Deserted

by E. H. Reinhard

  “Where is Allamoore?” I asked.

  “About an hour and forty-five minutes southeast of El Paso,” Chris said.

  Gallo cracked his knuckles. “Chris, get on the phone with the El Paso office.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  We stood over the conference table, staring down at a large foldable map of the state, which Gallo had laid out. He had one fingertip on Allamoore. We traced the area from Dallas to Allamoore and then from Allamoore to Butterfield, the location of the Levy home that the girls had called.

  “I don’t know if it’s the route I’d take, but it’s definitely a way to get there,” Bill said.

  “One second.” Scott dug into his bag, which sat near his chair, and came back with the printed map pages showing the dump points of the bodies six years prior. Scott flipped through the pages until he found the one that showed the drops west of the Dallas area and leading toward El Paso. “Bang and bang.” Scott put his finger down twice on two points on the map.

  “That’s their route,” Beth said. “And has to be where they are headed or are at right now. The past body dumps follow the same path toward the Levy house in Butterfield.”

  “I think we need to pull the trigger on packing up and moving locations,” Scott said.

  The team all agreed.

  Chris walked back into the conference room. “I just got off the phone with an Agent Matt Philben. He’s the supervisory agent in El Paso’s serial-crimes division. He’s sending two agents out to this truck stop to have a look at their video.”

  “And the property where we believe them to be?” I asked.

  “Flyover,” Chris said. “He said they’d have a plane up within the hour.”

  Beth looked up from her phone’s screen, which she’d been plugging away at. “Are they going to be able to get any kind of visual in the dark?”

  “He said they had it under control and would give me a call back as soon as they had something,” Chris said. “He asked if we wanted him to get a team set up to go to the property. I told him that we’d get a plan together and let him know. I also gave the semi model that I wrote down to the agents that I had working on the fliers. They’re going to get it added and distributed.”

  “Good,” Gallo said. “So what’s the plan here?”

  “Check on the next flight to El Paso,” I said. “If we can’t get us anything that will put us there before morning, get our things from the hotel and hit the road.”

  Beth was beside me, still punching away at the screen of her phone.

  “Are you checking flights?” I asked.

  “Have been,” she said. “The next flight I found, on any airline, doesn’t go out until tomorrow morning. We wouldn’t be on the ground there until after one in the afternoon. Which means we’d have to still get cars, meet with whoever from the local office there, and get something together before we even start for this address. We’d be looking at probably four in the afternoon before we actually got to this house.”

  “That’s too long,” I said. “If we got in cars now, and even if it took us ten hours to get all of our things, wrap here, and get out there, we’d still be there in the early-morning hours.”

  “The early morning hours without sleep,” Scott said.

  “I may have a quicker option. Give me a minute to make a call.” Gallo took his cell phone from his pocket and walked out of the conference room.

  “We’re going to need to call Ball and let him know we’re making the trip west.” Bill took out his phone and dialed.

  I looked over at Chris, who’d taken a seat. “Are you guys planning on taking this trip with us?”

  “It’s Gallo’s call,” Chris said. “Knowing him like I do, I don’t foresee him just dropping it or passing it off now that we’ve put in some footwork on the investigation. He’s the seeing-things-through-to-fruition type.”

  “Understood.”

  Bill was talking with Ball on his cell phone. He cupped the mouthpiece and lifted his head, looking over at Scott, Beth, and me. “Do we want Ball to rustle up Jim to try to find us some flights here?”

  “Unless Jim knows of a top-secret airline that flies from here to El Paso and can get us there quicker than we can drive, let’s hold off,” Beth said. “Maybe Gallo can come up with something to put us there sooner. Tell Ball that we’ll let him know if we need Jim to book us anything.”

  “Got it.” Bill went back to the call.

  Scott put one leg up over his other knee and leaned back in his chair. “Let’s say that these girls are at this property. That leaves us with just unlimited possibilities of what can go down when we get there. We’re going to need to go in strong whether they’re there or not. We have two people that live there that we know have violent priors. Possibly another in the father of these two girls. If the two girls are there, we know we have murderers. And we may very well be dealing with hostages on top of that.”

  “We can’t really get any kind of plan together until we get some kind of eyes on this place.” Bill tucked his phone back into his pocket, having just finished talking with Ball.

  Gallo walked back into the conference room. “How long until you can get your things from the hotel and meet me at the airport?”

  “I’d have to think within the hour.” I looked at Beth, Bill, and Scott, and none of them debated my estimate. “What do you have going?”

  “We have a plane.”

  “We do?” Chris asked.

  “I called our special agent in charge here, Ed Ludwig. He approved use of one of our planes sitting at DFW. He said he’d have one of the pilots get a hold of me within the hour and meet us at the airport for our trip.”

  “This is a done deal?” Scott asked.

  “It is. Chris and I will travel with your team,” Gallo said. “If that’s not a problem, Chris.”

  “If we have an hour, that’s all the time I’ll need to be ready,” Chris said.

  “Let’s get whatever we need taken care of here, you guys can get your things from the hotel, and we’ll meet at the airport at say”—Gallo looked at his watch—“ten thirty.”

