her into the night, all, Keri suspected, on the orders of Cave.
Somehow, Mags had managed find a way to anonymously reach out to the Black Widower. It turned out that he was happy to pass on a lead about Evie’s whereabouts for a hefty price. He seemed to have no loyalties, which worked out well for Keri in that instance because his information ultimately led to her learning of the existence of the Vista event.
But while some of the particulars, like the Black Widower connection, were old news to her, Mags said nothing. She didn’t interrupt once, although she pulled out a notepad and took occasional notes. She listened intently, from the beginning all the way up to the call from Susan Granger this morning about Evie being the Blood Prize at the Vista.
When she was sure Keri was done, she asked a question.
“I understand your predicament, Keri. And I’m horrified for you. But I still don’t understand. Why are you staring at hundreds of papers about Mr. Cave?”
“Because I’m at my wits’ end, Mags. I have no more leads. I have no more clues. The only thing I know for certain is that Jackson Cave is somehow involved in my daughter’s case.”
“You’re certain?” Mags asked.
“Yes,” Keri said. “I don’t think he was initially. He probably had no idea that one of his abductors’ victims was my daughter. After all, I wasn’t even a detective at the time. I was a college professor. Her disappearance is the reason I became a cop. I don’t even know at what point I really attracted his interest. But at some point he must have pieced together that the kid the lady detective was searching for was abducted by someone he had commissioned.”
“And you think he sought out her location?” Mags asked. “You think he knows where she is now?”
“Those are two very different questions. I’m sure that at some point he did investigate her location. It would have been in his interest to know her circumstance. But that would have been well before I started to sniff him out. Once he suspected I was looking into him, I have no doubt he made sure that he couldn’t be connected to her. He knows that if I thought he could lead me to Evie, I’d follow him day and night. He probably worries that I’d kidnap him and torture him to get her location.”
“Would you?” Mags asked, more curiously than accusingly.
“I would. A million times over I would.”
“Me too,” Mags whispered.
“So I don’t think that Jackson Cave knows where my daughter is or who has her. But I do think he knows individuals who know individuals who know where she is. I think he could find out her current location if he was so inclined. And I think that he could direct her to be at a specific location at a particular time if he wanted. That’s what I think is going on. I think Evie is the Blood Prize because he wants her to be. And somehow, his wishes have been conveyed to the people who can make it happen.”
“So you want to follow that trail?”
“No,” Keri said. “The maze from him to her is too complicated for me to figure out, even if I had unlimited time, which I obviously don’t. That’s a rabbit hole I won’t go down. But I started to realize, all this time I’ve only been looking at Jackson Cave as an opponent, the mastermind who is keeping me from my daughter, this malevolent force out to destroy my family.”
“He’s not?” Mags asked, sounding surprised and almost offended.
“He is. But that’s not how he sees himself. And that’s not what he always was. I realized that I have to forget my preconceptions to learn who this guy is and what makes him tick.”
“Why do you care what makes him tick?”
“Because I can’t beat him if I don’t understand how he thinks, what his motives are. And if I don’t understand what’s really important to him deep down, I’ll never get leverage over him. And that’s what I really need, Mags – leverage. This guy isn’t going to volunteer any information to me. But if I can determine what matters most to him, maybe I can use that to get my daughter back.”
“How?”
“I have no idea…yet.”
CHAPTER FIVE
When Ray walked into the conference room three hours later, Keri still didn’t have leverage. But she did think she had a better sense of who Jackson Cave was.
“Lovely to see you, Detective Sands,” Mags said when he entered bearing submarine sandwiches and iced coffees.
“Good to see you too, Red,” he said as he tossed the sandwiches on the table.
“Well, I do declare,” she replied huffily.
Keri wasn’t sure when Ray had started calling Margaret Merrywether “Red” but she got a kick out of it. And despite her reaction now, Keri was pretty sure Mags didn’t mind either.
“I brought the guy’s financials and property records,” Ray said. “But I don’t think they’re going to be the answer. I reviewed them with Edgerton and he couldn’t find anything hinky. But for a guy with that kind of money and power, that alone is actually kind of hinky.”
“I agree,” Keri said. “But hinky isn’t enough to act on.”
“He wanted to bring in Patterson but I told him to hold off for now.”
Detective Garrett Patterson went by the nickname “Grunt Work,” and for good reason. He was the second best tech guy in the unit behind Edgerton, and while he lacked Edgerton’s intuitive gifts for finding unseen connections within complex information, he had another skill. He loved to pore over the minutiae of records to find that small but crucial detail that others missed.
“That was the right call,” Keri said after a moment. “He might uncover something with the property records. But I worry that he couldn’t help but tell Hillman or accidentally cast too wide a net and set off warning lights. I don’t want to involve him unless we have no other choice.”
“It may come to that,” Ray said. “That is, unless you’ve cracked the Cave code in the last few hours.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Keri admitted. “But we have uncovered some surprising stuff.”
“Like what?”
“Well, for starters,” Mags piped in, “Jackson Cave wasn’t always a complete asshole.”
“That is a surprise,” Ray said, unwrapping a sandwich and taking a big bite. “How so?”
“He used to work in the D.A.’s office,” Mags replied.
“He was a prosecutor?” Ray asked, nearly choking on his food. “The defender of rapists and child molesters?”
“It was a long time ago,” Keri said. “He joined the D.A. right out of law school at USC – worked there for two years.”
“Couldn’t hack it?” Ray wondered.
“Actually, his conviction rate was pretty amazing. He apparently didn’t like to plead down often so he took most cases to trial. He got nineteen convictions and two hung juries. Not one acquittal.”
“That
