All Dressed in White (23 page)

He looked at the clock. It was already ten
A.M.
He saw a note beneath the door that joined his room to Laurie and Timmy’s. He felt his hamstrings ache as he bent down for it. At sixty-four years of age, he was in good shape but needed to stretch more.
Figured I’d let you two sleep in,
the note read.

Timmy was getting older. He could sleep until noon if undisturbed.

Leo walked over to the small desk in the corner, opened the laptop Laurie had bought him for his birthday, and clicked on the Internet browser. He could spend a few minutes working on his pet project before waking his grandson for a late breakfast. He used two fingers to type
facebook.com
into the search window. Grace was the one who was teaching him how to “cyberstalk,” as she called it. When he was on the job, gathering background information had required knocking on doors and pounding the pavement. These days, people posted their entire lives, including what they ate for breakfast, on social media.

He typed “Carly Romano” into the search window of Facebook. He read recently that it was increasingly common for families and friends to maintain pages of those who had passed, as a place for loved ones to post memories. Sure enough, he found her wall, with a posting as recent as two months ago, from a Jenna Romano:
Happy Birthday, Sis. You’re still in my heart. Xoxo.

He had called the police in Waterville and confirmed that Carly’s case was still unsolved. According to the detective he spoke to, the primary suspect was her high school boyfriend back in Michigan. The two had tried a long-distance relationship during their freshman year, but Carly broke things off when she returned to campus for her sophomore year. He didn’t take the news well. But police had never been able to build a case against him.

It seemed like a good case for Laurie’s show.

Leo clicked through the photographs on Carly’s profile, searching for one of the old boyfriend. He checked the dates. He was still browsing the college years. He needed to keep scrolling back to high school.

He couldn’t help but notice that Carly looked happy and lively in every photograph. She had thick, dark hair and big brown eyes. She seemed to always be smiling. He was scanning the pictures so quickly that he almost missed it: a familiar face.

He flipped back two pages. The caption on the photograph read, “DJ Night at the Bob-In!” Carly looked straight at the camera. The man next to her in the booth had his arm around her. He was younger, Leo thought to himself, but that’s definitely him.

Younger, but familiar. He spotted him two more times in other photographs taken within a few days of this one.

He clicked over to his email and found the production schedule that Jerry had sent everyone prior to the trip. Alex was interviewing Charlotte at nine
A.M.
in the courtyard behind the hotel, with Kate
to follow at 10:30. If he hurried, he could find Laurie on a break in between.

•  •  •

Leo waited until he saw Charlotte Pierce leave the set. Laurie smiled when she saw him, but then a moment of panic crossed her face. “Dad, where’s Timmy?”

“He’s fine. I woke him up and he’s in your room getting ready for breakfast.” They had lived for five years in the shadow of a killer’s threat that he would someday return to kill both Laurie and her son. That kind of fear doesn’t fade easily. “I think Alex may have been right when he said I was jumping to conclusions about Jeremy Carroll. You need to see this.” He opened his laptop screen.

Laurie’s mouth opened in surprise. “Is that—? Oh my God, it is.”

He clicked to the other two photographs. “His arm’s around her here. And check out the way he’s looking at her in this one. I think Jeff was dating Carly Romano. Amanda may not have been his first victim.”

48

J
erry was waving in Laurie’s direction. “Is everything okay? We’re ready to go over here.” They had scheduled Charlotte Pierce and Kate Fulton in back-to-back interview sessions.

“Just a second.” She turned to Leo and said, “Dad, let’s not share this discovery yet. If word gets back to Jeff that we’ve connected him to Carly, he might panic. We’re supposed to question him this afternoon.”

Leo nodded. “I agree.”

Laurie approached the set, smiling calmly at Kate, and then explained she just needed to speak to Alex briefly before they began.

Alex knew her well enough to know that something unexpected had occurred. They stepped aside, out of earshot of the others.

“Remember how I told you that a girl was killed near campus when they were all in college?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Dad found some photographs of Jeff and Carly together online. It looks like they may have dated.”

“How come no one ever mentioned that?” Alex asked quickly.

Laurie shrugged, still trying to process the new information herself. “The girls probably didn’t know; Kate said they weren’t friends
with Carly, and they weren’t close to Jeff yet. But Jeff’s friends presumably knew.”

“Should I ask Kate? Or maybe we should just wait until we have him on camera.”

“Don’t ask Kate anything about this. I want to make sure we catch Jeff off guard later.”

Grace was making her way toward them, her tanned legs revealed by an impossibly short minidress. “How are we doing over here? I told Jerry to calm down, but you did look a little worried.” Grace’s ability to read Laurie was almost eerie.

“We’re all set,” Alex said confidently. He reached over and squeezed Laurie’s hand. Don’t worry, Alex is a pro, Laurie reminded herself. He’ll handle this perfectly.

•  •  •

“Now, Kate, you said Amanda expressed doubts about going through with the wedding. Can you tell me exactly what she said?” Alex asked pointedly.

Kate pressed her lips together, appearing to concentrate deeply. “I don’t recall every word, but we were alone in the pool, and she was asking whether I ever wondered if I got married too young. She wanted to know if I had regrets, if I would have experienced more in life if I hadn’t—that kind of thing. She even asked if I thought it was too late to call things off.”

