“Or, it could be the killer didn’t know.”
“This just keeps getting worse.”
“That it does.”
“Do the Montclaires know?”
She nodded. “I thought they should be the first to find out.”
“You talked to them?”
“Mmm. Just a second ago, on the phone. Actually spoke with Glenn. At first he denied it could be possible, but then he turned right around and said that Donald Justison Junior was the . . . let’s see, ‘son of a damned bitch’ who was responsible and that I should just go out and arrest him before something happened to him.”
“Glenn threatened to do something to Justison?”
Alvarez tipped her hand back and forth in a “maybe, maybe not” gesture. “Worth watching.”
“Crap.”
Alvarez glanced at the clock. “You ready to go?”
“More than ready. God save me from more paperwork.”
“I told the Montclaires we’d be over, to go through their daughter’s room, double-check for the missing phone, and grab her laptop. Then, I want to talk to Bianca, but now, in light of this recent development, I want to check in with Donny Justison.”
Pescoli slipped her cell phone into her bag. “I thought the mayor wanted us to stay away from her kid.”
Alvarez’s lips twisted into a cold smile. “All the more reason to talk to him ASAP, don’t you think?”
“Didn’t Carolina call Blackwater and tell him to back off or something?”
“She sure did.”
“And what did he say?”
Alvarez’s smile became icier. “ ‘Put him at the top of the list.’”
“Good.” That was a surprise, she thought as she found her sidearm. Maybe Blackwater was more of a cop and less of an ass-kisser than she’d originally imagined.
“Justison may have been the last person to contact Destiny,” Alvarez said. “I’m still waiting for her phone records. The cell carrier promised them today.”
“We haven’t located her cell phone?”
“Not yet. The parents had a GPS tracker installed, but somehow it was disabled.”
Pescoli clicked off the desk fan. “Destiny was probably a hell of a lot more technologically savvy than her folks. She could have turned it off herself. There’s an app for everything these days.”
“Glenn Montclaire even went so far as to call the phone and walk around his house and property, hoping to hear it, but no answer. Our guys did the same thing in the area where the body was found. Nothing. Either it’s turned off or lost or . . .”
“With the killer,” Pescoli said before snagging her bag and following Alvarez out of the building to a blast of August heat. Though shadows were lengthening from the trees planted at the edges of the parking lot, the asphalt was sunbaked, the street shimmering with heat waves.
With a click of a remote, Alvarez unlocked her Subaru, an SUV she’d purchased recently. She’d parked the Outback nose-in, the front bumper nearly touching the brick wall of the backside of the station. Black and gleaming, the car soaked up the rays from the afternoon sun.
As they slipped into the sweltering interior, Alvarez said, “Did I forget to mention that Donny Justison was on the wrestling team in high school? He made allstate.”
“So strong as an ox.”
“Maybe superhuman,” Alvarez agreed as she twisted her key into the ignition.