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Dawn’s apartment was in disarray when we entered, and not in a ransacked kind of way. It was clear Dawn was a messy person. There were fast-food wrappers on the sofa, empty soda cans on the coffee table, which had a broken leg that had been duct-taped to keep it in place. The apartment didn’t appear to have been dusted or vacuumed in ages. Given its messy state, I was shocked as I entered the kitchen. It was pristine.

Turning toward Ramona, I said, “I don’t get it. How could her entire place be a cluttered mess and the kitchen be tidy? It’s like two different types of people live here.”

Ramona offered me a sheepish grin. “Oh, well, you see ... I did a look-see through the kitchen window after Dawn had been gone for a week. There were a bunch of dishes piled up in the sink. None of them had been rinsed off, and food was stuck to them. Food that was ... well, starting to have bacterial growth, if you know what I mean. I was sure the place stunk to high heaven, and given the residents on the first floor all use the same hallway, I started to worry they’d notice.”

“Did you clean Dawn’s kitchen?”

“Between us, I sure did.”

She pointed to a note beneath a dog magnet on the refrigerator door.

It read:

Hello, Dawn,

I was doing a routine inspection and noticed your dishes needed to be done. I hope you don’t mind, but as you have been away for some time now, I thought it best to wash them for you. We wouldn’t want the other residents to complain now, would we?

Your friend,

Ramona Olson

Apartment Manager, but you know that already

P.S. Stop by the office for a chat any time.

As much as Ramona labeled herself as one of Dawn’s friends, I was of the notion that Ramona wished to be Dawn’s friend, but in all likelihood, she wasn’t even an acquaintance. I felt for her. She struck me as the type of woman who was often misunderstood—much because of her strong, quirky personality.

For the next several minutes I searched through kitchen drawers and cabinets, moved things around, looking for clues, finding none. In the bedroom, I found Dawn’s suitcases, just like Austin had, but upon closer inspection of her open dresser drawers, they were sparse, like things were missing. Perhaps Dawn had returned home for a short time, loading several things into a duffel bag before she took off.

Ramona entered the room. “What do you think? Anything?”

I pointed at the top drawer. “There are only a few pairs of panties in this drawer, and a few bras in the next. Women never own just a few pairs of panties. It doesn’t make sense.”

“I’ll be right back.” Ramona marched down the hall, returning a minute later. “Washer and dryer are empty, and I don’t see a laundry basket full of clothes anywhere around here.”

“It’s possible Dawn packed a few things before she took off.”

“I take self-defense classes two nights a week. If she was here during that time, she could have come and gone without me seeing her.”

“Are there any security cameras in the community?”

Ramona laughed. “Security cameras? I can’t even get them to spring for a vending machine, which the guy who owns this place would make money on, I might add.”

I spent the next several minutes looking around the rest of Dawn’s room. In one of the drawers, I found a notebook with the word POETRY on the front. I flipped through its pages, noting several handwritten poems, my eyes wide as they came to rest on the title of the last poem in the book. It was titled: “Winter Is Like a Trickster, Full of Lies.”

A chill ran up my spine, as I realized the title of the poem was the exact words Noelle had spoken to me in my dream. Aside from the title, the poem hadn’t been written yet. Even so, it told me one thing—I was in the exact place I needed to be.

I entered the bathroom and looked around.

“Hey, Ramona, did Dawn wear a lot of makeup?”

“More than most women I know. Why?”

“There’s not much of it in these drawers.”

“How odd.”

Odd, indeed.

In the wastebasket, I noticed a crumpled-up napkin with writing on it. I leaned over, fishing it out. The napkin appeared to have gotten wet at some point, blurring part of what had been written. All I could make out was 5 Salt.

I grabbed my phone and made a call.

“How’s it going?” Hunter asked when she answered.

“It’s going,” I said. “I need a favor.”

“Name it.”

“I’m in Dawn’s apartment, and I found a napkin in the trash that’s been written on, but part of the word is blurred out. I’m thinking it might be an address. I can make out 5 Salt, but that’s it. Will you search for any addresses around here that have the word salt in them, and then take those addresses and cross-reference them with everyone we’ve spoken to during this case?”

“I’ll get on it right now.”

I thanked her and ended the call.

“I believe I’m done here, Ramona,” I said. “Thank you. I know you agreed to ten minutes, but you’ve allowed me to look around a lot longer.”

She gave me a wide smile and said, “Aww, it’s nothing. What are rules for if ya can’t bend them once in a while, right?”

“Right.”

“Now that you told me the scoop, I have to say, I’m worried. If there’s anything else I can do, anything at all, you just buzz on over here.”

As we stepped outside, I said, “Is there anything else you can tell me about Dawn before I go? Anything to help me understand her better?”

“Sure.”

For the next several minutes, I listened as Ramona went over Dawn’s daily routine in excruciating detail, including how she dressed, what days she worked, what days she had off, the type of food she liked to eat, among other things. As she wrapped up, I received a text message from Hunter, and with it, a shock to my system.

“Is everything okay?” Ramona asked.

“No, I don’t think so. But never mind that for now. What did you just say?”

“I asked you if everything was okay.”

“Before that.”

“Oh, I said sorry for assuming you were a reporter like the last guy who was here, trying to get into Dawn’s apartment. Thought he could get into the place by offering me a piece of Bubble Magic. Who likes that old stuff nowadays?”