"She missed her appointment. I told you that. She never showed." He set the camera bag and the food down on the desk, slowly, the way someone moves when they're deciding what to do next. "You broke in through my window. You went through my private files."
"Those girls are underage."
"Those girls signed release forms. They're clients."
"They're children."
"Go to the cops, then." He stepped closer. "Tell them what you found. And while you're at it, explain how you found it. Breaking and entering. Trespassing. Theft." His voice was quiet and steady and it was worse than shouting. "No one is going to believe you. You're a ski rental clerk who broke into a man's home. That's the story. That's all there is."
Ruby felt the wall behind her. She'd backed up without realizing it. Garrett was between her and the hallway now, between her and the fire escape, and the front entrance was through the living space behind him.
"I know Fiona was coming to see you," she said. Her voice was thinner than she wanted it to be. "I know she left to drive here Thursday night and she never came back."
"And I told you she never arrived. That's not my problem."
"Then whose problem is it?"
His face shifted. He moved fast. His hand caught her by the collar of her shirt and he shoved her sideways into the wall. The impact knocked the air out of her and sent a framed print crashing to the floor beside her head. His face was close, close enough that she could smell the coffee on his breath and see the small red veins in the whites of his eyes.
"You have some nerve," he said through his teeth. "Coming into my home. Going through my things. Calling me names." His grip tightened on her collar, twisting the fabric. "You want to know what happened to your friend? Maybe she got smart and left. Maybe she realized that people like you drag her down."
Ruby brought her knee up hard into his thigh. It wasn't where she'd aimed but it was enough. His grip loosened for a second and she twisted free, stumbling past him into the hallway. He grabbed at her arm and caught it, his fingers digging into the skin above her elbow. She wrenched away and felt something pull at her shoulder but she was moving, through the living space, past the kitchen counter, toward the front entrance. She hit the door with both hands, got it open, and half fell down the staircase to the street.
She didn't stop until she was in her car with the doors locked and her hands shaking so badly she could barely fit the key in the ignition.
Callie wasat her desk working through a stack of missing persons reports when the front desk officer approached.
"Deputy Thorne. Someone's asking for you."
Ruby Caswell was sitting in the lobby on a plastic chair with her knees pulled up and her arms wrapped around herself. She was wearing a T-shirt with the collar stretched and tornon one side, and there were bruises forming on her upper arm, four distinct marks that Callie recognized immediately as fingerprints. Her left cheek was red and beginning to swell where it had hit something hard.
"Ruby," Callie said. "What happened to you?"
Ruby looked up and Callie saw that she'd been crying but wasn't anymore. Her eyes were dry and steady and furious.
"Garrett Finch," Ruby said. "The photographer. He did this." She held up her arm so Callie could see the bruises clearly. "I went to his studio to look for information about Fiona. He caught me and he attacked me."
Callie crouched in front of her. "Start from the beginning. Everything."
Ruby told her. The open window. The filing cabinet. The boudoir photographs. The girls who looked underage. Garrett returning, the confrontation, the shove into the wall, the grab, the escape. She told it fast, without embellishment, the way people talk when they've already gone over it in their heads enough times that the fear has been replaced by something harder.
“You entered his property without permission?”
"Fiona was supposed to go to him Thursday night for a photoshoot," Ruby said. "She never came back. He says she never showed. I don’t believe him."
Callie studied the bruises on Ruby's arm. Then she stood and turned to the front desk officer.
"Get me McKenzie. Now."
They hitthe studio forty minutes later. Callie, McKenzie, and two county deputies in marked vehicles. McKenzie had thewarrant. A judge had signed it in under twenty minutes once Callie laid out the assault, the underage material, and the connection to a missing person in an active serial investigation.
The print shop below was still closed. The street was busier now, late afternoon foot traffic slowing to watch as the marked cruisers pulled up and the officers climbed out. McKenzie tried the front entrance first. Locked. He knocked three times, loud, and announced.
"Garrett Finch. High Peaks Police Department. We have a warrant to search these premises. Open the door."
Nothing. Callie moved around to the east side and glanced up at the fire escape. The window was closed now. She signaled to McKenzie and he nodded.
"Garrett Finch. Last chance. We're coming in."
