Missing: The Body of Evidence (18 page)

Ten-twenty in the morning, and Nancy had
still not seen the doctor. She had half a mind to skip the ward and to go to
Kyle’s bedside. A familiar voice distracted her train of thought and the
curtains parted. Bill’s beaming smile greeted her and she placed the fingers of
both hands on her cheeks, before waving for him to enter.

‘Bill! I thought you were on vacation. How
did you know I was here?’

‘News travels, not much gets past me,
vacation or not, besides, we weren’t going anywhere. How are you?’

‘I’m fine, just a little sore. Have you
been to see Kyle?’

‘No, I was lucky to get to see you at this
time of day. I had to flash my badge. I bumped into Rob, he told me what
happened.’

Nancy was relieved she didn’t have to go
through all the details again.

‘What you want to do; is to use this as an
excuse to take a few weeks sick leave, and to forget all about work.’

‘Maybe. Perhaps Kyle will need a nurse,’
Nancy said, and winked at Bill.

The curtains opened again and her dad
walked through. He sent Bill a stare. Bill looked down at his feet.

‘What are you doing here?’ Dad asked Bill.

‘Just going,’ he replied. ‘Take care,
Detective Roberts, I have all the details to relay back to Logan at the office.’

Detective Roberts?
Bill turned to leave and Dad’s disdainful glare followed him through
the curtain.
How rude.

‘Do you know him?’Nancy asked.

He didn’t answer, but set down a luggage
bag at the side of the bed. He looked agitated. Nancy assumed they must have
had a run in some time. Whatever their connection, there was clearly bad blood
between them.

‘There’re some of my pyjamas in there, a
dressing gown, and an old cell phone. Best I could do. Are you ready to go, I
can give you a lift home.’

‘I haven’t seen the doctor yet and I need
to see my boyfriend who was with me in the accident. If you can give me some
money, I can take a taxi.’

‘Suits me.’ He took out his wallet, fished
out some bills and tossed them on the bedcover. ‘Anything else you’ll be
needing?’

‘Yeah, I need to thank you for saving both
our lives.’

‘How come.’

‘Well, besides the clothes and the money,
my boyfriend’s car careened into a lake. I remembered all you taught me about
breathing to stop panic and how I’d need to equalize the pressure to get out of
a sinking car.’

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘At least you
listened to something I said.’

There was something on his mind, but he
seemed to be talked-out, which didn’t surprise her. But she thought he would
have at least asked what happened and how she was.

‘By the way, I think I’ll live.’

‘I can see that.’

The next minute hung in uncomfortable
silence. The doctor rescued both of them when he swept the curtains aside and
picked up the clipboard from the bottom of the bed.

‘I’d better be going.’

‘See you, Dad.’ In the blink of an eye, he
was gone.

Nancy was trembling inside and she hoped it
didn’t show on the outside, or maybe the doctor would see it as a sign that she
was other than fit for discharge. The nurse walked in and joined the doctor. It
peeved her the way they whispered about her. The doctor turned to her.

‘Can you stand and walk for me?’

‘Sure.’

The nurse pulled back the bed covers and
Nancy threw her legs over the side of the bed. Her feet touched the floor and
she eased herself to stand at the side of the bed. Nancy said an inward prayer,
and walked to the bottom of the bed.

‘How was that, any pain?’ the doctor asked.

‘Fine, no pain,’ she lied.

‘Good, I think we can send you home.’

The nurse opened the curtain for the doctor
to leave, followed him and drew the curtains.
Yes!
A sense of glee
overcame the anxiousness that had twisted her insides. Nancy hauled the bag of
clothing onto the bed, unzipped it and tipped out the contents.
Damn,
nothing for my feet.
She removed her hospital gown and put on the pyjamas.
She rolled up the sleeves and then the pants legs. Nancy slipped on the
dressing gown over her pyjamas. She turned over the sleeves and looked down at
the hem, which was almost touching the floor.
Oh, Dad, what were you
thinking?
Undeterred, Nancy threw back the curtain and headed for the floor
where Kyle was.

