CHAPTER10
Three days passedin which Cassie worked her shift patrolling the county, answering 911 calls and breaking up fights between family members. As soon as she got off duty, she went back to the office for a couple more hours to pour through the missing persons databases with no further breakthroughs regarding the woman in the wall.
To make it even more depressing, no more clues surfaced to help Cassie in her search to find her missing friend.
She’d always thought that a body was the most important and telling clue. They had the mummified remains of a woman. A body. And no idea who she was, nor how or why she’d been sealed in the hidden room behind the drywall.
Fishing through missing persons databases seemed futile. With no distinctive features that would help her narrow her search to a more reasonable outcome, she was stuck looking through hundreds of entries with photos of women who’d disappeared fifteen to twenty years ago.
With Molly’s permission to miss his day job, Drake had worked with the sheriff over the past couple of days, following through on the list of employees of Greenway Construction who’d been on the job during the work on the addition or the remodeling.
None of them admitted to hanging drywall sheets in that particular room on their own. That had been Earl’s job. They’d helped him when it had come to lifting the heavy sheets of gypsum up to the high ceilings, but, for the most part, Earl had been there, directing the men in the proper way to fit full sheets of drywall against existing studs.
The sheriff and Drake hadn’t been any more successful in their interviews than Cassie had been doing research in the databases.
Hank Patterson had offered his computer guru, Swede, to help sift through the missing persons databases. Cassie decided it was pointless to add more people when they didn’t have the information about the body.
After Drake and the sheriff had exhausted the list of workers, Drake joined Cassie at the sheriff’s office in the evenings, bringing her dinner from the B&B, provided by the talented Ms. Dottie, or a meal he’d ordered as carry-out from the Blue Moose Tavern.
They’d searched the databases, bouncing ideas and scenarios off each other, hoping one made sense.
After a few hours of fruitless data mining, they’d call it quits, drive over to the bed and breakfast, shower together and fall into bed.
Inevitably, they’d have a sudden burst of energy, fueled by desire. They made love and then fell asleep in each other’s arms.
Being naked with Drake was the best part of Cassie’s week. He was a thoughtful lover, always ensuring she climaxed first and then again when he was inside her.
Cassie considered less than a week was too soon to know where their relationship was headed. One thing was certain…they were good together. Working through issues, brainstorming ideas and making love. The kissing couldn’t be better.
By Friday, Cassie was ready to drive to Missoula and shake information out of the medical examiner and the forensics team.
She’d taken her lunch break in the office, going through more images of smiling women who had never made it home. It was depressing and seemingly endless. After an afternoon of patrolling and performing her normal deputies’ duties, she ended her shift and settled into the office.
An hour later, the front door of the sheriff’s office squeaked open. Sheriff Barron was having dinner with the mayor and city council members to discuss the sad lack of applicants for the open positions in the sheriff’s department.
Cassie called out, “Can I help you” and poked her head out of the office door.
Abby stood there with a paper in her hand, her brow puckered, appearing confused. When she saw Cassie, she sighed. “Oh, good. You’re just the person I wanted to talk to. Is anyone else here?”
“It’s just me minding the store,” Cassie said. “Come on back.”
Abby joined her in the office. Pulling up one of the rolling office chairs, she sat and placed the sheet of paper on the table in front of Cassie. “I don’t get it.”
Cassie stared down at three sets of data. “What is this?”
“You remember I told you I had my DNA analyzed?”
Cassie nodded.
“Are these your results?” She leaned over the sheet, curious about how it worked, having considered doing it herself.
“Mine, my father’s…and my mother’s.”
Cassie glanced up. “How did you get your mother and father to participate? I thought your father was against it.”
Abby’s cheeks flushed a deep pink. “I told them I was doing an experiment for my biology class on the amount of bacteria in a person’s spit. I wanted to see who I was most like.” She sighed. “I know that wasn’t very honest, but that’s not what’s got me concerned.”
Cassie frowned down at the diagram. “Then what does?”