Todd would just drop any idea of hooking up with Jaclyn permanently. That guy wasn’t letting her get snagged by another man anytime soon.
Hell, Todd knew it—he envied the guy. Jaclyn was pressed up against Jones on the small bench seat across from Todd. The two of them looked good together.
Like the PAVAD: FBI poster couple. Surprising envy filled his chest.
Todd sat there and thought about his life and what he wanted next.
Came to a decision.
Once he made it to PAVAD long enough to do what he had to, he’d find a woman of his own there. Just for the hell of it.
There had to be one or two he could be bothered dating. Finding something more with.
There was Miranda Talley. Miranda. She’d made him laugh several times earlier. He found that very attractive.
Maybe she was bigger than the women he usually found attractive—Todd’s taste ran to small, petite women that did what they were told, both in the bed and out—and had way more attitude than he was used to, but a change from his usual taste wouldn’t be all that difficult. She’d keep him fired up—that was for sure.
And she would understand the job, that part of him that had brought him to the FBI in the first place.
No. If nothing else, he suspected Miranda knew what she was doing in the bedroom. A woman like that always did.
She’d probably be hot and fierce and demanding. He liked that idea.
Jaclyn was the exact opposite. Soft and alluring and easily guided into exactly what a man wanted her to do. No doubt, the great Dr. Jones got off on that—liked feeling like the man.
Todd used thoughts of the two women to distract him from what he was hurtling through the sky in.
When he made it back to St. Louis, he was going to get more serious about convincing Miranda to give him a chance.
She’d probably like him if she’d stop listening to the pricks in St. Louis who hated him. He was strong enough to handle a woman like that.
Far more than any of the other pricks in St. Louis.
The helicopter finally landed on a desolate stretch of Iowa Route J56. Todd breathed in, thankful his feet were back on firm ground.
He took a look around. There was a gravel road off to the right of where the helicopter had landed. A pond was nearby.
The sign for the Iowa/Missouri border was right there, too. There were a lot of fields, trees, and barren pavement.
The red Pontiac was the only real spot of color. Garish and out of place.
Todd’s stomach clenched—he had a feeling in his gut, someone had probably died right there.
He hoped it wasn’t kids. Todd hated it when it was kids. He’d studied those photos of the two little girls, too.
That and the state patrol cars with their lights blazing. Half a dozen local LEOs were waiting for them to take charge and do their job for them.
The car sat awkwardly off the side of the gravel road, nose deep in the ditch. Pointed straight at the old wire fence separating the ditch from the field and pond.
“So where did she go?” Todd asked. There wasn’t anywhere in this pit of desolation for anyone to go.
54
Jac approached the car carefully, aware that she wasn’t in sterile coveralls. She did not want to contaminate the scene. Barnes apparently felt no such concern. He lumbered down toward the car.
“Be careful, Barnes. Don’t touch anything. Do not contaminate the forensic evidence, or you’ll be dealing with Marianna Dennis—the director’s wife.”
“I’m not an idiot, Jaclyn.” But he stopped when she told him to.
The rear window on the Pontiac was down.
Jac used the flashlight Max handed her and ran the light across the rim of the window. There was a slightly purple film on the edge. “We have child-size fingerprints. Reasonably fresh.”
Four handprints. Two different sizes. Right there on the glass. As if two children had put their hands on the glass and pulled themselves out of the car through the window.
It would’ve been difficult, but the kids could’ve managed. Especially if they were scared enough. Or their aunt was helping them. The car door was wedged at the bottom against the ditch. They couldn’t have opened the door. And at the angle that the car sat, climbing out of that window would’ve been extremely difficult.
But they had. “There’s blood on the car here. Outside.” Jac looked around where she stood.
There were footprints. Child-sized, and some slightly bigger than her own. Debbie’s, most likely.
And there was blood.
“Yes.” Max said from behind her. She hadn’t realized that she’d spoken aloud.
“What do a typical seven-year-old and four-year-old do when they’re scared?” She asked the one agent who was also a parent out there with her now. Her eyes met Max’s.
There were too many memories of when she and Nat were little like that. Jac had spent her entire childhood protecting her sister.
Olivia probably felt that same responsibility for Ava.
It was a heavy burden to put on such small shoulders. It had taken Jac a long time to realize that about herself.
Jac shined the light inside the car, looking for any clue to where Debbie could be headed.
It was possible she’d killed her niece and Edith Lindsay and taken the girls for some reason known only to her—revenge, psychotic break, a need for children of her own again. Jac wasn’t making any assumptions.
Not until they had more answers. The forensics team would be there as soon as they could get the van there. It would just take time. The teams were at least three hours by car from St. Louis.
Time they couldn’t afford to lose. Not if the girls were out there.
“There.” She focused the light on the interior.
“What do you see?” Barnes demanded, practically stepping between her and Max.
“Ava’s stuffed emu. Mr. Bird.”
“How do you know? It could be any kid’s toy.”
“It’s a specialty item that you can only get down at the mall. Max’s daughter, Emery, and
