“Glen, I’ve been waiting at Rachel’s apartment for over an hour. She hasn’t come home yet. I called her but the calls go straight to voicemail. Glen, I don’t like this. Something’s wrong. I know something happened to her. We have to find her.”
“Mack… Rick and I are on our way. Stay put. We’ll be there in five minutes.” Glen said before hanging up.
Mack stood there holding the takeout bag of food her brought for his and Rachel’s dinner and he also held the white rose. He always gave Rachel a white rose on every date. He knew the rose made her feel special and he loved that it was their thing. He said a silent prayer that she was unhurt and returned to him soon.
Glen was true to his word. He and Rick pulled into the apartment complex parking lot in under five minutes.
“Thank God. Nothing can happen to Rachel. I’ll destroy anyone who hurts her, Glen.” Mack said, brushing his hair off his forehead nervously.
“Calm down Mack. We’ll find her. You can’t go off half cocked. Now, on the way over here Rick called the hospital security and they found Rachel’s car in the parking garage and outside the driver’s door, on the ground was her purse and keys. He phone was still in her purse. Lucky for us the garage has security cameras. Rick and I are on our way there to have a look at the camera footage. We’ll let you know what we find.” Glen said.
“No way am I going to sit back and do nothing. I’m coming with you.” Mack told Glen.
Rick spoke up finally, “Mack, we’ve been in this position before and we know what’s going through your mind, but we are cops. Let us do our job. We will get Rachel back. You need to go back to your apartment and wait. Who ever took Rachel, and we do now feel she was taken, might contact you. We need them to do that. We need to know why she was singled out and that will help with the ‘who.”
Reluctantly, Mack agreed. He wasn’t happy about it, but he also was smart enough to realize it was the only thing he could do at the moment.
“Please let me know when you find out anything. And I mean anything.” He said as he slowly walked to his car and drove off.
“Damn, I remember how I felt when Lynn went missing and how helpless I felt and the not knowing if she was alive or dead. I can’t blame Mack for wanted to destroy whoever is behind this. We both know that feeling, Glen.”
“True, we know it all too well. But Mack is a doctor, not a cop with a gun. It’s too dangerous for him to join us. I don’t want to find Rachel, only to lose Mack in the process.”
“Agreed, let’s get to the hospital and see if we can find anything on those tapes.”
One of the security guards met them inside the double doors to the hospital. After introductions and Glen and Rick showing identifications, the guard led them to the monitoring room.
“I’ve looked over the tapes and we got lucky. See for yourself,” the guard said.
Glenn and Rick watched as Rachel approached her car smiling and keys in hand. In a flash two men stood there, one grabbed her while the other one put something over her face and within seconds, they saw Rachel go limp. Then one man carried her under the arms, while the other carried her legs and they shoved her in the back of a black SUV and covered her with what looked like a black blanket. As they backed out of the parking space next to Rachel’s, the tape showed their license plates.
Glen immediately called in an all points bulletin on the vehicle. Rick made a call to the station to find out the owner of the vehicle.
“Glen, the vehicle belongs to a man by the name of Sergio Gillamo of Denver. Who, Denver Police Dept. suspects of heading the Italian mop racket in Denver. His known associates are Ray Bugiardini and Leone Contadino, to name a couple. Ray and Leone are known to be Sergio’s muscle.” Rick said.
“I was afraid of this. Guess we found the connection to Mack’s cousin. Denver called earlier after they identified a couple of partial prints in Thomas Sterling’s apartment belonging to Leone Contadino.”Glen said.
Glen’s phone rang and he stepped a short distance away as he answered the call. He wasn’t on the phone long, before he hung up and said, “We have a lead. We have to go.” He shook the guards hand and thanked him for his help and then he walked briskly out of the hospital. Time was important. They needed to find Rachel. The thought of her out there, wherever she was, overnight, terrified Glen.
“What’s up? What lead did we get?” Rick asked.
Old Man Webber reported seeing a black SUV off Route 7 at the back of his property. Said he noticed it twice today. We need to talk to Old Man Webber before Rachel runs out of time.”