The Vanished

by Tim Kizer

  Maybe what he’d seen on Sam’s face was not shock but bewilderment?

  When he was two blocks from Elizabeth’s house, Vincent pulled over to the curb and turned off the engine. Then he looked at the GPS tracking screen. Sam Powell’s car hadn’t moved since he had last checked its location.

  Still no activity on Sam’s cellphone except for a text message from Sam’s girlfriend, which read: “I’ll be home in 30 min.”

  Vincent opened Sam’s email account. There was one new sent message, which was a reply to Lucas Hanna’s email from yesterday. Sam informed Lucas that he liked the pictures Lucas had taken on his trip to Paris. The message had been sent nine minutes ago.

  Vincent called Bob Navarro and asked if Sam Powell had called anyone from his home phone.

  “No, he hasn’t,” Bob said.

  “Is he alone?”

  “It looks like he is. I think he’s watching TV.”

  It had been almost an hour since Sam had heard about Tom’s body. If Sam was going to get hold of his son, he would have done it by now—or at least started doing it. Why was he watching TV instead of trying to find out if his son was okay?

  Maybe Sam didn’t want to get hold of Tom.

  Why?

  One possible reason Sam didn’t want to contact his son was that he was sure Tom couldn’t have been killed yesterday. Perhaps he had spoken to Tom on the phone this morning.

  Well, even if Sam was positive Tom was alive, he, as a loving father, should call his son just in case, right?

  2

  “Hello. How can I help you?” Elizabeth smiled.

  Vincent showed her the badge and said, “Good afternoon. I’m Detective Duncan. Can I come in? I have something important to tell you.”

  “Sure.”

  In the living room, Elizabeth asked, “Did something happen to Philip?”

  Vincent supposed she was talking about her husband, Philip Riggle.

  “No, it’s not about Philip. It’s about your son, Tom.”

  “Tom? Did you catch his killers?”

  “No. We found out that Tom wasn’t killed in May of last year.”

  “Tom’s alive?”

  “No, he’s not. He was shot to death yesterday. I’m very sorry, Mrs. Riggle.”

  Elizabeth’s jaw dropped, and her eyes widened. “Where did it happen?”

  “Avondale.”

  “Did you catch the guy who shot him?”

  “No. We don’t have a suspect right now.”

  Elizabeth sighed heavily and said, “Oh my God. I can’t believe it. He was alive the whole time. My Goodness.”

  “I’m very sorry, Mrs. Riggle.”

  “Can I see his body?”

  “Yes. We’ll let you know when you can come in and view it.”

  Elizabeth wiped at her eyes and asked, “Do you know what happened to Tom a year ago? Was he imprisoned somewhere all this time?”

  “We don’t know. The investigation is in its early stages.”

  “When will we be able to take the body?”

  “Probably in a few days.”

  Elizabeth nodded slowly. “Are you sure it’s Tom?”

  “I can’t tell you all the details right now, but we’re sure it’s your son.” Vincent took out his notebook and asked Elizabeth for her cellphone number.

  3

  As Vincent turned around the corner, Elizabeth called Carol from her cellphone.

  “Hi, honey, how are you doing?” Elizabeth said.

  “I’m fine, Mom. How are you?” Carol replied.

  “I’m good. I just talked to a police detective. He said Tom was alive all this time. Can you believe it?”

  Vincent pulled to the curb and killed the engine.

  “What do you mean?” Carol asked.

  “We thought Tom was dead. It turns out we were wrong. The detective said Tom was shot to death yesterday in Avondale.”

  “So Tom’s dead?”

  “Yes. But he was alive until yesterday.”

  There was silence, then Carol said, “This is terrible. How are you feeling, Mom?”

  “I’m okay. I’m just wondering why Tom never called us. I think they kept him locked up in a basement.”

  “Maybe they did.”

  Elizabeth sniffled and said, “Poor Tom. I hope they catch the bastard that killed him.”

  Was it all an act or did Elizabeth really not know that Tom had faked his death a year ago?

  “I hope so, too,” Carol said.

  “They’ll let us take his body in a few days.” A pause. “I’ll call you tonight, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Bye, honey.”

