Final Deposit (18 page)

Charles glanced at Kyle and then back at her. Her stomach lurched. Something was wrong.

“I'm sorry, Miss Taylor.” Charles said in a clipped British accent, rubbing the back of his head. “We've searched the entire premises. Your father isn't here.”

L
indsey pulled away from Kyle and ran toward the house. Her feet pounded against the hard pavement. Her father had to be there. Somehow they'd missed him, but he was there, waiting for her. She stumbled over a rock but kept running, cutting across a patch of grass toward the driveway.

She stopped short of crashing into a uniformed officer, his hand on his holster.

Her breath caught. “My father's in there.”

The man's grip tightened on his weapon. He obviously had no plans to let her by.

“Lindsey?”

She turned to Kyle. “He's in there, Kyle. He has to be.”

“I'm sorry, ma'am.” Charles stepped forward. “You can't enter the house, but I can assure you that your father's not in there.”

She shook her head in defeat, fighting back the tears. “Then where is he?”

“We're doing everything we can to find him.”

She looked at the office equipment sitting on the driveway. They'd caught their ring of scammers, and no doubt the answers to the rest of their questions lay in the confiscated computers.

“We don't know his real name, but Abraham Omah, the man who scammed your father, is still at large. Our unit plans to do whatever it takes to bring him into custody.”

“And my father?” she demanded.

“We'll do everything to find him as well,” Charles promised.

Lindsey weighed her options, which were few. Forcing her way into the house would only get her arrested. She had to trust Charles, trust that he had the resources to find her father before it was too late.

She blinked away the tears.

“The best thing for you to do, ma'am, is stay out of the way while my men and I take this evidence and see if we can find anything that will help us locate your father.”

She was worried that they weren't moving quickly enough. They'd spent months tracking down this ring and this sting was only the tip of the iceberg. Taking time wouldn't hurt their investigation—it would strengthen it. But she could lose her father in the process.

She cocked her head. “How long will that take?”

“A few days, a week. I don't know.”

Panic swelled again. “My father has less than thirty-five hours to live.”

“Lindsey.” Kyle touched her arm. “He's right. We can't just go off chasing shadows.”

“And I can't sit around and do nothing while some maniac murders my father!”

Kyle shook his head. “Then let them do their job.”

She turned away and headed back to the car with Kyle following her. She was furious—at her father for dragging her into this situation, and at herself for not being able to find him. “You said he would be here, Kyle.” She needed to blame someone, and Kyle was the closest target at the moment.

“We hoped he'd be here. I never made any guarantees. I couldn't. You know that.”

She stopped beside the car, her arms pressed tightly around her waist. “Again, I'm sorry. I don't mean to take this out on you. I just don't know what do to. We've got to get this guy, Kyle.”

He quirked an eyebrow. “So you're not giving up?”

“Never.”

“Then let's go to your father's hotel room—Daniel got a key from the hotel manager. Maybe your father left something there that will help us figure out where he is.”

Lindsey glanced at her watch. Time was running out.

 

Kyle pulled an empty brown suitcase out of the closet and checked the pockets for anything her father might have forgotten to unpack. So far they'd found nothing of interest. The top drawer of the dresser was filled with socks, underwear and a couple of T-shirts. His toothbrush sat on the bathroom counter beside a tube of toothpaste. A black toiletry bag hung on the back of the door. Everything was neat—there were no signs of a struggle. It was as if he'd walked out of here expecting to return.

Kyle glanced up at Lindsey, who was methodically going through a briefcase. “Anything?”

“Nothing that seems out of the ordinary. His Bible, a copy of
The Hobbit
and some travel documents.” She shrugged.

It was hard to find something when you weren't even sure what you were looking for. Kyle rubbed his chin. They had to be missing something.

The concierge told him that Mr. Taylor had been dropped off at the hotel by a private car, which meant that Omah had sent someone to pick him up. It also meant Omah had still been playing the role of friend and confidante at that point.

Kyle looked through the sliding glass door that led to a small balcony. This side of the hotel overlooked half a dozen bars and restaurants that were preparing for the lunch crowd. Omah would have taken Mr. Taylor out for a few drinks and then to the undisclosed location to show him the suitcase full of dirty money. When Lindsey's father said he didn't have any more money to pay for the cleaning products, things would have turned ugly.

He doubted there would have been any question left in Mr. Taylor's mind at that point about Omah's innocence. The con man's switch from friend to foe would have been quick and shocking. Mr. Taylor would definitely know the truth by now.

Kyle pulled open the sliding door and went out to the private balcony. It was a nine-by-six area with a wrought-iron table, an umbrella and four chairs. A pen sat on the table.

Kyle looked closely at the pen—it was from a health club in Dallas. It was the only evidence he could see that Mr. Taylor had come out here.

Lindsey stepped out onto the balcony. “Anything?”

“Your dad's pen.” He handed it to her, wondering what her father had been writing.

A gust of wind sent a chill down his spine despite the sunny, humid day. There was nothing more to see out here. He turned to go inside and something caught his attention—a piece of paper fluttering against the edge of the balcony. He bent down to pick it up.

“What is it, Kyle?”

He handed her a piece of hotel stationery with a few lines written neatly in black ink. “Looks like a letter your father started. To you.”

 

Lindsey scanned the few lines of the unfinished letter, feeling her heart break. She stepped back inside the hotel room. Kyle closed the sliding door, muting the noise from outside.

“What does it say?” Kyle asked.

