Faith smiled as Asher walked into the office several hours later carrying a plate of sandwiches, a bottle of water for her and a diet cola for him. “You’re going to make some lucky woman an amazing husband someday. She’ll enjoy being waited on. You certainly spoil me.”
He gave her an odd look then smiled, making her wonder what that look meant. “Make any breakthroughs while I was slaving away in the kitchen?” He set the plate and drinks down to one side, away from the color-coded folders and papers on the desk.
“Not yet. I can’t believe it’s been...” She glanced at the time display on her phone on the corner of her desk and grimaced. “Over four hours since we started researching Leslie Parks and we still don’t have a clue about what happened to her. It would help if TBI and Gatlinburg PD weren’t so stingy about sharing their info. If it wasn’t for the news reports, we wouldn’t even know that she was abducted from her home.”
“Speaking of news reports, the TBI press conference is supposed to start soon.” He took the remote from one of her desk drawers and turned on the TV beside the massive map on the far wall that they’d used when trying to find Jasmine’s grave.
After turning on closed captioning and muting the sound, he took the largest of the two ham and cheese sandwiches he’d made and enthusiastically began scarfing down his very late lunch, or early dinner since it was past four in the afternoon.
Faith shook her head. “I don’t know how you don’t get fat.”
“Why?” he asked around a mouthful. “It’s just a sandwich. No chips or cookies.”
She motioned toward hers. “Twice the size of my sandwich and you’re a third of the way through in one massive bite.”
He took a drink before answering. “I’m hungry. Besides, I’m twice your size. Of course, I eat twice what you do. I’m surprised you don’t blow away in a strong wind. I’ll be even more surprised if you finish half of your sandwich.”
She took a large bite just to prove him wrong and then promptly ruined her point by choking on her food.
He laughed and pounded her back until she waved him away, begging for mercy. Her eyes were watering as she coughed in between laughs.
Finally, she drew her first deep breath and wiped her eyes. “Serves me right for trying to compete with you.”
“I’ll always win,” he promised. “No matter what the contest.”
“I’m pretty sure there are more ticks in my win column than yours right now.”
He shook his head. “No way. You still owe me over our bet about that anchorwoman.”
“Dang. I forgot about that. I guess we’re eating steak tonight. Well, maybe not tonight. Not with it this late already. And time’s our enemy with Leslie missing.”
His expression turned serious. “Rain check. Definitely. Hopefully, by this time tomorrow, we’ll—”
“Asher. Turn up the sound. The press conference is starting.”
He grabbed the remote. “Look at Frost, front and center. Always wants to preen for the cameras, even when he has nothing to say.”
“The camera loves him just as much as he loves it,” she admitted.
He gave her the side-eye. “If you like the stoop-shouldered, gray-haired, senior type, I suppose.”
She laughed. “He has a sprinkling of gray, enough to make him look debonair. And he’s not a senior or stoop-shouldered.”
“If you say so.”
About ten minutes later, he held up the remote. “Heard enough of this nonsense?”
“Definitely.”
He muted the sound again. “In spite of all their talking, what they actually have is a big fat nothing.”
“That’s my take, too,” she said. “Basically all they did was confirm what we already knew—that she was abducted from her home. The abductor sure is bold.”
“Calm, cool, able to snatch a young woman from her house in broad daylight without anyone noticing. That’s not the act of a first-timer. He’s confident, patient. I guarantee he’s done this before.”
She sat back beside him, arms crossed. “That supports the theory that he’s the same perpetrator who took Jasmine. Five years later, more mature, confident, experienced.”
“Agreed. Maybe we’ve been going at this all wrong. We’ve been approaching it like we do all our cases, trying to gather as many facts about the victim as we can and build a timeline. That hasn’t gotten us anywhere and it’s what TBI and Gatlinburg PD are doing—Investigation 101—by the book. Let’s throw the book away, make a leap in logic. We already assumed that Jasmine was one of the bodies. Let’s assume we also know we’re dealing with the same perpetrator and see where that takes us.”
