by Ben Rehder
He frowned at me. “So what?”
I stared at him. He stared back.
“Oh, come on,” I said.
“Come on with what?”
I took a breath. Why was Ruelas always so uncooperative? “Why do you think she was wearing it?”
“Because she looks cute in it?”
He wasn’t stupid. Just obstinate.
I said, “Imagine you’re the captain on a party barge. Turns out the owner’s stepdaughter is gorgeous. She asks to steer the boat. What’re you gonna do? Say no? I mean specifically you. What would you do?”
“I wouldn’t be the captain on a party boat,” Ruelas said. “I got better things to do.”
He placed my iPad on the table and slid it toward me.
“You’d let her steer any time she was on the boat,” I said, “and if she was being a flirt and took the hat off your head, you’d go home later with dirty thoughts and see if you could smell her shampoo on it. Or you’d put the cap on her head yourself. Either way, the captain’s hat was on her head because she was steering the boat.”
Ruelas let out a dismissive snort. “Can’t believe I drove up here for this. Holloway might’ve been standing right fucking beside her, just out of the photo, maybe even with one hand on the wheel. This photo is basically worthless. Another one of your theories, with nothing to back it up. That might work in your world, but it doesn’t work in mine.”
It was time to lay all my cards on the table.
I said, “Eric Moss was willing to have me killed to shut me up. Three hours ago, they had me tied up on the Island Hopper, ready to drop me in the lake.”
He gave me a skeptical look, so I told him the full story—every last detail—and I ended by saying, “Feel the bump on the back of my head.” I leaned toward him. “Seriously, feel it.”
I didn’t think he would, but he did. The knot on my head was tender, but the blow hadn’t broken the skin or caused any bleeding. I still didn’t know who had blindsided me—Holloway or Byrd—but it didn’t really matter at this point.
“You could have a career in phrenology,” I said.
“You could have a career in getting your ass kicked,” Ruelas said, leaning back. “Did you call it in?”
“Why would I? Holloway and his punks would simply say I was lying.”
“Pretty funny that your partner had to save your ass again.”
Which meant he believed my story. That was progress.
“Again?” I asked.
“Yeah, that’s the way it usually works with you two. You fumble around in the dark while she actually gets shit done.”
“I’m bringing you fresh information on this case. I was hoping you’d do something with it.”
“You wanna file a report about the abduction? Go for it.”
He knew as well as I did that reporting the crime would likely create more legal headaches for me in regards to Holloway’s assault charges. Ruelas also probably believed Holloway’s claim that they were only trying to scare me, so he wasn’t taking the incident seriously.
I said, “I would prefer that you talk to Starlyn about this photograph. Surely you can get a twenty-year-old girl to crack under your skillful interrogation.”
“She’s not a girl, she’s a woman,” he said, totally needling me. “And she’s not talking anymore. None of them are. I already told you that.”
“Then talk to her attorney. Tell him it’s Starlyn’s last chance to stop this thing from getting even worse for her than it already is.”
He’d had enough of me telling him how to go about his work.
“At this point,” he said slowly, “you’ll be lucky if I don’t charge you with interfering with an investigation.”
“That would be great,” I said. “At least you’d be making an arrest.” Then, before he could respond, or perhaps punch me in the teeth, I added, “That was out of line. I apologize.”
He said, “You should leave now, and it would be great if I didn’t hear from you again for a long time.”
On the way back to my apartment, I daydreamed about various ways to set things right with Gilbert Holloway, Anson Byrd, and Eric Moss. No doubt about it, they were going to pay for what they had done.
I don’t know why, but I wasn’t quite as angry with Meatball. He hadn’t given me an egg-sized lump on my head. He hadn’t tied me up—as far as I knew. He hadn’t tried to kick me in the face, or taunted me, or taken great enthusiasm at the prospect of sinking me into the lake. On the other hand, he’d driven the boat, so he would need to atone for that.
I took a shower—to wash off all that panic-induced sweat—and when I got out, Mia had sent a text. Still no Dennis.
I sent one back. What a menace.
She replied with a sad face.
I tried to watch a college football game and decompress, but it didn’t help much.
Finally, an hour later, I got a decent distraction: a call from Mia.
“Let me just say that these people would fit right in on an episode of Jerry Springer. It’s like their IQ is just high enough that they can get through the day without injuring themselves.”
I could tell from the ambient noise that she was talking to me hands-free in her Mustang.
I opened my mouth, but she had more to say. “Roscoe actually believes that smoking doesn’t cause cancer. He says it’s all a scam so the government can put a tax on cigarettes. And it’s not just that he’s willfully ignorant, it’s that he’s so damn obnoxious and condescending about it.”
“So, uh, you’re not enjoying your time together?” I asked.
“I have no idea what to do. Dennis could be anywhere. He might literally be halfway to Florida or California by now. I’m not sure what they expect me to do about it.”
“You owe them nothing,” I said.
She ignored that comment and instead said, “If you had a brother like Dennis, wouldn’t you take some precautions against this sort of thing?”
