The Scavenger's Daughter: A Tyler West Mystery

by Mike McIntyre

  “Listen, West, I know how you must feel. But don’t give up hope. We’ve got everybody out looking for him.”

  Walton continued talking. The phone was still to my ear, but I didn’t hear what he was saying.

  I was driving on autopilot. My mind reeled. I had found definitive proof that Luther Shard was Friar Tom, but it was too late.

  My eyes welled with tears. Everything was blurry.

  I didn’t see the tree until my car had already left the road.

  My last thought was that it looked like one of the trees on Friar Tom’s greeting card.

  CHAPTER 102

  “Welcome back, partner.”

  I glanced sideways and squinted at an old man. He reclined in a nearby bed, grinning like a loon, an IV line attached to him.

  I shifted in bed. I felt groggy. My head hurt.

  “Where am I?”

  “Poway Memorial Hospital,” the man said. “You tussled with a tree, the tree won. But I heard the doc tell your gal you were lucky. Be good as new.”

  “Jordan?”

  “Went to get some coffee. She’s been here all night.”

  I suddenly came to life.

  “There she is,” the man said.

  A smile spread across my face as I struggled to turn my aching head toward the door.

  “Ty, you’re awake.”

  It was Mel. She held a Styrofoam cup. I stopped smiling.

  “What happened?” I said.

  “You had an accident. You have a slight concussion, two cracked ribs and some bruising. Nothing serious, but they want to keep you another night.”

  “And Jordan?” I asked hopefully.

  “Nothing yet. But SDPD finally called in the FBI. Hector is heading up the investigation. Every cop in Southern California is on the lookout for Shard.”

  I labored to rise and clutched at my side.

  “That would be your ribs telling you to stay in bed,” Mel said, placing a hand on my shoulder, forcing me to recline.

  “I’ve got to get up. Jordan’s running out of time.”

  “You’re in no condition. Besides, there’s nothing you can do that isn’t already being done. Hector’s on top of it.”

  I flung the covers back and tried to climb out of bed. Mel held me in place. She was strong.

  “I thought you might react this way, so I brought your files.” She pulled a thick wad of manila folders from her camera bag and set them on the bed. “You’re going to have to do your sleuthing from here.”

  Heather suddenly burst through the door.

  “Ty!” she said, rushing to me.

  Lisa trailed her. “She begged me to bring her here. I hope it’s alright.”

  I smiled that it was okay as Heather climbed partly on the bed and threw her arms around my neck. I stifled a groan from the pain in my chest.

  “Hello, sweetheart, I’ve missed you.”

  “I’ve missed you, too. When are you coming home? When’s Mommy coming home?”

  “Soon, honey, soon. Are you taking good care of Maya and Torpedo for me?”

  “Yes, but they miss you, too.”

  Heather let go of my neck and knocked the stack of files from my bed. The contents scattered across the floor.

  “Sorry,” Heather said.

  “It’s okay, sweetheart, it was an accident.”

  She helped Lisa and Mel gather my notes and records. She knelt and picked up a photo. It was the picture of Tiffany Samples that Friar Tom had sent to the media. The one that showed her locked in a pillory, her hands strangely clasped.

  I gestured at Lisa to take the photo from Heather. I didn’t want her to make the connection to Jordan. But it was too late. She studied the gruesome picture.

  “Here, Heather, I’ll take that,” Lisa said, returning the photo to its file.

  I expected Heather to cry or ask questions I couldn’t bear to answer.

  Instead, she put her hands together as Tiffany Samples had in the photo. She interlocked her fingers and pointed them down against her palms. She peaked her index fingers in the shape of a steeple, then parted her thumbs and wiggled the rest of her fingers.

  She recited a playground rhyme I hadn’t heard since grade school: “Here’s the church, here’s the steeple, open the doors and see all the people.”

  It reminded me of the original suspicions about Friar Tom. Had I missed a church tie-in after all?

  Heather again said, “Here’s the church, here’s the steeple, open the doors and see all the people.” She illustrated the sing-songy rhyme with her hands—her index fingers the steeple, her thumbs the doors, her other fingers the people.