The receptionist looked up Kyle’s details
and gave her directions to his room. The corridor on Kyle’s floor seemed to go
on forever as she checked the private room door numbers. Finally, she arrived
at his door, which was ajar, and she could hear him and his mom talking. Nancy
ran her hands down the sides of her dressing gown and waved her head from side
to side. Nancy heard Kyle’s mom speaking.

‘Why won’t you let me phone Chloe?’

‘You know I love her, but it’s best she
doesn’t see me like this.’

A cold shudder passed through Nancy’s body
and her legs weakened.
Chloe... Love?
Nancy thought she was about to
faint, and walked unsteadily over to a seat and collapsed onto a chair. None of
what she had heard made sense.
Was the ring for Chloe? The bastard, he is a
player.
Then logic kicked in; it didn’t make sense in her mind that he
would ask her to live together if he loved someone else. Maybe, she thought, it
could be an aunt.
It is an aunt; it has to be an aunt.
She kept
repeating the notion in her mind and hitting her thigh with a clenched fist.
Nancy took a deep breath, stood, and marched over to the door and entered.

‘Nancy, good to see you’re okay,’ said his
mom. ‘I’ll leave you two alone and go and find a coffee.’

Nancy wasn’t sure it would be a good idea
to be left alone with him. Right at that moment, she wanted to strangle him.
Kyle sat up in bed with pillows stacked behind him and a smirk that she wished
she could swipe from his face.

‘I hear from Bill I owe you my life? Thank
God, you’re okay.’

She wasn’t sure how to respond, but was
mindful of how Kyle had jumped to conclusions in the viewing room when she had
drenched Logan. She decided to hold her counsel, but there was no point in not
asking the question.

‘Who’s Chloe?’

‘Oops, I think I’d better go for that
coffee.’

His mom left the room.

‘Don’t look so serious. I guess you
listened at the door?’

‘Not intentionally.’

‘I was going to tell you before the fire
interrupted me, remember?’

Her question had had the desired effect and
had wiped the grin from his lips, replaced with a look of panic in his eyes.

‘Honestly, I was going to tell you. None of
the guys at the station knows anything about her, but I wasn’t going to keep it
a secret from you. I was just scared to tell you earlier, in fact I still am
scared.’

Nancy, emotionally drained, could feel
anger well up inside because he was drawing out the conversation.

‘For God’s sake stop being a wimp and spit
it out.’

There was a few seconds silence.

‘Chloe is my daughter.’

‘Daughter?’

The speed at which she covered the four
paces to the side of his bed would have won Nancy a gold medal.

‘Arghh, my ribs,’ He screamed out, as she
threw her arms around him and planted a kiss on his lips.

‘Sorry.’ She drew back. ‘You dark horse.
When do I meet her? How old is she?’

‘Slow down. Chloe is eleven. You can see
her all in good time. She lives over in East LA with her mom. You really don’t
mind? All my other girlfriends have run a mile when they found out I had a
daughter.’

‘Don’t mind? If she had four legs and two
heads, I couldn’t be any happier. I’m just ecstatic you’re alive.’

‘Thank God. Where did you get that outfit?’

‘Oh, this?’ She realized she must look
strange. ‘Dad. Incidentally, thinking about Dad, did Bill mention where he knew
him from, they seemed to know each other?’

‘No idea.’

Her shoulders dropped. She knew her dad
would not say anything and with Bill on vacation, she doubted there would be an
opportunity to ask the question. She resigned herself to the notion that their
secret would remain a mystery.

‘What has the doctor said?’

‘Bruised rib, stitches on the gash on my
head and a sprained knee. He reckons I’ll be out on Tuesday. And you?’

‘Only small cuts on my arm, otherwise he
says I’m fine.’

The time slipped by, then his mom poked her
head around the door.

‘Is it safe?’

They both laughed and Kyle beckoned his mom
to enter the room. His mom tapped her watch.

‘Time for your physiotherapy.’

‘I need to get a taxi to my car,’ Nancy
said. ‘I can go home, get changed and come back for a visit tonight.’

