Stalked

“Immaturity is the least of his personality flaws.”

Evelyn nodded thoughtfully. “But he has Haley up on a bit of a pedestal. He views himself as her protector, and I think he’s getting an ego boost from the fact that a girl like her would date him.”

“She’s a high school student,” Sophia countered. “Is that really brag-worthy to a college guy?”

“He referred to her as ‘sweet and innocent.’ Things he obviously thinks he isn’t. She’s the ideal he thinks he wants, but he’s still chasing after other women when she’s not around.”

Sophia snorted angrily. “Or he’s just a jerk. You see what I mean about the smug bullshit, right? Seriously, this kid thinks he owns the world. And maybe Haley, too.”

“He’s definitely an entitled rich kid. That doesn’t mean he killed Haley, though. If he’s going to be a legitimate suspect, we need to figure out how he could have dropped her off and driven away and then come back to grab her.”

“Maybe he circled back,” Sophia said stubbornly. “Look, at this point, you’ve met all the key players in Haley’s life. If it was someone close to her, chances are it’s one of the people we talked to today. So, which one is it? You said you’d have a better sense once we talked to them. So, lay it on me. If you think it’s someone other than Jordan, fine. But I want to focus this investigation.”

Evelyn held in her frustration that Sophia wanted her to hand over some magic solution. At least Sophia wanted her help, unlike a lot of officers who dismissed profiling out of hand. “The problem with a case where there’s only one victim is that we don’t have patterns of behavior to analyze. It’s the patterns that give us some of the most useful information for profiling. And we don’t really have a crime scene, either. We have a last known location, but we can’t say for certain she was grabbed there, or if she snuck out on her own. Which means we have to work off the events of the day, from witnesses, and I have to profile the players. Unfortunately, it’s a process.”

“Okay,” Sophia said, her voice quivering with restrained frustration. “So, what can you tell me? Can we narrow it down?”

“I think you’re right about Haley’s mom not having anything to do with the abduction,” Evelyn said. “I don’t think she has any idea what happened to her daughter. Her reactions don’t seem faked, and I doubt she’s that good of an actor.”

When Sophia looked ready to agree, Evelyn added, “But that doesn’t totally get her off the hook. I’m pretty sure she’s medicating, which is part of the reason I don’t think she’d be able to successfully hide her reactions. It’s logical that a doctor would prescribe her something in this situation, but we shouldn’t make assumptions. We should consider whether the medicating is new, or if she might have been abusing prescriptions—or something else—beforehand. It’s not alcohol—” Evelyn knew the smell and look of that too well to be fooled “—but illegal drugs could be a possibility.”

“Illegal drugs?” Sophia scoffed. “Seriously? Linda Varner?”

“Let’s just look into it. If she’s been abusing drugs for a while, maybe she missed what was happening right under her nose.”

“So your bet is Pete Varner? You think, what?” Her tone turned sour. “That he was sexually abusing her?”

“I get a weird feeling from him. I want to take a closer look at him and Bill Cooke. The timing of that new note was suspicious—especially if we can confirm it’s Haley’s handwriting.”

“It happened really fast after Bill’s little video,” Sophia agreed.

“Which could mean that Bill walked down into his basement and made Haley write it as soon as we left. Or he faked it, because he knows her writing, and she’s not around to do it herself. And quite frankly, he’s strangely calm, just going about his usual business, for someone whose only daughter has been missing for a month. Everyone reacts differently to tragedy, and it’s possible his calm response is denial or repression. But it could also be that he killed her, either because she didn’t want anything to do with him, the way her mom and Jordan are claiming, or because he wanted to try to make Linda look bad.”

“You think he might have been trying to set Linda up? That he’d kill his own kid to do it?”

“Unfortunately, it’s not unprecedented. For someone who seems to have spent no time with search parties or hanging out at the police station waiting for updates, Bill sure hasn’t wasted an opportunity to point fingers. Which to me says one of two things. He doesn’t need updates on the search because he’s involved and he already knows what happened to Haley, or he cares more about sticking it to his ex than whether his daughter is okay.”

Sophia nodded, not looking entirely convinced, and Evelyn added, “And I agree with you about Jordan. He might be telling the truth about Haley, but if he could lie so straight-faced about not seeing anyone else when there was a woman literally in his bed, we need to see what else he might be lying about.”

