In Her Tracks (Tracy Crosswhite #8)(73)
She also ran both names through four federal law enforcement databases: the National Crime Information Center (NCIC), the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS), and the Violent Crime Apprehension Program (ViCAP). And she ran the names through Washington State’s Missing Persons database. She did not get a hit on any database. With each search she began to feel less and less at ease.
Tracy knew from experience that, at least at one time, many cities and counties buried unidentified remains without attempting to collect DNA samples for later analysis. She also knew that even if they collected a sample, they didn’t always enter the information into the federal or state databases. In addition, when Tracy had searched for her sister, she had learned there were upwards of 40,000 sets of human remains held in evidence rooms of medical examiners throughout the country that could not be identified through conventional means. One of those means was for family members to provide DNA for comparison to the DNA kept of missing or deceased persons. A lot of variables, but none applied to Lindsay Sheppard since she wasn’t a Sprague blood relative.
Tracy searched through court cases using electronic systems such as Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER), as well as Westlaw and LexisNexis. She did not get a hit in the civil, criminal, or bankruptcy databases.
Lindsay Sheppard had turned eighteen and simply disappeared from the planet.
Just like Sarah.
Just like Stephanie Cole.
Tracy felt a wave of tension, enough that it caused her to stand from her desk and stretch. It didn’t help. Her heart suddenly felt as though it was beating a hundred miles a minute. She was short of breath, sweating. She recognized the symptoms.
Fight or flight.
She took several deep breaths but felt dizzy and light-headed, causing her to sit. She lowered her head to her knees, fearful she might pass out.
After several minutes, her breathing returned to normal, but she felt weak. She wondered if she was diabetic or anemic. She’d heard of women giving birth and becoming one or the other. She also wondered if her search for Lindsay had triggered the subconscious memory of those horrible days after Sarah went missing, as Dan had feared possible, and Lisa Walsh suggested.
She needed to get her mind off Lindsay Sheppard. She pulled out Elle Chin’s file and quickly flipped through the pages. Then she made a few phone calls and, eventually, tracked down Jewel Chin.
She grabbed her purse and headed out the door.
CHAPTER 31
Tracy called the Seattle real estate company where Jewel Chin worked and obtained her cell phone number. Chin didn’t sound thrilled to get Tracy’s phone call. She indicated she was too busy staging a house for a showing that weekend and had a personal training session that evening. Tracy wondered if the personal trainer was a new boyfriend.
Tracy told Chin she’d make it convenient and come to the home on Queen Anne that Chin was staging.
“Do I need a lawyer?” Chin asked.
“I just want to ask questions about that night. I’m taking another look at the file.”
“Why?”
Tracy had grown tired of answering that question. “I’m pursuing a new angle,” she said.
“Does the new angle involve her father?”
Tracy sensed her answer would dictate whether Chin agreed to speak with her. “It does,” she said.
Chin reluctantly agreed to meet.
Tracy parked across the street from a brick Tudor home with a moving van parked at the curb. Workers carried folded, padded blankets from the house, presumably used during transport to protect the staging furniture. Tracy estimated the home to be 3,000 square feet on a quarter-of-an-acre lot. It would likely be put on the market for a couple million dollars, give or take a few hundred thousand.
She climbed the front steps and knocked on an open door as she stepped across the threshold onto freshly redone hardwood floors. The interior felt cold and smelled like paint, which was likely the reason someone had opened the doors and the windows. Based on the strength of the smell, they’d need the rest of the week to air out the house. The front room was white on white. White walls and two white couches positioned perpendicular to a fireplace with an elaborate silk flower arrangement on the mantel. The flower colors complemented the tones in an abstract painting hanging over the marble mantel. Recessed, low-wattage LED bulbs gave the room a soft, warm glow.
Tracy couldn’t imagine white couches and silk flowers in her home, not with the amazing shedding dogs and her cat, Roger, running around like bulls in a china shop.
“I’m sorry, the house isn’t showing until tomorrow,” Jewel Chin said as she walked into the living room.
She looked as put together as the staged front room in tight white jeans, red three-inch heels, and a navy-blue blouse cut low enough to reveal several gold chains. What looked to be an expensive watch and jewelry adorned her wrist and her fingers. Tracy wondered if Chin was staging the house or herself. The file indicated Chin remained single. Now, in her early thirties, crow’s-feet already projected from the corners of her eyes, despite heavy makeup. “Worry lines,” her mother had called them, and she said you could count them like aging rings on a toppled tree trunk.
“What’s the listing price?” Tracy asked.
“One point two five, but it’s likely to go above that price.”
“Too rich for my blood.”