  “Bye, Mom.”

  Elizabeth hung up.

  Vincent checked Sam Powell’s cellphone and saw that there had been no incoming or outgoing messages since the text sent by Sam’s girlfriend, and that Sam had just received a phone call from a contact named George. Vincent played the recording of the call, which was only forty-two seconds long. George turned out to be Sam’s buddy. He had called Sam to ask if he wanted to play poker tonight at Hank’s place. Sam said that he didn’t know and promised to call George around eight o’clock.

  Vincent was disappointed to see that Sam hadn’t sent any emails since his message to Lucas Hanna.

  Sam’s car was still in the garage.

  Vincent opened the text message log of Elizabeth’s cell. Elizabeth hadn’t sent or received any text messages since he had left her house.

  He logged into Elizabeth’s email account. Elizabeth’s last email had been sent at 10:17 this morning.

  At the moment, he was inclined to think that Elizabeth didn’t know Tom’s death in May of last year was fake. If Elizabeth was in on the secret, she would have tried to contact Tom before calling Carol. That was what a decent mother would have done, and Elizabeth did seem to be a decent mother.

  His eyes fixed on the spy program’s control panel, Vincent called Dennis Hatton, who was stationed in a van about a hundred yards from Elizabeth’s house. He instructed Dennis to text him when Elizabeth made a phone call.

  A few minutes after Vincent left Maricopa, Elizabeth called Sam on his cellphone. Vincent listened to their conversation while he drove.

  “Hello, Sam,” Elizabeth said.

  “Hello,” Sam replied. “How are you?”

  “I’m fine. I just talked to a police detective. He told me our Tom was killed yesterday in Avondale.”

  “I talked to him, too. About two hours ago.”

  “This is terrible. Poor Tom.” Elizabeth sniffled.

  “Yeah. Poor Tom. Are you crying?”

  “No.”

  “Calm down, Liz. You’re going to give yourself a heart attack.”

  “I don’t understand why he didn’t call us.”

  “Maybe he got in with the wrong crowd. It doesn’t matter now anyway.”

  “I think he was held captive somewhere. And they killed him because he tried to run away.”

  “If Tom had stayed out of trouble, this wouldn’t have happened.”

  “Sam… Please don’t blame him. You don’t know what happened.”

  “I’m not blaming him.”

  “Do you want me and Philip to arrange the funeral?”

  “Sure, why not. He can afford it.”

  When Vincent crossed the city limits of Phoenix, he decided to follow Sam around for a while. He was going to wait until seven o’clock; if Sam’s car didn’t leave the garage by then, he would head back to the hotel. As he entered Sam’s address into the GPS, his cellphone rang. It was Carol.

  “Hi, Vincent,” Carol said.

  “Hi.”

  “My mom called.”

  “I know.”

  “Has she called Tom?”

  “No.”

  “Have you talked to my dad?”

  “Yes. He hasn’t contacted Tom yet, either.”

  “Do you think this will work?”

  “It will if any of them has Tom’s contact information.”<
br />
  “Please keep me posted.”

  “Okay.”

  4

  It was five-fifty when Vincent got to Sam Powell’s condo complex.

  At 6:13 pm Sam Powell drove out of the garage. He traveled four blocks west and pulled into the parking lot of a Safeway store. He parked the car, got out, and went into the store. Vincent chose not to follow Sam inside, for fear of being spotted by him. He was monitoring Sam’s cellphone while he waited for Sam to come out. Thirteen minutes later, Sam walked out of the store, carrying a plastic bag. He was alone. Then Sam drove home, making no stops along the way.

  Vincent went back to the hotel at a quarter past seven.

  After he changed his clothes, he called Bob Navarro and Dennis Hatton and told them to keep the surveillance going until seven o’clock tomorrow evening. He said they could leave the vans unattended for the night, and instructed them to take cabs to their hotels.

  “I’ll sleep in the van,” Bob said.

  Dennis told Vincent he would spend the night at the hotel.

