Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 103027 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 515(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103027 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 515(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
“Alice said you’re a podcaster.” I spoke the word like I’d never heard of podcasting before, just to get under her skin, hiding my amusement when it worked.
Her eyes flashed again, this time with a little heat. “Yeah,” she agreed. “A podcaster. You know, I record things. People listen.”
“And you talk about crime?” I said again, letting disbelief color my words as if I couldn’t imagine such a delicate little flower involved in something as messy as crime. As I expected, this got her back up. I fought a small grin as she bristled.
“I investigate unsolved murders of women.” Her tone was cool, almost crisp, and I got the feeling I wasn’t the first person to give her attitude about her job. “I’ve finished four seasons. Well, season four still has one episode to air, but I’ve put it to bed on my end, and I’m investigating season five.”
“So, you’ve been doing this for five years?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Kind of. I started researching my first season about five years ago, but seasons in podcasting aren’t the same as television. It’s basically, I find a case, I record episodes tracking my investigation, and when I think I’ve gotten as far as I can or the story’s done, I wrap it up, and I find another one.”
“Solve anything?” I asked, remembering that Cooper said she had, but wondering how she’d spin it.
“One, I helped, yeah. There’s a guy behind bars for the murder of a teenager, in part because of me.”
“What did you do that the cops couldn’t?” I asked, curious to know if she’d really played a part in closing the case.
That rosebud mouth curved again, and I saw her pride in what she’d done. “I’m guessing, given where you work, that you know as well as I do that there are things the cops can’t do.”
“Yep,” I agreed, knowing exactly what she meant.
“Well, in that case, there were things they thought they knew that they couldn’t prove. And they couldn’t dig anymore because their suspect had been pushing back, and they didn’t have enough to justify their investigation.”
I cocked my head to the side, trying to put the picture together in my head. “The cops threw you at the killer?”
She shrugged. “It was my idea. And to be fair, the lead detective did not feel comfortable putting me in this guy’s path. But I would have put myself there one way or another. He killed a fifteen-year-old girl. Her family deserved answers, she deserved justice, and he was getting way too confident that he was off the hook. Sloppy. Truthfully, I was in the right place at the right time. The police did all the hard work.”
“They usually do,” I agreed, but I couldn’t help being a little impressed. “So that was your last season?”
“No, two seasons ago. The last one was another cold case, another murdered woman. I didn’t get the answers I wanted on that one. But at least her story’s out there. The more people who hear it, the more we have a chance of sparking somebody’s memory, digging something up.” She sat back, tapped the point of her pen against the blank page of her notebook, leaving little blue dots to track her impatience. “Do you always get the answers you’re going for?”
I shook my head. “We usually get the job done, but we don’t always get the answers.”
“Yeah,” she said. “It’s the hard part of investigations.”
“And now?” I asked. “What are you investigating now?”
At that question, Sylvie straightened, wrote the date at the top of the clean page of her open notepad, then my name, a dash, and Sinclair Security.
“Last night,” she said, “my van was blown up.”
I stared at her, at a loss for words. The wobbly knees and dirty clothes made more sense. But— “Are you here for help finding out who blew up your van? What do the police think?”
“I haven’t talked to the police,” she said, her voice still calm. Too calm, if what she’d said about her van was true.
“Why not?” I asked, letting my voice get sharp. What kind of idiot didn’t report an explosion to the police? “Wouldn’t that be the normal thing to do after someone destroys your property? File a police report, tell them what you know?”
“Normally,” she said. “But it happens that the woman I’m investigating died when her car blew up in her driveway, with her in it. Everything about her murder has been weird. I came to Atlanta following a lead—my only lead—and then my van gets blown up. I don’t believe in coincidences. Generally, things that look like coincidences aren’t. There’s always a connection when you dig. And this—” She shook her head. “I’ve tried talking to the police who investigated her murder, and I got shut down fast.”
I didn’t love the parallel between Sylvie’s van exploding and the murder victim’s car blowing up, but I pushed back. “I’d think that would be procedure. The police generally don’t love collaborating with the media.”