Thread of Hope (The Joe Tyler Series, #1) (27 page)

I snapped the laptop closed.  “Let’s ask him about her phone records, too.  Take a look at those.”

Gina nodded, but something crossed her face and she looked hesitant.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Meredith’s a smart kid,” she said.  “You saw that with her grades.  If she wanted to hide something, she’d figure out how to do it.”

“So you don’t think we’ll find phone numbers or emails that might help us?  That she would’ve covered her tracks that well?”

Gina thought about that.  “Yeah.  I think that’s accurate.”

I stood and looked around the empty room.  It seemed so sterile, so generic.  Teenaged rooms usually had their own personality, their own vibe.  Meredith’s did not and it made me feel sorry for her.

“You’re probably right,” I said to Gina.  “But we need to check anyway.”

We walked out of Meredith’s room, down the long carpeted hallway and out of the massive Jordan home.

“I’m going to see Chuck,” Gina said, as we walked down the steps to our cars.

“Oh yeah?  Good.”

“This afternoon.”

“Good.”

She wanted something else from me, but I wasn’t sure what.  I stayed quiet.

“Is he any better?” she asked.

I shook my head.

“What you said...” She glanced away from me.  “The other day, about not really giving a shit about him.  It’s not true.Oh y

“Okay.”

She moved her gaze back to me.  “I’m serious.  I care about him.  A lot.”

“Okay.”

“Stop saying okay,” she said, irritation pinching her face.

I started to say exactly that, then caught myself and didn’t say anything.

The irritation faded in her features.  “I don’t think Chuck did anything to Meredith.  I don’t.  All of that came out wrong.  Yeah, they were spending a lot of time together, but I know there has to be an explanation for that.”

“I believe that, too,” I said.

“And what I said about Jordan, about being sure of what you know before you go up against him?” she said.  “That’s the truth.  You do need to be sure about taking him on.”  Her mouth twisted and untwisted.  “But you and I?  We’re on the same page.  Because I’m sure about Chuck and if I’ve gotta choose between him and Jordan, I’m choosing Chuck.  Every time.”  She waved her hand in the air between us, like she was shooing a fly.  “And I just wanted you to know that.”

The morning sun was warm on my neck as I studied her.  I wasn’t much into trusting people any longer in my life.  Trust had disappeared the day Elizabeth did.  But Gina seemed sincere in her words and she hadn’t given me a reason to distrust her.

“Is it okay to say okay now?” I asked.

A thin smile forced itself onto her lips.  “Yes.”

“Okay.”

She took a deep breath, seemingly relieved to have cleared the air.  “Have you learned anything else about Chuck?  About what happened?”

Before I could answer, my phone vibrated in my pocket and I pulled it out.  I looked at the number on the readout and my breath caught.  The familiar cold and dread I felt every time that number showed up on my phone consumed me like a bitter cocktail forced down my throat.

I waited a moment until my breathing found its rhythm again. 

“I haven’t,” I said to Gina, then held the phone up in her direction.  “But this might help.”

FIFTY-FIVE

A couple of times a year, just when I’m beginning to think the pain is subsiding from suffocating to tolerable, I get a phone call that goes like this.

“Joe?”

“Yeah,” I say.  “Hey Mike.”

Mike Lorenzo is a cop, was my mentor and we have known each other now for a dozen years.  I would recognize his voice if it was one in a thousand.

“Got a call,” Mike says.

The familiar fluttering begins in my stomach.  I would use every ounce of my strength to crush it, but it is Pavlovian now and there is nothing I can do to quell it.

“Oh yeah?” I say.

“Similar description,” Mike says.  “Enough for me to take a look.”

Sometimes it’s a description, sometimes it’s an unidentified victim, sometimes it’s something else.

“Okay,” I say, even though it is anything but.

“Just wanted you to know,” Mike says.  “Didn’t want you to catch wind of it elsewhere.”

“Appreciate that, Mike.”

“I’ll let you know.”  Mike will pause.  “You doin’ alright?”

He never asks where I am, what I’m doing, what my plans are.  Just if I’m alright.

“Yeah,” I lie.  “I’m okay.”

“Good to hear,” Mike says.  “I’ll be in touch if it’s anything.”

We hang up and I know he won’t be in touch because it won’t be anything.
It never is.  Not once in eight
years has it ever been anything.  The only time he will call will be the next time he gets something that tells him to take a look.  The fluttering will stick around for a day and then slowly die off until the next time it’s summoned.

