Bookshots Thriller Omnibus Page 3

  The battery’s charged and I’m getting four bars, but as I try to open apps, nothing comes up. No messages, no voice mails, no stored numbers, no record of recent calls in or out. Just the factory settings.

  No teenage girl could resist junking up her phone with apps, or abstain from texting and calls. Certainly not Gabby, who makes it a practice to live up to her nickname.

  The memory’s been wiped clean.

  I can’t imagine her doing that, tech-savvy as kids are today. Someone proficient with computers must have performed the vanishing act—on the run, flinging the phone onto the bed when finished. Either Josh or Gabby could have done that, I supposed; teenagers know their phones inside and out, as if by instinct.

  If so, Mercer was right, and they’d taken off on their own—making sure to leave behind no trace of their recent contacts, and sabotaging attempts to trace them through their signals.

  I don’t like that. It helps to confirm the marshal’s suspicions about Kevin’s guilt.

  On the other hand, someone else might have covered their tracks, to make sure no one knew where he was taking them and what he had planned for them. A professional, well-versed in police methods.

  And I really, really, really don’t like that.

  Chapter 7

  Another thing amateur sleuths always seem to have is a friend who can make a computer sit up and beg for him to hack it.

  I do have one of those.

  Sharon Kowalski works in the Sackville branch of a small chain of computer sales and service centers, blocks away from the university attended by Josh Moore. I met her when my old computer kept turning itself off. She could have complicated the diagnosis and charged me a bundle, but she said only the switch needed cleaning, a twenty-dollar job. On another occasion, she’d spent an hour helping me work out instructions for how to install programs on a laptop that wasn’t on the market until the next year. Her boss was out, she said, and it was a slow day at the shop. She refused payment.

  If that weren’t enough to make me warm to her, she’s also a fox.

  I’d tried asking her out for a cup of coffee, but she’d declined firmly—there was a bad break-up still haunting her. The customer’s side of the store is shallow, divided by a black-glass counter from shelves of electronic equipment in varying stages of repair or awaiting pick-up and a long workbench littered with tools and parts and scraps of cable. Sharon is standing in front of it with her back to the door when I come in, bells above the door tinkling.

  “Be with you in a sec.”

  “A sec might as well be a year when I’m waiting for you.”

  Okay, clumsy line. It sounded like Browning until it got to my mouth.

  She smiles over her shoulder—indulgently, I’m afraid. She’s wearing a white cotton blouse. Her red hair is short, and her high forehead, slightly turned-up nose, and round chin are tailor-made to be seen in profile. “Hi, Ray. Don’t tell me you need a new cartridge already. You’re the Stephen King of how-to writers.”

  “Tell that to my clients. They pay me as if I were Edgar Allan Poe. He went hungry most of the time.”

  When she finishes what she’s doing and turns, wiping her hands on a microfiber cloth, I realize all over again that her profile is only the opener for the main event. On her, the sparkling array of precision screwdrivers, tweezers, and circuit-testers in her plastic pocket protector might as well be precious jewels.

  Lest I stare too long where I shouldn’t be looking, I fumble out Gabby’s phone. “Can you recover data that’s been erased from this?”

  She takes it, examines both sides. “I think so. I know this model. You know, it doesn’t go with what you’re wearing.”

  I’ve got an excuse ready: I found it on the street. I want to find out who it belongs to so I can return it. But for once in Sharon’s intoxicating presence, I don’t let the thought get as far as the spoken word. That explanation wouldn’t cover everything I needed, and she’s no dummy. “Is there someplace we can talk in private?”

  A thin vertical line spoils the perfect symmetry of her brow. “Ray, if this is a gambit, please forget it. You know my situation.”

  “I wish it were.”

  Something in my tone cuts off the question on her tongue. She glances at a digital clock on the wall next to the counter. “Jim’s on a service call. We’ve got maybe twenty minutes.”

  “I hope that’s long enough.”

  “When it’s just one person on duty, we close down for breaks. But it’s a little early for mine.”

