Chapter 8

After what seemed like an age, I decided that I was being stupid. If someone wanted to hurt me or even grab me then they would have done it by now. Very slowly I opened my eyes and then turned onto my back. There was nothing obvious so I leant over and turned on the lamp next to the bed. Shit, the clock was saying that it was 3.30 in the morning. Sitting up now I couldn't see that anything was different. Moving from the bed I checked the window before moving into the lounge. Okay, so maybe I was still upset about what had happened at that nightclub because there was definitely no one here in my apartment. The windows and doors were still locked so maybe it was my subconscious playing tricks on me. Now wide awake I started up the coffee machine trying to decide what to do next. Maybe it was a stupid idea, especially after I suspected someone of being in my apartment, but I went out onto the balcony. It was quiet and cool allowing me to think while I sipped my drink.

I began to replay everything that had happened at that nightclub. Of course, my first thought was how something like that always seemed to happen to me. Wrong place at the wrong time, the story of my life. That had me wondering why Kiera had decided on that particular club. I suppose it was close to here and had a reputation, but Kiera wasn't from around here so how had she come across it? Yeah, that was a question to ask Kiera. As soon as she sobered up enough.

Okay, even I had to admit that curiosity had got the better of me. What was the saying, curiosity killed the cat? That sure came close to happening. Which then had me wondering why such an extreme reaction. Surely there had been other party goers that had inadvertently walked into the wrong area. The only reason for such extreme behavior was because there was something going on there that they didn't want anyone to find out about.

The conversation that I'd overheard was what set me off. It sounded iffy. Okay it had me curious. Yeah, there was that word again. The thing is that I was ready to turn around and get back to Kiera, ignore what I'd overheard. If that damn door hadn't locked on me then I wouldn't have had to find another way out. Innocence established. What happened wasn't my fault.

The problem was that the conversation that I'd overheard wasn't sitting right with me. Something was going down that included clients with high expectations of merchandise that was in pristine condition. I had too many ideas for what the merchandise might be. Drugs being at the top of my list followed by weapons. I pondered the words that had been used at the end of the conversation. There would be people bidding so the systems needed to be operational at exactly the right time with no glitches. What the hell had he meant by that? Then it dawned on me. People were going to be bidding through a site on the internet. Wasn't that a weird way of doing business? Maybe the drug dealers and gun runners in Trenton were way behind the times with making their deals in back streets.

By the time that I'd finished my coffee I'd decided that I would tell Jonas what I'd overheard at that club. I just hoped that he didn't think badly of me for what I'd managed to get myself involved with. I'm sure that a moan escaped from me when I remembered the state that Kiera had been in when we'd eventually managed to get out of that building. Jonas could probably just fire me for allowing that to happen.

The sun was just coming up, promising a sunny day, just like it had done for the last few weeks. It was time to go into the office. Time to catch up with the goings on of the FBI at that house. An hour later I was stepping off the elevator into the office. That the lights came on told me that I was the first person here, so I walked over to the desk where I normally worked. The papers and files were just as I'd left them, but I wasn't sure what else I could do. Finding out what had happened to Lisa seemed like an impossible task now. I was glad of the interruption of the elevator doors opening and watched as both Oscar and Jex walked out into the room.

"Do you know how Kiera is?"

Aiming my question at Oscar. In some ways I hoped that she had the hangover from hell. Maybe that would teach her to be more careful with how much she drank.

"Probably sleeping it off. Any idea where the fire was?"

I shook my head because I knew that there hadn't been a fire. Time to change the subject before I gave myself away.

"Anything new on the house in Monson?"

That Oscar came and sat down next to me didn't bode well for me and an awful feeling in the pit of my stomach began to take hold.

