Smoke Screen (A Miranda and Parker Mystery Book 7)

by Linsey Lanier

  The Lake Placid event might have been the one that had attracted the perpetrator’s attention. Still, it had occurred what? Eight months before the Las Vegas case? Eight months before the first text was sent.

  That indicated planning.

  And that the anonymous messages had not been sent on a whim, but were carefully thought out. It also indicated a great deal of patience. Definitely worth another pass through the phone list, starting in the northeast this time.

  And if he were lucky he just might catch the bottom feeder they were after.

  Chapter Seventeen

  From the car Miranda watched her daughter bounce up the curved granite steps of the sprawling creamy-white stucco castle that was the Chatham mansion and slam the ornate front door. Just the way she’d slammed her bedroom door over a month ago.

  How Mackenzie had the energy to stay that angry for that long was a mystery to her.

  At this rate the girl might stop being mad at her by the time she turned, oh, maybe twenty?

  Feeling a headache coming on, Miranda stared out her windshield at the expansive emerald green lawn and felt a powerful wave of longing for what she’d once had.

  It had been a mistake to come here, but what choice did she have? She wasn’t going to let her fourteen-year-old daughter take public transportation home, even if it was only late afternoon. Mackenzie had led a sheltered life. She didn’t have the means to handle any…trouble that might arise. Besides, didn’t Miranda have enough to worry about?

  The kid would be the death of her. Nearly had been already.

  Miranda put the car in drive and slowly rolled down the long path to the iron gate. She’d spent the better part of thirteen years searching for her daughter just to know she was safe. She’d nearly died to save her. She loved her so much. And—she never would have found her if it hadn’t been for Parker.

  At the thought of Parker sudden tears sprang up out of nowhere to sting her eyes.

  Dear Lord, why oh why had he turned out to be such a stubborn ass?

  She wanted to tell him that. Tell him about Mackenzie’s visit to her office to hire her to find the slimeglob that was her real father and say, “Look what you’ve done!”

  But it wasn’t Parker’s fault. Mackenzie didn’t even know he had been looking for the creep himself.

  Parker thought her father was the one who’d sent her those crazy texts. Just because he’d learned the first one had come from Chicago. Talk about jumping to conclusions. And Parker had warned her Mackenzie would keep trying to find him. He’d been right about that one.

  No, she didn’t want to see Parker. Wouldn’t know what to say to him if she did. They’d just get into a big fight. She was sick to death of arguing with him. There was no point to keep rubbing salt in the wounds they’d given each other.

  And yet as she drove away from the Chatham place, she found herself heading for the Parker mansion.

  Force of habit, she told herself. Too late to turn around, she told herself. Besides, she told herself, it didn’t matter. It was too early in the afternoon.

  Parker wouldn’t be there.

  So she’d just swing by for a minute and take a peek at the place. It would be a good reminder never to let herself get spoiled again. Yeah, a good hard reminder.

  As she turned onto the curvy streets of Mockingbird Hills, her stomach felt as if she’d stuffed it with cotton candy. Dry, sick, overly sugared. She certainly had let herself get spoiled. Spoiled by luxury. Spoiled by love. Something she’d vowed never to do. But it was hard to say no to a man like Parker.

  The first night he’d brought her here she’d been unconscious. It had been against her will.

  But the heady lovemaking session that had followed wasn’t. She remembered the passion of that night. The thunder and lightning bolts of his talented hands. How he made her feel things she never knew existed. How he’d left her breathless and stunned and wanting more.

  She’d fallen in love with him that night, though she’d refused to admit it then. Deeply hopelessly in love.

  And now?

  She was just as much in love with him. But that didn’t meant they could make it work between them. Apparently it took more than that.

  She steered onto the lane she knew by heart and just before she caught sight of the live oaks rising over the mansard roof of the ten-bedroom edifice, the willows casting shadows over the lawn, the sprawling gray stone balustrade around the front, she saw the figure of a man standing in the drive, hands on his hips staring up at the place.

