LITMIR.BIZ

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“It helps us to get a full picture of Kelly. He’ll want to know who her girlfriends are, when Raymond last saw her, anything that might help us figure out what happened to her.”

      “We have to find her,” Lambert said. “I lost my wife... I can’t lose Kelly. She’s everything to me.”

      Sympathy for the man made Amanda squeeze his shoulder. “I promise you, Mr. Lambert, that Sergeant Thorpe and I will do everything we can to find Kelly and bring her back home to you.”

      He glanced down and studied his knuckles. Amanda narrowed her eyes. He had scrapes on his left hand. A gash on his right.

      She casually poured them both coffee, an image of Kelly at eighteen, when she’d won an award for most congenial, flitting through her head. “What happened to your hands?” she asked, sliding a cup of coffee in front of him.

      He twisted his fingers in front of him, his expression odd as if he didn’t remember. “I...was nervous when Kelly didn’t call me back. Went outside and cut some wood. Guess I scraped my knuckles.”

      His explanation was feasible. Still...his daughter was missing.

      “We’ll need a current photograph of Kelly for the media and to spread around to other law enforcement agencies.”

      Lambert reached inside his back pocket, removed his wallet and pulled out a picture of her. Amanda’s heart tugged. Kelly had always been pretty and had grown more so. She was dressed in a print dress, her long hair sweeping her shoulders.

      “That was a couple of months ago,” Lambert said. “I took her to the club to discuss the wedding plans.”

      Amanda studied the photo, thinking of her own father and how special their father/daughter dates had been.

      Worry gnawed at her for Kelly’s sake.

      If Kelly had been kidnapped by the same person who’d abducted the other girls, they might never find her.

      Kelly could already be dead.

      Or...she could be suffering now.

      Which meant every minute counted.

      Amanda claimed the chair across from Lambert. “You say your daughter was excited about the wedding. Does she have any enemies that you know of?”

      Another wave of sadness washed over the man’s face. “No. Everyone loves her. In high school she was voted most congenial and most likely to succeed.”

      Amanda had forgotten about the most-likely-to-succeed award.

      “In college, she worked on the school newspaper,” her father continued, “then earned her degree in English and planned to teach high school. She’s been applying for jobs and hopes to start in the fall.”

      Amanda cradled her own coffee cup, aiming for a casual tone. “You and Kelly get along?”

      “Oh, yes,” he said. “Kelly means everything to me.” He coughed. “When we lost her mother, she was depressed, and at first I thought what the hell am I going to do with a teenage girl? But then...we both missed Janelle and...” His eyes flooded with tears as he looked up at her. “She’s a good girl, Sheriff. A good girl.”

      “I know she is,” Amanda said, battling to keep her compassion at bay so she could ask the tough questions that needed to be asked. The first rule of police work was not to let your emotions get involved. Her father had taught her that, God rest his soul.

      “How about her and Raymond?” she asked. “Do they have any problems?”

      “Not that I know of,” Lambert said. “She adores him. I wanted them to take it slower, not marry till they had more money in the bank, but they insisted on going ahead, said they’d survive on love.”

      Amanda grimaced. She’d never been that naive. Maybe because she didn’t believe in love. Her mother and father sure as hell hadn’t loved each other.

      “Mr. Lambert, what about you? Do you have any enemies?”

      His eyes widened. “You think this might be about me?”

      “I don’t know, but we have to look at all the possibilities.”

      He stood and paced across the room. “No, I mean I own the bank and a few people got angry at me because I turned down loans. Filed a couple of foreclosures. But that’s business.”

      Money was a powerful motivator. “I’ll need their names.”

      He paused in his pacing, smoothing his hands down his suit jacket. “All right.”

      “Tell me about your financial situation,” she said. “Do you have a large portfolio of investments? A big savings account?”

      “You mean in case we receive a ransom call?”

      “Yes,” Amanda said. “That’s a possibility.” In fact, it would be preferable to the alternative. If someone called with a ransom request, they might have a chance of saving Kelly and catching the kidnapper.

      “I have some money,” he admitted. “Enough.”

      “Enough that someone might take your daughter to force you to pay them off?”

      He paled. “If this is about money, I’ll pay whatever they ask.”

      “Just make me a list of all of the people who might have a grievance against you,” Amanda said. “We’ll also need a list of all of Kelly’s friends so we can talk to them.”

      “Of course.”

      He headed back to the chair but paused by the whiteboard in the corner. Amanda tensed. On the back of that board she’d tacked photos of all the missing women from the past ten years. She didn’t want him to see them. “Mr. Lambert, sit down and—”

      But a strangled sound escaped Lambert as he flipped it over. He staggered back, shaking his head in denial.

      Anger hardened his voice when he spoke. “You haven’t found any of those girls, have you? And you’re not going to find my Kelly either.”

      Fear mingled with anger in Amanda’s chest. She’d inherited the ongoing case from Sheriff Lager, but Kelly had gone missing on her watch. An image of the pretty woman’s face taunted her. Kelly was her age, vibrant, planning her wedding. Looking forward to having a family and a long life ahead of her.

      But her life might already have been cut off because some crazy maniac had targeted her.

      And Amanda didn’t have a clue as to who it was.

      What if Lambert was right? What if she couldn’t save Kelly in time?

      * * *

      JUSTIN TAPPED THE notepad in front of Fisher. “Make a list of the groomsmen in the wedding and their contact information for me.”

      Anger blazed in Fisher’s eyes as he realized the implication. “What the hell? Kelly’s father and I came here for help, and now you’re treating me like a suspect. You think I had something to do with Kelly’s disappearance?”

      Justin forced his voice to remain level. The majority of missing-persons cases wound back to the family members or close friends. The fact that a string of females around the same age had gone missing was suspicious, but he couldn’t discount anything at this point.

      “I didn’t say that. But it’s important for us to talk to everyone who knew Kelly,” Justin said. “Female and male friends included. Maybe one of them saw or heard something that could be helpful.”

      Fisher shot up, glaring at Justin. “That’s bull. You want to ask them how Kelly and I got along. If I was jealous enough of an old boyfriend to hurt her.”

      “I will ask that, but it’s routine,” Justin said. “The first thing we do in an investigation is to clear family members and friends. Oftentimes, someone may tell us some detail to help us—it might be something small

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