‘I’ll give you ride to your car,’ said his
mom and passed her the keys to her car and apartment.

‘No, leave it tonight,’ said Kyle. ‘I
really am tired and besides, you need to rest. Your hospital test, remember.
Why don’t you visit tomorrow after your hospital appointment and we can make
plans for when I’m discharged?’

‘Ah, yes, the plans. Congratulations.’ His
mom winked at Nancy. ‘Come, dear, let’s go and I’ll fill you in on any gaps
about Chloe that he’s probably missed.’

All excitement waned on the way to the car.
Her mind wandered. Nancy, features expressionless, looked as if she had donned
a pale mask. Three unexplained incidents relating to the fire defied
coincidence in her mind. Inwardly, she vowed to find the answers to events that
tracked back to the professor’s death. Nothing, in her mind, was going to stand
in the way of her future with Kyle.

Monday morning; a glance at the clock
showed it was seven-thirty-five. Nancy had showered, dressed, and after eating
a fried breakfast, was eager to get to work. On leaving Kyle on Sunday the day
had dragged. Today, she hoped to immerse herself in work and to pass time
quickly. Thoughts of the MRI scan, though scary, were regarded as a milestone,
one that, in her mind, brought her nearer to the time she could visit Kyle.

After the scan, she would need to call her
bank branch to arrange new bankcards. Customer services had been most unhelpful
when she had phoned them, telling her there was a computer glitch and she would
need to call into her branch to have them replaced. The evening before, she had
spent the night trying to make a space in her closet for Kyle’s clothes, but in
the end, she gave up trying and decided to allocate him the spare-bedroom
closet. The phone rang and she answered the call.
Logan?

‘Don’t come into the office, the press is
camped out and wanting a story on your incident with the wildfire.’

‘I thought you had something lined up for
me?’

‘I do, if you’d let me finish. Meet me in
reception at 100 West Main Street 10:00 a.m., sharp. We have an appointment
with personnel. You
are
fit to work, I take it?’

‘Well, yeah, but I have an appointment this
afternoon at the hospital for some tests.’

Personnel division?

‘Good, it won’t take that long.’

The call ended with the handset still
pressed to her ear. Her mind rolled over why he wanted her to meet him at
personnel. To her, as much as she wanted time to pass, events regarding her
future career were moving too quickly. It was obvious Logan knew that she and
Kyle had spent the weekend away together, despite his protestations, but she
didn’t think Logan had been serious about shipping one of them out of the
division so soon. A laugh escaped her lips, and she placed the handset back on
its cradle.

‘To hell with him, I was the one who was
going to ask for a transfer, anyway.’

The only thing that bugged Nancy was that
it would be obvious whom Logan favoured to stay in the department. Otherwise,
she was pleased to be getting the subject behind her and she suppressed her
competitive streak.

With the door to the apartment locked,
Nancy skipped down the stairway and headed for her car. Only one more morning
after this and she knew they would discharge Kyle from the hospital. Kyle
moving into her apartment had given her a new meaning for existing. She opened
the car door and slipped onto her seat.

The traffic was jammed, but
Flying
Without Wings
blaring out over the speakers lifted her spirits. Finally,
picking up the one way on South West Street, her heart skipped a beat. Parked
before the cross section with West Street, were two news channel vans, one from
channel 2, and a Brazilian news channel, Univision 34 Noticias. Nancy hoped
their target was some other poor soul as she turned left at the lights and
moved slowly along West Street.

Nancy parked her car and made her way to
reception. She was twenty minutes early and took a seat in the foyer. The girl
in reception kept smiling over at her, but Nancy was too busy thinking to
strike up a conversation. A thought had struck her that she had the situation
wrong, and with their escape from the wildfire being newsworthy, that maybe she
was going to be portrayed as a heroin for saving Kyle’s life.

Commendation started to whirl through her
mind. Perhaps, she thought, this was what the meeting was all about and to
prepare her for the television interviews so the police department could
extract maximum PR. Thoughts that the publicity may prevent Logan from carrying
out his threat made her smile inside.

