Before She Disappeared

by Lisa Gardner

  “Hell, that doesn’t make a damn lick of sense.”

  “Exactly.”

  Charlie drains his coffee mug, waves over the waitress for a refill.

  “All right. So if Livia was the target, and the girls are still alive—”

  “Angelique smuggled out a message. Help us.”

  “Damn, that’s scary. But . . .” Charlie considers the matter. “If the girls are still alive but can’t come home, are like, held against their will?”

  I nod.

  “Then they must be worth something, right? Only reason to keep them alive, cuz the girls know something or are doing something their captors need.”

  I like the way he puts that. Simple, logical. The girls know something or are doing something. “Which brings us back to Livia’s skills with AutoCAD and 3D printing. But that’s still not enough for counterfeiting currency, and apparently plastic guns aren’t nearly as valuable as we thought.”

  Charlie’s turn to nod. “If counterfeiting currency is like advanced math or something, then what about other kinds of forgeries? Starting with fake Real IDs. Now that would be worth some serious dough.”

  “Explain.”

  “Back in my day, a fake driver’s license was a simple matter of prying apart the lamination and inserting a new photo. More recently, I’ve heard some of the kids at the rec center talk about buying fakes online, especially foreign IDs. Say from Ireland, places like that. You wanna sneak into a bar, it gets the job done. But now, with states transitioning to Real ID . . .”

  “Which is very sophisticated, right? Watermarks, hidden images, reflective ink. Isn’t that why it’s now the new standard for TSA?”

  “Exactly. The old model of fake driver’s licenses just doesn’t cut it. World’s getting serious, meaning everyone, including criminals, gotta get serious. I’m not saying faking a Real ID would be easy, but compared to forged bills, gotta be a step down.” Charlie shrugs.

  I think of Angelique, showing up at the cybercafé with a fake ID. Then trying to buy a cell phone from the wireless store with the same ID. Letting it fall to the ground in her escape.

  I wonder suddenly if we hadn’t missed the obvious. She hadn’t been trying to leave us a coded message. The ID itself was the clue.

  “I’ll be damned,” I mutter.

  “Not as long as you keep from drinking.”

  “Charlie, are there any new players in town? I don’t know. New gangs, or criminal enterprises? Even something that seems like a whisper of a ghost story. Keyser Soze, that sort of thing?”

  Charlie arches a brow. “Street loves a good ghost story. But not that I’ve heard.”

  “What about a newer gang rising to sudden prominence? A power grab?”

  This takes him longer to consider. “Maybe,” he says at last. “For all the evils in Mattapan . . . Most of our gangs are small. Fractured. Got not just Blacks versus other Blacks, but El Salvadorans versus Asian versus Haitians. Can be a block-by-block sort of thing. Keeps the violence high as someone is always shooting someone, but also keeps the level of sophistication low. Nobody gets big enough or lasts long enough to do too much damage. What you’re suggesting . . .”

  “I don’t know what I’m suggesting.”

  “Quality fake IDs, quality fake money, or at least access to quality counterfeits . . .”

  I wait.

  “Off the top of my head, I’d say it doesn’t have to be a new gang,” he says slowly, “but maybe a traditional player with a new connection. I can do some digging.”

  “Don’t put yourself at risk.”

  Charlie glances down at his imposing size. “I’ve been around a long time, little girl. Grew up in this town. Lived on these streets. Don’t you worry about me.”

  “But I do.”

  “Aren’t you sweet for a woman who doesn’t stick around?”

  “Doesn’t mean I’m not sentimental.”

  “Think it means exactly that.”

  “No.” I shake my head seriously. “I just know how to live with the pain.”

  He doesn’t have an answer to that.

  “You really think these girls, Angelique and Livia, are caught up in some sort of criminal enterprise?” he asks at last.

  “I think . . . I think Livia was clearly terrified of something. You can see it on her face on the security camera. And the fact that Angelique left her school disguised as her friend . . . Angelique’s been described as a nurturer. Let alone, she clearly had a close relationship with Livia. Maybe a very close relationship.”

