Read Online The Trouble With Murder by Catherine Nelson - Free Book Online Page B

her score was on the
low side. That isn’t uncommon for people her age.
    It was May. May was a very busy
month for move-outs and new leases because of school, but still it seemed
strange for Stacy to be moving. Typically kids move the last week of May, not
the first.
    I realized this was more a gut
feeling than a position based on facts. But her lease wasn’t up, she hadn’t
gotten a new job, she wasn’t moving in with a boy- or girlfriend. Why did she
suddenly want to move?
    I was moving because I had
ugly thoughts about the people I lived with more often than I felt was healthy.
“Stressful” didn’t begin to cover what it was like living with my mother.
Bradley and the others didn’t help anything, either. Was it possible Stacy was
moving to get away from her roommates? Given the amount of rent she was
currently paying, she had to be one of at least three — more likely four — people
living in the same place.
    I left the boxes and walked away
from the closet, pulling out my laptop. I sat at the empty desk and brought up
the Fort Collins Coloradoan website. Stacy’s attack didn’t make the
front page of the newspaper, but I did find a little blurb about it. It was
minimal, lacking insightful or significant details, and reported the police
were withholding the name of the victim. This told me nothing new, so I opened
dexknows.com. I didn’t have access to all the same search systems from home as
I did from the office, but I could still dig up some basic information.
    I searched the last name Karnes and
the first initial S and got a few hits. After reviewing the photos I’d
taken, I saw one of the results matched the address on her license. Next, I did
a reverse search of the address and wrote down the names that came up. I also
did a reverse search on all of the phone numbers in her call history, only a
couple of which back to landlines, for which I also wrote down names. I
searched county property records and discovered the house Stacy rented was
owned by William Rivas. He might be worth talking to; he could know why Stacy
Karnes was suddenly so interested in moving.
    Next, I Googled Stacy’s name. One
of the top hits was for Facebook. I opened a new window and brought up
facebook.com, signing in as my friend Jill. I don’t have a Facebook page, and
Jill always uses her dog’s name as her password. People should never use the
names of family members or pets as passwords; they are too easily discovered by
people with more malicious intentions than me. I used the “search for more
friends” function to bring up Stacy Karnes’s page. I couldn’t believe how much information
was accessible via Facebook; I scribbled several pages of notes.
    Her boyfriend was Tyler Jay. When I
typed him into Dex, I got nothing back. I couldn’t find a Facebook page for
him, either. I typed his name into Google and hit pay dirt.
    One of the top results was a link
to the Larimer County Sheriff’s Office website. It took me to the county’s most
wanted list. Tyler Jakowski, a.k.a. Tyler Jay, was at the top. I had to
consciously snap my mouth closed as I read the page. Jakowski was wanted on
suspicion of murder, six counts of felony assault, two counts of rape, and a
slew of other things. His physical description was listed and his mug shot
provided. At the very bottom of the page it said, “$15,000 reward for information
leading to the apprehension of Tyler Jakowski.”
    Fifteen thousand dollars?
Interesting. More interesting was the question of his possible involvement in
the attack on Stacy Karnes. According to the information I’d just read about Jakowski,
he certainly had it in him to stab a woman. Karnes’s Facebook page reported no
troubles in their relationship, but perhaps she hadn’t updated it yet. Or maybe
her recent feelings were on Twitter, which I wasn’t interested in checking. Or
maybe Stacy didn’t put her every emotional whim online. Maybe he was mad at her
for dumping him. Or maybe she had an as-yet