The girl at FedEx has a flirty smile, and when I tell her that I’m working with the police on a case, she seems even more interested in me. I play along, grinning back and leaning toward her on the counter like I’m about to ask for her number.
“Do y’all know who killed that guy?” she asks, eyes big. “They’re saying it was a girl.”
I give her a coy look. “You know I’d love to tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.”
She laughs like she’s never heard that before, and I sort of hate myself for using such an overdone joke. “Seriously, I need to trace a package. Can you help me with that?”
“Depends,” she says.
I know this game. It’s the one where she dangles the information carrot, and I offer to take her for coffee. She can’t tell by looking at me that I’m a nightmare in relationships, that I start out strong, then drift so far into myself that no one can reach me.
My shrink tells me I have insight into my mental state, that it’s a good indicator of an eventual recovery. Tell that to the women I’ve hurt. Though I long for an end to the loneliness, I don’t want to take anyone else down on the way.
She seems like a nice girl; I change my body language so I won’t lead her on. I get to the point and ask her to do a search for packages sent to Hannah Boon in the last month.
She pretty quickly comes up with the package sent to her via her in-laws. It was the box I saw from Seattle. I’ve already checked to see if there really is a Seattle company called Jack’s Sporting Goods. I found nothing. “Where did the package originate from?” I ask. “I mean, not what was on the Sender line, but the FedEx office it was shipped from.”
She does a little looking, then sucks in a breath. “Oh my gosh. It’s not from Seattle. This was sent from one of our Atlanta stores.” She looks at me like she’s just saved the day. “Do you think that’s where that killer is?”
I give her a look that reminds her I can’t say, but I know she interprets it as more flirting. “Can you do a search of any packages sent from Hannah Boon in the last month?”
Eager to help more, she clicks away. Finally, she turns her screen where I can see it. “Yes, she sent a package just a few days ago to someone named Liz Harris in New York. Do you think the killer’s in New York?”
I ignore the question this time. “Can you look up that recipient and see her history? Has she shipped or received packages before?”
She looks excited, as if I’ve just thought of a genius plan.
“Yes! Liz Harris has been getting packages at that address for three years. Before that, she had a Shreveport address. Is this the killer?”
“No,” I say firmly, hoping she doesn’t consider this grist for the gossip mill. I think for a moment.
So Hannah’s package—the cardboard box I saw—could have come from Casey. Why else would it have a fake Sender address? But that doesn’t mean Hannah’s shipment went to Casey. If Liz is a real person with a history at that address, the package probably had nothing to do with Casey.
Still . . . the timing of Hannah’s package going to Liz Harris could be important—just a couple of days after she received the Jack’s Sporting Goods box. “Do me a favor,” I say, glancing at her name tag. “Linda, could you give me printouts of the packages sent immediately before and after the one Hannah Boon sent to New York?”
She gets right on it. “You’re really good,” she says as she types. “I would never think of all this.”
“That’s why they pay me the big bucks,” I tease.
“Here they are.” She prints them out and hands them to me. “Anything?”
They’re both from different people.
“Were either of these paid for with the same credit card Hannah used on the Liz Harris package?”
She checks. “No. Both were paid for with cash.”
I study the addresses. The package sent before the one to New York was a return to Pottery Barn. The one sent immediately after was to Grace Newland at an Atlanta hotel.
Pay dirt. The sender is listed as John Smith. Hannah isn’t very creative.
Grace Newland. Could that be the name Casey is going by?
“Linda, you’ve been amazing. Just what I needed.”
She beams. “Anytime. Seriously. If you need anything else, just call.” She jots down her cell number and I take it.
“Listen, don’t talk about this, okay? We don’t want anyone tipped off.”
“I never would,” Linda says, but I doubt she can contain it.
“I mean it,” I tell her. “You could be charged with obstruction of justice.”
Her smile fades. “Oh. Wow. I won’t say a thing.”
