Find out what happened to Millicent Estrada. Hopefully the other stuff will fall into place.”
“Speaking of,” Jessie noted, “I’ve gotten multiple texts from both Detective Bray and Jamil in the last few minutes. I think they’re anxious to discuss developments. I should probably go see what’s up.”
Decker’s only response was to unlock the door and hold it open for her. She hurried out, headed toward Research. She was almost there when she stopped in her tracks. Something Decker had said moments earlier was bouncing around in her brain, making it itch in that way she knew she shouldn’t ignore.
He had told her to find out what happened to Millicent Estrada. And while she knew what he had meant—that she should find out who murdered the woman—it occurred to her that she should be focusing on the larger question: what happened to Milly.
Jessie had been so busy running around, trying to get stays lifted, studying surveillance footage, and listening to audio files from trafficked young girls that she’d lost sight of her purpose. To find out what happened to Milly, she had to understand why it happened, and that meant profiling the killer, not the victim.
Instead of going to Research, Jessie stepped out into the courtyard. There was still a chill in the morning air, which she found clarifying. She sat on a shaded bench and closed her eyes, allowing her breathing to slow and her mind to clear.
After a minute, she let her brain relax and go wherever it chose. The first image that popped into her mind was of Milly’s blouse, lying on the floor beside Jasper Otis’s bed.
However it had ended up there, the fact that the buttons had been undone, rather than ripped off, suggested that, despite how Milly had been found—half naked in a shower—this hadn’t started as an assault. Either that blouse had been removed voluntarily or it had been removed after her death, without any resistance.
There was bruising on Milly’s body. But the medical examiner said there were no scratches on her, meaning the perpetrator had likely gotten close to her without a fight. That implied it was someone she knew and was comfortable with.
It was possible that the encounter had begun consensually before turning violent. She’d explored that theory a bit. But another theory, one she’d mentioned to Decker in passing but never truly considered, was that the incident wasn’t about sex at all. What if it was just made to look that way afterward to throw investigators off? What if Milly had been killed for another reason entirely?
If that was the case and this wasn’t a moment of passion gone awry, it meant that whoever had killed her wasn’t worried about time. People in a panicky rush don’t methodically undo all the buttons on someone’s shirt.
And if the killer wasn’t worried about time, that meant it was someone who wasn’t afraid they’d be discovered in the residential wing, or even in Otis’s personal space. It was someone who felt like they belonged there. Add that to the possibility that Milly knew her attacker and suddenly the pool of likely killers got pretty small. There were only a few people at the estate that night who both knew Milly and had free rein of the residential wing.
Clearly Jasper Otis was one of them. He had dozens of alibi witnesses, not even including his unnamed lady friend, though Jessie was skeptical of all of them. On the other hand, Davey Pasternak had zero witnesses but didn’t seem like the type to have the run of the Otis Estate. But there were others.
Jessie got up from the bench and rushed to the Research department to see if Jamil could rule any of them in or out. When she walked in, she got exasperated looks from both him and Karen, who were hunched over the same monitor.
“Glad you could join us,” Karen said, trying to sound jokey but failing to hide her frustration.
“Sorry, guys,” Jessie said. “I’m currently juggling five balls with two hands. I understand you’ve got some updates.”
“Quite a few,” Jamil said, returning his gaze to the screen. “You’re not going to like any of them.”
“Way to sell it, Jamil,” she replied.
“Sorry,” he said. “I figured I’d just rip the Band-Aid off.”
“Rip away,” she said, waving her hand as she took a seat beside him.
“Okay, let’s deal with Nancy Salter first. I noticed that after she cold-cocked that caterer, she texted someone. It got me thinking. Even though I couldn’t track her location using