Page 16 of Keeping Collette

“I bet the only reason you’ve decided to say something is because I’m sitting opposite you. How much longer were you going to keep it from me? How is this helping to find my sister? You could be out there, looking for her with this new information, but here you are drinking your tea as if someone’s life doesn’t depend on you.”

Collette was breathing heavily after her tirade, and still, he wanted nothing more than to hold her. Her hand shook a little as she took a sip of her water.

“I deserve everything you just threw at me. We had our reasons for not saying anything to you.”

“What you’re telling me is that everyone knew about this, except me. Is that right? Did Astrid know?” The last words were whispered, and Deal couldn’t stand it any longer.

He couldn’t sit opposite her when she was breaking. Not when what he had to tell her had the capacity to render her panic-stricken.

Getting up, he rounded the small table and pulled out the chair next to her. He situated it so that he was on an angle and was facing her. “Astrid didn’t know. Don’t think for one second that she was keeping something from you. She wasn’t.” He waited for her to acknowledge what he was saying. She nodded, and murmured something about Astrid saying that to her earlier. “We told you we were doing further investigations of the place where we got that last ping on Courtney’s phone. Do you remember the map that was on the screen? The one with all the colored dots?”

“I do. What about it?”

“We said at the time that a lot of people go missing from that spot. What we also found is that a few of those missing have been found dead. Some of the dots on the screen showed locations of where the bodies were found. And other dots were of the people who are still missing.”

Her hands flew up and covered her mouth. “No!” The word a tortured whisper. “No. Please no.”

“We don’t know if what those victims went through also happened to Courtney, but we have to consider it. That’s why it’s taken me so long to give you this information. I wanted to cover every possible angle before we shared it. We got the police files to see if we could try to piece together any connection between them and Courtney. Or to see if there were any discrepancies that could rule out Courtney’s case falling into the same category as those who died.” Neither scenario was perfect. Either her sister was the next victim of the suspected serial killer, or she had been shipped to a trafficker and sold off.

“They’re connected, aren’t they? Those that are dead.” Tears trickled down her cheeks.

“We believe it’s possible. I’ve read through the files three times, and in terms of where they were taken and how they were killed, they’re all the same. The only difference is where their bodies were found.”

“Wait!” She twisted toward him, her brow furrowed, and her teeth worried her bottom lip. He could practically see the wheels turning in her mind. “You’re not saying… No, it can’t be. The police would say something. They would have to. You have to be wrong, it can’t be the work of a serial killer. There isn’t a serial killer terrorizing people in Los Angeles. We would know about it. The press would be on it like rabid animals.”

“I’m sorry, Collette. That’s the conclusion we’ve come to. And we’re as baffled as you are as to why the police haven’t said something. They either don’t believe they have a serial killer on their hands, or if they do, they’ve got good reason not to say anything.”

“This can’t be real. There’s no way something like this could be kept quiet. There’s bound to be people online, on various platforms, that have theories about this type of thing.”

The fact Collette could still be thinking clearly surprised the heck out of him. “Cass is already on it, and yeah, there’s a few posts about it. People are commenting, speculating the same as we are.”

“I don’t believe it. I don’t believe the police would keep something like this from us.”

“There have been reports of the killings in the press. We’ve found the articles. But there’s nothing to suggest that they’re all connected. Given some of the victims are homeless or drug addicts, we believe the police have the assumption that they’re drug deals gone wrong. Or people being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Like Collette, Deal was struggling to comprehend why the authorities weren’t seeing the pattern that they’d been able to when Cass had put all the dots up on the screen.

“But Courtney wasn’t homeless or a drug addict. She had a home, even if it wasn’t the best. She had me. And she would never touch drugs. She’s everything that the victims weren’t.”

As much as he wanted to give assurance that Courtney’s situation was different, he couldn’t. His gut was still telling him that Courtney had been the killer’s next target. “We know.”

“There’s only one reason you haven’t suggested she was trafficked. You believe she’s the next one. Whoever this person is, they took Courtney. She’s dead.” The last was spoken on a wail, and Deal’s heart broke for the woman in front of him. Without thinking he tugged her into his arms, and she came willingly, so deep in her grief.

He held her as sobs wracked her body, and his shirt dampened with her tears. Deal shouldn’t give her false hope. Shouldn’t say something that in all likelihood wasn’t true, but the sound of her cries was cutting him deep. “We don’t know that for sure.”

She leaned back, her hair a mess, her eyes red, and tear tracks marred her cheeks. “Don’t bullshit me. Don’t try and make me feel better when you know deep in your bones that she’s not coming back. She’s been missing for too long. If she’s not dead, she’s somewhere where she’ll never be found.”

Even with her world falling apart, she still had the guts to call him out. “You’re right, it doesn’t look good for her, but until we find a body, there’s still a chance that she’s alive and hiding.”

Abruptly, she pulled out of his embrace, rose from her chair and took a few steps away from him, her arms wrapped around herself as if giving herself the hug she needed. “I have to go. I can’t be here. I need to go where she was last seen.”

“We’ve been there. There’s nothing. We checked for cameras and asked around, but the people there aren’t ones who cooperate well.”

He hated breaking the bubble of determination, but there was no way in hell he was letting her go there by herself.

“Maybe they wouldn’t talk to you because.” She paused and waved her arm up and down in his direction. “You look like you could snap their neck without breaking a sweat. But they may talk to me, especially if I say I’m looking for my sister.”

Part of her assumption was right, he could do what she said without sweating, but they wouldn’t talk to her. “You won’t get anything out of them either. It’s lucky if they remember what they did two hours before you talked to them. They’re like your parents.”