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Kit had nearly forgotten about Rita’s mother’s murder. “And?”
“And the mark against the victim’s cheek was the impression of a signet ring. And two years later, the suspect’s wife is ready to cooperate. Seems she’s tired of his cheating. She allowed us to search their home and guess what we found?”
Excitement had her leaning forward. “The ring?”
“Yep. Found it in his sock drawer. It was apparently an heirloom, so he didn’t want to get rid of it. He’d cleaned it, but there were traces of Maria Mendoza’s skin in the crevices. DNA came back yesterday and it’s hers. We’re going to arrest him today. That will allow us to take a DNA swab from him to compare to the child the victim was carrying.”
Kit drew a deep breath, her eyes suddenly burning. “Thank you. Hopefully this will allow my little foster sister to have some hope in the system. She’s too young to be so jaded.”
His smile was gentle. “Thank you for following it up. He might get a good lawyer, but the evidence is pretty damning.”
“Can I tell Rita?”
“Once we’ve arrested him, yes. I don’t know if the girl knows that her mother was pregnant, so tread softly there.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll go by Mom and Pop’s tonight after work.”
“Good.” Navarro pointed to her board. “Now, tell me what you’re going to do with these dozen possible victims.”
“I need to figure out how he’s targeting these girls. The more recent ones have the drama connection, but that doesn’t tell us where they crossed paths with him. Or Driscoll. Or both. I’ve talked to everyone associated with Driscoll and none of them had anything useful other than ‘He was a creep. I’m glad he’s dead.’ I couldn’t find a single person with anything nice to say about him, but all the negative stuff was a big zero in terms of leads. So I went back to the victims.” She turned back to the board. “I need to develop a better profile of this killer. I’ve made an appointment with Dr.Levinson for one o’clock this afternoon. He’s been helpful in the past and he developed the original profile on this case.”
The criminal psychologist was very good at developing personality profiles and suggesting defining characteristics that had been instrumental in catching other killers.
“He’s good,” Navarro agreed. “Is he coming here?”
“He is. I’ve got a meeting room reserved for one o’clock.”
“Then we can meet with him together. Since I investigated the earlier victims, I might end up remembering something useful. What else?”
She sighed. “I still think the Epstein kid knows something she’s afraid to tell.”
“Should we bring her in?”
“No. I think that would make things worse. I’ve popped back a few times in the last week. I plan to try again this afternoon when she gets home from school. Although her parents are starting to get aggravated with me. I’m also going to visit the families of these dozen girls. I want to know everything about them.”
“Watch out for that Tamsin Kavanaugh,” Navarro warned. “I don’t want her focusing on any more families of the victims.”
“I’ve been watching my rearview mirror for the past week. Caught her following once, but Baz lost her.” Her throat tightened at the thought of her partner lying in a hospital bed. He’d looked so gray. Old. And tired. “He’s good at losing pursuers.”
“He’ll come back,” Navarro said and it sounded like a vow. “I’m not ready to see him retire just yet. He’s younger than I am.”
She had to push the thought of Baz’s retirement from her mind because she wasn’t ready for that, either. “I hope so. This case has me feeling a little... desperate.”
“How so?”
“I think he killed Skyler Carville to make Dr.Reeves look guilty. So if we don’t arrest Dr.Reeves, how many more girls will the killer murder to continue making him look guilty?”
“A valid question. What about the boy who found the body with his metal detector? Are we buying that?”
“It’s damn good timing,” she said, looking at the photo of Skyler Carville. “Kid’s name is Daryl Chesney. He claimed he got the metal detector for his birthday.”
“Kind of an odd present for a teenager. How old is he?”
“Fifteen. I asked him how he picked that site to search with his metal detector. He said it looked ‘dug up.’ He thought maybe someone had buried something useful.”
“Like?”
“ ‘Stuff.’ ” She used air quotes. “Baz was like, ‘What stuff, kid?’ He became uncooperative when we pressed that question. I thought he might have been looking for drugs or guns, but he denied that with gusto.”
