The voice was familiar, but she couldn’t place it. There was a lot of static on the line, and putting the call on speaker made it worse. “Who is this?”
“Scotty Jensen.”
Rachel fumbled the phone again and caught it before it hit the floorboard.
“Are you still there, Rachel?” Now Scotty’s voice came through loud and clear.
She had to take a second to pull it together. After all this time of trying to track down Scotty Jensen, now she had him on the phone. She didn’t want to blow it without finding where Mallory was.
“I’m here,” she answered.
“How was your trip to Mexico? I heard you got a little R and R in. Paddleboarding?”
Rachel’s face turned red. Her nervousness disappeared quickly, replaced by anger. She looked over at Red, who had stepped out of the vehicle and was now on his cell phone. No doubt calling the FBI to try and get a trace on her phone, she thought. She would have to keep Scotty on the line as long as possible.
“Where’s Mallory?” she asked.
A brief silence on the other end. Then his answer: “I don’t know.”
“Bullshit! Your name was all over the place on those seized computers.”
“Believe it or not, I had nothing to do with it.” Scotty paused for a moment. “I might know where she is, though. For the right price, I can find out.”
Rachel’s hand gripped the phone so hard she felt it was going to break into pieces.
“Then stop playing games and tell me. Where is she?”
“I’ve got to go, but we’ll stay in touch.” And the connection was gone.
Rachel put the phone down, resisting the urge to throw it. “Son of a bitch!”’
Red got back in the car and handed her his cell phone. “The FBI wants to talk to you. They weren’t in place to pull a trace.”
Rachel went over the details of the phone call. Agent Hammond Lewis, who’d worked with Rachel in Mexico, listened to her frustrations.
After a few minutes, Rachel hung up.
“What did he say?” Red looked concerned.
“Hammond said they’d put a tap on my phone and be ready if Scotty calls again. Of course, he’ll probably find another way to contact me. That’s if he gets in touch at all.”
Rachel got the car back on the road and headed toward Houma.
“I’m sure he will,” said Red. “I think he likes the attention. The question is, does he really know where Mallory is?”
“His name was all over the computer the FBI confiscated. E-mails back and forth between him and the Amsels.”
“Nothing in those e-mails mentioned Mallory, though,” Red said. “Just her photos were on that computer—along with photos of tons of other kids. And I hate to point out the obvious, but Scotty could still be furious with you for helping Janine get her son back. He might just be pulling your strings.”
“I’ve thought about that, but it’s a little suspicious that he got involved with a kidnapping ring after he tried to take back his own son.”
“Maybe he was always involved in kidnapping. Rick told you about all the employment problems he had with Scotty. Always late to work. Sometimes not showing up at all. Seeming to pull
extra cash from thin air. Maybe it was after Rick fired him that Scotty started cultivating a vendetta against your family.”
“I’ve been all over Scotty. Tracking down his whereabouts the last days of his employment at the dealership and around the time Mallory was kidnapped. I’ve come up empty-handed each time. There’s nothing to tie her disappearance to him.”
“We just have to look harder.” Red patted Rachel on the arm. “We’ll get him. One way or another.”
A sign announcing their arrival into Houma greeted them. A low rolling fog seemed to greet them at the same time. After ten minutes of following the directions Krapek gave them, Rachel gasped as she noticed a sign that read
McDaniel’s Fish Camp.
Madame Verdene had mentioned a fish camp when they’d first met. She’d said that was where Erin could be found.
R
achel held up her hand, shielding her eyes against the harsh midday sun that periodically pushed its way through the fog. An unpleasant briny smell floated through the muggy air, and mosquitoes made a landing strip of her arms. Thank goodness she’d had the sense to wear long pants and sturdy boots. She lifted the yellow crime scene tape that was hanging between large cypress trees. Peter and Rankin, who’d met her at the scene, followed her and ducked under the tape, as did Red.
“Hey, Agent Krapek,” said Rachel, spotting the woman’s shiny blond hair. “I didn’t think we’d see you this morning. Anything new?”
Krapek looked up from the notepad she held in her hand. “Not yet. Our guys have been out here the last two days. We’re just wrapping it up.”
