Nikki had only learned about the Innocence Project getting involved in Mark Todd’s appeal a few days before Thanksgiving. She’d spoken with the new district attorney, who assured her that his staff was handling the defense’s request. He’d told her to enjoy the holidays and not to worry about it and Nikki had done her best to put it out of her mind and focus on more important things. But she still hadn’t heard when the judge planned to rule on getting the DNA tested, and she wouldn’t have come to Stillwater if she’d known the appeal had become such a hot topic.
She nodded. “I’d rather focus on Madison and Kaylee, if you don’t mind. That’s what I’m here for.”
Hardin’s chair groaned as he leaned back, his meaty jowls making him look like a dangerously overfed bulldog. Nikki worried his uniform buttons might become tiny projectiles at any moment. “I just want you to understand you’re going to get hit with questions, especially if Mark Todd’s younger brother finds out you’re in town.”
“I’m not worried about it,” Nikki said. “I’m only here to do my job.”
Hardin’s meaty hands rested on his stomach. “So, you married? Kids?”
“Divorced. Too busy for kids.”
Sergeant Miller cleared his throat. “The families will be here soon.”
Nikki was thankful for the interruption. “Kaylee and Madison disappeared six weeks ago?”
“Yes. Kaylee was at Madison’s home. It backs up to the woods and a nature trail that’s close to the lake,” Miller said. “Madison texted a friend who lives on the other side of the park to let him know they were coming over and taking the trail. It’s about a ten, fifteen-minute walk. They never showed.”
“Just vanished,” Hardin added. “Madison’s cell phone was turned off, and it’s never come back on again. No GPS. Her phone records don’t show anything suspicious.”
“What about Kaylee’s phone?”
“She didn’t have one.”
“A teenager without a cell phone? Really?”
“Her mother confiscated it a few weeks before,” Miller explained. “Kaylee was a bit of a handful. Got caught this summer sneaking out and partying with people she had no business being around.”
Hardin smiled and winked at her, but his eyes were flat. He’d busted more than one underaged party Nikki had been attending.
“You didn’t find anything in her phone records? No texts to suspicious people? What about her social media?”
“Kaylee only had a few contacts in her phone: her mom, Madison, her mom’s work. But like the sheriff said, she didn’t have it for three weeks. She only had Instagram, and it was set to private. She deleted all her other accounts last year.”
“I can’t fathom a teenage girl going without a phone for three weeks,” Nikki said. “Did Kaylee have a part-time job?”
“Sort of. She babysat for some of the neighbors,” Miller replied. “Her mom Jessica barely keeps her car running and she works long hours. Kaylee didn’t have a ride to work anywhere else.”
“But she did have cash?”
“Presumably.”
“Then she had a cheap phone somewhere,” Nikki said. “Pay as you go. No way she’s cut off from friends like that.”
“We searched her room,” Miller said.
“She likely had it on her that day.” Nikki would bet a month’s salary on Kaylee having a secret phone. She just hoped Madison wasn’t the only one who knew about it. “Any suspects?”
“No good ones,” Miller confirmed. “Kaylee’s mom had an on-again, off-again boyfriend. He was at work when the girls disappeared, alibied by several people. Miles Hanson, the boy Madison and Kaylee were going to see before they disappeared, has an alibi. His dad was at home with him all day and security footage from Hanson’s front and back door confirmed the girls never showed.”
“What about the parents?” How anyone could harm their own child was beyond Nikki, but the statistics didn’t lie—someone close to the family was usually responsible.
“Kaylee’s mom works long hours at a nursing home,” Miller said. “She was at work all day. Madison’s mother went to visit her parents in Northfield. Her stepdad works for a pharmaceutical company. He had a business meeting with a client in downtown Minneapolis. Restaurant receipts verified a lunch meeting around the time Madison and Kaylee left for their friend’s.”
The stepdad had at least an hour’s drive time both ways, and probably more. “You’re certain the stepdad was in Minneapolis?”
“At the time they left the house, yes. We have security-camera footage of the girls leaving shortly after Madison sent the text to her friend,” Miller said. “And a witness saw them on the trail not far from Madison’s house. They disappeared at some point after that.”
“When did the stepdad come home?” Nikki asked.
Miller handed her a dog-eared evidence file. “He went to the office. Entered at 3:00 p.m., left shortly after 7:00 p.m. Kaylee’s mother went to the Hansons’ to pick up Kaylee. When she realized the girls had never arrived, she called him, and he rushed right out of the office.”
Nikki sifted through the notes. Miller’s neat handwriting was easy to read, and his records appeared to be thorough. “What about her real father?”
“Left when she was little and lives in California. His alibi is rock solid. He was in the hospital with kidney stones.”
“What about the other kids Kaylee hangs out with?”
“She was kind of a loner. Her cousin lives in Hudson, and Kaylee started hanging out with her and her friends over the summer,” Miller said. “Everyone she was known to hang out with was accounted for.”
“But Kaylee didn’t come around much after they got caught partying. Her cousin hadn’t talked to her since before she got her phone taken away.” Hardin shrugged. “I’d like to think she would have told us that Kaylee had a secret phone, but…” He spread his hands wide. “You know teenagers.”
Nikki chest tightened, but she didn’t look up from her notes. Everyone drove across the river to Hudson for fireworks and Wisconsin beer. “Teenagers lie to police all the time. And they’re a lot smarter than we were. Most of them know you can’t look at their phone without a warrant. And you’d never get one without a lot more evidence.”
“Madison had a decent-sized social circle at the high school,” Miller said. “None of their friends had anything bad to say about either girl.”
“Which is suspect in itself.” No matter how fast the world changed, the behavior of teenage girls remained predictable. There was no way some other girl didn’t have a grudge against one or both of them.
“Teachers were a different story,” Miller added. “Madison was the golden kid, but Kaylee was a problem child who didn’t live up to her potential and had a smart mouth. She spent a couple of afternoons in detention.”
“If it were just Kaylee, I’d have suspected she ran away when she was first reported as missing. But Madison isn’t the type,” Hardin said. “Lots of similarities to your Frost murders. That’s why I invited you to check things out.”