Little Girl Gone

by Brett Battles

  There were no curtains covering the windows of Ryan’s apartment. The ratty furniture, the television, even the pizza boxes, they were all gone. The place was as spotless as Aaron’s place had been the night before.

  Logan stared inside for a moment, then sprinted the rest of the way to Elyse’s place. The curtains were closed, which he took for a good sign as he pounded on the door. When no one answered, he knocked again, then tried the doorknob. Locked.

  Angie must have gone out.

  He thought for a moment. Anthony’s place was only a half-mile away. Logan could see if he was home, and probably be back in less than thirty minutes. Maybe by then, Angie would have returned.

  It took him longer to find a parking spot than it took to drive over. Anthony’s apartment was at the back of his building on the first floor off an interior hallway. There were no windows, so Logan couldn’t see in.

  He rang the doorbell, then knocked several times. But, like at Angie’s, there was no response.

  He contemplated what he should do, then decided to go around back and take a peek through Anthony’s windows, just to make sure it wasn’t another empty apartment.

  He found an exit, but was surprised when he had to take a staircase down to reach the back alley. The reason for this became clear as he stepped outside. The building had been erected on the side of a small rise. The architect had used this to his advantage, and built a carport into the lower part of the slope, below the first floor. Unfortunately, this meant he couldn’t simply walk up to Anthony’s window and peer in.

  He examined the back of the building. The last foot of the carport stuck out like a lip just below the first floor. If he could get on that, he could work his way over to Anthony’s windows. The question was, how to get up there?

  The simplest answer turned out to be his El Camino. He drove it around, then backed it most of the way into one of the empty parking spots, leaving the hood sticking out from under the carport. Carefully, he mounted his car, then pulled himself onto the lip.

  Making an educated guess as to which windows belonged to Anthony’s place, he inched his way over. There were no curtains over the nearest of the target windows, but when he looked in, he saw with relief a very lived-in looking living room.

  As he moved down to the next window, he noticed that the screen covering it was hanging loose in one corner of its frame. Somebody had cut a triangle flap large enough for a person to fit through.

  Logan looked inside. It was a bedroom. And unlike the living room, it was occupied. There was a man lying on the bed, his right arm flopped on the pillow beside his head. But what caught Logan’s attention was the Berretta pistol lying inches from the guy’s hand, and the impossible-to-miss hole in the side of his head.

  He would have preferred it if the place had just been empty.

  He thought it was a pretty good chance the dead man was Anthony. According to Lara, he’d been the last to see Elyse. Did that mean she was in the apartment, too? As much as he’d rather not, he knew he was going to have to check.

  He pulled the sleeve of his jacket over his hand, then put it through the cut in the screen, and up against the window. With just the slightest of pressure he was able to slide it open. He then looked both ways down the alley to make sure no one was watching, then slipped inside.

  Immediately, he started to gag.

  The smell of rot and death hung in the room like a thick fog. He threw a hand over his nose, and quickly ran into the hallway.

  The stench was there, too, but not quite as strong. He did a quick sweep of the rest of the apartment to see if there were any more bodies, but, with a definite sense of relief, he found none.

  Returning to the bedroom, he took a couple of T-shirts out of the dresser. He used one to cover his nose and mouth, then wrapped the other around his hand so he could pat down the body.

  The dead guy had a wallet in his front pocket. Logan worked it out, then carefully opened it. A driver’s license sat behind a clear window in the front. The name on it read: Anthony Hudson. Logan put the wallet back.

  The position of the gun, Anthony’s hand, it all pointed to suicide, but with the way things had been going, suicide was not a conclusion Logan was ready to jump to. Besides, the unlocked window and cut screen bothered him. Could be he had a cat that used it, but, if so, where was it now?

  What surprised Logan most was that no one had heard the shot. In most of the apartment buildings he’d ever lived in, someone was always complaining about hearing their neighbors through the walls. A gunshot from the Beretta should have been heard not just by the people next door, but also by people in the buildings that lined the alley. And since this was the middle of a big city, no matter what time the trigger had been pulled, someone would have been home. But by the look of the wound and the smell, Anthony had been lying there dead for at least a day, if not more.

  Logan scanned the room, looking for a note somewhere, but there was none.

  …death could be made to look like anything. An accident, suicide, whatever they want…

  Was this not what it appeared? There was no way for Logan to know for sure, but it certainly felt that way.

  Instead of going out the window, he used the front door, then circled around to the alley like he had before, and got back into the El Camino.

