Page 62 of Twice the Rivalry

She ground her teeth. The nerve of this man astounded her sometimes. “Is there any point in arguing with you?” she demanded.

He smirked at her. “What do you think?”

“Fine, but stay the hell out of the way. We’ll discuss this later,” she snapped at him.

Taz snickered. “Aww, sounds like you two are getting close,” he teased. “Better hide your balls, brother, because when a woman says that to a man, it never ends well.”

“I don’t care what she does as long as we get this woman and her kid out safely,” Simba said firmly, getting the conversation back on track. “Code, I don’t think I have to explain that anything said here isn’t to be repeated. Even to your own club. If that’s a problem for you, then get off the call.”

Code was silent for a moment and she watched him carefully. This was the moment that would show whether he was a man of his word, or not. This MC was not like hers. Her team kept secrets, but his didn’t, and this was firmly crossing over into territory she wasn’t sure he was ready for. She knew he wouldn’t care that they didn’t do things legally, especially since the Dragons were considered 1%ers, but keeping his brothers in the dark was akin to treason. His eyes met hers, and she saw the war in them, but then whatever he was thinking must have been resolved because he said, “Nothing in this conversation has anything to do with our club, so there’s no need for it to be shared.”

“Alright,” Simba continued. “So based on what Code has given us, we have a possible trend. How far apart did the girls go missing?”

“Couple months in between each,” Code answered. “First was Lola Beattie, age twenty four, no family, but her landlord reported her missing after finding the apartment abandoned. There were possible signs of a struggle. Second was Marie Nazario, age twenty-two, no children, but her parents and older brother filed a missing person’s report. Both women lived in town. The two from the next town over were Lisa Costa and Penny Krouse, both twenty three, and both of them were local waitresses, but at different businesses. Lisa was reported missing first when her father couldn’t reach her and found her car abandoned on the side of the road. Penny’s sister said she didn’t come to pick up her nieces for a playdate she had just called to arrange. Her car was also found abandoned on the side of the road, but on the opposite end of town from Lisa’s, and not close to where she or her sister lived.”

“Glitch, are there any images of the property, or any of the surrounding area, that show what they could be up?” Warg asked suddenly. “Maybe we’re focusing too much on the house and the people in it.”

“See if you can find out who owns the neighboring land as well,” Jag added.

“Adjacent land is owned by AJM Enterprises,” Glitch replied after a few minutes of searching. “I’m sending you the images of the surrounding areas now. I don’t see anything out of the ordinary, but you have better eyes for that than me.”

“AJM?” Ursa repeated, his deep voice sounding thoughtful.

“On it,” Code announced. “Bet you anything it’s a shell company, and that’s how they’re getting away with hiding shit.”

“The area around them is all wooded. The satellite images show nothing in the backyard that is concerning,” Vulture added. “So if they’re hiding bodies or these women, then they’re not doing it where they could be seen by any kind of cameras.”

“The land along the back of the property looks too pretty,” Tiger remarked quietly. “Most tree cover is messy and overlaps. This almost looks like it’s been purposely planted that way. Just enough overlap so you wouldn’t think much of it, but it’s also so you can’t see the forest floor. Not with those kinds of trees.”

“You’re right,” Warg agreed. “There’s no diversity in the kinds of trees, either. Those are all the same.”

“Which means we now have a place to look,” Simba declared.

“Got the information on AJM,” Code interjected. “Set up five years ago by a J Champlin, and is listed as an agricultural wholesaler. They were going to clear the land and use it as farm land, but clearly they haven’t done that. They also haven’t filed any tax returns in a couple of years. Before that, they were abysmal at best. And Champlin just so happens to be the maiden name of one Jane Murphy. Though, technically, her father is named James Champlin, so it could have been him instead of her.”

“Something tells me that she doesn’t have much to do with money,” Glitch said.

“What I see is a bunch of land that could hide a hell of a lot of bodies,” Jag said soberly. “Glitch, how much land does AJM own?”

“In total, about fifty acres,” she said after a moment.

“And all of it is wooded,” he said thoughtfully. “Which means they either have buildings under that tree cover, or they’re doing everything in that mansion and then getting people out to the land somehow.”

“I may have something,” Code suddenly announced. “I found some old plans from a house that used to be on the land to the west of the Murphy house. It was also a mansion, but was torn down after a fire six years ago. Turns out, the same people built both of the mansions, and the original owners were slave owners.”

“There is no way they let slaves live in their big fancy mansion,” Warg said grimly. “There had to be another place for them somewhere.”

“Do you have any old blueprints of the torn down mansion?” Simba asked Code.

He sent them to Glitch, who forwarded them to the team. “Seems that they had a basement, and there were some tunnels going out of the house toward the back of the property and also toward the Murphy residence.”

“So it’s possible that if they’re up to something, and it sure as hell sounds like it, they could be using those tunnels. And since the trees cover the old site, it doesn’t show us if there is a door or hatch or something that comes up where it used to stand. We’re going to have to go look,” Simba summarized. “Glitch, do you have any more information on Abraham that could be helpful?”

“I’ve sent you everything I have,” she told him. “By all accounts, he keeps to himself and has stayed out of trouble. No arrests or visits to the home from CPS,” she told them. “But as far as I can tell, their daughters have never moved out of the home.”

“Alright, we need to do some more recon on these people and decide our next moves,” Simba decided. “We can’t make accusations, and I want to know what we’re working with. Glitch, we’ll be in touch, probably tomorrow night with some more intel. In the meantime, if you have time, run a few searches on Abraham and Jane’s families to see if there are any connections there, or maybe some dirt to tell us what they might be doing inside that big house? And run the kids. The boys should be adults by now, and it’s possible one or all of them have a past to unearth.”

“On it,” she promised.

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