In Broad Daylight (11 page)

had shadowed his every move. The machine was recording. Calibrating.

Dax indicated that Simon tilt the receiver so he could hear the conversation firsthand.

Simon glared, but complied. He held the mouthpiece firmly with both hands.

"Hello?"

"Quite a lot of excitement you have going on there, Simon. I can see it all right here on

my TV. You're the breaking story on all the channels." The disembodied voice on the other

end chuckled. Broadcast, the tinny sound rattled in the room. "A regular media circus. But

then, you Hollywood types welcome that kind of thing, don't you? The press, the attention,

it's what you live for."

"Where's my daughter, you worthless lowlife?" Simon demanded.

"All in good time, Simon, all in good time. I must say, I liked your housekeeper better. She kept her temper." There was a significant pause, as if the person on the other end was

debating continuing with the conversation. "Is she around?"

Simon drew himself up to his full six foot stature. He gave the impression of being taller

because he was so thin. "You'll talk to me."

"No," the voice contradicted, "I'll talk to her. Or I won't talk at all. Learn to bend, Simon, learn to bend." The pseudo-friendly tone faded. "Now do I talk to her, or not?"

Dax waved Brenda over, indicating to Simon that he should give her the receiver. Brenda

caught herself thinking that if anyone's look could turn a person to stone, Simon's glare

would have been the one. Finally, he shoved the receiver into her hands.

She was quick to make her presence known. "Hello?"

There was an audible sigh on the end. "Better, much better. I don't like anger," the

kidnapper informed her. "It makes me dig in my heels. And that won't be good for anyone,

would it?"

"No." Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the technician by the table indicating that she should stretch the conversation out and keep the kidnapper on the line for as long as

possible.

As if in tune to what was going on, the kidnapper picked that moment to say to her, "Oh,

and tell them not to waste their time trying to trace this. They're not dealing with a

novice. The signal's all over the map and besides, this is a public phone. Even if they did

have the mental capability of finding their faces while staring into the mirror, by the time

they locate this, I'll be far away from here."

"I'll tell them." Looking toward the technician, she shook her head. The man continued

trying to pinpoint the trace. "Where's the photograph?"

"Direct. I like that in a woman." The metallic chuckle scraped against her soul. It took effort not to shiver. "You'll find the photograph in the ladies room of Hamburger Heaven.

It's taped to the inside of the lid of the tank."

It was one of the most popular fast food chains around. She knew of at least half a dozen

in the city and knew there had to be more. "Wait a minute, which Hamburger Heaven?"

"Mayflower andAzusa. I'll be in touch." The line went dead.

She surrendered the receiver to Dax. The latter looked at the technician. "Anything?"

The man took off his headphones and tossed them on the table. "He bounced the signal all

over the country. We were closing in, but—" He shook his head.

"He's shaking his head. What does that mean?" Simon wanted to know. "What's next?"

The technician popped the audio tape out of the machine and handed it to Dax, who

turned around and gave it to Nathan. "Detective Brown takes the tape into the lab for

analysis and I go to retrieve the photograph." He was already crossing to the room's

threshold.

Brenda stepped in front of him. "Let me come with you." Before he could refuse, she said quickly, "If the kidnapper's watching the restaurant, he might expect the housekeeper to

be the one to come for the photograph. She and I resemble each other a little." It was a

long shot and she knew it, but there was this overwhelming need inside her to make herself

useful.

Dax hesitated. He could always use a policewoman, but that would require having the

woman get a change of clothes and time was at a premium. The faster they moved, the

more likely they were to recover the little girl alive. Of late, they'd been lucky with their

recovery record when it came to kidnapped children and he wanted to keep it that way. He

could almost feel the seconds ticking away.

"All right," he agreed. From across the room, he could see the quizzical look Nathan was giving him. "She has a point."

Nathan spread his hands, as if he wasn't about to say anything to contradict him.

Leaving his wife's side, Simon was on his heels. "What am I supposed to do?"

Dax turned at the front door. "Sit tight and wait for the call. He might decide to call

while we're out getting the photograph. I think this guy enjoys pulling strings and watching

people jump." It seemed as apt a description of the function of a director as any. A

thought occurred to him. "He seemed especially pleased at turning the screws to you.

Anyone in particular have it in for you?"

Behind them, in the living room, Rebecca rose from the sofa. Taking a step toward them,

she dried her eyes. "How much time do you have?"

He hated making promises he couldn't keep, but he knew that parents of kidnapped

children needed something to hold on to. "Successful recoveries varying—"

Rebecca shook her head, her auburn hair shifting from side to side like a luxurious shawl.

"No, I meant for Simon to give you a list of people who have it in for him. My husband's

very powerful in this town, that means he has a lot of enemies."

Terrific, Dax thought. Nonetheless, he made a mental note to show the director the

sketches Brenda had made of the two people. Maybe they'd get lucky and the man'd

recognize one of them.

"He'd have less enemies if he wasn't such a jerk," Dax said to Brenda several minutes

later as they left in his car. Nathan was already on his way back to the precinct with the

audio tape. With a great deal of luck, the lab could clean it up sufficiently to yield some

kind of background noise that they could use to pinpoint the kidnapper's location.

Excitement was vying with her baby for space in her stomach. God, she hoped she

wouldn't get sick. "Less what?"

Dax rolled the windows up to cut down on the noise in the form of questions being hurled

at them as they drove by the reporters and their camera crews. "Enemies."

"I think a man like that counts the number of enemies he has as a testimonial to his

power. The more he has, the bigger he is." She shook her head as they cleared the estate.

"I never understood that kind of thing, being proud of who hated your guts."

