While his grip put excruciating pressure on her wrist, and the twisted position of her arm caused great discomfort, she screeched at the painful stress he was putting her in. She reached into her pocket with her free hand and pulled out a needle, raising it to her mouth and using her teeth to remove the cap, she jabbed the needle into his neck.
His vision blurred and it went black again.
Silence…
Chapter 3
An hour after Trevor had left home, Symóne became worried. She called him and was directed to his voice mail before the phone even rang. She tried again, thinking that maybe he was trying to call her at the same time. She was directed to his voice mail again.
“It shouldn't be taking him this long to just get movies and snacks,” she said to herself.
She got up and walked to the front door and looked out toward the driveway, hoping to see him at least pulling in, but there was no sign of him.
Waiting to see if he would call her or just come home, Symóne began to feel uncomfortable.
She dialed Faye's number, hoping Alex had somehow talked to Trevor this morning.
“Hey girl, how's my little momma to be?” Faye chimed, answering her phone.
“I'm okay. Um…is Alex there?”
“No, he's at work. Why? What's going on Symóne? You sound weird,” Faye questioned.
“I was just wondering if he's heard from Trevor?”
“Well, Alex left at six o'clock this morning. I don't know if he's heard from him or not. Why don't you know where Trevor is? What's going on?” she demanded again.
Symóne took a deep breath and began her explanation. “Trevor and I decided to have a day of bonding with a few movies. He left for the store over an hour and a half ago, but he's not back yet. His phone is going straight to voice mail and something's not right,” she sounded worried.
“Okay,” Faye breathed. “Let me get dressed and call Alex and tell him what you've just told me. I'll be right over in a few,” Faye promised, then ended the call.
She called Angela and told her to open and manage the store until she could come in, that there was an emergency, and she would fill her in later.
Symóne began pacing the floor with her phone in hand, hoping to get a call from Trevor. Thirty minutes later, she still hadn't gotten a call and her next three calls to him ended the same as before.
The doorbell rang and Symóne opened the door to let Faye in. They embraced each other, then Symóne closed and locked the door.
“Alex said he hasn't talked to Trevor today, but said if we haven't heard from or seen him in the next thirty to forty minutes, call him back and he'll make some calls,” said Faye as they both entered the family room.
The girls took a seat on the sofa next to each other and Symóne tried again to call Trevor.
“Something has to be wrong. Trevor would never turn off his phone or take this long to come home, and not call me with an explanation,” Symóne complained. She palmed her belly and lay back against the sofa with a long exhausted sigh.
The sound of the house phone ringing, startled Symóne. She jumped to her feet and rushed to answer it.
“Hello? Trevor?” she answered.
“Symóne, this is Julia and…I'm guessing since you seem to be expecting my son's call, my intuitions are correct? Something is wrong?” she checked.
Symóne let out a broken gush of air, “Julia, he left here almost two hours ago to get movies and snacks and he hasn't returned yet, nor can I reach him,” Symóne sounded tearful.
“Okay honey, I need for you to calm down. Don't get too worked up right now. I feel that something is wrong, but he's okay, so calm down,” Trevor's mom urged her.
“I'm trying, but…” she was interrupted by a call coming through her cell phone.
“Hello?” she answered.
“Symóne, its Vince. Alex called and said that you think Trevor is missing?”
“Yes. He's been gone a couple of hours and I can't reach him,” she sounded panicked all over again.
“Okay, hang tight. Let me take care of some things, then I'll be right there,” he promised.
Symóne put the other phone back to her ear, “Julia?” she called out.
“I'm still here. It sounds like you're getting some help, so try to keep calm, okay?” she insisted.
“Okay,” she whispered.
“Is someone there with you now?” asked Julia.
“Yes, Faye's here,” she answered.
“Good. Let me speak to her please.”
Symóne handed Faye the phone and stepped back, cradling her stomach as tears began to trickle down her face. Faye reached for her and put her arm around her as she took the phone and put it to her ear.
“Hi Mrs. Harrison,” said Faye, her tone desolate.
“Hi Faye. Look, I need for you to try to keep Symóne as calm as possible. Her stress is the baby's stress and we have to take care of her for Trevor's sake,” she urged.
“I'll do my best,” Faye agreed.
“Okay, well I'm going to let you go so that you can help her through this. If at any time you get any type of news on my son, please contact me.”
“Yes Ma'am. Will do,” said Faye.
After ending the call, she led Symóne back to the sofa and let her sit to rest. She instinctively drew her legs up and curled them to the side of her and grabbed a pillow from beside her and hugged it. She tried her best to calm down and not over think things, but her mind was going through all sorts of scenarios.
Thirty minutes later, the doorbell rang and Faye got up to answer it. There were three men in black suits standing on the other side of the door with Vince. One of them had a metal looking suitcase, another carried a white box, and the last one carried a brief bag that seemed to be bulging with something. They all entered and headed to the family room and began setting up what seemed to be a makeshift mission control room.
Vince approached Symóne and sat on the large wooden coffee table in front of her. He took her hands and looked into her eyes.