The answer, of course, was yes. The same kinds of precautions Mia and I took with each other, such as the Find My iPhone app that had basically saved my life earlier in the day. If Dennis were my brother, I’d be in charge of his cell phone account and make sure that I could track his phone if it became necessary. He probably wouldn’t like it, but he’d have to live with it just the same.
It was a rhetorical question on her part, so I said, “What’s your plan?”
“Right now, I’m going to go home, have a glass of wine, and try to relax a little.”
“You want any help?” I said.
“Sure. Meet me at my house. Oh, and bring some wine.”
“I was talking about finding Dennis,” I said. “But I like your idea better.”
31
After I did everything in my power physically to reduce her stress and lower her frustration level, we both got a good night’s sleep, and in the morning, she agreed to let me help find Dennis Babcock.
“Did they have any guesses as to where he might go?” I asked. “Favorite places? Strip bars? Crack houses? Book clubs?”
We were still in bed at 8:03 on Sunday morning. I’d been awake since 7:15, but Mia had been sleeping so deeply, I lay still until she finally woke at 7:52.
“According to Lorene, he doesn’t have many friends,” Mia said. “She said Dennis occasionally mentioned a guy named Ted, but she’d never met him before and didn’t know where he lived. There’s also the very real possibility that Ted doesn’t exist.”
“Except in Dennis’s imagination?” I said.
“Right. As to where else he might go, they named a couple of restaurants in his neighborhood, but I checked both of those with no luck.”
A cool front had blown in overnight, and I could tell from the muted light filtering through Mia’s bedroom curtains that it was a cloudy morning. I’d noticed that the air conditioner hadn’t kicked on since I’d been awake.
“Did he take his cell phone with him?” I asked.
“Yes, but he won’t an
swer. Goes straight to voicemail.”
“Does he have a debit card?”
“Yeah, but there’s no way to know when and where he’s using it. Lorene and Roscoe don’t have access to his accounts.”
I tried to remember some details from our early investigation into him. We hadn’t been able to find a Facebook account for him, or any social media presence, for that matter. That was unusual for a person his age, and it would make our job all that much harder. But there was also the chance that he used a screen name instead of his real name.
I asked Mia about that possibility, and she said, “Lorene said he wasn’t into all that.”
“No Twitter? No Snapchat? Nothing?”
“As far as she knew.”
“So what did he do with his free time? Any hobbies?”
It was odd how little we had learned about Dennis Babcock in the time we’d had him under surveillance. He didn’t leave the house much. We didn’t know if that was typical for him, or if he’d avoided going out in public after making the claim about the tetanus shot. It wasn’t unusual for fraudsters to become hermits temporarily, especially if they were feigning some sort of physical impairment or disability. The less they went out, the lower the chance of getting caught in a moment of forgetfulness.
“He spent a lot of time online doing something—maybe forums or gaming or something like that,” Mia said. “But his laptop was password protected. Lorene admitted she’d tried to snoop on it before.”
The man had delusions of paranoia. Of course his laptop was password protected.
“He took the laptop with him?”
“Yep.”
“Did Lorene or Roscoe ever come up with the brilliant idea of simply asking him what he did with his time all day?”
“You’re talking about people who show more interest in his government check than they show in him.”
“Good point. I’m going to repeat that you owe them nothing. They are both horrible people, from what I’ve seen.”
“Yeah, but Dennis isn’t,” Mia said.
“Maybe he wants to be gone. Maybe it’ll turn out to be the best thing for him.”
“Oh, I agree. He needs to be in a better environment. But right now, he’s probably on the street, and since I promised to help...”
We lay in silence for several minutes.
“Is that rain?” Mia said.
“Sounds like it. Just a sprinkle.”
But I knew she was picturing Dennis Babcock out there in the weather with nowhere to go. Then it began to rain harder.
“I just have no idea how to find him,” Mia said.
It was frustrating that the police might be able to find Dennis fairly quickly—through cell phone tracking or debit card usage—if they had grounds to look for him. But Dennis’s illness didn’t strip him of the rights and autonomy every other adult enjoys. I couldn’t help thinking that maybe it should.
“We’ll figure something out,” I said. “We always do. And until then, I’m going to stay right here, rubbing your thigh. And what a thigh it is. Oh, hey, here’s another one just like it!”
Mia placed a hand over mine to stop the rubbing. Now wasn’t the time, I guess.
“Okay, so we start with good old-fashioned canvassing,” I said. “We visit every convenience store and restaurant within a mile of Dennis’s house and ask if they’ve seen him.”
“He should be memorable, since he’ll still be holding his arms over his head,” Mia said.
Which was true. Just because we had gotten Roscoe and Lorene to confess to their scam, that had no impact on Dennis’s delusion that he’d been damaged by the tetanus shot.
“I wonder what makes something like that go away,” I said. “I mean, eventually it will, right? He can’t walk around like that forever. Maybe it just takes time. Or some other delusion has to take its place.”
Mia sat up suddenly. “Those are great questions,” she said, her mood totally different now. “And we should ask the person who probably knows more about Dennis than anybody else. Because they might also be able to help us figure out where he is.”
“Uh, who are we talking about?” I said.
