He received another call five minutes later.
“We ran the license tag on the car,” said the voice. “The owner is Eloise Cain. I’m sending you her personal details, to the extent we could find any. She’s done some jail time, had some drug problems. Curious thing is, there’s nothing on her until she was about nineteen or twenty. Before that, it’s a black hole.”
“Then dig into the black hole,” ordered Buckley. “And how do we find her?”
“She has a credit card. We’re using our resources and contacts to track both. She used her card to stay at a Marriott after she attacked your brother.”
“And her cell phone? She must have one. She can be tracked that way.”
“She has no registered account. She could have stolen a phone and just uses local WiFi and other free sources to enable calling and internet services, or it might be prepaid minutes or a burner phone or a hybrid thereof; there’re lots of ways around that. Her credit card is registered to an address that’s no longer valid. There’s a Gmail address listed on the account, but she hasn’t used it recently, and there’s no really good way to track it. So we’re keeping a hawk’s eye on the credit card activity.”
“If you have her car information, can’t you hack into her satellite mapping service and pinpoint her location that way?”
“It’s an old car and doesn’t have that feature.”
“Send me the information on the Marriott; there’s probably more than one in this town. And get me a picture of the woman. Maybe a copy of her driver’s license.”
“On it, sir.”
When Buckley received the hotel info, he drove to the Marriott and checked in. He spent the day walking around the property and talking to staff members about El Cain. He explained that he was her father’s attorney and needed to get in touch with her about an inheritance. No one questioned his credibility after looking over his professional appearance and listening to his earnest, cultured voice. However, no one had seen a woman matching her description.
Until he walked into the hotel bar that night.
He sat on a stool and ordered a bourbon and soda on the rocks. The same bartender who had served Cain was now serving him. He described Cain generally and asked his question, using his cover story.
The woman nodded. “Yeah, she was in here. Looked like she could use some good news.”
“Do you have any idea where she might have gone?”
“No. She didn’t really say much.” The woman wiped down the counter and attended to another customer while Buckley waited patiently. When she came back over she said, “But something was weird.”
“What do you mean?”
“There was this thing on the news. On the TV right there.”
Buckley glanced at the TV and then looked back at her. “Go on.”
“The FBI was looking for a woman. They had her image up on the screen. They said her name but I don’t remember it. Anyway, they were looking into something that happened to her in Georgia in the early 2000s. Well, the gal on the TV looked like some wild animal, she really did. She was tall with these batshit eyes, with long hair down to her butt.”
“Why is the FBI looking for her?”
“They didn’t say.”
“And the connection to Ms. Cain?”
She placed her elbows on the bar, leaned forward, and said in a confidential tone, “Inheritance, huh?”
“Yes.”
“Big money?”
“Yes.”
“Go figure. Some of that money coming my way, mister? Because I could sure use it.”
Buckley placed three hundred dollars on the bar.
“I like your style,” she said as the money went into a fanny pack on her belt. “I’m a bartender, we have to be observant, read body language and expressions, see if people are three sheets to the wind, you know.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Well, she was staring at the woman on the screen and looking scared as shit. She even spilt her beer. And when she got up to leave, I watched her go. She’d only had the one drink, but it was like she couldn’t walk straight. Whoever the lady on the screen was, that gal knew her somehow, I’m sure of it.”
Chapter 28
Asheville, North Carolina, was home to the Biltmore Estate. At nearly 180,000 square feet it was the largest private residence ever constructed in America, and it was still owned by the descendants of the Vanderbilt heir who built it. It was now open to the public for tours and other events, and it brought a great many people to Asheville every year. The town also possessed a thriving arts and wine and food community. The western part of the Tarheel State was picturesque, with the Blue Ridge Mountains providing a brilliant backdrop to the town.
As Pine and Blum rode into Asheville, neither one was thinking about any of that.
They had in their sights one person and one person only.
As the FBI had finally told Blum after some delay — probably because it wasn’t connected to an official case — the phone number that Pine had seen Wanda Atkins input to her phone was attached to a specific address in Asheville. The Bureau had now provided that information, and Pine meant to make good use of it.
Dusk was coming quickly, and the streets they passed were filled with people sitting in outdoor restaurants with gas-fueled heaters providing warmth; art galleries were ablaze with light and activity, and cars and pedestrians were making their way to a flurry of destinations. People of means seemed to be having a good time trying to figure out where to plunk down their hard-earned cash.
“I’ve never been here,” said Blum. “It looks quite lovely.”
“Only we’re looking for the dark side right now, not the lovely,” replied Pine. Following the navigation instructions, she turned right and then left and slowed the Porsche. “And that’s it, up on the right with the white siding.”
“How appropriate,” said Blum, eyeing the sign out front as they passed by. “Desiree Atkins runs an occult shop. I didn’t think she’d be baking cupcakes.”
“She goes by the name Dolores Venuti now,” said Pine. “At least the phone is registered in that person’s name. But it’s Desiree, I’m almost sure of that.”
They had previously gotten Desiree’s file photo from the Georgia DMV. The picture showed a stern-faced woman with protuberant eyes that Blum had proclaimed were “downright creepy.”
“But that photo is really old,” Pine had pointed out after seeing it for the first time.
“I doubt she would have changed that much,” said Blum. “People like her never do. Except to get even creepier.”
The occult shop was in a small bungalow that one reached by going up a set of warped wooden steps. The large sign out front read in exaggerated calligraphy: THE DARK MOON RISING OCCULT SHOP: PSYCHIC READINGS, CLASSIC WITCHCRAFT PRODUCTS, POWER CRYSTALS AND CANDLES, PROTECTION SCARVES, LARGE APOTHECARY SELECTION, AND MUCH MORE.
“Protection scarves?” muttered Pine. “People really buy that crap?”
“More than you think. There’s a large occult business in Arizona, in fact.”
“How do you know that?”
“One of my friends is in the business. She’s also a tarot card reader, has a psychic hotline, and does workshops for aspiring occultists. She makes far more money than I do.”
“Then the world is truly upside down, Carol.”
Pine pulled to a stop down the street. “The place looks dark.” She checked her watch. “I don’t see the hours posted, but she’s probably closed for the day.”