When he saw us enter the hallway, Captain Sullivan waved to get our attention.
J.T. opened the captain’s office door, and we stood against the framework. “Two more girls have gone missing?”
The captain pushed back his heavy desk chair and got up. He jerked his head to the right when he reached us. “Meeting in the bull pen.” He jiggled his change in his pocket as he gave us a brief explanation while we walked. “Stone took the call from a Mrs. Kelly, and Mills took the call from a Mrs. Henry. They have the details.”
We entered the bull pen and pulled a few vacant chairs into the aisle between Mills’s and Stone’s desks. Sullivan sat on the corner of Andrews’s desk and crossed his arms and legs. He pointed at Stone. “You go first.”
“Yes, sir, I have the notes from the caller right here. A Mrs. Kelly called about a half hour ago. She said her daughter, Bethany, went to Paul’s Tap on the east side of town last night for ladies’ night and never returned home.”
I nodded. “That makes sense. Tuesdays are ladies’ night at most bars.”
Stone continued. “Anyway, I told the mom we couldn’t consider her daughter a missing person until twenty-four hours had passed. Under the circumstances, though, I got her contact number and said I’d call her back in an hour. That’s about the time Mills got a similar call. Turns out these girls are best friends and went out together last night for half-priced drinks. That’s when we informed Sullivan.”
“Did the mothers do the usual? Call all the closest friends, check their daughters’ social media pages, their jobs, and so on? Didn’t the girls work?”
“We didn’t ask all the details yet, Agent Monroe. I wanted to run this by you two and the captain before we alarm the parents any more than we already have.”
“You did the right thing, Stone. Not a problem,” J.T. said. “Did either mom say if they went to Paul’s Tap and asked questions?”
“We didn’t get that far.”
I looked at Sullivan. “We’re ready to pursue this, Captain. What’s your take?”
He stared at the ceiling as if he were counting tiles. “I agree. We need to move on this while it’s fresh.”
“Oh, by the way”—I turned to Fitch—“Mitchell Carter isn’t our guy.” I saw the disappointment on her face. “He has black hair, and he stands six two and two hundred pounds. He said he hadn’t talked to Molly since last Friday. Let’s put him on the back burner for now and keep looking.”
Captain Sullivan spoke up. “Okay, Andrews and Fitch, keep working the Molly Davis leads. Stone and Mills, follow up with the parents of the most recent missing girls.”
I grabbed my jacket from the chair and put it on. “We’ll go to Paul’s Tap and ask questions. Text us the vehicle information for both girls. They did drive to the bar individually, correct?”
“According to the initial notes we took, yes,” Stone said.
J.T. and I were back in the cruiser minutes later with the directions to Paul’s Tap displayed across my cell phone screen. “From here it looks like a fifteen-minute drive.” I watched out the passenger window as we passed block after block of the most depressed areas of Gary. “This investigation is going nowhere, J.T. We need more details.”
“We do have a description of sorts. A medium-sized guy that possibly has blond hair was seen kissing Molly at the trails. That much, we’re certain of. He has to be our number one suspect. With her car still on site, we know she didn’t leave there alone.”
“Right, but we still need more than that. I’m thinking he’s in the same general age range as the girls. So far, we have Taylor Dorsey as the youngest, at nineteen, and Corrine Lionel and Molly Davis, the oldest, both at twenty-three. Other than these latest girls, has anyone checked to see if the ladies had any common friends, hobbies, clubs they belonged to, that sort of thing?”
“Not sure, but call Sullivan and ask. With Corrine, Taylor, and Heather going missing months apart, they probably had no reason to connect them to each other. We’ll definitely start putting a profile together to work with, though. We need to know if there’s any current chatter going across the phone lines with Alex too. At this point, anything will help.”
I dialed the captain’s office phone. He picked up right away. “Captain Sullivan, Jade here. We never asked if anyone had made a connection between the girls.”
“We were working that angle with officers Jeffries and Christopher. They were checking the coffee shops around the university Taylor was a student at.”
“Has anything popped? Did any employees recognize her picture?”
“I’ll get back to you on that. It’s a long shot, Jade. Taylor went missing months ago.”
“I know, sir, but there has to be a common thread somewhere. I’ll touch base after we talk to the employees at Paul’s Tap.”
J.T. pulled into the pea-gravel parking lot and killed the engine. Three cars sat side by side, and two of them probably belonged to employees. We got out and scanned the area.
“Wow—this place is dead.”
“Nah, it’s just early, that’s all. The younger generation doesn’t go out until ten or later. That way they don’t have to spend so much money on drinks. They get started at home then enjoy the buzz once they’re at the bars.”
