“Out of service,” he said. “Probably it was a fake number from the start. They’ve usually got a burner phone, but they don’t give the real number to anyone.”
“Detective Dougan would be able to check it out and see if it’s a real number and what the last few calls made on it were. You could say that it just came to your attention, or one of the other workers gave it to you because they were starting to get concerned about not having heard from Jose.”
“I could,” McDonald said morosely, not giving Zachary the impression that he would. But Zachary didn’t want to push it yet, or he’d get kicked out before he got a chance to ask the rest of his questions.
“Did Jose have any friends in particular? Was he always on with someone else?”
McDonald shrugged. “No one that I’m aware of.”
“What did he do? Did he have any particular specialty?”
McDonald looked at the file folder again, his eyes skimming over the information there. “He was a hard worker, did pretty much anything. Mowing, carrying, loading and unloading, handyman work. But he wasn’t a skilled laborer. He didn’t have any particular training or certifications.”
“You don’t know what education he might have had back in El Salvador? Did he ever say that he was an accountant or engineer or anything like that?”
“What would he be doing working at a landscaping company?”
“People do, you know. They get here and they can’t use the education they had in their home country. Doctors and lawyers too.”
“Well, he wasn’t any damn lawyer, that’s for sure.”
Zachary gazed toward the open file on McDonald’s desk. “I don’t suppose I could get a copy of that, could I? Any information you could give me on Jose would be very helpful.”
“You don’t have a warrant. There’s nothing in here you could use, anyway. There’s hardly anything here.”
“Do you have his next of kin? Contact information for his wife?”
McDonald looked at the file, then shook his head. “No. We have an emergency contact—I believe his roommate. But nothing back in El Salvador.”
“Is the emergency contact Nando González?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. I’ve already talked to him. Is there anything else? Anything that concerned you or that came up with the police?”
McDonald looked at his watch. “I think we’re ready to wrap up here. I wish you all the best on your investigation, but I don’t think there’s anything else I can help you with.”
Zachary waited for a few seconds, letting the silence draw out, seeing if there was anything else that McDonald had to contribute.
“How about that phone number? Do you want to give it to Dougan or me?”
“Why would I give it to you?”
“You might find it easier than talking to Dougan. Some people don’t like talking to cops.”
“What are you going to do with it if I give it to you? The number is no good. It isn’t going to lead you anywhere.”
“I may take it to Dougan myself and see if he can find anything out about the last people that Jose talked to, or if there was someone particular who had that number. It may not be a fake number. It may just have run out of minutes or battery by now. He’s been gone for over a week. If it wasn’t plugged in, the battery would be dead.”
“If you tell Dougan it came from me, he’s just going to be back here getting on my case and asking why I didn’t give it to him in the first place.”
Though that would be a good question for Dougan to ask, Zachary didn’t want to antagonize McDonald. “I can say I got it from a friend of Jose’s. Then it’s off of your conscience, because you passed it on, but you won’t have Dougan here asking questions. If you want to know the truth, I don’t think Dougan is interested in putting any more time into the case. Not unless I can turn something up for him to look at.”
McDonald pondered this for a few minutes, then shrugged. He turned the open file folder around so that it was right side up for Zachary. “There it is. You can copy it down.”
Zachary skimmed the rest of the page as he slowly got his notepad out and flipped through it, looking for the next blank page to write the number down on. He wasn’t a fast reader and he didn’t have a photographic memory, so there wasn’t a lot that he could get from the form in the time it took for him to write down the number. But he did his best, quickly skimming past Jose’s name and address. No SSN, of course, and the birthdate was also blank. The phone number that didn’t work. Nando’s name and phone number. A short list of the safety and hazardous materials training Jose had received from the company. There was nothing filled in under medical conditions and allergies. A few codes at the bottom of the page that Zachary didn’t understand. Probably his pay level and other terms of employment. Zachary painstakingly scrawled out the phone number, reviewing the page for any other clues. When he was done, McDonald took the file back again.
“I appreciate you taking the time with me,” Zachary told him.
McDonald stretched, then took a drink of his coffee, as if he’d just been released from a tedious meeting. “Tell me the truth… you don’t think that Jose was actually killed by a serial killer, do you? That’s just something you said to get in the door?”
“I’m afraid it is something I’m looking at. I’m meeting with someone shortly who can hopefully give me a head start on that. You’ll let me know if you think of anything else? Or if anyone else seems to be showing interest in Jose and what happened to him?” Zachary slid another business card across the desk for him. “Just give me a call if you think of anything. It doesn’t have to be proven. Random facts are fine. You never know what might trigger a connection.”
McDonald nodded, but didn’t pick up the card.
Zachary called Philippe to see where he was on getting ahold of his friend who had inside knowledge of the men who had disappeared. Philippe said that he had talked to him, but that he needed some time to prepare before meeting with Zachary. Zachary hoped that didn’t mean that he was spooked and on the run.
