Page 55 of Avenging Angel

“A year ago, I would have defended the organization just as much as Bennett. Personally, I think we should cut the guy some slack and give him the benefit of the doubt. He’s been transparent that his intentions aren’t aligned with ours; his end goal isn’t to catch a kidnapper. It’s only to help us remove a pawn from the playing board while still protecting the Queen.”

Jeremy scoffs. “A Knight can still remove a Queen.”

Jeremy and Jack continue walking with us toward the far edge of the campground. “We spotted Kenneth on camera at the Dutton Creek Trailhead near the rim.”

Kenneth has about a three-hour head start on us because I had to refill my pack after Daisy and I went through our supplies while trapped in the mines. I pull out the map, lay it on the ground, and point to the entrance to Dutton Creek. Running my finger down the trail, I say, “It leads to the Pacific Coast Trail and meets at Oregon Section C. If we enter the PCT off Highway 62, we can save some time. There’s a chance we’ll run into him if he goes south instead of north.”

“I wish I was going with you, but I’m trained for more suburban areas, not mountainous terrain that requires half my body weight in supplies on my back,” Jack says. As a former cop, he’s better off here anyway, and his role will be to remain in constant contact with Jordan, Benjamin, and Seth. “You focus on Kenneth, and we’ll take care of Brad if he heads in our direction.”

Jeremy rubs his left shoulder where he was shot three months ago trying to protect Scott’s wife, Grace, before she was captured and held hostage. Grace told me all about her ordeal and how her investigative reporting nearly cost both her life and Jeremy’s.

“I’m still on the equivalent of desk duty. Roger doesn’t want me overdoing it unless someone else’s life is in immediate danger.”

As a former Marine, it has to be rough on Jeremy not to be in the thick of the action. He might not have been in the special forces, but he’s still tough and ready to fight the good fight.

I’m about to tell them both that they’re our eyes and ears at the campground when Owen’s phone rings in his pocket. He pulls it out and says, “It’s Jerry. I called in the big guns at Shining Knight HQ to help with data mining.”

I do a quick look around to ensure there aren’t any campers milling about. There are a few RVs parked a short distance away, one with a family laughing around a fire pit. Thankfully, there’s no one close enough to hear us. “Put it on speaker with the volume low.”

After following through with my request, Owen says, “Hey, Jer. What do you have for us?”

“I did some digging into Northwyck Girls Academy because I couldn’t understand why they would ignore your warning about the risk of abduction.”

“What warning?” I ask.

My question takes Jerry off guard. “Uh, the one Daisy called in yesterday?”

Owen explains. “When you fell back asleep in the hospital, Daisy left your room and started mumbling something along the lines of, ‘If a sacrifice is going to be made, it’s not going to be by one of the girls.’ Then she asked for my phone, searched for the number of the school, and made the call. Sadly, the principal, I guess the term would be headmistress, laughed it off. Then Daisy had me call. I gave my Federal Badge ID number and everything, but the headmistress said, ‘Your joke isn’t funny,’ and then hung up on me.”

Jerry interrupts. “I hacked into the school’s computer system and found a donation of $75,000 a year ago to support the science program for the high school-age girls to go on this trip. There was even a schedule of events attached, as well as a multitude of field experiments. Activities included plant identification, a wildlife scavenger hunt, track casting, and a host of other things to do. Get this! The science adventure was titled, ‘Could Bigfoot Live at Crater Lake?’ The only condition was that it had to be over three days during the beginning of fall. Naturally, the school chose Columbus Day weekend to accommodate the requirement.”

Scott shakes his head. “Is it possible that it’s just a coincidence? I mean, that’s a special brand of evil to plot that far ahead.”

“I agree, but I traced the money,” Jerry says. “It came from an offshore account under the name Brad Callahan.”

“Any luck tracking down Emily Bloom’s brother?” Owen asks. “I couldn’t find anything in the short time I had to search. If he exists, then you’re our best bet at discovering his whereabouts.”

Jerry grunts. “That’s a high bar you’ve set for me, and sadly, I’ve fallen short. Digitally, there’s nothing to go on. No birth certificate, high school diploma, transcripts, driver’s license. It’s as if he was never born.”

I frown. “You said, ‘as if.’ Does that mean you believe he exists?”

“It’s quite possible. Shortly after Emily Bloom died, there were a string of fires in Colorado Springs. One was in the records room of Pike’s Summit School District, and the other was at Rampart Regional Medical Center. And before you ask, yes, it was the records department where the birth registry for the hospital was located. A week later, there was a cyberattack at the Colorado Vital Statistics office in Denver.”

“That’s too much of a coincidence,” Scott grumbles.

“It’s another dead end unless Daisy can get his picture,” I say, annoyed with yet another roadblock. “What about Kenneth Johnson? Have you been able to learn anything?”

I cringe as the sound of Jerry cracking his knuckles comes through the speaker. “No. I’ve taken the precaution of running the search on an isolated system to prevent another shutdown. Your CIA friend really doesn’t want you looking into this guy. I’ve let my algorithm run for days to check the photo you sent me against every database known to man.”

“Well, Kenneth Johnson is alive and well, but getting farther away the longer we stand here,” I say. “His photo has to be somewhere online, like in the background of a social media post or article.”

“Hmm. Maybe you’re right. You said that Daisy first saw him five years ago, correct?” Jerry asks.

“Yep. And then again two years after that.”

Jerry shuffles some papers. “Where was the abduction five years ago?”

As I’m trying to recall the information, Owen chimes in. “Saguaro National Park. The victim was Brit Larson. Only child in a single-parent home. That one got to Daisy because she didn’t arrive until a week afterward because I’d been shot in the line of duty and was in the hospital. I told her to go, but she didn’t listen. To this day, I know my sister wonders if she’d arrived sooner, whether she would have found Brit before the trail went cold.”