He shifted in the chair. “I met her in a bar, it went down hot and heavy, and she ended up pregnant. We got married a few weeks later. Then she lost the baby and split.”
“Leaving Eli?”
“That’s the kind of woman she is. Not that I want it any other way. If she tried to take Eli from me, I’d fight her till the end. The marriage was one of those six-week wonders.” Another swig from his bottle. Kacey watched his Adam’s apple move, then turned her attention to the images.
Another woman near her age, who looked like her, who’d lived around Montana’s state capital, possibly born there, and who was now missing.
“Here’s something else,” she added. “I just found out that the man who I thought was my father wasn’t. My mother had an affair with a doctor in Helena, and even when my dad found out, he kept raising me as his own.”
“So?”
“These women don’t just look alike. Some of us are dead ringers for the other. For a while the staff at St. Bart’s thought I was the woman in ICU when Jocelyn was brought in.”
“You think you’re related to these victims, these women? That this one guy fathered all of you, and now he’s . . . what? Knocking you off?” He looked at her as if she’d lost her mind.
“I know it sounds crazy, but there’s a connection there. I’m not making it up. Come into the den. . . .” She scraped her chair back and led him to her computer, where she pulled up the information she’d gotten from Riza and printed it out.
He read the reports, looked through the pages, checked pictures on driver’s licenses, scanned obituaries, and scowled thoughtfully. “Where’d you get these?”
“A friend. It’s mostly public record.”
He examined the pages a second time. “If you’re right ... and I don’t think you are . . . but this is pretty sick. It could all still be coincidence. These deaths . . .” He held up a stack of death certificates. “They were all ruled accidents.”
“A lot of ’em. A librarian in Detroit, a ski instructor in Vail, a single mother and stay-at-home mom in San Francisco. Two others in Seattle and three . . . in Boise.”
“All women.”
“That we know of. But ... I think we’ve just tapped the surface.”
“We don’t know anything yet. Some of these people died over ten years ago.” He shook his head, denying the evidence, even while his eyes kept coming back to the pages. “Let me get this straight. You think one person is behind these deaths and is just incredibly patient. Taking time, over a long period of years. And now a rash of murders?”
“He’s escalating,” she said. “It happens.”
“You don’t know that.”
“We don’t know a lot, like you said, but something’s really off here, and now the deaths, the ‘accidents,’ are happening closer together.”
When he didn’t seem convinced, she reminded him, “You came over here. You recognized that the women you were involved with are a type. I’m just taking it one step further. I think we might all be genetically linked. In fact, I’m running some DNA tests to prove it, but unfortunately, that takes time.”
“Seriously?” He appeared skeptical.
“Yes. Elle Alexander was a patient of mine.” She pointed to the picture of the woman. “I’m having tests run comparing her DNA to mine. I know already that we both have B-negative blood, and that’s not common, so it’s a start. Not real proof, but a start.”
His eyes searched hers. “And if you find out something concrete?”
“Then I, or we, go to the police. Right now it’s too early. They would blow me off as a nutcase. Kinda like you want to do.”
“I’m keeping an open mind here,” he said, though he didn’t seem convinced as he finished his beer while going over again every scrap of information that Kacey, with Riza’s help, had amassed.
As he did, he turned on the news, and they both learned that another car might have been involved in Elle Alexander’s accident. The sheriff’s department had issued a statement, then had asked for the public’s help in letting the department know if anyone had witnessed the minivan going into the river.
“They think it’s a hit-and-run,” Kacey said as the news segued into the weather.
“It still could be an accident.”
“Could be,” she allowed.
“I’m just saying that her car could have been hit, her tires spun out on the ice, and the driver of the other vehicle freaked and left the scene.”