“Was she worried about anything else?” John asked. “Maybe nervous about the presentation? Could she have uncovered a glitch and felt embarrassed or wanted to test it elsewhere?”
“No, it functioned as intended. The only thing she was doing last night was recording a demo with the night-vision camera. The tech is state-of-the-art—I mean, nothing that hasn’t been done before, but different. I—I’m not the technical person. But I knew from talking to our clients that they were eager for something like this, light, quiet, extremely responsive—particularly when serving warrants. Our drone would save lives, both law enforcement and civilians.”
Lucy asked, “Was she having problems with anyone? Maybe not work-related, but personally?”
“Not that she told me. And we talk every day.”
“Is there someone else she might confide in?”
“Me!” Marc exclaimed. “Her best friend,” he added quietly. “Grace Hotchkiss. She’s a pediatric surgeon at Mercy. If anything was wrong, and Ellen didn’t want to tell me, she’d talk to Grace.”
“Do you have her contact information?”
“I’ll call her.”
“I need her number.”
Marc clearly didn’t like the direction of the conversation, but he pulled out his phone and read off Grace’s phone number.
“We’ll contact hospitals,” John said.
“I called the hospitals, she’s not there!”
“We’ll check again,” John said. “In the meantime, I’m going to ask Megan to take you to Ellen’s house. You said you have a key?”
“Yes—but I told you, she’s not there.”
“Megan can look for any clues as to where she might have gone.”
“Oh. I—okay.”
John sent Megan a text message, asked a couple more questions, then Megan came in and retrieved Marc, took him out of the room.
John turned his attention to Steven Decker. “You said you were friends with both Marc and Ellen.”
“Yes.”
“And you had drinks with Marc last night before he saw her.”
“Yes. For about an hour. Here at the hotel.”
“What did you talk about?”
“Business, mostly.”
“You own a competing business.”
“Not really. NorCal handles mass distribution of basic PPEs and required equipment. Vests, utility belts, the new Taser holsters that Sac PD bought last year. Pride Tactical is high-end, more expensive, sells in smaller qualities, usually for SWAT teams and private security details, some elite military units.”
Steven looked from John to Lucy. “Look, Marc didn’t say this, but he should have. I want to buy Pride. I talked to Ellen about it a while back, she flat out said no. But Marc and I have been talking quite a bit, and I told him I would keep their staff and Ellen could work as much as she wants. He was excited about the proposal—I knew he wanted to get back together with her, and he thinks she works too hard. Pride is everything to her—she has done an amazing job building the company. But if Ellen doesn’t want to sell, Marc won’t. Just to get it out there.”
He had just handed them motive for murder—both Steven and Marc had reason to kill Ellen.
If she was dead.
By the slight shift in John’s posture, he had thought the exact same thing.
John asked, “When was the last time you saw Ellen Dupre?”
“Yesterday, briefly, at the mixer. Then I had drinks with Steven—we met up at eight. Later, I went out with clients to the Esquire for a late dinner. Got back here about eleven fifteen or so.”
John took down his contact information and thanked him.
John and Lucy left the vendor room. “What do you think?” John asked her.
“We need to find Ellen.”
“And?”
“And he didn’t have to tell us all that. It’s almost as if he wanted to cast suspicion on Marc. Or—he thought because Marc didn’t say anything, it would cast suspicion on him if it came out later.”
John glanced at his phone. “One sec.” He answered. “Marcie, I need a warrant to locate a cell phone. Missing person . . . No, she doesn’t meet the criteria, but there are other circumstances . . . Yeah, I’ll write it all up. I’m sending you her name, number, and provider. Thanks.” He typed into his phone for a minute, then turned to Lucy. “It won’t take long to get the warrant, it’s limited. If her phone is on, we’ll have a location shortly.”
“You must have an in with the D.A.’s office to get a warrant that fast and over the phone.”
“I have a good relationship with the office.”
“Do you know Megan from work?”
“We’ve had a couple of cases that overlapped. She’s my favorite fed.” He gave her a half smile. “So where’s this tech guy Jack mentioned? Rogan? I assume the Rogan in Rogan-Caruso-Kincaid.”
“One of them. Sean Rogan, my husband. He’ll be here soon.” She had no idea why he wasn’t. He didn’t tell her where he was, and Jack didn’t tell her what he’d said, just that he was on his way. “I can call, get an ETA?”
“He’ll be here when he’s here, let’s talk to the security office. I’m going to want to see footage from last night, when everyone left, if Ellen came back in after she left the van. This could be a robbery or corporate espionage or Ellen ran away when she was bowled over by her ex declaring he still had feelings for her.”
She’d thought the same thing, but Ellen didn’t seem like the type of person to run from a commitment, like the drone presentation. Did she have plans last night, after Marc left?
John asked to speak to the security chief, then he got a call. He listened, thanked the caller, then turned to Lucy. “Ellen’s cell phone is still on, and it pinged in the alley between 14th and 15th, off J Street. Not far from here.” He waited until the chief arrived, told him what recordings he wanted to look at, and said they’d return shortly to view them.
Lucy’s stomach fell. She had a really bad feeling about this.
They left the hotel, crossed the street toward the convention center, then turned the corner. The Pride Tactical van was parked with a SPECIAL EVENTS plaque hanging from the mirror.
“SPD never should have given her a pass for three days,” John said.
Lucy glanced at him.
He continued. “It’s highly irregular, but the chief likes the gear and the Dupres always let SPD beta-test, then give us a discount.”
“You know her, too?”
“Not as well as Jack, because Pride mostly caters to private security and military contractors, and I think your brother was in the army with her at one point. But I’ve met her once or twice.”
A patrol car was parked behind the van. The officer stepped out when he saw John approach. “Detective.”
“Riley. Any interest?”
“No. Megan—I mean, SSA Elliott—from the FBI came over and said no one in or out until you arrive with the tech.”
“He’s not here yet. You might know him—Rogan?”
“Sean Rogan? Yeah, of course. He and his brother were hired to protect my sister once.”