  Only she didn’t quite have it right. She tripped over the word steeple, elongating it.

  “It’s steeple, Heather,” Lisa said.

  “Here’s the church, here’s the steep-ill,” Heather began again.

  “Steeple,” Lisa corrected. “One word.”

  “That’s what I’m saying,” Heather said. “Steep-ill.”

  “Steeple.”

  “Steep-ill.”

  I grew annoyed with Lisa. Heather was just a little kid, and steeple was a big new word. She’d eventually get it right. Why did it have to be now?

  I tuned them out and tried to concentrate on how to save Jordan. But Lisa’s distracting vocabulary lesson kept drifting in.

  “Steeple,” Lisa said.

  “Steep-ill,” Heather tried.

  “Steeple.”

  “What’s it matter?” I snapped. “Steeple, steep ill, steep pill, steep hill. Who cares?”

  Lisa and Heather stopped talking and looked at me.

  “Ty,” Mel said, “calm down.”

  “Sorry,” I said, reclining.

  Steep hill…

  I suddenly bolted upright. I swung my legs over the bed before Mel could stop me.

  “I know where he’s hiding her!”

  CHAPTER 103

  “Hiding who?” Heather said.

  It was too late to take it back, so I covered as best as I could. “I know where Mommy is, sweetheart. I’m going to go get her now.” I looked at Lisa and said, “But I need something to drink first.”

  Lisa picked up on my hint. “Heather, let’s go get Ty a soda,” she said.

  After they left, Mel said, “What’s going on?”

  “The photo Friar Tom sent of Tiffany Samples,” I said. “Everyone thought she was either praying or signaling that her captor or location related to a church. But the steeple formed by her fingers was code for steep hill.”

  “That’s quite a reach.”

  “Think about it. If Friar Tom was a priest or had her locked in a church, he wouldn’t snap her photo with her hands that way. He’d see it as an obvious clue to his identity or location. She fooled him. He thought she was praying. She held her hands the way Heather did for that children’s finger play. It was a visual pun. She was signaling that Friar Tom’s torture chamber is on a steep hill.”

  The explanation left me winded. I grabbed the bed’s railing to brace myself.

  “Ty, get back in bed, please,” Mel said. “Hector and Walton can follow up on this.”

  “Listen to your friend,” my roommate said.

  I shrugged Mel’s hand off my shoulder and headed for the closet. I wobbled a few steps, then straightened out. My neck was stiff and my chest hurt.

  “I’ve got to get back to town,” I said, stepping into my pants.

  “At least let me drive you,” Mel said.

  I thought about it as I buttoned my shirt. Mel might find some way to keep me from leaving the hospital if I didn’t agree. “Okay.”

  I was too sore to bend over and tie the laces on my shoes, so Mel did it for me.

  In the parking lot, Mel unlocked the passenger door of her Saab wagon. It hurt as I sank into the seat, but it was a good hurt. I was gaining strength. I was on Friar Tom’s trail.

  We pulled onto Poway Road and drove toward the I-15. I flipped on the radio. The manhunt for Luther Shar
d dominated the dial.

  I had a rough idea where I would find Shard—and Jordan. But Shard was shrewd. If I alerted Hector and Walton before I found Shard’s hideout, he’d see them coming. I had to pin down his location. Then I’d call the cops.

  “What kind of shape is my car in?” I said. “Where is it?”

  “Not so bad,” Mel said. “It was towed to a garage.”

  “Which one?”

  “Ty, what are you thinking?”

  I knew she’d help if I asked, but that would put her in the position of lying to Hector. I had to do this myself.

  “Mel, which garage?”

  “Poway Towing. Up ahead on the right.”

  “Drop me there.”

  She looked at me sternly.

  “Mel, I need a car. I’ve got to get mine back to town anyway, and I’m feeling good enough to drive.”

  She was pissed. She didn’t say a word. We reached the tow yard and pulled through the gate. Mel waited in her car.

  My Chevy was smashed in front but still drivable. I paid the tow charge and got the keys.