Lost in her daydream, she hadn’t noticed
Logan arrive.

‘You ready?’ he asked

‘Sure am.’

Her answer was an understatement; Nancy had
never felt so good.

Neither of them spoke a word as they made
their way in the elevator to personnel. She hoped that if her latest scenario
were correct, he would have to choke on his acceptance of the situation with
her and Kyle.

‘Wait here.’

Logan entered the office and returned with
a woman carrying a file. If she was about to bestow Nancy with congratulations,
it didn’t show. If anything, the woman’s facial expression looked as though she
had a bad smell under her nose. They walked down the corridor and stopped at a
door signed ‘Conference room.’

‘Take a seat,’ said the woman, followed
with a false smile.

A glimpse of three men sitting around a
conference table came into view as the door opened and closed, leaving Nancy
alone.

The palms of Nancy’s hands felt clammy, and
her breakfast started to rumble in her stomach.

The door opened and the woman from
personnel beckoned her inside.

‘Detective Roberts. This way.’

Nancy stood and ran her hands from her
waist to her hips, waved her head from side to side. With her back straight and
her head held high, she strode into the room with a confident sense of purpose.

There wasn’t a smile to be seen anywhere in
the room. The woman pulled out a chair at the table and Nancy sat next to a
beast of a man weighing over 240 pounds. He was sweating profusely. The man
unfastened the collar of his shirt and loosened his tie. He leaned over to her
and whispered.

‘I’m your union rep. You’re here to answer
some questions and I’m here to ensure fair play.’

Nancy’s jaw lightened and her arms fell to
her sides. She looked at Logan at the head of the table for a clue, but he
averted her gaze. The two men opposite looked to have overly starched shirts
for detectives and both sent a stare straight at her.

‘Ahem.’ The woman from personnel opened her
file and took out a pen from her purse. ‘I’m Ms. Sanchez, Detective Roberts. We
asked you to come here to help internal affairs with their enquiries.’ She
pointed in turn to the internal affairs agents. ‘Detective Cole and this is
Detective Brogan.’

The back of Nancy’s throat tightened and
she gripped the armrests of her chair. Cole looked to be in his early thirties,
but Brogan had the air of a seasoned campaigner and was in his fifties.

‘Nothing to be alarmed about,’ Brogan said
and smiled. Nancy ignored his attempt at empathy. ‘Just a few background questions.’

The sweaty hand of the union rep gripped
her wrist with a squeeze and let go. Nancy kept her gaze firmly on Brogan.

‘I see from your record that you were well
thought of down at South Los Angeles. Looking at your address, that’s a good neighbourhood.
Tell me how long have you lived at your apartment?’

‘Eleven years.’

‘Does it come with a mortgage?’

‘No.’

He made a note on a pad, tapped the table
with his pen, and looked to be waiting for her to expand on the answer to his
question.

‘How are you doing financially?’

‘Better since I made detective. Why?’

‘I’ll come to that in a minute.’ He gave
her a supercilious grin.

‘It must have taken some doing to clear the
mortgage on your apartment?’

His line of questioning sounded ridiculous
in her mind and he may just as well have asked her what the weather was like
outside. She hated the intrusion and chose not to be overly helpful. Resentment
stirred inside at him not getting to the point.

‘Not really. Look, I had bacon and eggs for
breakfast this morning; does that help your enquiries? Now what is it you
really need to know?’

He opened a file at the side of his
notepad, took out a photograph and passed it over the table. Nancy picked it up
and studied the mug shot. She glanced across at Brogan and back to the photograph.

‘And, your question is?’

‘Do you recognize him?’

Nancy stared long and hard at the picture,
when the answer hit her.

‘Yeah, it’s Dean Jacobs. We arrested him
last week at the Piru Street gang’s house, but we had to let him go. The place
was clean.’

Brogan shuffled some papers around in his
file.

‘Have you had dealings with him before?’

‘Yeah, I’ve pulled him in a few times for
petty theft.’

‘And his mother?’

