by Angela Foxxe
She was all checked in at her hotel and in her room in record time, and after a few moments spent on her laptop to update the little information that she had on the case, she decided to call it a night. The sun would be up bright and early, and so would she.
She wanted to get as much canvassing done before the temperature hit one hundred.
She figured she had until at least ten in the morning before it got insanely hot. Hopefully, that was enough time to get what needed to be done, done. The sooner she could get out of this good ‘ole boys club, the better. She stuck out like a sore thumb there, and she couldn’t wait to get back to Virginia and away from this place.
CHAPTER TWO
The shrill ring of the phone yanked Senora out of a deep sleep just in time to see the room light up so bright that it nearly blinded her. She fumbled for the phone, answering it on the second ring, the loud rumble of thunder shaking her to her core and making her chest hurt.
“Edwards,” she said, though she knew who it was.
There was another flash and an immediate clap of thunder, then the sky opened up and the deluge began. Senora struggled to hear J on the other end, but the storm was too loud. She got out of bed, hurrying into the bathroom and closing the door behind her. The storm still raged, but at least she could hear.
“J, are you there?” she asked, waiting for the all too familiar, disjointedly spoken voice of the computer talking back to her.
She could hear the click of the keyboard as J typed, and the generic male voice came over the line as it had every year since Senora had been recruited for the high risk missing person unit.
“Have you made any progress in the case?” J asked through the computer’s voice.
“There wasn’t much to go on,” she admitted.
She blinked a few times, looking at her watch and noting the hour. It was only five in the morning, but it was time that Senora got going. There were some local places she wanted to canvas before it got too hot, and she needed to head out, despite the storm. Addie Thompson wasn’t going to find herself, though she had in the past, according to the Sheriff.
“How are the locals?”
“Awful,” Senora admitted, dropping her normally professional tone for a second. “They don’t believe that she is a victim, and they’re not willing to ‘waste’ much time on finding her. It’s really sad.”
“Did they give a reason for their apathy?”
“Apparently, Miss Thompson has faked her disappearance a few times, and the Sheriff seems to think that if she got kidnapped, she’s finally getting what she deserves. I am more than a little disgusted with how they’re treating the case, but I guess I can’t blame them. I’m waiting for the background report on Miss Thompson to come back so I can see for myself what the pattern is with her, and if there’s a chance that this disappearance is a hoax.”
“Do you think it is?”
“No,” she said after a long pause. “I don’t know how to explain it, but something feels different about this time. The way the Sheriff described it, Addie seemed to spiral into a funk, then fake a disappearance for attention. But this time, it looked as if she’d gotten her life together and was doing well. This just doesn’t have the markings of someone who is doing it for attention. She had everything going for her.”
“Others have faked their own disappearance while appearing to have their lives together. I don’t think it’s that crazy to think that too much responsibility could set a person like Addie off if the stories of her past are accurate.”
“That’s why I’m waiting for her background check to come back. I need to see what happened the other times to get an idea of where I should start. They don’t usually take this long.”
“That’s actually why I was calling. Her juvenile records are sealed, and not just by the normal avenues.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Usually, I can get around restrictions and sealed records, but this time, it’s as if her entire childhood was wiped clean and no record was kept anywhere.”
“That’s odd,” Senora said, jumping when another crash of thunder rumbled overhead and shook the hotel bathroom.
“Is everything okay?” J asked in the hollow computer voice.
“There’s just a bad storm,” she said.
“I’ll send over what I have on Addie, but it’s not much. Better be careful with that storm. It’s tornado season in Texas, and you don’t want to get blown away.”
“Tornado season?” Senora repeated, resisting the urge to gulp fearfully.
“Yep. Or as Texans like to call it, ‘every day of the year.’”
Before Senora could respond, J hung up, and the portable printer beside her laptop fired up and began spitting out papers in rapid succession. Senora waited until they were done to retrieve them, sitting down at the desk to look through the file and shaking her head. J hadn’t been exaggerating when he had said that Addie’s past had been wiped clean. There was nothing on her prior to her sixteenth birthday. No school records, no medical history. Nothing. It was as if Addie hadn’t existed before she had gotten her driver’s license.
“That’s so strange,” Senora said aloud, flipping through the pages and reading what little the report had to offer.
What the report did show backed up the Sheriff’s account of Addie’s multiple faked abductions.
Senora sighed heavily. Not that it made what the Sheriff had done and said any better, but at least she understood where he was coming from now. Addie had faked her own abduction fifteen times in the space of four years, and it was clear that she was doing it for attention. It was no surprise that the police department was tired of putting their resources toward a girl who obviously needed help. Looking through the file a second time, Senora didn’t see any indication that the girl had been sent to a counselor, but that didn’t mean anything. Senora could have sought help on her own, which wouldn’t necessarily be in her file. If Senora was a betting woman, she would bet that Addie had received some kind of help, or she’d hit a wall.