“That sounds like more than last-minute nerves,” Alex said. “She actually mentioned the possibility of canceling the wedding?”

“She didn’t say she
wanted
to cancel, but yes, I remember she said, ‘How bad would it be to pull the plug at this point?’ I told her it was normal to be nervous, but that she shouldn’t go through with a wedding just to avoid upsetting other people.”

“If this is true, Kate, you’re the only person we know of to whom
Amanda expressed her reluctance. Pardon me for saying this, but wasn’t Meghan closer to her than you were? She was the maid of honor, after all. Why wouldn’t Amanda have disclosed these concerns to her?”

She shrugged. “Maybe because Meghan was also friends with Jeff? She might have been worried Meghan would tell him.”

“Are you sure that’s the only explanation?” Alex persisted. “Meghan made it sound as if she and Amanda were extremely close friends. Wouldn’t Amanda trust her with such an important confidence?”

Kate cleared her throat. “It’s possible that over the years, I may have let it slip that, yes, I did used to wonder if I married too young. That I would picture how things might have been different if I had ventured off on my own for a while. But I told her when she asked if I loved my husband and my children. How could I possibly regret them? Later, when I asked whether she was seriously having second thoughts about marrying Jeff, she was a bit evasive.”

“How so?” Alex asked.

Laurie leaned forward, not wanting to miss a single facial expression or syllable.

“She said that something had come up—she was very vague—and that she needed to learn more about it before making a final decision.”

“What exactly did she need to learn?”

“I have no idea. That’s all she would say.”

“Was it something about Jeff?” Alex suggested. “Was she planning to talk to him?”

“I honestly don’t know,” Kate said.

Alex turned and looked to Laurie to see if he should press any further. She gave him a small headshake, indicating not to push. She didn’t want Kate to tip off Jeff that they were leaning in his direction.

Alex was bringing the session to a close when Laurie saw Sandra
Pierce walking quickly toward the hotel lobby, a handkerchief in her hand, her husband one step behind her. What was this all about? Seconds later, Amanda’s brother, Henry, emerged from the same door and ran toward Laurie.

“Mom asked me to find you. The police said they found a body that they believe is Amanda’s.”

49

T
he detective’s name was Marlene Henson. Laurie remembered Sandra mentioning her when she first came to Laurie’s office. She was short—barely five feet tall—with long red hair and round, full cheeks. She stood with her feet hips’ distance apart, sturdy like a tank.

“Are you sure you don’t want to keep this strictly within the family, Sandra?” the detective asked. Laurie detected a hint of a southern accent in her voice.

The entire Pierce family was gathered in the living room of Walter’s suite. Laurie suddenly felt all eyes on her and Alex, standing next to each other near the door. They were the interlopers.

“I want Laurie and Alex here,” Sandra affirmed. “Their show is the reason we may have finally found Amanda. I know they’re committed to helping us.”

“But they’re also reporters, Sandra. There are things we can’t divulge to the public without jeopardizing the investigation.”

“We’re not typical reporters,” Laurie said. “Anything you say in this room will remain between us for now. You have my word.”

“And unlike the police,” Alex said, “we have agreements with everyone in the wedding party to speak to us voluntarily. No arrests, no Miranda warnings. That could come in handy.”

Detective Henson looked one more time at Sandra and appeared
satisfied. Sandra’s eyes were still bloodshot and puffy from crying, but she seemed ready to hear the details. Walter put his hand around her shoulder.

Her voice remarkably calm, Sandra asked, “Do you believe you have found my daughter’s body?”

“Allow me to explain the events that brought us here today. A phone call came into the station house last night, a few minutes before midnight. The caller’s voice was muffled. At this point we’re not even certain if it was a man or a woman. The caller provided specific information about the location of your daughter’s body. Of course we tried to trace the call but it came back to a phone you can buy and throw away.”

Walter pursed his lips. “That was over twelve hours ago. No one thought to tell us?”

“The department wanted to investigate first. I didn’t want to distress you if it was a crank call, but we acted on it immediately. The address the caller provided was for a parking lot across the street from St. Edward’s Church, which is two miles from here. We checked the records. That parking lot was being resurfaced at the time your daughter disappeared. The instructions were very specific regarding where the body would be found.

“We had GPR—that’s ground-penetrating radar—out there in the middle of the night. Based on what we saw on radar, we began excavation of the parking lot at sunrise and unfortunately did locate remains at that location. We’ll do further testing to confirm if they belong to your daughter, but we found these on the left ring finger.”

Detective Henson handed Sandra a photograph of two platinum rings: a classic Tiffany-style diamond engagement ring and a matching wedding band. The setting was caked in dirt.

“I think these are hers,” Sandra said. “The engagement ring was engraved. A and J—”

Detective Henson finished the phrase with her. “
Semper amemus.
”

“It means ‘Let us always love’ in Latin,” Sandra explained, choking back a sob. “It’s definitely our daughter. It’s my baby. It’s Amanda.”

Walter wrapped both arms around her, and she leaned her head on his shoulder.

“I’m so sorry to have to tell you this,” the detective said softly. “I’ll give your family some time alone. I’ve always hoped there might be a different ending.”