Page 73 of Night Hawk
Except for Toni.
Clay turned to where she sat near the fire, her cheeks rosy from the heat. She was staring at her computer, the white light highlighting the frown on her face. Maybe she was thinking about their talk with Wilshire. Clay sure had been. For the entire drive home. Both their law enforcement sixth senses told them the guy had been lying or withholding information, and Clay hoped to find out what.
He took his laptop along with the list of missing girls and the photos for the girls found at Rader’s house and went to the dining table where he could spread out. Maybe these girls would connect to Wilshire’s youth group.
Clay looked at Erik, who was shredding cheese in the kitchen. “Your algorithm finish on the girls yet?”
“For ten of them. Emailed the report to you. And I matched their info to the pictures from Rader’s house.”
Clay found the report on his computer and sent it to the printer. “Give me a summary.”
Erik stilled the block of cheese midair. “The pictures I matched are for missing or runaway girls. I had five more possible matches. As I predicted, the older photos returned nothing.”
“So a potential fifteen of the fifty-five girls are identified,” Toni said, joining them with the report from the printer.
Erik nodded. “We can’t rule out the ones without a match. We’ll need to manually review them.”
“Then we best get to it.” Clay took the report from Toni.
“Dinner’s in thirty minutes.” Erik resumed shredding. “You’ll have to clear the table.”
“No worries.” Clay opened his laptop.
Toni sat next to him. He suspected she was still wondering if Wilshire had told someone about Lisa. After all, Clay couldn’t let that thought go. Nor could he quit wondering if Lisa was one of the bodies Kelsey had unearthed today. Not that she’d said she’d done any digging, but she’d returned to the cabin far dirtier than Sierra.
Since Trent told them there were six bodies found at Rader’s place, Kelsey’s disheveled state could only mean one thing. She’d begun excavating and would probably have recovered DNA. With the evidence likely on its way to the lab and Trent’s promise to inform Toni of the results, in twenty-four hours or so, she would know if her sister was buried on Rader’s property.
Dinner so far had been a somber meal. The brothers weren’t their usual joking selves, and the mood change worried Toni. Did they think Lisa was dead? She was beginning to think so. And Blake and Kelsey seemed to take a clue from the atmosphere and quietly ate their meals.
“I’m finished with the beach house,” Sierra announced as if she couldn’t stand the quiet. “So I’ll be heading home in the morning.”
Kelsey set down her taco. “Would it be too much if I asked you to stay and take photos for me?”
“I have to move a few things around on my calendar, but I should be able to arrange it. Means I can keep these guys in line.” Sierra laughed, but the others kept eating, raising Toni’s concern even more.
“You need Sierra’s help tomorrow only or for longer?” Clay asked.
Kelsey shifted her attention to Clay. “We’ll take things one day at a time.”
“Nice way to sidestep the fact that you likely unearthed more than one body today,” Drake said.
Kelsey wrinkled her nose then looked at Sierra. “Of course, anything you learn on-site will be confidential.”
Sierra frowned. “I’ve never had to keep so many secrets from my brothers. At least not since high school.”
Aiden arched a brow. “You kept things from us?”
She forked a bite of the tangy Spanish rice and giggled like a young girl.
“We might know more than you think,” Drake said wryly. “We all read your diaries.”
“You what?” Sierra’s fork clattered to her plate. “Those were private.”
“Then you shouldn’t have forgotten your box in the treehouse. We had some fun with them.”
She ran her gaze over her brothers. “You didn’t?”
“Sorry,” Brendan said. “But they were too hard to resist.”
