Little Girl Gone (An Afton Tangler Thriller #1)(76)

“What if the sick person who stuck the baby in that log in Cannon Falls was the same person who murdered Muriel Pink?”

“Why would you say that when there’s no real connection?”

“But there is,” Afton said. “Animal hair was found on both of the victims.” Even as Afton said it, it sounded weak to her. No, it sounded preposterous.

“It’s too far fetched,” Max said.

“I hear you.”

Max tilted his head back, pursed his lips, and seemed to be working the notion through his mind. Finally he said, “You’re grasping. You want there to be a connection.”

“Yes, probably.” Go ahead and talk me out of it.

“But it doesn’t make any sense. We’re pretty sure it was the doll lady who went after Muriel Pink. But how on earth would she tie in to the Cannon Falls baby?”

“I have no idea. Unless . . .” Afton stopped herself. “No, you’re right. The whole thing is too preposterous.”

“What were you going to say?” Max asked.

“Well, a baby was found. And another baby has disappeared.”

“Okay,” Max said. “I think I see where you’re going with this. And the whole thing scares the hail holy shit out of me.”

“Me, too.”

“That’d be one hell of a nutty twist.”

“The animal hair thing is what freaks me out,” Afton said.

“All right,” Max said. “Say we brought the animal hairs into the equation. Who would have something to do with animal hair?”

“I don’t know. A hunter maybe?”

“Or a dog trainer?”

“Maybe,” Afton said. “We’ve got samples of both hairs. We could have our lab do a DNA analysis. To see if they’re related.”

“I don’t know. I’m still thinking the hair from Pink came from one of her dolls, while the animal hairs found on the baby are just that, from an animal.”

“But if they are related . . .” Afton didn’t want to drop it.

“Then we’re really in deep shit,” Max said. “Okay, so it’s something to think about. When we get back, I’ll run it past Thacker. See if it’s worth doing the lab testing.”

“Thank you,” Afton said. She looked out the window as a stand of birch trees flew by. “Is Darden a hunter?”

“Not that I’m aware of. This is a guy who even gets manicures. I don’t know too many guys with manicured nails who spend their weekend in a deer blind hugging a rifle and freezing their ass off.” Max tapped the brakes and slid into the right lane, the slower lane. “Animal hairs. Shit.”

“A zookeeper? A trapper?” Afton wondered.

“Hard to sift out the possible suspects from the regular Joes.”

“What would you do normally?” Afton asked.

“Probably look for sex offenders, felons in the area.”

“Should we do that?”

“Sheriff Burney is already doing that in his jurisdiction,” Max said. “And we can try it, too, up to a point. There’s protocol to follow and we can’t investigate everybody. We don’t have the manpower.”

“What do we do in the meantime?” Afton asked.

“Keep working the case and wait for the kidnapper to call back,” Max said.

“When do you think that will be?”

“Not sure. My experience tells me it’s got to be fairly soon. Criminals usually like to grab their money and run.”

“I wish I could be there,” Afton said.

“You mean, to facilitate the exchange with the kidnapper?”

“No, to put a bullet in his brain.”


*

WE’RE still missing something,” Max said.

“What?” Afton asked. It was late afternoon Thursday and they were sifting through a pile of reports that had been slowly filtering in on missing children. “We’re getting decent cooperation from—”

“No, I mean like a thread . . . a connection.”

“Like the animal hair thing?”

“No,” Max said. “I mean like a personal connection.”

“Okay.” Max was worrying something, tossing it around in his brain, and Afton decided the best thing to do, the smart thing to do, was let him chew at it until he came up with something.

“We need to go over to Synthotech.”

“Darden’s current employer,” Afton said. “But the FBI guys already did all that.” She shuffled some more papers. “I have their reports right here. First on their list was Gordon Conseco, the CEO of Snythotech.”

“Was he standing firmly behind his new hire?”

Afton scanned the report. “Mmn, not so much. Conseco seemed more concerned with doing a slick PR job for Synthotech. Decrying any involvement with the kidnapping and offering law enforcement complete access to all their employees.”

“So Don Jasper and his guys talked to everyone over there?”

“They conducted interviews with at least a dozen people,” Afton said. “And there just wasn’t much take-away.”

“For them. But maybe there would be for us.”

“Because you think we’re smarter?” Afton knew that wasn’t the case. Don Jasper and his band of merry men were scary smart. If they couldn’t pry anything loose at Synthotech, how could she and Max?