24
Max’s alarm woke Noelle the next morning, and she lifted her head, expecting to watch him wake up.
After the alarm blared for thirty seconds and his eyes hadn’t opened, Noelle turned it off.
She meant to only rest her eyes for a moment after that, but suddenly it was two hours later.
She’d tossed and turned in bed last night, and Max had done the same—once he finally came to bed.
He’d been up much later than she, going over the new leads from NCMEC about Belle.
They spent the next hour at home, scrambling to shower and to catch up on emails and phone calls. After seeing they had matching dark circles under their eyes, Noelle decided that a quick but heavy breakfast was necessary, so they stopped at a diner for a late breakfast.
Belle was still missing, but Max seemed optimistic about some of the new leads he’d read about before coming to bed last night.
At the nearly empty diner, Noelle poured warm syrup over her thick French toast as Max dug into biscuits and gravy and a side of eggs, both of them having ordered comfort food that morning.
The only thing missing from the meal was good coffee.
She’d had a cup at home before they left, but she planned to hit a nearby drive-through for another on the way to her office.
This might be the day I double my usual amount of espresso.
Max’s phone buzzed, and he set down his fork, only two bites into his biscuits.
“It’s Detective Shults.” He glanced around and saw the closest customer and waitress were at the other end of the restaurant, so he touched the speaker button and set the phone in the middle of the table.
“Morning, Lori,” he said. “You’re on speaker and Noelle is here too. ” He shoved another bite in his mouth.
“I got her!” crowed Detective Shults. “I’m at a mailbox store, and an Elise Nunevillier rented a box here six weeks ago!”
Lori’s excitement spilled out of the phone and infected Noelle as she met Max’s brightening gaze.
He feels it too.
“That’s fantastic,” said Max. “Any chance they have her on video?”
“They don’t keep video for more than four weeks, but the system also takes a still image of everyone who comes through the door.
Those they keep forever. The owner is getting me photos from the date Elise rented the box.
The owner doesn’t know what time Elise came in, so we’ll have to review the entire day for a woman with dark-red hair. ”
“That can’t be too hard,” said Noelle. “Does the owner remember the woman?”
“Not off the top of her head, but she said she might when she sees the photo.”
The second Max had heard the name, he’d asked Lori how to spell it and then whipped out his laptop and started tapping the keyboard. “I can’t find her . . . but the last name isn’t common, so—here she is!” He turned the screen for Noelle to see.
“A driver’s license from Idaho,” he said. “Her first name is actually Elisabeth, and she’s thirty-two.”
“We finally see the roommate’s face,” said Noelle, studying his screen. Elise had dark hair with blunt bangs. Her eyes were brown, and she appeared to be wearing false eyelashes. The woman looked intently at the camera, her close-lipped smile coy under the peachy lipstick.
Then Noelle froze. “Max.”
At the same time, he said, “Shit.”
Elise’s license had a Boise address; Layla Holder had also been in Boise.
“What’s going on?” asked Lori, her voice coming through the speaker on Max’s phone.
“Elise and Layla Holder both have Boise connections,” said Noelle.
“That can’t be a coincidence,” said Lori.
“Pull up Layla Holder’s license, Max,” asked Noelle.
“She still had an Oregon driver’s license when she passed,” said Max, awkwardly stretching his arms to type while keeping the screen in Noelle’s view. “I don’t see an Idaho one for her.”
“Then how about her prior addresses in Boise? I know Layla wasn’t in Boise that long, though.”
“There’s just one address. And that’s the one where she was living when her friend reported her missing.” He pulled up Elise’s license again. “The addresses are different. Not even on the same side of town.”
“What else can you find?”
“Elise has eleven prior addresses in Idaho going back seven years. Which is when she first got a license there.”
“Moves a lot,” commented Noelle.
“None of them are the same as Layla’s address.” He paused. “Before Elise lived in Idaho, she was in South Carolina, which appears to be where she grew up. I’ve got a couple of addresses from there going back more than ten years before she moved to Idaho.”
“These women crossed paths somewhere,” said Noelle. “I can feel it.”
“Think Elise disappeared back to Idaho? Or maybe even South Carolina?”
Noelle was silent for a long moment, wondering if the roommate was even still alive. They’d connected Sydney to Layla through Hayden Hall. Sort of. Elise had lived in Bend with Sydney and had lived in Boise, same as Layla.
The three women had connections.
Two of them were dead.
That we know of.
“Hayden Hall thought Elise was from California,” said Max, frowning at the screen. “The stolen license plate we saw on her Toyota is from there.”
“We need to show this photo to the guy who had his plates stolen. Maybe he’ll know her.”
“Good idea.”
“Now that we know her name, is that Toyota Corolla actually registered to Elise?” asked Noelle.
Max had the answer in less than a minute. “Yep. In Idaho. The plates are still good.”
“Then why did she put on stolen ones?” asked Noelle.
“Hey, guys?” Lori’s voice came from Max’s phone. “I’m gonna go. I’ll look through the photos from the mailbox place, and then where do you want to meet up?”
“Task force conference room,” said Max. “We’ll head over there in a few minutes. Good job, Lori. This might be exactly what we need to lead us to Belle.”