Rachel knew that the local sheriff’s office plus the FBI’s crime scene investigators had been through the swamp in recent days. If anything was there to be found, it probably would have been found by now. But nonetheless, Rachel was determined to take a look for herself, for the sake of the O’Malley kids.
“Can you show us where the arm was found?” Rachel asked.
Agent Krapek led the Florida Omni Search team over to the edge of the swamp where the local fisherman had pulled up his line. “Right over there.”
Rachel had Peter work his magic around the site with his thermal imager, while Rankin walked around the perimeter with Max in tow. Rachel was able to secure some clothing that the kids and Erin had recently worn. She watched as Rankin followed Max around the dirt trail that wound its way along the bayou. Max would sniff the ground, pause, continue walking along the trail, and sniff again. Red went to talk to the crime scene techs, who were loading up their equipment.
After two hours of going over an expended area, Rachel called it quits with her team. “I’m going to head over to the bait store and get some cold drinks. I’ll meet you guys back here in a few,” she called out to her team.
“Want me to drive you over? That’s a bit of a walk,” Red offered.
“It’s okay. I need to clear my head.” Rachel used a purple bandanna to wipe the sweat from her brow and headed down the road toward McDaniel’s Fish Camp.
It was a ten-minute walk, and Rachel was grateful for the silence. She walked into the two-story worn clapboard store.
“What can I get ya?” an old man called out from behind the counter.
“Just looking for something cold to drink.”
He pointed to the back of the store. “Soft drinks to the right, beer and wine on the left.”
“Thanks.”
Rachel felt his eyes on her as she made her way down the aisle. Dust covered most of the merchandise. Grimy boxes of cereal, bread, Pop-Tarts, and cookies filled the rows of shelving. At the end, a large walk-in cooler held water and soft drinks. Rachel grabbed two bottles of water, a soda for Rankin, and an energy drink for herself. On the way through the snack aisle, she impulsively added a large bag of salted cashews that seemed slightly less
dirty than the rest of the merchandise. Juggling her purchases, she laid them down on the counter. The old man started ringing them up without even looking at her.
“That all?” he asked, bagging the items.
“Yes, thanks.”
“You looking for that missing family?” he asked, startling her with the question.
“I am. Did you know them?”
The old man shifted a wad of chewing tobacco around in his mouth. “Me? Naw. I just read about it in the news. I haven’t seen you around the last week, though. Most of the sheriff and FBI folks have been in, but you, I haven’t seen yet.”
“I’m with Florida Omni Search. We assist law enforcement agencies in locating missing people,” Rachel said. She dug out a business card and handed it over to him. “I’m Rachel Scott.”
He looked at the card and then stuffed it in his shirt pocket. “I know the guy that found the arm,” he said as a matter of fact.
Rachel studied his worn, leathery face. “Really?”
“Yup. He’s my son.”
“So that’s an area where he normally hunts?”
“Yup. He pulled up the line to check for gators and pulled up a woman’s arm instead. Ran down to the store screaming like a little girl. After he calmed down, we called the sheriff.”
“I suppose the sheriff’s department has talked to you and your son?”
He nodded before grabbing an empty plastic soda bottle and spitting a stream of brown liquid into it.
“Did you notice anyone strange in the area the week before he found the arm?” Rachel asked, trying not to look repulsed by his actions.
“I told the deputy sheriff about it already. Aaron ran off some man last Friday just as he was coming in for the night. My boy is very territorial with his lines and traps, and this guy looked like he was up to no good.”
Cha-ching. Something Agent Krapek hadn’t shared with her, Rachel thought.
“Did your son Aaron happen to see what kind of vehicle this guy was in?”
“No. He just saw the boat. Pulled up next to the guy and told him to beat it.”
“Can you give me a description of the boat and the man?” Rachel asked, holding her breath. She wasn’t law enforcement, and this tidbit of information apparently wasn’t going to be shared with her. If Drake Reynolds had been on Krapek’s team this time around, he would’ve shared this with Rachel already. But Krapek and Phipps tended not to be so generous. The FBI liked to solve its own cases, and in the last big one the agency had been involved in, Rachel had found the missing teenager before the agents did. This was the case of the daughter of the Florida governor, and Krapek didn’t like getting her toes stepped on given it was such a high-profile case.
