Immoral Read Free Page B

fronting the Stoner house and saw a man inside carrying a drink into a back room. The crystal glass caught light from the chandelier and glinted like a mirror sending a message.
    “So what do we have here, Mags?” Stride asked.
    “Nothing you don’t already know,” she said. “Rachel Deese, seventeen years old, senior at Duluth High School. The jock, Kevin, says he saw her Friday night around ten o’clock driving away from Canal Park. Since then, nothing. Her car is parked in the driveway, but so far no one saw her arrive home on Friday or leave here on foot or with anyone else. That was two days ago.”
    Stride nodded. He took a moment to study Rachel’s Volkswagen, which was surrounded by officers doing an exhaustive search of the vehicle. It was flashy red, cute, and clean, not the kind of car a teenage girl would willingly leave behind.
    “Check for bank ATMs on the route from Canal Park to the house,” Stride suggested. “Maybe we’ll get lucky with a security tape from Friday night. Let’s see if she really was heading home, like Kevin says.”
    “Already being done,” Maggie informed him. She arched her eyebrow as if to say,
Am I stupid
?
    Stride smiled. Maggie was the smartest cop he had ever worked with. “Graeme’s her stepfather, right? What about her natural father? I think his name was Tommy.”
    “Nice try. I thought about that, too. But he’s deceased.”
    “Anyone else missing? Like a boyfriend?”
    “No reports. If she ran off, she either did it alone or with someone from out of town.”
    “People who run off need transportation,” Stride said.
    “We’re checking the airport and bus station here and in Superior.”
    “Neighbors see anything?”
    Maggie shook her head. “So far, nothing of interest. We’re still doing interviews.”
    “Any complaints involving this girl?” Stride asked. “Stalking, rape, anything like that?”
    “Guppo ran the database,” Maggie said. “Nothing involving Rachel. Go back a few years, and you’ll find Emily and her first husband—Rachel’s father—in a few scrapes.”
    “Like what?”
    “Father was often drunk and disorderly. One domestic abuse report, never formally charged. He hit his wife, not his daughter.”
    Stride frowned. “Do we know if Rachel and Kerry knew each other?”
    “Rachel’s name never came up last year,” Maggie said. “But we’ll ask around.”
    Stride nodded blankly. He put himself in Rachel’s shoes again, re-creating her last night, tracing what may or may not have happened along the way. He assumed she made it home on Friday. She was in her car, and now her car was at home. Then what? Did she go inside the house? Was someone waiting for her? Did she go out again? It was sleeting and cold—she would have taken the car. Unless someone picked her up.
    “Time to talk to the Stoners,” Stride said. Then he paused. He was used to relying on Maggie’s instinct. “What’s your gut tell you, Mags? Runaway or something worse?”
    Maggie didn’t hesitate. “With her car still parked outside the house? Sounds like something worse. Sounds like Kerry.”
    Stride sighed. “Yeah.”
     
     
     

Chapter 3
     
     
    Stride rang the doorbell. He saw a shadow through the frosted glass and heard the click of footsteps. The carved oak door swung inward. A man about Stride’s height, smartly attired in a V-neck cashmere sweater, a white dress shirt with button-down collar, and crisply pleated tan slacks, extended his hand. In his other hand, he swirled the ice in his drink.
    “You’re Lieutenant Stride, is that right?” the man greeted him. His handshake was solid, and he had the easy smile of someone accustomed to country club cocktail parties. “Kyle told us you would be arriving shortly. I’m Graeme Stoner.”
    Stride nodded in acknowledgment. He got the message. Kyle was Kyle Kinnick, Duluth’s deputy chief of police and Stride’s boss. Graeme wanted to make sure Stride understood the juice he had at city