Chapter Twenty-One
In the passenger seat of Lance’s SUV, Sharp moved on to the next item on his agenda. “Dylan Sanders.”
Lance plugged the address into the GPS.
Sharp gave a quick synopsis of Zoe’s disappearance. “The cops won’t investigate because there’s no clear sign of foul play. But Olivia isn’t buying it.”
“That’s good enough for me.”
“You don’t think Liv’s personal experience might cloud her judgment?”
Lance glanced sideways at him. “Do you?”
Sharp paused. “I think it might drive her to follow the investigation like a bloodhound, but her judgment is sound. If she says Zoe wouldn’t just leave, then I believe her. Also, Dylan has been acting suspicious.”
“OK, then.” Lance nodded.
Sharp’s heart warmed. Loyalty was a thing, wasn’t it?
Three years ago, Sharp wouldn’t have found Olivia without his partner’s help.
When Lance was a boy, his father had gone missing.
Sharp had been the lead detective on the case.
When he’d seen Mrs. Kruger’s mental illness made her incapable of raising her son, Sharp had stepped in to help.
Lance was the closest thing Sharp would ever have to a son.
He started to choke up a little but shook off the emotion.
Getting old was a bitch. He got more sentimental with every year that passed.
He was one step away from crying at Folgers commercials.
“When a woman goes missing, the husband or boyfriend is always a suspect.” Sharp added, “Nicki saw Dylan at a bar last night, hitting up a pretty young woman.”
“Ugh.” Lance slowed the SUV and made a left. “Dylan might be a cheating asshole, but his criminal record is clean.” He turned in to the parking lot. “He drives a black pickup truck.” He drove up and down the rows of cars. No pickup trucks in sight. “Maybe he’s not home.”
“Let’s knock anyway. He might have left his vehicle at the bar.”
Lance parked and they made their way to the apartment door. Sharp knocked. No one answered. He knocked again, then put his ear to the door.
“Anything?” Lance asked.
“Crickets.” Sharp considered their options. In a low voice he said, “Our first option is the most obvious. We could unlock the door and search the apartment.” Unlock was code for break in.
Lance glanced over his shoulder. “There are people in the parking lot. What are our other options?”
“Do a deeper dive into both Cody and Dylan.”
“Research might lead us to other places we can look for Dylan or to other people to question about him. Plus, if we can find some financial data, that might suggest a motive.”
“Excellent point. Following the money is always a good idea.” As much as Sharp was in action mode, his partner was right. Information was key.
They returned to the SUV, and Lance drove them back to the office.
Five minutes later, Sharp printed out the list of potential passwords Olivia had found in Zoe’s office.
“I’d love basic financials on Dylan and Zoe,” Sharp said.
Since PIs couldn’t get warrants for financial institution records, there was only one way to obtain that info and it was slightly less than legal.
“No problem.” Lance pecked away at his keyboard. “My mom is too busy for random hacking today, but I can get us in.”
“Without getting caught?”
“Pfft.” Lance snorted. “Of course. Easy peasy. My mom and I built this computer with a few enhancements.”
“I have a list of potential passwords.” Sharp handed over the list. “And Dylan gave Olivia the sign-in for their iCloud accounts.”
“That will speed things up.”
Sharp made a cup of green tea while Lance worked. Then he returned to the office and paced the space in front of his partner’s desk.
“You need to start drinking decaffeinated tea,” Lance said without looking up.
“Is this going to take a long time?”
“Not at all.” Lance sat back. “I’m not hacking into the bank’s server.
I’m accessing Dylan’s and Zoe’s accounts via the customer portal.
” He shifted back and forth between multiple windows on two monitors.
“Thankfully, most people care more about remembering their passwords than security. Zoe picked decent passwords, but she wrote them down. Dylan’s were easy to guess from his personal information.
Dylan used a combination of their address and his birthday. ” Lance rolled his eyes.
Sharp leaned closer.
Lance adjusted a monitor to give him a better angle.
“Dylan and Zoe have one joint account and they each have a few individual ones. Zoe transfers money into the joint account for rent, insurance, and other household bills, but they don’t keep a balance there.
Dylan stopped contributing to the household account about ten months ago.
Here’s his individual account. As you can see, he’s broke.
He generates decent money from personal training but spends it all—and more—on marketing, clothes, hair and skin products, self-tanning, photo editing software, et cetera. ”
“He’s starting up a fitness influencer business.”
