“BURGLARIZED?” Luke stared at Woody. They were about to set out for the Lancaster sheriff’s office to formulate a plan of attack on their cold case. Because they’d been given the okay to work through the weekend, they decided to divide the workload and hoped to be able to comb through everything pertinent by Monday. Then the plan was to pool what important information they’d each pulled out and determine the most useful tidbits, see if they had a handhold and a place to start.

“No harm, no foul. Apparently Abby’s friend Jessica was house-sitting and she scared the guy off. Bill called me this morning.” Woody fastened his seat belt.

But Luke stopped the car in the driveway. “Does Jessica know what the guy was after?”

“She caught him in Abby’s office. As far as she can tell, nothing was removed.”

“What does Abby say?”

“I told Bill not to tell her.”

“What? Is that a good idea?” Luke was beginning to wonder if Woody was going overboard on the “protect Abby” angle.

“I don’t want her rushing back for no reason. Do you think we should call her?”

“Uh . . .” Now Luke stammered with the ball in his court. “I guess I’m not sure. I want her to get the rest and relaxation she needs away from all the bad stuff here, but . . .”

“When she calls Jessica to check in, Jessica will tell her.”

Luke had to be content with that response. He put the car into drive and they started the long trek to Lancaster. Traffic was light, and for the first part of the drive they bounced possible reasons Abby’s house was burglarized. It all circled back to the Triple Seven.

But who still had a stake in that investigation?

They talked themselves out after an hour and rode the rest of the way in silence. It wasn’t until they’d parked in the SD lot that Luke’s mind fully returned to the task at hand.

“Where do you want to start?”

In the conference room they had before them all the materials pertinent to Molly’s case.

“I’ll take the official police reports,” Woody said. “I’ll be able to read between the lines and sift out what is important.”

“Good idea.” Luke nodded. “I’ll go through the tip line files and the follow-ups.”

They sat for several hours and got through a good bit of the paperwork. After lunch they took a break to go over what they’d found so far.

The first step in opening a cold case was reconstructing the investigation from the beginning. So they’d drawn a time line of the investigation on the whiteboard. Point one was the date of the attack, and the last point was the most recent due diligence review done by Steve Jones on the tenth anniversary.

The due diligence reviews were extremely helpful. Many of these reviews were brief, noting only another check with CODIS, but it was useful to know that the case had not been buried away and never reviewed.

Luke stood in front of the board. The first point was the bus stop where Molly and her assailant had their fateful meeting. Also on the board was a map of the entire area, with pushpins of all the relevant locations in place: the Antelope Valley Mall, the strip mall where the assault occurred, and the road where Molly got away. Additionally they had a box of various reports, pages from the tip line logs, and all the follow-ups to the initial investigation. There were also pages of notes written by the investigators regarding Molly herself.

It was as important to understand the victim as it was to understand the crime. The original investigators had looked at Molly to ascertain her veracity and discovered that she was the proverbial good kid. She had no history of running away or fights or problems with high school classmates. She was an average student, on the swim team, and the day she was abducted, she’d had permission to be at the mall.

Particularly interesting to Luke were the girl’s references to God and prayer. The investigator asked her how she got out of the trunk.

“I prayed and prayed for God to help me with the rope. It was really tight at first, but the more I prayed, the looser it got. When my legs got loose, I thanked God and kicked something and it released the latch. I believe Jesus opened the trunk. He saved me.”

When Luke looked over the photos taken of Molly and saw the marks the tight ropes made on her wrists and ankles, especially on her wrists where the securely tied bonds had broken the skin, he didn’t have any problem entertaining the thought of a miracle freeing her. He wondered, looking at the reports on the girl’s struggles now, what had destroyed her faith over time, since it was obviously very strong ten years ago even after the horrible rape and kidnapping.

“Well, I’m not sure.” Woody studied the board. “As far as the crime scene or scenes, the strip mall where the rape occurred is no longer there, and there’s a big-box store there now. But it looks like not much else has changed in the area.”

“Yeah,” Luke said. “Not sure we could learn much from the mall even if it were still there. And the two servicemen who saved Molly were interviewed three times. Their stories were consistent. I’m not sure we need to recontact them.”

“Good call. They seemed squared away and innocent.”

“I’m drawn to a couple of other things,” he said, tapping on the table. “The most interesting stuff I found revolves around the composite drawing of the suspect.” He taped the picture up on the whiteboard. “I think the guy looks like Johnny Depp with short hair. All he needs is a little mustache.”

“I’ll take your word on that,” Woody said. “You think by focusing on this picture, maybe seeing if we can get it rebroadcast, we’d find the guy after all this time?”

