Chapter 17 #2
“Pull up the map of all eighty-nine cases and take out the Winter Falls Tavern case since we’ve already ruled that out along with the cases where they were either found alive or they found a body,” Shayne said, watching as his brother quickly sorted the cases.
“What now?” Aidan asked, glancing over his shoulder to send him a questioning look.
“Put the map on the television,” Shayne said, grabbing the remote off the desk and turned on the flatscreen television mounted on the wall.
“What are ye thinking, lad?” Liam asked as they took in all the areas marked in red.
“All of the women were grabbed within two miles of high-end restaurants and supply companies,” Shayne said absently as he took in all the dots.
“Except for the King William’s Faire lass,” Liam pointed out.
“Which means we either missed something or he hunted the lass down,” Shayne said, crossing his arms over his chest as he took in all the areas marked red.
“Take away the cases that we already dismissed,” Shayne said, watching as more red dots disappeared, leaving small clusters of red dots throughout the map.
“What are ye thinking?” Aidan asked as Shayne’s gaze flickered from the map to the files listed on the monitor.
“Does it not strike ye as odd that none of the five-star restaurants were located in a hotel?” Shayne asked as his gaze shot back to the map.
“Ye want ta expand the search?”
“Aye,” Shayne said, slowly exhaling as he racked his brain trying to figure out what they’d missed. “Mark the King William’s Faire case blue.”
Less than a second later, he watched as one of the red dots turned blue and noted that it was away from the other dots. So, he focused on what all the red dots had in common.
“They’re all in business districts,” Shayne murmured absently.
“Are ye sure?” Aidan asked, frowning as he took in all the dots.
“Positive,” Shayne said since he got to know New Hampshire well over the past twenty years.
“Business districts are usually downtown, have minimal hotels, mostly two and three stars hotels, with the occasional four-star hotel. The upscale restaurants are typically meant to impress clients, handle work lunches, and host corporate events,” Aidan said, reading the results of a quick search.
“Megan’s case was the only one in a tourist area,” Shayne said as his gaze shot back to that blue dot.
“Meaning?” Liam asked, moving closer to take a better look at the map.
“Do me a favor, look up missing women in Evergreen Harbor,” Shayne said as his gaze shot to the lake area.
“Why Evergreen Harbor?” Aidan asked as he opened the ViCAP database and typed in Tristan’s login information.
“Tom and Beth used to take Tristan and Denny there every summer. It’s a big tourist area with lakes, a drive-in movie theatre, shopping outlets, and caves,” Shayne explained, never more grateful that Tristan’s adopted parents dragged Tristan out of the house every summer than he was at that moment.
“Twenty-five,” Aidan said after a slight pause.
Nodding, Shayne said, “Narrow the search by adding women only and search for cases in the past twenty-two years.”
“Six,” Aidan said when most of the results disappeared.
“Can ye pull up their files?” Shayne asked, watching as his brother selected all six cases, and in less than a minute, they had access to the files for the missing girls in Evergreen Harbor.
“Start with the oldest one,” Shayne said, watching as Aidan clicked open the first case marked twenty-one years ago and went through the images only to curse when they came across a picture of a dead girl.
“Ye were supposed ta search for missing women,” Liam pointed out only to have their brother glare at him.
“I did,” Aidan said as he began clicking back. “Her husband reported her missing. Her body was found the next morning,” Aidan said as Shayne opened his mouth to tell him to go to the next case when something caught his eye.
“Go back,” Shayne said as his brother quickly clicked back through the images and-
“There,” Shayne said, pointing to a spot a few feet away from the body.
He watched as Aidan zoomed in on the picture and-
“Eight rocks,” Liam said, frowning.
“Go through the rest of the files,” Shayne said, watching as his brother made quick work of going through each file only to discover that they’d all been reported missing by their husbands only to be found dead the next morning.
All of them were found outside with eight rocks scattered around the body, blending in with the debris.
“Search Pinecrest Bay for missing girls with the same filters,” Shayne said, only to come across the similar results, women reported missing by their husbands only to be found dead the next morning and all of them had eight black basalt rocks randomly scattered around their bodies.
“Search Mirror Lake Village, New York,” Shayne said only to curse twenty minutes later when they found six more dead women.
Jaw clenched, Shayne looked at the growing number of bodies and-
“Get Tristan and tell him that we found a serial killer’s playground.”