  At 7:58 pm, while Vincent was still on the phone with Dennis, Elizabeth’s car began moving. At 8:23 pm it stopped in the parking lot of the Antonio’s restaurant in Tempe, which was less than thirteen miles from Vincent’s hotel. Vincent went to the restaurant and watched Elizabeth for some time from a distance. Sitting with Elizabeth at the table were her husband and two other people, a man and a woman in their sixties. Elizabeth’s car left the parking lot of Antonio’s at 9:35 pm and pulled into the driveway of Elizabeth’s house twenty-seven minutes later.

  Later that night, Vincent listened to the recordings of the transmissions from his bugs in Elizabeth Riggle’s house and Sam Powell’s apartment. He learned that Elizabeth had told her husband the news about Tom when he had come home at ten minutes to six. Sam shared the news with his girlfriend at five past seven.

  Vincent stayed up until four in the morning, checking Elizabeth’s and Sam’s email accounts and cellphones every five minutes. He woke at eight am, when his cellphone alarm went off. Without getting out of bed, he grabbed his laptop from the nightstand and opened the cellphone spy program. Since Vincent had fallen asleep, Sam had sent one text message and Elizabeth two. The recipient of Sam’s message was Elizabeth, and the recipient of both of Elizabeth’s messages was Sam. There was nothing of interest in these texts.

  Neither Sam nor Elizabeth had sent any emails while Vincent was asleep.

  After he talked to Bob and Dennis, Vincent took a shower and then had breakfast at a nearby fast-food joint.

  Carol called at a few minutes past noon and asked if he had any good news for her. Vincent said that he didn’t.

  “So neither of my parents contacted Tom?” Carol said.

  “Not yet.”

  “Do you think they will ever contact him?”

  “Well, I’m beginning to think your parents don’t know that Tom faked his death.”

  “And you still have no proof that he did fake his death?”

  “No.”

  “I really hope it’s Tom who did it.”

  “Why?”

  “He won’t kill Annie. I’m sure he won’t kill her.”

  You want to believe he won’t kill Annie.

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “What are you going to do now? Do you have a plan?”

  “I’ve got a couple of ideas. Are you still in Phoenix?”

  “No, I’m in Plano. My mother found some of Tom’s credit card statements. I should receive them tomorrow. When are you coming back to Dallas?”

  “Friday.”

  “David’s sentencing hearing is in nineteen days. Do you think you can find Annie before then?”

  “Do you want the truth?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t think I can find your daughter before the hearing.”

  5

  Neither Sam nor Elizabeth tried to get in touch with Tom on Wednesday. They didn’t try to contact their son on Thursday, either. They didn’t say anything suggesting that they knew Tom had faked his death last year.

  Evidently Tom didn’t trust his parents enough to let them in on his big secret.

  Vincent canceled the surveillance at ten pm on Thursday. On Friday, after they returned the vans to the rental agency, he called Carol’s mother to inform her that the body “found” on Monday didn’t belong to Tom. To cover his tracks, he used a disposable phone. Elizabeth said that she remembered him and that she had been waiting for his call.

  “I’m calling to let you know that there’s been a mistake,” Vincent said. “It wasn’t your son who was killed last Monday in Avondale. It was someone else. I’m sorry for the error, Mrs. Riggle.”

  “You said you were sure it was Tom.”

  “Turns out we were wrong. Mistakes like this happen from time to time. I’m very sorry.”

  “Do you know where my son is?”

  “No. Your son is still presumed to have been murdered last year.”

  “I see.”

  “Have a nice day, Mrs. Riggle.”

  He terminated the call and then dialed Sam Powell’s number.

  “Hello, is this Sam Powell?”

  “Yeah.”

  “This is Detective Duncan. We spoke last Tuesday.”

  “How are you doing, Detective?”

  “I’m great, thank you. When we met three days ago, I told you we’d found your son’s body in Avondale. It turned out we were wrong. The victim is not Tom. I’m sorry for the error, Mister Powell.”

  “It wasn’t Tom?” There was a pause. “Well, everyone makes mistakes. Thanks for the call, Detective.”

  “You’re welcome. Have a nice day, Mister Powell.”

