Mariah Stewart - Hard Truth

“I got two six-packs of Sam Adams and two of Bud Light, that okay?” he asked.

“Sure. Thanks.” She pushed a can of Diet Pepsi across the table. “Soda will have to do for now.”

“No problem.” He leaned back in his seat, then thought better of it when the plastic back groaned slightly. He sat forward and asked, “Who’s this other girl Fritz mentioned?”

“Danielle? She went to our school, and was about two grades ahead of us, if I recall correctly. I think Melinda had just started to get to know her the spring before she disappeared. I don’t know how well they knew each other, or how Mellie got to know her. She didn’t say much about her, but that last summer and fall, she spent a lot of time at Danielle’s house. Weekends, mostly.”

“The police did interview her, I saw her name on the list.” He popped the tab on the soda can. “She didn’t have much to add, though.”

“I don’t know why she would. She wasn’t around that night.”

“They would have talked to anyone who might have been in contact with Melinda during that time,” T.J. told her. “They’d want to know if Melinda had mentioned any stranger who might have approached her, or if she’d felt someone had been watching her, that sort of thing.”

“I always thought there was something odd about Melinda’s relationship with Danielle.” Lorna got up and went to the counter and returned with two straws, one of which she silently offered to T.J.

“No, thanks,” he declined. “What did you think was odd?”

“I could never figure out how Melinda knew her. Or when she got to know her.”

“She never talked about her?”

“She talked about her, but she never really said anything about her.” Lorna appeared pensive. “I can’t explain it.”

“Did she go to Danielle’s house, or did Danielle go to hers?”

“She almost always went to Danielle’s. I can only think of one time when Danielle was at Melinda’s. But Mellie never talked about what they did at Danielle’s. I just remember that she was always excited about going. As a kid, I was probably a little jealous-you know, my best friend had a new friend. I guess I was afraid Melinda would dump me for her and then I wouldn’t have a best friend anymore.”

“Did you know Danielle?”

“I knew who she was. As I said, she went to our school, but she was a couple of years older. The school we attended was a regional elementary, it went up to grade eight. It was odd that a sixth grader would want to be friends with a fourth grader. Especially since they didn’t seem to have much in common.”

“Why would you say that, if you didn’t know Danielle?”

“The girls she hung around with were a little more advanced than Melinda and I were, socially. So it just never struck me as a good fit, that’s all. The one time I remember Danielle stayed at Melinda’s for an overnight, she seemed bored to death.”

“Well, now I’m intrigued,” T.J. said. “I think we’re going to have to find this Danielle person and see what was going on. In the meantime,” he said as he pushed his chair back from the table, “it looks as if our dinner is ready. Let’s continue this conversation back at the house. Maybe we can get Mitch to use his FBI skills to track down Danielle.”

As it turned out, Mitch had already begun to apply his skills to the case.

“First thing in the morning, I’ll be making the acquaintance of your local police force,” Mitch told Lorna.

“Good luck there.” She laughed. “Are you planning on just walking in and introducing yourself?”

“Actually, that’s exactly what I’ll be doing.” He grinned. “As the special agent assigned to the case, I’ll be-”

“Whoa, back up.” T.J. twisted the cap off a beer and handed the bottle to Mitch. “The FBI is in on this now?”

Mitch nodded. “As of about three this afternoon.”

“How the hell did that happen?” T.J. joined him at the table.

“I started discussing the case with my boss, and told him about Regan getting involved through Lorna.” He took a swallow of beer. “He’d seen the coverage on the news, of course, and thought by now we’d have had a request from someone to send an agent in to assist. Since this is apparently a serial killer’s work, and they have a small police force here with no experience in this area.”

“So what did…” T.J. paused. “You still working for John?”

Mitch nodded.

“How did he manage to get you in?”

“He called the district attorney and asked if he thought the Bureau could be of service. And the DA was happy to get the call, from what I understand. He’s up for reelection next year and the last thing he wants is something like this hanging over his head for the next twelve months.”

“So John graciously offered to send a man down to assist.” T.J. nodded. He knew John Mancini’s MO all too well.

“Who’s John?” Lorna distributed four plates from the stack she’d set on the table.

“John Mancini. He’s the head of the unit I work for,” Mitch told her. He turned to T.J. and said, “He told me to tell you he’d pull the reprimand from my file if you came back in to talk to him.”

“What reprimand?” T.J. asked.

“The one he gave me after I sent that fax to the Callen Police Department asking for the reports on the Eagan case.”

“Who’s he kidding?” T.J. shook his head. “He didn’t put any such thing in your file. Not his style. Not for something like that. And you’re on the case, so you know he’s not even pissed off at you.”

“I told him you’d see through that, but he wanted me to give it a try.” Mitch shrugged. “He would like you to come in for a sit-down, told me to tell you he has a few select openings he needs to fill.”

“I’m not looking to go back to the Bureau, Mitch, but tell John I appreciate the offer.” T.J. got up and grabbed a beer from the six-pack he’d left on the kitchen counter.

“You worked for this John Mancini?” Lorna asked.

“With Mitch,” T.J. told her. “We went through training together, actually.”

Lorna stepped aside to permit Regan to place both pizza boxes on the table.

“You’ve been out now for what, six years?” Regan asked.

T.J. nodded. “Something like that.”

Lorna handed out napkins, then took the seat across from T.J. She opened the lids of both boxes and told her guests, “Pepperoni on the left, the works on the right. Please help yourselves.”

“So, you left the FBI to start your private investigation business?” Lorna asked T.J.

“My cousin and I started one, yes.” The slice of pizza he’d just slid onto his plate appeared to have garnered an inordinate amount of his attention.

Lorna didn’t have to be hit over the head. His leaving the Bureau was off-limits. Okay by her.

She turned to Mitch. “So, what’s your plan to aid and assist the Callen Police Department?”

“The first thing I want to do is see if we can start putting together a list of young men who went missing over the past twenty-five to thirty years from the Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and New Jersey area.” He drew an imaginary circle on the table, encompassing the points where those states came together. “Then we’ll see what evidence we have that will enable us to start matching up the remains with the missing. At least, that’s the goal. Once we’re able to start identifying victims, we’ll try to find some commonality among them.”

“Meaning?” Lorna asked.

“There has to be a reason why each of these victims was chosen. Once we figure out what that reason was, we’ll be closer to figuring out who we’re looking for,” Mitch explained.

“After all these years, isn’t it likely that the killer is gone from here? All of these victims were killed a long time ago,” Lorna pointed out. “What are the chances the killer stayed in Callen?”