Chapter 9

 

I stomped into my office the minute the newscast ended and dialed Ben Ortiz’s number. His secretary said he was busy but once I gave my name in a none-too-friendly tone, she managed to put me through.

“What was the purpose of that stupid press conference if we get this kind of coverage from it?” I demanded the moment I heard his voice.

“Charlie, settle down. I don’t have to talk strategy with you. Ron is my client.”

I shouted across the hall for Ron to pick up the phone.

“Charlie, just settle down,” Ortiz said, his voice impossibly calm. “These things always happen. Media people are notorious for sensationalizing everything. They need a story and they need it to be as tantalizing and salacious as possible. We can’t stop that. They would do it whether we appeared at a news conference or not. The important thing is that we’ve got Victoria’s face up there on every TV screen in the state. With luck, the national networks will pick it up.”

Luck? My stomach did a flip at the thought of this pack of lies being spread across the whole country.

“We’re getting Victoria recognized everywhere. That’s the main thing. Her abductors won’t be able to keep her hidden. Someone, somewhere will see her. If she’s hurt or doesn’t remember what happened, at least somebody out there can get her back to us.”

“Charlie, he’s right,” came Ron’s voice on the line. “Once Vic is back and we’re together, the wedding will go forward and this whole story will do a one-eighty. We’ll be America’s luckiest couple because we found each other again.”

Since that was far more optimism than I’d heard from my brother in a lot of hours, I let the statement stand right there. Maybe he was right. We let the attorney go—no doubt that phone call had just cost another few hundred dollars.

Ron appeared in my doorway. “We’d better eat something. I’m exhausted and I can hear the frazzle in your voice.”

“I don’t want to go out. That broadcast is still too fresh, and I’m afraid I’ll say something Mr. Lawyer won’t approve of.”

No argument from Ron. I dialed Drake’s cell; he would have finished the airport run a long time ago and I was a little surprised I hadn’t already heard from him.

“Hey, hon.” He sounded a little breathless. “Sorry I didn’t call earlier.”

“Everything okay?” I pictured a last-minute airline screw-up that sent Paul’s whole family back to our house for a longer visit.

“It’s great, actually. I just got a call from Fish and Game and they got approval for an elk count up north. They want to start at daybreak tomorrow, so I’m packing. I need to pull pitch by three o’clock.”

“Do you need me to come along?” Please not, please not. Ron needs me plus there is already snow in the high country and I’d been in on enough game counts already, thank you. Staring at the ground while the helicopter circles the herd, trying to count animals that look like black dots on the ground … well, the tummy tends to go all queasy.

“Nope, I’m good. I’m just throwing my winter gear into a bag. I’ll head out to the airport in a few, preflight the ship … I’ll call you right before I take off. Where are you guys anyway?”

I gave him the short version of the morning’s events and the fact that we were basically hiding out at the office.

“Probably wise,” he said. “The news vans were gone awhile but now they’re back in front of the house.”

“Great. We’ll probably hang out here until dark. Maybe they’ll give up on us. Look, can you bring Freckles by the office on your way out?”

Bless him, my hubby is the best. He agreed without even taking an extra breath.

“I got the gist of it,” Ron said from the doorway. “I’ve already called Sal’s and ordered a pizza. They said forty minutes.”

I glanced at my watch, noted the pizza ETA, and turned on my computer. I might as well get something useful done since I was stuck. My attempts at accounting entries held my attention for less time than it took for the pizza guy to drive up. I answered the door and took the box, which gave off waves of pepperoni and mushroom.

Ron met me in the kitchen. Drake drove into our back parking area just as I was rummaging in a cupboard for extra napkins, and Freckles bounded out of the Jeep.

“Glad you suggested this,” he said, snagging a slice from the box. “I needed to trade vehicles with you anyway. Forgot some of my tools are still in my truck.”

Freckles kept her huge brown eyes on each move of his pizza slice—up and down as he raised it to his mouth. It dawned on me how movie directors can get a dog to nod yes to a question. Her focus was total.

Ten minutes later, I sent Drake on his way with a kiss and a promise to track his flight once he let me know that he’d taken off. When I walked back from the truck Ron’s expression was glum.

“Sorry. I wish I knew what to do.” It had to be excruciating for him to watch Drake and me, happy and safe together.

He shrugged and balled up his third paper napkin.

“Want to talk about it? Maybe we can make a plan.”

“If this was happening to anyone else, a missing loved one, I’d tell them to do everything we’ve already done. Get flyers out, get media coverage if possible … I just never knew how it would feel from the inside.”

“What else can we do?” I finally got my second bite of pizza.

“If I had access to her files, I’d start looking for names, calling people she’d recently contacted. See if anyone could tell us something we don’t already know.”

“She told me she’d scheduled most of her decorating jobs around the wedding and the trip. I don’t recall her saying there was anyone she needed to tend to until after the holidays.”

