Page 20 of The Couple's Secret
Josie dumped four half and halfs into her coffee and then a spoonful of sugar. With one hand she stirred it, while the other used her phone to scroll through countless reports and interviews from the case file about the Lachlan/Stevens disappearance. True to her word, Meredith had emailed it over within an hour.
“Let’s see.” The coffee scalded Josie’s tongue but she ignored it. There was something that had stoked her curiosity since the moment she read about the couple. “Pings from their cell phones placed them near a clearing along Geerling Road which apparently is not a residential area.”
“How far from the restaurant?”
“About four miles. No blood evidence, no tire tracks. No sign of them.”
Gretchen took a long sip from her cup. “That answers the question of where they were killed.”
“Here,” Josie said. “Someone was waiting for them in Brighton Springs, though. On their way home from the restaurant. Got Tobias to stop somehow. Or they were driving along and saw something they weren’t meant to see.”
From there, the couple and their car were transported to Denton. Whoever they’d encountered had managed to do it without leaving one iota of evidence. A gun was an easy way to control people. Had Tobias and Cora been restrained for the long drive to Denton? If there had been abrasions or bruising on their wrists or ankles, the evidence was long gone. Or had they been beaten into submission and then restrained?
“I’m assuming the phones were never found,” said Gretchen.
“They were not.”
She wondered if they’d been recovered from the sedan. They’d find out from Hummel later. If so, that meant whoever had murdered the couple had either destroyed them or made sure to turn them off before leaving Brighton Springs.
As if reading her thoughts, Gretchen said, “Whoever did this knew enough to make sure the phones couldn’t be tracked to Denton—or linked to any location that would lead back to them.”
Even seven years ago, it wouldn’t have taken a genius to realize the police would be able to track the couple through their phones, but Josie was continually surprised by how many criminals were caught because they were too stupid, too lazy, or too careless to make sure that their electronic devices didn’t give them away.
“Phones were a dead end,” Gretchen said. “What about the car? GPS? Infotainment system?”
Josie searched through several more reports. “The 2015 Hyundai Accent had neither.”
Gretchen made a noise of acknowledgment and slugged down more of her coffee. “And since the vehicle just spent seven years in the river, any DNA the killers might have left behind is gone by now. Does that file say anything about potential suspects?”
“Here’s something. Tobias was co-owner of At Your Disposal Junk Removal Company. It was doing well. So well that his business partner, Hollis Merritt, wanted to expand, move east, and set up a second location in Denton.”
Gretchen lifted a brow. “That’s certainly interesting considering Tobias and Cora were here in Denton all along.”
“Very interesting,” Josie agreed. “Tobias and Hollis disagreed on the cost and location of the expansion. Several employees reported hearing them argue over it. Hollis had an alibi for the night of the disappearance—he was… get this: in Denton spending the night with a woman. She corroborated his story. He got there at nine, which was around the time Tobias and Cora left the restaurant in Brighton Springs.”
“That’s pretty convenient if you’ve hired someone to take out your business partner,” Gretchen noted.
“True. Except now that Tobias and Cora have been found in Denton, it doesn’t look very good at all. Maybe it wasn’t a murder-for-hire thing. Maybe Hollis did the deed himself. The woman he was seeing could have lied. Hell, she could have helped him for all we know.”
“That’s possible,” Gretchen said. “Although how much money are we talking here? Does a junk removal company really bring in that much?”
Josie shrugged. “Plenty of people have killed for less.”
They quieted as the waitress returned with their food. Gretchen thanked her and then regarded her pile of pecan pancakes with something akin to lust in her eyes. “Don’t tell Paula.”
Josie shook her head but smiled. “How long do you think you can keep this little affair with sugary pecan treats from her?”
After giving her twins up for adoption as a young woman, Gretchen had been reunited with them eight years ago. They had both been college students by that time but Paula, Gretchen’s daughter, was hell-bent on making up for lost time. She’d moved in with Gretchen a few years earlier and now had her mother on a very strict diet and exercise regimen so that she’d be around as long as possible. Gretchen was in her late forties, hardly at death’s door, but she couldn’t deny Paula anything.
Except a promise to swear off pecan pastries and pancakes.
Gretchen stuffed a forkful into her mouth and spoke around it. “Tell her and they’ll never find your body.”
Josie laughed. “If she finds out I knew and didn’t stop you, they’ll never find my body!”
“Less focus on my dietary transgressions and more focus on the case, my friend.”
Snickering, Josie took a few bites of her omelet and went back to reading through the file. “This says that Fanning didn’t rule Hollis Merritt out but couldn’t find any evidence that his alibi wasn’t solid or that he hired someone to kill them.”
