Eric Reynolds’s statement about Buzz Almond paying a visit to his home the week after Kimi disappeared had thrown her off her game. No such report existed, at least not in the file Tracy had, and Buzz Almond certainly appeared meticulous about including everything in his file. If Reynolds was telling the truth, Tracy had little doubt Buzz would have documented their encounter and kept it. And if he had, that meant someone had removed the report from his file.Tracy considered the logic of someone doing that. If someone was aware Buzz kept a file, that person might be reluctant to destroy it, concerned that would draw too much suspicion. Instead, he or she could have opted to just destroy one essential element of the file, a portion that might have implicated a specific person but that nobody would have missed unless they knew it existed in the first place, a portion that might have been useful to an investigation but could not be duplicated. Lionel Devoe, Stoneridge chief of police, certainly would have known how to search for, and gain access to, a closed file.The alternative was that Reynolds was lying, and Buzz Almond had not driven to the house to question his whereabouts that night.