She would be six
tee
n now, my daughter.  A junior
i
n high school, driving
, dating boys and spending too much time on the phone.  Every high school, every unsteady driver, every surly teenage male and every cell phone reminds me of that. 

But she is gone.  No matter how many times Mike calls me, I know that she is gone.  If I hadn’t accepted that, I would be dead, gone in a much different way than Elizabeth.

So I can’t look for her anymore.  I let Mike do that.

Instead, I look for other people’s children.  I try to help them.  Because I know what they are going through, how excruciating it is, to experience the disappearance of a child.  I know how to do it now and looking keeps me occupied.

Because I know Elizabeth’s not coming back, won’t ever call me on the phone and say “Dad. I’m okay.  Come get me.”

That call won’t come for me. 

But sometimes I can make it happen for others and I pretend that is enough for me right now.

It has to be.

Because I have nothing else.

FIFTY-SIX

“You look good,” Detective Mike Lorenzo said.

“You’re a liar,” I answered, squinting into the sun.  “But thanks.”

We were sitting in the left field pavilion at Petco Park, the Padres playing an afternoon game, getting run over by the Cardinals.  The stadium was maybe a quarter full, the city once again demonstrating their apathy for a team that had always played second fiddle to the Chargers.  Mike had always been one of the few who saw them as a first fiddle.

He’d gotten the message I’d left for him at the station and when he called at the Jordan home, he’d asked me to meet him at the park not just because he loved baseball, but because he knew it was probably the most private place we could get together.  Not that he was doing anything wrong meeting with me, but we both knew being seen on the island would get too many tongues wagging.

Mike dug into the bag of popcorn in his lap.  “Fine.  You look better than I thought you might.”

“Must’ve thought I’d look like shit.”

“Just about,” he said, before shoving a handful of the popcorn into his mouth.  “Thought I got your message wrong when I read it.”  He glanced my way.  “Shoulda known you’d come back for your buddy, though.”

I shrugged.

“Bazer left me a message, too,” he said, brushing the salt from his hands and smiling wryly.  “Said I should steer clear of you.”  He set the bag of popcorn on the ground between his legs and the smile grew.  “Oops.”

I laughed.

Mike was the only detective on the Coronado force and had held that title for almost twenty-five years.  My intention had been to get in line for that spot when he retired and I’d told him that my first year on the job.  He’d been unimpressed, having heard it too many times before, but after a few months of my pestering him, he began to take me seriously and we became close friends, despite the fact he was old enough to be my father.

And being the only detective on the island, he’d drawn my daughter’s case.

“Here’s what I know, Joe,” Mike said, keeping his eyes on the field.  “Two guys jumped your buddy.  Based on the doctor’s report, he never saw them coming.”  He pointed to the back of his head.  “Took a shot back there with something pretty heavy.  Crowbar, bat, I don’t know, but definitely something other than a fist.”

“Something smaller if they caught him on the beach,” I said, seeing the game but not really watching it.  “Be a little tough to run down a guy in a public place with something big.”

Mike nodded.  “Yeah, most likely.” 

The crowd feigned enthusiasm for a Padres two-out single.  “You said two guys jumped him.  Jane told me there were no wits.”

“Officially, there weren’t,” Mike said.  “But I got a guy who saw a little bit.”

Probably a kid messing around with drugs on the beach.  Mike was like that.  No reason to ruin a kid for smoking a joint where he thought he wouldn’t get caught.  But somehow Mike tracked him or her down, promised to keep him out of it if he or she could convey what they saw.  It was one of the reasons he was good at his job.  He had no taste for the stuff that didn’t matter.  His ego didn’t need it.

“Any description?” I asked.

“Generic stuff.  Big, but not huge.  Athletic.”

“Could he I.D. if he saw them?”

Mike paused.  “Maybe.  You further along on this than me?”

The crowd groaned at a weak pop fly that ended the inning.  “Where are you?”

“All I got is a guy who, off the record, saw two other guys jump your friend,” he said.  “That and a handful of nothing.”

I smiled.  “I’m not much further.  Let me think on it before I pass anything along.”

Mike watched me for a moment, then nodded.  He waved at the soda guy and bought one for each of us.  He handed me mine.

“Based on what I’m hearing,” he said, taking a long drink from the paper cup.  He wiped his upper lip. “You think this is tied to the Jordan girl.”