Girl, Vanished (An Ella Dark FBI Suspense Thriller—Book 5)

by Blake Pierce

  Even behind her eyelids she saw the house. A fantasy scenario of how her meeting with Kevin Steen might play out looped in her mind, then she shot awake, craving the meeting for real. She pushed the exhaustion to one side, kept her eyes glued on the house and only blinked when she really needed to.

  It was going to be a long day.

  ***

  Ella glanced over at the dashboard clock. Nearly two hours had passed, and everything was still the same. A row of houses, an empty street, and nothing in Steen’s house had changed.

  One time when she was working for the Virginia Police Department, an officer had told her that chasing down criminals made up one percent of a cop’s job. The other ninety-nine percent was spent staring at people’s houses. That ninety-nine percent, he said, was why so many cops killed themselves. She thought he was joking, but actually doing the task painted his comments in a different light.

  No missed calls from Byford. No messages from Mark, for a change. She began to feel like time was running out here, and she couldn’t risk wasting time for fear of another life being lost. In the past three and a half hours, only two pedestrians had walked past. This was an optimistic task, but a lost cause given the urgency.

  Ella put her key in the ignition and flipped it once. She studied her surroundings one more time. She no longer saw this street as an animated, tangible part of the world she lived in, rather a two-dimensional backdrop hung up at the rear of the stage where her life story played out.

  But then something came to her. A note of irregularity. She saw movement where she hadn’t before.

  Someone was outside Kevin Steen’s house. Going through the gate. Pushing a key into the door.

  Ella fired out of her seat with the speed of a cheetah. She softly closed the car door as not to alert the man to her presence. She couldn’t make out his features so wasn’t sure if it was the suspect or not, but who else would be venturing into his home?

  She crossed the road, noticing that the door was left wide open. From that, she could only deduce that whoever had arrived wasn’t planning on staying long. She thought of the times she’d forgotten her purse and had to run back to her apartment: in, leave door open, out again in seconds. It saved messing around with the latches.

  Ella quickly one-rung her partner. There was no time to chat. He’d know what she meant. She gripped her pistol and handcuffs and swooped towards the house, making her way silently to the still-open front door. She caught her first glimpse of the interior and was impressed by the little she saw. She never expected a thief to have such good taste. She stood ready for battle, put her racing thoughts to rest, then pushed the door open.

  On the other side, something stopped its momentum. Then like a ghostly apparition, Kevin Steen appeared in front of her. He looked much different than his police mugshot. He was 57 years old but looked older, with a shaved head, deep brown eyes, and thin pink lips. Ella saw a scrawny physique beneath his beige trousers and white jacket.

  Kevin gave no introduction, simply went about his business as though she didn’t exist.

  “Mr. Steen?” she asked. She caught his eye for a second, then he stepped outside his house and tried to slam his door shut. Ella wedged her foot in the gap, eager to see the contents of his house. Somewhere in there would be evidence of his crimes. Steen walked off down the pathway.

  “Kevin,” she shouted. “I’m with the FBI. Please stay where you are.”

  Kevin did not comply; he turned the corner out of his house and started up the pathway. Ella jumped over the small fence and cut him off at the pass. “Kevin, we need to speak with you,” she said as she showed him her badge.

  Then the suspect froze. He checked his phone and turned in the other direction. Ella ran after him, caught up and grabbed him by the wrist. Kevin Steen spun to face her, bringing his nose right up against hers.

  “You stay out of this, little woman. You hear?”

  His voice was rough and gravelly like his vocal cords had charred to flakes. Her face against his, she didn’t blink or twitch or move.

  “Kevin, you’ve got three seconds to start talking, and I suggest you do it.”

  He pushed up against her. A classic intimidation tactic. The force displaced her balance, but she kept upright. Ella had seen it a million times.

  “Trust me. You don’t want any of this. Go home. This never happened.”

  “Wanna tell me who the big four are?”