“God, I hope so.” Lori ended the call.
Max waved at the waitress.
She rushed over, a coffeepot in her hand and a frown on her face. “Is everything all right? You’ve barely eaten anything.”
“Everything is great,” said Noelle. “But we need to leave immediately for work. We’ll take a couple of boxes.”
“Absolutely.” She bustled away.
Max shut his laptop. “Let’s continue our digging at the sheriff’s office. It’ll be faster.”
“This feels solid, Max,” Noelle told him.
Excitement buzzed under her skin. “It’s going to be big.
I can feel it. We’ve put Sydney’s mystery roommate in the same city as one of the other murdered women.
We just need to find the connection.” She eyed her French toast. Only two bites were gone, but she was no longer hungry.
The waitress brought boxes, and Noelle transferred their breakfasts into them while Max paid the bill. His eyes were bright, the tiredness gone. He looked as eager to get to the office as she felt.
This is good. Very good.
Fifteen minutes later they strode into the task force room. A skeleton crew was working the phones and computers; most of the task force was out in the field following leads.
And didn’t oversleep like us.
Evan came in on their heels. Noelle had called him from the road.
“I did some research,” Evan said. “I’ve got two previous places of employment in Idaho to contact for Elise Nunevillier, but I didn’t find employment in Oregon. She has a clean record in Idaho. Not even a parking ticket.”
“Why the stolen plates?” Noelle mentioned again. The detail bothered her.
“Hiding?” asked Evan with a shrug. “I wonder if something scared her out of Idaho. Obviously she’s been laying very low here.”
Or she’s dead.
Noelle didn’t say it out loud.
“We need to figure out what her history is with Sydney,” said Max. “Hall gave us the impression they’d known each other awhile, and I’d think they’d have to be good friends for Sydney to let her live in her home and be around Belle.”
“Do we have Sydney visiting Idaho at any time over the last few years?” asked Noelle.
“Don’t know, but I’ll have someone take a deeper look,” said Evan. “Maybe they belonged to the same . . . something. I don’t know. Could have met online. Book clubs, Facebook groups, a Star Trek Discord. We’ll figure it out.”
“Do you have contact information for Elise’s parents?” asked Noelle.
“I’ve got an address and a phone number,” said Evan. “Same for her last two employers.” He looked from Max to Noelle. “Who wants to call who?”
“I’ll do the parents,” said Noelle, eager to dig into the woman’s background.
“Max and I’ll divide up the employment.”
Lori Shults entered the conference room, a definite spring in her step. “I’ve got a photo from the mail center. The owner was off the day Elise came in, but she gave me the phone number of the clerk who signed her up for a mailbox.”
“Any chance Elise filed a forwarding address at the mailbox place?” asked Noelle. “She might have left town.”
“I asked that,” said Lori. “No forwarding address on their records, but it appears she hadn’t collected her mail for a while.
The owner let me look through her box’s contents but not take it, so I took a photo of each piece.
Some were local advertisements addressed to ‘Occupant’ sorts of things, but there were also ads from Victoria’s Secret.
Ulta. Buckle. Stuff that was addressed directly to her.
But no personal mail. No bank stuff or bills. ”
“Let’s see her photo from the store,” said Noelle.
Lori held out her phone. Max, Evan, and Noelle all leaned close.
Disappointment went through her. Elise wore a baseball cap with a ponytail hanging through the back. From the camera’s angle, the brim hid the upper half of her face.
“Her hair color’s right,” said Max, opening his laptop. “The shape of her jaw seems similar to the driver’s license photo, but I can’t say it’s her.”
“I can’t either. I want to,” said Noelle hesitantly. “The hair is just as straight. No wave or curl. But I can’t look at this photo and say, ‘Oh, no. That’s definitely not her.’”
“Agreed,” said Evan, looking from the photo to the driver’s license. “It’s not a photo that we can use. The license is the best.” He looked at Lori. “Any chance the owner would look through images from other days to see when this same woman was last there?”
“I asked her that, and she wasn’t happy. Said it would take hours of her time, or else she’d have to pay someone. I offered to have one of our people do it, and she tentatively agreed, but said they’d have to do it in her store.”
The four of them looked at one another. “Is that worth our time?” asked Max. “Seeing when she was in the store could add something to our timeline, but what information could it really give us other than she picked up mail there?”
“What if Elise walked in that store with a little blonde girl on a day after she was last seen leaving Sydney’s house?” asked Noelle. “Maybe even yesterday?” She raised a brow at him.
“Okay. You’re absolutely right. Assign someone to go through them.
Start with yesterday and work back to the date we have Elise and Sydney driving away from the house.
And if you do find proof of her there since then, ask if the strip mall the mailbox place is in has parking lot video.
I want to see if anyone else is in her car. ”
“We need more information on Layla Holder,” said Evan. “There could be something there that points us to Elise . . . and hopefully Belle. I know Layla’s parents weren’t that helpful. No one’s been able to contact the friend that reported her missing, right?”
“I think Detective Nelson tried,” said Noelle. “I believe she left a voicemail.”
“Follow up,” said Evan, his face grim. “I don’t want anything slipping through the cracks.”
“I will,” promised Noelle.
We can’t let anything slide.