No Brainer ( The Darcy Walker Series #2) (7 page)

Don’t be scared? I currently did the doggie paddle down the ditch of desperation. “I-I—”

I couldn’t form words.

“What does my girl need?”

A brain transplant. Leaning across the aisle, he gently rubbed his thumb back and forth over the top of my extended hand. Dylan could help you find your stride, and he’d called me “his girl” since eighth grade. As much as I hated to admit it, I wanted to crawl onto his lap and have him promise me I could pull off the impossible … before I died a liar.

Toward the end of the flight, the blood born Taylors went to the rear of the plane for their version of the Olympic Games. Grandma Alexandra would speak in her native tongue, and the grandchildren attempted to interpret, Colton being the judge. Since it was “all Greek to me,” Lincoln and I settled up front.

“What are you reading, Darcy?” he murmured. I’d pored over the copy of the Cisco Medina story for the past thirty minutes. Honestly, I’m surprised it took him so long to ask. But all I could think was I’d jumped out of the frying pan into the proverbial fire. Troy was probably giddy with what he expected to be front-page news when I remained thousands of feet in the air … a big, fat lying idiot.

Nudging the paper over, I painted on my concerned citizen face. “The article said he simply vanished. Who do you think did it?”

Pulling reading glasses from his pocket-T, he slid them on his nose then took his finger and speed-read down the page. Lincoln looked scary to the average person. His holster may say he carried a gun, but the bulge of his hands said he’d rather shove an M80 up your fill-in-the-blank.

“Most abduction cases are the other parent,” he murmured, “but the article said they were cleared.”
Not according to Troy
, I thought. Troy acted like momma might know something she wanted to remain underground. “That leaves psychopaths and predators. It’s not a pretty picture.”

Recalling that no ransom had ever been paid, I agreed the outlook for this little boy appeared grim. If, in fact, he was living, it wasn’t for money that the abductor could collect. A plea would’ve already been made, and one would think reported on. I twirled a tendril of my hair as I digested what little information I did have, and that was Lola Medina.

“Where would
you
look?” I asked.

“The places I’m sure they already have. When you exhaust yourself on the ground, if it were me, I’d keep plugging away on what didn’t feel right. Why the curiosity?”

Honestly? I didn’t know. Call me a concerned citizen; call me an older sibling of a six-year-old nudist. Either way, my laundry list of reasons boiled down to one thing: boredom. Boredom and my hound dog nose sniffed ridiculously along the trail. Did I have the skills to get this done? That remained to be seen. Sure, I’d solved who killed three people in Valley, but the difference there was my personal involvement. With this, I wasn’t even remotely involved. Heck, I wasn’t even in the same hometown.

But I would be.

“I guess my heart breaks for little kids,” I explained. “If you were coming in blind, where would you start?”

He shaved a hand down over his day-old beard, deep in thought. “I’d start with the people that knew your routine … your neighbors. I’d ask whom he liked to play with, what he liked to play, what he always had in his possession, if he had any enemies. The person that nabbed him might’ve been someone that had their eye on him for a while or simply might’ve been an opportunist. I’d retrace his steps.”

I briefly wondered why someone would hurt a child. Why do some allow their humanity to drain away? In a perfect world, you were supposed to protect children, clear the obstacles, give them the chances you never had; tell them they could do anything—
be
anything—even if odds and talent were stacked against them.

But it wasn’t a perfect world … that BS slapping me in the face every day.

5. PONKEYS

W
HEN YOU’RE HYPER, YOU HAVE
a tendency to feel caged in. This happened to be one of those times, and being in a jet right before landing didn’t help matters. Most people feared the lift-off … not me. The landing left me scared-stiff and blowing chunks. What if you never got to your final destination? Talk about disappointing. You went on vacation to have fun; at least, you hoped the dang plane crashed on the way back.

I forced myself to relax, breathe deep, and search for something to occupy my mind.

Lincoln had pushed out of his seat to visit the restroom, leaving four black-and-white surveillance photographs sprawled out on the table between us. First off, you should never leave anything lying around that you didn’t want me to look at. Secondly, my guess was they were crooks so looking at them seemed like a social service on my part. Plus, I remembered the cryptic text message I’d read earlier:

Midnight
tonight. He either talks or he’s dead.

A touch on the theatrical, but hey, that’s what I lived for.

I couldn’t help but ponder what choice the “he” had made. Did his tongue take the hint, or would he meet some untimely demise? In Lincoln’s world, that wouldn’t necessarily mean a bullet. There’s a good chance it could range from a car bomb to an axe to the head. Thing was, Lincoln and his partner must be referring to a specific threat against this man that both of them knew about. Furthermore, did that text even relate to the video I’d viewed? It
did
follow the same conversation thread, but it remained possible it represented a totally different case.

Stealing a quick glance around the cabin, everyone had strapped themselves in for landing. Dylan chatted with his mother, Sydney cuddled next to her father, and Zander informed Alexandra why hooters should be a food group.

Status quo, coast was clear, in my book.

Looking without touching tortured my eye sockets. My fingers got all jumpy, but right when I lifted the top photograph to my eyes, Lincoln’s BlackBerry practically jumped out of the seat he’d left it in. That was an FAA no-no, so I grabbed it and thumbed down the volume before anyone could complain.

Pulling it to my eyes, another LA prefixed message lit up the screen:

Making all kinds of weird demands. Told him to kiss my ass.

I was no stranger to the donkey word. My aunt used it at least ten times an hour. It didn’t take a genius to deduce this might be the same man that if he didn’t talk, death was imminent, either. And in my humble opinion, he just might be a donkey if he didn’t take the original deal.

