"A woman approached her at a mall in Phoenix.Jennifer was eighteen, had just graduated from high school, and was working part-time at a clothing store while she figured out what to do next.This woman—very polished—told her she had 'the look.'Said she could make a lot of money if she was willing to work hard."
Margaret's voice turned bitter."She made it sound like a fairy tale.Like Jennifer had been chosen for something special, something magical.Like all her dreams were about to come true."
"Do you remember the woman's name?"
"Caldwell.Vanessa Caldwell."Margaret said the name like it tasted bad, like just speaking it caused her pain."She runs a company that finds girls and brings them to L.A.Image something.Image Management."
Kari nodded.The same company that had recruited Tayen.The same pipeline that fed young women from small towns and reservations into the glamorous, brutal world of Los Angeles modeling.
"Jennifer thought she'd won the lottery," Margaret continued."A chance to be a model, to live in Los Angeles, to be somebody.She was so excited, so hopeful.How could I say no to that?What kind of mother crushes her daughter's dreams?"Her eyes glistened with tears she was trying not to shed."I should have said no.I should have kept her home.I should have told her that the world isn't like the fairy tales, that people who promise you everything usually want to take something in return."
Kari reached across the table and touched Margaret's hand.The woman's skin was cool to the touch."You couldn't have known.No parent could have known."
"Couldn't I?"Margaret shook her head."The first year was fine.Jennifer called every week, told me about her photo shoots, her new friends, the parties.She was happy.Really happy.I started to think maybe I'd been wrong to worry."She finally lifted the mug to her lips, took a small sip, set it down again."But then...something changed."
"What changed?"
"She stopped calling as much.When she did call, she seemed distracted.Nervous.She'd say everything was fine, but I could hear it in her voice—that tightness, that strain.Something was wrong, and she didn't want to tell me what."Margaret stared into her coffee."I flew out to see her about three months before she died.I had to see for myself.And when I got there..."She stopped, swallowing hard.
"What did you find?"
"She'd lost weight—too much weight.She had circles under her eyes, dark ones, like she hadn't slept in weeks.She said it was just the job, the stress, the pressure to stay thin.But I didn't believe her.A mother knows.I knew something was really wrong."
"Did she tell you what was bothering her?"
Margaret was quiet for a long moment, staring at the table.When she spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper, as if she were sharing a secret she'd kept locked inside for months.
"She said she'd gotten involved with someone at work.Someone she shouldn't have.She wouldn't tell me who—said it was complicated, said I wouldn't understand.You ask me, all that secretiveness sounds like an affair."
"How did you react?"
Margaret's jaw tightened."I told her to end it.Whatever it was, whoever it was, it wasn't worth destroying herself over.She said she was trying, but it wasn't that simple.She said this person was...possessive.Wouldn't let go.Kept showing up, kept calling, kept wanting more from her than she was willing to give."
Kari felt her pulse quicken."Possessive how?"
"I don't know.She wouldn't give me details.But she was scared, Detective.My daughter was scared of someone, and I didn't push hard enough to find out who.I thought I was respecting her privacy.I thought she'd work it out on her own."
Margaret's voice broke."Two weeks later, she was dead.Pills and alcohol, they said.Suicide.But Jennifer wasn't suicidal.She wasn't a drug user.She barely even drank—said it made her bloated, and she couldn't afford that in her line of work.Someone did this to her, and no one will believe me."
"I believe you," Kari said quietly."That's why I'm here."
Margaret looked at her with something like hope, fragile and desperate.It was almost painful to see—the raw need of a mother who'd lost her child and spent eight months being told that she was in denial, that she didn't understand, that she needed to accept what had happened and move on.
"Can you find out who did this?"she asked."Can you make them pay?"
"I'm going to try.I promise you that."
They talked for another hour.Margaret told Kari everything she could remember about Jennifer's time in L.A.—the agency she worked for, the photographers she mentioned by name, the friends she'd made and lost.Most of it was information Kari already had, details that overlapped with what she'd learned about Tayen and Amanda.
But she listened carefully nonetheless, looking for anything new, any thread she hadn't yet pulled.
"Mrs.Blake," Kari finally said, "do you still have any of Jennifer's belongings?Anything she left behind that might help me understand what she was going through?"
Margaret nodded."The police returned her things after they closed the case.I kept everything.Her clothes, her jewelry, her photos.I couldn't bring myself to throw any of it away.Sometimes I just sit in her room and hold her things, just to feel close to her."
She reached into her purse and pulled out a smartphone in a pink case, the edges worn from use."This was her phone.The police looked through it and said there was nothing relevant.But I never believed that.There has to be something on there.Some clue about what happened to her, who she was afraid of."
She pushed the phone across the table.Kari picked it up, feeling the strange intimacy of holding a dead woman's most personal possession.How many messages were stored on this device?How many photos, how many secrets, how many clues that no one had bothered to find?
