Alice was the first detective to arrive that morning. As soon as she sat down by her desk a middle-aged couple was directed to her.

"Hello, how can I help you Mr...?"

"Lewis Wheeler, and this is my wife Laura".

Alice shook their hands and indicated for them to sit in front of her desk.

"Nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler. How can I help you?"

"It's our daughter Amber. She's missing". Mrs Wheeler said.

"We were here yesterday, but the detective just told us to come back later". Mr. Wheeler added.

"I see. When did this happen?"

"Monday night. We called around. She was studying with friends in college, then went with them to a bar. After that they all went home, except for Amber. No one could tell us where she was. She just disappeared", Mr. Wheeler said.

"Do you know exactly what time she started heading home?"

"They said that they left the bar around 23:00", Mr. Wheeler replied.

"And where was this?" Amber asked.

"Mic's at Green Meadows Village, not far from Green Meadows College where she goes to school", Mr. Wheeler answered.

The distance between Elmwood, where Beth was presumably kidnapped, and Green Meadows Village was about 30 minutes by car. It was possible that whoever took Beth could have also taken Amber, but Alice wasn't going to simply jump to conclusions.

Alice continued gathering as many details from the Wheelers as possible. Then she gave them her card and sent them off.

She spent the rest of the morning questioning Amber's classmates and friends, but no one told her anything new. The staff at the bar hadn't noticed anything unusual either. She walked from the bar to the bus stop, retracing Amber's footsteps, and looking for anything that might provide a clue. Except for noting the locations of surveillance cameras, she found nothing. There was nothing in the bus station itself, either. The bus stop was surrounded with private homes. All the commercial buildings were either a block behind or a block ahead.

She began knocking on doors around the bus station, hoping that as with Beth, she would find a local resident who saw something and possibly provide more clues. Luckily she found one. She rang the bell, and heard female voice answer the door.

"Who is it?" She called out.

"I'm detective Alice Stone. I would like to ask you some questions". Alice answered, presenting her badge to the peep-hole. The door opened, and Alice saw a groggy-looking young woman standing before her, her long hair messy.

"Sorry for how I look. I work the night-shift at the hospital and you just woke me up. What can I help you with?" She said with a slight creak in her voice.

"I'm sorry I woke you up. This shouldn't take long. I wanted to know if you happened to see or hear anything outside between 23:00 and 23:30 last night". Alice said, feeling a little guilty for disturbing the woman's sleep.

"I looked out the window at 23:10 and saw a guy and a girl standing at the bus stop".

Alice presented her with picture. "Was this the girl?".

"I don't know. They had their backs to me, so I didn't see their faces".

"What can you tell me about their appearance?" Alice gently pressed.

The woman closed her eyes and concentrated, speaking slowly "The girl was white, had shoulder-length brown hair and was wearing black jeans and a black jacket. The guy was white, average height, had short dark hair, overweight, and I didn't see a beard. He could have had a goatee or a mustache, I supposed. I only saw part of his cheek. He was wearing a jacket. Sorry, that's all I've got".

"That's okay. Did you happen to see a vehicle next to them?" Alice said evenly.

"Yes, that's why I looked out in the first place, because I heard a car pull up and thought that it was my husband with the groceries, but it was just a gray van".

"Did you notice anything about the van, or do you remember the license plate number?" Alice asked.

"No, once I realized it wasn't his car I stopped looking. Sorry".

"There's no need to be sorry. What you've told me is already very helpful. Thank you. I don't want to keep you away from your sleep any longer than necessary". Alice gave the woman her card. "Please contact me immediately if you remember anything else".

"What is this all about?" The woman asked.

"I'm looking for the girl. Her parents reported her missing". Alice replied. The woman looked concerned. "You think she was kidnapped here?"

"I'm just trying to find out what happened, and find out where she is. Thanks again for your help". Alice walked away.

Together with the timing and location, which both matched the possibility of the kidnapper taking Beth and then directly traveling to the bus stop to kidnapping Amber, the information about the silver van was almost enough to confirm that it was the same kidnapper. What would be even more helpful is if she could see the van and make sure that it really is the same one.

After she finished questioning the residents who were home Alice walked over to the stores before and after the area of the bus stop obtain their surveillance footage of that night. Since it's been far more than 24 hours since the supposed kidnapping not all the stores still had the footage. She took what she could back to the station and reviewed it on her computer. Sure enough, it appeared to be the same van. Her two cases were now one bigger case. Unfortunately the video from Amber's case was just as bad as the video from Beth's case, providing no additional information about the van or the driver.

Since the timing was so exact, and since he didn't appear to have any way to know Amber would be at that bus station at that time, it seemed that Amber's kidnapping, at least, was a crime of opportunity. Alice reasoned that after kidnapping Beth the kidnapper drove straight to wherever he was taking her, and simply happened across an opportunity to obtain a second victim. That would mean that the path he took from Beth to Amber gave away the direction he was going in.

Alice decided to take a leap. Assuming that the kidnapper was taking his victims to his home, that would mean he lived in a private house. Otherwise there would be too big of a risk that the neighbors would notice something. It would also be most likely that he lived alone. She searched on the vehicle database for gray and silver vans and found that there were over 1000 in the county. When she narrowed it down to those registered to a white owner of average height, with a private residence, a status of "unmarried", the number dropped to less than 100.

Alice pored over a map of the county, marking where each of those residences was. Then she started checking the best routes from Beth's house to each residence. She crossed out those that couldn't reasonably pass through Amber's bus stop. That left her with 19 options, a reasonable number.

She took down their information and headed out. She visited each house on the list in turn, interviewing the owners of each vehicle and where possible, examining the vehicle. By the time she got through 7 vans and their owners it was already late in the evening. Unfortunately none of those 8 was it. Either they were renting in someone else's house, or they had their own tenants or roommates, or they were living with their girlfriends, children, or other family members, or the the van had markings on it that the van in the videos did not.

She sighed as she realized she had to give up for the evening and headed home.