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She started crying as they were reading her rights and then walked her out. They took her down in a service elevator and out a side door to the police cars, while Ray watched from his windows above. He was still in shock that he’d had someone on the premises actually connected to all this.
***
Emily was in hysterics all the way to the station. Who murdered Kevin? Was it Boss? Was she next? She didn’t know what to think or how to move forward. She needed a lawyer, but the shit she was in was deep, and if she had a snowball’s chance in hell of getting out of this alive, she was going to take it.
By the time they walked her into the local police station, past the curious eyes of locals in the lobby and into an interrogation room, she was shaking so hard she could barely stand. She stumbled twice going in and would have fallen but for the officer beside her. As soon as she was seated, they removed the cuffs.
Both agents sat down across the table from her, started a recorder, stated the date and time, and introduced themselves and the woman they were interrogating before beginning.
Agent Howard began the questioning. “Miss Payne, do you understand why you are here?”
“You said Kevin was dead. I didn’t know. I’ve been gone,” she said.
“Yes, we know. Your absences from your employment at the Serenity Inn happen to coincide with the disappearance of women who have gone missing from Jubilee.”
Shock registered. “Wait! What? I don’t understand what you’re talking about!”
“Yes, you do. We already know your part in this. Human trafficking is a federal offense. You’re going down for a very long time, Miss Payne. It would help your case if you are straight with us from the start.”
“No, no, I don’t understand,” she kept saying.
“Then understand this. Someone murdered Vanzant at his campsite, dragged his body back into his trailer, stole his laptop and his phone, and disappeared. We already know he was trolling women for a human-trafficking website. And we know that because he kept a backup on a second laptop. We don’t need his phone to know who he called. We’ve already gotten a search warrant for the records. We already have the man in custody who stole a baby they were going to sell. We already know who the kidnappers’ contact was, and there is a warrant out for her arrest. You and Vanzant were part of the team. You were in collusion with someone and we want to know who’s running the show.”
Emily froze. “I don’t know about this stuff. I wasn’t part of that. I bought things with stolen credit cards to keep from going to jail. Do I need a lawyer?”
“What do you mean, to keep from going to jail?” Pickard asked.
Emily started crying. “I never wanted to do this. But I was going to lose my license if I got a third DUI on my driving record. I’d just gotten an apartment in town and a job at the Serenity Inn. Kevin came to visit me. He had his travel trailer and parked it at Barton’s campground. We’d been in Jubilee partying up into the night, and we were on our way back to his place when these lights came on behind me.”
“Was it a county patrol car or a city patrol car?” Pickard asked as he handed her a handful of tissues.
Emily shrugged as she swiped at her eyes. “I don’t know. It was after midnight and dark on the highway. All I saw were the flashing lights behind me and then this guy at the window asking for my ID and stuff.”
“Then what?” Howard asked.
“He made me get out. I couldn’t walk a straight line. He gave me a Breathalyzer test which I guess I failed. He kept looking at me, walking in a circle around me like he was sizing me up. Then Kevin, who was in the back seat, wakes up and gets out of the car. The cop gets all freaky and pulls a gun on Kevin, makes him sit down on the side of the road. Then he puts me in cuffs, and Kevin in cuffs, and makes a call. I’m still crying and begging him to let me go. He’s talking to someone but I can’t hear. Then he shoves the phone up to my ear and there is this guy on the phone telling me if I do a favor for him that he’ll make sure the charges go away. I didn’t understand exactly what he’d asked, but all I cared about was not getting a third DUI.”
“What was the cop’s name?” Howard asked.
Emily frowned. “I don’t know, and he never wrote me a ticket so it wasn’t like I would see it later after I sobered up. Oh. Wait. When he made that phone call, I heard him say, “Hey, this is ‘Bear.’”
“And that’s it? They just let you go?”
“No. He took all of my contact information and told me I would be getting a call, and that I better not ignore it or I’d be sorry. That plenty of women disappear and no one ever sees them again. It scared me. Kevin and I went on to his travel trailer and slept it off. We woke up to a phone call, and three weeks later, I did the favor.”
“How did that happen? Did you meet up with someone to get the stolen cards?” Howard asked.
“No. The card and ID were shoved under the door to my apartment when I got off work. There were written instructions to dress up as close to the woman in the photo as I could and go to Frankfort to buy something with the card, then afterward burn the card and the ID and donate the purchases somewhere in Frankfort. Only it didn’t end after one favor. It was like a snowball rolling down a hill, and I was caught in it and couldn’t get out. That’s all I did. And I didn’t know what it meant.”
“You could have gone to the police,” Pickard said.
Emily looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “It was a cop that got me into this. Why would I trust another one to get me out?”
Pickard realized what he’d said when he got that “look” from Howard, but he ignored the faux pas and kept questioning. “How did Kevin Vanzant get mixed up in this? He wasn’t driving.”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I was drunk, remember? But the cop saw all of his cameras and Kevin was a witness to what had taken place. I know they took his information just like they took mine. But he got a call almost immediately. Something about taking pictures of tourists. They gave him a photo op, and they gave me the shopping deal. I know he got paid money to do that. I don’t know if he ever figured out what was going on, but I didn’t ask questions. Once we got involved with the boss, we were not supposed to know each other.” She started crying all over again, and they paused, giving her a moment to pull herself together.
“I called Kevin while I was on the way home the other day. The last thing he said to me was that it was almost over. He said Mr. Barton notified him that he was closing down the campground for the winter, and when Boss called, Kevin told him he was done. I don’t know how Boss took that. But Kevin told me when he left, I was going with him. We were going to disappear.”