“How do you know so much about the drinking habits of youth?”
I shot J.T. a sideways grin. “Amber used to bartend, plus she’s young. I learned everything I know from her.”
“That’s scary.”
“Actually, it’s very helpful. I just taught you something new, didn’t I?”
“Humph, I guess so, but still, wouldn’t kids worry about getting a DUI before they even get to the bar?”
“Do kids worry about anything? That job belongs to their parents.”
We took the four cement steps up to the front door. Inside, one person sat cozied up to the bar, drinking a glass of beer. The bartender looked to be in his mid-twenties and wore a long brown ponytail and a goatee. He busied himself stocking the refrigerator with canned and bottled beer. He looked up and gave us a nod. J.T. and I seated ourselves at the opposite end of the bar.
The bartender wiped his hands on a rag and walked over. “What can I get for you two?”
“How about a couple of coffees and a side of information?” J.T. asked.
I chuckled. He was clever and a fast thinker.
“Sure, coming right up.”
I watched as the bartender poured two cups from what looked to be a fresh pot of coffee. I was thankful for that. He set them in front of us with a couple of packaged sugars and creamers.
“So what can I help you with?” He wiped the bar with his damp rag, probably out of habit. It looked perfectly clean the way it was.
I thought it best to introduce ourselves and hoped he’d feel more obliged to be as truthful as possible. “My name is Jade Monroe, and this is my partner, J.T. Harper. We’re FBI agents, and we have a few questions we hope you can help us with.”
He raised his brows. “I’ve never met FBI agents. You look like regular people.”
I smiled. “We are regular people. Your name is?”
“Jackson Clark.”
“Nice name. My old commander at the Washburn County Sheriff’s Department in Wisconsin was a man by the name of Chuck Clark. Anyway, Jackson, were you tending bar last night?”
“Tuesday night, most definitely. Actually, there were three of us tending bar. Ladies’ night, you know. This place really gets hopping after ten. What’s funny is, Tuesday brings in the masses, but come Wednesday night, it’s pretty dead here. Everyone stays home because they’re still nursing a major hangover. It’s like clockwork every week.”
“So last night was packed?”
“Jam-packed.”
“Do you have regulars?”
“Sure do. They’re the people we depend on most.” He topped off our coffees and placed a few more creamers on the bar.
“Do you know Bethany Kelly and Kristen Henry?”
He grinned. “Who doesn’t? They’re here every Tuesday night. Bethany comes first and holds down the fort until Kristen gets off work.”
“Kristen works nights?” J.T. pulled his notepad out of his inner pocket and wrote that down. “Do you know where?”
“Yeah, at the movie theater by the mall.”
I had no idea where that was, but it didn’t matter. Getting vital information from Jackson was more important. “Were they here last night?”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure I saw them from a distance, but I didn’t wait on them. Jen worked the bar tables. I worked the bar along with Abe.”
“Do you have any idea what they drive?”
“Nah, never asked.”
I looked around. “No cameras?”
“Nope. The owner is still stuck in the seventies, when he used to frequent this place on his way home from work every night. He eventually bought the joint. He says there’s no crime in the area, so we don’t need that expensive crap.” He smiled. “His words, not mine.” Jackson knocked on the bar surface. “So far he’s been right. This is a local hangout, mostly kids in their twenties. Haven’t had any real problems, probably because it’s a low-key type of place. We’re kind of invisible to the outside world.”
“Did you happen to see anyone sitting with Kristen and Bethany?”
“Can’t say that I did, but Jen would be the person to ask.” He looked over his shoulder at the clock. “She gets in at nine.”
“Thanks.” We had over an hour wait before Jen started her shift. “What do you want to do, J.T.?”
He tossed six bucks on the bar for our coffees. “Check your phone and see if you got a message about those cars. Then let’s walk the neighborhood. Maybe somebody saw or heard something unusual last night.”
We left the bar and crossed the lot to our cruiser. Inside, with the car on and the heater blowing, I checked my phone calls. A new message had come in twenty minutes earlier. I nodded at J.T., and he pulled out his notepad.
“Stone says Kristen has a late-model white Honda Civic, and the plate number is 429-FNP. Bethany has an older blue four-door Subaru wagon, and the plate number is YYK-604. He and Mills are still conducting the interviews with the parents.”
“Okay, ready to go out and do some knock and talks?”
“Sure, I just wish it wasn’t twenty-five degrees outside.” I slipped my hands into what was the only thing in the cruiser that might help a little—a pair of latex gloves pulled from the box in the backseat. I pulled up my coat collar and zipped it as high as it would go. “Okay, I guess I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”