Chapter 21

TWENTY-ONE

Gulf Shores, Alabama

Sunday, September 22

10:32 a.m.

The Fuentes home wasn't like the others Leigh had noticed in Gulf Shores.

A single-level colonial off Wedgewood Drive with white siding, manicured hedges, and a red brick path leading to the front door. Something Leigh might see back home rather than in an ocean-tourist town churning out missing teens. The house itself was far enough away from the overpriced ocean front properties but close enough to be included in Gulf Shores High School's boundaries. The antique wood door held on to two elongated panes on either side. Giving visitors a blurry view into the home. The door was open now, with an officer posted to keep unwanted guests from entering.

Detective Moore nodded to the uniform acting as gatekeeper, Leigh close behind. Just as a news van pulled up to the curb. The detective stopped short of crossing the threshold. "Shit. Who tipped them off?"

The vultures were already descending. Eager for that first pound of flesh. The news woman Leigh had clocked at Ruby Davis's death scene slipped free of the van's passenger seat, wobbling on impossibly high heels before checking her hair in the side mirror. Caroline. That was what Detective Moore had called her. She wore a different outfit now, though the basics were the same. Skirt, heels, hairspray. Guess a night in jail hadn't been enough to curb Caroline's curiosity about this case.

The last thing a mother wanted when her daughter had gone missing was a camera shoved in her face. It was the last thing Leigh had wanted as a surviving member of her family for a long time. Reporters, true crime authors, interview requests, podcast hosts, documentary directors—they'd all followed her to college then become reinvigorated when she'd joined Concord PD. Leigh, do you still believe your father's innocence? Do you talk with your father in prison? Are you joining the police department in an attempt to reopen the case? Why did your mother kill herself?

Her move into the FBI seemed to ward them off. But the investigation in Lebanon two months ago had brought it all back.

Her face had graced newspapers she'd never read. National coverage had spilled details she'd always kept to herself. More interview requests, more journalists leaving messages on her voicemail. Literary agents had come out of the woodwork, all vying to work with her to pitch her story to publishers. Her entire life had been displayed for public consumption. But there was one secret they'd never have. Her brother, Chandler. They would never know he'd survived Chris Ellingson, or that she and her brother had set a plan in motion to reveal the monster hiding behind that manipulative smile.

It was the thought of someone else profiting off her loss—of attempting to insert themselves into the protected memories of her life—that had been too much to take. And no one, not even a cheating, gutless spouse like Wesley Portman, deserved that kind of pain. Leigh turned to the uniformed officer at the door of the Fuentes home. "They do not step one foot on this property. Understand?"

"Yes, ma'am." The officer nodded. A nervousness laced his voice, like he knew exactly who she was and what she was capable of if he failed to live up to the order. "I understand."

Leigh waited for the detective to show her into the Fuentes home. Though she wasn't exactly sure, again, why she'd offered Detective Moore her insight into a missing teenage girl in the first place. The FBI didn't actually like getting involved in cases where it hadn't been invited, but there was something about these disappearances Leigh couldn't quite grab on to. Something familiar and terrifying and compelling at the same time.

"Remind me never to get on your bad side." Detective Moore kept one hand on the butt of her sidearm to prevent jostling as she hiked up the single step through the front door. "I looked you up, you know. Read about your last case."

Her gut suctioned to her spine in preparation. For the questions. For the criticism and the disregard. She'd fortified herself against them since she was seventeen years old, mostly from other law enforcement officers, but that didn't make her any stronger to fight off the urge to prove her worth inside an investigation.

"You never gave up." Detective Moore slowed, coming to a full stop in the middle of an unfinished, two-story entryway. In that moment, she wasn't a detective. She was the aunt of a murdered teenaged girl. Henrietta, the woman who'd adopted and raised and loved her fifteen-year-old niece for the past decade. Who'd considered that girl her very own. "This case… It's personal for me. I don't have children of my own. I'm the only female detective in Gulf Shores, and it took everything I had to prove I deserve to be here like the rest of the detectives in my department. Longer hours, double the caseload, sucking up to the brass, but then this five-year-old girl shows up on my doorstep, and… something changed. I wasn't just a detective anymore. I had to learn how to be a mom, and I thought I was doing a pretty damn good job of it."