  Steen’s lips arched down at the edges. He sniffed violently then spat in Ella’s face. At her moment of disorientation, she heard footsteps escape from her. She wiped the residue from her eyes then saw Steen running back towards his house. Ella took chase, leaping over the fence and barging shoulder-first into the door. It slammed shut the micro-second she connected with it. It shook on its hinges but stayed firmly in place.

  Her brief interaction had confirmed one thing. Kevin Steen was guilty of something.

  Ella took two steps back and booted the door with everything she had. It flung open, breaking in two places. Ella leaped inside the home and found herself in the lounge with no sign of a suspect anywhere. She listened for any signs of life but caught nothing.

  She ran through the downstairs area, familiarizing herself with the layout and looking for any places where Kevin might hide from her. He’d run back in here for a reason, and something told her she’d quickly find out what it was.

  The back door leading to the garden. Locked. All the sizeable windows. Locked. Kevin must be somewhere in here. He couldn’t have gotten outside so suddenly.

  Ella withdrew her pistol and held the weaver stance as she turned into the hallway.

  “Kevin, make yourself known. That’s an order,” she shouted, expecting nothing by way of reply. From the hallway, she moved up the staircase. At the top, she found four closed doors. Without hesitation, she booted the first one and found a completely barren room. Next in line was the bathroom. Empty with no places to hide.

  She raised her foot to take the third door but stopped when she heard a noise. Tap tap. Then a scratching sound. She looked up and saw an attic, its cord swaying with life.

  Ella wasted no time pulling it down. A wooden staircase toppled down, and Ella had to jump back to avoid it. There was no disguising her invasion, so Ella decided to own it.

  “Yield now, Kevin, and I won’t shoot,” she shouted as she ascended to the peak of the house. A glass roof panel let in just enough light to make out the shape of the room.

  “Kevin, I know you’re up here. Come out now. You’re not getting out.”

  Wooden boards creaked beneath her feet as she checked the corners. Back to the wall, pistol jumping between the darkened parts of the room. There was a stash of crates in one corner, a pile of bags in the other. She edged along the wall, coming to the third corner, then heard a clink beneath her boot.

  Ella glanced down and saw a shining silver coin reflecting back at her. Not one she recognized. An imported one.

  Suddenly, she found herself lowering down to it. Not of her own free will, but by an absence of it. A forceful blow to the back of her skull sent her downward and she found herself eye-to-eye with the face on the coin. Her first instinct was to grip her pistol to ensure it stayed put, but a heavy boot to her wrist unlocked her clenched hand. Her attacker kicked the pistol out of reach, rolled her over and clasped his hand around her neck. She felt his fingernails dig into her flesh to the point it drew blood.

  The lack of oxygen clouded her ability to think but muscle memory took over in response. Ella wrapped her legs around Steen’s mid-section, aiming for either side of the ribs. She squeezed with fury, rolled back on herself and flipped Steen head-first into the crates. She scrambled to her feet, lunged for her weapon.

  Got it.

  “Don’t you dare move,” she shouted, training her pistol at Steen’s legs. He lay against the crates clutching his forehead. When his arms fell free, Ella saw the massive gash. “Looks painful. But not as painful as having your throat slit
, I bet.”

  “What?” Steen shouted. “The fuck do you want with me, anyway?”

  “I want you to empty your pockets. Show me you’re unarmed.”

  “Bitch you’ve got a gun. If I had a gun, I’d have used it by now.”

  “Do it.”

  Steen reached into his jeans and showed his pockets were empty.

  “Jacket too.”

  Steen slowly removed it and slid it across the floor to Ella. “There. Check yourself.”

  “Alright. Move an inch and I’ll make that gash much worse.” She bent down without taking her eyes off the suspect, reached into both jacket pockets, and found nothing. She rummaged around the inside and found another.

  Her fingertips connected with something.

  “What’s this, huh,” she said. She pinched it between her fingers and extracted it, and when she saw it, her trained target faltered just a little. “Oh my God,” she said.

  It was two foreign coins wrapped in plastic.

  Steen had a lot of explaining to do.

