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“I was a kid.” She leaned in closer. “What did I have to be sad about?”
“I know. I guess,” Laura shook her head, her voice thick with emotion, “I just didn’t remember. That sounds awful, I’m sorry.”
Cassie looked up at her. “You don’t have to be sorry. I forgot, too. So much has happened since then. We all grow up and change. We’re not meant to be the same as when we were kids.”
“Yeah, but some people get to hold on to that happiness for a
little while longer. You never had the chance.”
Cassie shrugged. She wasn’t sure what else to say. She could sit here feeling sorry for herself, but what would that change? For most people, the past was the past, but her past had come back to haunt her—literally. She couldn’t change what had happened, but she could change how it affected her.
The next few pictures were of Cassie and Sarah. Laughing and playing a board game. Eating popcorn and watching movies. Dancing around the living room in feather boas and sequined shirts. She barely remembered any of those moments in time, and yet here was proof they had happened.
The next picture made the sisters gasp. It was so different from the others. Everything before had been bright and colorful, but darkness enshrouded this image. The edges were black, and along the left-hand side, there was a too-close tree trunk. But beyond that was what had sent chills down Cassie’s spine.
The woman was in profile. Her skin bright white from the flash. Her eyes were closed against the light, and her hands were halfway to her face. But Cassie could see her. She was real. The monster in the woods had been a woman in her forties or fifties.
“Do you recognize her?” Laura asked. “I’ve never seen her before.”
“No, not at all.” She leaned closer and looked at the curve of her jaw, the point of her nose, the flatness of her forehead. “She’s no one I know, dead or alive.”
Laura leaned back and brushed her curls away from her face. “Sebastian wanted you to see the woman in the woods that night. And he’s been pretty insistent that he’s connected to Sarah. Could this woman be the kidnapper?”
“They always thought the guy who got arrested had a co-conspirator. And if they were stealing children—”
“Then having a woman, a mother figure, would’ve been smart to keep them all in line.”
Cassie looked back to the woman. “Either we caught her at a very bad time or she wasn’t a very good mother figure.”
“All of this is conjecture without knowing who she is, though. What are we going to do?”
Cassie stared out the windshield and watched the clouds roll by. She could ask her parents if they knew her, but the woman didn’t look like someone they would’ve called up for a dinner date.
Then it hit her. She turned to Laura and smiled.
“I have an idea.”
“Do tell.”
“Who do you know who has facial recognition software and a databank of known criminals?”
Laura’s eyes widened. “The FBI?”
Cassie tucked the photo back into the envelope and slipped it into her purse. She put the car in gear and couldn’t stop her smile from growing. For the first time since Sebastian showed up, she felt close to some actual answers.
“Hopefully, my new friend Agent Viotto won’t mind doing me a favor in exchange for the help I’ve given them on the Grayson case.”
35
After dropping Laura back home, Cassie followed Agent Viotto’s directions to meet him outside an apartment building in downtown Charlotte. She could tell just by looking at the structure that it was meant for a certain clientele, and she certainly didn’t fit those parameters. The sun bounced off the silver and glass monstrosity, forcing her to shield her eyes.
She pulled up behind Viotto’s sedan, hopped out, and made her way around the passenger side of his car. Inside, it was warm and smelled strongly of vanilla. But the cigarette smoke still lingered.
“New air freshener?” she asked.
“Nothing will ever remove that stench from this car.”
“It’s a losing battle.”