  Charlie arches a brow, doesn’t say anything.

  “I can imagine Angelique trying to devise a plan to help her friend. Save Livia. Except.” I sigh sadly. “They are just kids. And you know how it is with teens. They get in trouble first.”

  “Figure out the real danger later,” Charlie finishes for me.

  “Exactly. Whatever usefulness they’ve had for their captors, I’m wondering if it’s nearing an end. Hence Angelique’s desperate attempts at contact. Posting a coded message, appearing in the wireless shop. Something’s changed, the clock ticking down in a genuinely terrible, dangerous way. Given the two have been missing this long, nothing to stop their captors from disappearing them completely.”

  “Damn,” Charlie mutters. “I’ll keep an ear out.” Then, more softly, so only I can hear. “But as long as we’re talking danger, you should know I did learn a few things, but it wasn’t about them.”

  It takes me second. “About me?”

  “You’re asking too many questions. Your visit today to the Samdi household got people riled up.”

  “Who? And is that why he shot at me?”

  “You need to be more careful, my friend.”

  “Why? If Livia’s brother is just some low-level dope dealer, who cares about my visit?”

  “You can get killed for looking wrong around here. Don’t trust you’re as immune as you think.”

  I tilt up my chin in an impressive display of false bravado. “I’m here to find a missing girl. Or girls, as the case may be. I’m gonna keep going till that job is done. You can start your own rumor on the streets—they want the skinny white chick to go away, then produce Angelique and Livia. I’ll be gone within a matter of hours. On my word.”

  “Doesn’t work like that.”

  “Does for me.”

  Charlie smiles, but it’s a briefer expression this time. He leans forward. “Watch your back, little lady.”

  “I’ve been in tough places before.”

  “Not like this.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because I’ve been to war, and it still wasn’t as scary as living around here.”

  I don’t have an answer to that. I finish my salad. Charlie finishes his coffee. I pay for both of us—then, despite my protests, Charlie walks me home.

  Even then, I’m suddenly aware of all the dark shapes around us, noises from side streets, small gatherings in the dark. One kid with a gun. All it would take. Quick, dirty, effective. Charlie’s not wrong about that.

  At the side entrance to Stoney’s, I kiss my newfound friend on the cheek in gratitude, then retreat upstairs and hole up in the solitude of my apartment.

  * * *

  —

  I call Lotham. It’s late, but it doesn’t surprise me that he picks up immediately.

  “You should pull the fake ID Angelique dropped yesterday. I have reason to believe the ID itself might be a clue.”

  A pause, the weight of many unasked questions, such as why did I believe such a thing now and who might I have been speaking with. Then: “I’ll retrieve it from evidence first thing in the morning.”

  “Thank you.”

  Then, we don’t speak. I stay on my puny little flip phone. I listen to him breathe. And it’s like knives flaying my skin. The se
nse of déjà vu. The harsh knowledge that this is the only way I know how to connect. All these years later, nothing has changed. I am me, and the rest of the world, the good guys like Paul, like Lotham . . .

  “Good night,” I say at last, my voice thick. I might be crying, but I don’t want to be.

  “Good night,” he agrees.

  He ends the call. I sit in my threadbare room, holding my phone against my chest and telling myself I have no reason to be sad when this is the life I’ve chosen for myself. Eventually, I change into my sleeping clothes, brush my teeth, and climb into bed. Lights out. One day done, another soon to begin.

  But once again, my dreams haunt me.

  Paul: “Are you going to tell me what’s really going on?”

  Me: “I just have work to do.”

  “Are you drinking again?”

  “No! It has nothing to do with that.”

  “Then why all the secrecy, the disappearing act?”

  “I told you, I’m looking into something, a friend’s missing daughter . . .”

  “What’s it to you?”

  Me, hostile: “What’s it to you?”

  “There you go again. I’m trying to ask a question, you make it a war.”

  “I’m not making it a war!”