"Seems that the woman died of a broken neck, the hyoid was broken. From the state of the body, they think that she'd been sat there for about eight years. The feds have confirmed that the house was where Banning grew up from what they found inside that room. They're assuming that he killed his own mother. We'll never know the truth of that"

I suppose that it fit. The women who'd been found had died the same way and I wasn't going to question what the FBI were saying. That Oscar was now quiet but hadn't moved had me wondering if he had something else that he needed to tell me.

"And? What aren't you telling me?"

Instead of answering me he looked over to the board where he'd displayed the map of the area and the women who had been reported as missing. I know that I was frowning because something about it had changed so I stood up to go and take a closer look. Three photos had now moved from the right hand side as still being unaccounted for over to the left. The ones on the left were women whose bodies had been found.

"Three bodies?"

I whispered.

"Yeah. What's strange is that the coroner determined that one woman's body could have been there for five years, another for two years and a third only a year ago"

"So Banning killed his mother and then moved back to their original home. Where he killed three women who were possibly homeless from the streets. Then he took three more women, that we can identify, back to his mother's house and killed and buried them there"

Why go back to his mother's house?

"The three that were found were buried with their clothes thrown on top of them. Hell, even their personal possessions were there with them, which was how they were identified so quickly"

I looked from Oscar as he said that back to the board. Why were clothes found at the homestead? Oh hell, that meant that there could be at least four women's bodies out there somewhere, maybe even seven. It just didn't make any sense to me.

"Help me out here. Those three bodies from seven years ago that can't be identified, did any of the clothes found belong to them?"

A shrug of the shoulders was all that I got. I'd assumed that the FBI would have been able to compare DNA tests from the bodies against the clothes, then again, I had no idea if that could be done or how quickly. This was becoming a lot more complicated.

"I don't know. Maybe the bodies were too badly decomposed, or the older clothes were too contaminated. They found three dead women and a man who confessed, case closed. Jonas is trying to get hold of those clothes for him to take to a private forensic team"

Which could mean that there were between seven and four women still to be found. I had a feeling that those women were ones that disappeared recently. Looking at the board I knew that I wanted to track the movements of the ones at the top, the ones who had gone missing in the last three years. Any thoughts of what had happened the night before diminished as I set myself the task of tracking those women. If they had been taken by Banning, then there had to be a connection. The idea that he randomly chose them just didn't sit well with me. He must have seen lots of women as he travelled around collecting his bottles so why did he choose those women?

I started with Lisa as she was who we were being asked to find and she was the last one to have gone missing. My assumption was that if I found any leads on her then that might also lead us to the other missing women.

Lisa Harcourt was 26 years old, daughter to Mr Harcourt who was a very successful business man. I decided to look at what business he was into and discovered that he owned a chain of jewelry shops all around the area of Boston with a very lucrative on line outlet as well. Lisa's mother had died over six years ago, and the father had remarried, taking on a young boy through his new wife. Lisa had moved out of her family home just before the death of her mother, sharing an apartment with a friend.

Both girls had followed courses at the university, Lisa's chosen subject being child psychology. She had moved into a job with a private practice whose offices were close to where she lived. By mid afternoon I'd found no medical issues, financial issues or trouble with the police, which left me in a quandary with how to learn more about her. As I sat back and considered what to do next, I realized that the one person who would know her best would be the woman who she had shared an apartment with.

Josie Roose had moved away from that shared apartment. I couldn't blame her for doing that. As far as anyone knew Lisa was probably dead and that would have been so very hard for Josie to come to terms with. If something like that had happened to Mary Lou, I think that I would be inconsolable. Josie had opted for a studio several miles from where their apartment had been and as she worked full time as a marketing assistant, I reckoned that I'd have a good chance of catching her working from home. With some notes to take with me I left the office. Jex was back at his computer, but I had no idea where Oscar had gone to or what he was following up on.

Once back in the apartment I showered and then dried my hair, wouldn't want to scare Josie when I spoke to her. I debated for an age what to wear. Formal could make her wary of me especially if I dressed in all black. On the other hand, too casual and she may not take me seriously. In the end I went for a denim pencil skirt and white shirt that left unbuttoned revealed a cute little strapless top.