It was clear then. That while Henrietta Moore had been content with letting her career rule her life, she loved harder than anyone Leigh had ever met. "I've spent the past decade trying to shield her from the bad things in this world. From my job, especially. I kept her away from the department and the cases I worked. Nobody even knew she was mine because I thought if she got even a glimpse of what I did, she'd be taken from me. Just as easily as my sister and her husband had been. I should've been able to protect her. I should've taught Ruby to protect herself better, and that's something I will have to live with for the rest of my life. But all I want now is to find the son of a bitch who did this to my child."

The detective shifted her weight, shaking off the vulnerability and letting that controlled rage peek through her eyes. "Will you help me? Please."

Leigh hadn't expected that. This other side to the hard-edged woman who'd wanted her as far away from Elyse's case as possible yesterday morning. It was a monumental shift from the approach that usually welcomed her in the field, and that part of her that had joined Concord PD to reopen her brother's case surged to answer. "I'll do everything I can to help you find Ruby's killer."

It was only after the words were out of her mouth that Leigh remembered she wasn't actually in Alabama on official duty. That her medical leave didn't end for another three weeks. That she didn't have a say in which cases she was assigned. And that the chances of recovering Elyse alive were quickly running out.

Detective Moore nodded her gratitude. And headed through a dining room complete with sideboard, fresh flowers, and an antique chandelier to the living room on the other side. "Annalea, I'm sorry it took me so long to get here. Have you heard anything from Saige?"

The woman pressing a tissue to her mouth and nose shook her head almost violently as she stood. She surrendered one hand to the detective like they were old friends. Judging on the first-name basis, Leigh guessed they were. Annalea Fuentes carried herself as a ballerina or an etiquette teacher might. Tall, straight as a pin. Thin shoulders and a dipped collarbone. "No. Nothing. I've called her, I've left voice messages and texted her. I even had Rick try to reach out. He hasn't heard anything either. I can't believe this is happening."

"Agent Brody, Annalea Fuentes. Saige's mother." Detective Moore motioned to Leigh as everyone took their seats on the matching overstuffed navy couches. "When was the last time you saw or heard from her?"

"Friday morning. I asked her to pick up Valentina from school that afternoon because I had to work late." Annalea Fuentes clutched on to the tissue in her hand as if it would bring her daughter back through the door. "I got home around six, and I looked at my phone for the first time in a few hours. I had missed calls from the school. Valentina was still there. She'd been waiting in the office for her sister for hours."

Movement caught Leigh's attention from the next room over. A small thing. Hardly noticeable. But she made out the forehead and a set of great big brown eyes peeking out from behind the door frame of what looked like a sitting room. The younger sister, Leigh assumed. The girl couldn't have been more than six, but an entire life lived in the somberness of her expression. She understood exactly what all this meant.

"I don't understand. I didn't get a truancy call from the high school. Saige must've been there for at least some part of the day." Another shake of the head. Annalea leaned forward in her chair. "I called her at least a dozen times after getting Valentina from school. She never answered. I knew the police couldn't do anything until she'd been gone twenty-four hours, so I kept trying to get a hold of her. I thought maybe she'd gone to a friend's house, but none of the girls she hangs out with have seen her…" The tears took over again then.

Leigh returned her focus to the interview. "You said you had Rick, I'm assuming your husband, try to reach Saige?"

"Ex-husband." Annalea Fuentes regained some semblance of control. Leigh imagined it was much harder than it looked. "Rick and I have been divorced for three years now. Ever since Saige found him passed out drunk here in the living room and couldn't wake him up. I filed for divorce the next day. She thought she'd found her father dead. It gave her nightmares for months. It's just us three here now."

"Has Saige said anything about school recently? Any changes there?" Detective Moore's voice softened slightly, revealing a whole other side to the woman who'd just begged Leigh find her niece's killer. She felt for Annalea. Understood her on a visceral level she'd hoped she'd never understand someone, and Leigh's heart hurt in response. Because she'd been there too. "Is there anyone she's been seeing romantically?"