When I leave FedEx, I head to the police department and go up to the Major Crimes Unit, where Gordon Keegan sits at his desk talking on the phone. I lift my hand in a wave, and he takes his feet off his desk and motions for me to come over. I take a seat on a folding chair in his cubicle and wait for him to get off.
Finally, he hangs up and shakes my hand. “Please tell me you’ve found her.”
“I might have,” I say. “I have an address in Atlanta where she may have received a package.”
For some reason I can’t quite name, I decide not to tell him about the name Grace Newland. It may be a false lead, but that’s not really why I hesitate to share it. Maybe it’s a pride thing. I want to find her before he does.
“I need to go there and see if she’s at that hotel. I checked the schedule and the next flight to Atlanta is in two hours. Can you let the Atlanta police know I’ll be coming? I may need them to help me make an arrest.”
“Absolutely,” he says.
“One other thing. I still need the file on her father’s death.”
“Whose father’s death?”
“Casey’s. The suicide?”
He stares at me blankly for a moment. “Oh, right.”
“I’d especially like to see any video of Casey’s interview after finding her dad. That could tell me something about her mind, her emotions. Like why she might have snapped and murdered a friend.”
He scratches his eyebrow with the back of his thumb. “Okay. Yeah. Might take some time. I’m kind of up to my eyeballs.”
Not satisfied, I try again. “It’s just that I talked to her mother, who insists Andy Cox didn’t kill himself. That it was murder.”
“The mother’s a mental case,” he says. “Probably why he offed himself.”
His callous sentiment strikes me.
“Look, just go to Atlanta,” he says. “If you find her, the file won’t matter. If you don’t, I’ll shoot it to you.”
I was hoping to study the file on the plane, but I can see that he isn’t budging on that, so I head to the airport.
The flight is only an hour and a half, and when I arrive and turn my phone back on, I see that I have a text from Keegan, telling me the name of my contact at the Atlanta PD in case someone needs to verify my credentials. I rent a car and head to the hotel where the package was received.
After explaining who I am, I show Casey’s picture to the woman at the front desk, and she narrows her eyes. “Yeah, I think I’ve seen her. I recognize those eyes.”
“She may be going by the name Grace Newland. Is she still here?”
She types something into the computer, then shakes her head. “No, she checked out the day before yesterday.”
“What else does it show? Did she have a vehicle? A tag number? Did she receive any other packages?”
She looks at her file, then shrugs. “She wrote that she was driving a white Kia. I didn’t get a model or tag. That’s all we ask for. And she received one package, which she picked up right before she checked out.”
“Credit card?”
“She paid cash,” she says.
Disappointed, I look around at the ceiling corners. “Do you have cameras in the hallways? In the parking lot?”
“Yes,” she says.
“I’ll need to see the video of those days.” Maybe I can see her tag number, or any changes she’s made to her appearance.
The girl checks in the back, and I hear her talking on the phone. Finally, she comes back. “I’m sorry, but it’s on a two-day cycle. After a couple of days it’s recorded over. We don’t have that day.”
I can’t believe it. “Why have a security camera if you do that?”
“Because most of the crimes in the hotel are reported within twenty-four hours. We keep the video long enough for that. I’m really sorry.”
Unbelievable. I ask her if Casey asked for directions or a map, or said anything about where she was going. She says she doesn’t remember talking to her.
I find the business center. Maybe she left a trail on the computer. Nothing significant comes up in its history. Maybe she didn’t use it. By now she probably bought a computer of her own. She seems to have cash. I wonder where she got it. Is someone helping her?
I can’t believe I’ve come to another dead end. How can this keep happening?
She could have gone anywhere—north or south, farther east, back west. She doesn’t have family or friends in Georgia that I’ve been able to trace. But that might be precisely why she ended up here.
Before going back to the airport, I check with the bus and train stations. Another dead end.
Casey Cox is smarter than the average fugitive. She might be smarter than me.