A Darkening Stain. Robert Thomas Wilson

to be him, right?” Sophia demanded as they sat in her sedan in the parking lot of the frat house. The sun beat down on them, making the car feel like a sauna despite the mid-forty-degree temperatures.

      Sophia made no move to turn on the car, just shifted to face Evelyn, her face wrinkled with distaste. “I mean, his girlfriend disappears off the face of the earth, and he’s out boinking sorority girls? Isn’t that classic behavior for someone who killed their partner? I’ve seen that in the news a ton. Shit, I can name a whole bunch off the top of my head. It’s practically a bad joke.”

      “Maybe,” Evelyn said, unbuttoning her suit jacket, glad she’d left her winter coat in the stuffy police station. “But we usually see that with married couples, one spouse killing another to be with a mistress. This is a little different. Jordan could have just as easily broken up with her—it’s not as if they’ve got marital property or kids together. If he’s involved, I doubt it’s his way of breaking up with her. I’ve seen stranger things, but behaviorally, that’d be pretty odd. Still, we have to take into account that he’s nineteen and he could just be immature.”

      “Immaturity is the least of his personality flaws.”

      Evelyn nodded thoughtfully. “But he has Haley up on a bit of a pedestal. He views himself as her protector, and I think he’s getting an ego boost from the fact that a girl like her would date him.”

      “She’s a high school student,” Sophia countered. “Is that really brag-worthy to a college guy?”

      “He referred to her as ‘sweet and innocent.’ Things he obviously thinks he isn’t. She’s the ideal he thinks he wants, but he’s still chasing after other women when she’s not around.”

      Sophia snorted angrily. “Or he’s just a jerk. You see what I mean about the smug bullshit, right? Seriously, this kid thinks he owns the world. And maybe Haley, too.”

      “He’s definitely an entitled rich kid. That doesn’t mean he killed Haley, though. If he’s going to be a legitimate suspect, we need to figure out how he could have dropped her off and driven away and then come back to grab her.”

      “Maybe he circled back,” Sophia said stubbornly. “Look, at this point, you’ve met all the key players in Haley’s life. If it was someone close to her, chances are it’s one of the people we talked to today. So, which one is it? You said you’d have a better sense once we talked to them. So, lay it on me. If you think it’s someone other than Jordan, fine. But I want to focus this investigation.”

      Evelyn held in her frustration that Sophia wanted her to hand over some magic solution. At least Sophia wanted her help, unlike a lot of officers who dismissed profiling out of hand. “The problem with a case where there’s only one victim is that we don’t have patterns of behavior to analyze. It’s the patterns that give us some of the most useful information for profiling. And we don’t really have a crime scene, either. We have a last known location, but we can’t say for certain she was grabbed there, or if she snuck out on her own. Which means we have to work off the events of the day, from witnesses, and I have to profile the players. Unfortunately, it’s a process.”

      “Okay,” Sophia said, her voice quivering with restrained frustration. “So, what can you tell me? Can we narrow it down?”

      “I think you’re right about Haley’s mom not having anything to do with the abduction,” Evelyn said. “I don’t think she has any idea what happened to her daughter. Her reactions don’t seem faked, and I doubt she’s that good of an actor.”

      When Sophia looked ready to agree, Evelyn added, “But that doesn’t totally get her off the hook. I’m pretty sure she’s medicating, which is part of the reason I don’t think she’d be able to successfully hide her reactions. It’s logical that a doctor would prescribe her something in this situation, but we shouldn’t make assumptions. We should consider whether the medicating is new, or if she might have been abusing prescriptions—or something else—beforehand. It’s not alcohol—” Evelyn knew the smell and look of that too well to be fooled “—but illegal drugs could be a possibility.”

      “Illegal drugs?” Sophia scoffed. “Seriously? Linda Varner?”

      “Let’s just look into it. If she’s been abusing drugs for a while, maybe she missed what was happening right under her nose.”

      “So your bet is Pete Varner? You think, what?” Her tone turned sour. “That he was sexually abusing her?”

      “I get a weird feeling from him. I want to take a closer look at him and Bill Cooke. The timing of that new note was suspicious—especially if we can confirm it’s Haley’s handwriting.”

      “It happened really fast after Bill’s little video,” Sophia agreed.

      “Which could mean that Bill walked down into his basement and made Haley write it as soon as we left. Or he faked it, because he knows her writing, and she’s not around to do it herself. And quite frankly, he’s strangely calm, just going about his usual business, for someone whose only daughter has been missing for a month. Everyone reacts differently to tragedy, and it’s possible his calm response is denial or repression. But it could also be that he killed her, either because she didn’t want anything to do with him, the way her mom and Jordan are claiming, or because he wanted to try to make Linda look bad.”

      “You think he might have been trying to set Linda up? That he’d kill his own kid to do it?”

      “Unfortunately, it’s not unprecedented. For someone who seems to have spent no time with search parties or hanging out at the police station waiting for updates, Bill sure hasn’t wasted an opportunity to point fingers. Which to me says one of two things. He doesn’t need updates on the search because he’s involved and he already knows what happened to Haley, or he cares more about sticking it to his ex than whether his daughter is okay.”

      Sophia nodded, not looking entirely convinced, and Evelyn added, “And I agree with you about Jordan. He might be telling the truth about Haley, but if he could lie so straight-faced about not seeing anyone else when there was a woman literally in his bed, we need to see what else he might be lying about.”

      Sophia let out a heavy sigh and finally turned on the ignition, getting some air circulation in the car. “So, we’re not really any further along, are we? It’s the dad, the stepdad or the boyfriend. And both Pete and Jordan did take part in the search parties, in those early days. Bill’s the only one who didn’t. Does that mean he’s our prime suspect?”

      “Unfortunately, it’s not that easy. The others could be taking part in the search parties and calling for updates to seem innocent, and to hear where we are in the investigation.”

      “Okay, that’s not helpful. So, what now?”

      “Two things. When we get back to the station, let’s try to get Haley’s medical records.”

      “To look for signs of abuse.” Sophia nodded, but the set of her jaw was grim. “I already reviewed them and there’s nothing there. And I asked both Linda and Haley’s best friend about the week before Haley went missing, when her mom was out of town and Haley was alone with Pete. She didn’t say anything about abuse to either of them. But we both know that doesn’t mean there wasn’t any.”

      Evelyn nodded, Pete Varner’s demeanor still nagging at her. Quick flashes of a face in the semidarkness came to mind, a man with no name, when she was ten years old. That same predatory aura.

      Little needles crept up her spine and she forced the memory back, trying to stay objective.

      “All right,” Sophia said, her eyes narrowing, letting Evelyn know her detective instincts were buzzing, seeing that Evelyn was thinking more than she was saying. “What’s the second thing?”

      “I want to meet this best friend. The last person to see Haley before she went missing.”

      * * *

      “Did you find Haley?”

      The