Making Her Way Home

by Janice Kay Johnson

  “Then you’d think she’d have gotten off on taking them for everything she could get,” the guy said. Oh, please, not my father.

  When Sicily didn’t say anything, he shrugged and left. The lock scraped, and she was alone again. Her stomach growled, so she opened the bag and looked inside.

  “Oh, wow.” The room was so empty, her voice sort of echoed. “A cheeseburger.”

  * * *

  MIKE STOOD AT THE KITCHEN window looking out at the back of that goddamn stubborn woman’s head. She was playing the martyr, which pissed him off big-time. Her message wasn’t subtle: he’d forced her to stay, but he couldn’t force her not to suffer. She had to be freezing out there in jeans and a thin cashmere sweater that clung to her slim body and had a V neck that bared her pale throat and chest. At one point, in a fit of frustration he’d snatched a coat from her closet and carried it out, thrusting it into her arms as he snarled, “Put this on.”

  She didn’t acknowledge his existence with even a flicker of her eyes. When he checked five minutes later, the coat lay over the back of a chair.

  He was painfully reminded of the day Sicily went missing, Beth standing like a marble statue while the search went on around her. He knew damn well this would end the same way, too, with Beth so cold her bones would rattle. But what the hell was he supposed to do? Pick her up and haul her ass inside? In her eyes, he’d already stripped her of her dignity. Why not rip away any last shreds?

  But he couldn’t do it. All he could do was hide his turmoil, be the professional he was and keep an eye on the techs working her house, looking in every nook and cranny, checking out her computer, using black lights and luminol in a few places where they were likely to find blood splatters. The shower drain showed a hint of blood. He had to go out to ask her about it.

  “I cut my leg shaving this morning.” She bent down and lifted the leg of her jeans to show a wince-worthy two-inch raw gouge on her shin. “I was…distracted.” Her voice was flat but not dull as it had been Saturday at the park. He took a closer look at her unemotional, marble pale face, which gave no clues. Something was going on inside her, but he didn’t know what. He returned to the bathroom.

  “Yeah, that’d be about the right amount of blood,” conceded the tech. She took a scraping anyway.

  They’d borrowed a cadaver-sniffing dog that arrived with its handler about eleven. When Mike let them out in the backyard, he saw the first emotion on Beth’s face in hours. He felt like a monster.

  She swiveled on her heel and went in the house. Voices came from the bedroom wing. Someone was in the kitchen, banging cupboard doors. Her eyes got wild and her head turned, as if she sought a bolt hole. Following her, Mike was slashed by regret. I’m doing this to her. I’m hunting her as relentlessly as a foxhound. Body still stiff, eyes frantic, she got as far as the middle of the living room and stopped, apparently having realized she had nowhere to escape to. Standing in the doorway to the kitchen where he could see her, Mike wanted to slam his fist into a wall. He didn’t think he’d ever felt like a bigger son of a bitch.

  He was breaking her.

  It’s my job.

  He’d done it before, he’d do it again. He hadn’t had any choice this morning. Until they found some proof that Sicily Marks had lived beyond three-thirty Thursday afternoon when she stepped off the school bus at the corner, they had to take seriously the possibility that her aunt had killed her or was otherwise involved in her disappearance.

  He was doing what he had to do.

  But this time, he believed he was hounding an innocent woman. Worse yet, a woman so vulnerable he dreaded finding out who or what had wounded her deep enough to leave those unseen scars.

  She stood where she was, as if afraid of being cornered. He saw how hard she was breathing. Whatever had been sustaining her earlier wasn’t working anymore. Now, he suspected pride alone held her in place. She stared at the wall, refusing to look at a single person invading her house.

  Including him.

  Half an hour later, the dog handler brought his now wet and muddy lab through the side gate, shook his head at Mike and opened the door to his van so the dog could leap in. “Nothing.” The computer geek let him know that on Friday Beth had been on her computer most of the day, off and on, the way she’d said.

  “Nothing,” echoed the head of the crime scene crew in a low voice that wouldn’t be overheard by the reporters hovering avidly on the sidewalk, crowding as close as they could, cameras and microphones bristling. “If anything happened to that girl here, it didn’t involve blood.”

  “Thanks,” he said then watched as they departed, ignoring shouted questions. “No statement,” he said, and went back inside the house.

  She was right where he’d left her. Arms clasping herself as if for comfort or to hold in…what? Déjà vu, he thought.

  “We’re done,” he said, as gently as he could.

  “Then get out of my house.” Her voice had the texture of broken glass. It didn’t sound like her. She turned to face him, her eyes glittering with rage. “Don’t come back without a warrant.”

  “You know we had to do this.”

  “You’ve likely destroyed my reputation and with it my business. All so the police could look like they weren’t sitting on their hands. If Sicily is found alive…” She fought for control. “I don’t know what she and I will do. That’s what you accomplished today.”

  He felt like he’d taken a fist to the gut. Right this minute, it didn’t help to tell himself he’d had no choice but to take this step. “I’m sorry that’s how you see it.” He sounded wooden.

  “Please go.”

  He nodded wordlessly just as his phone rang. He glanced down, not recognizing the number although it was a Seattle prefix.

