When You See Me (Detective D.D. Warren #11)(18)

“Tomorrow, the search for additional remains. Do we help?”

“Of course!” Flora said immediately.

“For the sake of argument, how much experience do you have searching for bones?”

“At least I know the woods,” Flora grumbled.

“True. And if you want to be there, I won’t stop you. But I can tell you now, the most valuable members of the search team will be the dogs. You heard Dr. Jackson. So what do you bring to the table?”

“Eyes. Feet. An understanding of where to look, after talking to Dr. Jackson.”

“Information we should definitely share with the team,” D.D. agreed.

“I don’t get it,” Keith spoke up. “What do you want us to be doing?”

D.D. studied him. “What did you want to do most this morning?”

“Analyze Ness’s laptop,” he said immediately.

“Exactly. Because you have skills. Because you made more progress tracing Jacob’s internet footsteps in two days than the FBI did in seven years. You should be on the computer. But tomorrow you’ll head into the woods?”

Keith flickered a glance at Flora. Wearing his leather jacket and dark green cashmere sweater, he stood out in the diner. Too upmarket metro for this neck of the woods. What he had to wear into the forest, D.D. was guessing, would be even more fish out of water. Yet, she gave the man credit. Based on the look he was giving Flora, where she went, he would follow.

“You want to search, we can all search,” D.D. conceded. “But we don’t want to be just more bodies on the taskforce. We need to add value. As in, what can we do, what might we know that no one else does?”

Now she stared at Flora hard.

“You want me to walk around the town of Niche,” Flora said slowly. “See if I recognize anything. Except, I never saw the town.” Her voice picked up. “I just went from that stupid basement to that stupid rig . . .”

The waitress had returned with the bowl of grits. She glanced at Flora nervously. Flora sat back, let the bowl of corn mush be set before her. Next came the fruit. Then the yogurt. Flora glanced at the food, didn’t appear optimistic.

“You will eat,” D.D. reminded her again, as the waitress walked away. “Or I will stick you on a plane back to Boston.”

That earned her a glare. Which was good. Angry Flora was more workable than sad Flora.

D.D. let her get down the first bite of grits. Flora made a face.

“Add maple syrup,” Keith said. “Or honey.”

“How do you know?” she asked him.

“I read.”

“About grits?”

“When flying to Atlanta . . .”

Flora narrowed her eyes at him, but picked up the maple syrup. The second bite seemed to go better.

“You may not remember the town,” D.D. said now, “but you still might be linked to it. I think that’s what you and Keith need to work.”

“Hey, I thought I was laptop guru!”

“Unfortunately, you’ve lost the laptop to that much prettier FBI agent. Besides, remember what she said. You may have found Jacob’s password and username for the dark web, but unfortunately you were about half a dozen years too late. We need something more—or at least, something current.”

“Stupid pretty FBI agent,” Keith grumbled, which earned him a second glance from Flora.

The waitress appeared with his egg-white omelet and D.D.’s Hungry Man.

D.D. took in her overflowing plate and hummed in approval. She hadn’t been this happy in days.

“So,” she continued, picking up her fork, diving in. “You’re still computer dude. Just don’t worry about Jacob’s laptop, at least not yet. And remember, there are two things we’re looking for.”

“Bones,” Flora spoke up, moving on to the yogurt.

“And Jacob’s cabin where you were first held. Now, are any of us particularly qualified to locate skeletal remains?”

They both shook their heads.

“I think you and Keith should go around with the picture of Jacob’s rig and quiz the locals. You”—she stabbed her fork at Flora—“can see if they recognize his truck. While Keith can look for signs that someone recognizes you.”

“You think someone in Niche might know me.” Now Flora had given up on her food completely.

“There must be a reason Jacob came to the mountains. This isn’t on any trucking route, we haven’t found any houses in his name. Which brings us back to . . .”

“He had help,” Keith provided. “An accomplice, or at least a friend.”

D.D. nodded. “That’s a theory worth pursuing, especially now that the police have discovered another body linked to Jacob’s MO.”

“He’s not from here,” Flora said slowly. “All his family ties are in Florida. Yet he brought me to the mountains, and probably Lilah Abenito, too. So why northern Georgia? Why this town, this place?”

“And who can answer these questions for us?” Keith concluded.

“Strategy,” D.D. announced, around a mouthful of biscuit. “The trick to surviving a taskforce is to pick your path, play to your strengths, and no matter how much the committee gets in your way, accomplish real work. We didn’t come here to play well with the feds. We came here to learn anything and everything about Jacob Ness. Are we clear?”