  Chapter 25

  1

  A few minutes after he talked to Sam Powell, Carol told Vincent that she had found Tom’s old girlfriend’s cellphone number.

  “Her last name’s Meyer,” she said.

  The number still belonged to Christina Meyer. Tom’s old girlfriend was thirty-two, owned a seven-year-old Toyota Camry, and currently lived in Tucson. Posing as a cold-case detective, Vincent met her later that day at her apartment.

  “When was the last time you talked to Tom?” he asked.

  “About a year and a half ago,” Christina said.

  “What did he say?”

  “Not much. He just wanted to tell me he got out of prison.”

  “Did he contact you after that?”

  “No.”

  “Did you visit him in prison?”

  Christina pushed her hair behind her ear and said, “No.”

  “Do you have any idea who killed him?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  Vincent followed Christina for two days and then went back to Dallas.

  He spent the next eight days investigating the spectators from Tom’s guilty plea hearing. There were seven of them. Luis Olivares, 40, worked for the Collin County Health Care Services Department. Caterina Schier, 25, was a journalist from The Dallas Morning News. Jordan Richter, 32, worked for an oil company. Amy Tran, 26, was a law student. James Garside, 29, worked for a bank. Reuben Harman, 30, was a salesclerk at a department store. Angus Graham, 38, worked for an IT company.

  Vincent and his investigators followed each of them for three days and saw nothing suspicious. None of the spectators appeared to be involved in Annie’s kidnapping. It was another dead end.

  He went through all of Tom’s credit card statements that Elizabeth had given to Carol. Five of them were for Tom’s Visa card and four for his MasterCard card. Among the charges that caught Vincent’s attention was a charge for two hundred and fifteen dollars from the Flamingo Las Vegas Hotel in Las Vegas dated March 11 of last year. As Vincent studied the March credit card statement, he became curious about a $49.99 charge from a Las Vegas business called Showtime Theater. The charge had been posted on March 10 and, considering the name of the business, must have been for a show ticket.

  On July 19, driven by intuition, Vincen
t searched for Showtime Theater’s website, wanting to find out what show Tom Powell had seen at that venue. Showtime Theater did have a website, where one could peruse the current show schedule and purchase tickets. Located on Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas, the theater had an eclectic lineup, which included a music revue, a magic show, and a burlesque musical. When Vincent saw the name of the show that was going to return in September, his heart began to beat faster with excitement. The show was called Phenomenal and was described as a unique hypnosis experience. The star of the show was award-winning hypnotist Devon LeRoy. The website invited prospective audience members to watch LeRoy control perfect strangers’ thoughts and actions, and promised an unforgettable comedy thrill ride. “You won’t believe what he can make them do!” the website said.

  Vincent called Showtime Theater and asked if Devon LeRoy had performed in March of last year.

  “Yes, he did,” said the woman on the other end of the line.

  “How much was the ticket?”

  “Forty-nine ninety-nine for general admission and fifty-nine ninety-nine for a VIP ticket.”

  Tom Powell had gone to the Phenomenal show and met Devon LeRoy, Vincent was sure of it.

  Tom might have asked LeRoy to teach him hypnotism, and LeRoy might have agreed to do it.

  Could Devon LeRoy have hypnotized David Miller himself? Vincent didn’t rule that out.

  Why would LeRoy have agreed to hypnotize David?

  Vincent believed that all show business people were crazy to some extent, so it was possible that LeRoy had helped Tom just for shits and giggles. Maybe LeRoy had thought that hypnotizing David to confess to murdering Annie was a cool trick.

  As he searched for Devon LeRoy’s address, Vincent saw an ad for his show in Houston. LeRoy was going to be in Houston until July 26 and was scheduled to perform in New York from July 30 to August 25.

  Vincent decided to meet LeRoy tomorrow after a show.

  2

  LeRoy’s show was an hour and twenty minutes long. As soon as it ended, Vincent climbed onto the stage and caught up to the hypnotist. Devon LeRoy was a lean man in his early forties with thin lips, neatly combed dark hair, and a triangular soul patch.

  “Hi, how are you doing?” Vincent said. “I loved the show.”