“You’re sure he’s going to get back to us?”
“He will, he will,” Philippe assured him. “He wants someone to listen. For years, he keeps telling everyone about these men disappearing, and no one will listen. He wants to talk to you.”
“Okay. Well, I need to keep moving forward with the investigation, so have you had a chance to think about places that Jose might have spent time?”
“I don’t think it’s safe for you to go to these places. You were just telling me not to go anywhere alone.”
Zachary had a hard time coming up with an argument to that. “I’ll just be asking questions as a private investigator. Nobody is going to think that I’m gay.”
“Who are you kidding? People see you coming out of a gay scene, they’re going to think that you’re gay.”
“I’ll be careful,” Zachary promised. “Now, give me a few places to check out.”
Philippe sighed and complied, giving Zachary the names of a few establishments and where they could be found. Zachary could practically hear him shaking his head. “But you be careful, bro…”
“I will.” Zachary put his phone away. For a moment, he entertained the idea of calling a friend to go with him to the bars. But he was away from home and couldn’t think of any friends that he would have invited to go to a gay bar with him anyway. All of the cops he knew well were out of the jurisdiction and weren’t going to drive a couple of hours out of their way to humor Zachary’s whims.
Tyrrell wasn’t that far away, but Zachary couldn’t imagine taking his baby brother into such a place. Mr. Peterson and Pat were, of course, the logical choices, but they were getting on in years and neither would want to be seen as being on the prowl. Being seen crawling gay bars with a much younger man like Zachary might irreparably damage their reputations.
So he went alone, like he had planned to do from the start.
Chapter Ten
W
“Uh, hi,” Zachary greeted. “Get a Coke?”
The bartender nodded and got out a glass. He filled it from the fountain, added a lime wedge to the rim, and placed it on a square napkin in front of Zachary. Zachary slid a bill across to him.
“Don’t think I’ve seen you here before,” the bartender commented.
“No. This is my first time.”
“You meeting someone here?”
He had a feeling that the bartender was trying to figure out if he belonged there or had just wandered in from the street, thinking it was a regular bar.
“Actually, I’m looking for people who might know a missing man. Name of Jose Flores.”
“Missing?”
“He seems to have dropped off the face of the earth more than a week ago. I’m trying to figure out what happened to him.”
“That happens sometimes,” the bartender said cautiously.
“Maybe so. If he’s just gone on to something else, that’s fine… but he has friends who are worried that something might have happened to him.”
The man scratched the back of his neck. “That so?”
“Yeah.” Zachary passed his card across the bar. “I’m Zachary.”
“Paul.” He didn’t give his last name, but there was no reason he should. It wasn’t like Zachary was the police or it was an official interrogation. He didn’t need to provide any information he didn’t want to.
“Nice to meet you, Paul. Did you know Jose Flores?”
“Might have. How do you know him?”
Zachary considered how best to answer it. He didn’t know whether Mr. Peterson and Pat had ever been to the bar, or whether it was just somewhere for unattached young men to meet each other. Their names might mean nothing to Paul. But on the other hand, if he fudged on how he got the case, Paul might not see any reason to help him out. A private investigator looking into a disappearance for no obvious reason was very different from a private investigator looking into it for a friend who was concerned.
“A friend of mine asked me to look into it,” he said slowly. “But I don’t know if he has ever been here. I got the name of this bar from someone else.”
“Who is your friend?”
“Patrick Parker. He is sort of a step-father to me.”
Paul considered that, saying nothing. He polished a smudge on the bar counter that was invisible to Zachary. “He doesn’t come around here,” he said, “but I know him.”
Zachary nodded, relaxing a little. “If you want to ask him about me, he’ll confirm it.”
“I believe you.”
“So did you know Jose?”
“Not very well, but he did hang out here. Him and a couple of other immigrants.”
“Was there ever any trouble that you saw? Anyone give him any hassle? Or did he ever get in a fight or cause trouble for you?”
“He wasn’t that kind of guy. He was pretty quiet. Just wanted to meet people, have a drink and maybe a dance. Go somewhere else to take it any further.”
Zachary breathed slowly. He took a sip of his Coke. “The guys he came with, they ever cause any trouble? Give you a bad vibe?”
“No. Nothing I can remember. They were regulars. Nothing suspicious.”
“And was he always with them? Did he ever come by himself?”
“Might have. I didn’t keep close track of him. As long as he was ordering drinks and not causing any trouble, why would I care who he was with or what he was doing? This is a place where you come to be yourself. We don’t interfere with patrons unless they’re being disruptive.”
Zachary nodded. “When was the last time you saw him?”
“I couldn’t say. A week. Two. Couldn’t be sure.”
“He’s been missing from work for about ten days.”