  He knew he should call the police. But if he did it from his cell phone, they’d record his number, and know who he was. He couldn’t have that. He’d lose too much time down at the station trying to explain why he’d found the body, and given the suspicions Detective Baker already had, it was possible they would even lock him up for a few days. He could always find a pay phone, but those were few and far between anymore, and you never knew where a security camera might be aimed.

  There was a third option, though.

  He started the El Camino, and pulled out of the carport.

  16

  Logan’s phone rang as he was driving back to the motel. The number on the display had a D.C. area code.

  “Logan?” It was Ruth.

  “I thought you’d forgotten about me.”

  “I tried. Trust me.” She let out a little laugh. “My contact couldn’t run the plate number until after hours, and I wasn’t about to call you back from any of my phones.”

  “Uh…thanks?”

  “What? You want me to give them a good reason to fire me? I’ve got a family, remember?”

  He didn’t say anything. He’d had a family once, small as it had been.

  “Sorry, that was…unnecessary,” she said. “It’s just if anyone looks at the phone records they’ll already see that you called me at the office. One call I can play off, tell them I told you to get lost. But two? Especially if I’m the one initiating the second one? Not so easy to ignore.”

  “Don’t worry. I get it.” And he did. Her cell phone and, of course, her office phone were both paid for by Forbus. They would know exactly who she talked to. “What did you find out?”

  “Nothing that you’re going to like, I’ll bet. The car’s registered to a Cameron Jackson in Burbank, California. Unfortunately, Ms. Jackson filed a stolen vehicle report yesterday. It seems when she headed out to work in the morning her car was gone.”

  There was an airport in Burbank, one that was a hell of a lot easier to use than LAX. Fly in, walk a few blocks away, steal a car from in front of a home. Easy. No doubt, in another couple of days, the police would find the car, but wouldn’t be able to pursue the case any further because there would be no prints.

  “Thanks, Ruth.”

  “I said you weren’t going to like it.”

  “You’re right, but I’m not surprised.” He hesitate a second. Things had changed since they’d last talked. There was information she was uniquely positioned to provide him. He didn’t want to push, but he had to. “Listen, what kind of intel do you have on Burma these days?”

  “Burma? I thought we were talking stolen cars.”

  “Separate subject.”

&nbs
p; “What’s important about Burma?”

  “It’s for a friend. He…used to live there years ago.”

  Ruth said nothing for several seconds. “What have you gotten yourself into?”

  “Nothing. Just getting some info for a friend. That’s all.”

  “And the stolen car?”

  “I told you, unrelated. It dinged my dad’s car in a parking lot. But if it was stolen there’s not much we can do about it.” They both knew he was lying, but if Ruth was ever asked about it, she could honestly repeat what Logan had just told her. “So…Burma?”

  The pause went on for several seconds. He could imagine her shaking her head in resignation as she finally spoke. “As far as I know we don’t have much going on in that part of the world at the moment. A little contract work in Singapore, emergency response training, but that’s it.”

  “You still get the daily brief, right?” The daily brief was a breakdown of what was happening in the world by country and region. Forbus wanted its top people kept up-to-date in case an opportunity suddenly presented itself.

  “Hell, Logan. I don’t really pay that much attention to Burma. As far as I remember, it’s pretty much the same as always. A group of old, asshole generals not wanting to relinquish the power they don’t deserve. Nothing stands out, though. No new protests or anything.”

  Logan hesitated, then said, “I need another favor. I need the latest Burma assessment.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “I wouldn’t ask you if I wasn’t.”

  “I hate you sometimes, Logan Harper.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  “That’s a maybe.”

  “Thank you, Ruth. I mean it.”

  He pulled into the motel parking lot a few minutes later, and saw that the cars the Cambria contingent had ridden down in were all there. He called his dad.

  “What room are you in?”

  “Thirty-five.”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  Dev and Ken were standing just outside his father’s door like they were protecting the Oval Office.

  “Everything all right?” Logan asked.

  “Everything’s fine,” Dev said, then knocked on the door.

  “Good. Thanks for being here for them.”

  “Always like to help a friend.”

  A moment later, Barney opened the door and let Logan in.

  Tooney and his father were sitting on one of the two beds while Jerry stood nearby.

  “We were going to order some Chinese,” Jerry said. “Want some?”

  “We need to talk.”

  “Did you speak with Elyse’s friends?” Tooney asked.

  “I talked to Lara, but…” Logan hesitated only a second. There was no use sugar coating it. “Anthony’s dead.”

  Stunned silence.

  “Did you say dead?” his dad finally asked.

