Page 42 of All He Takes
She squinted. "Could it be... Harold?"
"Harold?" Ken lifted brow.
"Harriet and Olden. Combine them, you get the first name 'Harold.'"
Ken nodded, understanding filling his eyes. "Then the last name could be Smithson? Or just Smith?"
"Harold Smith," Nicky said aloud. "If we narrow down any Harold Smith or Smithsons in Florida with a 1998 Hana Kuma, then we might be onto something."
Maybe it was a longshot. Maybe this whole idea was off the mark, but based on this guy's profile, it seemed completely possible he'd leave a mark like that.
"That's a good start," Ken said. "You're right. He's narcissistic, but he's also very careful. He isn't an idiot."
"Right," Nicky said, nodding. "He knows what he's doing, which means he's using his name."
"Right. But it's still a lot of work. We'll have to go through every Harold Smith or Smithson with a Hana vehicle registered in 1998. It's going to take a while."
Nicky grabbed her laptop and opened it up. "Not if we narrow down the list," she said. "We're looking for a man named Harold Smith or Smithson, with a Hana Kuma, between the ages of twenty and fifty. Likely with a criminal record. Let's start there. We can do this."
"Okay, you narrow down the list," Ken said. "I'll make some calls."
Nicky began to type. "Thanks, Ken. This means a lot to me," she said.
"You mean a lot to me. We're in this together," Ken said, putting a hand on Nicky's shoulder.
She smiled, feeling herself blush. She cleared her throat and got back to work.
There were many people with the name Harold Smith or Harold Smithson in Florida. However, only fifteen of them were registered to have a Hana Kuma car--and only three of those happened to have the 1998 model.
Harold Smith from Miami. Sixty-one years old, a bit older than their profile, but still possible. He had no criminal record, but had been reported for sexual harassment once in his fifties. Miami was also where Paris Conner went missing, so it was possible, although it seemed he still resided there, which made his guilt less likely. They were looking for someone in the area nearby, judging by the way the killer had taken the photos in a basement then dropped the fresh body.
Harold Smithson from Jacksonville. It was only about an hour and a half away, very possible to have traveled here in that time. He was a school teacher, forty-one years old, and had been arrested for theft in his twenties. It seemed he turned his life around. A fair suspect, Nicky thought, but not exactly the top pick.
No, her top pick was Harold Smith from Green Valley--which happened to be only twenty minutes away from where they were now.
This Harold Smith did not have a job. He was married with a child, thirty-eight years old, and he had a criminal record. Nicky wondered if his wife knew that in his early twenties, he had been charged with sexual battery in relation to an incident that occurred inside a frat house he was part of. Charges were pressed against him and two other boys--a truly sick crime. But his record had been clean since then.
Nicky looked at his mugshot from back then--a stone-faced man with no remorse in his eyes, and a flaccid smile. A more recent photo of him showed a similar face, only with more lines.
He gave Nicky the creeps.
Ken came back over, hanging up his phone call. "Still no hits on the car in town," he said.
"But I'm gonna call Grace and--"
"Don't worry about that," Nicky cut in. "I think I have our suspects."
Ken's brows went up. "What do you mean?"
"I narrowed it down to these three Harolds," Nicky said. "They're the only ones with a 1998 Hana Kuma. One is thirty-eight, one is forty-one, and one is sixty-one. I don't think our killer is sixty-one, but that leaves the other two."
"Okay," Ken said. "So, you narrowed it down to those two. So, what do you think? Are they the killers?"
"I think it's possible," Nicky said. "But, I mean, it's not exactly concrete. One guy lives just twenty minutes from here. I think he's our top pick."
Ken nodded, obviously agreeing with her. "You're right," he said, "but we should send officers to talk to the other two as well."
Excitement moved through Nicky. This was finally something they could work on. "Agreed. Let's give them a call and visit Harold Smith from Green Valley ourselves." She stood and grabbed her keys. "Come on. I'll drive."
