Smith Investigation Series Box Set 1 (13 page)

Chapter 5

"So, what are we looking for?" I thought aloud, as I pushed open the door to Smith Investigations.

"I'm not sure. It has to do with the app, I guess. Robert territory."

In Operations, Robert was busy typing at his keyboard.

"Got anything?" I asked, settling my blazer on the back of my chair. He raised a finger to shut me up. "What?" I mouthed to DeMarco, who shrugged.

"What do we know so far?" He decided to steer the conversation onto a more useful path.

"Not much. I mean, we're still on square one. The boy left for school, attended classes, started back home and disappeared along the way."

"He never got to the basketball court, according to his friends."

"Right. So he must’ve been abducted somewhere between that and school. Any cameras?"

Robert shook his head, still engrossed in whatever he was doing. I hoped he was working on our copy of the BlackBerry.

"No cams, you mean?" I asked again. I was starting to lose patience.

After another minute of tense silence, he finally looked up.

"There were some the first couple of blocks from his school, but as he got closer to home, I couldn't find any footage of him. I mean, there were no cameras around."

"Right. So, nothing useful from there. Have you got anything from the phone?"

"I haven't started yet."

I raised my eyebrows, thinking that if I used my mouth to express my displeasure, it wouldn't have been a pretty thing to hear.

"I had something to finish for Spike. Starting on the phone now," he explained, unmoved.

DeMarco handed me a hot cup of coffee. Judging by the look on his face, he desperately wanted a peaceful work environment.

"Something's not right here," I heard Robert mumble.

"What is?" I was already at his side.

"These texts. Some of them are really, and I mean really, encrypted. Close to impossible to extract any sort of metadata from them."

"If he's done this before, it's to be expected. What's not right? You can't work on them?"

"It's not that. What's weird is that other messages have almost no encryption. Like he forgot to cover his tracks."

"Is there a pattern to this?" DeMarco asked.

I had other concerns in mind. "So, does this mean that you can track the bastard from these unsecured messages?"

"Very possibly, yes."

"Then, what are you waiting for, kid?"

"Right, yeah." He swiveled on his chair and began his magic. I glanced at DeMarco, who looked like he was thinking hard.

"What is it?"

"Nothing, really. I was just trying to imagine why a predator like this one would be so careless. I mean, by how detective Bellagio talked, I was pretty certain they had nothing on this guy. Which means he never made a mistake before."

"Maybe it's not him that's causing the change. Maybe it's Mickey," I threw out, without really thinking.

"Yes! You're right!"

I sipped my coffee calmly, waiting for DeMarco to reveal his conclusion. He was grinning like he had discovered the secret of eternal youth.

"Mickey wasn't allowed to have a phone or any Internet access, for that matter. So he stole his father's phone whenever he could, right?"

I nodded.

"So, maybe, he caught the guy unprepared. I mean, he insisted on talking to Mickey, even with all the technical difficulties. We have to assume the boy is something he really wanted."

"And he got cocky and greedy. He thought he won't get caught if he did a slack job covering his tracks a couple of times. Good for us, then."

"Perfect. When we find Mickey, I'm gonna shake his hand."

"Why? He was stupid enough to get in touch with this guy. If we find anything on the bastard, it won't be because of Mickey, but because the bastard got stupid and underestimated risks."

DeMarco's eyes widened in shock. I suspect it might've been something I had said.

"I got him!"

"Where?" I asked.

"All the unsecured texts come from right outside the city. I think I got an address."

"You think?" DeMarco sounded revolted. I, on the other hand, felt like Robert had his right to some leeway.

"Right. Text me the address, we're going back to the police station."

"No need," DeMarco said, waving his phone at me. "I got Bellagio's number from the front desk."

"Thank God!" I couldn't take another drive.

Chapter 6

"We got the confirmation," I said, hanging up. "The bastard's name is Lucas Mort."

"I'm on it," Robert mumbled in reply.

"Find everything you can on the son of a bitch," DeMarco added, his voice tight. Before I could say anything about the redundancy of his remark, Dylan burst through the door and ran to his desk.

In the awkward silence, he rummaged through the drawers, frowning.

"Yes!" he exclaimed, raising a hand with his find. It looked like a type of lens.