  “Lara gave me his address. Said that he was supposed to have had dinner with Elyse the night before last, so I went over there. I found him in his apartment.”

  “How did you get in if he was already dead?” Barney asked.

  “I just did.”

  “Did someone kill him?” Jerry asked.

  “The way it looks, he shot himself through the head.”

  Harp leaned back, surprised again. “Suicide?”

  “That’s the impression.”

  “What do you mean ‘impression’?” he asked.

  “With everything that’s been going on, I’m not willing to believe suicide yet.”

  “So what do you think might have happened?” Jerry asked.

  “I don’t know. Could be he did kill himself. But if he did have dinner with Elyse, he would have been one of the last people to see her before she disappeared. Maybe he was with her when they grabbed her. Wrong place, wrong time.”

  “Oh, no, no,” Tooney said, burying his eyes in the palm of his hand. “We should have called the police yesterday.”

  “I don’t think it would have made a difference,” Logan told him. “I’m pretty sure he was shot before that guy even came to the café to try to kill you.”

  “But the police are going to know now anyway, aren’t they?” Barney said. “You must have called them after you found the body.”

  Logan hesitated. “No. I didn’t.”

  “No?” his dad said.

  “They almost got Tooney,” Logan said. “They probably did kill Anthony. The first sign that anyone tries to involve the authorities, I think you might be right. Whoever has Elyse will kill her, too. As far as Anthony goes, the police will know, but it can’t come from me. Not if you still want me to find Elyse.”

  “We can’t just let him lie there, can we?” Barney asked.

  Logan shook his head. “No, we can’t.” He walked over to the front door and opened it. “Dev, can you come in here for a minute?”

  “Sure,” the ex-marine said.

  Once they had rejoined the others, Logan asked his dad, “How much does Dev know?”

  Harp shrugged. “Maybe not all the details, but pretty much everything.”

  Good, Logan thought. It would save him some time.

  Vets who’d seen serious action usually went one of two ways: they’d either wall off what they’d gone through and tried to forget, or they remembered and gravitated to others they’d served with or who’d had similar experiences. Logan had a feeling Dev and his buddies fell into the second group. “You have any local friends you can call on for help?”

  Dev cracked a smile. “A few.”

  “Can you get them in a hurry?”

  “Shouldn’t be a problem. Why?”

  “Tooney’s granddaughter had two close friends,” Logan said. “One of them’s turned up dead. That’s not public knowledge. Two things I need your help on. First, I know I’d feel a hell of a lot better if the one who was still alive had someone keeping an eye on her. And second, I’m hoping that you or someone you know can anonymously inform the police about the one who’s dead.”

  “The people who did this, are they the same people who are after Tooney and his granddaughter?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Give me the info. I’ll take care of it.”

  Logan wrote everything down on a piece of paper, then gave Dev a quick description of Lara. “She can’t know you’re there.”

  “She won’t.”

  “Thanks, Dev.”

  He gave Logan a nod, then left.

  “Do you really think someone’s going to try to kill Lara, too?” Logan’s father asked.

  Logan shook his head. “If they considered her a threat I think they would have gotten rid of her by now, but better not to take a chance, don’t you think?”

  For a moment, no one said a word, then Tooney looked up. “Find my granddaughter, Logan. Please, just…find her.”

  Logan hesitated, worried that he wasn’t the right one to do this, that he’d make a mistake, that he’d fail once more.

  Worried that he wouldn’t get to her in time.

  But he could see in Tooney’s eyes that he was also the old man’s only hope.

  “Rise above, that’s what we do, soldier,” Carl had often said with a smile when faced with adversity. “Rise above.”

  Logan nodded, still holding Tooney’s gaze, then said, “I will.”

  17

  So far Logan seemed to have been doing a lot of catch up. What he really needed to do was get ahead of the game. To accomplish that he needed to find someone who could help him, whether they wanted to or not.

  As he saw it, he had three choices: Aaron the not-boyfriend, Ryan the neighbor, or Angie the roommate. Aaron and Ryan, because of their sudden absences, would take time to find, if Logan could locate them at all. Angie, on the other hand, was still around, or at least had been when he’d talked to her that morning. Hopefully, she wasn’t gone, too.

  Logan made a quick stop at the Home Depot in Playa Vista, then got to the girls’ apartment by 7:30 p.m. With the exception of the sun
having gone down, nothing else had changed—Ryan’s apartment was still empty, and the curtains were still pulled across the windows of Elyse and Angie’s place. Logan rapped on the door, but, like before, heard nothing from inside.