His eyebrows knotted in a way I know so well, his thinking mode. “She has a couple of shipments coming in, some tile for a bathroom remodel and drapes or something for somebody else. But she had talked to Sally about accepting the packages here at the office, stashing everything in one corner of the conference room until we got back from our trip. The customers were not expecting to hear from her. Both had agreed to holding their completion dates until after the first.”

I pushed the food aside and closed the box. “None of that sounds even remotely connected.”

“I agree.”

“So, it seems that we’re left with two possibilities. She was taken forcibly …”

“We would have received a ransom demand by now,” he argued.

“Or, she had to leave, to escape someone who came after her.” I didn’t dare mention the idea that not everyone who is kidnapped is taken for ransom. The thought of Victoria abducted, probably raped or killed, was too horrible for me to get my mind around.

Ron massaged the sides of his head, raising spikes of hair at his temples. “I can’t help but think it’s something to do with our argument. That she had second thoughts about the wedding and just had to get away and sort it out.”

“Really? At the press conference you said this was no runaway bride scenario.”

He sent me a look.

“Okay, I get it. I wouldn’t say to them what was really on my mind either.” Especially since the police were already thinking badly of Ron. “So, let’s go over the days before the wedding and see if we can figure it out.”

“It’s just what I have been doing.” His voice was miserable. “She talked about the plans—cake, flowers, invitations. I guess that’s the stuff all brides talk about. I don’t know.”

“Sounds like it to me.”

“What about when you gals were alone? Did she say anything at all, anything beyond that day’s events?”

I wanted to rub my temples too. I honestly hadn’t heard Victoria give any clue that she wasn’t a hundred percent in love with Ron and ready to get married. I told him so, if for no other reason than to get a trace of a smile to show on his face.

It didn’t really work.

I went back to my computer but my heart wasn’t in it and my mind wasn’t on the work. Rather than make a bunch of mistakes I would have to find and correct later, I decided to take the dog for a walk. The fresh, chilly air stimulated me and a plan began to hatch, not one I could tell Ron.

Back at the office, he was on the phone. I held my breath, hoping for good news. Well, really, any news. When he hung up I could tell it hadn’t been anything of importance.

“So, what do you want to do?” I asked. “Tonight, you need to make some decisions. Most of your stuff is at Vic’s but you can’t go back there yet and your old place is out of the question. You should sleep at our place for awhile yet.”

I could see him picturing his crummy apartment, worse now because it was mostly empty. He nodded at my suggestion.

Drake called to let me know he was heading north and would be staying the night in the little town of Eagle Nest. In the background, rotor noise almost obliterated his voice. I told him Ron would be with me and he wished us luck.

“We both need some rest,” I said to Ron. “All this has been too much.”

He nodded again, too wrung-out to make conversation anymore.

“Let’s go home, settle in, ignore the news people. One of us should call Kent Taylor and find out the status, if they have any new leads from the hotline.”

“What about Ben Ortiz?”

“I’m not asking permission. I think this needs to come from family. Make the call.”

Of course there was no real news. Taylor would have let us know. He did say calls were starting to come in, but so far none of the leads were specific enough to be of value. He thanked Ron and told him to take care, which I thought was nice.

I drove the Jeep home and hustled Ron and Freckles into the house without a glance toward the vans at the curb. The temperature had dropped at least ten degrees—good news for us because it kept the reporters in their vehicles. Inside, I closed all the drapes. It would be dark soon anyway, and I wanted lamps on without feeling that the whole world was watching me.

The clock ticked. Our phones stayed silent.

Ron finally crashed, face down, on the bed in the guest room. From the living room I heard his snore so I went in and did the sisterly thing--I removed his boots and pulled the comforter over him. I set his cell phone beside his hand, knowing it was probably the only thing in the world that would wake him up at this moment. I made myself a cup of tea and stretched out on the couch to enjoy it. When I woke up the tea was cold, Freckles had curled up at the base of the sofa, and I had a horrible crick in my neck from sleeping at the odd angle. The light-up face on my phone showed it was almost five a.m.

I got up and checked on Ron. He hadn’t moved a muscle in more than ten hours and didn’t appear likely to. I gently closed the door to his room and thought again about the plan I’d hatched the previous afternoon. I didn’t dare tell Ron. It was better he not know what I had in mind. He could claim ignorance and his innocence would be assured.

I fed Freckles a super-early breakfast which she gobbled without question as I bustled about, gathering supplies. She went willingly into her crate and I peered out the front window before opening the door. The news vans had given up and gone away, but I had no illusions that they wouldn’t be back by daybreak. I closed the front door behind me and crunched across the frosty lawn to my Jeep.

I was on my way to Victoria’s house, police and lawyers be damned.

What none of them knew was that I already had a key to the place; I’d volunteered for plant-watering duty while the newlyweds were to have been honeymooning. All I had to do now was get to the front door and past the yellow crime tape without being spotted. It was the reason I’d changed into black jeans and hoodie. My flashlight had a semi-covered lens and I’d even remembered to tuck latex gloves into my pockets.