  “Please, Sharon. It’s important.”

  She nods, comes out from behind the counter, locks the front door, and turns the OPEN sign around.

  I follow her around the counter through a door into an unpainted storeroom cluttered with more electronic components and grimy canvas bags bristling with tools on a bench scarred all over with nicks. She turns and waits, her short-nailed hands folded at her waist.

  As briefly as possible I tell her what’s happened, swearing her to secrecy. I don’t want to get myself in more trouble than I already am, or jeopardize my friends by spreading the word.

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I wish I were. The law’s treating the Moores like criminals instead of citizens in danger. I want to find out what’s happened before they go public. This guy Adder who’s after them…I don’t feel good about it.”

  “I believe you. I know Margo. She calls us when the office equipment needs work. I thought she had the perfect family—” She stops herself. “Twenty minutes. Let me see what I can do.” She unlocks a drawer under the counter, takes out a cable and a clear plastic case with various adapters nesting in compartments, uses one to plug the cable into the pink phone, and another to plug the other end into a jack in a laptop that looks like something I thought existed only at NASA. Then she draws a pair of red-framed readers from behind her pocket protector and hooks them over her ears, with the solemn ceremony of a matador dressing for the bullring.

  Chapter 8

  Again I divide my concentration, this time between Sharon and my watch. I don’t want her getting in trouble with her boss if he gets back and finds the shop closed. That would be yet another person in on the investigation, and more risk for the Moores.

  Her fingers dart over the keyboard, but not as fast as the second hand racing around the dial. We’ve got maybe twenty minutes, she’d said. That “maybe” thuds in my ears in time with each tick.

  “Something,” she says.

  I look first at the pink phone lying on the bench. I know nothing about this procedure, apart from what I’ve seen on crime shows on TV. When I shift my attention to the laptop, I see a column of numbers filling the screen from the top toward the bottom.

  “What is it, a code?” I ask.

  “No, Mr. Hawking. They’re telephone numbers.”

  “Oh.”

  “Calls going out. When do these kids stop to eat and sleep and go to the bathroom? This one”—the nail of her index finger taps a row of digits beginning with the local area code—“see, it comes up five times more often than all the others. Gotta be a BFF, or maybe a boyfriend.”

  “Are they texts?”

  “No. I haven’t been able to raise those. Can’t even tell you what apps she might’ve had installed.”

  “I’m hoping it was one of the Moores. I mean, if it was someone else, wouldn’t that person just destroy all their phones?”

  “I can’t help you there. I’m a techie, not a terrorist.” She tapped the screen again. “If the girl called anyone to tell them where she was going, this’d be the one.”

  “Can you match the number to a name?”

  “If it’s listed.” She looks at me over the top of her glasses. “If I had it for the day, I might get more out of it. I’ll make some excuse to Jim.”

  “Better not. I’m hoping to sneak it back into the house before Mercer and Howard realize it’s missing.”

  “Right.” She jerks the cable from the laptop’s ja
ck and opens another program.

  Someone bangs on the front door.

  “Jesus!” My heart smacks my ribs like a handball.

  “That must be Jim. He’s early. Talk to him, will you? Make something up. I need another five minutes.”

  I leave the storeroom, composing and discarding excuses on the way. The store’s manager has his hands cupped around his eyes, leaning against the glass front door trying to peer inside. He’s heavyset and dresses sloppily, with half his shirttail hanging below the hem of a too-tight brown suede jacket, baggy carpenter’s jeans with a hammer loop, scuffed black Oxfords, and a grubby ball cap with a pair of gigantic women’s breasts in a bikini bra patched on the front. If you had to guess what he did for a living, it would probably involve a grease pit. Sharon told me he graduated from MIT.

  I twist the latch, tinkling the bells as I pull open the door.

  He frowns. “Schick, right? Roy Schick?”

  “Close. Ray Gillett.”

  “Right. Compaq Q. Dirty power switch. Get yourself a can of compressed air, save us both time and trouble.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Where’s Sharon? If I knew she was going to lock up I’d have taken along my key.” He starts inside.

