“Hello? Is someone there?”
“Hi.”
The voice startled her, she hadn’t even considered that someone else might be down there, and her heart pounded. She wasn’t alone.
“Who are you?”
“My name is Ed. You?”
“Chelsea.”
There was a brief moment of silence before he spoke again.
“What’s your last name?”
“Morris.”
“Oh.”
Chelsea scooted as close to the wall where the voice came from as she could manage.
“How long have you been here?”
“Two days, I think.”
“Why are we here? Do you know?”
“I asked him. He just said I would know soon enough.”
Chelsea heard the man scoot closer to the wall, his chain dragging on the floor, before he spoke.
“Do you know who he is?”
“Not a clue. I don’t remember ever seeing him before. Do you know him?”
The man on the other side of the wall sounded tired.
“No. I don’t know him either.”
The room returned to quiet. She scooted back to her blanket and tried to look for a weakness in the walls of the room. Everything looked solid. She tested the chain. She wasn’t going anywhere.
She resumed the praying she had started in the van.
****
Trudi had an uneasy feeling. It wasn’t like Chelsea to be late and her friend hadn’t answered her calls in two days.
Sitting at the counter was Mr. Perkins. He had asked, about every ten minutes, when Chelsea would be in.
“Miss Trudi, have you heard from Miss Chelsea?”
“Not yet, Mr. Perkins. I’m sure she’ll be along any time now. Do you need a refill?”
“Please, just a half cup.”
Trudi knew the drill just as well as Chelsea but for Mr. Perkins, only his favorite really made him happy. And truth was she wasn’t sure her friend would be along any minute. Something wasn’t right. She tried calling again.
“This is Chelsea; you know what to do….”
Trudi hung up. Her shift ended in a half hour and she had decided to go over to her friend’s house if she hadn’t shown up by then.
The manager, Mr. Chambers, came out of the back and signaled Trudi over.
“Where’s Chelsea? She’s over an hour late.”
“I don’t know, boss. I’m going over to her house after work. I’ll call and let you know what I find.”
“A ‘No call, No show’ is supposed to be instant termination. I don’t want to do that to one of my best girls. She better have a good reason.”
“I’m sure she does. I’ll have her call you when I get over there. I’m going right after my shift.”
****
Trudi got to her friend’s house around noon. Chelsea’s vehicle wasn’t there and mail was sticking out of the mailbox.
Trudi parked on the driveway and entered through the side door to the garage. When she got to the utility room door, she found it locked.
Chelsea had shown her where the spare key was and she opened the door to find the house dark. Something felt very wrong.
“Chelsea?!”
There was no answer, no sound at all. Mugsy, Chelsea’s cat, came around the corner.
“Hi, Mugsy.” She reached down and scratched him on the head. “Chelsea?!”
She stuck her head in the door, looking towards the kitchen. Nothing. She went in and walked through the house. The litter box in the kitchen was full and hadn’t been cleaned in days. The cat’s water was empty.
“Chelsea?!”
Convinced her friend wasn’t there; she took out her phone and called 911.
****
Jason and Nina had started first thing in the morning on the task of finding out everything they could on Ed Garland. They went to where he worked and to the golf club where he was to meet Jerry Baker. No one had seen the missing man.
Nina had managed to get a check on his debit card and credit card activity. Neither had been used in three days.
They arrived back at the station around 3:30 in the afternoon. Jason had one stop he wanted to make before briefing Lieutenant Banks.
“I’m going to see Doc Josie.”
Nina didn’t want to face Sarah Banks alone.
“Mind if I tag along?”
“Fine with me.”
“They took the stairs down to the basement and went through the double glass doors leading into the forensic department.
Affectionately called ‘Doc Josie’, Dr. Jocelyn Carter, is the head of the Forensic Science Department. Short with curly, brown hair and black wire framed glasses around blue eyes, she looked like the classic college professor. Some might describe her as ‘frumpy’ but she was brilliant. The detectives found her sitting at her desk.
“Josie. How we doin’?”
“Jason. What a nice surprise.”
“You’ve met Nina Jefferson?”
“Yes, of course. Hi, Nina.”
Nina gave Josie a smile as Jason sat down in one of the two chairs facing Doc Josie’s desk.
“So Josie, what did your crew find at the Garland house?”
“Not much. There were prints on the ledge and a door knob, neither of which belonged to Mr. Garland. We ran them through the AFIS fingerprint system but no luck. Evidently, the person who left the prints doesn’t have a record.”
Jason figured the fingerprint data base would be useless. He knew most people who didn’t conceal their prints did so because they knew there was no record of them.
“What about the shoe print?”
“Size 9 running shoe. Nike but not rare enough to be much help except as a match to another print.”
“Okay. Well, not much to go on. Thanks.”
“No problem. Always glad to see you.”
****
Jason and Nina found Lieutenant Banks sitting in her office. Nina wrapped on the door frame before entering. The lieutenant looked up and then back at her paperwork.
“What’s up?”
Nina stayed by the door and Jason had to slip past her to speak to the lieutenant. He gave Nina a knowing smile.
Afraid to go in the lion’s den, huh?
Jason pulled up a chair.
“Just wanted to give you an update on the Garland case.”
“Okay, shoot.”
Jason gave her what they knew so far and how they had subpoenaed the phone records. When he was done, she looked up from her paperwork, and crossed her arms.
“Not much. Any ideas besides the phone records?”
Before Jason could answer, the phone rang. Sarah Banks pushed the speaker button.
“Banks.”
“Lieutenant, this is Doc Josie.”
“Yeah, Doc. What’s up?”
“The car we recovered this afternoon from the missing Morris woman, it’s got prints that don’t belong to her.”
“Got an ID?”
“Sort of.”
“Can you be more specific, Doctor?”
“Sure. By the way, do you know where Detective Strong is?”
“As a matter of fact, I do. He’s sitting here listening to our conversation.”
“Oh. Hey, Jason.”
Jason let out a small laugh.
“Hi, Doc.”
“Well, to answer the question about ID on the prints, I don’t have a name but I do have a match. It’s the same ones we pulled from Ed Garland’s duplex.”
Lieutenant Banks sat up and grabbed a file on her desk, sliding it across to Jason.
“I just passed the file to Strong. It would appear the cases are connected. Did you find anything else in the car?”
“Not so far.”
“Okay, Doc. Thanks for the update. I’m assigning the Morris girl to Strong and Jefferson, so keep them in the loop.”
The lieutenant hit the disconnect button without waiting for a reply.
“Alright, you two better review the Morris file and see if it gives you any direction on Garland. It appears the two cases are connected.”
Jason got up and headed for the door.
“Yes, Maam.”
It seemed they would be working the missing persons cases awhile longer.