Chapter 8: What the Photographs Show
Jessica called back while Ruiz and I were leaving the marina. This time I answered.
“I need you to look at something,” I said. “Frank’s office. Ruiz will be there.”
“Is Ryan coming?”
“No.”
She went quiet for a beat. “I’ll come.”
At Frank Bell’s office, the air smelled of printer toner and old coffee. Frank had set his laptop on the desk, and Officer Ruiz stood beside him, one hand resting near the trackpad. A listing photo filled the screen: my back hallway, widened by a phone camera’s lens, the side entrance just visible at the edge.
At first, I saw only the bench and the coat hooks. Then the open cabinet caught my eye.
“That’s the cabinet,” I said.
Frank nodded. “The listing had several photographs. Ruiz asked me to preserve the images and whatever timing information came with them.”
Ruiz enlarged the frame. The cabinet door stood open behind the hallway bench. Its glass reflected a slice of the room—blurred shapes, a shoulder, the edge of a face.
Jessica came in as Frank opened the image details. She stopped just inside the office.
“Where was this taken?” she asked.
“The back hallway,” I said. “You can get there from the side entrance.”
Her eyes moved from the open cabinet to the faint reflection. “Can you make it bigger?”
Frank enlarged the reflection. The image grew grainy, but two figures became easier to distinguish. One stood close to the cabinet. The other was angled toward him, half turned away from the camera.
Ruiz leaned closer. “Do you recognize either person?”
Jessica didn’t answer right away. Her fingers tightened around the strap of her purse.
“That’s Wade,” she said finally. “I know the jacket.”
“And the other one?” Ruiz asked.
Jessica looked at the screen, then at me. “Ryan.”
The word landed with less force than I expected. Maybe because I’d spent the morning collecting facts that pointed in his direction, each one careful not to say what it couldn’t prove. Hearing Jessica say his name made the room feel smaller anyway.
Frank clicked into the file information. “This image was captured Thursday evening, after the exterior camera went offline. Before the reunion started.”
Ruiz glanced at him. “You can confirm that from the file record?”
“I can confirm the timestamp preserved with the original image,” Frank said. “It doesn’t tell us who took the picture.”
“Or what was happening when it was taken,” Ruiz added. Her voice stayed even. “The photograph places them there. It doesn’t establish what either person did.”
I looked at the open cabinet on the screen. “No. It doesn’t.”
Jessica kept staring at the reflection. “Ryan told me Wade was helping with the house. Getting it ready for people who might rent it.”
“You said you knew they were taking pictures for renters,” I said.
“I did.” She swallowed. “I thought that was all it was.”
The old instinct rose in her voice—the one that reached for an explanation before the truth could hurt. But she stopped herself. Her gaze stayed fixed on Ryan’s reflected shape, close enough to the open cabinet that there was no room in the image for the version of the day she’d been trying to preserve.
I studied the photograph. The cabinet was open, but the image didn’t show anyone touching its contents. Ryan’s reflection was too blurred to read his expression. Wade’s hands were hidden by the angle.
Nothing about it told me who had taken the missing case.
Nothing told me whether Ryan knew it was gone.
Ruiz closed the file details and wrote down the time. “I’ll add the image and Frank’s information to the report. I’ll also note what we can and can’t see.”
Jessica’s gaze snapped toward her. “You’re putting Ryan in the report?”
“I’m documenting the evidence,” Ruiz said. “I’m not making a finding about what it means.”
Jessica looked back at the screen. For a moment, she seemed less afraid of what the photograph showed than of the story she’d been telling herself about it.
“He said he was trying to help,” she murmured.
I didn’t answer. I’d heard enough versions of help to know how often the word was used to make the person being helped feel ungrateful.
Her phone buzzed.
Jessica flinched and pulled it from her purse. I watched her face change as she read the message. Not confusion. Not the quick, practiced embarrassment she wore when Ryan had spoken too loudly in a room. This time, something in her went still.
“What is it?” I asked.
May you like
She turned the screen toward me.
Ryan’s text read: “Tell Emily she has until morning to withdraw everything.”