“Maybe. The tip line logs document a call from a woman convinced she knew the guy. She said he looked exactly like her old neighbor, even named him. I’d like to connect with her, find out why she was so certain before we run to the media with the photo. My instincts are telling me this is our best bet.”

“Didn’t the original guys follow up?”

“Yeah, but it’s not clear what they found.” Luke pulled out a piece of paper. “See, here’s the guy’s name and address and a note that says Iraq, with a question mark.”

“Did you ask Jones about that?”

“I did, but he wasn’t familiar with it. He remembered the tip, that it went nowhere, but doesn’t recall exactly why. Other than this tip sheet, I don’t find any more references to this guy. Does his name ring a bell with you?”

“Nope, I didn’t see this name in anything I looked at. Maybe the note ‘Iraq’ means he was serving and it wasn’t possible for him to be our guy.”

“I thought that, so I asked Orson to check enlistment records. Once we hear back from him and know one way or another, I’ll have a better idea of the next step I want to take.”

As if on cue, Luke’s cell phone rang and he answered. It was Orson.

Luke put the call on speaker. “Speak of the devil, we were just talking about you. Were your ears burning?”

“Only if you really sit around and think of me as the devil. I have info for you. I got no match on that name you gave me. The guy never served.”

“Thanks; that helps.”

“Is he a suspect already?”

“Just an avenue to investigate. There’s a question as to why he was crossed off the list ten years ago.”

“Cool. I’m glad to hear it. If you do a great job on this case, it may clear the bottleneck no matter how the sponsors’ legal issues play out.”

“Sounds great. Thanks again for your help.” Luke hung up and looked at Woody. “Not in the service. I think I need to ask Faye if she’s heard of this guy.” He ignored Woody’s raised eyebrow and the flush he felt in his own face at the excuse to talk to Faye again.

Luke had spoken at length with Faye about Molly, and at the same time he learned more about the victim, he also learned a lot about Faye. He could tell she was still hurting over the loss of her husband. But she had strong faith and a strong sense of purpose, and Luke found that very appealing.

He cleared his throat and got back on track. “She might know something not in the notes. And I’m going to set up an appointment with the tipster. Her name is Brenda Harris. I’m pretty sure I can find her.”

“Tell Faye I said hello when you talk to her,” Woody said with a smile in his voice.

Luke ignored him and phoned Faye to ask if she remembered the tip from a woman who was certain she knew the face in the composite.

“No, I don’t. Did she have a name to put to the face?”

“Barone. Gil Barone from Northridge.”

“I don’t remember that, and if someone had mentioned that to me five years ago, I would have remembered.” Her voice turned hopeful. “It sounds like you’re already making progress. I’m impressed.”

“I don’t want to get your hopes up. This may just be a miscommunication, but I will set up a meeting with Harris if I can find her.”

“Well, miscommunication or not, I can tell you’re working hard. Thank you for that.”

“It’s what we do. Thank you for the time you put into this before us.” He wanted to say more, but Woody was watching, and there really wasn’t more to say. So he thanked her again and said good-bye.

Turning to Woody, “She doesn’t remember the name.”

Woody nodded, pensive. “That Faye sure is a looker. Too bad I’m not twenty years younger.”

“This from the guy who’s been divorced three times?”

“Not thinking of me, thinking of you. She took a shine to you. I could see it.”

Luke was sure his face flushed crimson. “Ah, Woody, don’t try to be a matchmaker here.”

“Just saying. I’ve been working with you for a while and you seem to live like a monk. No reason for that when there are women like Faye out there worth dating.” He held his hands up as Luke started to protest. “I’m a trained observer. I know what I see.”

“The woman still misses her husband,” Luke said, trying to ignore the “she took a shine to you” comment.

“Maybe you could give her a good reason to move on.”

Shaking his head, Luke tried to change the subject. “I did some poking around about Lucy Harper. She graduated from Jordan, so I talked to some people I know from church who were in her class. She was Simon’s girlfriend, on and off, from what the two people who remembered her said. I’ve also been searching the Web, but the name is common, and she could have married and now have a completely different name. Not sure if I’ll get anything anytime soon.”

“I wish I could help, but I didn’t know Simon at all. He didn’t hang around with his brother, and his actual arrest was in San Diego.”

“I’ll find her, I’m sure. That’s what I do.”

“I have faith in you.”

“I still think we should let Abby in on this.”

“Not unless we get something solid. Trust me, she’ll need a solid connection, not another wisp of smoke like she’s gotten all these years.”

Luke said nothing and prayed that Woody was right.