  “That works for us, I think,” Scott said.

  Beth, Bill, and I agreed. I rolled my chair back to stand. As I did, the conference-room door opened, and Brian from the tech unit entered with a couple of papers in hand.

  “Are you guys leaving?” he asked.

  “We were just about to get set here and take off, yes,” Gallo said. “Did you get something?”

  “Yeah, here are some satellite images of the property.” Brian held them out toward Gallo, who took them in hand and retook his seat at the table.

  Gallo looked down at them and flipped through the pages behind the first one.

  “How old are these?” Gallo asked.

  Brian shrugged. “I couldn’t say. I’d guess a year or two. They’re all the same as the first two pages, just copies. We have a wider aerial view that covers about five miles, and one about as close as the maps would allow. You can see the house and property pretty clearly there.”

  Gallo passed the pages out to our team. I took my set in hand and stared at them. The first page showed not much more than green-and-brown desert landscape. Small mountains, hills, and a couple of straight gray lines, which I figured were gravel roads, broke up the expanse of nothing. A red circle marked the home. Looking at the wide aerial view, I didn’t spot anything that looked like another building or structure around. I flipped to the next page, a close-up of the home, which looked to be a small single-story ranch. Off to the right of the home was a large shed, almost double the size of the house. Cars and junk were scattered among the bushes, rocks, and scrappy desert plant life. I spotted a number of semitrailers parked to the side of the long driveway. The homestead appeared to have been dropped in the middle of nowhere.

  “We have semitrailers on this property,” Beth said. “I don’t see that as a coincidence. That outbuilding could be large enough to house a semi, minus the trailer.”
/>   “Chris, you want to give me that number for the supervisory agent you spoke with at the El Paso office?” Gallo asked. “I’d like to touch base with him and let him know that we’ll be in the air, heading to the area shortly.”

  “Yeah, I have it right here.” Chris gave Gallo the number from his cell phone.

  “Okay, let’s head out. Grab your things and take care of whatever you have to take care of,” Gallo said. “I’ll give you a call with where to meet. Ten thirty is our time, so let’s try to stick to that.”

  We left the conference room.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Silas

  Country music played at a low volume from the small speakers of an old boom box. Silas cracked his eyelids open, and flickers of the orange flames from the fire filled his eyes. He focused on Kitty and Kerry, who’d scooted their chairs closer to the fire and were sitting next to their cousins. Silas and Harper had stayed in their original positions some fifty-plus feet back from the bonfire pit, which had since burned itself down to flames of just a couple feet.

  Silas rearranged himself in his chair and closed his eyes again. He felt a thump in his lap a moment later. Silas opened his eyes and looked down to see his brother’s hand passing him a whiskey bottle with about a half inch left at the bottom.

  “I think I’m going to call it a wrap, brother. I’m drunk and old and tired,” Harper said.

  “I don’t have much longer in me either,” Silas said. “I’m falling asleep sitting here.”

  Harper pushed himself from the chair and stumbled a step before catching his footing. “You want to follow me back up to the house, or are you going to hang back for a bit yet?”

  “No, I’ll follow you up.” Silas got himself to his feet and stood in place, looking over at the fire and his daughters sitting next to his nephews. “You guys be good!” Silas yelled.

  Kerry looked back toward him. “We will. Are you going to bed, Daddy?”

  “Yeah, we’re heading up.”

  “Okay, have a good night,” Kerry said.

  “Love you, Daddy!” Kitty called.

  Silas gave them a wave and followed his brother up the gravel path toward the house.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Beth and I stepped from our rental car in the parking lot of our hotel. We waited at the trunk for Bill and Scott to park and get out. They pulled into a free parking space a couple down from us, left their car, and approached. We walked inside and waited at the elevators. Bill stared at his watch.

  “We should probably be out of here within about twenty minutes or so,” Bill said.

  No one responded, but I figured that sufficient time to pack up.

  The elevator doors opened and allowed us inside. We rode up to the sixth floor and split up to our respective rooms. I walked into my room and went straight for my suitcase in the closet. I had rolled it to the edge of the bed, heaved it up on top, and opened the zippers when my phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out, saw it was Gallo, and clicked Talk.

  “It’s Hank,” I said.

  “Hey, everything is set, and the pilot is there. Our departure time is slotted for four minutes after eleven. I’m going to text you the concourse and gate number. Chris will meet you at the security check and bring you guys through. I’ll be waiting for you at our gate. We’ll have to go outside across the tarmac to our hangar.”

  “Sure,” I said.

  “We’ll see you guys in a bit.”

  “Sounds good. Thanks again for getting the travel taken care of.”

  “No problem.” Gallo clicked off.

  I caught the time on the alarm clock on the nightstand and dialed Karen. The phone rang in my ear.

  “Hey, babe,” Karen said.

  “Hey. You’re not sleeping already, are you?”

  “Nope. Still up. You’re not just getting done for the day now are you?”

  “Still not done for the day,” I said. “Just figured I’d call you quick before we head out.”

  “Head out where?”