“What if we’re wrong and we waste time chasing that theory?”
“Then we’ll be no worse off than we are now. We have nothing to show for all the hours we’ve been working. Come on. Grayson wanted us to work on this because we know the case. Let’s use that experience, jump in where we were on Jasmine’s investigation and see where it leads.”
She sat straighter. “You’re saying build off our geographical profiling we were already working on.”
“Absolutely. If it’s the same guy, then he’s lost his favorite burial grounds. He needs somewhere new. A place he can take his victim that’s secluded, quiet, and offers options for...whatever he wants to do.”
She rubbed her hands up and down her arms again. “A place where he can dispose of the body, too, just like we theorized in Jasmine’s case.”
“A theory that proved true. Same guy, same—”
“Habits,” she said, feeling more enthusiastic now.
He pushed back from the desk. “I’ll get the map.”
“I’ll clear some space.”
He strode across the room and carefully pulled the three-foot-wide map off the wall where they’d taped it months earlier.
She stacked their papers and folders into neat piles on the floor.
He grinned as he waited. “Even when you’re in a hurry, you’re organized.”
“Cleanliness is next to godliness.” She frowned. “Wait. Wrong quote.” She shrugged, brushed a few crumbs off the desk and then dumped them in the garbage can while he smoothed out the map on top.
“Colored pens?” he asked.
“Here, on my side.” She opened the bottom left drawer and selected two markers. “Red this time? We used blue for Jasmine.”
“Works for me.” He took one and they both got on their knees on their chairs and leaned over the map. “We know the Parks live at the same address as they did when Jasmine went missing. So we can start with a red circle around that.”
She drew a large circle around the house that already had a blue circle from when they began noting areas where the first sister had been known to frequent. “I wish we had time to talk to our convicts again.”
“Let’s cross our fingers that we can use the same reasoning they told us about to think like Leslie’s abductor. Our theory is it’s the same guy, so he’d have the same thought process.”
“Right. Scary to make all these assumptions without facts, but I’m game to try.” She drew another red circle around a horse ranch business for taking people on trail rides in the Smoky Mountains foothills.
He seemed surprised by what she’d circled. “Stan’s Smoky Mountains Trail Rides. We talked through all the tourist traps when making our first pass on the map for Jasmine. I can’t imagine Leslie’s abductor trying to sneak her past people lining up for trail rides.”
“We’re trying to think outside the box, right? The TBI and police are covering the box. They’re following standard protocols, performing knock and talks, canvassing Leslie’s neighborhood trying to find someone who saw something out of place, noticed some stranger in an unfamiliar car, that kind of thing. We did all that with Jasmine and found nothing. No one in her neighborhood or even the immediate surrounding area had any useful information to help with the investigation.”
He was starting to look as enthusiastic as she was feeling. “You’re saying skip all that, because we covered it once already, again assuming we have the same perpetrator. We cover the places outside law enforcement’s current search zone, places they won’t get to anytime soon.”
“Now we’re on the same wavelength again.” She tapped the circle she’d just drawn. “This place seems promising to me. It’s not all that far from the burial site and yet has many similarities. Familiar types of surroundings and advantages could place this in the killer’s comfort zone. That’s what the convicts told us, that they typically had specific types of territories they considered theirs, places where they felt secure. That’s where they hunted.”
“And where they buried their dead.”
She grimaced but nodded her agreement.
He ran his fingertips across the map, exploring the topography symbols that showed many of the waterfalls in the area, major trails, elevations of the various foothills and mountains. It also showed the roads in the vicinity of the stables. “I rarely go out that way, don’t even remember this place. It’s not on a main thoroughfare between Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge, or any other towns. There wouldn’t be much traffic to worry about. And there should be pull-offs since it’s in the foothills, safe places where someone can park their car to take pictures of the mountains.”
“Places where a killer could pull off the main road and no one would think anything of it. He could park in one of those and walk Leslie onto the trail-riding land.”
