First Girl Gone(38)

Sharon’s gaze moved from the door to Charlie. She folded her hands in her lap, regaining her composure.

“She left in the morning to meet up with some old high school friends for brunch. But she came back in the afternoon to grab her things.”

“And you saw her then?”

Sharon shook her head.

“No, but we have a doorbell camera. It showed her returning around two thirty and then leaving again around seven.”

“And no one else was home at that point?”

“I was at a real estate conference in Ann Arbor.” Sharon fiddled with a diamond earring. “Todd was working late, and Jason was out with friends. They didn’t get back home until after she’d gone.”

Charlie could see the muscles along Ted Spadafore’s jaw clench, and Charlie forged ahead in an attempt to curtail further bickering.

“Can I ask what you do, Mr. Spadafore?”

His brow furrowed at the sudden change of subject.

“I own a financial consulting firm.”

“And what about you, Mr. Ritter?”

“Ritter Custom Installations, owner and operator. We do dock installations. Boat lifts. That kind of thing.”

Charlie made a pleasant face as she jotted this down, hoping her positive attitude might rub off on the family.

“Tell me about yesterday,” Charlie said. “How did you discover Amber was missing?”

“She’d wanted to invite a few friends from her sorority to stay for Christmas. Girls from out of town that aren’t going home for the holidays. I wanted them to feel included on Christmas morning, so I asked Amber to think about a few small gift ideas for them. I kept texting her about it, and she kept not responding. I finally called and got her voicemail. That was Friday. Yesterday she still hadn’t gotten back to me, so I called the house and talked to one of her sorority sisters. She told me no one had seen Amber since the start of break.”

Amber’s father broke in.

“That’s when Sharon called me, and I reminded her that Amber’s car has GPS tracking. I called up the company and got a location on it.”

Charlie glanced down at her notes.

“And it was in a park-and-ride lot just off the island, is that right?”

Ted nodded.

“We drove out there straight away. The car was there. But…” Eyes filling with tears, he shook his head.

“How was the car when you found it? Locked? Unlocked?”

“Unlocked.”

“Were any of Amber’s things inside?”

“All of her school stuff was still in the car,” Sharon said, clasping her fingers so tightly that her knuckles blanched white. “Laundry, overnight bag. But her phone and purse and keys were gone.”

Charlie set her notebook aside, folding her hands together.

“Well, I can tell you right now that I’ve already spoken to the police. With two girls going missing in such a short period of time, they’re making this investigation their highest priority. But if you still want me looking into things, the first thing I’ll need is a list of Amber’s friends. A contact at the sorority house would be a great start. And I’d really like to talk to the people she met up with the day she disappeared.”

“I think it makes sense,” Sharon said, glancing at her ex-husband. “Since you’re already looking for the other girl, I mean, it seems like we could pool our resources, so to speak.”

“Absolutely,” Ted agreed.

Charlie noticed Todd nodding along with this, as if he were part of the conversation.

She wheeled her chair back from the desk and stood.

“Let me go grab a service agreement for you to sign. I’ll be right back.”

Ducking into the back office, Charlie grabbed one of the pre-printed contracts Frank kept in a filing cabinet. She went over the form, filling in the blanks, pausing when she reached the space for the client’s name.

“Decisions, decisions. Do you put down just one of the parents? Both parents, but leave off poor Todd? List all three?” Allie asked. “Tricky situation.”

In the end, Charlie put down all three names: Ted Spadafore, Sharon Ritter, and Todd Ritter.

Charlie fixed the papers to a clipboard before returning to the main office. She passed it to the family and returned to the chair behind her desk.

“Our rate for this kind of investigation is seventy-five dollars an hour. We’ll also require a thousand-dollar retainer at the time of signing.”

Ted Spadafore nodded along with this as he scribbled his signature at the bottom of the contract.

“I can write you a check right now,” he said, handing the clipboard to his ex-wife and getting out his checkbook.

Sharon signed her name like she did everything else: with a fierce efficiency. The pen scratched over the paper like a sharpened claw.

Todd took the clipboard last. Where the other two had simply signed it after a cursory glance, he was apparently intent on reading it in full.

Amber’s father slid a check across the desk to Charlie.

“Theodore Spadafore!” Allie chuckled, then repeated it several more times in a sing-song. “No wonder he goes by Ted.”

“If we’re finished here, I’ve got a meeting I have to get to,” he said, getting to his feet.

“Typical,” Sharon said, muttering under her breath.