Holden's Resurrection (Gemini Group Book 6)

like she’d been crying. Her skirt had blood on it, and she wasn’t wearing shoes. In that case, the dad was so pissed he asked the officers to leave. The last thing they noted was faint bruising on her wrists and ankles.”
Jonny paused and pulled out another file.
“This one.” He stopped again and cleared his throat. “Was my case. Six months ago, I was on shift and got called out to a noise complaint out on Perkins Hill Road. The caller said it sounded like cars were racing. Something that happens on that stretch of road a lot. We went out there, and indeed there was a group racing, but there was also a large gathering of cars in front of the Morgan residence. Two squads took care of the boys racing and I went to the house. The Morgans were out of town, leaving their eighteen-year-old son, Tyler, home alone. Kids scattered like cockroaches, a few were given alcohol citations, and the two twenty one year olds were given a summons for distributing alcohol to minors.”
Jonny looked around the table, shook his head, then glanced back at the report. “Molly Buchannan. I found her outside about thirty feet from the main house, behind a barn. When I walked up she was adjusting her clothes. I gave her a moment to get herself presentable and walked her back to the house. Mascara was running down her cheeks, she had scratch marks on her arms, and she was visibly terrified. She was also sober. She swore she was just embarrassed she’d been caught with her boyfriend and nothing had happened. Since she was sober, not breaking any laws, I had no reason to detain her. I did follow up with her parents and they said she was upset with herself because her friends had talked her into going to the party and there was drinking going on. I had no evidence a crime had been committed so there was nothing further I could do. But there are some things you just know in your gut but can’t prove. Whatever had happened to her was not consensual.”
“Playing Devil’s advocate here,” Weston said. “But getting caught by the cops having sex with your boyfriend would probably freak any teenage girl out.”
Undeterred by Weston’s comment, Jonny continued.
“Three months ago, a fourteen-year-old girl was reported missing at midnight when her mom heard a car stop in front of her house. The way the mom tells it, she had a bad feeling and went to check on her daughter. She found her daughter missing, the bedroom window unlocked and left open a couple of inches. The mom wasted no time calling the KCSD. The girl called her mom at five the next morning asking her to come pick her up from McDonald’s. Her story was, she’d snuck out and gone to a party in Queen Anne county. She refused to give any names because she was a freshman and they were seniors and she didn’t want to snitch. She’d rather take the heat from her mom than be shunned at school. Kimberly Lot committed suicide last month.”
Jesus fuck.
“Any prior issues with mental health?” Holden asked, then followed up with, “How did she look when you picked her up from the McDonald’s?”
“No prior issues on record. It was a shock to her teachers, coaches, and family.” Jonny held Holden’s gaze and he braced for Jonny’s next answer. “We took Kimberly’s mom to pick her up and all it took was one look at the girl’s dead eyes to tell she’d been violated. We brought in a female deputy and social services but Kimberly insisted nothing had happened, she was just scared her mom was going to be mad since she snuck out. And she said she was upset because the girls she thought were her friends left her at the McDonald’s instead of driving her home.”
Before Holden could process the horror of a young girl taking her life and the possibility of what could’ve been done to her that night, Micky spoke.
“You have a pattern. Every three months to the day.” Micky looked up from her laptop. “You also have a type. All blondes, all in high school. There’s a reason these girls aren’t reporting what happened to them. My guess would be he’s much older and someone in a position of power, or perceived power. The girls are scared of him—he likely threatened to harm them if they talked, maybe told them no one would believe them, or he could’ve threatened their families.”
“That’s my opinion as well,” Jonny agreed. “And the two girls we found, they were taken three months after Kimberly. Both blondes.”
“If you’re working a profile, Elliana and Ayla don’t fit. They said they were together the whole time.”
“Upping the thrill factor,” Jameson tossed out, and Holden’s stomach revolted at the suggestion.
Holden hadn’t been with Jonny, Nixon, and Weston when they’d found the girls but he’d heard the story they’d given Jonny and it didn’t add up. From start to finish, it sounded like bullshit. The girls said they’d been at a bonfire with a group of friends when they’d wandered off and gotten lost. Holden and Jameson had searched the stretch of beach they’d claimed to have been at and there was no evidence of a bonfire or a party. And there was the small detail that the road they’d been found on was over ten miles away from where the party had supposedly happened. Not to mention there were a lot of hours unaccounted for between the mid-afternoon when neither set of parents could get ahold of their children and when the party started. And another long stretch of time from when they’d wandered away from their friends and when they were found.
“Have they changed their story?”
Jonny frowned and nodded. “So many times, I’ve lost count.”
“What about the nine-one-one caller?” Nixon inquired.
After hours of searching, they’d caught a break when the 911 call came in from a motorist that two young girls