  “You keep secrets, Frankie. You enforce boundaries, erect walls. Then turn around and try to pretend it doesn’t matter. What’s it going to take for you to be honest with me?”

  “What’s it going to take for you to trust me?”

  “You’re an addict. You really have to ask that?”

  Me, staring at him, feeling my throat thicken and my chest compress. “It’s not always about drinking!”

  “Then what’s it about?”

  My mouth opens, but the words don’t come out. I stare at his kind, earnest face. I gaze into the eyes of the man who loves me. And once again, I feel nothing but my own frantic heartbeat. I gotta go. I gotta get out. I can’t handle this.

  I found this man. I fell in love with his kindness, his patience. He saw me, all of me, and he didn’t turn away. He let me in. He held back my hair while I puked my way through detox. He spoon-fed me broth while I slowly fought my way back to living. He crawled into bed beside me, all those horrific nights, when I shook uncontrollably and prayed for death but never actually let go because I didn’t want to disappoint him.

  He is my anchor. The best person I’ve ever met. If I think of life without him, I feel pain, way down deep in the place that alcohol once took away, and now I will always get to live with.

  And yet, day after day after day. This life. This existence. I don’t feel joy or contentment or everlasting peace.

  I think, most of the time, don’t look at me, don’t look at me, don’t look at me.

  I think, all of the time. I wish I could disappear. Vanish without a trace. Never to be seen again.

  My hand, on the doorknob, trembling slightly. “I’ll be back later.”

  Paul, his handsome face now contorted. “Don’t bother.”

  “Okay.”

  “It’s that easy for you? Just walk away, never look back? For God’s sake, I love you, Frankie.”

  Me, twisting the doorknob. “Okay.”

  “Okay? That’s all you have to say? Fucking okay? You break my heart.”

  “I love you,” I whisper finally, though it’s not enough. We both know it’s not enough. I so wish I were on the other side of the door. I so wish . . .

  “Get the fuck out, Frankie.”

  “Okay.”

  “It’s not,” he says bitterly. “It never was.”

  And me, a stupid broken record. “Okay.”

  I leave.

  He lets me.

  Okay. Okay. Okay.

  And then, mere hours, days, an entire lifetime later:

  “What did you do, Frankie? Dear God, what did you do?”

  Now I’m the one crying. I’m the one cradling his head in my arms. The blood, the blood, the blood. Dear God, the blood.

  “I love you. I love you, I love you. I promise I loved you.”

  But there’s just so much blood. As his eyes close, and his breath starts to rattle.

  “What did you do?” Paul asks me, one last time.

  “I loved you . . .”

  * * *

  —

  I wake up screaming. Or maybe I’m sobbing. It’s hard to be sure which. Piper is curled up against my lower back. I focus on the sound of her rumbling purr as I stare into the dark, willing my breathing to ease, the horror to fade.

  Paul is gone.

  Two girls are missing.

  And I am still me. Afraid of everything. Of anything.

  I will find Angelique and Livia, I promise myself, hands fisting the sheets. I will bring them home. I swear it. Because I need this. Need it.

  Which explains the phone call I get next.

  CHAPTER 24

  This is Emmanuel,” he says.

  I’m groggy, still rousing from my troubled night. “Emmanuel?”

  “I’m here with my aunt. We need to speak to you.”

  Talk. Now. The victim’s family. “I can meet you at your apartment.”

  “We’re outside, at the side entrance.”

  Of course they are. “Five minutes,” I mutter, which is a total lie. I’m buried in bed, still wearing my nightshirt, breath foul, feral roommate long gone.

  I hang up the phone and stagger my way to the shower. I subject myself to an ice-cold spray, then throw on jeans and a long-sleeved shirt and head downstairs before I think better of it. Angelique’s family. They might have new information for me. Or new information to demand of me. Either way, their pain matters.

  I crack open the side door of Stoney’s establishment long enough to identify Emmanuel and his aunt. Guerline is wearing traditional turquoise hospital scrubs, but there’s something about the expression on her face . . .

