Angel Dance (Danny Logan Mystery #1) (13 page)

“But,” I interrupted, “you’re not willing to risk her life on that.”

“No, I’m not,” she said. “It’s just one theory. I don’t want to fixate.”

It was quiet for a second, then Richard said, “I believe that if we can’t locate Gina in another few days, then we’re probably not going to find her alive anyway. At that point—today’s Thursday, say by next Monday—we should switch entirely to the voluntary disappearance possibility. Until then, we owe it to her to keep pounding away on the predator possibility.”

“It’s a sobering thought, but it makes logical sense to me. What do you guys think?” I asked.

Everyone agreed. We weren’t jumping to conclusions, but we were being realistic.

~~~~

The office phone in the lobby rang. Toni got up and walked out to answer it. A few seconds later, she walked back in and said, “I think you’re going to want to listen to this.” I looked at her curiously as she reached over and punched the button on the speakerphone sitting in the center of the conference room table.

“Go ahead, Mr. Salazar,” she said.

No shit. Eddie Salazar decided to cut through all the crap and just give us a call—the direct approach.

“Hello,” he said, his voice coming through strong and confident over the phone. “Is this Danny Logan?”

“I’m here,” I said. “What can I do for you?”

“Good. I got your business card. I hear you’re looking for someone—perhaps someone we both know.”

“Could be,” I said. “We’re actually looking for two people,” I said. “First, we’re looking for Gina Fiore. I believe she’s a friend of yours.”

He was quiet for a second. “I know her,” he said. “Too bad she’s gone.” He paused, as if considering his next statement. “Why you? How come the police aren’t looking for her?”

“Oh, they are,” I said. “My company and the police are working together, although my company is technically working for Gina’s family.”

“Oh,” he answered. “So you know anything? You got any leads? Maybe I can help.”

“No thanks,” I said. “I don’t think we’ll need outside help on this one.” Obviously, even if Gina were sitting right in front of me, I wouldn’t have told this scumbag. “While I have you on the phone, though, when’s the last time you saw her?”

He was silent; then he said, “Been a long time—I’m worried about her, esse. There’s lots of bad people out there. Maybe she hooked up with the wrong crowd.”

“That’s true,” I said.

“You say you’re looking for two people. Who’s the other?”

“Why, that’d be you,” I said. “We’re looking for you. You know, if you really want to help, why don’t we get together, talk things over?”

He laughed. “Soon enough, holmes,” he said.

“Yeah, sure,” I said. “By the way, I think we bumped into a few of your friends last night. When we left, they seemed a little confused. How are they doing?”

He laughed again. “My friends are fine.” He was quiet for a second, then said, “They tell me they’re eager to see you again.”

“Me, too. Anytime. Sounds like fun,” I laughed. “I’ll tell you, maybe after we return Gina to her family, we can all have a celebration party. I think our friends at the police department have even offered to host it. What do you think?”

He was silent for a second. Then he said, “I was thinking more of a private party.”

“Oh, that’s good. A private party. That’s okay, too. Like I said, anytime.”

“Maybe soon,” he said. “Maybe sooner than you think.” He paused for a second, then said, “By the way, I’d like to meet your associate. I hear she’s one fine
mamacita
. Watch for us, holmes.” He hung up before I could answer.

~~~~

At first, no one said anything. Kenny broke the ice. “It was blocked, boss,” he said, referring to the caller ID number. “Most likely, it was something like a prepaid cell phone anyway.”

I nodded. “That was an unusual phone call,” I said.

“Sure was,” Toni said. “Scary, too.”

“Bullshit,” I said.

“What’s with all the ‘homes’ talk?” Kenny asked.

“‘Holmes,’ not ‘homes,’” Doc said. “Consider it a term of endearment.”

Kenny looked confused.

“What was he really saying?” Richard asked. “Was he saying he doesn’t know where Gina is and he’s fishing to find out what we know? Or was he saying he does know where she is and he’s trying to warn us away?”

We thought about this for a second. Then I said, “If it’s your first choice, then we’re more useful to him alive than dead. He can set up on us and follow us to Gina. If it’s your second choice, then he’d probably rather see us dead so we don’t try to find her and lead anyone to him.”

“He might also just be a rabid dog. Bite anything that comes near,” Doc said. “I’ve seen lots of assholes just like him who were that way. Couldn’t think five minutes ahead.”