  “El Paso.” I snatched my hanging suits from the closet and set them in the suitcase.

  “Did you guys get a lead in the investigation that’s sending you there?”

  “Yup. I’m packing up everything at my hotel room right now. I guess our flight leaves a couple minutes after eleven.”

  “What airline, so I can make sure you get there?” Karen asked.

  “No clue. I think it’s private. I’ll just send you a text or something when we land so you know I made it.”

  “Private?”

  “The supervisory agent here got us a plane to use,” I said. “I’m not sure if it’s the Bureau’s plane exactly, or what.”

  “This isn’t one of those tiny little planes is it?”

  “No clue. Why do you ask?”

  “Just that it seems as if those are the ones that always crash.”

  I chuckled and grabbed a stack of undershirts from the dresser under the hotel room’s television, centered on the wall. “There’s a good thing to put in my head right before I fly.”

  “Sorry. Don’t crash.”

  “I’ll try not to. What’s going on at the house?”

  “I have this fat lard of a dog snoring on my lap on the couch,” she said. “Watching some recorded shows. I’ll probably go to bed in a little bit here.”

  “I mean with the unpacking and all of that.” I walked to the desk in the room to get my laptop and charger.

  “The unpacking is going surprisingly well, actually. The kitchen is basically done. Bathrooms are done. I still have to finish up our bedroom, but I’d say that I made a pretty damn-good-sized dent in the process.”

  “Sorry I’m not there to help.”

  “Seems killers have no consideration for things that need to be done at home,” Karen said.

  “So it seems.” I pulled each dresser drawer out and made sure they were all empty. “I’ll knock out whatever needs to be finished when I get home.”

  “I’ll leave you the garage. I think I’ll probably be done with the house by then.”

  “What have you been doing with all of the boxes?” I got on all fours and looked around the base of the bed, making sure that a sock or something else belonging to me hadn’t gone astray.

  “Breaking them down and stacking them in the garage. Figure we can probably load the bed of my truck up with them and take them to the recycling place when we’re through.”

  “Sure.”

  “Okay. Well, give me a call or send me a text when you get to El Paso,” she said.

  “So you know that I’m alive and we didn’t crash.”

  “Correct.”

  “All right. Will do, babe. Pet the dog for me. Love you.”

  “Love you, too. Fly safe.” Karen clicked off.

  I put my phone back into my pocket and did a quick lap around the room, grabbing all remaining items, including my phone charger. Everything from the bathroom found my suitcase. I zipped it up, wheeled it to the door, and left my room. I caught Bill walking from his room a couple down from mine.

  “Ready, Hank?” he asked.

  “Set, yeah.”

  “I think Scott is already downstairs. Not sure about Beth.”

  We walked to the elevators and hit the button to take us down. The doors opened and let us inside a moment later. Bill jabbed his finger at the button for the lobby. He stared at his big black watch, sticking out from the sleeve of his suit jacket.

  “We should be right on time to get over to the airport. You haven’t heard anything from Gallo yet, have you?” Bill asked.

  “He just called a couple minutes ago. Our flight is at eleven oh four. He said he was going to text me the concourse and gate number. I guess Chris is going to take us through security.”

  The doors opened, and Bill and I found Scott standing in the center of the marble lobby near a circular black table. We walked over, and I filled him in on our flight details. I pulled out my phone and saw I’d received the text
with our concourse and gate from Gallo.

  “Beth?” Bill asked.

  “Must still be upstairs,” I said.

  “No, I’m not,” she said. “I was getting a coffee over by the little kiosk there.”

  I turned to see Beth wheeling her suitcase from the corner of the lobby opposite the front desk and near the bar entrance. She held a cardboard cup with her free hand.

  My cell phone rang in my pocket. I pulled it out and took a look at the screen. The call was coming from a number I didn’t recognize. I clicked Talk.

  “Agent Hank Rawlings,” I said.

  “Hey, it’s Chris Rockwell.”

  “Yeah, Chris. What’s up?”

  “Two things. First, Gallo told you guys that I’m meeting you at the security checkpoint at the airport, correct?”

  “He did,” I said. “I talked to him a couple of minutes ago.”

  “Okay, good. Second thing. I got a call back a couple minutes ago from one of the people I spoke with at this truck stop in Allamoore. They said that they pulled up the security video of when these two were in the place to have another look. The guy just sent it over to me, and I viewed it. It’s definitely our girls.”

  “So we know that they are at least in that part of the state.”

  “Positive,” Chris said. “A little more information there as well. They said they had video from last night and this morning. The girls had to have parked there and stayed the night.”

  A thought bubbled up in my head. “Any signs on the video of the older couple that were missing?”

  “I didn’t think to ask.”

  “Anyone reported missing or cars in the lot that have been there for too long?” I asked.

  “Again, didn’t ask. Let me make a call back to the supervisory agent in El Paso. He was sending some agents to the truck stop. I’ll make sure he relays those questions to his guys so we can get some answers.”

  “That will work.”

  “Okay. I should be over at the airport in about fifteen minutes,” he said. “How are you guys looking on time?”