Where the Blame Lies(46)

Zach’s heart was beating more swiftly. “Have you looked through this, ma’am?”

Mrs. Bellanger nodded, her face taking on a strange expression. Guilt? Almost as though, even in death, she feared she’d invaded her daughter’s privacy. Or maybe she was disturbed by what she’d read. “It sounded like she was sleeping with someone,” she said, her eyes downcast. “But she hadn’t said anything about a boyfriend, and she was usually open about that stuff . . . dating and whatnot.”

“Did she give a name?”

Mrs. Bellanger shook her head. “No, but she apparently met him on Wednesday nights.”

Wednesday nights. “Any indication why that night in particular?”

“No, but she had to have met him after class. Wednesday night she took an English literature class from five to seven. It was the only time the class was available, even though she preferred to take morning classes and study in the evenings.” She looked down. “Miriam had a learning disability. School was always a bit of a struggle for her. But we were so happy when she got accepted to UC. It’s a good school, she’d worked hard, and it was right here in town.” Grief passed over her expression and her eyes welled with tears.

Zach tapped the notebook on his knee. “Thank you for this, Mrs. Bellanger. It could help.” He paused. They both looked incredibly tired, haunted. He would ask only the most important questions and then leave them to their family. “And it will help me understand Miriam’s state of mind prior to her disappearance.”

She glanced at her husband. “There are personal things in there, Detective, things that—”

“No one will look at this journal except the people investigating this crime, Mrs. Bellanger, you have my word.”

Mrs. Bellanger nodded. “I’d lain down on that bed before, Detective,” Mrs. Bellanger murmured, her eyes going distant, “and I’d never seen the journal. At some point, it must have shifted from where it’d fallen so I could see it.” She paused, dabbing at her reddened nose. “It almost felt like Miriam was reaching out from the grave. Giving us the clue we needed to find the person who took her from us.”

**********

Zach sat at his desk, reading through Miriam Bellanger’s personal account of her last months on earth. Most of the entries were short, listing the date, where she’d gone, the initials of the people who had been there, and a brief description of the event. Zach referenced her case file as he used a stickie pad below the entries to write out the whole name of each friend the police had interviewed when Miriam was reported missing. She had a regular crew, it seemed. Her roommate, two female friends who also lived in the UC dorms, and a couple guy friends who lived in a fraternity house off campus.

Included among the bar and club outings, parties, Zumba classes, hair appointments, and dinner dates, were indications that she was meeting someone at least once a week and that they were having sex. Zach tapped the page that read: Feb. 8, Sex on PMs desk, so hot. W. almost caught us. Oops.

PM. Zach leafed through her case file again, looking for someone with the initials PM, but didn’t find anything. Wednesday nights. English Lit. He’d need to get a class list from three months ago, see if anyone she’d attended class with had those initials. Maybe Miriam had met someone in her class who she hadn’t mentioned to her parents because she wasn’t interested in dating him, per se, but in a casual hookup. Not exactly the kind of thing a college girl tells her mom and dad about.

But wouldn’t she have told her friends? They’d all been interviewed and none had mentioned a boyfriend or a hookup of any kind during the months surrounding her abduction. Was it because they didn’t know, or hadn’t considered it important like Aria Glazer’s roommate? He’d need to interview them again, especially now that circumstances had changed. She wasn’t just missing, she was dead. Murdered in a heinous fashion.

His eyes again moved to the description of the sex from February 8, just a short time before she’d disappeared after leaving a campus bar earlier than her friends because she had an exam the next morning. She’d never made it back to her dorm. Never been seen again, until her body had turned up in that abandoned basement.

Sex on PMs desk, so hot. W. almost caught us. Oops.

Desk. Having a desk was not an oddity, especially on a college campus. Every student had a desk in their dorm or apartment. But . . . Miriam’s Wednesday night sex partner was obviously a secret—she hadn’t told her parents or her friends. And someone had almost caught them. Caught. W. Wife? The man’s wife had almost caught them? What if the affair was not with one of the students in the English Lit class, but with the teacher? PM. The Professor. Professor who?

That morning, Zach had requested class schedules from the university for both Miriam and Aria. He checked his email, but still hadn’t received anything. He’d need to call again and put a fire under their asses. How hard could it be to pull up an old class schedule? But in the meantime . . . Zach pulled up the Internet, looking up the English Literature professors at the University of Cincinnati. He scrolled, spotting the Wednesday night class that Miriam must have taken the semester before. It was still held during the same times, five to seven.

Taught by Professor Vaughn Merrick. PM. Professor Merrick?

Zach’s heart thumped, that sixth sense that he was onto something zinging through him.