“Camo-covered johnny boat. Black guy was driving the boat. Not many black fellows fishing in this area. The FBI had some artist come in earlier today and had my boy describe the fellow he saw.”
Well, that was something to go on, Rachel thought. She thanked the older man and then headed back to share the information with her team. All it took was something small like this to crack a case wide open. The black man and his boat may not have had anything to do with the O’Malley case. Then again, it may have everything in the world to do with it.
R
achel called Matt on the way back from Houma.
“Your timing is perfect. The FBI wants me to come in and take a look at a sketch,” Matt said.
“When?” Rachel asked. She had a pretty good idea that the sketch the FBI wanted to show Matt was the one of the man who Aaron had run off.
“This afternoon. Anything new turn up?” he asked.
Rachel could hear the desperation in Matt’s voice. She couldn’t bear to think about what Matt was going through. Losing his wife and not knowing where his kids were. If they were safe or not. Unfortunately, she knew the pain only too well.
“We’re on our way back from Houma. Part of my team is going back to work canvassing the area where your truck was discovered,” she answered. “I just wanted to call and check in with you.”
Rachel couldn’t believe she hadn’t received any strong leads from the hotline, other than the usual crazy people who just wanted attention. She hated that she didn’t have anything new to tell him. After all the media surrounding this case, no witnesses had come forward yet. Rachel wanted to go back to the original
scene of the crime. It hadn’t taken place in a desolate, rural area, after all. This was freaking New Orleans, for goodness’ sake. Similar to New York, the city that never sleeps, New Orleans was open twenty-four hours a day. There was always activity. Homeless people, tourists, and locals all commingled at all hours of the day and night around the Riverwalk and French Quarter. She felt certain somebody had seen
something.
“I’ve got a few things I’d like to discuss with you,” said Matt. “Alone. Is there a place and time where we could meet in private?”
“Of course.” Rachel said. “You just tell me when and where.”
“I’ll meet you tonight at seven o’clock. There’s a place called Crescent City Brewhouse on Decatur Street, not far from your hotel.”
“Okay, see ya then.” Rachel checked her watch. She had a couple of hours to kill before meeting Matt.
“What was that about?” Red asked.
“Matt wants to meet me tonight.”
“What’s going on with him?”
“He didn’t say, but I’m pretty sure the FBI is showing him the sketch of the man from Houma,” Rachel said. “I’m meeting Matt at seven, so that gives us about two hours to go back to the Quarter and take another look around.”
“Rach, we’ve canvassed that area a dozen times. I don’t see the point of going back again. Flyers are all over the place. If someone saw something, we would have gotten a call by now.”
His words caught Rachel by surprise. “What else do we have? You of all people should know that we don’t give up that easily.”
“I’m not talking about giving up. I’m talking about changing things up. We’ve laid all the groundwork with the flyers, the canvassing, and working the tip line. We need to start looking at motivation. This is different from any other case we’ve worked. A whole flipping family disappeared. That’s not an everyday occurrence. Something out of the ordinary happened here. It’s not like
we are dealing with your typical runaway, bored housewife, or family member kidnapping.”
Rachel trusted Red’s judgment. In his role as a detective at the Miami PD, Red had solved many missing-persons cases and was knowledgeable in more areas of the law than she’d ever be.
She took a deep, calming breath. “Of course we’re not. So what do you suggest? Where do you think we need to be looking?”
Red opened his notebook. “I’ve been thinking about something. What would Matt have to gain from his whole family disappearing?”
“We’ve been over this. I don’t feel like Matt orchestrated such a complex scheme. You’ve said it yourself. His financials are solid. No evidence of an affair or anything like that. Everyone we’ve talked to said he is the ultimate family man, husband, father, brother…”
“Who else would have something to gain?”
“His brother, Chris?” Rachel guessed.
“With Matt and Erin out of the picture, Chris and Melinda would get the house. The business, the money, all of it would be theirs.” Red drew a big red circle in his notebook. “In all the cases we’ve worked together, the majority of them have one common denominator.”