Page 27 of The Lost Bones
“Yes. She isn’t answering. Something is wrong.” Dave’s eyes widened. “She was supposed to start recording a special an hour ago. That’s why we’ve been airing her old footage. It was an interview with someone important from London. She wasn’t going to miss that.”
An intern interrupted them, whispering something in Dave’s ear.
“Think she’s just throwing her weight around?” Nick muttered.
“Her office was locked from the inside. Please come take a look.” Dave led them to some rooms in the back of the studio. “She usually retires here for hours. Has a bed in here as well. We just got a few guys to break the door down…”
He paused in front of the open door. Mackenzie and Nick went in and froze. The large suite had red walls and wooden furniture. There was a bed in a corner, but mostly it was couches and tables with vanity mirrors and a slew of makeup products.
Everything was a shambles. Two lamps were on the floor with their bulbs smashed. A table had been turned over. The couches were out of alignment. Makeup products were scattered on the floor. The futon on the bed had been ripped. And the window was open, curtains fluttering in the chilly wind that permeated the room.
“What the hell.” Dave cursed and began shouting at some intern about security protocols.
“Call it in,” Mackenzie said, treading carefully through the room, finding a phone on the floor. “This is a crime scene.”
“No one heard anything?” Nick asked Dave, who was standing by the door white as a ghost. “There was clearly a struggle here.”
“It’s always loud in the studio. And Debbie had a habit of blasting music…” Dave ran a hand through his hair. “I need water.”
“We need security tapes from all the CCTV cameras around here, and no one leaves until we take their statement,” Mackenzie instructed, inching closer to the open window and peering out. It overlooked one of the many lakes in Lakemore. The water looked like ink, perfectly still on this windless night. The moon was full, a sparkling silver disc reflected on still waters. Like a painting.
“Second disappearance in less than a week after months of peace,” Nick said in a quiet voice dripping with panic. “Think this is a coincidence?”
“Debbie is a public figure. She rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way.” It felt like a lie. But maybe she was just being paranoid. Especially after Austin’s words.
“Yeah, but the timing is suspicious as hell,” he continued, while Mackenzie struggled to contain her anxiety. “And she hates you.”
“She hates a lot of people.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I’ll ask tech to look for muskrat hair first thing.”
Mackenzie tried swallowing the lump in her throat, hoping that this disappearance had nothing to do with her. “If it’s related… Courtney was killed immediately after she was taken.”
“Debbie might have no time.”
SEVENTEEN
APRIL 15
Mackenzie’s feet slapped against the concrete. As the sun floated up the horizon, drenching the sky in a rosy glow, it ignited all the colors around her. The rich browns of pine trunks. The silver-cream lake. Green wands of grass. A cocktail of scents assaulted her nostrils. The air had lost its bite. She threaded through the woods this time, taking a different path from her usual route. The ground was swathes of waving green. Her bare arms brushed against the vibrant tips of leaves and flowers. The dappling sunlight made the morning mist blanketing the grass look like crystalline flakes. It was all picturesque and idyllic. But as she kept pushing forward, the light began changing. The ground became uneven and the trees crowded together. She had to squeeze her way through. The trickling sunlight was blotted out by thick leaves and branches.
And then there was a patch of darkness. Even the sun couldn’t reach here. The shadowy trees looked menacing, as though they didn’t like her being here.
She took out her earbuds and listened for sounds. No leaves rustled. No birds cawed. Her breathing was the only sound in this part of the woods where she felt like a trespasser.
When her phone rang, she jumped out of her skin. “Hello?”
“Mack?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“You’re breaking up,” Nick said. “Where are you?”
Good question. “Just out for a run. Bad reception. But I can hear you fine. What’s up?”
“I’m patching Anthony through. He got something for us.”
Anthony worked at the crime lab in Seattle, an old, lanky man with clumps of white hair around his head, and large eyes. “We picked up muskrat fur from Debbie’s bed,” he said. Mackenzie’s heart sank. “We compared it to the samples obtained from Sophie Fields and Courtney Montenegro. They come from the same source.”