  Ella inspected them a little more closely, and as she averted her eyes off the fallen suspect, she saw a blur in her peripheral vision. Footsteps thundered across the floorboards. Ella dropped the coins and re-aimed her pistol at the fleeing suspect but couldn’t get a lock-on. To her sheer astonishment, Steen was heading in the opposite direction to the exit. The bizarre direction choice confused her, until Steen seemingly flew towards the ceiling and out the open window. His full weight crashed down the roof outside, sounding like the god of thunder had come to a side street in Newark. She heard the thuds cascade down the roof then suddenly stop.

  Ella followed his trail, climbing halfway out of the window to see Kevin Steen standing in place at his garden gate.

  Standing opposite him was Agent Byford, gun in hand.

  Ella made her way down in haste, bringing the coins down with her.

  At last, the game was over.

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  After taking an hour to process everything, Ella went down to the holding cells at the NDPD precinct. Inside, notorious thief Kevin Steen awaited his official arrest. Byford accompanied her down there for their first interview with the suspect.

  A uniformed officer unlocked the massive steel door leading into the holding cells. The area was not a pretty affair, not too dissimilar to the jail cells in Ella’s strange Victorian dream. A powdery light sifted through the windows. Overhead was a vaulted ceiling, at least thirty feet high, and on it, Ella saw three layers of paint, each a dismal attempt at cheerfulness. The remains of a pair of rusted chains, bolted to the wall, lay on the ground like dead snakes.

  “Hello, Kevin,” Ella said to the prisoner. He sat on a bench with a bucket of water beside him, gradually applying splashes to his head wound. “Now are you ready to talk?”

  “Let’s get this over with,” he said.

  The guard brought two chairs over for the agents. They took a seat outside Steen’s cell.

  “So, you’re a thief. Is that right?”

  “I’m whatever pays me.”

  “Sure. Now, we talked with your parole officer today. Want to tell us why you didn’t report to your last checkin?”

  Steen shrugged then laughed. “I’ve been busy. I guess I forgot.”

  “What could possibly be more important than not going back to prison?” asked Byford.

  “Look, I’ve been a free man for a month. Man’s got things to do, alright? Tell the bitch I’ll call her when I’ve got five minutes.”

  “You certainly do have things to do. I’m guessing you’ve got some old friends to catch up with, right?”

  “Something like that,” Steen grunted.

  “Old friends like Alan Yates, or Jimmy Loveridge.”

  Steen soared to his feet and gripped the bars of his cell. “I know where this is going, and I didn’t touch those bastards. Yeah, I know those guys, but I didn’t cut them up.”

  “Are you sure about that?” Byford asked.

  “Positive, buddy.”

  “How do you know them?” asked Ella.

  Steen cracked a smile, showing two rows of alarmingly white teeth. Ella remembered reading it was quite common in newly released prisoners because brushing teeth took away hunger pangs.

  “I’m a burglar, okay? I’ve been burgling since I was at my mother’s teat, and I’m still going even when I’m at your mother’s teat. If you want to stay in this game, you gotta put some beats in between you and your hot property.”

  Ella pulled a look of perplexity. “Kevin, you’re 57. Stop speaking like a rapper and tell us in plain English.”

  Steen retreated to the back of his cage. “When you lift something, you always sell it to a vendor. You don’t go round selling to the public like some clueless dipshit. Vendors will then sell it to other vendors. These are the beats, so it never comes back you, comprende?”

  “We didn’t ask for a lesson in stealing. We asked how you know Alan and Jimmy,” Byford said.

  “I sold them things I’d lifted. Watches, necklaces, old ass shit for Jimmy’s stupid shop. They loved it.”

  “Did they know it was all,” Ella paused, “hot property?”

  “Jimmy did. He didn’t care. Alan not so much. He thought I imported it.”

  “Kevin, Alan Yates was a banker and philanthropist. Why would he need you?”

  “He didn’t need me, but men like that are fuckin” addicted. They love seeing the numbers go up. He used to sell my stuff for himself directly. All those hospital wings and park benches – that’s my doing.”

