The second one rings a half dozen times, then goes to voicemail: “You’ve reached the Sunset Dunes Trailer Court. Our lots are full up right now, but if you wanna get on the wait list, leave a message and we’ll get back to ya.”
Only one number left, then. If it’s a dead end, I don’t have a plan for what happens next. For the first time since lunch, a creeping doubt starts to dull the adrenaline.
I suck in a deep breath and dial.
The line rings once, then a second time…
“Hello?”
An older woman’s voice on the other end, raspy and deep.
“Um, hi,” I stammer. “I’m not sure if I have the right number, but I’m trying to reach Dottie Ross.”
The line goes quiet, but I can hear the woman breathing. I know she’s still there.
“Ma’am?” I press. “Do you know Dottie?”
The woman sighs.
