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Brook would have preferred not to address the situation, but she couldn’t always have chocolate ice cream with her chocolate cake. What she could do was pour herself some of the freshly brewed coffee that Kate had made sure was available in the carafe.
“As I have no doubt you already heard, there is no need for any of you to travel to Illinois this weekend.” Brook reached for one of the white porcelain mugs next to the carafe. “I do appreciate that you were all willing to do so, but I made the last-minute decision to have a private ceremony at my father’s gravesite. It’s what he would have wanted, and it was also a way to divert any media presence that might have shown an interest in the family name.”
It was unfortunate that the father of a notorious serial killer would garner such interest from the press, but macabre stories usually garnered attention from the public. She’d like to believe that society hadn’t always been so depraved, but she was too busy attempting to prove that nature won out over nurture. There were times that she found herself believing that Jacob had been born with evil coursing through his veins, but then seeds of doubt would grow roots when she least expected it.
Had something or someone made him this way?
Had her brother’s wiring just short-circuited at some point during his development?
“I also realized something else this morning,” Brook said as she leaned back in her usual chair at the table. The offices of S&E Investigations had two conference rooms. The one they were currently using was the larger of the two, while the smaller one had a focused purpose—it contained the murder board for Jacob Walsh. The board was a mirror copy of the one on her dining room wall. “Jacob hasn’t reached out to me since our father’s death.”
“Do you think that Jacob is even aware of your father’s death?” Sylvie asked as she wrapped the thin string of her teabag around her index finger. It appeared that Brook wasn’t the only one still shaking off the cold from today’s outing. “We all agreed that he is somewhere out there searching for Sarah. There is a chance that he doesn’t know about your dad.”
“He knows,” Brook stated with the utmost confidence.
She would reach out to Special Agent Russell Houser, the man who was currently in charge of her brother’s case at the Bureau. They hadn’t spoken in a few weeks, and it would be wise to touch base with one another about the situation. There was something lingering in the background, though she couldn’t put her finger on what that might be.
“Kate, has anything unusual arrived at the office?” Sylvie asked, still being the only one to speak since Brook entered the conference room. “A package? Envelope?”
Sylvie had pulled her blonde hair back in her usual bun after returning to the office this afternoon. She’d been wearing a cream-colored knitted hat earlier this morning that matched her turtleneck sweater. Now that her jacket was off, Brook noticed that Sylvie had also worn a thin shirt underneath as a double layer. Considering that even Brook hadn’t known that they would have a case today, it was an odd choice of clothes.
“No,” Kate said with a shake of her head. “Well, other than Bit finally receiving the—“
“Those extra DisplayPort wires that were on backorder,” Bit interjected quickly as he sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. His right leg was clearly bouncing underneath the table in his usual nervous tick. He then quickly waved a hand to dismiss the importance of such wires, telling Brook that he’d ordered something else for his arsenal of technological gadgets. She’d worry about the expense report later. “You remember, Boss.”
Brook didn’t react to the question or her nickname. She simply took a sip of her coffee and allowed the caffeine to do its job.
“Theo?”
Brook could see that Bit’s breaking news hadn’t settled well with Theo. Then again, he’d always been a little protective of her. They’d grown close ever since she’d asked him to join S&E Investigations. Of course, they might differ on the definition of that word. Still, he took it personally when she kept things from them.
“I think I speak for the team when I say we would have liked to have been there for you.”
Sylvie and Bit shared an awkward glance, while Kate feigned interest at the 4k monitor that had been mounted to the wall behind Brook’s chair. Courtesy of Bit, the firm had caught up with technology. Instead of using a portable whiteboard as their murder board, Bit had installed the large monitor and uploaded a software that mimicked the appearance of a murder board. The software had also been uploaded to everyone’s electronic tablets. Brook would have really preferred if they were using said software at this moment instead of rehashing something that couldn’t be changed.
“I’m wholly aware, Theo,” Brook managed to say with understanding. She truly grasped their desire to be there for her, but the choice that she’d made had been in everyone’s best interest. “And I appreciate that you were all willing to fly to Illinois for the weekend. Sylvie, you are always saying that things work out the way they do for a reason. This investigation that we are consulting on with the Bureau seems to be that reason, and we have a lot of ground to cover.”
Brook turned her chair to view the screen for a couple of reasons. Mainly, to push along the meeting. There was nothing else left to say about her father’s funeral. It was over and done with, and it was time to move on.
Besides, it was already after four o’clock. At this point, they were simply wasting time.
Brook reviewed the data on the large display. Kate had already created a file for the case, and multiple tabs could already be seen on the lefthand side as information was in the process of being downloaded from multiple sources.
“I take it that Agent Nelson sent over Agent Parker’s case files?”
“Yes, and we have also received the missing person’s report on a young woman by the name of Jenny Capshaw,” Sylvie replied before pointing out something of significance. “She was the woman seen on the coffee shop’s security camera. According to her family, she was being stalked by someone for weeks.”
“Let’s hold off on rehashing the missing person’s report,” Brook stated as she turned back around to face the others. She now had their attention, and being back in her element was like experiencing a rush of adrenaline. It could have been the caffeine, but she’d like to chalk it up to both. “Okay. What do we have?”
“I’ve spent the last hour combing through Agent Parker’s files,” Theo said, as if to preface he only had a brief outline of the investigation. Brook hadn’t expected much else considering that they had been out in the field most of the day. “Three years ago, over the span of eighteen months, five women were stalked, abducted, and then never seen again.”
“Grace Willow, Debbie Horton, Jean Goldwyn, Felicia Rhimes, and Heather Krinsky,” Sylvie interjected as she set her teacup down on a slate coaster. “All in their late twenties to early thirties. According to the original profile, it doesn’t seem as though the victims were connected in any way. Some were blonde, some brunette. Heights were also different. Two were married, one was engaged, and two were single. All of the victims had different professions and lifestyles.”
“If you add in Jenny Capshaw, you now have a redhead who was also married,” Theo interjected as he rubbed his chin. He did that when he was deep in thought, and there was clearly something on his mind when it came to the victim. “She was twenty-five. The youngest out of all the victims.”
She could sense that he wanted to add on that Jenny Capshaw might not be connected to the initial investigation from three years ago, but Brook didn’t want to steer them off course. Sticking to their usual routine during their debrief was vital when it came to seeing the bigger picture.
“Any suspects?”