Nancy tried to think if they would know
that she knew Dean’s mom.

‘Yes, I know his mom. She’s a God fearing
woman. His mom helps out at the local church in South Compton.’

‘Tell me about when you pulled him in for
shoplifting.’

‘He stole a carton of milk when his mom’s
food stamps were delayed. The shopkeeper didn’t press charges and his mom paid
for the milk.’

Brogan pulled out a statement sheet.

‘It says here, you asked the shopkeeper to
drop the charges.’

The audacity of his question and the
direction he was taking caused her cheeks to flame, more out of anger than
embarrassment. She started to answer.

‘That’s...’

The union rep gripped her arm.

‘You don’t have to answer that.’

She pulled her arm from his firm hold.

‘Yes, I do, and it’s true, I asked the
shopkeeper to drop the charges. His probation officer thought he could be
turned, Dean was about to start a new job and my sergeant said to go for it.
Listen, get to the point, I have nothing to hide.’

‘Let’s get back to your apartment. If you
have no mortgage, how did you pay for the property?’

Nancy let out a snicker.

‘For goodness sake, I bought it with money
from the trust fund my mom left me for when I reached the age of twenty-five.
My papers are held at the bank and with my attorney.’

‘Talking about banks, how much do you
reckon you have deposited at the bank?’

‘I have Fifteen-thousand in a deposit
savings account, and my last pay check less expenses in my checking account.
Say a thousand dollars or so.’

‘And you can provide statements for the
last... say five years.’

Nancy laughed and leaned forward.

‘If you have the time and an internet
connection, I’ll show you now.’

‘In good time. Tell me, at the meeting
before the Piru gang bust, did you go into McDonald’s?’

‘Yes. I used the bathroom.’

He fished in his file, took out a
compliment slip sized piece of paper and slid it across the desk. The
realization it was a bank deposit slip made out for ten-thousand dollars and
payable to her account on the Friday just gone, sent waves of shivers through
her body. Another photo slid across to her from Brogan. The picture was clearly
from a security camera in her local branch with a time and date stamp that
matched the date of the deposit slip.

‘I believe that’s your Dean Jacobs.’

The union rep interrupted and stood from
his seat

‘Okay, that’s enough. I don’t think
Detective Roberts needs to answer and I’m advising her to get an attorney.’

Nancy took hold of his arm.

‘Sit down a goddam minute. There has to be
an explanation, I have nothing to hide. Where in hell’s name would Dean get
ten-thousand dollars? More to the point, I want to know as much as you do why
he would pay the money into my account.’

Nancy rested her elbow on the table and
cradled her forehead with her hand. She thought back to that last encounter
with Dean.

‘I’ve got it. When we arrested him, he
threatened me. He said, ‘you’ll get yours bitch, I know who you are.’ The
sergeant from the gang team and Bill heard him.’

Brogan didn’t look phased, but simply fired
back.

‘You admit going into McDonald’s, we have
the phone records from the payphone and a call was made to the target at the time
you were in there.’

Her head began to swim as she thought back
to the events at McDonald’s. A picture of Bill talking with a guy at the door
and then arguing with him flashed through her mind. Instinct told her to throw
in Bill, as a plausible red herring, but jumping to conclusions, she had
learned of late, did no one any good. She knew if she dragged Bill into this,
it could lose him his pension. However, visions of her being locked up brought
logic into play.

‘How do you reckon he got your account details?’
Brogan asked.

‘You tell me.’

She needed time to think, before they got
to the point of reading her rights. Looking at the deposit slip and the photo
at the bank, she began to wonder why they hadn’t already booked her. Her head
began to throb. She touched the area at the side of her head where she felt the
pain and groaned.

‘Damn, I need a break. I need to take my
medication.’

Thoughts that she had gone from hero, to
zero and from happiness to total despair, in the bat of an eyelid, made her
wonder if there was a way out of the situation. She glanced at Logan and they
locked eyes. Nancy hoped for his support, surprised to see him stroking his lip
and doing the pensive thing again. Logan remained silent. His expression gave
nothing away.