  “Ryan.”

  “Detective Ryan, this is Sergeant Chen. Seattle P.D. We talked.”

  “Sure, I remember,” he said hoarsely. “You’ve got something?”

  “A possible address for Chad Marks. A house in the University District. We plan to move right away.”

  “Tell me the address. I can be there in twenty minutes.” If he drove like a sixteen-year-old out for his first solo with dad’s car. Chen agreed to hang back until Mike got there.

  He’d paused on Beth’s doorstep, and realized the door was open behind him. He hesitated, then turned. “We may have located Marks.”

  Fear and hope flared in her eyes. She nodded.

  “I’ll see you are kept informed.”

  Her thank-you was stiff. He still hadn’t moved when she closed the door. Mike had the sick feeling he might not see her again unless it was on the Channel 5 news. But he knew better. She might think she was done with him, but whether she liked it or not he was still primary. He’d be back, and she’d by God let him in whether she detested him or not.

  * * *

  MIKE WONDERED WHY, GIVEN THE price of real estate in Seattle, anyone would let what had once been a decent house end up in this condition.

  Most of the other houses on the street shadowed by the Ship Canal Bridge were shabby. They were probably all rented to students. Lawns were patchy and yellowing, porches sagged, paint peeled. But this one looked as if it had been transported from a slum: several windows were boarded over, moss was eating the roof and broken beer bottles made the front walk perilous. A faded, torn U.S. flag served as a curtain in the only upstairs window that was intact. A rusting hulk rested on cinder blocks in the tiny backyard off the alley.

  Mike, Chen and a detective named Jarrel Wright were walking up to the front door. Two more Seattle P.D. officers had all possible exits covered.

  Glass crunched under their feet. All three stepped gingerly up rotting front steps. Movement inside sounded like rats scuttling for holes. Mike’s hand slid to the butt of his gun.

  The doorbell hung two in
ches out from the wall, one wire severed. Chen hammered on the door.

  Silence.

  They glanced at each other. The sergeant called, “Police! Open the door.”

  After another delay, and a couple of thumps and bangs, the door cracked open a few inches and a face appeared. Mike wasn’t sure he’d ever seen so much metal on any face—eyebrows, nose, lip, ears. Damn, it would weigh you down, he couldn’t help thinking with the part of his brain that wasn’t warily watching for the wrong kind of movement.

  “Police.” Chen held up identification. “May we come in.”

  “Cops? What the…? We didn’t do anything.”

  “We need to talk to you and anyone else residing in this house.” Chen was a mild-looking guy, but he didn’t sound mild.

  Reluctantly, the pierced dude opened the door another foot. He was well on his way to covering the rest of his body with tattoos.

  “Yeah, okay,” he muttered. Backing up, he yelled over his shoulder, “Cops here! They want to talk to us.”

  More rustles and thumps and some creative obscenities had Mike almost as nervous as the possibility of crashing through the squeaky, uneven floor. This place needed to be condemned and razed.

  The living room was flophouse décor—a couple of filthy sofas with stuffing poking out, a mattress with bedding Mike wouldn’t have touched with latex gloves on, a half-decent flat-screen TV resting on plastic crates, more plastic crates filled with empty booze bottles and—good God—was that one filled with used condoms? Seven people gathered: four guys, three women, all skinny, seedy, shifty-eyed. Tattooed and pierced. One had a swastika tattooed on his neck. Mike found himself hoping like hell one of these men wasn’t Sicily’s father. He searched their faces and couldn’t tell, even though he had seen a driver’s license photo.

  A couple of them didn’t seem to mind giving their names. The remainder were reluctant but finally mumbled them. Jarrel Wright had his eye on one man. Mike suspected he’d be making an arrest on their way out. The guy was edging away, trying to get toward the back of the group. His hands stayed at his sides, though. Lucky for him.

  Chen explained that they needed to speak to Chad Marks. All but the guy who was trying to ease himself out of sight stared blankly.

  “Who’s that?” one of the women finally said.

  “I know him.” It was the heavy metal dude. “He lived here when I first came. Like, four years ago? Man, he hasn’t been around in a long time. He played an awesome guitar. He had some band that almost made it, I remember that.”

  “This him?” Chen showed the photo.

  “Yeah! That’s the man.”

  Mike kept his stance beside Chen, but out of the corner of his eye watched a slow-motion chase. Wright, easing to block the exit from the room, wanted this guy real bad. The guy wanted to be gone. No violence had yet erupted, though.

  Chen and the residents participating in the conversation established that no one knew where Chad Marks had moved. Heavy Metal thought the house had been getting too crowded. “I think maybe he was putting together another band.”

  “Would you mind if we walked through the house?”

  The whites of their eyes showed. “We’re not interested in drugs,” Chen told them.

  For the first time, the group noticed that one of their number was trying to fade away and that the Seattle detective was in not-so-subtle pursuit.

  “Hey, man, what’s going on?” a skinny kid who didn’t look over sixteen asked, and the target broke and ran.

