All the Little Raindrops(95)

“What did you find?”

He opened the folder, and she could see that it was a short pile of printouts. “I have to believe that if the part of the story about abducted women is true, the man who committed the crime was never caught. Or even charged. Maybe he killed them and then died himself, and his crimes were never discovered.”

“Even a massacre?”

He shrugged. “Maybe it was a small massacre.”

She gave him a look that was the melding of a smile and a grimace. “Hmm. Okay. Well, that doesn’t help us.”

“No, but I did find a few things that might be of interest. I narrowed my search to specific dates, which made it a little easier.”

He handed her the printouts, and she took them, scanning the page at the top of the pile. She moved that one to the back and read the second one. Each page was a series of articles from different locations about local missing women who were never found. She pulled the third page forward and read that one. “Slovakia?” she said. “You went worldwide?”

“Where I could,” he said. “Because of the accent.”

“Good thinking,” she murmured, looking quickly through the rest of the stack. It was pretty depressing to know that a basic internet search pulled forth so many missing women.

“I still need to do some digging,” he said. “But it’ll take more time. As it relates to other countries, there’s not a lot in English, so I pulled what I could for now. That’s just my initial find.”

Noelle moved back to the one from Slovakia, reading quickly through the headlines for that one. Several young girls had gone missing. Children under twelve. There was once a man who collected things, very fine things. Jewels. Rubies. Emeralds. Diamonds. And he draped them on the women he stole. No, if she was going to take the man who’d told her the story at his word, then this didn’t exactly fit.

She flipped the page, reading brief snapshots of crimes from the Netherlands that weren’t quite right either. There was the headline from an article near the bottom of that page that interested her, and she read the small portion that Evan had printed out and compiled on the one page. “Do you have the entirety of this article printed out?” she asked, tapping her finger on the one she meant.

He craned his head slightly and then nodded. “Hold on.” He had another folder on the other side of his desk, and he pulled that one out, going through the larger stack. She liked how he’d compiled snippets for each geographical location onto one page. It made it much easier to get an idea of what she was thumbing through. A few of them she’d been able to dismiss right away, as the timing didn’t quite work as far as the age of the man she thought they were dealing with.

She scanned the page he’d handed her. “Local authorities looked into a man in Brussels named Dedryck Van Daele, the heir to Van Daele Diamonds, a major diamond-mining company.” She looked up. “Diamonds?” Jewels. He draped them in jewels . . .

Evan nodded. “I remembered you mentioned jewels and thought that might be an interesting link.”

She read through a few more paragraphs. “So they looked into this man named Dedryck because a few young women went missing in the area where he lived, and one of those women—a waitress in town—told her friend that Dedryck had invited her to a party a few nights before she disappeared.” She frowned. “That’s all the evidence they had? That sounds kind of weak.”

“I guess the local authorities thought so, too, because I didn’t find any more information about the police looking at him for the other disappearances that followed.”

“Did Dedryck have children? Specifically twins?”

“No,” Evan said. “At least none that he claimed at the time. I actually can’t find any more information on him after that one article. The family business is no longer in operation.”

“Hmm.” That was interesting too. There was no one available to carry on the family dynasty? Or had it failed financially? Was it worth looking into? “Dedryck would be . . . what, in his eighties?” she asked. “Did you look for a record of his death?”

“I did, but none exists. So either I didn’t look hard enough or he’s still alive but living and working somewhere else.”

“Odd.”

“I thought so too. But again, it might not be connected to the man who told you that story.”

She sighed, setting the papers on his desk. “Even so, these crimes aren’t even related to ours. They may or may not have something to do with some man I barely remember who told me a story that might be a lie.” And if he’d told it to her for some other purpose, she had no idea what that might be. She let out a short laugh that held more frustration than humor. “I feel like we’re wading into the weeds, Evan.” And potentially about to trip down rabbit holes.

He ran a hand over his face. He looked as frustrated as she felt. And tired too. He was the one who’d stayed up half the night downloading files about missing women near and far.

“And I’m running out of time,” she said softly. “I have less than a week before I’m scheduled to go home. I cleared out my dad’s storage locker. I can’t just hang around town. I need to get back to my life. I need to get back to Callie.”

“You promised two weeks.”