  I move to block him. “Uh, give her a minute, okay?”

  He stops, stares at the embarrassment on my face. “Oh, for—what am I running here, a dating service? You run interference while she puts her panties back on?”

  “God, no, nothing like that! I brought in a cell belonging to a friend for her to look at.”

  He isn’t buying it. A splayed fingertip thumps my chest. “You need to think about another place to take your shit to. I met that jerk she was with. I threw him out when he came bulling in here to finish a fight he started at home. It was another year before she got up the gumption to walk out on him, and then I had to rag on her to get her to file an injunction to keep him away.”

  “She told me how good you were throughout that mess.”

  “She’s the best employee I ever had. I wasn’t about to waste a year training a replacement if she got so messed up she had to quit.”

  “Leave him alone, Jim. You can’t bar a man from the shop just because he likes me.”

  I turn. Sharon has come in from the storeroom, carrying Gabby’s phone and a piece of paper. “Here’s the name and billing address.”

  I went back to the counter and took both items.

  Jim points at the pink cell. “This guy’s bad news, Shar. We sell more of that model to high-school cheerleaders than anyone else.”

  “Get your mind out of the gutter. He’s doing a favor for the daughter of a friend.”

  “Yeah? Do me a favor and don’t let any civilians into the back. We don’t give tours.” He storms around the counter into the storeroom and slams the door.

  “I’m sorry, Ray.”

  “Believe me, you don’t have anything to apologize for. Thanks, Sharon.”

  I pocket the phone on my way out and look at the paper for the first time. The girl’s name is Tiffany, and she lives in Willow Grove. We’re neighbors.

  Chapter 9

  I probably drove past the place a hundred times without noticing it. It’s a plain box painted white with gray trim in what architects label American Craftsman, because it doesn’t fit into any specific category. Whoever designed the first one was interested only in four walls and a roof.

  It’s well-kept, though, with a small square lawn that’s been cut recently and the flag on the mailbox carved into a wooden woodpecker. Thurgood’s the name on the box.

  The woman who answers the door is tall and middle-aged, with her hair cut in a bob and graying.

  “Mrs. Thurgood?”

  “Miss.”

  Her tone is a rich contralto, deeper than mine. Somewhere back in the house, someone is rattling dishes and singing a tune that was popular when the woman at the door was young. This voice is higher.

  “I’m looking for a Miss Tiffany Thurgood. I thought—”

  “You assumed Tiffany’s my daughter. I’m Tiffany Thurgood.”

  My confusion causes her expression to relax. “You’re not the first,” she says. “My mother gave birth in the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton in New York. There was no time to get her to a room. She was staring at the Tiffany chandelier when the hotel doctor performed the delivery. The name was unique until the millennials came along.”

  “I still came to the wrong place, I’m afraid. The Tiffany I’m looking for is a friend of the teenage daughter of friends of mine.”

  “That would be Gabby Moore?”

  I blink. “You’re the girl she called all those times?”

  “I’m the woman she called. Just what is your business, Mr.—?”

  “Excuse my manners. My name is Ray Gillett. Gabby has disappeared and I’m trying to help find her.”

  Nothing stirs the smooth surface of her features, but she steps back, opening the door wider. “Come in, Mr. Gillett.”

  The living room is spartan, but not uncomfortable. We sit in chromium-and-black-leather love seats set corner to corner, she with her ankles crossed and her hands folded in her lap. Beyond the open arch to the kitchen, the dishes stop clattering. “Tiff, do we have company?”

  “A school matter, Do.”

  “Whatever can they want with you now?”

  “Unfinished business.”

  “Oh.” The noise resumes, only now without musical accompaniment.

  “School?” I ask.

  “Willow Grove High. I was nurse there for twenty-seven years. I’m retired now, but Gabby and I got to be quite close. We stay in touch.”

  I say, “Oh. I’m sorry to bother you. I’m just concerned for my friends’ daughter.”