“That’s right. If we were in Mexico, he’d probably just bomb our office building with us in it,” Kenny said.

“Either way, he’s basically telling us that he’s going to be watching us—either to have us lead him to Gina, or in preparation for taking one or more of us out. I think we need to bump up our security level,” Doc said.

“That makes a lot of sense,” I said. “Pay attention, everyone. This bastard could be parked across the street right now. If these guys are out there essentially stalking us, we need to be able to recognize them and counter it. Everyone needs to be armed at all times. If anyone sees anything unusual—a car, people, anything at all—hunker down and call Doc or me. We’ll be right there. Got it?”

“Great,” Kenny said. “So basically, you guys are saying that we’ve managed to find a psychotic, homicidal maniac and, without even meeting him, we’ve pissed him off to the point that he either wants to follow us and then kill us, or maybe just save time and go right ahead and kill us straightaway? Is that it?”

“Almost, but you got one thing wrong,” Doc said to him. “He’s not interested in following you.”

“That’s right, you little coward,” Toni said. “You don’t know anything. No reason for him to follow you.”

“Good,” Kenny said. “I’m safe.”

“No, no. That’s not what I meant,” Toni said. “What I meant was, you don’t know anything worthwhile, so he won’t waste time following you. Instead, he’ll just kill you straightaway.”

“Oh, great.”

Everyone laughed, except for Kenny.

“Okay,” I said. “Game’s heating up. Be careful.”

Chapter 7

AFTER OUR STAFF
meeting, Toni and I drove past Memorial Stadium at the eastern end of Seattle Center on our way to Gina’s condo. When I was in high school, the state championship track and field meets were held at Memorial Stadium. In my senior year, I remember running the mile in the state finals there. The race was four times around the track. The favorite was a fast kid from Spokane with a personal record of something like four minutes, twenty seconds. My own personal record was four minutes fifty. I knew going in that it would be tough, and it was. Bell lap and I was gassed. I’d managed to stay with the Spokane kid for the first three laps, but it was tough. Then, after the bell, he turned up the heat a little, just to see if I could hang with him. I did, but it hurt and he knew it. So he did what good runners do—he turned up the heat a little more. This turned the event into a two-person race: him leading, me struggling to hang on, everyone else falling back fast. Coming off the final turn, he started his kick, as I knew he would. In response, I did my own version of a kick, but it was pretty obvious that I couldn’t hang with him. I started to fall back myself.

Yet even as I began to falter, my teammates and our supporters yelled for me, encouraged me on, urged me forward. And somehow, right in the middle of the screaming throng, I remember seeing Gina. To my weary eyes, she was a vision. Strikingly beautiful, smiling, confident, waving me forward. I felt a breath of inspiration. I was renewed. I had to do better, dig deeper. Spurred on by the sight of that beautiful high-school sophomore, I found a burst of energy and was able to kick it up to a new gear that I never knew I had. In the last fifty yards of the race, I closed the distance on the leader. I felt like I had wings.

Unfortunately, as I drew near, my opponent heard me closing. Turns out that on that day, he had the bigger wings, and he was gone. I crossed the finish line several seconds later, in second place. Afterward, I was disappointed but not devastated. I’d known I was an underdog and that my chances were not great. I jogged a little to cool down, and then returned to the team area.

My teammates congratulated me for running hard and taking second place.

“Noble effort, dude,” Robbie said.

“Thanks. Thought I might get him for a second,” I said, reaching for the towel he handed me.

“You were awesome,” said a girl, standing behind me. I turned around and saw that it was Gina. She looked at me and smiled. “You know you ran a four-thirty.”

“Really?” I asked, shocked at the result and even more shocked that she was talking to me.

“Yeah,” Gina said. “Four-thirty. Damn good. You beat your own PR by twenty seconds. That’s fantastic. I’m impressed.” She smiled at me, then turned and walked back to her friends.

