Vanished in the Night (12 page)

She leaned forward and looked directly into his eyes, her face inches from his. She could feel his warmth from across the table. His lips were so close. If she leaned forward just a fraction and he leaned forward just a fraction, the gap between them would disappear. She wondered what his lips would feel like on hers, what he would taste like. “You don’t have to treat me like a spooked horse,” she said.

He jerked back. “I wasn’t aware that I was treating you like any kind of horse.”

She leaned back in her chair, satisfied at having rattled him. “I know all the little tricks of the trade. I use them in the emergency room every freakin’ day. Talking down meth addicts and calming car accident victims is my job. I know how to mirror people’s posture and keep my voice low and steady. I don’t like having the same tricks used on me. Just talk to me like a person. Not like a resource to be managed.”

Ooh. She’d made him blink. Score one.

He shook his head and laughed. “You’re right, I’m
sorry. It’s an occupational hazard. I do it to my mother all the time. It pisses her off, too.”

She smiled. “It’s okay. I know. I’m constantly triaging people in my head. You have no idea how many diseases I’ve diagnosed walking through Arden Fair Mall. Only my nursing buddies will shop with me anymore. Now. About the press conference. Tell me what I need to do.”

Gary Havens chopped the green onion. He liked to cook. He found it interesting to see how things came together, how different flavors complemented each other, what things went together and what things didn’t.

It had started out as a necessity. He had to learn to cook to feed himself when he was finally out on his own. It was either that or a steady diet of McDonald’s, and he’d had more than enough of institutional food for a lifetime. He’d found an old copy of the
Joy of Cooking
in a thrift shop and a whole new universe had opened before him.

After a while, cooking had become less of a necessity and more of a hobby. He cruised the farmer’s markets now, often driving into Davis on Saturday mornings to get the freshest produce. Then he’d scour the Internet looking for recipes for things to do with
the magical things he’d find. Fava beans? Who had ever heard of fava beans? They were a revelation with their double pods and strange fibrous insides. And he’d never even heard of chard, much less eaten it. Now he had it all the time when it was in season.

Everything was best in its own time. You had to be patient. Wait until things were at their peak and then seize your opportunities when they presented themselves.

He switched on the evening news while he cooked. He preferred Channel 14, largely because of Marianne Robar. She was one of the reporters, and she was on almost every night.

It went without saying that she was very pretty. What television newsperson wasn’t? They were all pretty, with thick hair and perfect teeth and flawless skin. Gary knew some of it was makeup. Sometimes when they got in super close on Evelyn Martinez, the anchorwoman, you could see that her skin had broken out under the pancake makeup.

Marianne never looked like her skin had broken out. Or like she hadn’t gotten enough sleep. She had a great laugh, too. It wasn’t phony sounding, like most of the newspeople’s laughs. Marianne really sounded like she was enjoying herself, even when they made her stand out by Interstate 80 up in Truckee to broadcast about the latest winter storm. Gary snorted. As if snow in the Sierras in January was breaking news.

Sometimes Gary imagined that he was making dinner for Marianne as he watched her on TV and cooked. He liked to pretend that she would come over after she was done at the station and they would have dinner together and talk about the broadcast. She would tell him funny stories about what the cameramen had done and he would tell her what a great job she’d done. Then she’d look up at him with those beautiful dark eyes and tell him that his opinion meant more to her than anything else.

One time, he’d actually gone to the television station and waited outside. He’d followed her when she left. He hadn’t been able to follow her all the way home, though. She’d pulled into a gated community, and Gary couldn’t figure out how to get in after the gates had pulled shut behind her. It was a shame. He’d hoped to see where she actually lived. He thought maybe he’d come and watch over the place sometime, maybe do little repairs that he could see needed doing without telling her. He’d be like her special guardian angel.

He diced the green onion very thin. He was sure Marianne would like it better that way. She came on now, and Gary picked up the remote to turn up the volume.

“We’re here live at the press conference now, Evelyn,” Marianne said. “The victim’s sister is going to be speaking.”