  “Why aren’t your friends here instead of you?”

  “They’re away, and can’t be reached.”

  “Are you sure she isn’t with them?”

  I consider taking her into my confidence, as I did Sharon Kowalski; but I know Sharon. “I’m sure. She left her phone behind. That’s how I found you, from the number of times she called.”

  “Gabby left her phone behind? Her cell?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “What kind of teenage girl does that?”

  This is the woman who’d called out from the kitchen. She stands inside the arch, wiping her hands on a striped towel, in a man’s shirt with epaulets, stretch jeans, and loafers. Her short brown hair frames a sweet face, wearing a concerned look.

  “You don’t need to worry about this, Dorothy.”

  “You forget I’ve met Gabby. I like her. I worry about the people I like. I worry about you.”

  I’m learning a great deal about their relationship. The half that looks the less feminine is the one with the open heart; and the effect of it on the partner is immediate.

  “I know.” Tiffany’s tone is softer.

  I said, “You can call Cam Howard if you like. He’s the chief of police. I reported to him when I learned th—she was missing.” I nearly blew it there.

  Tiffany Thurgood unfolds her hands and reaches for a console telephone on a black aluminum table at the end of her love seat. All my muscles clench. What was I thinking? If Howard and Marshal Mercer find out I’m really butting in on their investigation, they’ll jail me. Good God! I’ve got a stolen cell—evidence in a federal case—in my pocket!

  Dorothy steps up behind her companion and rests a hand on her shoulder. Tiffany withdraws her hand from the phone and grasps Dorothy’s. Dorothy squeezes.

  “Tiff, I think you should tell this man what Gabby told you.”

  Chapter 10

  “Not until I’m satisfied.”

  Tiffany Thurgood, I see now, has thick eyelids, which when lowered partially give her the appearance of a reptile, cold-blooded and infinitely patient.

  I’m no match for that. I’m naturally gregarious, and when there’s a lull in the conversation I panic, compelled to fill it. I stall for time to put my thoughts i
n order.

  “What do I need to do to convince you I’m telling the truth?”

  “Tell the truth.”

  I spread my hands. “Gabby’s missing. That’s it.”

  “It’s not it. It may be part of it, but part of the truth is the same as a lie. I’ve never met her parents, but from what she’s told me—complained to me, sometimes—they’re conscientious. So why am I talking to you and not one or both of them?”

  “I’m very close to the Moores.”

  “Not as close as a parent to a child, in a normal family.”

  “I’m curious as to why a teenage girl—a normal one, to use your word—should spend so much time talking to an older woman.”

  Sour amusement twists up the corners of her mouth. She isn’t fooled. “Did you never have a mentor besides the people who brought you up? That’s what I am to Gabby; and for that matter to many of the girls in the freshman class, some of whom, like her, remain in contact. The faculty advisor, Mr. Sweet, is a good man, but a man nonetheless. There are certain subjects in which his gender makes him a better confidant to boys than girls.”

  Dorothy speaks up. “Now that you know more about Gabby and Tiffany than we know about you, Mr. Gillett, it’s time to answer her question. Otherwise you can leave and we’ll call Chief Howard and get it from him.”

  I sit back, placing my palms on my thighs, as much to wick off sweat as to rest them. “I can see I’m outnumbered. But you’ve convinced me, both of you, that I can trust you to keep what I’m about to say in this room.”

  Tiffany turns her head away from me for the first time, meeting Dorothy’s gaze. The nod they share seems hardly big enough for one; theirs, I realize, is an almost telepathic understanding, the kind I hope someday to have with someone. Sharon Kowalski’s face flashes in my mind.

  “Proceed, Mr. Gillett,” says Tiffany.

  Once again I tell it: Arriving at the house for my weekly date with Kevin and the hoops, finding the place deserted, my meeting with Howard and Mercer, and my Junior G-Man stint at the Moores’. I get some satisfaction from the length of the silence that follows my narrative. I know instinctively this pair doesn’t shock easily.