They make a plan to reach out to the Bridgeport friend. They wait for the dental records from Laurel Hayes’s parents. But first, they go over the security footage.
It’s the young man from the team, the one who didn’t remember the crack epidemic, who spots the red jacket. Had the jacket not been such a significant piece of evidence found at the shelter, it would have passed him by. A man with a red jacket sitting on a bus stop bench across the street from Clear Horizons—not just once, but four separate times.
The last time was on the day Laurel Hayes disappeared.
They go over the possibilities—two completely separate theories. First, the remains belong to Billy Brannicks, killed over drugs or illegal guns. Similar story as three years ago. Or they belong to Laurel Hayes, a young woman who’s gone missing in the neighboring town—close enough for the killer to know about the shelter, that it was a good place to kill, or to dispose of an already dead body. The dental records will decide which theory to follow. If it does turn out to be Laurel Hayes, they may have to find this guy with the red jacket.
But for now, they wait.
ChapterTwenty-One
My secret investigation into Wade Austin is full-on after I get the lead from the car he rented. No one would approve of my methods or the chances I’m taking to execute my plans. I weave a complex narrative to justify it to myself. Rowan, Mitch, Aaron—they’d make me stop. They’d question my moves. They’d get inside my head and make me question them myself. I am now a criminal thinking backward, not a cop trying to catch one. I am plotting a crime against Wade, stalking him now. Infiltrating his life.
Wade. The 404.
There are four Getaway Inn hotels within afifty-mileradius. The plastic bag he used to cover the floor of the rented car likely came from one of them. This is the best assumption I have to work with. I have to believe this and move forward. If I stop moving, all hell will break loose inside me. I know it. I can feel the emotions wanting to be set free. If there is guilt, I have locked it away along with the impact from the shooting, the stages of trauma I should be going through. I am high as a fucking kite on surviving, on hunting my predator. I can’t stop until this is over.
This is my own painstaking work. I do not ask the managers or the clerks or the cleaning staff if they’ve seen a blue truck or the man in our facial composite. I do not even set foot inside the hotels. I use remote cameras now because I had time to purchase them and set up an online account. I attach them to bike seats like I did at the Ridgeway. Each one feeds into a website, sending images of people and cars, coming and going from the hotels. I find locations where the bikes won’t be out of place and where the cameras lodged beneath the seats can capture the entrance. Three are on main roads with one way in and one way out. The fourth has a back exit as well, and this will require two cameras and more time going over the surveillance. I watch the recordings in the kitchen while my family sleeps. I limit the recording hours from 8:00 a.m. until 10:00 p.m. I assume he won’t come or go when he could be easily spotted. Still, I am always behind, watching scenes over the course of three days.
I find time to replace the batteries, but it’s not easy. There are only so many times I can tell Rowan I’m home with Mitch and tell Mitch I’m on the job with Rowan. I wait in fear of getting caught and remain in a constant state of anxiety. But then, I suppose I’m used to that.
I park half a mile away or more. I make sure the car is hidden from the road. If Wade has seen me, then he’s seen me. What will he do about it? Move locations? It’s a risk I’m willing to take. He may have studied my classes, but I remind myself that he’s already made mistakes. I have to believe I can stay ahead of him.
His messages continue. He knows I’m reading them. He tells me so.
Elise? When will you answer?
Are you waiting for my surprise?
Maybe he’s studying. Learning new tricks. But he can’t catch up. I’ve been doing this my whole life. And yet I am waiting and wondering. I still don’t know what he wants to show me and what he thinks it will get him. I do not delude myself into thinking it’s insignificant or foolish. I assume the worst, but I don’t know what that could be.
At least that’s what I tell myself when I stare at my girls in their beds, breathing in and breathing out, lost in their dreams. When I feel my eyes closing in spite of my attempts to keep them open. I have to believe this will come to the kind of ending I can live with.
It’s now the third night I’ve had footage, and I’m watching it on my laptop at the kitchen table. It’s just past midnight, and I’ve made a fresh pot of coffee. I replay the footage as fast as I can without missing a car or a body, coming or going, throughout the day and night. I look for the truck, but I also assume he’s on foot, having parked somewhere else. Somewhere hidden from view. The BOLO they issue is across the state, and even with no plate number, it stands out. We’ve had hundreds of sightings of blue pickups, run the plates, then pulled the owner’s photos from the licenses on file. The effort has been futile, which means the officers assigned the task grow weary with each useless lead. Still, he won’t take that chance by parking in plain sight.
So I look for bodies, tall bodies leaving their cars and walking to the entrances, the front or the sides. I watch for a head towering over others as they move from all directions, in and out. It’s the one thing he can’t hide.
The search feels essential. It feels ludicrous. It tests my sanity and my perception of that sanity, as I recall thewild-goosechases of the past that have turned up nothing, but then the ones that solved a case. And then the broken, damaged faces of those who have lost their loved ones and finally have some peace. Justice.
I am now one of those faces. I am working my own case. Saving myself.
This is what I tell myself in the middle of the night when I should be sleeping. These are the whispers of the unsolved mystery. Of Wade Austin, the man who has hijacked my life.
One message haunts me as the chemicals in my brain fuck with my thoughts.
They don’t deserve you.
He told me I’m a killer. A liar. And I am those things. I don’t know what they’ve done to me, but he’s right. I am forever changed.
Maybe I’m fortified. Stronger. Better than before. Superwoman.
Or maybe I’m damaged. The Titanic after it hit the iceberg. A sinking ship. Maybe the people I love don’t deserve this person I’ve become.
I think about my girls and see the pieces of me, not just on their faces and in their bodies, but the way they are. Fran’s irreverence. Amy’s cautious calculating. I wonder if I’ve had enough time to give them what’s good in me. If I am the Titanic, I will send them off on lifeboats, far away from me, and watch those good pieces drift to safety. If that’s where this is heading, I will make sure they don’t get pulled under.
I hear Mitch coming down the stairs and close the computer screen. I hear him stop first in the study where I usually am at this time of the night when I’m not in our bed.
He pauses, and I feel his heavy sigh through the walls and across the floorboards.
