‘I think so,’ Brown confirms, ‘but I don’t like to make assumptions. It’s possible that Marilyn was abducted at an alternative location.’
‘But if Geraldine and Patricia have stamps, it stands to reason that Marilyn may also have had a stamp.’ Kristin peers at the drawings. The stamp image is a delineation of wings, not a cartoon but not much more than an outline. Only a suggestion of feathers remains. ‘Is the stamp of a particular type or make?’ She’s not sure how to describe it. ‘Er, is it—’
‘It’s a self-inking stamp, not a pad stamp,’ Brown clarifies, nodding. ‘Now we just need to narrow down which club in Pittsburgh uses this stamp.’
‘That’s very clever.’
‘Thank you.’ Brown smiles.
But Kristin finds herself distracted by the identification photographs of the victims that are spilling out of the file folder. Faces areso much more interesting and revealing than inert facts, and each of the girls in this case has a pleasing similarity. To her eye, they are like a three-part harmony: the same melody sung in a different but consonant key, with the same rhythm …
‘Wait,’ Kristin says.
She slides the photos onto the desk surface, aware that Brown is watching her. Kristin has examined these photos before. But a very subtle understanding is occurring to her now, in this place, in this office. Maybe it’s something about the quality of the light.
She tilts the photos, to examine them from different angles. ‘They’re all …’
Brown is a stillness in her peripheral vision. ‘What do you see?’
Kristin’s mind is whirring. ‘They have the same bone structure. The same build. The same hair.’
‘We know he’s selecting girls of a certain type—’ Brown starts.
‘Yes, but this is more than just an issue of type.’ Kristin looks up at Brown sharply. ‘Do you have identification photos from the Huxton case?’
Brown hesitates a moment, before walking over to a shelf with an expanding file. Inside the file, she collects a folder. The folder is marked HUX-V79, and Brown peels a sheet out of it, places it on the desk. The sheet is a compilation of victim photos from Ohio’s most horrifying case of serial homicide.
Kristin scans through the sheet, arranges the current photos nearby.
‘Look,’ she says, pointing. ‘The Huxton girls are all Caucasian brunettes. But these four have short hair. And this girl has braces.’
‘She was one of the youngest victims,’ Brown supplies.
But Kristin is tracking another thread. ‘This girl has curly hair, which doesn’t match. Let’s rule out these six. These others most resemble the girls in Pittsburgh.’
Brown is beginning to see the pattern. ‘This girl – the large eyes.’
‘Yes. And the sharp jawline …’ Kristin rearranges some of the photos. ‘They’re all petite, and their bone structure is petite.’
‘But the Pittsburgh girls all have a distinct look,’ Brown says, frowning. ‘The high foreheads, the facial shape …’
‘We’re missing a photo,’ Kristin says. She can hear the certainty in her own voice.
Brown looks at her. Then she goes again to the expanding file for a separate folder called HUX-SV79. She takes out a photo and places it next to the photos of the other girls.
Now Kristin sees it in front of her, she can’t imagine why it never registered before. The killer has been targeting girls similar to Huxton’s victims, and these current girls all have a resemblance, yes. But it’s more than resemblance. They don’t just look likeeach other. They look like –
‘Emma,’ she breathes. She looks up and holds Brown’s gaze. ‘He’s searching for Emma.’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
‘There were only two photos of me released to the media, that I’m aware of,’ Emma explains from the front passenger seat of the car, craning her neck a little to talk to Travis and Kristin in the back.
Travis hasn’t kept track of the number of photos. He frowns out at a FedEx truck passing them on I-95. ‘So, one picture released around the time you went missing?’
Emma nods. ‘And another one of me coming out of the hospital with my parents, when it was all over, but I had a jacket over my head that time.’
‘No,’ Kristin says immediately. ‘There was another one.’
