Page 19 of Murder in the Lighthouse

“You have to find her alive,” Marta pleaded again, her voice breaking with worry. “We can’t lose them both. Sam and Bethany are all we have.”

5

With a bit of digging, the internet gave up countless articles about the Upland murder. It had been a local mystery for years that haunted detectives: a mother of two and a schoolteacher were found dead in the woods with no leads or suspects. It didn’t take a genius to figure out why the case had gone cold within six months. Barry and Marta had shared all they could remember about Bethany’s late nights poring over old reports and witness statements. The more they had revealed, the more Brogan and Lucien realized there was a possibility that Bethany’s disappearance might be connected to her investigation into the Upland murder.

“So the records clerk for the sheriff’s department is pulled into the unsolved crime enough that it drove her to dig deeper,” Brogan repeated as she sat across from Lucien inside his office. She glanced at the whiteboard they’d started. The pertinent datawas now divided into three columns instead of two—one for Sam’s murder, one for Bethany’s disappearance, and one with a photo of Connie Upland used in a newspaper article dated 1999 tacked to the top. “My guess is that Bethany’s curiosity didn’t sit well with a busy homicide unit.”

“I often wonder why that is. You’d think detectives would be eager for a new set of eyes and input. But, of course, they aren’t. They’d be mostly assholes about a lowly records clerk snooping on their turf.”

“It’s a common theme, especially at the sheriff’s department.” When that statement got her a strange look, she added, “Brent used to be the sheriff, remember? I’ve had conversations with him about how he doesn’t like outsiders poking around in his cases. He claims that it all began while working for the county. If it’s someone who isn’t a part of their tight-knit group, they won’t even consider their contribution. Seems dumb to me. But you know how we’ve had to fight Brent tooth and nail to get him to listen to us. I bet Bethany was up against that same kind of resistance.”

“But she must have stumbled onto something significant to have put her in harm’s way. And would that mean that whoever or whatever caused her to disappear had something to do with the sheriff’s office?”

Brogan tapped her pen against the desk. “If it’s a common theme in law enforcement, probably. Egos and pride can get in the way of progress.”

He leaned back in his chair, deep in thought. “We should find out who might have felt threatened by her investigation into the Upland murder.”

She pulled out her notebook, ready to jot down any pertinent information. But she realized they would likely get stonewalled by the same members of law enforcement who felt threatened by Bethany. “We have no access to her computer. Wecan’t check her search history, emails, or her contacts. They’ve already taken her personal laptop. But…”

“What?”

“We could go to the county website and check out each of the detectives listed in the homicide unit. Although we have no idea which one she talked to about the case, we can see which one is actively assigned to her disappearance and start there.”

“You do know that we’ll be stepping onto dangerous ground if they find out we’re investigating the investigators, right?”

“Do you have another suggestion?”

Lucien shook his head and stood up, energized. “But we need to find out all we can about the Upland murder, more than what’s in these old newspaper articles. If we discover the same thing Bethany uncovered, it might have us gaining ground in her disappearance.”

“Other than breaking into the records room at the county, how do you suggest we do that?”

Lucien rubbed the back of his neck. “Family. We’ll contact Connie Upland’s relatives. Let’s look up her daughters first, then go from there.”

It took them most of the afternoon to locate Connie’s relatives. Her husband had remarried long ago and moved out of state to Colorado. However, the two adult daughters lived in the Los Angeles area. They discovered Connie’s sister, Angela Manning, had remained in Santa Cruz all these years later. According to a newspaper article written on the tenth anniversary of the murder, Angela often bugged the local detectives for an update on her sister’s case, only to be told they didn’t comment on active investigations.

Talking to Angela seemed the best place to start. During the phone call, they huddled around the speaker phone in Lucien’s office while the sister opened up because she had plenty to say.

“When it first happened, I thought it might have been Rick who killed her,” Angela admitted.

“The husband, Rick Upland?”

“That’s right. But the police swore that Rick had an airtight alibi between four and five that afternoon when Connie left school. It turns out Rick was in a meeting with six other people. They told the cops he never left, not even to go to the bathroom. In fact, he didn’t arrive home that night until almost six-thirty and had to pick up the kids because Connie hadn’t.”

“Why did you suspect Rick? Was he abusive to Connie?”

“To my knowledge, he never hit her. But Connie had confided in me a few times about how unhappy she was in her marriage. She felt stifled, trapped. It wasn’t just Rick’s controlling nature, either. He had a temper, even with the girls. He had a way of making Connie feel small and insignificant. There were moments when I could see the fear in her eyes when something would piss him off.”

“Had she ever talked about leaving him?”

“Yes, she had. She had been considering divorce for a while but was worried about how Rick would react. She was afraid he wouldn’t let her take the kids or that he would make her life a living hell if she tried to divorce him.”

“Did Connie ever mention anyone who might have wanted to harm her?” Lucien asked.

“Not specifically, no. But she did mention that she’d met someone else. She told me this man was married, too. She talked about how messy her life had become, all because she’d married the wrong man.”

“Ah,” Brogan uttered. “Do you know anything at all about her mystery guy? Was he a teacher at the same school?”

“No. I think he was a cop. I remember she called him Keith. But I never knew his last name. I was with her when shebought a Valentine’s card for him and wrote Keith on the outside envelope.”

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