He considered the map again then gave her a skeptical look. “Theoretically, sure. But the land around that ranch has rough terrain, steep climbs. I don’t see anyone making it up those foothills without a horse, which is kind of the point of running a trail-riding business there. Leslie’s picture is all over the news. Her abductor wouldn’t want to risk someone seeing him try to lead her into the mountains. The weather is mild today, perfect for sightseeing or riding. That place has to be crawling with tourists right now, even if it is getting late in the day. I say we skip the horse ranch and look down this main road for something more appealing to our killer. Someplace more isolated.”
“I’d agree with you, except that today is Wednesday. This particular business is only open on weekends. No tourists to worry about.”
He arched a brow. “You sound sure about that. I know you didn’t call them to schedule yourself a trail ride. You hate horses.”
“I don’t hate them. They hate me.”
“You got bucked off as a kid and stepped on once as a teenager. Deciding all horses hate you because of those two minor incidents is rather extreme.”
“Minor? You should have seen the bruises I had from being thrown. They lasted for weeks. And the beast who stepped on my foot broke two bones. It still hurts sometimes, all these years later.”
He grinned. “One of these days I’ll get you on a horse again and you’ll change your mind.”
“No way. Unlike you, I didn’t grow up around them. And I don’t intend to do anything to change that going forward.”
“Back to my original question. Why do you know so much about this place?”
“Daphne’s been visiting, remember? She went trail riding with some of her friends last week. I did some of the research for her, called around, made the reservations. She didn’t want to wait for a weekend, so we marked this place off her list. She ended up at a place in Pigeon Forge.”
“Makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is for a trail-riding business to only be open two days a week. Seems like they’d lose a ton of money limiting their options like that in a town that lives and dies by the tourism dollar.”
“I asked Stan Darden, the owner, about that when I called. He said he and his son, Stan Darden Junior, used to run the place seven days a week. But the father is retiring and downsizing. It’s just the two of them now during the week, taking care of the remaining horses. They have others who help on weekends, earning enough for him to help offset the maintenance costs. That’s the only reason he keeps it open anymore, so he can afford to keep his horses.”
“I wonder what the son thinks about his dad essentially letting the business die instead of giving it to him. Regardless, I agree we should take a look. With only the two Stans around during the week, our perpetrator could easily park down the road, like we said, walk Leslie onto the property, maybe staying in the tree line on the peripheral edge. Once he’s out of sight of the main house and doesn’t see any activity at the stables, maybe he takes her into an empty stall or tack room. If he’s comfortable with horses, he could even take a couple out and escape into the foothills with her. The roadblocks the state police likely have on the main highways in and out of the area won’t stop someone on horseback from escaping through the woods. How far is this place from the Parkses’ residence?”
“About twenty minutes, like where he took Jasmine. It’s just in a different direction from her home. But get this—it’s only five minutes from his makeshift cemetery, in the same geographical area where he feels comfortable. If TBI or the local cops aren’t considering this ranch, I believe we should.”
“Agreed.”
She wrote a note on the map, naming the ranch as their first place of interest. “What other promising locations should we focus on?” She ran her finger on the map down the road past the trail-riding place, studying the names and descriptions they’d put on it earlier. “Maybe this house here. It’s isolated. No neighbors anywhere around to speak of. I can search property records, see if it’s occupied full-time or a vacation rental. It’s one of the places we were going to research next for Jasmine if the scent dog hadn’t hit on our original location.”
When he didn’t respond, she glanced at him. He seemed to be lost in thought as he stared at the map, his brows drawn down in concentration.
“Faith to Asher, come in. What’s going on in that brilliant but math-challenged mind of yours?”
“What?” He glanced up, seemingly surprised. “Oh...the stables. There’s something bothering me about those.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “Stables. Horses. I heard something earlier, somewhere.”
“About horses?”
He nodded. “I can’t remember where, or why...wait. The news. That’s it.” He grabbed the remote control.