  He had on a pricey light gray suit and a cobalt blue Ascot that made the shock of his pure white hair and neatly trimmed mustache look even more distinguished. She’d know that tycoon air anywhere.

  Mr. P. Parker’s playboy-slash-real-estate-mogul father.

  His face wore an expression of deep thought tinged with a bit of worry.

  She spotted a black Lamborghini parked along the curb and pulled up behind it. Like father like son, she thought, getting out of her car.

  “Good afternoon,” she called, taking in the smell of the freshly cut grass as she crossed the lawn.

  He turned to her and his thick white brows arched in surprise. “Miranda. Have you come home?” The tenderness in his old-world southern accent bore into her heart like shards of glass.

  For some reason, Parker’s father had always liked her and had been delighted when she and Parker had gotten together.

  “No,” she said flatly as she reached his side.

  His expression fell. “Russell isn’t here.” He always called Parker by his middle name. But today the quaint paternal habit didn’t make her smile.

  “I know. He’s at work.”

  Mr. P gave his white mane a brief shake. “He’s moved out.”

  “Out?”

  “He’s moved back into his penthouse downtown.”

  She vaguely remembered Parker had had a penthouse before they’d moved into the family estate together. She hadn’t realized he’d kept it all this while. Had he thought their breakup was as inevitable as she had?

  With a weary sigh Mr. P stared up at the house again. “Antonio and Coco are thinking of taking over the place. I stopped by to see what sort of condition it’s in.”

  Antonio and Coco? She didn’t know what to say.

  Antonio was Parker’s semi-adopted son. His surrogate son, she’d always called him. And Coco had been her friend, one of the few women she socialized with, such as her social life was. But Miranda hadn’t been in contact with her since the breakup any more than she’d been with Fanuzzi.

  The pair had run off and gotten married almost a year ago. And now they were moving into the Parker mansion? She should be glad for them. Coco deserved it, and Miranda had never wanted to live in such a grand house.

  Instead she felt like Mr. P had given her a sharp jab in the gut.

  “At least the place will stay in the family.” He turned back to her, fixed her with his sharp crystal blue eyes. “Miranda, tell me the truth. What happened between you and my son?”

  The same question Fanuzzi had asked her. The same one Mackenzie had asked with her eyes.

  She stuck her hands in the pockets of her jacket and raised her shoulders. “It just didn’t work out, Mr. P.”

  His gaze continued to bore into her. “Do you still love him?”

  She couldn’t believe he’d just asked her that. Her throat went dry. She swallowed, trying to hide her reaction. “Of course, I do.”

  “Then why can’t you work things out?”

  Stubborn man. The trait ran in the family. But he was also a kind man. At least he’d always been to her. Suddenly she felt she could confide in him.

  “We just can’t, Mr. P,” she croaked out. “He won’t let me be myself.”

  His expression said he didn’t buy that at all. “I don’t see how he could stop you from being yourself.”

  He hadn’t. That was why she’d had to leave. How could she tell him that?

  She couldn’t b
elieve she was standing on the front lawn of the Parker mansion, trying to explain to Parker’s father what had happened between them. She didn’t understand it herself. She was still reeling with bewilderment over it. And truth be told, she was as much in denial about it as Mr. P seemed to be. But facts were facts.

  It was over.

  She pulled herself together and blurted out the truth. “Parker’s shutting down our consulting business.”

  His mouth moved wordlessly a moment as the shock overtook him. “The one that’s taken you on cases all over the world?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Why? You two are tremendous together.”

  Miranda didn’t know her former father-in-law had followed their cases. He’d been travelling with his new bride most of the past year. But most of them had been on the news all over the world.

  “That’s what I thought, too,” she said. “But Parker thinks the work is too dangerous. He thinks I’ll get myself killed sooner or later.”

  Mr P uttered a bitter laugh. “Isn’t that ironic? I’ve been worried about Russell’s safety since he took on his first case.”