“Symóne, we're going to find him,” he assured her. “I need to ask you some questions—are you up for it?” he checked.
She nodded, wanting to be of as much help as possible. She sat up and put her feet on the floor and took a deep breath. Vince pulled a note pad and pen from inside of his jacket pocket and started asking questions.
“Okay, I want you to think carefully of these questions and give me as much detailed answers as possible. Please remember that even the smallest details matter,” he told her and she nodded.
“What time exactly did Trevor leave this morning?”
“About 10:40 am.”
“Where did he say he was going?”
“To the grocery store to get snacks and movies.”
“Which store did he go to?”
“I assumed the shopping center a few miles away. It's where we always go,” she breathed.
Vince looked up in thought, “Would he have used cash or plastic for this trip?”
“He could have used either inside the store, but for the movies, he would have used his debit card. It's the only way to rent from the kiosk.”
“Have you checked the bank to see if he actually made it to the store or kiosk?”
Symóne gasped. She hadn't thought of that. She picked up her phone from beside her and logged into their bank account to look for his last transactions. He had used his card both inside the store and at the movie kiosk.
“He made a purchase of twenty-two dollars and forty-seven cents at the store at 11:05 am, then he used the kiosk for four dollars and eighty cents at 11:12 am.” she read off the transactions.
Vince breathed, “Okay, so he made it to the store, but what happened between there and him coming home, is what we need to find out,” he said and looked to the team he'd brought with him. They finished setting up and began to run a satellite trace on Trevor's vehicle and phone.
“There's no connection to either,” one of the men informe
d Vince.
“Can you get a position of where he was before he lost trackability?” asked Vince.
The agent began typing in some codes and pulling up several towers in the area that had reads on his GPS.
“Yes, the last point of trace was at the store, at 10:57 am. It must have been disarmed while he was inside the store. The alarm was disabled as well, then there are no more receivable traces on his vehicle,” the man continued.
“What about his phone?” asked Vince.
The men worked to gather information on Trevor's phone location and pulled up an area that was twenty-six miles from the store. The address pulled up as property that belonged to an elderly couple who had both passed away over ten years ago. It was two hundred acres of land that had been acquired by the county for unpaid taxes six years ago, but not used since then.
One of the men pulled up a satellite view of the property and only saw a heavily wooded area with a small lake on it.
“His phone was last traced to this location at 11:38 this morning,” the man relayed.
Symóne's head dropped and she leaned on Faye for support. She began to cry again, and became nauseated. She got up from the sofa and headed for the guest bath, with Faye following her.
Vince put in a call to a friend of his that owned a helicopter. He was more than willing to take Vince and one other detective on a ride over the property in question.
When Symóne returned from the bathroom, her body language displayed depression. Her head was down, and she seemed to be withdrawn, folded within herself as she returned to the sofa.
“Symóne, one of the guys and I, are going to meet up with a buddy of mine and take a helicopter ride over the area we last traced Trevor's phone. These two gentlemen here will stay and continue to work on finding information on your husband,” Vince assured her. He jerked his head to the side, signaling Faye to come to him, he needed to talk to her.
“She needs to eat to keep her strength up. Try to talk to her…about good things. Take her mind off her fears and get her to relax. I'll call if we find anything, but assure her that we will find him,” he declared.
Faye nodded, agreeing to his terms, then returned to Symóne and asked if she was hungry. Symóne shook her head no and curled back up on the sofa.
“Honey, you have to eat something. You have to be starving; you only threw up foamy stomach acid. You and the baby need nourishment,” she pleaded.
“I can't eat anything right now, Faye—I'm too worried about Trevor,” she sighed.
“I know, but Vince promised that they were going to find him, and when they do, don't you think that Trevor is going to want to know that you have been taking care of yourself and the baby?”
“I'll eat later. I don't feel so well. It'll just come back up,” she complained.
Faye drew in a deep breath, what other way could she get Symóne to eat something, anything. “You feel that way because you are stressed and the baby is hungry. That's Trevor's baby you're carrying and you really need to take care of him or her. You know that because of your prior miscarriage your doctor wants you to be extremely cautious with this pregnancy. Your husband would be devastated if something bad were to happen to you or this baby,” Faye tried to get Symóne to see reason.
“Okay!” Symóne snapped and got up to go search the kitchen for something she felt would stay in her stomach. Faye followed her and thought that she should start with some crackers to settle her stomach first. Symóne agreed, and took out a box from the pantry and sat at the bar counter, nibbling on one at first. Suddenly her stomach was gurgling, and the hunger set in.
“Okay, I'm starving…I want something else,” she admitted.
Faye exhaled and made Symóne stay seated while she made home-made soup and a salad for her. Once she was finished eating, Symóne decided that she would go put on a pair of jean shorts and a light weight maternity top and a pair of sandals. It was early May and pretty hot in Texas, but Symóne felt like going out by the pool to wait for more information.
Just before she and Faye headed out back, the doorbell rang again. Faye was followed by one of the detectives as she went to answer the door.