  Five strides down the hall, Wright had him with his face to a wall and cuffed. The racket brought another Seattle officer through the back door, weapon in hand. He holstered it, smiled and said, “Well, well. Jiggs. What a nice coincidence.”

  He departed with the prisoner, and Wright, Chen and Mike did a walk-through. They ignored the drug paraphernalia and the sickening odor. There was nothing to suggest Sicily Marks had ever been held here. Hell, there didn’t seem to be a door sturdy enough to hold a hostage, slight as she was. The basement had only cobwebs, broken furniture, a washing machine and a few wooden clothespins hanging dispiritedly from a line strung from one side of the dank space to another. Mike wondered if the washer worked or anyone ever made use of it.

  That was it. They walked out. Chen thanked the other officers for their time, and got a big grin from Wright, who said, “I’m happy with my bonus.”

  Chen grunted, “Well, that was a bust,” and they parted ways.

  Mike sat in his car for a few minutes, more discouraged by the dead end than he usually let himself be. He didn’t like thinking about how long Sicily had been missing. So far the focus, inevitably, had been on the Greenways and Sicily’s father. The scariest possibility was that none of them had anything to do with her disappearance. Stranger abductions were a nightmare, the chances of a happy ending remote.

  So where to go from here? he asked himself.

  Intensify the pleas for public assistance. Calls were still coming in from people who claimed to have been at Henrik Beach County Park on Saturday. He wanted to hear from every single person who’d been there. He knew damn well the beach and picnic area had been crowded.

  Plaster Sicily’s photo everywhere. The process had started, but if he had his way her face would become familiar to every resident of four counties.

  Return to Beth’s neighborhood to call on the two neighbors who hadn’t yet been home. He supposed he should talk to the grandparents again, but didn’t see that serving a lot of purpose unless they received a ransom demand. He intended to visit Rachel Marks’s last known residence and talk to neighbors there. Who was the last boyfriend? Roommates? Anyone who’d been especially interested in her kid?

  He reached to turn the key in the ignition, then exhaled with a huff and instead opened his cell phone. It would be interesting to see if Beth answered or let his call go to voice mail.

  One ring and she answered, having snatched it up. “Hello?” Mike heard anxiety in her voice. Of course she’d been sitting there counting the minutes, praying.

  “Detective Ryan,” he said. “We didn’t learn anything useful. Marks did once live in this house, but moved out years ago. Nobody knows where he went.” He closed his eyes. “I’m sorry, Beth.”

  There was a moment of silence. “Thank you for calling,” she said very formally, and was gone.

  He swore out loud, thumped his head a couple of times against the headrest and tried hard not to picture Beth Greenway alone in the house that probably felt polluted to her now, no longer the refuge it had been.

  * * *

  BETH DREW EVERY SINGLE WINDOW blind, then went to huddle in her home office. Earlier, the doorbell had rung several times. The reporters knew she was in here and didn’t want to give up. She’d called to warn her staff that they would be inundated with phone calls. Tracy, her assistant, said, “That won’t be anything new.”

  “I’ve left you to deal with it. I’m so sorry.”

  “Don’t be silly. This is not your priority.”

  They discussed a couple of upcoming events, but Beth couldn’t focus and Tracy could obviously tell.

  “Nothing is at a critical point,” she said firmly. “We’ll keep things going, don’t worry.”

  Don’t worry. Right. Under other circumstances, it would have been funny. As it was, if she’d laughed she was afraid of what sound might emerge. Something horrible, angry, hurt and so terrified she might not be able to put herself back together again.

  Finally, she went through the motions of making a lunch and pretending to eat it, then cleaning up afterward.

  She began to wish she hadn’t said those things to him. Not because she hadn’t meant every word; Tracy hadn’t said anything about cancellations, but Beth suspected she wouldn’t have even if they’d been getting them. And she knew—hoped—she could salva
ge her reputation anyway. The best thing she could do right now was issue a statement saying yes, the police had searched her home at her invitation. She fully understood that they had to look at family members when a child disappeared and she wanted to help them eliminate her as a possibility so they could focus on finding Sicily. She urged the public to blah, blah, blah.

  That’s what she should do. Instead, she sat at her desk, colder than she’d ever been, and wished Detective Mike Ryan could tell her more about what was going on. Her rage still simmered, but she also remembered his occasional kindnesses—that hand gently rubbing her back, the low-voiced croon, the fact that he had kept her informed every step of the way even as he let her know she was a suspect. He’d included her in the search yesterday because he knew she needed to be doing something even though she’d likely been more of a nuisance than a help. Maybe he’d driven up to the park the night before to find her because he thought she was…who knew? Moving Sicily’s body? But…some instinct said that wasn’t all of it, that he’d been worried about her, too. She remembered the meal he’d cooked for her, the way he coaxed her to eat. The blanket he’d wrapped around her when he saw her shivering.

  She squeezed her eyes shut, but tears seeped out nonetheless.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MIKE SPENT HOURS chasing down Rachel Marks’s friends, who were mainly male, as well as roommates, neighbors. The more time he spent with people who’d known her, the sorrier he felt for her poor kid.

  Her last apartment building wasn’t terrible. The neighbors hadn’t liked the looks of the people who came and went, though.