THIRTY
Waking up the next morning, the house had felt incredibly empty, like even the walls called out for life and energy. Amanda had none of the latter to give, and she missed Zoe like crazy. Making the call for her to stay with Libby last night had been the wise decision, though, as she’d been at the station with Trent until two in the morning.
She’d called Libby’s to speak with Zoe at seven, but Zoe didn’t want to talk to her, and that hurt like hell. Libby tried to soothe Amanda’s conscience, but it felt like a half-hearted effort. She’d said it was only because Zoe was concerned about getting ready for school on time. Amanda could believe that to an extent—the girl certainly wanted to make sure she looked perfect every morning before heading out the door. She was six going on sixteen that way.
Amanda had stopped at Hannah’s Diner on the way to work for a coffee and a muffin. That was about all her queasy stomach could handle this morning. While she’d let Zoe and Libby down, her efforts, and Trent’s, had paid off. They had something that looked quite damning for Josh Ryder, and it answered one of their earliest questions about what had Chloe at the park so early in the morning.
She dropped off her coat at her desk at a quarter after eight. Trent wasn’t in yet, but they’d discussed strategy last night—technically, this morning—about how they’d approach things with Josh and his lawyer. She drained her coffee and tossed the cup in her trash.
“Morning.” Trent came in looking flushed from lack of sleep.
She managed little rest much better than her partner did. “Good morning. You ready for this?”
“Sure am.”
“Let’s go, then.”
They went down the hall to the interrogation room and found Josh Ryder with a balding man in his late fifties, possibly sixties. Amanda recognized him from some previous cases. His name was Peter Wilson. He worked with a defense firm in Woodbridge and had created quite a formidable reputation for himself as a powerful attorney.
She knocked and entered the room. “Mr. Wilson.”
“Detective Steele.”
Josh’s eyes darted between the two of them. “You two know each other?”
“Hang around this town long enough and run in similar circles, it’s bound to happen,” Peter said.
Amanda and Trent sat down across from them. Josh’s eyes were underscored by dark shadows. A holding cell wasn’t conducive to getting a good night’s sleep. It was referred to as the drunk tank for good reason. All night, street cops would be pulling people in, many of them high or drunk. Most of them amped up and hostile. A fair number of them puking.
Josh had shared a cell with Ashton Chambers. She and Trent had requested the officer on duty watch them and report how they interacted, if they even did. When she’d popped by the cells before hitting her desk, she was told Josh and Ashton had stuck to different sides of the space. An act? Time would tell.
“Can I get you a water, coffee…?” Amanda asked Josh.
“I just want to get out of here.”
“I don’t think that’s happening any time soon.”
“What do you mean? I didn’t—”
Peter laid a hand on Josh’s arm. “From what I hear, Detectives”—he let his gaze swoop to take in Trent—“you don’t have anything concrete against my client.”
“That changed overnight,” she said, then confirmed Josh’s phone number with him. She didn’t say a word as she pulled a printout of Chloe’s phone records from a folder. She pushed the sheet across the table to Peter. “It’s a text message from Josh to Chloe Somner sent this past Sunday night, requesting a meetup at Leesylvania State Park on Monday at four in the morning.” She read the words again, upside down, even though she had them memorized. Just want to talk. The park at 4 AM tomorrow. Meet by the water. Your favorite spot.
Josh’s face paled, and his mouth opened and closed like a fish. “I didn’t send that!”
“Mr. Ryder, please.” Peter leveled a look at Josh like a parent scolding a child.
“But, no! I didn’t do that! Check my phone. You took it from me on lockup.” Josh’s cheeks were flaming bright red now.
“We’ll look at it, I assure you,” Amanda said. “But if we don’t find the message, it doesn’t mean you didn’t send this. It just means you deleted it.” She pointed to the page. “This came from your phone number.”
“One that you just confirmed was yours,” Trent stressed.
“No. This can’t be happening.” Josh shook his head wildly. “This has something to do with that Ashton guy. Has to.”
“Ashton…?” She played dumb.
“I saw him in holding. No idea what he was doing there, and he wasn’t talking to me. But he had every reason to hate Chloe.”
Reason to hate you too, she thought, but wasn’t going to say that out loud in so many words, making it too easy for Josh’s lawyer to shoot down accusations about his client and Ashton teaming up. And that was a road they had to go down. The fact remained that while they had Ashton and his car at the park, he couldn’t have driven and been the mystery figure who’d emerged from the vehicle. “I heard about the prank you helped pull on Ashton Chambers.”
Josh’s brows bunched together. “The one in high school?”
“Some experiences never leave us.”
“Then don’t you see? He had more motive than me.”
That took him all of five seconds… “I think you were far more upset about your breakup with Chloe than you’re admitting. Maybe you and Ashton even teamed up and decided on a way to take out Chloe together? Two slighted guys against the girl who hurt them?” A baseless accusation and possibly a long stretch that Josh and Ashton would collaborate. And if Ashton had found it in his heart to forgive Josh’s role in the prank, why not Chloe too?
“He’s setting me up for this.” Josh was heaving for breath, bent forward, gasping.
“We have Ashton’s vehicle dropping someone off at Leesylvania State Park at three thirty in the morning. The request for this service was made using the same name you have for your Snap VidPic handle. We’ve been over this,” she added.
“Detective, anyone could have used that handle. You can’t prove it was my client behind it.”
He had her there. They were still waiting on an approved subpoena to request the payment information from the car service. “We will.”
“Awful arrogant to assume that’s the case.” Peter sat back, tugged down on his suit jacket. “Did this Ashton character ID my client as being his fare?”
Amanda gave her response some thought and went with the truth. “No. But… he didn’t see his fare’s face.”
“Ah, see?” Peter smiled at Josh. “They can’t place you at the scene.”
“We still have the circumstantial evidence. The lack of a verifiable alibi and a text message that took Chloe to the place where she was murdered. We have motive—your client’s broken heart. We have also recovered Chloe’s car.”
“It was missing?” Josh screeched.
“It was found at the Fairfax campus. Where you left it?”