“Nothing,” Holt replied, and his jaw tightened as it always did when he was forced to report a dead end. “Whoever took it knew exactly what they were doing. No usable prints on the wall cavity or the door that we can tie to anyone outside the household.No witnesses. No camera coverage on that side of the Morrison property.” He looked at her steadily. “It’s as if it simply ceased to exist.”
June looked back at the pictures of the boards.
Something had been nagging at her since before the storm. Not a specific thought. More like the feeling of a word sitting on the tip of your tongue that refused to come forward, no matter how hard you reached for it. She’d learned over years of legal practice to trust that particular feeling. It meant something was there. It was simply waiting for the right moment to show itself. It had been a few weeks now, and June was still waiting for the shoe to drop.
“What about Nigel Frost?” June asked. “Have you gotten hold of him yet?”
“Still nothing,” Holt said. “His phone is still dead. The department he was supposed to transfer to confirmed he’s deferred his start date, but won’t give me more than that.” He reached for his own coffee. “Either he doesn’t want to be found, or someone has made it very clear to him that being found is not in his best interests.”
“Or both,” June said.
“Or both,” Holt agreed, his expression turning grim.
June looked at Victoria Morrison’s name on the board. It had been sitting there long enough now to have taken on a kind of weight simply from the looking. All the threads from the fires and the accidents and the evidence destruction led back toward her orbit in ways that were suggestive rather than conclusive. But suggestive was not what you could take into a courtroom. They needed something concrete.
June was about to say so when a knock at the office door pulled both their heads up.
“Come in,” Holt called.
The door opened.
Sienna Morrison stepped inside.
June’s first impression was that Sienna looked nothing like herself. The polished, composed exterior that had always been the girl’s most reliable armor was entirely gone. Her hair was pulled back in a scruffy bun that looked like she’d slept with it in. Her face was pale, devoid of makeup, and drawn in the way of someone who had not slept properly in several days. Sienna was wearing a soft gray sweater, the sleeves long and pulled down over her hands so that only her fingertips were visible. Her fingers worked the fabric edge in a slow, unconscious movement as she stood in the doorway.
Sienna looked at Holt, then at June, and her eyes filled immediately.
“I need to talk to you,” Sienna said. “Both of you.”
Holt was already on his feet. “Come in and sit down, Sienna.”
Sienna crossed to the chair across from his desk and sat, pulling the sweater sleeves further over her hands as she settled. It was a nervous gesture. Like a child trying to soothe themselves, rubbing a blanket or a toy. June gave Sienna a warm smile.
“Do you want something to drink?” She asked.
“No, thank you,” Sienna declined the offer.
Her polite answer made June’s brows shoot up as she stared at the young woman in surprise, then worriedly, as this was definitely not the Sienna they had all become accustomed to.
“Are you okay, Sienna?” June asked, feeling a little alarmed. “Your father’s not here, he’s at a conference, but I’m sure if we call him, he’ll come.”
“No!” Sienna said abruptly, her eyes filling with fear. “Please, don’t call my father.”
“Okay,” June said, with an encouraging smile, her worry growing.
Holt sat back down. He and June exchanged a brief look across the desk.
“What can we do for you?” Holt asked her.
Sienna looked at her hands for a moment. Her fingertips were fidgeting with the edge of the sweater. She drew in a slow breath.
“I need to tell you something about the security footage from our property,” Sienna began. “I’ve been going through it over the past two days. The system that covers the front of the house and the inside of the garages.” She paused. “A few days ago, I asked Rad to come out and help me find out who’d stolen my safe from my bedroom.” She swallowed and continued fidgeting with the cuffs of her sweater. “I found footage of who took my safe.”
The room went very quiet.
“Who took it, Sienna?” Holt asked, watching her intently.
“Alfred,” Sienna answered.