"Going unequipped to do the job, dude?" DeMarco joked.

Dylan grinned. "Oh, you have no idea."

"Got the guy, I presume?" I managed to say before he slipped out the door again. He gave me a thumbs up and shut the door.

I shook my head, slightly amused. At least, in all this madness, Robert looked deeply focused on work. All I had to do was to wait. Not my strongest suit, but I was willing to compromise.

"What are you doing?" I asked DeMarco, who was reading something on his computer.

"I've googled Lucas Mort. Did you know there are hundreds of them?"

"Hard to believe," I said, and sat on his desk. I needed something to do.

"I wish we were in a book," DeMarco sighed. “Then, we’d be able to find clues all over the place and would solve this case in a minute.”

"Book!" I exclaimed and hurried to my desk. I still had some plotting to do, concerning Fitzpatrick's fate.

It felt like the best cure for my soul, once I started writing. My apathy, my annoyance, all gone as the story ran before my eyes. I suspected I must've even giggled a couple of times, but took no notice of my colleagues' reaction.

"OK, so he never married. And he lives in his mother's house, that's why I had trouble finding him earlier."

I looked up at Robert. "You had trouble finding him?"

"Yeah, I just told you, a minute ago."

I chose to remain silent, feeling guilty for not listening earlier.

"Yeah, so, he lived by himself until his mother died, five years ago. And, I think, that's when the spree started. I mean, judging by what detective Bellagio has sent me."

"Sure. It figures, I guess," I encouraged him.

"Right. Now, there's not a lot of information on him, apart from the few government databases that you'd expect. He appears to be working as a taxi driver, he never went to college and never had any major medical intervention. There's nothing on his father and I only have his mother's death certificate."

"What else?"

Robert shrugged, to which DeMarco exhaled loudly. He had been sitting at the edge of his seat, listening to Robert's findings, and was now visibly disappointed. I didn't have time to comfort him, as my phone was ringing.

"James," I said for the benefit of my colleagues. It had been around an hour since we had given him our findings. I was impressed with how fast he had found something to report. "What's up?"

I listened for a few seconds, both grateful and uncomfortable with the silence in Operations. Then, he told me the worst news.

"What do you mean, the boy wasn't there?" I was already standing. "It's the perfect location for him, isolated. Mickey must be there!"

He tried to calm me down but I wasn't agitated. I was angry and was looking for someone to blame and scold.

"Talk to him, then! Squeeze the fu—"

DeMarco interrupted my rant by dangling the car keys in my face. I grabbed them and ran out, with him at my heels.

"I'm coming there. I'll show you how to get everything out of him," I said and hung up. In the parking lot, I didn't wait to check if DeMarco had gotten in the car. I turned on the engine and drove off, wheels screeching on the ground.

"You almost killed me!" DeMarco cried out. "I wasn't in the car, yet."

"Tough," I said and steered out of the parking garage. "This bastard. Where is he keeping Mickey?"

"Maybe he has another property. Robert is already looking into that. Slow down!"

"Wait until I see his face. I'll show him then!"

"Seriously, slow down! We're not the police, we don't have sirens or priority—or immortality for that matter."

"Oh, grow up! We're not gonna die. I'm not missing on talking to that son of a bitch, taxi-driving pedophile . . ." I stopped for a second. The wheels in my head were spinning. There was something for my mind to figure, but I wasn't quite there.

"What?"

"There's . . . Tell me what I just said."

"What, you don't remember? It was only seconds ago . . ."

"Would you stop being a smartass and just do it?" I snapped.

"Fine. Let me see . . . I was saying that you're gonna kill us both and then you said that I should grow up, as if only children die in car crashes! Then you told me, basically, how you're only interested in having your way with this bastard, regardless of how many lives perish in the process . . ."

"Leave the director commentary for another time. Just repeat, like a parrot, what I said. I need to hear the words."

"Gee. You called him a son of a bitch, understandable, and a taxi-driving pedophile, which was pretty funny, 'cause . . ."

"That's it! Call James!"

He dialed quietly, most likely seeing that I was in no mood to joke or explain myself.

"Detective Bellagio," James' voice sounded in the car.

