Page 11 of Long Gone

She clasped her hands together. “Would you?”

“I can’t guarantee he’ll be able to find anything, but if he can’t, I’m sure he’ll point us in the direction of someone who can.”

“Thank you.”

“Do you have any paperwork at all about these deals? Addresses or surveys or anything to help with the locations would be great.”

“I don’t. They were all at Hugo’s office, and when I went to collect Hugo’s stuff about a month after he disappeared, the office manager had already packed it up into a box.”

I glanced up in surprise. “He was still a missing person, legally speaking. I would think they would have given him more time.” I considered what she’d said. “I take it the paperwork wasn’t in the box?”

“No. Just personal items, such as family photos. A civic award and a trophy from a charity softball tournament.”

I tilted my head. “Nothing else?”

“Nope. They said everything else was office supplies and they’d tossed them.”

That seemed hard to believe. He must have had business files. What had happened to those? I paused. “You said Hugo worked with the Colter Group. Was he an employee or a consultant?”

“Definitely a consultant, but Hugo said the contracts stated that he was to get a percentage of the net proceeds, plus bonuses.”

“And Colter didn’t give you anything?” I asked.

A shadow crossed her face. “No. Brett said they used the amount Hugo would have received and used it to help cover the money the group lost because of him.”

“How did Hugo cost them money?”

“I don’t know.” A bitter look filled her eyes. “He said it was too complicated for me to understand.” She shrugged, looking sheepish. “Honestly, he was probably right. I rarely understood what Hugo was talking about.”

“Did Brett or anyone else with the group give you any financial statements or documents?”

“No. Nothing.”

That sounded like bullshit, and I planned to look into it. “Where was Hugo’s office? Did the office manager say why they boxed up his property so quickly?”

“He said Hugo was two months behind on the rent. So when he heard Hugo was missing, he boxed everything up and threw out what he considered trash. I…I only found out because I went there looking for his business checkbook.”

My brow shot up. “Did you ever get it?”

“No. It wasn’t in the box of items they gave me. Nothing pertaining to his business was in the box.”

“What made you think the checkbook was at his office?”

“Because he always kept it there.” Her jaw set and her tone darkened. “When I mentioned all of this to the sheriff’s department detective, he told me that Hugo had probably taken the checkbook with him when he ran off. And he figured he’d probably destroyed the files intentionally.”

“You told the police about his office being cleaned out without your consent?”

“Yes, and they told me I could file a police report, but I chose not to. The sheriff’s department had already made up their minds, and I was tired of trying to change them.” She paused. “Maybe that’s why I want to have him declared dead. It would be like a big FU to them for not looking harder.”

I could understand why she felt that way, but the sheriff’s department had more information about the case than she did. Hopefully, they’d reached that decision after a thorough investigation. “Did the detectives have anything to say about his office? Surely, they searched it.”

“They did, although I didn’t remember them telling me they’d gotten a search warrant. It doesn’t mean they didn’t, though. I don’t remember much from that first week he was missing. There was a flurry of activity, making posters and posting in Facebook groups and such.” She sniffed. “It’s all a blur.”

The week my sister had gone missing was the same. It was a blur, yet there were still some excruciating details I’d never forget. Like the crumbs hanging from Chief Larson’s mustache when he came to tell us Andi was dead. And the shoestring that hung from a tree next to John Michael Stevens’s head when he’d approached us in the park with a gun and told my sister to come with him.

“So I know they searched his office,” she continued, “but they wouldn’t confirm whether they’d found the checkbook.”

“Instead they suggested he may have taken it with him,” I said. Which meant they must not have found it. I couldn’t see a reason why they would hide it from her.

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