Paul nodded. “Somewhere in there.”
“You ever talk to him? Discuss any interests? Home? Hopes and dreams?”
Paul chuckled. “Like I say, he wasn’t here to talk to me. We never exchanged more than a few words.”
“He was from El Salvador.”
“Uh-huh.”
“He never talked about it?”
“No, can’t say he did.”
“Never talked about going home?”
“Going home? No. Never. Nothing like that.”
“You got the feeling that he intended to be here permanently.”
“I don’t know what his plans were, but I don’t think going back to El Salvador ever entered into it.”
“He had a wife and kids there.”
Paul gave a grin. “All the more reason never to go back.”
“I guess so. Do you get a lot of men in here who have families? Who hang around here but aren’t… out?”
“Probably half the people who come in here, my friend. If they can’t be themselves at home, they need somewhere they can be. This is that place for a lot of people. Leave the mask at the door and show who you really are and what you really want.”
Zachary shifted uncomfortably. He looked around briefly. There were a few more customers trickling in, but things were not picking up yet. The music sounded too loud. Later, it would be drowned out by conversations. One patron, a big bear of a man with grizzled black and gray whiskers stared at Zachary, his face curious and challenging. He seemed to be a customer rather than a bouncer, but he looked like he would be perfectly happy running Zachary out of there if he felt like it was necessary. Zachary took a few more swallows of his Coke, trying not to let the man’s stare unnerve him.
“Did he have any particular friends, other than the other immigrants that he sometimes came with?”
“No one particular. He hadn’t settled down.”
“So he didn’t have a steady date.”
“No.”
“I was talking to Philippe earlier.”
“I figured.”
“How?” Zachary was taken aback that Paul would know who he had been talking to.
“Most people know to keep their mouths shut. That young pup Philippe… he hasn’t learned yet.”
“He’s concerned about Jose. I’m someone who could help. It’s not like he talked to someone untrustworthy.”
Paul looked at him thoughtfully, then nodded. “Still… the boy needs more experience. I’m afraid he’s going to say something to the wrong person. Something that will have consequences.”
“Do you know who the wrong person would be? Is there someone around here you would not trust?”
“There’s always people around here you can’t trust,” the bartender said slowly. “And once you say something, you can’t take it back. Things could happen.” He traced a white scar that ran down his neck.
“Is that what happened to you?”
“I was a young pup once too. The lessons can be harsh. Luckily, I survived. Not everyone does.”
“Who cut you? Did you get in a fight? Were you attacked?”
“It was a long time ago. He’s not around anymore.”
“But there could be other people around here who would hurt someone like Philippe if he said the wrong thing.”
Paul agreed. He left Zachary to attend to other customers, moving down the bar and then back again eventually. Zachary watched the patrons around him. He knew he couldn’t tell who was safe and who was dangerous just by looking at them, but there wasn’t anyone in the bar yet that he had a particularly bad feeling about. He would have felt comfortable talking to any of them. At least, under the right circumstances. Maybe not in a gay bar, but if they were sitting next to him on the bus or at a conference, he wouldn’t have felt like they were dangerous.
; “Philippe said that there have been other people who have disappeared. Other men like Jose,” he said when Paul was back down at his end of the bar.
Paul busied himself with the till and the bar, serving drinks and making change as more people started to flow in through the doors. It was picking up faster than Zachary would have expected. Paul returned to where Zachary sat and leaned closer to him, bringing him a second Coke. “I wouldn’t discuss that here.”
Zachary looked around. The man who had been staring at him was sitting down, nursing a drink of his own, and no longer staring at Zachary, though he still glanced over while Zachary was examining him. Zachary looked around for anyone else who might be listening in or showing an interest in their conversation. No one looked particularly concerned with his being there.
“I don’t suppose you’d want to discuss it another time and place,” he suggested.
“No,” Paul agreed. “So maybe you’d best just drop it. You don’t need to be panicking people, making them think this is not a safe place.”
“No, I didn’t mean that. I didn’t mean that anyone had disappeared from the bar. Just from town.”
“People come and go all the time. Someone hangs out here for a few weeks or a few months, and then one day you think, ‘I haven’t seen that guy lately. I wonder whatever happened to him.’ And probably, you never find out.”
“Sure,” Zachary agreed. “They find somewhere else they like to hang out, or they start a serious relationship and aren’t here looking anymore. People aren’t static.”
“No. And it’s best not to start talking about people disappearing, like something bad happened to them. There’s a difference between disappearing and just not going back to the same bar.”
Zachary drained his first Coke and pulled the second toward him. He needed to pace himself, or he was going to end up having to use the public restroom, and he really didn’t think he wanted to risk that. He took a very small sip to show that he was still drinking and passed another bill to Paul to pay for the second drink.
They Thought He was Safe Page 7