“What, Asher? Tell me.”
“The press conference, after it was over. There was a story on the ticker the news runs along the bottom of the TV about some stables. But I didn’t pay attention to what it said.” He pressed the rewind button until the feed was at the end of the press conference. Then he fast-forwarded and reversed several times, frowning at the TV. “Yes, there.” He pressed Play.
She stared up at the screen, reading the captions. “Blah, blah, blah...okay, same stables I circled. A horse broke out of its pen this morning. They’re warning motorists in that area to be careful in case the horse wanders onto the road.”
“Not exactly, darlin’. Two horses went missing.”
She frowned. “Okay, two. But they said the horses broke out of a pen. They didn’t say went missing.”
“No. They didn’t. I’m saying it. What if they didn’t break out? What if someone took them and made it look like the horses escaped on their own? Not long after Leslie was abducted?”
She checked their notes on the map, around the red circles, the distances between them. “When did the horse thing happen?”
“Early this morning. The owner, or whoever was checking on the horses, realized they were gone around ten.”
She stared at him. “Leslie went missing just after nine. Twenty minutes from the horse place.”
He smiled. “Stables.”
“Whatever. That’s enough time for our perpetrator to drive there—if they did go to this place—leave his car on a pull-off, steal the horses and—”
“Force her at gunpoint or knifepoint to ride up into the foothills. He doesn’t have to know the area. The horses do. They’re trained to follow the trails. Once he gets high enough, far enough, he could go off-trail, take her somewhere isolated where no one ever goes.”
They both stared down at the map, considering the possibilities, talking about other potential hiding places. But they kept coming back to the stables.
“It’s a long shot,” he said. “We have no evidence either way, just supposition.”
“And it assumes the killer is comfortable with horses.”
“He’s comfortable outdoors, has been in this area for years. It’s not a huge leap to assume he could be familiar with horses given that there are so many horse-riding businesses around the Smokies. But, honestly, even a novice could handle a trail horse. That’s the whole point. They’re docile and trail-trained so tourists who’ve never sat on a horse before are safe around them. Once you’re on their back, they practically guide themselves.”
“You’d still need a saddle. A novice wouldn’t know how to put one on. I sure wouldn’t.”
“If he chose this place, he either has the background to prep the horses or—”
“He forced one of the ranch hands to do it. Or, I guess it would be the son, or father, since they’re the only ones there during the week.”
He shook his head. “That didn’t happen or the news would have said that. They always go with the most sensational story angle. Someone being forced to saddle some horses would definitely be a bigger story than a small note about motorists watching out for horses on the loose. I’m a transplant around here. Horses didn’t escape all that often where we lived, if ever. You’ve told me your family visited here a lot on vacations. How common is it for this kind of thing to happen? Ever heard of that on the Gatlinburg news before?”
She stood. “No. Never. We need to check this out. Now. We should call the TBI. Let them handle it. Goodness knows they can wrestle up a lot more manpower than we can to search for her. Maybe they can get a chopper up and—”
“Scare Leslie’s horse into plunging down the side of a mountain? A trail horse is docile, but it’s still a horse. A chopper could spook it. Regardless, do you honestly think the TBI would put even one person on this if we called? What would we tell them? That we’re working a case we’re not supposed to be working? That we drew some circles on a map and guessed that some horses that got out of their stalls might have been taken by the bad guy? With absolutely no proof whatsoever? What do you think they’d do with that information?”
She frowned. “They’d laugh us off the phone. Then they’d complain to Grayson that we broke the rules of UB’s contract with law enforcement, not to mention the warrant. They’d try to get us fired. Or worse, arrest us.”
“And while they’re comparing jock straps to see whose is bigger, Leslie is all alone with a serial killer. Maybe she’s at these stables, maybe not. But so far, that’s our best educated guess. If Leslie was Daphne, what would you do?”
She grabbed her purse from near one of the stacks on the floor. “You drive. I’ll call Grayson.”