Maybe, she simply grew up and decided that the attention she was receiving wasn’t the kind that she wanted. Whatever the reason, the more she knew about Addie Thompson, the more she was certain that this latest abduction was genuine.
Her faked abductions had run on a pretty consistent pattern for years, but the last faked abduction had been over a year before, and that was out of character for Addie. Senora doubted that someone who faked their own disappearance every three to five months could go an entire year between cons. That was, unless they had stopped conning people altogether and were making positive changes in their life. Despite what the Sheriff had assumed, knowing what she did about Addie made it more likely that this abduction was real. The pattern didn’t fit, and Addie had made herself an easy target with her past behavior.
Anyone who knew Addie knew that no one would believe that she had actually been kidnapped, at least, not right away. She was the perfect mark, and as Senora finished the file and set it down on the desk, she felt more worried about Addie than she had yesterday.
Addie was in danger. Senora felt it down to her very core. If she didn’t find Addie soon, Senora suspected that she never would. At least, not alive.
“Stop it right now,” she said to the empty room, shaking off the gloomy thoughts and wishing that she could silence them.
But death was a common occurrence in her line of work, especially since the victims who came across her desk were the least of the least. They were the women, and sometimes men, their families had given up on. The people that police no longer wanted to search for.
The faces that would never make the six o’clock news. Senora was their last hope, and she usually didn’t even hear their name until their light had been snuffed out. The occasional success story was worth all the heartache, but Addie’s case left a heavy, hopeless feeling in Senora’s chest. This girl was in trouble, and the apathy her disappearance had been met with wasn’t working in her favor.
Only the mother’s desperate plea had given Addie a fighting chance, but Senora knew that the chance was slim at best. Addie’s choices had brought her to this place. Not the choices of the past year, but the ones before. Senora knew without a doubt that Addie’s previous lies had created the perfect victim. She knew on a visceral level that someone had pounced on the opportunity that Addie had created.
Even the boy who cried wolf eventually got what was coming to him.
The words swirled in her mind like dead leaves in the autumn wind. A part of her realized that the Sheriff was justified in his feelings. But the whole of her fiercely denied it. It didn’t matter how many times Addie had messed up. Addie needed Senora now. And Senora wasn’t about to let her down if she could help it.
Not wanting to sit around the hotel a moment longer, Senora looked out the window and gauged the storm as it made its way through Glen Rose , headed east toward the neighboring town.
Senora scoffed. Neighboring town? How about the nearest town, which was almost thirty miles away? There were a few little places here and there that might qualify as towns, but Senora doubted that. somehow. With populations in the double digits at most, they seemed more like scattered neighborhoods than actual towns. At any rate, the storm was heading that way and, by the looks of it, would fizzle out before it found its way to anywhere with a substantial population.
Getting dressed, she pulled on her shoes and shoved the file folder into her backpack. She checked her revolver and her backup piece, then headed out the door. She cursed under her breath, wishing that she had thought to bring a light jacket. Even though it was still drizzling and the sun wasn’t up yet, it was very muggy and starting to get hot already. It was going to be miserable outside no matter how long she waited. She might as well get in the car and get going. It wasn’t like she was going to sleep anymore anyway.
She ran down the stairs, outrunning the drizzle as best as she could and groaning when she looked in the rearview mirror of the car. Her hair was damp and already starting to frizz as the curls fought against being straightened after her shower. Rolling her eyes, she hurriedly twisted her long, deep brown hair into a quick French braid and flung it over her shoulder. It was too humid to do anything else with it, and she really didn’t have the energy to fight it.
Keying the first address into the GPS, she pulled out of the parking spot and headed down the dark streets.
She was surprised by the number of cars going down the main two-lane highway, but it seemed that all of Texas got up early to avoid the heat. She wended her way through the sluggish traffic, then turned down a dark, quiet street and pulled into the parking lot of the Glen Rose Nursing Home.
She got out of the car and looked for a buzzer on the front entrance and found none. At the front desk a man with a big smile waved her through the door.
“There are no locks here,” he said, tipping his head even though he wasn’t wearing a hat. “I’m Mark. Can I help you with something?”
Senora smiled at him, then pulled out a stack of photographs.
“Do you know this woman?” she said, handing him a photo of Addie, smiling brightly with vibrant honeysuckle in the background and the sun shining down on her face.
“I do,” he said, his hands shaking as he looked at Addie’s face. “She’s got a good heart.”
“Why are your hands shaking?” Senora asked bluntly.
Mark looked up and smiled, the expression sweet and open on his face. Senora got the impression that this man didn’t know how to be anything but genuine, and she instantly liked him.
“Addie was,” he paused as if searching for a kind way to say what he was thinking, “troubled. She worked here for about three months before she ‘vanished’ while taking some seniors into Granbury to go shopping. She left them there and ‘disappeared’ in the shopping center.”
He put his fingers in the air, making quotation marks when he said “vanished” and “disappeared.” The sentiment was all too familiar, though this man was being far nicer than the Sheriff had been about Addie’s past.