"Hi. It's me, Rob."

"Oh, Rob. Look, my guys are searching his house as fast as they can. I have nothing else to say to you at the . . ."

"Where is Mort's taxi?"

"His what?"

"He works as a taxi driver, right?"

"Right. I see where you're going. Mathews!"

He instructed someone to look into Mort's company car and I couldn't help but feel proud of how fast he was catching on. I could've even hugged him.

"Taxis have GPS tracking, don't they?" I continued. "We could see where he's been. Maybe a route will stand out, and we can check it."

"Found it!" I heard someone on James' end.

"What is it?" I asked, frustrated with the fact that I couldn't drive faster.

"My guy found the taxi. It's not at the firm, but somewhere outside the city."

"I'm going there."

"The address is already on your phone," he said and I could've kissed him.

"You need to make a U-turn," DeMarco instructed after checking the address.

Traffic was our friend now. I managed to get us through half of the city in less than twenty minutes, which lifted my spirits considerably.

When we got there, police were already cordoning off the vacant lot. The taxi had been left among the various discarded household electronics, the trunk open.

James motioned me into the perimeter, his expression grim. I had the feeling something was terribly wrong, but my mind seemed to refuse to think of the most obvious conclusion.

"We found the boy," he said in a low voice. It was a strange time to notice the pleasant raspiness in it.

I instinctively walked to the trunk and took a look inside. James was at my side, ready to comfort me, but I felt nothing. I turned to DeMarco, who was approaching us.

"Well?" he asked, hopeful.

"He's dead," I said and shrugged at his shocked expression. This outcome had been a possibility ever since Mickey had disappeared; why fuss about it? This was how my mind felt, in its numbness.

DeMarco said something but I was already on my way to our car.

"Come on, our job is done," I said. "This is police business now."

DeMarco shot me an angry look. I suddenly had no energy to deal with him, so I just got into the car and started the engine. The drive back to headquarters was quiet, the tension thick enough to cut with a knife.

Chapter 7

The last rays of sunlight coming in the window painted the room orange. No one had switched the lights on, and I was having trouble writing my report.

Operations was completely quiet. You couldn't even hear us breathe. It made me feel even more apathetic, the silence eerie around me.

The door opened and Dylan walked in. The team watched him walk in silence to Spike's desk and place the envelope marked “Surveillance” in front of her. Their case had been successfully closed.

No one made a sound.

I signed and dated my report, then stood up.
I should've taken my things,
I thought, as I walked out.

I couldn't remember the drive home, but it had gotten strangely dark by the time I arrived at my door.

Leaving the lights off, I dropped on my couch and tried to settle my mind. My thoughts were racing fast, making it difficult for me to understand them, but, at the same time, they were oppressively quiet.

I kept asking myself what had happened there, at the site. I had felt nothing. I was still unable to frame the macabre discovery as anything other than something that happens from time to time in our line of work.

"Have I been doing this job for too long?" I asked myself aloud. It was a child, for goodness' sake.

Before my eyes, I replayed Loreen Gerald's cry. "Find my baby." The hand she had squeezed in desperation felt as if it were burning, now.

"It was just a baby," I whispered, and tears started rolling down my cheeks. A baby, dead, stuffed into the trunk of a car, left like garbage in a vacant lot.

Soon, my thoughts mingled again, and I was shaken by convulsive crying. I didn't know why I was in pain or what I had lost, but it hurt like hell.

My humanity. This job had been eroding my humanity, case after case, and the things I had seen permanently marked on my retinas, to keep me company every time I closed my eyes.

And my mind had decided to guard me against these nightmares. To do this, to offer me comfort for survival, it’d had to shut off whatever made me human. It muted natural feelings so I could go on and solve cases for other people's sakes.

"I can't do this job anymore," I decided aloud. It sounded foreign on my lips but I knew I just had to find a way to discover myself, and everything else that made me who I was. It couldn't be that I was just Robin Walsh, Private Investigator.

Instinctively, I reached for my old laptop. Right on the home screen, there was a shortcut to my first book.
Manuscript, I.

"I'm also Rob Walsh, writer," I said, and opened my word processor.

Slowly, I typed at the top of the page:

Manuscript, II