Page 11 of Bring Them Home

Hearing the name of the restaurant for the second time this evening, her mind drifted to their Oreo Dream Extreme… Not that a serving of the chocolaty treat would solve anything for Amanda right now. “That’s right.”

“What time do you want to look at?” Danny popped his eyes at her as his hands hovered over the keyboard ready to leap into action.

Amanda thought of Brooke’s text to her mother. “Let’s start with Saturday sometime between two and three o’clock in the afternoon.”

“Sure thing. I can play it at a faster speed and slow it down if we see something. That way it won’t take as long.”

“I like the way you think.” Amanda’s breathing became shallow. Call it instinct or intuition, but they were about to see something telling. She couldn’t imagine anything short of a forced abduction having Valerie Archer leaving her personal belongings in the car. And as a mother, she couldn’t imagine abandoning her ill child.

The video played out on-screen, but it wasn’t until the time stamp read 2:50 PM that the orange Charger came into view. Amanda shifted forward on her chair. “There she is.”

Danny adjusted the playback to regular speed, and they watched as she parked.

Only a few minutes later, a black Ford Transit cargo van parked in the spot next to her, blocking out the view of the Charger. It was reversing out a short while later.

“Okay, that’s strange. Why pull in and then leave right away?” Amanda said.

“They changed their mind about shopping,” Trent suggested.

Amanda’s stomach tightened. Something was off. “Can you go back and follow the van in the moments before it pulled up next to the Charger?”

“Yeah, of course.” Danny did just that, and it wasn’t long before Amanda was asking him to pause the feed again.

It was two thirty, and the black cargo van was parked in a handicapped spot close to the entrance doors. People were coming and going from the mall, but Amanda’s focus was on a teenage girl who was leaving. Given the camera angle she could only see her from behind, and she might be getting carried away, but her instinct was screaming at her.

“That could be Brooke.” She’d only seen the teen’s photograph that was attached to her learner’s permit. Amanda might be leaping to see what she wanted to. Teens looked so much alike. As independent as they liked to think they were, so many of them dressed and styled their hair the same. “Resume playback in slow motion.”

The footage moved forward, and the teenager walked close to the van. She was alone, but there was a slight hesitation to her steps, and she looked over her shoulder as she got into the back of the van.

“Can you zoom in?” Trent asked. “I’d like to see if we can make out anyone in the back.”

Danny did so, but it was of little use. The interior of the vehicle was black, as if it were night, not late afternoon on a sunny summer day.

He started the playback again, and the door was slid shut the moment the teen cleared the doorway.

Amanda popped up from her chair. “Trent, a minute?”

“Yeah.”

Danny stopped the video while Amanda and Trent excused themselves into a corner of the room.

“It can’t be a coincidence that a teen girl gets into the back of a van and, a short while later, the same one pulls up next to Valerie Archer. That had to have been Brooke.”

“I believe so. She appeared tentative.”

“I picked up on that too.” Amanda wished they had an angle that afforded them a view of Valerie and the Charger when the van stopped next to her. But there was one thing they could try. She turned to the security guard. “Danny, could you zoom in on the Charger after the van leaves the neighboring spot?” She walked back to her chair but didn’t sit down.

Danny forwarded the footage to the desired point and zoomed in.

“She’s gone,” Trent said.

“Yep. So that was Brooke getting into the van moments before. Then they circled over to get Valerie. They were waiting and watching out for her. And Valerie’s not going to refuse to get in if she sees her daughter in the back.” It seemed likely Brooke’s text to her mother was to lure her to the mall. That her abductor had put her up to it, so they could also take Valerie. Amanda’s phone rang, cutting into her thoughts, and she answered at seeing Officer Brandt’s name.

“It’s Leo. I just found Brooke’s phone in a dumpster.”

“And you’re sure it’s hers?”

“I gave it a bit of a charge, and the lock-screen photo is of her and two other teenage girls. I’ll send you a photo of the screen.”