Sophia let out a heavy sigh and finally turned on the ignition, getting some air circulation in the car. “So, we’re not really any further along, are we? It’s the dad, the stepdad or the boyfriend. And both Pete and Jordan did take part in the search parties, in those early days. Bill’s the only one who didn’t. Does that mean he’s our prime suspect?”

“Unfortunately, it’s not that easy. The others could be taking part in the search parties and calling for updates to seem innocent, and to hear where we are in the investigation.”

“Okay, that’s not helpful. So, what now?”

“Two things. When we get back to the station, let’s try to get Haley’s medical records.”

“To look for signs of abuse.” Sophia nodded, but the set of her jaw was grim. “I already reviewed them and there’s nothing there. And I asked both Linda and Haley’s best friend about the week before Haley went missing, when her mom was out of town and Haley was alone with Pete. She didn’t say anything about abuse to either of them. But we both know that doesn’t mean there wasn’t any.”

Evelyn nodded, Pete Varner’s demeanor still nagging at her. Quick flashes of a face in the semidarkness came to mind, a man with no name, when she was ten years old. That same predatory aura.

Little needles crept up her spine and she forced the memory back, trying to stay objective.

“All right,” Sophia said, her eyes narrowing, letting Evelyn know her detective instincts were buzzing, seeing that Evelyn was thinking more than she was saying. “What’s the second thing?”

“I want to meet this best friend. The last person to see Haley before she went missing.”

* * *

“Did you find Haley?”

The girl staring hopefully at them in the doorway of her house with the dark curly bob and the wide blue eyes wore the clothing of a twenty-five-year-old, but the expression of a five-year-old. Hopeful and afraid, all at once.

“We haven’t found her,” Sophia told Marissa Anderson, Haley’s best friend.

The girl’s shoulders instantly slumped and the hope in her eyes shifted into wary concern. “So why are you here?”

“Can we come in?” Sophia asked. “I want you to go over that day with Evelyn Baine here. She’s a profiler with the FBI.”

Marissa studied her, looking intrigued. “Like on that TV show?”

“Except I don’t get a private jet,” Evelyn joked.

It must have fallen flat, because Marissa just frowned. “All right. Come on in.”

She held the door open, letting Sophia and Evelyn into the bright blue entryway. With three of them, it was crowded, especially next to a bench overflowing with cheerleading pom-poms, a pile of colorful hoodies and a big stack of toy cars and airplanes.

“Let’s go upstairs, where my brothers will leave us alone.”

“We can talk to you with a parent—” Sophia started, but a woman peered around a doorway from what must have been the kitchen and called, “No need, Detective Lopez!”

She walked into the front hallway, wiping her hands on a dish towel, as Evelyn and Sophia came in. “You said you didn’t find Haley, right? That’s what I heard?”

“That’s right,” Sophia told the woman who must have been an exact replica of her daughter back in high school. Now, gray roots peeked through her dark hair, and her blue eyes were ringed with dark circles and bracketed by lines.

She held out a hand. “Jan Anderson. You’re a profiler?”

Evelyn shook the proffered hand, surprised at how calm Jan was about the police questioning her daughter. Then again, maybe she was just used to it after a month-long investigation. “That’s right.”

Before she could properly introduce herself, Jan continued, “If Detective Lopez called in the FBI, it must mean some wacko grabbed Haley?”

“No,” Sophia said.

Marissa wrapped her arms around herself as if she was trying to ward off bad news.

“It’s a complicated case,” Evelyn said. “We’re trying to look at it from every angle.”

“All right.” Jan put a hand on her daughter’s shoulder and Marissa shook it off. “Call down if you need me, honey.”

“Mom,” Marissa groaned, her cheeks tinged with pink. “I’m fine.” She turned and led them up a wide staircase lined with family pictures.

Evelyn stared at them as she walked up, to avoid looking straight ahead as Marissa led them upstairs in her too-short skirt and hoodie.

She was a little surprised Jan Anderson let her daughter walk around in clothing so revealing, but then again, all the signs of teenage rebellion were there.

“Here,” Marissa said, leading them into a room that practically exploded with pink, and had clothes draped over every available surface. She scooted a pile off a desk chair in one corner and spun it around for Sophia, who took a seat.

“I can get another from my brother’s room.”