  She lifted her palms. “Well, there you go.”

  Mr. P stood silent a long time as he took in what she had told him about his son. Robins chirped and hopped along the branches of a nearby willow while the afternoon sun bore down its last vestiges of fury before setting for the evening.

  Slowly the older gentleman ran a hand over his face, just the way Parker did when he was frustrated—usually with her.

  He murmured half to himself. “Russell says he’s through with love, through with commitment. I’ve never heard such talk from him.”

  A nice follow-up solar plexus punch to the news about the house. Miranda almost doubled over. She wrapped an arm around her waist.

  So Parker was through with her. Really through. But why shouldn’t he be? He’d find someone else eventually. Someone more his type. A socialite like his first wife. Someone he could coo over and protect.

  The thought made her sick.

  She felt dizzy. Her ears rang in her head. Suddenly she realized Mr. P was still talking to her.

  “There’s the little matter of your mortgage.”

  “What?” she said, bewildered at the comment.

  She hadn’t given him notice when she left. Was he going to make her pay for the last month on the house? She’d have to dig into the money from Santiago.

  “I—I’m not sure what I can give your right now, but—”

  “Miranda.” He reached out and grabbed her with both hands. “I’m not asking for payment.”

  “You’re not?”

  “No. I’m trying to tell you I’ve been keeping your payments to me in an investment account. The economy being what it is, it hasn’t grown as much as I had hoped, but it’s yours. I want to make arrangements to transfer it to you.”

  Now her head was really spinning. “What?”

  “Do you want figures? Reports?”

  “No, no.” He’d been saving all the money all this time? It would be enough to pay for her new apartment for a year. But she pulled out of his embrace and shook her head. “No, Mr. P. I can’t take that money. I owed it to you.”

  “Miranda. The whole deal was a ruse to get Russell to take the house.”

  “And look how that turned out.”

  “Nonetheless, the money’s yours. Give me a voided check and I’ll have it wired to your account tomorrow morning.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  So, Miranda thought as she took the ramp to I-85 heading south and into the heart of rush hour traffic. If she didn’t find Hannah Kaye, aka Nitro and Santiago wanted his money back, at least she’d have the cash from Mr. P to fall back on.

  Cause to celebrate, right?

  Not with the ache that still throbbed away in her heart like a deep open cut. Parker had moved out of his family estate. He said he was through with love and commitment. That didn’t sound at all like the man she’d known.

  She really didn’t know him anymore, did she?

  But what did it matter? What Parker said or thought or did was totally irrelevant to her now. She was on her own, as Mackenzie had put it. And she had a job to do.

  A job.

  Gritting her teeth she shook off the bad feelings, or attempted to. She had no right to wallow in her own self pity when a young woman’s life could be at stake.

  With a sheer force of will she wrenched her thoughts back onto the case. And the first thing she thought of was the To-Do list the obnoxious Detective Chambers had ticked off for her.

  No dead body in the ME’s office. That left hospitals, checking out Hannah’s car, and the parents.

  The parents.

  A sick feeling rippled through her. She didn’t want to be the one to tell Hannah Kaye’s folks their daughter was missing. But despite what Bambi-Crytal had said about permission from Yolanda, the dancer could have been up in Gainesville lounging around the family pool all this time. What if she was?

  Miranda had the family’s address and phone number. They were on the employee information Yolanda had given her yesterday as the emergency contact. She had thought it was odd for Hannah to have listed them. Did she think her parents wouldn’t care she was working in a strip club?

  Maybe she’d assumed, like most folks, that she’d never have an emergency. Well, she had one now.

  An in-person visit would be appropriate. But it would take Miranda at least two hours to get up there in this traffic. She didn’t want to waste the time.

  And she really didn’t want the parents involved yet. Yes, they had a right to know about their daughter, but as soon as they did they’d be calling the police, getting on the news, spreading flyers everywhere and that would only drive whoever she was hunting further underground. Besides, if some sick slimeball had kidnapped Hannah Kaye a news story could trigger him to kill her.