“It's okay, he's my fiancé,” she informed him.
Faye opened the door and had to embrace him long and hard. She and Alex both felt sorrow for their friends with all of the dangerous drama they had been victims of since they'd met.
He was still in uniform, but told her that he had gotten off a couple of hours early to come be of assistance. Faye gave him the run down of everything that's happened so far and that Vince was taking his search airborne.
“Where's Symóne?” he asked.
“We were just about to go out by the pool. I think she needs the fresh air to relax,” said Faye as she led him out back and joined Symóne.
Once out there, they could hear the helicopter in the distance, circling in what seemed to be a pattern. Some time later, the helicopter disappeared and thirty minutes later, Vince and the agent that had accompanied him on the search had returned to the house.
Symóne rushed inside to get information. “Well? Did you see anything?” she demanded.
Everyone was now in the family room, waiting to hear some good news, hopefully.
“The entire property is heavily wooded. We saw the lake, but no boats or anything of the sort. There was a small abandoned cabin out there, but it was hard to see through the trees. It had to have been at least three miles from the roadway, but we couldn't see a driveway to it. Since Trevor's phone was last traced in the area, we are going to put together a search team to comb the area,” Vince gave his report.
He turned to face Symóne, “I have more questions, so that we know what we're looking for,” he told her, then led her back to the sofa where he had first began his questioning.
“Has anything happened recently that could have anything to do with what's happening now?”
“Yes. Yesterday he and Alex took a trip to the same store. He told me that Alex had spotted a woman watching and videoing him with a cell phone. He said that he tried to approach her to find out who she was because she looked just like the woman in one of the security videos at your firm. She got away before he could catch up to her, but he did describe her clothing which led me to believe that she was somewhere around our age,” Symóne gave as much information as she could remember.
Vince inhaled and went into thought. He still had a copy of the surveillance footage of the woman in question on his tablet. He took it out and searched through his gallery for the footage. He and the agents all watched for something that may lead them to this woman's where-a-bouts. They kept freeze framing her every move, looking for anything helpful.
“Stop right there!” Symóne screeched.
Vince rolled back to where she said stop and zoomed in. They all saw it at the same time.
“That tattoo! Trevor has one just like it. It's his high school mascot!” said Symóne.
“What is it?” asked one of the agents.
“Its a Roman gladiator, the Spartans of Campbell High School,” she told them.
“Where is that?” asked Faye.
“Smyrna Georgia,” Vince and Symóne both said at the same time.
“Pull up the yearbook from his senior year and see if we can find out who she is,” Vince ordered the agent, while he put in a call to Trevor's mom.
She answered quickly, anticipating some news about her son.
“Hello?” she answered.
“Hello Mrs. Harrison, this is Vince Moore,” he started.
“Hi Vince. Please tell me you have good news on Trevor,” she sounded worried still.
“Not exactly. We think we may have a suspect in his disappearance, but I need to know if you know anyone…a woman from Trevor's past with a tattoo of a Spartan?”
She gasped. “Yes. His ex-girlfriend, but I haven't seen her in over twelve years, since Trevor went off to college,” she confirmed.
“Can you give me any information on h
er?” he asked.
“Well, her name is Lori…um…Starnes,” she breathed.
Just as she gave Vince the information, the agent was typing in her name. He pulled up her class picture and got a good look at her. Then he did a government grade search on her and pulled up all kinds of information on her.
“Thanks Mrs. Harrison. This helps and I'll call you back when we have some news for you,” said Vince as he ended the call and stepped behind the agent and looked over his shoulder at all of her information.
“Oh boy—” Vince breathed. He didn't like what he was seeing and didn't want to upset Symóne with their findings. They continued to read over documents that eventually led Lori Starnes to Texas one month prior to her infiltrating the Harrison and Moore firm.
“Well…apparently this woman is from Trevor's past since Julia knows of her. She has the exact same tattoo as Trevor, and you guys think he's with her. Is this the gist of it so far?” Symóne sort of snarled in a catty way.
“Yes, to her being someone from his past. But them being together…well…that's what I'm thinking. We can't be one hundred percent sure, but the evidence is undeniably pointing in that direction,” Vince confirmed Symóne's suspicions.
“Okay, so what else did you find out, because I can tell there is more?” she demanded. She had come to look at what they were looking at, but Vince reached over and closed the screen.
“Symóne…I really need for you to trust me on this. Right now, you're going to have to accept information on a need-to-know basis. Your condition is too fragile, and part of my job of finding Trevor means keeping you safe as well,” said Vince.
A wave of heat passed through Symóne's body. She felt light-headed and needed to sit down. Faye rushed to get a face cloth and ran cool water into it. Once she wrung it dry, she returned to Symóne's side and placed it on her forehead.
“Symóne, I know this is easier said than done, but you have to calm down for the sake of your baby. I can tell you that these people that your husband and his partner have working for them will not stop until they find him,” she assured her, then patted her upper arm. “Trust Vince and let him do his thing,” she finished.
Hostile Vengeance Page 3
