He let out a breath. “I didn’t. I didn’t know where to begin. I haven’t touched a thing, except to lock the door between the library and the hall. It was cold with the glass broken.”
“That’ll have to be fixed,” Savannah said. “But first, we need to have someone comb through what’s there to see if there’s anything useful. Fingerprints, footprints, clothes or hair samples—”
“No police, Savannah.”
“There are two fellows I work with all the time.”
“No police.”
“I’d trust these two with my life.”
“It’s not your life in danger, it’s Megan’s.”
“I’d trust them with hers, too. Itrustthem, Will. Sammy and Hank are on long-term assignment to the AG’s office. They’ve handled dozens of sensitive cases for us. They’re good. They’re professionals. They’ll go to your house looking like… like that cleaning service Megan uses. If our kidnappers are in the bushes watching, they’ll assume you’re just cleaning up the mess they made.”
She paused to see whether Will would argue, but Paul wasn’t giving him that chance. “Our men will sweep the place for anything that might be helpful in identifying the kidnappers,” he said. “Something they find—even the smallest little nothing—could prove to be the key to finding out who they are. At the same time, we’ll put a tap on the phone and set up monitors in the basement. You won’t even know Shanski and Craig are there, but they’ll be listening and recording any calls that come in. There may be some background noise that will identify where the kidnappers are, and even if there isn’t it’ll be important to get their voices on tape. We’re doing more and more with voice-prints. That could help with a conviction.”
“If you catch them.”
“Right. But if you don’t let us do our thing, we won’t have a prayer in hell of catching them. I don’t know how to comb a room for prints or tap a phone. Neither does Savannah. Shanski and Craig do.”
Savannah picked up the ransom note she had earlier dropped on the floor. “I think we’ll need all the help we can get.” She turned the brown paper over, then back. “This kind of bag has to be used in dozens of markets in Rhode Island alone. We could probably identify the papers and magazines these letters were cut from, but trying to locate one particular reader would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.” She glanced at Will. “We need Sammy and Hank.”
Will showed his first sign of wavering. “They don’t look like they’re with the police?”
She would have grinned had the situation been less serious. “They don’t wear uniforms, if that’s what you mean. Sammy’s hair reaches his shoulders. Hank has three earrings in his left ear. They could easily pass for workmen, or for thugs come to wipe you out while those French doors are out of commission. What do you say, Will? Let us do it. It’s our only chance.”
Will looked torn in two. “What if the kidnappers find out your men are with the police?”
“You didn’t go to the police. You came to us.”
“But those men you’ve mentioned are with the police.”
“They’re with us. The kidnappers will never know where they came from. They won’t even know Sammy and Hank are at the house.”
“Won’t there be a car parked outside?”
“They’ll be dropped off,” Paul said. “Whatever equipment they need will be suitably disguised. Once they arrive at the house, they’ll be there for the duration.” He hesitated. “I take it no one’s there now?”
“You’re the first people I’ve told. I was afraid to call anyone. Word spreads too quickly. If this gets out to the papers, Megan will be in trouble. Everything has to be kept quiet.”
“It will be,” Paul assured him, and turned to Anthony. “Agreed?”
Anthony, who would have liked nothing more than to call a press conference there and then to announce that the attorney general’s office was taking charge of the Vandermeer kidnapping case, agreed, in spite of himself, that immediate publicity would have to wait. There would be plenty of opportunity for grandstanding when the case was solved.
“Agreed,” he said.
Paul reached for the phone. “Let me put in a call for Shanski and Craig. I want them over there ASAP.”
Savannah stood, as did Will. He was looking bewildered again, as though he still didn’t know what he was supposed to do. “You should have someone with you,” she advised gently. “Is your sister around?”
He shook his head. “She’s in Paris with husband number three, but even if she weren’t, she wouldn’t come. She never liked Megan.”
Not caring to belabor that point, Savannah moved on. “Is there someone else you’d feel comfortable having over?” She thought back to the people with whom the Vandermeers were most closely associated. “How about the Brogans? Or Carter and Julie West?”
But Will was shaking his head. Darting an uncomfortable glance at Anthony, who was fidgeting by Paul, he took several steps away. Savannah followed him toward the door, out of earshot of the other two. Still, he spoke under his breath, barely moving his mouth. His head was bowed. He remained visibly uncomfortable. “We haven’t been seeing many people lately. Things have been difficult.”
Savannah had guessed that, based on hints Megan had dropped the last time they’d seen each other, which had been two weeks before. “Financial things?” she asked.
