I See You (Criminal Profiler #2)(5)

“No way of knowing. Though Jane’s dental work is modern.”

“Any personal items found with the skull?”

“No.” She was Jane’s last and best hope for identification.

Ramsey straightened. “Impressive work, Agent Spencer. The bust will be a significant help to Alexandria police. You’re working with Detective William Vaughan?”

“Correct.”

“He attended several of the profiling team’s workshops in the spring.”

The spring training sessions had been designed to help local cops solve crimes. Detective Vaughan had been one of her best students. She had discovered he had a master’s in theoretical math, a reputation for thinking outside the box, and, over his ten years on homicide, a closure rate edging toward 90 percent. Her respect for his work had grown into desire, and when he had asked her out for coffee, saying yes had been easy. It was not long after that that they had started sleeping together.

“I’ll send Vaughan a picture of the bust so he can cross-check it against any pictures he has on file,” she said. “His department’s public information officer is arranging a news release. If we can publicize her face, we might get an identification.”

“Good.”

“Ms. McDonald has called my office several times,” she said. “I haven’t taken her call, but her voicemail messages make it very clear she wants access to the case. Kind of a finder’s fee.”

“She’ll get the news along with everyone else.” His mouth bunched in curiosity as he regarded the still face. “I understand the apartment building where the skull was found is a half mile from I-95.” The north-south interstate’s twelve hundred miles of roadway ran through a dozen states and was a main artery for running drugs and weapons and human trafficking.

“Correct. Jane Doe could be from anywhere.”

Ramsey stood back from the bust, folding his arms over his chest. “Her face is familiar.”

Zoe looked again at the bust. “You’ve seen her before?”

He leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. “Ever had a name on the tip of your tongue, but you couldn’t quite grasp it?”

Instead of pressing him for the name, she took a different tactic. “You’ve worked hundreds of cases.”

His gaze cut back to Zoe. “Yes. And I’ve seen the faces of a thousand victims.”

“Given she was in the basement for up to twenty years, you could have been a new agent when you saw her.”

“Early 2000s.”

“Remember, she’d have been a girl of means and likely missed when she vanished.”

He flexed his fingers and then suddenly straightened, snapping his fingers. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it right away. This is Marsha Prince.”

“Prince?” Zoe said. “Why is that name familiar?”

“She was a rising sophomore at Georgetown University and was in Alexandria working in her father’s business. She was days away from returning to school in August 2001 when she vanished.”

Tumblers clicked into place, and the memory unlocked. The case had been profiled at the academy. “She was living at home with her parents, who lived in Alexandria. She literally vanished, and the cops never figured out what happened to her.”

“That’s the one,” Ramsey said.

There had been search crews scouring the region. Cadaver dogs had canvassed the parks, fields, and riverbeds, dry from drought that summer. As Zoe studied the face, more fragments of the forgotten case slid together into a cohesive picture.

Young, blond, smart. With the world before Marsha Prince, her disappearance had set off a firestorm that had rippled through all levels of law enforcement, local politics, and television news shows. Her name had been kept alive for a few years until finally time had cast Marsha into the sea of lost souls.

“Should we notify her family that we may have found her?” Zoe asked.

“Mom and Dad are both deceased,” he said. “She does have a sister, Hadley Prince, but last I heard, she’d moved away.”

“Without DNA, we’ll need a visual identification from family.”

“Turn it over to Detective Vaughan. The ball’s in his court now.”



I rocked the finals! This is going to be an epic summer.

Marsha Prince, May 2001





CHAPTER THREE

Monday, August 12, 1:30 p.m.

Shenandoah Valley, Virginia

One Day Before

A homicide detective’s case rarely fell into place easily and quickly. Solving it required legwork, poking and prodding of countless witnesses, sifting through hours of surveillance tapes, and the ability to study a murder scene until the critical details presented themselves.

A cop needed patience. Lots of it.

And so did the father of a teenage son.

The past year had been a study in tolerance and persistence as Alexandria homicide detective William Vaughan had shepherded his son through his final year of high school. Teenage hormones, brooding silences, and a couple of broken curfews had dominated their spring. The kid chomped at the bit and thought he knew better than anyone, especially his old man. Many a night, Vaughan had stood on the back porch of their home, drunk a beer, and counted the seconds to this moment.

“Do you have everything?” Vaughan asked his son.