My fridge was empty of anything that took my fancy, well empty of anything really. With being away in New York I'd need to buy in some groceries. I could do that on my way back from seeing Josie. That had me wondering what I would do for food right now because all of that time researching had left me very hungry.

As I sat in the outside eating area of a MacDonalds I realized how much I had missed the taste of fried chicken and fries. I'd tried to avoid fast food because I knew that it really wasn't healthy. I also avoided it because it brought back a lot of memories. Take aways sat in the bonds office with Connie and Lula or how Lula and I would pick up a quick lunch between apprehensions. It made me wonder how Lula was doing, if she was managing to make her new job work for her. I wasn't a very good friend as I realized that I hadn't been in touch with her to catch up. Something to do tonight.

Once I'd finished my food and thrown the waste in the trash, I was back in my car inputting Josie's address into the sat nav. She still lived on this side of Boston even though she worked in the city, probably down to cost and availability of suitable places.

14 Chestnut Hill Ave was a yellow brick three floored building. Parking was a bit of an issue, but I found a space further down the block and then took advantage of scouting out the area where Josie now lived. At the end of the street there was a small park, so no traffic going up and down the street and I'd passed a grocery store as I'd turned in. To me it seemed like a nice area to live in, but then I knew nothing about the neighborhood. Approaching the door, I was faced with the usual array of names next to an intercom system so pushed the button next to her name.

I didn't have long to wait before I heard a tinny voice come through the speaker and that was when I was really hoping that Josie would see me.

"Hello, who is it?"

"My name is Annie and I'd really appreciate a chance to talk to you"

"I don't like having sales people annoying me"

Came the reply, which to be honest I was in total agreement with her. The methods used to induce you to buy things was almost out of control. What with emails and cold calls.

"Yeah, I know how you feel about that. I'm not here to sell you anything. I actually wanted to talk to you about Lisa"

Time passed without any more conversation coming from Josie. I couldn't blame her for being reluctant to talk about Lisa, but this was really important. I was about to push the intercom again when the door suddenly opened, and I was looking at Josie. She looked pale but there was a touch of annoyance in her eyes as she looked at me. Automatically I gave the spiel that I'd prepared on the way here.

"I'm not the police or FBI. Not a reporter or someone being nosey. Lisa's father hired my boss. He wants some closure, he wants to know what happened to her"

I could tell that she was uncertain of what to do or say but eventually she opened the door wider and stepped to one side.

"I don't think I can add anything more than I did at the time, but I have one condition to talking to you"

"Name it"

I quickly said because at this stage I was willing to do anything to talk to her.

"I want to know everything that you find. She was my best friend and, well there are times when I find it so hard to cope after she went missing"

That was easy to agree to so after a nod of my head I was following her up the stairs. Three flights later and I felt proud that I'd conquered the climb without being out of breath. Hell, an age ago as a bounty hunter those stairs would have just about finished me off. Why the hell didn't I start some form of exercise sooner? Stubbornness was my internal reply. The place where Josie lived was really nice, larger than I expected for a studio apartment. She had sloping ceilings which could have been a problem but the way that she'd organized her furniture worked really well.

"I love how you organized this space"

She looked around her before looking back to me as though she wasn't sure how to take the compliment.

"It has a slightly bigger floor space because of the low ceilings and to be honest it was in a price range that I could afford"

I followed Josie across the room, past the corner that housed a kitchen area, to the small couch and single chair. Taking a seat on the couch I was aware of Josie sitting down in the chair and how she avoided looking at me. Aware that things were a bit uncomfortable I decided to surge ahead and get to the reasons why I wanted to talk to her.

"I want to get to know who Lisa is. What she liked, disliked and what she was like to live with. That way maybe I can work out why she disappeared, what it was that made her who she was"

Okay, that little speech did have Josie looking at me, but I was almost regretting what I'd said when I saw tears in her eyes.

