Page 80 of My Child is Missing

“No,” Josie said. “Every photo. All four.”

It took a moment, but then Gretchen saw them. “The flowers. The purple flowers. What are you saying? This is the killer’s signature? He leaves these flowers at each scene? It’s not a very good signature. They’re trampled at every scene. They don’t look like they were left there, they just look like people walked all over them. Typically, serial killers’ signatures are pretty obvious.”

“It’s not his signature,” Josie said.

“It’s not a signature?”

“It’s not Henry Thomas’s signature. It’s Kayleigh Patchett’s. She’s not a victim. She’s a killer.”

FIFTY-ONE

Gretchen slid her reading glasses off her nose. Lips pursed, one eyebrow arched, she stared at Josie, her eyes darkening as she considered what Josie had just said. Then she leaned back in her chair as far as it would go. In protest, the chair shrieked. Gretchen folded her arms across her chest. “Kayleigh met Asher Jackson Jenks on StoryJot.”

“Yes,” Josie said, relieved that Gretchen didn’t think she was crazy.

“Asher is a small-time drug dealer. We know that because we found all that stuff in his apartment. Almost enough for a charge of possession with intent to distribute. He gets the drugs he sells from Henry Thomas, who we know now has a long history of being in the drug trade. Kayleigh met Thomas through Asher.”

“Yes,” Josie said.

“You can’t prove that.”

“Just run with this for now,” Josie said. “Hear me out.”

“For some reason, Thomas becomes…what? Obsessed with Kayleigh? Why?”

“I don’t know,” Josie said. “That’s the part I haven’t quite worked out but yes, he fixates on her, and they develop some kind of relationship. A secret relationship. No one knows about it. Not Asher, not Olivia. On some of the nights that Kayleigh snuck out, she could have gone through the woods to see him at his cabin.”

Gretchen frowned. “I don’t know. That’s a hike.”

“But not impossible. They could have met somewhere. Maybe he came to her. It would explain the handprint on the Patchetts’ sedan. My point is that they became involved somehow.”

“Sexually?”

“Kayleigh told Felicia that her boyfriend was going to kill her,” Josie pointed out. “Who does that sound like? Asher Jenks or Henry Thomas?”

“Okay,” said Gretchen. “Then what? They decide to become this killing couple?”

“Yes,” said Josie. “He grooms her. He’s got violent tendencies. He was turned on by the thought of a woman killing. We know that from Mett’s notes. Kayleigh was even younger than that girl. Impressionable. Neglected and dismissed at home. Always outshone by her little sister in everything. Gretchen, no one saw this kid. Not even her parents. When Felicia Evans plagiarized her story, her parents never even considered that Kayleigh was in the right. Not even for a moment. No one believed her. The only person who did, who knew that she was telling the truth, was Asher and he refused to go to bat for her.”

“Someone that beaten down and invisible makes for an excellent victim,” Gretchen said with a sigh. “People like Thomas, child molesters, that sort, they never target the self-assured kids who are well-loved at home with attentive parents. Those kids would be too hard to turn.”

“But with someone like Kayleigh, all he would have to do is make her feel special, important, make her feel seen for the first time in her life,” Josie agreed. “Make her feel like she was number one. Since her sister was born, she’s been like an afterthought in her house.”

“Jesus,” Gretchen said. “The Patchetts raised the perfect victim for someone like Thomas.”

“Yes,” Josie said. “They did. Gretchen, I read her stories on that app. While most of them revolve around sex, the ones that don’t are more or less about her family life. In ‘Bumper Cars,’ the parents leave an amusement park without one of their daughters. She’s left at the bumper cars, and they never even notice that she’s not with them. It’s the sister who reminds them that she’s not there. The story that Felicia stole is also about sisters.”

“And how the parents favor one over the other?”

“No,” Josie said. “The parents send the sisters on quests. One of those quests is to find a flower calledSaintpaulia ionantha.If they could find it, the kingdom would have protection from marauders for a hundred years, or something like that. I thought it was something that Kayleigh made up since it’s a fantasy story, but Gretchen, it’s a real flower. A type of African violet. Purple, and get this, it’s also called ‘Favorite Child.’”

“That’s her mark,” Gretchen said. “Her signature. The purple flowers. African violets don’t grow around here so she uses purple wildflowers in their place. She’s flaunting her involvement. Using something from her own writing. From the story that was stolen from her, from which no one believed her.”

“It’s fitting that it has to do with a favorite child, given her circumstances. When I was at the soccer field, Savannah gave me her scrunchie. She wanted me to give it to Kayleigh when we found her. She told me it was her favorite.”

“That’s been rattling around in your brain ever since,” Gretchen said.

“One of the things, yeah. Not because of the scrunchie but because Savannah used the word favorite—”

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