  Ella wasn’t sure how much of this was true, but she felt a little dirty if that was the case. Hopefully the truth about Alan Yates’s antics wouldn’t surface after his death, she thought.

  “Okay, and now those two men are dead. Bit of a coincidence, isn’t it?” asked Byford.

  “Yeah, so?” said Steen. “Why would I kill two people who gave me easy cash?”

  A reasonable question thought Ella, but she was convinced there was an answer hiding somewhere.

  “Maybe they wronged you. Maybe they didn’t petition for your release from jail. Perhaps you’re ready to turn over a new life and you wanted to wipe out your past connections?”

  Steen splashed his head again, this time soaking his skull in the process. “Ha. You’re out of your head, lady. I loved those two guys. I oughta be buying them gold tombstones with the money they made me.”

  “Money that you don’t have anymore,” said Ella.

  “Yeah, that’s a kick in the nuts, but what am I gonna do? Cry about it? No, I’m out there hustling again.”

  “We can tell,” Ella said. “Want to tell us about Barry Windham?”

  “Who?”

  “Barry Windham. A coin collector and local electrician.”

  “Never heard that name in my life.”

  “You know his brother, Trevor.”

  “Oh,” Steen tapped himself on the head. “Yeah, I know Barry. I think.”

  “Well, we found him dead this morning too. That’s three people all who have a connection to you. Pretty damning, wouldn’t you say?”

  Steen came back to the front bars again. “Lady, you ever heard of statistics? Those three guys probably had links to a million suckers like me. Yatesy did business with any old bastard. Loveridge was as crooked as I am and them Windham boys would sell their mother a timeshare if it made them a buck. Plus, what about all the boys I do business with that are still breathing? You ever think about that?”

  An hour ago, Ella was convinced they had their man. But now, doubts were coming thick and fast. Kevin Steen was clearly a piece of work and had skeletons in his closet, but she couldn’t definitely say he was responsible for these murders. For a mouthy criminal, he made some good points.

  “All of our victims were found with coins at the crime scene. Kevin, you’re big in the coin collecting scene, correct?” asked Ella.

  Steen shrugged his shoulders. “Maybe. Dying art, these days.”<
br />
  “Then what’s that I found in your jacket? Something for your personal collection?”

  Steen ran his hands across his scalp, spreading some of the drying blood. “I lifted it for a collector. And before you ask, he’s not from around here. He lives in New Jersey.”

  “You want to tell us about this big four?” Ella asked. “Your parole officer mentioned it.”

  “She did, huh? Well, I’m just gonna be honest here because I don’t got the energy for this. The big four are the four items you need to get back in the game. I’ve only been out the pen for a month and I need to get back into it.”

  “What items are these?” Byford asked.

  “Doesn’t matter. Anything. It’s a thief’s term. Most new fences won’t accept your goods ‘til you’ve got four valuable pieces. That’s how they know you’re a big deal and not some schmuck who got lucky.”

  Ella folded her arms and ran through all of the other questions she had, realizing that Kevin would just deflect them like he had done. She turned to Byford, who looked equally at a loss. If she wanted something from him, she had to dig into his psyche. Rile him up. Mia’s old trick.

  “Kevin, before we go, mind telling us about your murder trial?”

  “No.”

  “Well, can I make an assumption then?”

  “Sure, why not.”

  “My assumption is that the serial killer I’m looking for is standing right in front of me. We’ve got enough evidence to send you right back to prison today and make sure you never see daylight again. I think not only did you kill Alan, Jimmy, and Barry, but you killed Barry’s brother five years ago too.”

  Steen dipped his hand on the bucket and violently threw water on his face. He spat a wad out.

  “I think you burglarized Trevor’s store, then went back and killed the poor old man three days later. Because you’re a coward who wants to swipe your problems under the carpet. You couldn’t handle a fair fight with him, just like you ambushed me from behind earlier today. You’re weak, disgraceful, and hide behind a tough façade.”

  “Oh yeah? You think?” Steen spat. “We’ll see about that.”