  Mel shook her head at me as I walked back to her car.

  “Please don’t call Hector or Walton,” I said. “I’ll call them myself.”

  Mel didn’t call me on my lie. She sighed. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  I’d find out soon enough.

  CHAPTER 104

  My wrecked car pulled to the left as I searched for the steep hill Tiffany Samples must have sensed as she rode on the floorboard of Friar Tom’s snatch van.

  San Diego is no San Francisco, but it’s no pancake either. I didn’t have time to drive up and down every steep street. I had to narrow my search.

  Shard lived in Clairemont and worked in Mission Valley. He had a schedule to keep, so his torture chamber would be within short drives of those places.

  Downtown was a possibility. It has several sharp inclines and it’s close to Shard’s home and job. But pricey condos and office buildings abound. Shard couldn’t afford a high-rent hideaway on his meager income.

  That left the hillside districts north of downtown.

  I started in Bankers Hill, an old neighborhood between Balboa Park and the I-5. I wended along hilly streets named for trees—Quince, Redwood, Spruce. But the area was thick with million-dollar-plus bay view homes. Like downtown, no place for a serial killer on a budget.

  I drove to Hillcrest, the city’s vibrant gay district. The surrounding canyons are laced with steep, twisting lanes. Tiffany Samples would have felt her captor’s van drop into low gear to lumber up one of these. But Hillcrest is densely populated, with more apartment buildings than houses. Shard’s activities would be seen or heard.

  I was losing patience. I wondered if I was wrong. Perhaps Tiffany Samples was, in fact, praying in the photo and not signaling that she was locked in a torture chamber on a steep hill.

  I drove in circles. I grew frantic. Was Jordan even still alive?

  I headed west on Laurel Street, a main artery that extends from Balboa Park to the airport. It runs downhill after the intersection with Front Street. The slope starts off gradually, then increases after Albatross. It flattens out briefly at Union Street. There’s a stop sign at the intersection—an oversized one that practically yells, STOP!

  I braked at the giant red stop sign. The airport runway below stretched out toward the ocean. In the foreground, traffic rushed along the I-5. What I couldn’t see was Laurel Street itself. The next block after the stop sign was so steep, it wasn’t visible beyond the smashed hood of my car.

  I eased down the sharp incline, pressing the brake to the floor. I parked and curbed the wheel. I cut the engine and set the emergency brake. When I stepped off the brake, the car lurched forward. I opened the door and gravity nearly flung it from its hinges.

  I stepped out and leaned into the hill to keep my balance. I gazed up and down Laurel, from Union to State. This had to be the steepest block in the city.

  Ramshackle apartments, with warped wood sidings and peeling paint, spilled down the south side of Laurel. On the north side were more ratty apartments, a small self-storage complex and a taxi garage. A few derelict buildings that looked vacant sat across State Street.

  I gazed out at the freeway. A sign indicated that the I-8 interchange was only two exits north. I recalled the day I followed Shard home from HomeMart—how odd it was that he took the I-8 instead of the 805. It now made sense. He wasn’t going home. He was headed for his torture chamber, somewhere here on Laurel Street. He must have spotted me trailing him, and when he did, he detoured north.

  I now stood on Laurel, trembling with excitement. Jordan had to be locked inside one of these shabby dwellings.

  I wanted to run up and down the street, banging on doors and yelling her name. But I couldn’t. Shard would hear me and kill Jordan.

  I had to find his hideout without him knowing. The only way was to watch for him. He had to come out sometime. But he wasn’t likely to show his face during daylight. Plus, he might see me first.

  I’d return after dark. Once I spotted which building he exited, I’d call the police.

  Before I got back in my car, I looked up and smiled.

  I knew where I’d wait for Friar Tom.

  CHAPTER 105

  I parked a few blocks away on Kalmia Street and made a call.

  “You know that SeaWorld billboard on Laurel and Union?” I said.

  “The one with Shamu?” said the Billboard Bandit.

  “That’s the one. I want you to meet me there as soon as it gets dark.”

  “Why? I got nothing against Shamu. I take my kids to SeaWorld two, three times a year.”

