Page 101 of A Step You Shouldn't Take

Five days since Kim and Annie disappeared, and we’d added all of our non-supernatural evidence to the police file. Maria’s description of Tim and his British accent. The pictures of Kim in the black Mercedes from Luigi at the Italian restaurant and Brittney. The message wishing me a happy birthday on the wrong date. The tape of the car with diplomatic plates at the scene of Emma’s disappearance. We’d tried getting Maria to look at photos again, but she still hadn’t recognised anyone.

Captain Ward, Wyatt’s boss and my ex-boss, had been sceptical, but he’d agreed to write to the ambassador and request his cooperation, if only to rule out an embassy connection. At first, we’d received an overly polite “fuck off” from a low-level staffer, but Kim’s father had thrown his weight around and this letter, written on thick cream paper, signed by Robert Turner personally and couriered over, was the result.

“Why won’t he help?” I asked, slumping onto Wyatt’s sofa. He had the late shift today, so we were still in his apartment. “Is he just an asshole, or does he have something to hide?”

“We know it wasn’t him, but somebody borrowed his car. Think he’ll have a talk with his staff?”

“After that brush-off?”

“He might want to handle things internally as opposed to causing a diplomatic incident. If only we had something concrete…” Wyatt sighed, which was better than punching the wall like he did after the initial response. The bruises had faded to a yellowish-brown now. “I’ll go back to Kimberly’s father and see if there’s anything else he can do.”

Rather Wyatt than me. Kimberly’s father had marched into the station the evening after she disappeared, his tan suggesting he’d flown back from someplace far hotter than Bethesda. First, he’d insulted Barb by treating her like a waitress, then he’d demanded someone get the chief out of bed to explain what was going on when any one of the dozen detectives there working on the case could have filled him in.

Mr. Jennings had brought his current girlfriend along too, a bottle blonde who perched on the edge of a chair in the lobby, giving dirty looks to everyone who passed after she’d first complained about the lack of a cappuccino machine. Between his stuck-up attitude and what he’d done to his ex-wife, no wonder Kim had little to do with the man.

I rolled my eyes at Wyatt. “Good luck with that. Did any of the forensic results come through yet?”

“Still backed up, but only one set of fingerprints in Kim’s house got a hit on AFIS, and they belonged to the guy who repaired her dishwasher two months ago.”

“What did he do?”

“Assault and battery on his ex-girlfriend.”

If Kim came back, I’d be vetting everyone who set foot in her house in the future, as well as getting her a new alarm that monitored the perimeter when she was home. No, not if. When.WhenKim came back. I had to think positive. Until we found a body, I wasn’t giving up, although with Emma having been gone for over two years, fighting off the inevitable feeling that the worst had happened was becoming more difficult with every passing minute.

We were out of clues. One neighbour thought she’d seen a blue minivan driving slowly past Kim’s house, and another said a light-coloured van with some kind of logo on the side paused at the kerb for a while. But Kim’s front yard was hidden from view by a high wall, so nobody saw either girl being taken out of the house, and despite TV appeals, no one had come forward with any information.

“I can’t believe there’s nothing.”

“Seen it before,” Wyatt said. “A respectable man driving in a decent car around a middle-class neighbourhood. People don’t even notice. If he’d been a black man in a pimped-out truck, we’d have gotten fifteen phone calls ‘just in case.’”

Speaking of phones, mine pinged with an email. Another notification from that damn PI forum. Over thirty posts and counting taking the piss out of me over that thread asking for a reputable psychic. I wished I’d never posted the damn request.

Except this one wasn’t the usual sarcastic reply; it was a private message.

Saw your post about communicating with the dead. Always been fascinated by that area myself. How does it impact on your case?

Will Lawson

L&A Investigations, London

I almost wrote it off, but two things made me pause. First, he was from England. Could he have any connections that might help to identify our cagey diplomats? And second, I recognised his username: LA-Law. With a handle like that, borrowed from a US legal drama, I’d written him off as another wannabe at first, but over the past year, he’d boasted a solve-rate even the most experienced investigator envied. Although I’d never realised he had an interest in the paranormal.

Unless of course his message was a joke, in which case… No, he’d always been serious on the forums. Never courted controversy.

But how the hell was I supposed to answer him?

Me: You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.

The green dot beside his name showed he was online, and a message popped up seconds later. What time was it there? Ten p.m. here, so it must be the early hours in the UK.

LA-Law: Try me.

At this point, what did I have to lose? Only the woman I’d fallen in love with.

Me: My client believes there’s a ghost in her living room. A crime was committed there, and we have no other witnesses. Sounds crazy, right?

Yes, it definitely sounded crazy. In fact, I could hardly believe I’d typed those words.

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