"Did he report his concerns?"
"He tried.Same result.The cops didn't want to hear it.Another sad story about a girl who couldn't handle the pressure."Ruiz shook his head."I remember thinking at the time that it was strange, two similar situations so close together.But I didn't connect them.Didn't have any reason to."
"Until now."
"Until now."He met her eyes directly."You think someone's killing these girls and making it look like suicide."
It wasn't a question, and Kari didn't treat it as one."We're talking about women connected to the same industry, dying under similar circumstances, with details that trained observers say don't add up.That's not a coincidence."
"No," Ruiz agreed quietly."It's not."
"Do you remember the name of the other victim?The one from eight months ago?"
Ruiz thought for a moment."Jennifer something.Jennifer Blake, maybe?Or Baker?I can try to find out from my colleague, if you want."
"Please.Anything you can tell me would help."Kari pulled out one of her cards and handed it across the table."My cell is on the back.Call me if you remember anything else, or if you hear about any other cases that fit the pattern."
Ruiz took the card and studied it."Navajo Nation Police.You're a long way from home."
"Everyone keeps telling me that."
"Maybe because it's true."But there was warmth in his voice now, a kind of respect that hadn't been there at the start of the conversation."The girl who's missing.Tayen.Is she connected to Escalante?"
"They were friends.They worked for the same agency.And Tayen disappeared the same day Amanda died."
Ruiz was quiet for a moment, processing that."You think she saw something.Or knew something."
"I think it's possible."Kari stood, sensing that she'd gotten everything she was going to get for now."Thank you for talking to me, Mr.Ruiz.I know it wasn't easy, after the way you were treated."
"Victor."He stood as well and extended his hand."Find out what happened to that girl, Detective.Someone should give a damn about these women, even if the system doesn't."
Kari drove back toward her hotel, her mind churning through everything Ruiz had told her.Who would have access to these women?Who would know their schedules, their vulnerabilities, their isolation from family and support systems?
The agency.The photographers.The recruiters who found them and brought them to L.A.in the first place.
Blake Montgomery had seemed genuinely upset about Amanda's death, but he'd also admitted to pushing models to emotional extremes.Jessica Vance was cold and calculating, more worried about her reputation than her models' lives.And Diana Shepherd, the one who seemed so caring, had been the one to lie about Amanda's death.
Any of them could be involved.Or none of them.Kari still didn't have enough information to narrow it down.
She needed to find out more about Image Management.The CEO, Vanessa Caldwell, still hadn't returned her call, and Kari was tired of waiting.She was going to track them down.
She needed to look into the death from eight months ago, see if Jennifer Blake or Baker was connected to the same network of agencies and photographers.And she needed to keep pushing on Amanda's death, see if she could get the official investigation reopened.
Most of all, she needed to find Tayen before whoever was behind this decided she was a liability that needed to be eliminated.
She wondered, not for the first time, if she was in over her head.She was a tribal police detective operating far outside her jurisdiction, chasing shadows in a city she didn't know, trying to find a girl who might already be dead.
But Tayen Chee was family.And Kari had made a promise.
She got out of the car and headed inside to make more calls, dig through more records, pull on more threads.
Somewhere in this maze of agencies and photographers and dead young women was an answer.She just had to find it.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Ben had dreaded many things in his years as a police officer, but nothing quite like this.He sat in the passenger seat of Captain Yazzie's truck, watching the Naalnish house grow larger through the windshield, and felt his stomach tighten with each passing second.
Dorothy Naalnish was waiting on the porch, as if she'd known they were coming.Maybe she had.Word traveled fast on the reservation, and the FBI's departure hadn't gone unnoticed.She stood with her hands clasped in front of her, her face composed but her eyes already betraying the fear of what she was about to hear.