  “I don’t want you to graffiti it,” I said. “I just want you to get me up there.”

  “What for?”

  “I’m pretty sure Friar Tom’s torture chamber is within a block of that sign. I need to watch for him from someplace he won’t see me.”

  “Why not tell the cops?” the Bandit said.

  “If they go poking around, he’ll spot them, and my wife dies. I’ll call the police as soon as I identify his hideout. Just a little reconnaissance, nothing too dangerous. Don’t worry.”

  “I’m not worried. I’m the outlaw, remember? But that billboard is a high-risk target. It’s way too visible, right there by the freeway and all. That’s why I never tagged it when it was a casino sign. Isn’t there another place you can watch from?”

  “Not without being seen. I’ve already checked it out. It’s got to be the billboard.”

  “Okay. I still owe you for protecting my identity.”

  “This will make us even,” I said. “I’m parked over on Kalmia. Meet me there.”

  “I’ll head over after dark,” the Bandit said.

  “Bring everything you got. It looks like it’s about fifty feet up.”

  CHAPTER 106

  The Rock 107 radio van was parked outside Wave House, a nightclub near the roller coaster in Mission Beach. Deejays Riff and Raff had introduced speed metal band My Monkey’s Uncle, a favorite of the station’s young listeners, then slipped away from the concert.

  They leaned against the van in the parking lot while producer Amy Gossett loaded the gear. Riff smoked a cigarette while Raff sipped from a bottle of SoBe Zen Blend iced tea.

  The station’s motto was emblazoned across the van: MUSIC THAT MATTERS. Riff read it aloud and scoffed. “Yeah, if you’re a pimply teen-aged geek.”

  “Easy, man, those are our fans you’re disparaging,” Raff said.

  “Fuck our fans,” Riff said, stamping out the cigarette with his heel. “At least this is our last live remote, and we don’t have to interact with these morons anymore.”

  “I’ll drink to that,” Raff said, hoisting his iced tea.

  It had been a long climb to the top. The duo had started fourteen years earlier as Chuck and Buck, afternoon deejays on KWCO, a country music station in Chickasha, Oklahoma. As they bounced from station to station
, they had gone through several format and name changes.

  They had recently hit it big in San Diego as Riff and Raff, drive-time shock jocks. Their morning show was a mix of lewd, mean-spirited bits that drew the ire of censors and critics, yet won huge ratings.

  They had recently signed a nationwide syndication deal and were moving to Los Angeles. There would be no more band intros, lame commercials or mall appearances. They would each now pull down seven figures a year for spewing profanities before dawn.

  “I got an appointment with a financial planner tomorrow,” Raff said to Riff. “You may want to talk with him, too. Most of them charge a percent and a half, but this guy only takes one percent.”

  “I hate to interrupt your little economic summit,” Gossett said, coiling cables. “But the sooner we get loaded up and out of here, the sooner you boys can go count your money. So how about giving me a hand?”

  “Sorry, Amy,” Raff said, “but the talent doesn’t pack the van.”

  “Since when?” she said.

  Raff checked his watch. “Since about three minutes ago, when we officially left the employ of Rock 107.”

  “Hey, Amy, how many producers does it take to pack up a live remote van?” Riff said. She stared blankly at him. “Two,” he said. “One to pack up and one to suck my dick.”

  Riff and Raff cackled wildly, Riff slamming the palm of his hand on the side of the van.

  “Pack this,” Gossett said, flipping the deejays the bird. “I’m really going to miss you guys.”

  “Oh, didn’t we tell you?” Raff said. “We’re taking you to L.A. You’re our new coffee girl.”

  Riff and Raff gave each other high fives.

  A U-Haul moving truck pulled up. The driver had a blond shag-style haircut. He rolled down the window of the rented orange and white vehicle.

  “You look way lost, mullet head,” Riff said. “There’s no trailer park around here.”

  Raff snickered and added, “Yeah, there’s no camping on the beach, either.”

  “You clowns think you’re so funny,” Friar Tom said. “Here’s something to laugh about.”