  All she really wanted was to know whether Hannah was with her folks. She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. How to get that information. An idea formed in head.

  The traffic slowed to a parking lot like standstill and she reached for her phone. She scrolled to the information and dialed the Gainesville number.

  After three rings a woman answered.

  “Yes?” She had a low, throaty voice, and sounded as if she’d just woken up.

  Miranda cleared her own throat and tried to make herself sound like she was twenty. “Mrs. Kaye?”

  “Yes. Who is this?”

  “My name is, uh, Nancy…” She glanced around and saw a billboard for a local barbeque joint. Flynn’s Ribs. “Flynn,” she said. “Nancy Flynn. I’m a friend of Hannah’s?” She raised her voice into a question the way young folks do.

  Now there was throat clearing on the other end as well. At last the voice said, “What can I do for you, Nancy?” She sounded awake now. And on the young side herself.

  “Well, I…uh…I missed my Discrete…Digital…Equations class last week?” Miranda hoped this lady wasn’t a scientist. “And Hannah said she’d lend me her notes. But she doesn’t have them. Did she by any chance leave them with you when she was home this weekend?”

  There was a rustling, and a murmur. Then a male voice mumbled in the background. The father?

  The woman came back on the line. “I’m sorry, Nancy. But Hannah wasn’t here this weekend.”

  Miranda felt her heart sink. She’d been secretly hoping the girl was at home safe and sound.

  “Nancy? Are you still there?”

  “Yes. Oh. My bad. I wrote it down wrong. Hannah was with Marty this weekend.” She let out a nervous girlish giggle and waited for the response.

  “Marty?”

  “You know. Hannah’s boyfriend?”

  “Oh. I’ve never met the young man.”

  “So she didn’t call and tell you her plans?” Miranda bit her lip. Might have gone a little over the line with that one. But it was a good opportunity to find out about Hannah’s family and how they
felt about her.

  “Hannah’s a grown woman, Nancy,” the woman said, sounding annoyed. “Charles and I have our life. She has hers.”

  Miranda blinked at the phone. Pretty cold for a mother. She had to get off the line. “Oh, okay,” she said in her girlish tone. “Sorry to bother you.”

  She hung up.

  Didn’t sound like Hannah Kaye had the warm loving family relationship Miranda had assumed. Whether that had anything to do with the case or not, she didn’t know. What she did know was Santiago had been right. Hannah Kaye was definitely missing. And it didn’t look good for her.

  A horn blared behind her. Traffic was picking up.

  “Okay!” she yelled and stepped on the gas.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Forty minutes later, Miranda was back in her crappy Midtown office, going through the list of local hospitals she’d dug up on her laptop. One after the other, she schmoozed administrators and nurses and clerks, giving a description of the girl, asking if anyone matching it had been brought in after an accident or an attack or any similar circumstance.

  No match anywhere.

  She hung up and rubbed her eyes. She stared at the rest of the list on her screen. She’d covered the city but there were dozens of medical facilities around the Atlanta area. It would take her hours to go through them.

  She got up and poured out the coffee from Mackenzie’s visit this afternoon and made herself a fresh pot.

  As she pressed the button she forced her thoughts off her personal life and onto the young woman she was trying to find.

  Missing for five days. Didn’t show up for work. Roommate hadn’t seen her. Ex-boyfriend hadn’t seen her. Wasn’t at home with her parents.

  The car.

  That was the thing to look for. From what she knew of the fickleness of young women, Hannah might have decided she wanted to be an actress and hopped a plane to LA. Her car might be sitting at Hartsfield airport for all she knew.

  Chambers said he’d track it down. Hah. She didn’t need his help.

  Forgetting the coffee Miranda returned to her laptop and attacked the keyboard with a vengeance. She hacked into the school’s website again, the way she had with Marty last night, and after a few false starts, got the license plate and VIN number of the vehicle registered to Hannah Kaye.