“Any idea of what the sister will be saying?” Evelyn asked Marianne.

There was a little pause as Marianne listened to what Evelyn said, then she replied, “No idea yet, Evelyn. I’ll be letting you know as soon as we know something. Here she comes now.”

Marianne’s face left the screen and the picture now showed a dais with a row of police officers standing behind it. A woman walked past them and up to the microphone. She was short. Wearing heels, she still barely came up to the shoulder of most of the officers she walked past.

She was pretty, too. Not as pretty as Marianne. Certainly not as exotic. She had a round face and feathery reddish-brown hair and a little pointed chin. She had on black slacks and some kind of complicated shirt that wrapped around her and tied.

She adjusted the microphone down and said, “My name is Veronica Osborne and I am . . . was . . . Max Shelden’s sister.”

Gary’s world whirled a little. Max’s sister? He peered closer at the TV set. Was it little Pop-Tart? It had to be. Who else could it be? Max had only talked about one sister. He’d talked about her a lot, though. What a great kid she was. How smart she was. How funny she was.

Only once had he mentioned that she had been
the one to betray him, that it was because of her that he’d ended up at the Sierra School for Boys enduring treatment that no one would wish on a dog.

Gary shoved a tape in the VCR and hit record. He’d need to watch this again. Maybe more than once.

After the interview Marianne came back on. “There you have it, Evelyn. A plea from the dead boy’s sister for any information that could help police figure out how his body came to be in that construction site.” Marianne looked very earnest, as if it was terribly important that everyone know what happened to Max. She was right. People should probably know.

“Thanks, Marianne,” the news anchor said. “Here’s the contact information for anyone with any information on Max Shelden.” The screen filled with an 800 number and a website URL, and Gary jotted both down.

What would they do if he called? He could tell them about the last time he saw Max. About the blood and the bruises and the way his head had rolled back. Gary wasn’t sure how Max’s bones ended up down in that construction site, but he was beginning to have an idea or two. Maybe he could share those, as well.

First, though, he wanted to be sure about the Pop-Tart. He turned the heat off from beneath the frying pan, washed his hands, and went to the trunk that he used as a coffee table. He cleared the top off and
opened it up, then lifted out the blankets that were on top. Beneath that were several shoe boxes. He took out the brown-and-orange one at the bottom and opened it. Inside was a watch, a belt buckle, a ring, and a photo of a light-skinned African-American boy with a little blond girl on a beach.

He took the photo back into the kitchen, hit rewind on the VCR tape, and watched Veronica Osborne’s press conference all over again, holding the photo up to the TV set.

It was her all right. It was Max’s Pop-Tart.

A whisper started in the back of his head. The Pop-Tart was a betrayer. She was the first and possibly the worst, and fate had shown her to him. The universe had shoved her in front of his face. It must mean something.

9

It was over. How did politicians do that day after day? All those lights. All those cameras. All those eyes. It was horrible.

The second it was over, she’d escaped off the dais and found a quiet corner in a back room.

“You did great.” Zach walked up to her.

“Yeah, right.” Her heart was still racing and she could barely get the glass of water to her lips because her hand was shaking.

“Seriously, you were perfect. Concerned. Sympathetic. Calm.” He leaned against the wall next to her and smiled.

She felt her shoulders relax a little. They were only halfway up to her ears now. “You just think I did well because the flop sweat hasn’t soaked through my jacket yet.”

He laughed. It was a nice laugh. A deep, rumbling chuckle. “It really sets off all those fight-or-flight reflexes, doesn’t it? I look up at those banks of cameras and microphones, and my first urge is to rabbit right out the back door.”

“Have you done a lot of press conferences?”

He shook his head. “No. That’s why we have a PIO.”

“A what?”

“Public information officer. The person who gives most of the press conferences and manages all the media contacts.”

Veronica blew a breath out at her bangs. It felt as if they were sticking to her forehead. No way was she taking off her jacket; she hadn’t been joking about the flop sweat.

“You ready to go?” he asked.