“I’m fine,” Evelyn said, glancing around again, noticing how different this room looked from Haley’s. “How long have you and Haley been best friends?” she started, wondering what they had in common apart from cheerleading. Haley had been a straight-A student, but from what Evelyn had gleaned from the notes on Marissa, she was closer to C+/B-grades. They were both cheerleaders, and seemed to spend a lot of time together, but Haley took art classes and volunteered, while Marissa acted in school plays and had a retail job after school.

“Since we were kids,” Marissa said, and Evelyn tried not to crack a smile.

They were still kids, at least in her mind. Focused on all the normal concerns of a high school student, she assumed. Then again, at seventeen, Evelyn had been dealing with the sudden return of her alcoholic mother after seven long years away. She’d been getting her grandma settled in her first nursing home after her stroke, and making the tough decision to go to college early so she wouldn’t have to live with her mother.

She forced herself to listen closely, and not take anything about Marissa—or Haley—for granted. Assumptions could derail an investigation.

“How’d you meet?”

Marissa flopped down on the bed, resting her chin in her hands. “We lived in the same neighborhood. Before Haley’s parents split up, she lived down the street. A whole bunch of kids from our elementary school lived here actually, and we all used to play together. But Haley and I got tight. We’ve pretty much done everything together ever since.”

“Like cheerleading?” Evelyn asked, acting on a hunch. “Did she join for you?”

“Yeah.” Marissa tugged at a lock of hair, twisting it around and around her finger. “How’d you know?” Not waiting for an answer, she continued, “Haley did gymnastics when she was little, so I knew she’d be good at it. I had to convince her to try out for the squad, but once she joined, she loved it. Cheerleading is the best way to get guys to notice you.”

“And did they?”

“Of course. I mean, Haley didn’t need it after she met Jordan, but it’s still nice to be noticed.”

Marissa’s voice changed at the mention of Jordan, and Evelyn wondered why. “What do you think of Jordan?”

Marissa stopped her hair twirling. “He’s super nice. He drops her off for practice and takes her out for dinner all the time. He’d do anything for her.”

Jealousy, Evelyn realized. That’s what she’d heard in Marissa’s voice. But was it because Haley was dating a college boy, or specifically because of Jordan?

“What about the day Haley went missing?” Sophia jumped in, her thoughts obviously taking a different track than Evelyn. “You saw him drop her off and then drive away when Haley walked into the school?”

“Yeah,” Marissa said. “Well...” She frowned. “I saw him drop her off and drive away. I guess I didn’t actually see her go inside, but she must have. She was walking toward the school and I watched Jordan leave, and then when I looked back, she wasn’t there. But there’s nowhere else she could have gone.”

“How’d Haley meet Jordan?” Evelyn jumped in. She watched the girl closely, certain she’d stumbled onto a different secret. Because instead of watching her best friend walk into the school, Marissa had been watching Haley’s boyfriend drive away.

Marissa sighed. “Six months back, I begged her to go with me to this party I heard about at Neville U. I had a friend who went there, and he said I couldn’t miss it. The party was at Jordan’s frat, and that was where we met him. Practically the next week, he and Haley were official.”

“Officially dating?” Sophia asked.

Marissa rolled her eyes. “Yeah. It’s like if he’d given her his class ring or pin, or whatever you used to do back in the day.”

A smile quivered on Sophia’s lips. “Okay.”

Evelyn frowned, wondering at the inconsistency. Jordan had said they weren’t exclusive, but it sounded like Haley had thought they were. Had Jordan been lying to her? “Were they sleeping together?” Evelyn asked, and Sophia’s eyebrows rose.

Marissa fidgeted on the bed and she flushed. “Nah. Haley was waiting. Seemed crazy to me. I mean, Jordan was a catch! She should have done it, hooked him even more.” Her lips pursed. “Though he sure seemed crazy about her, anyway.”

“And since then, you haven’t seen Jordan with anyone else?” Sophia asked. “They were exclusive?”

“Jordan?” Marissa scoffed, and just when Evelyn thought she was going to say he dated around and Haley had no idea, she finished, “That guy adores Haley. He was exclusive.”

“Are you sure—” Sophia started, but Evelyn cut her off.

“What about Haley?”

Marissa fidgeted, went back to the hair twirling, but this time she brought the hair up to cover her mouth. “She was crazy about Jordan, too. I mean, look, she’s my best friend.”

“But she was cheating on him?” Evelyn persisted, even as Sophia gave her a “what the hell” look.

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