I spent the rest of yesterday going over all the paperwork Jenna had given me, making notes and plans of action. This wouldn’t be a one and done sort of case, and Jenna understood that. She’d reassured me that I could submit hours each week for payment, but that if another case came in, I could set hers aside. That was good, considering the enormity of what she was asking me to do.

Eight kids of varying ages, the oldest of whom Jenna believed was in his mid-thirties while the youngest would still be a child. Unknown birthdates as well as adoption dates, if they’d been adopted at all. Since the chances were that they’d been taken before they were more than a few years old, the chances of adoption were high, but not guaranteed. Unknown gender for the younger kids and only her mother’s word regarding the gender of the older kids. Two birth states – the older ones in Florida and the younger in Wyoming.

Adare had let me have the big whiteboard so I could put everything up to see it all at once, and I had a feeling that before this case was over, I was going to run out of space.

Once I’d organized everything, I was ready to begin. Since the case four years ago had been held here in Fort Collins, that was as good a place as any to start. Granted, that case had primarily been against Christophe Constantine, a pedophile who’d become obsessed with Jenna before the two of them had actually met, but he’d been connected to Helen Kingston.

With so many questions regarding where Anna Newbury had been born, when she changed her name, and what she’d been doing during the years prior to Jenna’s birth, I needed to come at things from a different angle. Rather than starting at the beginning and working my way forward, I was going to start at the end.

Which was how I found myself entering hour number three in a dusty, mildew infested basement room at the Fort Collins courthouse.

I sneezed for what felt like the hundredth time and cursed under my breath. This was so unfair. Ninety-eight percent of the courthouse was modern, clean, and bright. The other two percent was the dingy corner where the things I wanted were being kept.

I put my hands on the small of my back and bent backward, giving a sigh of relief as my spine stretched. I didn’t necessarily mind paperwork, but it wasn’t my favorite thing in the world.

As I gave my eyes a bit of a break, I ran through what I’d learned so far.

Helen Kingston had been only one of Anna Newbury’s many aliases. When it came to her ‘work,’ she’d gone by the name Helena King. In witness protection, her name had been Marcy Wakefield. After her arrest four years ago, her WITSEC identity had been compromised, so it had been included in the official record. She’d declined a new one, which meant that her name in the prison system had been Anna Newbury.

She’d also revealed a handful of other aliases. Crystal Troy. Ann Montgomery. Jasmine Sands. She’d used those names the times she’d been arrested for solicitation or drug possession in Florida. I doubted they were the only ones, but they would be a good place to start if her other names didn’t turn up anything.

There was a good chance that I’d have to go to Florida to try to find Jenna’s older siblings, but Helen / Ann had been put into her new life in Cheyenne, Wyoming, not that far from where we were now. It explained how she’d connected with Christophe, and how she’d gotten to Jenna before her handlers had known she skipped town. It was a good bet that the kids she’d had in WITSEC had been placed nearby and a much higher possibility that they were still in the same place compared to the older siblings.

I sneezed again and glared at the dusty files I’d been searching through. I’d come here assuming that I’d either be turned away, sent to the US Marshal service for answers, or shown to a computer where I could find court transcripts and allocutions. Instead, a rather perky paralegal had brought me down here with the explanation that the information I wanted was of such a sensitive nature that my access had to be restricted to solely what was available in hard copy.

Then she’d left me there. I’d heard her whistling as she made her way back to the stairs, the sound fading as she got farther away. I didn’t know what other sorts of offices or storage rooms were down here, but in the past two hours, I hadn’t seen or heard anyone else.

I made a mental note to make sure I left a good half hour before the building closed, or I could end up getting locked in. I doubted anyone checked down here very often.

I picked up my notepad and fanned my face. It might’ve been fall outside, but down here, it was sweltering. One would think that a basement would lean more toward the cooler end of the temperature range, and that was true in the hallway, but this particular room seemed to be situated right next to the boiler room…and had a connecting vent.

Between the heat and the dust, I was a mess by the time I finally packed it in. I’d gotten some good information, but I’d completely exhausted this particular source. After a shower, food, and some perspective, I’d sit down with my information and tweak my game plan for tomorrow.

All of those plans, however, went right out the window when I reached the top of my stairs. Leaning against the railing was a familiar figure with that same cocky grin that I both loved and hated.

I didn’t even try to hide my surprise. “Clay? What are you doing here?”

He pushed himself off the railing, sticking his hands in his pockets as he moved to the side to let me through. “Isn’t it obvious? I came for you.”

I really hoped he didn’t mean that like it sounded.

I doubted orange jumpsuits would be my best look.