"You think she could be with a boy? No. No way. She would tell me, and she would never leave her sister like that." Annalea Fuentes shook her head, instantly dismissive. "Besides, Saige doesn't have time for a boyfriend. She barely has time for her friends. The only reason she and Ruby knew each other and spent so much time together is because of their AP classes. She would've told me if something was wrong or if she'd met someone."

"Did you tell your parents everything when you were Saige's age?" Leigh asked.

"Excuse me, who are you?" A flash of frustration burned across Annalea's face.

"Agent Brody doesn't mean any offense, Annalea. She has experience with this sort of thing." Detective Moore secured both hands around a single one of the mother's. "Anything you can tell us, any change in Saige's behavior or grades, friendships, tastes—it all helps."

Leigh wished she didn't have experience in this arena. She wished there was a day she would be out of a job entirely. Then again, she wasn't sure what else she would do with her life if crime suddenly stopped existing.

Annalea Fuentes took a deep breath of composure. "I don't know what to tell you. Saige was just… Saige. I never have to worry about her because she's usually the one worrying about us. Making sure to pack lunches in the morning, to get Valentina to school, doing her homework on time. I'm a single mother. I have to work in order to keep us in this house. I can't be here all the time." A fresh wave of tears streaked down the woman's face. "But maybe if I had been, I would've seen something was wrong."

"No. You are not at fault, Annalea. You didn't do anything wrong." Detective Moore caught Leigh's gaze and motioned toward the rest of the house that way she did with her chin. "We're going to do whatever it takes to bring her home to you."

"Mrs. Fuentes, do you mind if I take a look at Saige's room?" Leigh asked.

A sniff accentuated the grieving mother's accent. "What for?"

"I'd like to get a sense of who your daughter was, her habits, her friends. Anything that might tell us where she would go if she were in trouble." It was the small things—journals, interests, text messages—that provided the most information about a person. She needed all of it.

"Down the hall, last door on the right." Annalea Fuentes made another pass beneath her nose with her tissue.

Detective Moore turned the mother's focus back to her. "We're going to get you through this. I give you my word."

Leigh took the opportunity to peel herself out of the living room and follow the directions she'd been given. Valentina had vanished from her hiding spot, but a sense of being watched followed Leigh down the hall and into a room very much decorated by a teenager. Posters of LANY and Taylor Swift, clothes discarded in piles and over furniture, an unmade bed, and study books.

Shuffling let Leigh know she wasn't alone, and she turned to find Valentina, the six-year-old sister in the doorway. "Hello." She crouched to make herself smaller. She'd been told her entire life she was intimidating, most especially about the things she was passionate about: freeing innocent men from prison, protecting siblings who'd been abducted, exposing corruption, and Legos. But she didn't want to scare anyone today. "We're looking for your sister. Do you know where she might've gone? Or who she might be with?"

Valentina didn't answer. But she didn't ignore Leigh either. Crossing the room, she went to Saige's dresser—the top drawer—and opened it. Then came back, a single item in hand. A photo. She handed it off.

"Thank you." A sticky film outlined a rectangle across the top. Like it'd been stuck to a wall before hidden in a drawer. Out of sight from Annalea? Leigh studied a grouping of girls, mostly blurred due to poor photography. Wide smiles flashed brilliantly from the exposure. Bare midriffs paled in the glow, as did the half-empty bottle of vodka in Saige Fuentes's hand.

But there was one shape that stood out from the rest.

The outline of a man, facing away from the camera. As if he hadn't wanted to be photographed. His flannel work shirt and jeans wouldn't help to identify him, but he was much older than the girls posing behind him. That much she could tell from the coarseness of his ear-length hair. Leigh pointed to the man. "Do you know who this is?"

Valentina shook her head. Then ran from the room. Like she'd given away a secret she promised not to ever reveal.

Leigh let herself take in the rest of the faces captured in a split second of time. Ruby Davis, Saige Fuentes, a girl she didn't recognize. Then another she did. "Ava Portman."