Her name was Dr. Caren Creech, and we had her on the phone less than an hour after Mia had her flash of brilliance. Creech was, of course, Dennis’s psychiatrist.
Roscoe and Lorene hadn’t been able to give us a name—surprise, surprise—so Mia had instructed them to check for a physician’s name on one of Dennis’s prescription bottles. After that, it was easy to find the doctor’s website, and then a phone number, and then an after-hours phone number for use in the event of a crisis. We decided Dennis’s disappearance counted as a crisis. Mia left a voicemail explaining the situation, and Creech called back in less than five minutes.
“I understand the reason for your concern,” she said, “but we have no reason to think he’s in any danger. Correct?”
“He’s not taking his meds,” Mia replied, using speakerphone so I could hear the conversation.
“I figured as much, but that alone isn’t a reason for me to reveal any confidential information,” Creech said. “And even if I did, I’m not sure if it would be helpful. I haven’t seen Dennis for six weeks.”
I was thinking, Isn’t that in itself confidential information? But I kept my mouth shut.
“His sister is concerned about him,” Mia said, “because he has never taken off like this before.”
There was a pause on Creech’s end, and I interpreted that pause to mean, His sister is concerned? Really?
Finally the doctor said, “You can ask questions, and if I can answer them, I will.”
“Thank you,” Mia said. “Have you heard from Dennis lately?”
“I have not.”
“He hasn’t tried to call you or anything like that?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
“Has he ever brought up the idea of just taking off someday?”
“That I can’t answer.”
“Has he mentioned any friends that might take him in for a few days?”
“Sorry. Can’t answer that, either.”
“Do you think he might go to a homeless shelter—the Salvation Army? Places like that?”
“Seems like a decent guess, but honestly, I don’t know if he’d go there or not. Maybe for a meal, but probably not to stay overnight.”
“Do you have any other ideas where he might go? I’m talking local, even within walking distance from his house.”
I got the sense that Creech felt that she was overstepping her boundaries, but that the circumstances called for it.
“There’s a small library branch near the bus stop he uses. I know he hangs out there sometimes.”
The branch was maybe five thousand square feet. Had a large service desk right up front, a media and technology room with maybe a dozen computers to the left, and, in the back, several rooms filled with... books. Imagine that. Real printed books, in this day and age. Who would’ve guessed?
I moved to a nearby table and took a seat. It wasn’t busy, but there were enough people seated at tables and browsing at various racks and shelves that it took me a full minute to scan them all. No Dennis Babcock.
I did see two men I assumed were homeless. Yes, I was profiling. The men were unshaven, their hair unkempt, and their clothing hadn’t seen a washing machine in some time. Ragged backpacks rested on the floor under their chairs. One of the men had his head on the table, plainly sleeping. Who could blame him? I didn’t know where I’d go if I were homeless, but a library would look pretty good. My understanding was that many of the shelters allowed overnight habitation only—they didn’t allow patrons to hang around in the daytime—so all those people had to go somewhere. Why not pick a safe, quiet place with a restroom and access to a variety of entertainment choices?
Earlier, on the drive over, Mia had said, “If we get lucky and find him there, I don’t want to talk to him. I just want to call Roscoe and Lorene and tell them where he is. If we ta
lk to him, or if he even sees us, he might take off again.”
“Agreed. That’s why I should go in alone.”
“Wait, why? This is my mess and I should clean it up. I’ll go in.”
She meant it, too. She didn’t see the flaw in that approach. So I said, “Think about it. Which one of us do you think Dennis Babcock is more likely to remember? Some random dude like me, or the potential supermodel?”
“Oh,” she said, but she didn’t argue the point.
Still, though, I needed to be as discreet as possible, and that’s why I was wearing eyeglasses with a thick black frame—to change my appearance, even just a bit. I would be willing to wager I could walk right past Dennis Babcock without turning his head—if he were here, inside the library, which he probably wasn’t.
I rose from the table and made my way to the rear left-hand room in the building. Judging by the colorful posters and other artwork on the wall and the toys in one corner, this was the children’s section. Also, there were some children, so that was a clue. I glanced quickly down the three aisles of books. No Dennis.
I moved to the next room over, which was about twice as large as the children’s room. The shelves here were closer together and taller, giving the room the feel of a maze. This appeared to be the fiction section. No Dennis browsing in the aisles. No Dennis sitting at either of the small tables at the rear of the room.
I exited the room and Dennis walked past me.
He didn’t see me. Didn’t even look my way. He was heading for the front door, carrying only a small duffel bag.
And he was walking normally.
32
I yanked my phone from my pocket and began recording video as quickly as possible, but by then, Dennis Babcock was already walking out the front door.
I followed, but not so closely that he would notice me. By the time I exited, he was fifteen yards away, crossing the parking lot toward the street. Fortunately, the light rain from earlier had stopped. I recorded for several seconds, then slipped my phone back into my pocket, still recording, so I would at least capture audio. By now, Mia would be recording from her SUV, which was parked about twenty yards away. She would have seen Dennis leave the library, arms down, and known what to do.