Lance continued to scroll through statements. “So far, all he’s generating is a loss. He’s been solidly in the red for many months.”
“It takes time to start up a business. What about Zoe?”
“Her podcast turns a nice profit, and the income has been steadily increasing over the last several years. Recently, she’s had a nice uptick, but she hasn’t prepared a profit and loss statement for this quarter yet.
Unfortunately, Dylan’s business has been eating up much of her excess cash.
But look at this.” Lance pointed to the screen.
“Whatever is left over each month, she withdraws in cash at the end of the month. In August, it was roughly fifteen hundred dollars. In July, she took out almost two grand. Yet neither one of them have any real money in savings. Dylan’s savings account balance is less than a hundred dollars.
Zoe keeps about five hundred in her account. That’s it.”
“What does she do with the cash?”
Lance typed. “No idea. Unless she has another account somewhere.”
“Maybe she doesn’t want a clear trail from one account to another.” Sharp pointed to Dylan’s account. “She might be afraid her husband would spend it if he could find it. Do you see any transactions from Saturday night or Sunday morning?”
“Yes. She withdrew the max from an ATM a little after midnight. Three thousand dollars. She didn’t leave much behind, and that’s the last time her card was used.”
“So she’s been socking away cash for how many months?”
“I can only see twelve months of statement history, but she’s been doing it the whole time.” He scratched on a notepad for a few minutes. “The total for the last year is just over nineteen thousand dollars. Plus, the three thousand ATM withdrawal totals twenty-two thousand dollars.”
“She could live off that for a while if she’s frugal.”
“We don’t know where she’s keeping the money, how much she started with, or how long she’s been stashing it away.
She might have considerably more than that,” Lance said.
“Here’s something else that’s interesting.
Dylan withdrew one thousand dollars from their joint account yesterday.
He didn’t leave much behind. Looking at their typical monthly activity, their rent will be due in about ten days.
If Zoe doesn’t come back or transfer some money, he’s not going to have that rent money. ”
“What about credit cards?” Sharp asked.
“Zoe doesn’t use hers that much. There’s been no activity on her cards since she disappeared. Dylan uses his more, but he has a low credit limit. I don’t see anything unusual on either card.” Lance shook his head. “No charges from the Tuscan Grill.”
“He had cash to spend,” Sharp said. “While we’re here, can you access Cody Vass’s accounts?”
“Let me pull up his personal data and see what I can do.” Lance cracked his knuckles and worked his keyboard for about ten minutes.
“For a guy who works for a bank, he’s very lax with online security.
Cody’s financials are very boring. Wait.
This is interesting. Last month, Cody received a payment from the Mindi Warwick Talent Agency.
” He opened a new window and googled the name. “They represent models and actors.”
“You’re kidding?” Sharp couldn’t believe it. “Usually, when one of us says ‘he’s either innocent or a good actor,’ we’re not serious about the acting bit.”
“Let me see if I can find out more.”
“Try a reverse image search on Cody’s dating profile pics.”
“Already doing it.” Lance banged away on the keyboard with more enthusiasm. “Ha! Got him.” He turned the monitor so Sharp had a better view.
“I’ll be damned.”
Cody’s face stared back at them, with all his even white teeth, chiseled jaw, and perfect tan. He was holding a tube of toothpaste.
Lance changed the image, showing Cody with an equally blond and attractive woman and their Gerber-commercial-clone baby. “Here he is again, selling diapers this time.”
“So, he is an actor.”
Lance leaned closer to the monitor. “His agency bio says actor slash model.”
“I guess we move Cody back up the list.” Sharp would never have guessed Cody was an actual actor. “This is a first for me.”
“Same,” Lance agreed. “Professionally, he uses the name Cody Vaughn.”
“What if Cody didn’t tell Nicki about his acting because he was embarrassed about his lack of success? Or because he’s being modest.”
“He didn’t strike me as the modest type.”
“No,” Sharp agreed. “We need to talk to him again.” He checked the time. “Tomorrow, we can pay him a visit at the bank.”
“Sometimes it’s helpful to surprise people at their place of work,” Lance said. “What do you want to do now?”
“Find Dylan.” Sharp drained his tea. “Speaking of surprising people at work, we could look for him at the gym where he does personal training. If he’s not around, it might be interesting to see what his coworkers think of him.”
Lance checked his notes. “Dylan trains at Titan Fitness.”
“Let’s roll.”