Dax laughed. "Some people thrive on that. Me, I'm with you."

I'm with you.She knew it was silly, but she liked the sound of that, even though in reality,

it meant nothing. He wasn't "with" her in any true sense of the word; it was just a figure of speech. But for a fleeting moment, she pretended that they were a unit. And she

supposed in a way, for the duration of this case, they were. For as long as he allowed it.

"I think the kidnapper I talked to was definitely a man," she confirmed.

He turned toward her as they came to a red light. "What makes you so sure?"

"He said something about liking direct women. It's the kind of flippant line a guy might

say."

The light turned green. Dax shifted his foot back onto the gas. "Is that the kind of line

guys gave you?"

"Guys didn't give me lines." She saw him raise a quizzical eyebrow. "I never really hit the dating circuit." Her father had kept a tight rein on her all through school, demanding she

be there to make his meals and take care of the house. "I was married at a young age.

Right out of high school."

That would have made her, what? Eighteen? Much too young in his opinion. She'd hardly

been more than a baby. "You must have really been in love to get married that young."

It would have been easier to say yes and leave it at that, but she hated lies, even little

white ones. They'd been the kind she'd lived with for most of her marriage. Pretending to

be in love when she wasn't. There was a huge difference between loving and being in love.

"No," she corrected, "What I really wanted was to leave home." And Wade had been her ticket. "Wade was a marine, that meant travel. Or so I thought." Things never quite turned out the way they were planned. "As it was, I never left the state. But Wade did. He was

sent overseas on four tours of duty, always to places where bringing a wife along wasn't

feasible." That was why there were times when she'd hardly felt as if she really was

married. She did a lot of growing up in those seven years.

Squeaking through a yellow light, he glanced at her. "So what did you do while your

husband was over there?"

"Went to school, broadened my mind." Her mouth curved. "Played house." That's what it felt like because there was hardly ever a husband to sit opposite her at the table. "Got

used to living on my own for the most part." She looked at his profile. It seemed so

chiseled, so forceful. In a way, he looked like more of a marine than Wade had. "Found out

to my surprise that I could."

"I think you could probably do anything you set your mind to."

A compliment. Lord, when had she last heard one? Wade wasn't given to wasting words

and before that, there'd been no one to say anything kind to her at all. "I could have used

you years ago, when I didn't believe that."

He picked up on what wasn't being said. "But now you do?"

"For the most part." Except in those wee hours of the night or morning, when everything was covered in darkness and it seeped into her soul, making her doubt herself. Making her

afraid.

Turning into a strip mall, he brought the car to a stop in the small lot that looked out on

three fast-food restaurants. Hamburger Heaven shared a sidewalk with Chinese-Food-To-

Go and Hot Tamale. "We're here."

He held the door for her as she walked into Hamburger Heaven. The fast-food restaurant

was thinly populated this time of the morning. The quick breakfast crowd was all but gone

and it would be several hours before the early lunch crowd arrived.

There was only one person behind the counter. She looked from Brenda to Dax, an eager

smile on her young, unlined face. Her fingers hovered over the digital register. "How can I

help you?"

"Where's your ladies' room?" Dax asked.

Leaning over the register, the young girl pointed to the far side of the counter on her

left. "Just follow that to the end. Rest rooms are right there," she informed them

brightly.

Brenda was already hurrying down the narrow hall, leaving Dax in her wake.

"Damn it, wait up, Brenda! I'm the cop here, not you."

She pretended not to hear him. Her heart was racing. Dax was half a step behind by the

time she reached the ladies' room.

"Police," he called out in case there was someone using the facilities. But there was no response. No one was inside.

He took the lead. The moment they walked inside, the smell of liberally applied

disinfectant assaulted his nose. The cleaning woman had obviously just been here.

Three stalls lined the back wall. The center one had an Out Of Order sign on it. When he

pressed his palm against the door, it wouldn't give. It had been locked from the inside.

Playing the odds, he went to the first stall. The door swung open and he lost no time in

picking up the lid. Nothing. Brenda crowded in behind him. He heard her sigh of

disappointment.

The third stall yielded the same results. Either the kidnapper was playing them, or the

photograph was in the middle stall.

Dax tried the door again. It didn't budge.

"I can crawl under it," Brenda volunteered.

But he waved her behind him. "Stay back." Bracing himself, he lunged at the door, applying his shoulder to it. The door flew open as pain shot through his body. He paid no attention

to it.

Brenda pushed passed him. Holding her breath, she gingerly lifted the lid from the tank

and turned it over. She wasn't sure what she was going to do if there was nothing there.

But there was.

"Oh, thank God."

There was an instant photograph of Annie taped to the underside of the lid. It was

wrapped in a plastic bag. Dax lost no time in removing it.

Standing on her toes, Brenda looked around Dax's shoulder at the photograph. Annie was

sitting on a bed in a bedroom that looked like a thousand other bedrooms. Brenda could

feel her heart tightening in her chest.Poor baby."She looks scared."

He thought of the photographs Brenda had shown him of the girl in her album. "But none

the worse for her ordeal." The little girl was holding up this morning's newspaper. That

meant that as of this morning, she was still alive. Something caught his eye. He looked

closer. "I didn't realize she wore glasses."

"She just recently got them," Brenda told him. She remembered how insecure Annie had

been, afraid that the other children would call her cruel names. Brenda had sat with her,

mentioning other people who wore glasses as children, people who had gone on to make an

impression in history. "She's nearsighted." Her eyes narrowed. "Wait, isn't that something reflected in her glasses?"

It was what had caught his attention. "Looks like it, but it's hardly more than a speck."

Excitement began to build inside of her again. They had something, she could work with.