"We were best friends, like sisters, no more than that. Not a day goes by without me thinking about her. I had to move. There were so many things that reminded me of her, and I couldn't bring myself to just replace her with another person using her space"

I nodded my head in understanding realizing how difficult it must have been for Josie. One minute Lisa was there and the next she had gone.

"So what did the two of you do?"

"Everything. We went to uni together and decided when we were looking for jobs that we'd share an apartment. Everything was split down the middle, the rent, utility bills, food. We rarely argued and if we did it was usually over men. I suppose that was why we survived lockdown. But you know, that changed us both"

I could relate to the whole lockdown situation. I had so many people insisting that I stay with them. My parents, my sister, Mary Lou, Lula and even Ranger. The only person who had never offered me their company had been Joe. His reason was that he still needed to go and work, and he didn't want to expose me to the virus. In the end I'd stayed by myself in my apartment with Ranger organizing regular drop offs of food. At least I'd been able to go back to work quickly even if the whole court system was screwed up, I could get out of the apartment.

"How did it change you?"

I wasn't aware of it having a lasting effect on me.

"We just didn't want to go out. We had groceries delivered and we'd both got into the routine of working from home. Besides the wine bar that we used to go to closed down and the place that we'd sometimes eat at reduced their hours. You had to book in advance so meeting up with friends became impossible. We'd only just started to get back to some sort of normal about a year ago"

I'd noticed in Lisa's financials that she bought a lot more clothes through the internet so what Josie was telling me was making sense.

"So what did your new normal look like?"

"Walks. Hell, we even bought a couple of bikes that we'd use at the weekend. We, err, found that we. Hell, I haven't told anyone this, but we ended up becoming partners, as in romantic partners"

I would never have worked that one out, but I could see how it could happen. Two people whose lives were so dependent on each other. It was probably a natural progression for them.

"So no more arguments over men"

Trying to lighten the mood so Josie wouldn't feel embarrassed.

"No. We went out to enjoy ourselves. We didn't flaunt it. In fact, no one knew. The few friends that we kept didn't see the connection that had developed between us, and Lisa's father didn't really see us together. We started to look for new places to go, places where no one knew us"

Okay, now we were moving into an area that was interesting to me.

"Where, where did you go?"

Thinking that maybe one of these places was where Lisa had caught the attention of Banning.

"We volunteered at an outreach center, Action4kids. I did some art classes with the kids while Lisa would do some group sessions. There was a wine bar in town where we went to and then we treated ourselves to some spa sessions. The last place that we went together was a new club over in Randolph. We had a great weekend cycling and then she was gone"

Yeah, you guessed. My brain went into overdrive at hearing her mention a club over in Randolph. Wasn't that where Kiera had taken me?

"The club, was it The Cat's Whiskers?"

Josie smiled as if remembering that evening.

"Yeah, it was. We had an amazing night, danced and talked in the quiet area that it has. It was that night that we discussed us as a couple and decided to stop hiding what we were"

I was deep in thought as I remembered that club and as I tried to dig deep into my memory.

"Neither of you have a car, do you?"

I was sure that Lisa had a license but for the life of me couldn't remember if Josie could drive.

"No. I can't drive. An age ago we'd hire a car for a mini vacation and Lisa would drive but we decided that for the cost of buying one and then insuring it we could get a taxi if we needed to"

"So you used a taxi to get to and from that nightclub?'

"Yeah. Is that important?"

Was it? I remembered seeing the line of taxis waiting outside of the nightclub but knew that it would have been the only way for the girls to get home.

"No, it's the best way for getting around. So the day that Lisa went missing, what were the two of you up to?"

Wanting to move on and establish if anything had happened that day that was unusual.

