“Call me if anything happens.” Ryan nodded to Dane, then headed out of the station. She mentally reviewed the file she had on the dead girl as she drove. By the end of a case, detectives knew the lives of their victims almost better than their family or friends. Ashley, nineteen, recently out of high school. Not in college. Not mixed in with the local bad crew, but didn’t seem to hang out with many locals either.
Could she have been going out of town? That was something to consider, especially with the whole drug mule thing.
Hell, she could have been leaving the country. Ryan slumped in her car, even as she kept driving. She’d never personally dealt with a drug runner, but she knew from both TV and experience talking with other cops that they went international quite fast.
Ashley’s family was quite close to the station, in the poorer part of Amaranth. Ryan could see the mother standing at the window, her red-rimmed eyes tired but strong. That was what happened when you lost someone, Ryan knew. You cried until you couldn’t cry anymore, then you kept going.
She got out of the car, her notepad tucked into her pocket. “Hi, I’m here to talk to Melinda and Virgil?”
The door opened. “I’m Mel.” Her eyes were tired, lined with the tiny creases of the devastated. Ashley’s death had aged her. “Virgil had to stay at work, I’m afraid.”
“I’m Detective Olsen. We talked on the phone?”
Mel just nodded. Ryan shook her hand gently, then followed Mel into the house. “Do you want some water or coffee?” Mel’s voice was husky.
“I’m good, thanks.” Ryan didn’t want to inconvenience her in any way. “Can you tell me about your daughter?”
“She was brilliant,” Mel said softly. “She was smart, and she was going to be a doctor.”
Ryan dutifully jotted those things down, but from experience she knew parents tended to see the best in their kids. “Do you know if she ever got involved with drugs at all?”
Mel’s eyes turned sharp at her. “No.” That was a firm answer. “She may have gotten in with the wrong crew in high school, but she was getting her life back in order. She was working, she was getting ready to move into her own place…”
That was a similarity Ryan hadn’t thought of. Apparently both the missing girl and the victim lived at home, with their families. Was that a commonality for whomever was preying on them?
“Who was she hanging out with?” Ryan prepared to jot down names. Those would be her next targets.
“There was Ellie and that missing girl, Jasmine,” Mel said, obviously having to stop and think. “There was also a boy called Tanner.”
“Were these friends from high school?” Ryan asked.
Mel nodded. “Most were attending college,” she said. “Ashley was getting ready to start this fall.” Her eyes turned distant and tears streaked down her cheeks.
Now her daughter would never start college.
Ryan nodded sympathetically, and she took a moment to survey the house. It was definitely lower middle class. Large TV, older game systems, and fractured paintings on the wall that looked like they’d been owned for years. “Did she have any siblings?” Ryan asked. That wasn’t something that had been included in the documents she had read.
Mel shook her head. “No. She was an only child.” She picked up some tissues and dabbed them to her eyes.
Ryan could only imagine that it made her loss so much worse. “Do you happen to know where her friends hang out?”
“The abandoned train tracks about a half mile outside of town.” Despite the tears on her face, there was a hint of a smile, too. “Ashley loved them. Said they were spooky.”
They were. And they were also the perfect place to drink or deal drugs as needed. But Ryan didn’t let what she was thinking show up on her face. “If there’s anything else you can think of, please give me a call.” She passed Mel a copy of her business card.
Mel nodded. Ryan took one last view of the house.
Then she nodded back and left. She got in her car, her mind spinning a mile a minute. She needed to go talk to the kids. A glance at the clock told her it was too late for today. Tomorrow.
She had plans to meet Liv.
Tuesday 25th October; 6pm
Liv stood at the coffee shop, checking on it. She had gotten a call from River that she had driven by after hours and saw that the door was open and the lights were off. Liv had rushed there after picking Mocha up from River’s. It sent a chill down her spine, but surely it was just a mistake on the door mechanism’s part or something else that had happened. There was nothing sinister about it.
Mocha by her side, she opened the door and looked inside. It looked just the same as she had left it. Exhaling in relief, she sank down into the chair at one of the small tables. She had a few more minutes before she had to go back home, maybe a half hour before Ryan had said she would be there.
The thought of Ryan coming over for the night made her just as giddy as it had in high school, when they snuck over to Ryan’s house at night to sleep together. It wasn’t always sexual. But usually, they had an agenda.
Mocha whuffed softly, and Liv looked down at her. “What do you see, girl?” She stroked the long ears. Mocha stood up now, her nose doing the twitchy thing beagle noses did when they were sniffing. Her eyes were alert, her body stiff. Something was bothering her.
Liv looked out in front of them. There was nothing. But that prickling feeling was back, like
