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Josie’s phone chirped. A text from Noah. He was finished with his questioning. Olivia was visibly relieved when Josie told her that she could go back to work. Outside the coffee shop, Josie watched her sprint down the pavement and through the doors of the Timber Creek restaurant, almost bumping into Noah’s chest as he emerged.
In the car, Josie used her phone to log in to social media, starting with Instagram, which, along with Snapchat, she knew was quite popular among teens. She found Olivia Wilcox’s account fairly quickly. It was set to public. Josie scrolled through her list of followers and then the list of people she followed, hoping to see any username that could be associated with Kayleigh Patchett. There were a couple of spam accounts with usernames that were seemingly random combinations of letters and numbers that Olivia followed. Teenagers usually had their main Instagram account which their parents were aware of and on which they posted photos of benign things like sports games, family outings and school dances. For the stuff they didn’t want their parents to see, they simply created a spam account, or a Finsta—fake Instagram account. It was a different Instagram account that almost always had the word spam right in its name. It was always set to private and usually had a smaller number of followers. Josie took screenshots of the spam usernames. Later, she would see if there was a way to connect any of them to Kayleigh and get a warrant for their records.
Noah sat in the driver’s seat watching her, the car idling. He answered a text on his phone. “Gretchen’s at the stationhouse to relieve me. You get something good?”
“I’m not sure.” She told him about her conversation with Olivia. “She’s lying about something.”
“You think she’s lying that Kayleigh had social media?”
Josie nodded. “Yes. This kid has gone to great lengths to undermine her parents’ plan for her to continue playing softball. She’s snuck out of the house. She’s been smoking weed without her parents knowing at all. She had erotic novels hidden in her nightstand. She read smut on this story app on her phone—until her parents found out. Why wouldn’t she have social media?”
“With Kayleigh missing, why would Olivia lie about her using her phone to log in to her social media accounts?”
“I don’t know.” She looked at her husband. Even in her tired and stressed state, she couldn’t help but admire the lines of his face, his hazel eyes, and his thick brown hair. “What did you get? Anything?”
“Nothing immediately helpful,” he said. “But one of the cooks has seen the secret boyfriend—or J.J. as we can call him now.”
Josie sat up straighter. “Are you serious?”
He smiled. “Don’t get too excited. He couldn’t give me much that would help us find him, except that he sometimes picked Kayleigh up behind the restaurant after her shifts. That’s why he saw them. He hangs out the back door to smoke. They never even noticed he was there. Anyway, the kid pulls up, waits. Kayleigh comes around the side of the building, gets in, they leave.”
“The car,” Josie said.
“A black four-door sedan. Maybe a Mitsubishi or a Hyundai.”
“Plate number?”
“No. He didn’t notice. Didn’t think it was important. I asked the manager to pull any footage of the parking lots for as far as it goes back but he’s not on there.”
Josie looked around at the various businesses that had external surveillance as well as the traffic cams. “Gretchen and I can cross-check the last three or four of Kayleigh’s shifts with the camera footage nearby and see if we can spot the car via some other establishment’s security footage.”
Noah grimaced. “That could take a while, but it might be worth it.”
THIRTY
I’m so close to them and yet they don’t hear me. I knew they would be here. It never fails. They don’t see me. But they’re talking about me. Teenagers, fearless, drinking in the woods. Talking about me. They still don’t think I’m real. Not truly. I wait and watch and listen. It’s too risky to grab one of them here. Too many witnesses. I am at a disadvantage. I have to be patient and hope that one—or more—will delve deeper into my territory. I have to be patient. Drunk teenagers do stupid things. It’s only a matter of time before one of them wanders into my darkness. Studying them, I have some hopes for which of them it might be, some preferences, but even if I don’t get my wish, I will get my kill.
Patience.
THIRTY-ONE
Josie and Gretchen didn’t find the car. By the time Josie went home to get some sleep, they were no closer to finding Kayleigh Patchett’s secret boyfriend. They were no closer to finding Kayleigh either. Misty, Harris, and Pepper had gone home so there was only Trout to keep Josie company through the night. As usual, sleep was difficult. This time, the memories of Mettner’s death were interspersed with a dream in which Josie chased a man through the woods. He was pursuing Kayleigh Patchett. Josie could see the girl ahead, running for her life, but couldn’t seem to catch up. Then her foot got caught in a snare trap and Josie woke to the sounds of screams echoing in her head.
She went to see Dr. Rosetti the next morning.
It didn’t help. She felt a slight relief at having unburdened herself to her therapist but on the whole, she was still every bit as exhausted and stressed as she had been when she’d tried to go to sleep the night before. In the car, she checked her phone to see a message from Noah telling her to meet him at Denton East High School in the back of parking lot A. She got there in under ten minutes, heart whipping into a frenzy as she wondered if it was a lead or something worse. Parking lot A was on the side of the football field which backed up to the woods. When she pulled in, the lot was mostly full. The last few parking lanes, closest to the forest, were empty save for a small white pickup truck. Standing around it were Noah, two uniformed officers, and a blonde woman in her forties who looked very distressed.
Josie parked a few spaces away and jogged over. On closer inspection, the woman’s blue eyes were red-rimmed from crying. She wore a pair of pajama pants and a white blouse, the buttons of which were crooked, as if she’d hurried to put it on. She pushed her short hair around on her head, making it stand up on one side, and regarded Josie with a hopeful look.
“Detective Quinn,” said Noah. “This is Pam Hicks.”
“My child is missing,” Pam said.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Josie said.
Noah quickly filled her in. “Brody’s a junior here. Mrs. Hicks went to wake him for school this morning, but he wasn’t in his bed. She tried calling his phone, but it went to voicemail—”
“His battery must have run out. He would never send me to voicemail. He wouldn’t do that,” she said. “We have a rule. No matter where he is or what he’s doing, he always picks up when I call. When he didn’t pick up, I came here because I thought maybe he got up before me and came to school. Sometimes he does that so he can use the weight room. If he’s lifting weights, he won’t look at his phone.”
