Deserves to Die (Alvarez & Pescoli)

“No.” He gave a quick shake of his head as if dislodging an unwanted idea.

“Maybe you had an ex-girlfriend who didn’t like it.”

“Sheree and I started dating when I was sixteen and she was fifteen. We . . . we were each other’s firsts.”

“Can you send the picture of the ring to me?” Alvarez asked, offering up her e-mail address.

“I can do it now.” He typed onto the keypad of his phone, then said, “There.”

“Thanks. We’ll need to go over to your place, take your computer and anything of hers that might be of interest.”

“Okay.” His shoulders drooped wearily.

Two hours later, Pollard had finished calling Sheree’s relatives and Alvarez had coordinated information with the office so that bank, insurance, cell phone, and tax records could be accessed. Pescoli and Alvarez had not only examined the victim’s living space and taken her personal computer and iPad but her fiancé’s electronic gear, as well. Pollard had offered up passwords and given them Sheree’s cell phone number, which he’d admitted to calling “about a hundred times” when she hadn’t come home.

They were young and unmarried. There were no life insurance policies, even though she worked for an insurance agency. Just hadn’t gotten to it yet, he claimed. Sheree didn’t own a car, and she was a renter, so there were no other assets besides her missing ring.

As the detectives were leaving, Alvarez said to Pollard, “We’re sorry for your loss.”

He looked about to break down again, then stiffened his spine. “Just get the motherfucker bag who did this.” He turned and walked into the apartment alone.

Next, the detectives went to Sheree Cantnor’s place of business. Armed with a warrant, they approached the twenty-something behind a wide wooden desk and asked for her boss. Pescoli’s eye followed a blue carpet that ran behind the receptionist and through a room bristling with cubicles. A one-sided conversation was emanating from the only office, where shades were drawn over the glass walls, but the door was ajar.

“Wait a second, Len,” said the male voice inside the shaded box. “I’ll call you back. I think I may have a situation I have to deal with here. No . . . no . . . give me five. No big deal.”

Seconds later, hitching up his ill-fitting slacks, a man who was as wide as he was tall sauntered out of the office. “I’m Alan Gilbert,” he stated, obviously the “dick” that Pollard had mentioned. Also the namesake for the Alan Gilbert Insurance Agency. He was balding and, as if to compensate, had grown a thick, neatly trimmed beard that was just beginning to fleck with gray. Frowning from behind slim glasses, he said, “Can I help you?”

“Detectives Selena Alvarez and Regan Pescoli. We’re looking into the disappearance and possible homicide of Sheree Cantnor.”

Behind Pescoli a woman gasped.

“Homicide?” Gilbert blinked rapidly. “Oh, holy . . . Sheree didn’t show up a few days ago and we’ve been calling . . .” He looked as if he might actually swoon.

“We’d like to check out her work space and speak to everyone who worked with her,” Alvarez said.

“What? Now? Oh . . .”

“We have a warrant,” Pescoli said, handing him the document. She asked for someone to box up Sheree’s personal things. “We’ll also need access to her computer.”

He glanced at it unseeingly, still processing. “Yes, yes. Of... of course. Uh, there’s a conference room in the back.” He waved limply at a glassed-in area behind a row of cubicles.

Pescoli glanced at it and saw four different women’s heads stretched over their soundproof half walls. Every face showed shock, from the girl barely out of her teens and still wearing braces, to an older woman with a phone headset buried deep in her neat, gray curls.

“I, uh, I have to leave at three,” he said, rubbing his broad forehead as if that would help him think. “This way.” He walked along a path toward the conference room at the far end, passing by an empty cubicle. “This . . . this is Sheree’s.”

The small, boxed-in desk was neat with pencils and pens in a cup inscribed with DOUG AND SHEREE, NOW AND FOREVER and a date, presumably of their engagement as they weren’t yet married. Pictures of Doug adorned the cloth-covered walls along with a few of them as a couple, a calendar, and various notes and memorabilia.

“I’ll be right with you,” Pescoli said, stopping to look through Sheree’s work space and gather what she thought might aid in the investigation. As she sorted through the personal belongings, she heard one woman softly crying and two others whispering. Sheree, it seemed, had made more friends than her fiancé knew.

By the time Pescoli met Alvarez and Gilbert in the conference room with a faux-wood table, Alvarez had already set up. A recorder was in place, a notepad at her side, and she was asking Gilbert basic questions about Sheree—how long she’d been with the agency, what kind of an employee she’d been, any odd behavior, who were her friends, and who were not.

The interview took less than thirty minutes and the same was true for the women who worked with her, all who happened to be present. After the interviews, in which the detectives learned again that everyone was convinced Sheree didn’t have an enemy in the world, they crossed the parking lot to Pescoli’s Jeep. Daylight had faded and dusk had begun to creep through the snowy streets. Street lights had winked on, adding a bluish illumination to the coming night, and traffic rushed by, wheels humming, engines purring, most vehicles pushing the posted speed limit of thirty miles an hour.

Once inside the car, Pescoli jabbed her keys into the ignition and threw Alvarez a disappointed look. She suddenly craved a cigarette. “We’ve got nothing,” she said, feeling a little defeated.

“It’s early. We haven’t begun to dig yet. So the workplace was a bust. Maybe there’s something on her calendar or on her computer.”

Pescoli shook her head, started the SUV, and backed out of the parking slot. She felt her stomach rumble. “Let’s grab some coffee. Maybe something to eat. I’m starved.”