She cleared her throat. “‘All I can do, Lindsey, is ask for your forgiveness for what I've put you through. If anything goes wrong today, I want you to know that I love you. And I need you to forgive me, even if you never understand why I did this.

“‘There are so many things I never told you because I wanted to protect you and your mother. I loved her so much. I loved you both. And now…'”

“Is that it?”

“That's all he wrote.” She ran her hand across the page and shook her head. “Someone must have interrupted him. He was scared, Kyle. He believed there was a chance he'd never see me again.”

“I'm so sorry, Lindsey.” Kyle wrapped her in his arms and held her tight. “Omah must have arrived, stopping him from finishing the letter.”

“But what did he want to tell me?” Rage suddenly gripped her and she wanted to rip up the letter. She pulled away from Kyle's embrace. This could have been avoided.

She threw down the letter and grabbed the map of London Kyle had left on the table, jabbing her finger at the center of the city. “This is crazy. He could be right next door or fifty miles away.”

“Charles and his team are working as fast as they can.”

“What if it's not fast enough?” Less than thirty-two hours, and her hands were tied. She could hardly stand it.

She stared at the map, looking at all the unfamiliar places and names, feeling very far away from home. Hackney, Camden, Brent, Lewisham.

Lewisham. Uncle Lewis.

“Kyle, look at this. The borough of Lewisham,” she said, pointing on the map.

“What about it?”

Her breath caught in her throat and she could hardly get the words out. “I don't think my father was talking about Uncle Lewis, Kyle. I think he was trying to tell me where he is.”

 

Kyle punched Charles's number into his cell. It was a long shot, but if Lindsey's theory was right, and the borough corresponded with one of the locations they'd already identified, they had a very real chance of finding her father.

“Charles, this is Kyle.” Traffic roared in the background, but the connection was clear. “I think we might have a lead on George Taylor.”

“What have you got?”

Kyle relayed the details of the cell-phone message, and the fact that Lindsey's uncle had died a decade and a half ago.

“That is odd,” Charles said. “But fear can make people do and say a lot of strange things.”

“Or maybe her father was trying to pass a message to her.” Kyle glanced at Lindsey who was barely holding it together. He had to get the man to listen. “It makes sense, Charles. Mr. Taylor knew Lindsey would figure it out.”

“Lewisham isn't much to go on, Kyle.”

“It is if you can match it to one of the assets you've identified.”

“Give me a second to find out what we've got on this end.” Thirty seconds later, Charles came back on the line again. “Okay, I've got one location in Lewisham. A small restaurant that's been open about two years.”

“The perfect setup for laundering money.”

“Yes, but that doesn't mean Mr. Taylor's being held there. And even if he was in that area when he called, they could have moved him during the past twelve hours. The chances are slim, and you know that.”

“Time's running out, Charles. What other leads do you have?”

“Our guys are working on the computers they confiscated earlier today, but at the moment, I'll admit this is the only possible lead we have.”

“You could have Abraham Omah in custody before the end of the day,” Kyle said.

Charles was silent for a moment. Then he relayed the restaurant's address. “Meet us there in an hour?”

“We'll be there.”

“And stay out of the way this time.”

Kyle smiled. “No problem.”

 

Lindsey leaned against the window of the silver sedan, feeling a strong sense of déjà vu. Another location. Another possible bust. Charles's team had gone inside the restaurant, but so far, no one had emerged. And there was still no sign of her father.

She scanned the narrow roadway with the binoculars. Cars, buses and bikes filled the busy street that was home to about a dozen shops and restaurants, and a high-rise of flats. A woman pushed a stroller past an Asian restaurant. Another woman ran by in a Windbreaker, listening to an iPod. A man chatted with someone standing inside a doorway.

She zoomed in on the targeted restaurant. Two cars were parked in front and a third in the alley that ran along the side of the shop. Beyond that car was a Dumpster.

Charles emerged from the restaurant. He stared down the street, his phone to his ear.

Kyle's cell rang.

“He's not here, Kyle. I've got two waitresses and a cook who speaks a little English. Unless you want to order lunch, this is a dead end.”

She searched the street again with the binoculars, and zoomed back to the man in the doorway. The signature
T
on a Texas Rangers baseball hat caught her eye. Lindsey squinted in the sunlight. The second man had emerged from the shadows. Her heart pounded. It was her father.

Lindsey threw the binoculars down and struggled to unlock the door, but she couldn't seem to make her hands work the way she wanted them to.

“What is it, Lindsey? Where are you going?”

“My father. He's headed inside that apartment building.” She shoved open the door and started off down the street.

“Lindsey, wait!”

Kyle jumped out of the car and hollered at Charles. She could hear Kyle and Daniel running behind her, but she wasn't waiting. Dodging an older woman pushing a shopping cart, she dashed toward the building. Fatigue from the last week was replaced by pure adrenaline. She caught the door before it shut and saw her father and the man turn the corner at the top of a staircase.

She flew up the stairs and through the doorway. “Abraham Omah!”

Her father's captor spun around, halfway down the hallway, his hand tightly gripping her father's arm. Abraham Omah looked nothing like she'd pictured. With his dark complexion and curly black hair, he could have been her next-door neighbor back home.

But his eyes were cold and hard.

She swallowed. “I want my father. Let him go.”

Her father's face paled. “Lindsey, I'm so sorry.”

“It's going to be all right, Daddy.”

The door to the hallway slammed open behind her. She glanced back at Charles and Kyle. “Get behind us, Lindsey,” Kyle said.