Page 78 of Remember Her Name

It was the only reason Josie was letting him follow her around the mill for a second pass. That, and if she left him andGretchen alone for any length of time, she was afraid of what would happen. Denton PD had arrived at the mill to find the car empty, save for Isaac Hampton’s cell phone which he’d smashed to bits. It had taken over an hour for the bevy of officers to clear the five-story building. Hampton, or Roger Bell, was not inside, nor was Juliet Bowen, but Josie had insisted on searching the premises again, though she couldn’t say why. All she knew was that finding Juliet was the priority and right now, they had nothing else to go on.

Gretchen and Noah were following other leads, including a search of the Hampton house. Sheila had granted them permission.

Glass crunched under Josie’s feet as she moved away from the window and deeper into the large room. She swept her flashlight over heaps of twisted metal, large rollers, and wooden pallets. Turner’s beam joined hers, pausing on the remnants of a tall metal apparatus that took up half the room and stretched almost to the ceiling. Shredded fabric hung from one of the metal bars. More rats skittered away from the light.

Turner made a noise of disgust. “How do you think Bell avoided leaving his prints in the other cars—Stella Townsend’s, that Downey guy’s, and the classic cars? Gloves? Bet his wife’s got a shit-ton of different disposable gloves.”

But the witness to Cleo Tate’s abduction hadn’t seen him wearing gloves, and he didn’t appear to have gloves on in the surveillance footage they’d pulled of him. “No,” said Josie. “Not gloves. The glue. That industrial-strength glue his wife was using for her prototypes. It would have only been temporary, but it would have prevented his prints from being left behind.”

Yet, the DNA samples Hummel had taken from each victim would surely be a match to Roger Bell. It was just a matter of time before the state lab returned results. The temporary alteration of his prints had only bought him time.

“Do you really think this broad—I mean, Sheila Hampton—had no idea what her hubby was up to?”

“It’s hard to say.” Josie stepped over a pile of broken beer bottles. “If she did, I doubt she’d admit it. I’m not sure we could prove it anyway. I think she knew that he was involved in something illegal because he asked her to pass that message along to me, but I don’t think she suspected him of murdering three Denton women in the last week.”

If Sheila Hampton was telling the truth, then Josie believed the shock of finding out her husband’s true identity had been enough to send her brain into survival mode. In those first hours after his revelation, she might not have been mentally and emotionally able to face the possibility that he was behind the recent murders.

Josie had done some of the initial questioning once they arrived at the stationhouse—before she went home to bathe. Sheila Hampton had admitted Isaac could easily have come and gone from the house without her realizing it since they slept in separate bedrooms, and he rarely came out of his except to eat. The tension in the household was high, given their daughter’s death and the fact that Sheila suspected him of cheating on her.

In terms of her work equipment, the most recent prototypes she’d created hadn’t been disturbed or gone missing, but she claimed that in the garage were several boxes of safety equipment from previous jobs. She kept everything in case she needed it later. According to her, it drove Isaac crazy that she didn’t just throw the boxes away, especially after she left to take the job in New York City.

Turner stopped to study some graffiti lining one of the cinderblock walls. “You think this Sheila could be the grandmother that paid Edgar Garcia for access to the old cars?”

“Brennan ran a photo of Sheila over to Garcia. He said it’s not her.” Sheila hadn’t been able to identify anyone they knewwho might fit the bill of a grandmotherly type. Her husband had always told her he had no living family. A quick background check on Roger Bell confirmed this was true.

Josie found the stairwell door and motioned Turner toward it. With a heavy sigh, he trudged up the steps after her, taking his sweet time. His voice faded as he fell behind. “What exactly are we looking for again?”

“Not sure,” Josie called over her shoulder. “I’ll know it when I see it.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” came his distant mutter.

“Turner, hurry up!”

He didn’t answer. She wouldn’t put it past him to have gone back downstairs to wait for her. Cursing under her breath, she kept climbing to the next floor.

As she reached the landing, concrete crumbled beneath her boots. Her body pitched forward at first, her forearms slamming painfully against the floor. The flashlight rolled out of her hand, plunging everything into near-total darkness. Light bounced above and below but it wasn’t enough for her to get her bearings. Her feet scrabbled for purchase. Just as she managed to pull herself upright, more of the ground beneath her gave way. Flailing, her center of gravity shifted. Her upper body tipped back. The metal railing disintegrated in her hand as she tried to stop herself from toppling. For a heartbeat, she teetered, suspended in the air. There was no time to call out, to get her bearings, to react at all. Her stomach dropped as she tumbled into blackness.

SIXTY

Josie’s head glanced off something hard—a step or maybe part of the railing, she couldn’t be sure. Bracing herself for a painful descent, she let her limbs go slack. The air whooshed out of her lungs when her body hit something solid enough to break her fall but soft enough not to inflict pain. Turner’s chest. His flashlight clattered down the shaft, the beam of light dancing as it receded. Clutching her shoulders, he steadied her. Together, they froze.

“Shit.” His breath skated past the shell of her ear. “I can’t see a damn thing. I lost my flashlight. Where’s yours?”

Josie pointed up the steps where a dim yellow glow struggled to cut through the darkness. “On the landing. But the steps broke apart right under me. That’s why I fell.”

His hands were still on her shoulders. “This place is dangerous as hell. I can’t believe no one got hurt when we came through here the first time. I’m pretty sure my light fell down toward the first floor.”

“We should go back down then,” Josie said. “There’s another staircase on the opposite side of the building. We can try that one.”

Turner gently turned her body so they could proceed back to the first floor. He kept one hand clamped around her bicep. “Iknow you don’t like me touching you, but I figured you’d make an exception this time. I’ll let go when we’re all the way down.”

For once, Josie didn’t mind. Turner had probably just saved her from a broken neck, although she’d be damned if she admitted it to him. He had a lot of flaws, but he’d proven himself to be strong and quick on his feet. It was, perhaps, his only redeeming quality. On a previous case, to save her from being mauled by a dog, he’d picked her up and tossed her over a six-foot fence like she weighed nothing. He’d called her ‘Paper Airplane’ for weeks after that.

True to his word, once they emerged from the stairwell onto the first floor, Turner released her. He went back into the stairwell to find his flashlight. The harsh glow of the halogens pierced some nearby windows, saving her from complete darkness. Josie took the time to assess herself for injuries. Scraped forearms. Slight bump on her head. Nothing serious. As she rubbed her scalp, a memory hit her like a slap. Her mouth went dry. She hadn’t forgotten what happened at this old mill all those years ago, but she hadn’t exactly been keyed in on the details during the initial search for Isaac Hampton.

Turner said something to her. She was too lost in the past to focus on his words.

Light pierced her eyes. She threw a hand up to cover them. “Turner, what the hell?”

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