Save Your Breath (Morgan Dane #6)(79)

“Five of them have never been found. How do you know they’re dead?” Stella asked in a soft voice.

“Because Cliff told me he killed them.” Joe backed up to his door and leaned on it. His eyes darkened and filled with pain. “He told me every detail. I begged him to stop. After each death, he promised me it would be the last one. A year or so would pass, and I’d think it was over. Then he’d give in to his need again. When Brandi Holmes was found, I hoped he’d go to prison.”

“Then why didn’t you testify against him?” Stella propped a hand on her hip.

Anger lit Joe’s face. “Because he’s my brother!” One big hand swept out to point at Morgan. “That’s your sister, right? Would you betray her?”

“If she murdered six people? You bet I would.” Stella nodded.

“Well, Cliff raised me after our parents died. He took care of me. He is the only reason I didn’t end up in foster care. He said, ‘Joe, we’re family, and family sticks together.’” Joe’s eyes glistened. “And now I’m going to have to betray him. I already have the deaths of six women on my soul. He can’t get out of prison. He can’t control himself. More people would die. I can’t live with that.”

He looked broken, and Morgan almost wanted to comfort him. But she remembered the five families of the missing women. This man had known their loved ones were dead for years and had let them suffer and hope all that time because he didn’t want to betray his monster of a brother.

Coldness swept through her as she realized his guilt went far deeper. He’d known after each woman had been killed.

His silence had allowed his brother to keep murdering.

Yes, those deaths were on his soul.

Almost all of his arguments had begun with I. He didn’t care about those women and their families. He only cared about himself.

“Will you testify now?” Morgan asked.

Joe blinked the moisture from his eyes. “Maybe. I’d have to make sure I wouldn’t be charged with conspiracy, aid and abetting, or accessory.”

Anger flared in Morgan’s chest. He was using the victims’ families as bargaining chips. That was low. And she’d almost felt sorry for him.

“Do you know where those women are?” Stella asked.

He met her gaze. His emotions closed down. His eyes shuttered, and his gaze went cold. “I might. Can you promise me immunity?”

Bastard.





Chapter Thirty-Five

An hour later, Morgan faced the whiteboard. Lance and Sharp stood shoulder to shoulder with her.

“Stella is going to be tied up for the rest of the night,” Morgan said. Her sister had taken Joe Franklin back to the station and sent Morgan back to the office in a patrol car.

“She’ll be tied up for the rest of the week,” Lance added. “Or longer, depending how quickly and where they locate the remains of the five women.”

“Which is why we need to concentrate on finding Olivia.” Sharp stared at the board and pressed both hands to the top of his head. “Who are the remaining suspects?”

Morgan picked up the marker and wrote ALIBI next to Ronald Alexander’s name. Next to Kennett Olander, she wrote DEAD. She drew a question mark next to Joe Franklin’s name. “Joe is in Stella’s hands now. Assuming his story pans out, we can eliminate him from our list.”

Sharp dropped his hands to his sides. “What about Franklin’s lawyer?”

Lance shook his head. “Mark Hansen said he was in Rochester, and he could prove it if he had to.”

“But he refused to provide evidence,” Sharp said. “What about the editor?”

Morgan checked her notes. “He says he was back at his bar in Brooklyn by midnight, and his bartender will back him up.”

Sharp waved a hand in the air. “The bartender would lie for him.”

Morgan sighed. “We could ask him for his E-ZPass records, but we can’t make him give us anything.”

“What if it was no one we know?” Sharp’s voice cracked. “What if Olivia was taken by some random psycho who saw her on TV and fixated on her? Or what if the LMS orchestrated her kidnapping because she found out about an illegal gun sale? Alexander could be right. Olivia could be dead. She could have been killed the same night she was taken.”

They were all quiet for a few seconds.

Lance’s phone went off, startling them. “It’s my mom.”

He answered the call. “Hi, Mom. I’m putting you on speaker. Sharp and Morgan are here.”

Jenny greeted them all, and then got down to business. “I’ve been digging deeper into all the people involved with Olivia, and I found something interesting about Kim Holgersen.”

“Interesting how?”

“Holgersen isn’t a common name. It wasn’t hard to find Kim’s parents. Frank and Ethel Holgersen live in Redhaven. I found their current home address and their previous one. A couple of years ago, the former property changed hands from Frank and Ethel to Stephen Holgersen. In the past six months, several creditors have filed against Stephen, and there’s a tax lien on the property.”

“So he’s in financial trouble,” Lance said.

“Yes,” his mom said. “He owns a company called Primitive Survival School, and the company has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.”