Nicky read each word on the file carefully. Ella had been missing for six months before she was found dead. And she was discovered in an abandoned warehouse of a now-defunct company called Home Furniture.
Nicky paused. Home Furniture. Why did that feel so... familiar?
She thought back to yesterday, in the prison. Bernard Brown and his empty, soulless eyes. The words he'd said to Nicky."All roads lead to home."
"Shit," Nicky said aloud. If Brown somehow knew something, then this could be the clue they'd needed. "She was found in an old warehouse," Nicky said. "But Ken, it's called Home Furniture. You remember what Brown said at the prison."
His dark brow furrowed, blue eyes hidden beneath long, inky eyelashes. "Yeah, a bunch of psychotic shit."
"All roads lead to home," Nicky told him.
Ken leaned back in the chair. "You think Brown knew about the warehouse?"
"Maybe," Nicky said. She looked back down at the file. "According to this, no one else was discovered at the warehouse, but we've got a lot of missing girls on our hands here, all from the same area."
"And from the same time period," Ken added.
Nicky nodded. "Yeah. All those girls went missing within the last three years, under similar circumstances. But Ella is the only one who turned up dead...?"
"This definitely stinks," Ken agreed.
Nicky's mind raced. She looked over the report of the search of the warehouse. It said they never found any other bodies there, and that the place had been searched thoroughly. But maybe they missed something. The police here hadn't proved their commitment to the cause.
Was it possible? She couldn't quite wrap her head around it. The idea that there could be more girls at the warehouse... Nicky wasn't sure if that was something she even wanted to find. But at the same time, this was her job, and if she wanted any hope in hell of finding Meghan, then she had to chase down every lead, no matter how slim.
"We need to check this out," she told Ken.
He nodded. "Yeah, I think we do."
Nicky looked down at Ella's file. "It's not far from here," she said. "It's off the highway, but we can make it there fast with me driving."
They ripped outside of the motel room. Maybe with this one, they would finally get some answers.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Nicky pressed her foot to the gas, zipping the car down the highway as Ken sat in the passenger seat. She didn't know what they were going to find at this warehouse, but her palms were sweaty with anticipation--and fear.
Anticipation that they could make a break in the case.
Fear of what the price of that break might be.
She didn't know what they'd find there. But she had a gut feeling it wasn't going to be pretty. Nicky knew the police had already searched the place when they found Ella's body, but she didn't trust that they'd done a thorough enough job. There was more to this story—Nicky could feel it in her gut.
Nicky turned off the highway onto a thin, cracked road, through a forest. At least this one wasn't a swamp. Still, she had to avoid potholes left, right, and center. The last thing they needed to deal with was a busted wheel in the middle of nowhere.
At long last, the warehouse appeared through the trees up ahead. It was surrounded by a tall fence with only one way in and out--a large metal gate. On the other side, a green sign with white lettering directed them to Home Furniture.
The trees around the warehouse were bare, the leaves crispy brown on the ground. As they pulled up, Nicky saw weeds and brush growing around the steps leading to the door.
"Wow," Nicky said. "This place hasn't operated in years."
"Could be squatters," Ken warned.
"All the way out here, I doubt it," Nicky said. "But we should be prepared."
"And if anything stinks like black mold or asbestos, we might have no choice but to call backup," Ken said.
“Yeah,” Nicky muttered, “but I’d rather see what we’re dealing with ourselves before we get any more hands involved.”