The incident room was buzzing. Over the past few days, the numbers of analysts, operators and detectives filling the cavernous room had steadily increased, as more manpower was brought to bear on this unsettling case. Normally requests for extra resources were met with Hoskins’ blunt rebuttal, but not this time, such was the pressure from the top for a result. The Tribune’s continuing fascination with the case was not helping, and an emotive press conference from Jones’s bereaved fiancée had only added fuel to the fire. The consensus in the media, and the general public, was that the CPD was dragging its feet on this one.
Gabrielle’s gaze was glued to her phone – she’d just received a reminder from her husband about a school baseball match later – but she didn’t need to have her eyes on her team to sense the energy in the room. If the naysayers could be here now, watching them hitting the phone lines, chasing down leads, arguing, analysing, then they would have a very different view of the department’s efforts.
‘Boss …’
Gabrielle turned to see Miller approaching.
‘I think I may have something for you …’
Gabrielle slid her phone into her handbag.
‘Go on …’
‘Shall we?’
Miller gestured to Gabrielle’s office, then stepped inside. Gabrielle followed her, catching a brief glimpse of Montgomery, who was hovering nearby, as she did so. She looked ill at ease, even a little downcast, leading Gabrielle to wonder whether it had in fact been she who’d unearthed this lead. Office politics would have to wait, however – hard intel was what they needed now.
‘We’ve been ringing around local construction companies, cleaning outfits, removals firms,’ Miller began, as Gabrielle walked past her, slinging her bag down on her desk, ‘to see if anyone matching Redmond’s description has worked for them in the last six months. And we found this …’
She handed Gabrielle a faxed copy of an employee form from a company called CleanEezy.
‘Who are they?’
‘Carpet cleaning, curtains, that sort of stuff. This guy’s been working on and off for them as a freelancer for the past five months.’
Gabrielle looked at the name on the form – Conor Sumner – then at the attached photo. It was a small black-and-white photo, but unless Redmond had a doppelgänger, it was him. The birthmark was unmistakable.
‘Have we checked out the address on the form?’ Gabrielle asked, urgently. ‘1566 West Lamont Street. Is that Cicero? Forest View?’
‘Doesn’t exist,’ Miller replied. ‘The street stops at 1450. But that’s not the interesting part.’
Gabrielle could see the ghost of a smile drift across Miller’s lips, as she handed her superior a second piece of paper. Gabrielle took in the contents – it was a copy of a paid invoice from CleanEezy. Her eye was immediately drawn to the client name – Jacob Jones.
‘When was this?’ Gabrielle demanded.
‘Two months ago. Jones gets his carpet cleaned twice a year, likes to keep the house spick and span. On this occasion, the operative assigned the job –’
‘Was Conor Sumner …’
Gabrielle’s gaze was already fixed on Sumner’s name, printed in bold on the company invoice.
‘So, two months before Jones vanishes,’ Gabrielle continued, thinking aloud, ‘Kyle Redmond has the run of the place. Carpet cleaning takes … what? Three, four hours?’
Miller nodded.
‘A busy guy like Jones isn’t going to hang around for that. Presumably Redmond would have had free rein. To go where he liked, do what he pleased. Maybe there were spare keys …’
Gabrielle petered out, her mind turning on the possibilities.
‘Ok, pull everyone off our other lines for the next few hours,’ she continued suddenly. ‘We need to find this guy today.’
Miller ran from the room to do Gabrielle’s bidding. All thoughts of her sons’ baseball match had already evaporated, as the familiar adrenaline kicked in. Five minutes ago, Redmond had been one of a number of suspects they’d been investigating. Now he had jumped straight to the top of the list.