Veronica looked around. Everyone had gone back to their business. She’d gone from being the center of attention to invisible in about thirty seconds flat. She rather preferred the invisible thing. “Yeah. That would be good.”

“Great. I’ll take you home.” He put his hand on her elbow and started to guide her toward the door.

“You don’t have to. I’m sure you have better things to do.”

He smiled down at her and her knees went a little weak. “I can’t think of a single solitary one.”

*     *     *

Veronica smelled good. It was one of those girl things, but it wasn’t perfume. Maybe it was the shampoo or the body wash—a soapy, clean thing. Zach opened the door of the Crown Vic and lingered for a moment to get a sniff of her as Veronica got in.

She smiled up at him after she got in and he shut the door. She looked almost impossibly young and way too sweet for the way she’d grown up. Looks clearly were deceiving in her case; she wasn’t half as vulnerable as she appeared. But knowing that did nothing to stop the clench in his chest when he looked down into those wide eyes. He gave her a quick smile back and walked around to the driver’s side.

He slid into the seat and put the car in gear.

It really had gone as well as it could have. Zach hadn’t expected anything else. The press would behave themselves in a situation like this. If they jumped all over the grieving sister, they’d look like a bunch of punks. Which would not be entirely inaccurate. Still, it required a certain amount of give-and-take. That was the way it was a lot of the time with the police and the press. The press used the police for stories and the police used the press to get information out. That was on a good day.

On a bad day? Well, on a bad day, the press trampled on the rights of the victims, leaked information,
and muddied the waters of an investigation. It felt good to put one in the win column today.

“Do you think it’ll help?” she asked, looking ahead into the darkness.

“We won’t know for a little while, but I do think it could. It definitely can’t hurt. Sometimes you have to jog people’s memories a few times. It’s been a long time.” The other possibility, of course, was that no one had seen Max in the Sacramento area because he hadn’t come here after he ran away from the Sierra School. The possibility was definitely there and growing stronger.

“Someone other than my dad, right?” She turned to look at him.

He gave her a rueful grin. “I can’t promise that, Veronica. The evidence will take us wherever it takes us.”

“But right now, there’s nothing that points to my dad. Nothing specific. And this might drum up something that leads away from him.”

“Sure, it could.” Or it could lead right back to him. Zach would cross that bridge if he came to it.

Her need to protect her father wasn’t surprising to him. He’d dealt with too many beaten and abused kids whose first instinct was to protect the very people who’d harmed them. Which wasn’t to say it didn’t mystify him at times.

She settled back in her seat, adjusting her seat belt again. “Okay, then.”

*     *     *

She fished the keys out of her purse before he pulled into the visitors’ parking area at her condo complex. “Thanks.” She opened her door and started to get out as soon as the car came to a stop.

“Hold on a second.” He was around the car before she could get all the way out. “I’ll walk you to your door.”

“It’s Curtis Park. I’ll be fine.”

“Humor me.” He stood there, hands shoved in his pockets, shoulders hunched a little against the fall chill. “You just did a press conference that aired on all the local news stations. Crazies come out of the woodwork after those sometimes.”

“Isn’t that precisely what we’re counting on?” As if she didn’t know how to deal with it. Even sane people were crazy when you got them into an emergency bay. The actually crazy people went to Bat Shit One in a nanosecond.

He didn’t budge. “There are crazies and then there are crazies.”

That was true enough. Plus, he smelled good. She was almost as much of a sucker for that as she was for the dimple thing. She sighed. “Come on, then.”

She saw him scanning the landscaping on either side of the sidewalk as they walked from the parking lot to her condo. They were almost at her door when
she heard the screech of tires in the lot, then a thud, like a car going up over a curb.

She had already turned and was heading back to the lot when he grabbed her arm. “Me first.”

Like he was going to know what to do if someone had hit something and needed medical attention? Still, the remark about the wide variety of crazies stuck in her head, so she nodded. They’d gone less than a dozen steps when they heard the slam of a car door and a voice yell, “You stupid slut, what the hell did you think you were doing?”