  I blink against the harshness of daylight, glance at my watch. Ten a.m. Late by many standards. Way too early for the night shift crowd. I open the heavy metal door wider. “Are you hungry?” I ask.

  “We’ve eaten,” Guerline speaks up.

  “Coffee?”

  No one says no to coffee. Plus, Lotham had said it was an important part of Haitian hospitality, and I want to be as welcoming as possible. Guerline nods. I allow her and her nephew entrance. Emmanuel, a pro by now, leads the way to the exact same booth he occupied before, while I disappear long enough to activate machines that produce caffeine. My stomach is grumbling. I inspect Viv’s fridge, hope she will forgive me as I select two eggs, fire up her griddle, and scramble away.

  I return with the pot of coffee, pouring out three mugs with the deft practice of a lifelong waitress. Emmanuel goes to work with the cream and sugar. I return to the kitchen, where I wolf down the scrambled eggs to settle my stomach, then give myself a brief and silent pep talk. I head back to the dining room.

  “The police,” Guerline says at last, clutching her coffee mug. “They ask, but they do not tell. You must have word.”

  I understand. The families so often live in anguished limbo—not trusted, not informed, not represented in their own loved ones’ missing persons investigations. I’ve worked plenty of cases where the suspicions regarding the family’s involvement have been borne out, but my gut tells me Emmanuel and his aunt aren’t part of that group.

  Briefly, I tell them about the findings involving Angelique’s recovered stash of money—that some of the bills appear to be high-quality counterfeits. Guerline’s eyes widen in genuine shock, while Emmanuel pauses with his coffee mug in midair.

  “Counterfeit?” he asks.

  “Probably printed in Europe and imported.”

  “We don’t have counterfeit money,” Guerline says. “We don’t have . . . money.”<
br />
  And yet, Angelique had.

  “Did Angelique ever talk about her friend from the summer camp, Livia Samdi?”

  Twin nos.

  “Do you know Livia?”

  More head shakes.

  “Ever hear her name mentioned, maybe when Angelique was talking to another one of her friends, or maybe you came home early to find a new girl visiting your apartment?”

  Guerline shakes her head, more emphatically this time.

  Emmanuel hesitates. “One day, I overheard LiLi, on the phone. She was trying to calm someone down. ‘I know, I know,’ she kept repeating. Then, ‘I’m working on it. Please trust me.’”

  “And?” I prod.

  “And then Angelique spotted me. She turned away, ended the call. It was only later that it occurred to me, the way she was holding the phone, it wasn’t right.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Her iPhone is flat, like everyone else’s. This phone, the way she had her hand wrapped around it . . . It had to be smaller, thicker. Like a flip phone.”

  “An after-hours phone,” I fill in.

  “What is an after-hours phone?” Guerline asks.

  “Like a burner phone. We suspected Angelique had a second phone, hence she left her original phone in her backpack.” Completing her disguise as Livia, I think, while also eliminating the chance her personal cell would be discovered on her or used to trace her movements.

  “Are you sure she wasn’t speaking to one of her other friends, Marjolie or Kyra?” I say to Emmanuel.

  “I don’t think so. Her tone . . .” He shrugs. “When she saw me, she looked guilty. Why would she feel guilty about talking to her friends?”

  Emmanuel is an astute young man. I’m willing to bet he’s right, Angelique was speaking on a burner phone with Livia, and once again, I’m struck by her level of secrecy regarding that relationship . . . But I don’t think now is the time to go into that level of detail with Angelique’s family.

  “I don’t think Angelique was trying to run away or disappear,” I say at last. “It sounds like she had befriended a girl, Livia, from the summer rec program. Livia’s own background . . . Let’s just say it appears she was in some kind of trouble and Angelique was trying to help her. So much so, Angelique was dressed as Livia that final afternoon in November. That’s why the police originally couldn’t find evidence of Angelique departing her school. She did it disguised as Livia Samdi.”