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Laura knew that Blackford would have had his guys looking into those sorts of connections already, but it didn’t hurt to look again. A fresh pair of eyes from out of town could sometimes reveal hidden layers of information. Maybe there was a bar that absolutely everyone in Atlanta knew and went to every now and then, and it was disca
rded by the initial search team as being only a coincidence. A non-local, though, would flag it up.
“All set,” the tech woman said, getting up out of Laura’s way. Laura thanked her gratefully and sat down in the chair herself, immediately logging in to the local database and starting to look up Veronica Rowse.
There were lots of records she could check, and Laura decided to go for all of them. Birth records was obvious, but searching by Rowse didn’t get her anything other than the family members that they already knew about. No record of a twin, or even another sister.
Didn’t mean one hadn’t been born in shameful circumstances and swept away, maybe given up for adoption or abandoned, with no name filled in for ‘mother’ on the birth certificate. Medical records could tell her a little more about that.
Laura searched Veronica’s mother’s information, trying to see anything that would give her a clue about an extended hospital stay or even just a one-night check-in. But there was nothing. Veronica, though, had a fairly serious stay on her records: a car accident, just over a year ago. By the list of procedures that she’d been through, it looked as though it had been pretty bad.
She’d survived it. Only to come out the other end and get herself killed by some kind of monster. What a waste. Of course, it was extra time with her loved ones, time to do the things she loved and maybe make an impact on others. She’d worked in the hospice, maybe made someone’s life better. Maybe lots of people. But, still, it seemed like a damned shame to go through all of that and then just die not long afterwards anyway.
Laura checked everything else she could think of, storing each piece of information in her mind. The non-existent criminal record, which told her nothing. Any mention of Veronica she could find in the local paper – which, as it turned out, was only one, a report on the car accident. The details of her family that came up in searches. Everything. Laura had no way right now of knowing which bit of information was important, so she kept it all in her head.
Beside her, Nate was slumped in a spare chair he’d wheeled over, hunched over his cell phone. He was making rapid notes on a page of his notepad, then pausing to scroll up his screen. They would both be here for a while, especially if they found nothing. Laura squared her shoulders and turned back to her keyboard, flexing her fingers above it as she thought.
There was no other way she could think of to search for information. There was only so much data that could quantify someone’s life. The real essence of them, that was what you got from interviews with the family.
She put her fingers to the keys and typed in Stephanie Marchall instead.
What she saw made her lean forward and frown, focusing more closely on the screen. The medical records were… interesting. Stephanie had only been in her mid-thirties, but according to the report, she’d been brought in after suffering from a heart attack some two years before. All manner of scans and tests were listed on her record, until she had been diagnosed with a congenital heart problem that had never previously been noticed. She had a prescription for heart medication. She must have been taking it on the day she was abducted, or the stress of the event would probably have been enough to trigger another cardiac event. Since the coroner hadn’t mentioned it, Laura guessed it hadn’t come into play during her twelve hours on that platform.
There was more data to go through, more information to find. But Laura had a hunch that something was up, here. Something that she couldn’t quite put her finger on yet.
Instead of looking through all the other checks for Stephanie Marchall, she focused on the medical records, this time looking up Lincoln Ware.
He, too, had a whole batch of tests on his record, and within the last six months. They all occurred on the same day. Tests for arterial blood gasses, a CT scan, blood and urine tests, a chest x-ray, an EEG. Something must have happened to him. The record didn’t show what, and the tests had apparently all come back clear.
Whatever it was, it was clear he’d had some kind of medical experience. Something dangerous, judging by the seriousness of the tests he underwent. The same as the other two.
An accident within the past couple of years. That was what connected all of them.
Was that what her vision had been trying to tell her?
But, then, why had it come through like that?
“Nate?” Laura said, getting his attention with an uncertain note in her voice. “I think I have something here.”
“What is it?” Nate asked, dropping his pen. “I haven’t come up with anything at all, yet.”
“Look,” Laura said, showing him the three records that she’d kept open on her screen. “All three of the victims we have so far were involved in some kind of accident or injury over the past two years. Serious ones, too. I would even guess they were all life-risking scenarios.”
Nate frowned. “Could that be enough?”
Laura shrugged. “I don’t know. But it’s all we have right now.”
Nate stood up, snapping his notebook shut. “Well, then we better chase it down. Where first?”
“The Rowse family,” Laura said. She gave him a faint smile. “If we get lucky and Bradley Milford has already been released and gone back to them, we might be able to hit two birds with one stone.”
***
The Rowse house was darker and emptier than it had been the last time they visited. There were only two cars parked outside now, which quickly dampened Laura’s hope of being able to speak to Bradley Milford. A call back to the precinct verified that he’d been transferred for processing before his court appearance, after a much larger stash of pills were found at his home. At least they knew where he was if they needed him again.
Laura knocked on the door, feeling Nate’s presence behind her as a reassuringly solid shadow falling over her own. She wasn’t quite sure anymore just how stable the ground was beneath her. This whole thing with the vision of the dead woman coming to life, with the killer tricking them about the times – it was all throwing her off. And her visions hadn’t been coming often enough, or giving enough detail, through the whole case. It was like she was reaching out for things she’d relied on for years, only to find them no longer where she’d left them. And she needed them to be where she’d left them.
The door opened to reveal the brother who had been helpful before – Stephen, Laura remembered. He took one look at them, sighed, and then stepped back to allow them inside.