“Is that why she got fired from here?” Senora asked, keeping her face passive.
“No, if you can believe that. She was found within forty-eight hours that time, and no one was harmed. She lost her field trip privileges, but she was so nice, and we have a high turnover rate, so good people are hard to come by.”
“Why the high turnover rate?”
“It’s the nature of the work. It’s hard not to get attached to the residents here, and they’re at the end of their lives.”
He whispered the last part even though the hallway was empty, and Senora was pretty sure that the people in the facility were aware that they were older. She didn’t think that it would be a shock to most people in their eighties and nineties that they would probably pass away soon. His discretion was endearing, his manner heartwarming. Senora could tell that he loved his job and the people he helped take care of. But he wasn’t a gossip, and he wasn’t going to give Senora the information that she needed unless she outright asked for it.
“I get that Addie was troubled, but I still don’t understand your reaction. She was found unharmed and still worked here for a few months before she was let go, right?”
“She was,” he said. “But I guess I don’t see how you would be asking about Addie if something hadn’t happened to her. It’s been a long time since her name has been on everyone’s lips here. I was kind of hoping that she’d made a change for the better, you know?”
“I do. So, what was the final straw that led to Addie’s termination?”
“She was stealing,” Mark said, looking decidedly uncomfortable. “You know, medication. She was stealing from the pharmacy, and that’s something they just can’t let go.”
“I understand. I don’t blame them. They can’t really have an addict working and having free-”
“She wasn’t an addict,” Mark said, cutting her off. “It was for her mother. Her mother was sick and couldn’t afford all the medicine she needed.”
“I hadn’t heard that. Her mother made a full recovery then?”
“She did, but it was all thanks to Addie. After Addie got fired from here, she got herself a good job with great benefits, and she fought to get her mother on her insurance. It took some time, but once that happened, her mother got better really fast.”
“Is Mabel doing well now?” Senora pressed.
“As far as I know, she’s doing great. But with Addie gone, she’s probably worried.”
“Why?”
“Mabel needs medicine to stay alive. She’s got some kind of autoimmune disease, and the medicine she’s on keeps her healthy and pain-free. If Addie loses this job, Mabel might lose her coverage, and then she’ll be right back where she was a few years ago. I’m not sure she can survive that again.”
Senora nodded. It made sense, and maybe Mabel’s illness had been the trigger that had helped Addie turn over a new leaf. There was nothing as scary as losing a parent young, and it looked like Addie had gone to great lengths to ensure that her mother lived a happy, healthy and full life.
“I guess I’m just scared that something bad happened to Addie and that Mabel won’t be able to take care of herself. Addie is a hot mess, but she was a sweet girl, and I wanted to see her succeed. They deserved to be happy, and I always worried that one day, Addie wouldn’t be pretending to be missing.”
“I understand,” Senora said. “But it looks like she’s missing for real this time, and I’m worried about her.”
Mark nodded, opening his mouth to say something when the phone started ringing. He looked at her as if asking her permission to answer it, and she nodded.
“You’ve been helpful, thank you,” she said, leaving as he picked up the phone and waved goodbye to her.
Senora got into the car as the sky turned a welcoming shade of orange, and the sun began to rise in the east. She was looking in the file folder, shuffling through the papers and looking to see where her next de
stination was when her own phone rang.
She looked at the caller ID, and her stomach dropped. There was only one reason for the Sheriff to be calling her this early in the morning.
“Edwards,” she said briskly.
“Miss Edwards, I need you to come down to the wildlife center if you would.”
“Where is it?” she asked.
“I’ll send the address to your phone. It’s easy to find. When you get to the giant dinosaurs at the entrance, someone will meet you to bring you to the scene.”
“Is she dead?”
“I wish it were just that,” he said. “We’ll have to wait for the Medical Examiner to take a look at her, but I’m going to guess that she was alive for most of this. And it’s not good.”
Senora nodded even though she knew that the Sheriff couldn’t see her. She’d had a gut feeling almost from the beginning that Addie was gone, but she hadn’t wanted to believe it. She’d wanted to find Addie, just like she wanted to find every missing person’s case that came across her desk. But life didn’t work that way, and for every happy story, she had ten sad ones that made her days hard to bear at times.
Today was going to be one of those times.
She pulled onto the highway and headed toward Fossil Rim, letting the soothing voice of the GPS guide her as the last of the darkness gave way to the most beautiful, brilliant dawn Senora had ever seen. The drizzle had let up, and the storm had moved on. This was the kind of day where good things happened to good people. This was not the kind of day that a family expected to say goodbye to their only daughter.
CHAPTER THREE
Senora saw the dinosaurs an instant before she saw the dirt driveway that led into the wildlife center. Four large, shaggy bison grazed lazily in a fenced area by the front entrance, not even lifting their heads when the tires of her car sprayed tiny gravel behind her. She stopped, unrolling her window and peering into the foggy morning, looking for the person that the Sheriff said would be escorting her in.