I parked around the corner at the nearest cross street. A hooded figure in black wouldn’t exactly be a welcome figure in this neighborhood in the pre-dawn hour so I adopted the few little things I could do to look more like a jogger or some other kind of health nut—pushed my hood back and let my ponytail swing as I walked merrily along as if I had every right to be there. It didn’t much matter—no one was out and about at this ungodly hour anyway.

As I approached Victoria’s place I spotted a light on across the street. Good old Gladys Peabody must be baking again (I have to admit my mouth watered slightly at the memory of those butter cookies). The lit window was on the side, facing a neighbor’s house. I kept my jaunty pace until it was out of sight. Her street-facing living room window was dark. I scoped out the street lamps at either end of the block. Neither cast enough light to illuminate my target so I edged toward the door, disguising myself as part of the large arbor vitae by the porch until I could get the key in hand.

It took a little gymnastic maneuver to ease myself between the crisscrosses of police tape without ripping any of them, but in under thirty seconds I was inside. I locked the door; a quick getaway would be easier through the backyard anyway. I didn’t want to be flashing a light around but risked a quick look to orient myself to any changes that might have happened since my last visit.

The furniture was exactly as before, coffee table skewed, the sofa a little out of place, pillows strewn. The blood-stained rug had been removed and her wedding dress was gone. For some reason, that made me sadder than anything else. I took a deep breath. This was not the moment for thoughts of what might have been. It was Monday morning and the neighbors were likely to begin stirring within the hour.

I decided to skip the living room and kitchen entirely. No doubt the police had been through them and had taken anything of interest. At a glance, for instance, I could see that Vic’s purse was gone, which meant the invaluable contact list on her cell phone would be out of reach too. I paused at the hall. Where to start?

Her home office would have the records Ron and I had discussed so I headed that direction. Not surprisingly, Victoria’s desk was uncluttered and immaculately clean. On top, only a phone, a notepad, an in-tray and a cup holding pens and pencils. She’d told me her laptop would be locked away in her home safe in the basement while she was gone. I would check that, except I didn’t know the combination. Would it be worth waking Ron to ask? I needed to give that a little more thought. If she’d had an appointment book or desk calendar they were gone now.

I picked up the phone receiver and listened as the quick dial tone indicated unheard voicemail messages. “You have two new messages,” it told me. I pressed the series of buttons it asked for. “First message.” A perky female voice spoke: “Congratulations, you’ve been selected to win—” I hung up before learning what the fantastic prize would have been. “Second message.” Another woman’s voice: “Hey, Victoria. Just calling to check on my drapery fabric but I realized you are away on your honeymoon. Congrats to you two! I’ll talk to you when you get back.” The woman didn’t leave a name so I could only assume Victoria would recognize the voice. I hung up without deleting either message.

I sat in her chair and opened the drawer on my left. It contained files tabbed with client names. Ron had mentioned her working with several current clients but he didn’t know most of their names. One of those little details that probably wasn’t important enough for her to tell him—until now. The drawer on the right contained business files of the sort everyone has—paid bills, tax information, supplier data. I grabbed a couple, laying them on the desk.

Along one wall were shelves filled with decorating books, the kind with wallpaper samples and color swatches. A display of tile samples dominated a corner of the room, and a huge paperboard-covered book held fabrics. There were paint chips, more fabrics and scads of catalogs—nothing I could imagine relating to our present problem. I flipped through the books on the shelf quickly, in case a secret diary or a note written in code should fall my way. Nothing did.

Victoria’s bedroom was much the same as I’d seen—except her packed bag had been rummaged by police, with lacy underthings now water-falling down the sides almost to the floor. There, too, if there’d been a trove of information in her travel stuff, it had been taken away. Same with the nightstand drawers. Even the bed pillows had been disturbed and the mattress was cockeyed showing someone had lifted it.

Odds were, the safe was the only untouched place in the house, unless the police had obtained the combination or a safecracker. Against my better judgment, I decided to call Ron.

“Where are you?” he asked with a querulous note in his sleepy voice.

“Don’t ask. I just need one bit of information and you can deny you ever gave it to me.”

Either he was too sleepy to process the implications or he’d taken my attitude—the hell with waiting for the police to solve this. He gave me the numbers.

I’d only been in Victoria’s basement a couple of times, and she had recently redecorated it as a little man-den for Ron’s sons. On one of my visits she’d needed to put something away, so I knew the safe was a floor model in a corner. A square of the flooring could be lifted once you moved a heavy floor lamp with a big base. The recessed dial presented itself and the information from Ron worked. The lid was heavier than I expected but it came up and I spotted the laptop computer right away. As long as I was blatantly breaking the law I figured I should go for it, so I pulled everything out and stuffed it into the knapsack I’d brought from home.

With the safe lid back in place and neatly concealed once again, I went back to her office to gather the files I’d pulled. They joined the rest of the plunder. I’d no sooner crossed the living room on my way to the back door when a set of headlights hit the wall. A car had pulled into the driveway.