I shrugged away his stupidity, leaving Lincoln’s phone where I’d found it, but then it vibrated with another message. I snatched it up again, covering the noise with both hands. Clicking the screen, I nearly bit my tongue in two when I scanned the words:

Opened a locker at the subway on a tip and found someone’s foot. It was as swollen as a pregnant pig. Sick crap, so I know it was him. Gotta love this job.

I had a horrible habit of biting my nails when nervous. I’d bitten down to three nubs on my right hand, my thumb and forefinger the only two remaining looking normal. How should I respond? Throw up? Pray? Beg for a picture? I erased the history of my earlier texts, in case Lincoln felt the urge to purge his inbox. If he found out I’d assumed his identity, God only knew the ramifications. The video, however, was evidence. It seemed too important to delete.

When I focused back on the photograph, Lincoln miraculously appeared out of nowhere like one of those biblical miracles that come just in the knick of time.

’Nuff said … God and I really needed some face-time.

Lincoln’s voice grumbled, “You know, in the Middle East they’d cut your hand off for what you’re doing.”

A thwack and a thud pierced the air, then I figured out it was my conscience banging around in my brain. “Would you believe that photograph jumped into my open hand? I told it not to, but what can I say,” I giggled, “it just … would not … listen.”

Normally, Lincoln would be proprietary, but he collapsed into his seat, kneading and massaging his temples. All of a sudden I had to know firsthand
what
—or should I say
whom
—caused the tension.

“Who’s the weird little guy?”

Lincoln slid his black reading glasses on his forehead, shoving the remaining three photographs over for my appraisal. “Turkey Cardoza. These photographs were taken about six months ago when we started our investigation.”

Turkey Cardoza looked like a skunk. A mixed Caucasian, he had coal-black hair and a rattail on his barbershop cut bleached as white as a new fallen snow. His nose had a triangle point, his eyes were beady little peas, and his body resembled an Oompa-Loompa. Turkey also carried hips—something I didn’t know men were capable of. Couple that with an Italian suit and you were looking at someone trying to be someone that biology didn’t intend. Maybe that’s what most criminals did … try to hide what lurked on the inside to make their crimes less believable.

“Turkey?” I laughed.

“As in Wild Turkey,” he frowned. “Evidently, he can drink an entire bottle and never lose an ounce of sobriety. Trust me, he needs to be sober judging by the people he’s in business with.”

“He’s bad?”

“I’d rather play with a venomous snake.”

Question answered. Lincoln took a long swig of coffee then noshed on the last blueberry danish onboard.

“Career criminal?” I asked.

“Mob,” he specified, “and that type are morally ambivalent. You name it, he’s done it. Plus, he’s got a smart mouth the size of the craters on the moon. ”

Cue
The Godfather
theme song.

“Why is he so hard to catch? He sounds like your textbook ponkey, and people like that should make anyone’s radar beep.”

“Ponkey,” he repeated.

“You know, when the punk in you makes a donkey out of you’re a-s-s. Marry them together and you have a ponkey.”

Lincoln burst out laughing. “Dear, I don’t know whether to be impressed with your creativity or tell you to gargle with some Listerine.”

“I’d prefer it if you were impressed.”

He wiped his mouth, appearing pensive and perplexed at the same time. “Fingering him isn’t the problem,” he muttered. “Getting things to stick
is
. I have people feeding me information, but when we bring him in for questioning, he’s always got an airtight alibi even though we have footage of him in the area.” He massaged the space between his eyes, adding a frustrated groan. “I know the answer’s in my head. I’m just having trouble piecing it together. Sometimes I think I’m too dumb for this kind of work.”

Surely, that was said in jest. Lincoln’s brain ran like the Autobahn—fast, unimpeded, and smooth. My brain moved like the off-road—full of ruts, gutters, and expletives you didn’t know you were capable of.

“And you believe your sources?”

You couldn’t miss the conviction on his face, while a hard line painted down his jaw. “Wholeheartedly. One gal especially would never steer me wrong.”

“Why don’t you just bring
her
in?”

Another drink of coffee. “I’ve offered, but she’s not the type to be cloistered away somewhere. So we’re being extremely careful in our dealings. If she were ever found out, that would be signing her death warrant, but she’s slick. Frankly, she’s the first person I’ve never been able to outsmart.”

I wondered who could be so close to Turkey to know firsthand of his dealings? “Do you think she’s a friend, enemy, mistress, neighbor?” I rattled off.

He lifted both shoulders in a slow shrug. “I don’t have a clear feel of
who
she is. I can’t pin down an age, only that my gut says she’s good. So she tells me things and that foists the problem off onto me, but hey, that’s my job.” Lincoln inhaled, then exhaled deeper, loosening up to laugh. “Can I tell you how much I’ve grown to hate secrets? But in this line of business,” he said, pausing to put his index finger to his lips, “mum’s the word.”

I mimicked the gesture, promising, “I won’t say anything.”

He gave half a smile. “I’ve known you since you were six years old, Darcy. You like to talk, but you’re not a snitch.”

Let’s just say I’d had a lot of experience with keeping secrets. Life sometimes mandated them, and I wallowed around in the damning truth of it. But that’s not to say I didn’t
love, love, love
a juicy story. My gossiping, however, stayed primarily between Dylan, me, and the Mrs. Butterworth’s syrup bottle. The three of us had ironclad confidentiality.

Lincoln shoved the last bite into his mouth, and when he turned to laugh at something said in the back of the plane, I grabbed the ink pen and drew a circle with a beak and a red wattle on my left palm. He turned around munching, “The thing with Turkey, he’s persnickety.”

“Excessively over particular,” I defined.

His dimples imploded. “Exactly, kiddo, and that’s why he’s been hard to catch. He’s always changing things up in every aspect of his life. Look at this photograph.” He pulled the bottom photograph from the stack. It pictured Turkey, a trophy wife under his arm, and two other men in a restaurant corner booth.