Read Online Ruthless by Debra Webb - Free Book Online Page A

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    She’d tossed and turned last night wishing she were in Dan’s big old bed at that fancy house of his in Mountain Brook. No matter how hard she tried convincing herself that they could continue with this charade indefinitely, the truth was they needed to make some decisions. Soon.
    “Thank you. I thought this could be a kind of work-friends get-together.”
    Which meant she wasn’t inviting the ex or the kid. “Sounds great.”
    “So.” Lori held the folder in both hands and tapped it against Jess’s desk, leveling the thick contents. “I could hardly sleep last night trying to figure out a connection between the children. There has to be one.”
    “Absolutely.” Jess had tossed and turned herself. Missing Dan and this case were the primary reasons. And thetext from Spears. She pushed that subject aside and still a shiver stole over her.
    “According to the official reports from over the years,” Lori continued, “the usual connections have been ruled out. It’s not the schools, churches, doctors, or any sort of extracurricular community program.” She shook her head. “It’s almost as if these girls weren’t even from the same planet despite the fact that they were all residents of the Birmingham area, Jefferson and Shelby counties.” She inclined her head, her gaze narrowing. “Yet their lives didn’t seem to cross paths at all before their disappearances.”
    “The parents insist there’s no contractor or handyman connection,” Jess noted. That was generally the next tier of suspects considered. Like Lori, it was driving her nuts not to be able to lay her finger on at least one connection. “No beauty shops, boutiques, or grocery stores in common. Nothing other than the Galleria mall that some say they rarely visited and others went to with more regularity.”
    “The Galleria employees were interviewed during the investigations of the final four victims,” Lori reminded her. “Backgrounds checked. Other than the routine traffic troubles and a few who’d had misdemeanor possession charges and one three-year-old DUI, the investigators got nothing there.”
    That was the hardest part in a case like this where there was no evidence and no witnesses. “The potential for contact is unlimited, really,” Jess confessed. “Even when you think you’ve covered all the bases there’s usually one more you didn’t think of.”
    “True.” She tapped that file on Jess’s desk again. “So true.”
    Jess felt a little trickle of anticipation. Lori had found something. Something important. “It almost always narrows down to something small,” Jess went on. “Something no one was even looking for.”
    “Exactly.” Lori grinned outright then. She opened the folder and placed a crime scene photo from thirty years ago in front of Jess. “The one thing every one of these families had in common was public utilities.” She pointed to the meter base right next to the missing child’s bedroom window.
    Her heart thundering, Jess moved through photo after photo and it was the same in each one. The angles were different but in every single photo of every damned window belonging to a missing child there was a power company meter base.
    “I want the name of every meter reader whose territory covered these homes during the past thirty-five years.”
    “Already made the call.” She gave a little acknowledging nod. “We should have the list by noon.”
    Jess surveyed the case board across the room and the sweet faces there. This was another monster she intended to get.
    He wasn’t taking another little girl on her watch.

 
    Pelham, 1:05 p.m.
    I spent thirty years with Alabama Power.” Lawrence Patrick leaned back in his rocker. “Went to work there right out of the army. I’d just turned twenty-two.”
    Jess had learned that in interviews like this one far more could be gleaned by allowing the person of interest to talk about her-or himself for a while first. In this case, the tactic allowed Mr.