"Oh geez, I've gone over that day in my mind so many times, wondering if maybe I could have changed anything. I'd had to go into the office that day. I had this big presentation to make so Lisa decided that we'd meet after I finished and have a meal in the city"

I knew from the reports that I'd read that the last time that Lisa was seen was a few blocks from their apartment. She never made it into the city, and it was only when Josie came home much later that evening having waited for her that Josie had called Lisa's father. Of course the police wouldn't do anything immediately as there was no evidence of foul play. It had been 24 hours before they'd accepted her as a missing person. So much could have happened in that time. People wouldn't remember seeing Lisa or there could have been people who were only visiting the area for work.

"How was Lisa going to be travelling?"

Knowing that she could have taken a bus or train or even a taxi.

"We usually got the bus. Though where we used to live, we caught the bus by the station, so she could have been planning on either one. I went through this with the police and then the FBI"

I could see that thinking about that day was causing Josie to get upset. She hadn't been around for Lisa when Lisa had disappeared which must have been heartbreaking. The one day when they were apart, and Lisa had gone missing. Which had me remembering one more question.

"Would she have used cash or card to pay?"

I wasn't sure why I asked that, but I felt that it was important.

"If we went out together then we'd use a prepaid card, but I'd taken it with me that morning. I'm not sure how she was planning to pay"

There was one more question that I really needed to ask Josie even though I knew it would upset her.

"Josie, the man in the red truck, had you seen him around here?"

There was a flash of anger in her eyes, so I knew that she was aware that the man who was responsible for Lisa being missing drove that truck.

"Elijah. That bastard. Hell, we took pity on him. We collected the bottles and cans from this building for him. Lisa said that he had a mental health problem, but why hurt Lisa"

Was that why the FBI were so keen to follow up on the red truck, because they knew that Lisa had had contact with him? Maybe Lisa had handed some items to him on that fateful day, and it had given him the opportunity to grab her.

By now Josie looked even paler than she had when I arrived. I don't think that anyone knew just how close she was to Lisa. She'd lost the love of her life and even now she still hadn't come to terms with that. It was as if she'd put her life on hold. I slowly stood up because I couldn't think of anything else that I wanted to ask her.

"Josie, I can see how much you loved Lisa and how you're still hurting. When I find out anything then I'll let you know, I promise"

I felt so bad leaving Josie on her own. By visiting her, I'd dragged everything back for her. Her memories and her love. Getting back in my car I sat there going through what Josie had said. Okay, I'd recorded our conversation and not asked her permission, but the recording was only for me. I wouldn't be allowing anyone else to listen to it. It was still light outside so on the spur of the moment I decided to drive to where Lisa and Josie had lived.

It was a busier area with more people on the streets, no doubt returning from work or out to meet with friends. To me it seemed like an ideal place to live with a couple of restaurants and bars close by. Parking almost opposite to where they had lived, I retraced those last steps that Lisa had taken. I passed a hairdressers, wine bar and grocery store before I saw the station up ahead of me. It was definitely a vibrant place to live with the advantage of access to public transport. As I stood on the sidewalk and looked around me, I couldn't work out how someone had grabbed Lisa off the street without there being a lot of witnesses.

According to the FBI they'd interviewed bus and train drivers, talked to shop workers, checked any available street cams and come up with nothing. It was as though she'd disappeared into thin air. Yeah right, like that could happen. So where would be an opportune place to make a grab for her because I couldn't see it happening here. So where else could it have happened. Everyone had made the assumption that Lisa had stayed home all day before setting out to meet with Lisa, what if she'd been somewhere else? What if she didn't like being on her own all day and decided to go out. So where would she go? The outreach center. Once back at the car I used my phone to google the outreach center where Lisa and Josie had volunteered. Inputting the address, Washington Street, Dorchester, I programmed the sat nav to get me there, surprised where it was. Certainly not local to where they had lived. It would have taken a few bus rides to get there. Would anyone be there now? I had no idea but at least I could get a feel for the area.