No shit
, I thought to myself. I didn’t think that she even knew who I was and it turns out she not only knows me, but she knows my stats. I could have finished last—it didn’t matter. I was on cloud nine.

~~~~

Gina’s condo was a corner unit on the second floor of an eight-unit building in Queen Anne. Toni and I started interviewing Gina’s neighbors at one in the afternoon. We managed to catch four of the seven at home, which I thought was pretty good for a Thursday afternoon. Three of the four recognized Gina and had seen on the news that she’d gone missing. One guy was pissed that we’d woken him up, and then said he’d never seen her before anyway. Most commented that they’d seen the police cars at the condo over the past few days.

One by one, we showed the neighbors the group photo plus the isolated head shots of Eddie Salazar and the mystery girl. Most importantly, we were looking for the identity of the mystery girl. Secondly, we were interested in determining if anyone had ever seen Eddie Salazar around Gina’s place. We struck out. None of the four neighbors had ever seen either Eddie or the mystery girl.

Just after three, we walked back to my Jeep and were getting ready to leave when a silver Toyota Prius hybrid glided silently into the lot. As we watched, an elderly lady got out. She removed a single bag of what appeared to be groceries from her trunk and took the elevator to the second floor. We watched as she entered unit 303—next door to Gina’s apartment.

“Should we talk to her now?” I asked wearily. “We’re going to have to come back to talk to the others tonight or tomorrow night anyway.”

“Poor baby,” Toni said. “We’re here, she’s here, we’re getting paid. You can take the elevator if you’re tired.” She got out of the Jeep without waiting for me and headed for the stairs.

Have I mentioned that Toni can be a little bossy sometimes?

We went upstairs and knocked on the door for unit 303.

A few seconds later, the door opened and a lady who looked to be in her mid- to late seventies looked us over. She was probably five four with silver hair pulled tightly back. She was neatly dressed, wearing a pink knit sweater over a print dress.

“May I help you?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” I answered. I introduced us and handed her our business cards. She studied them intently for a minute, then looked up at me.

“Ma’am,” I continued, “we’ve been hired by the family of the young lady who lives next door to you to try and find out what’s happened to her.”

“Gina? That poor, poor girl,” the lady said.

“You know her, then?” I asked.

“Yes, certainly,” she said. “I’ve come to know her well since she moved in last year. I hope and pray that nothing bad has happened to her.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” I said. “It says on the register that your last name is Perkins?”

“Yes, Elizabeth Perkins.”

“Miss Perkins, do you mind if we ask you a few questions?” I asked. “Questions that might help us locate Gina.”

“It’s Mrs. Perkins,” she said. “My Vernon passed many years ago. I’m a widow. I don’t at all mind answering your questions. Please, come in.”

We entered, and she said, “Do you mind if I put these groceries in the refrigerator first? I don’t want anything to spoil.”

I smiled. She reminded me of my grandmother.

“Please, take all the time you need,” Toni answered.

“Thank you,” she said. “You two are welcome to sit on the sofa there if you’d like.”

We thanked her and sat down. Her unit appeared to be identical to Gina’s—at least as far as layout. Of course, the decorating was nothing like Gina’s. Whereas Gina’s condo was stark, modern, and minimally furnished, Mrs. Perkins’s unit looked like my grandmother’s—that is, it featured painted and wallpapered walls, overstuffed furniture, and pictures and knickknacks everywhere. There was hardly a square inch of wall space without a picture or countertop space without some sort of figurine.

“May I bring you two some iced tea on a hot day like today?” she asked.

“Please,” Toni said. “That would be delightful. Would you like some help?”

“No, thank you, dear,” Mrs. Perkins answered, smiling sweetly, as she shuffled back to her kitchen. She laughed and said, “I believe I can still manage to bring a couple of glasses of iced tea all by myself.”

A minute later, she came from the kitchen carrying a small tray with a pitcher and three glasses full of ice. She placed the tray on the small table in front of us and said, “Please, help yourselves.” She sat down. “Now,” she said, “how may I help you?”

Before we go out on an interview, we always build a standard list of questions that we call our PQL—our Program Question List. This helps us make sure we don’t forget to ask a question that might make it necessary for us to come back later. Things like what’s your full name, how long have you lived here, how well do you know Gina, when did she leave for work, when did she usually get home—that sort of thing. Mrs. Perkins felt she knew Gina reasonably well, but in a neighbor-to-neighbor sort of way. They did not socialize. We asked if Mrs. Perkins knew whether or not Gina went out often. Seemed like three or four nights per week. Did Gina bring men home? Occasionally. When was the last time she saw her? Last Thursday morning when Gina went to work.