Predator

by Linsey Lanier

  “Okay.” she gestured in a circle. The six gates in this area belong to our airline. “Mackenzie had to land at one of them.”

  Holloway was consulting his phone as well. “Her plane landed on time.”

  Becker peered over Holloway’s shoulder. “Two hours and five minutes ago.”

  But they didn’t know which gate she’d arrived at. And none of this information told them where Mackenzie was now.

  Miranda caught Parker looking upward and followed his gaze. White surveillance cameras where posted on the ceiling to monitor the passengers who were arriving and departing.

  Her heartbeat quickened. “One of those cameras might have picked her up.”

  Wesson brightened. “If Ambrose met her here, the airport would have that on video.”

  Miranda turned to Parker. “Do you think you could sweet talk the security people into letting us take a look at their footage?”

  He rubbed his chin. “It’s a tall order given the state of airlines these days, but I think I can manage it.”

  She turned to her team and saw three expectant faces.

  Holloway and Becker each had a backpack slung over their shoulders. Wesson had a small rose gold carry on. They’d all checked luggage in Atlanta.

  They couldn’t stand around here. They were already two hours behind, and the clock was ticking.

  Parker read her mind. “Why don’t you go down to baggage claim and get your things while Miranda and I check this out,” he said to the team. “Pick up our luggage as well, and get a taxi to the hotel.” He handed Holloway their claim tickets and gave them the information for the accommodations he’d reserved. “Feel free to use the company credit card for whatever you need, and order room service when you get settled if you’re hungry.”

  Becker looked eager to get going. “Good idea, Mr. Parker. I’m thinking of looking for Ambrose on social media.”

  “Excellent thought, Detective.”

  Suddenly, Parker had gone into full boss mode.

  Holloway checked the information on the tickets and nodded. “Thanks, sir. We’ll get busy on the searches ASAP.”

  “Yes, sir,” Wesson chimed in. “If we’re lucky, we’ll have a lead by the time you get to the hotel.”

  Parker gave Wesson a smile of pride. “I’d expect nothing less of this team.”

  Miranda wasn’t so optimistic, but it was a start, at least. “So that’s the plan,” she said. “Let’s go.”

  She watched her team hustle away. Miranda turned toward the check-in desk she’d passed a few minutes ago. The attendant was busy checking in passengers for the next flight.

  “Think we’d have any luck with her?”

  Parker nodded toward a brightly lit area up ahead. “Let’s try TSA first.”

  “As good an idea as any.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  While an annoying voice on the intercom announced departures and arrivals, she and Parker followed the concourse, skirting around people with rolling carts and luggage, and some with kids. They went down an escalator, through a couple more passages, and ended up at the TSA checkpoint.

  It looked like they were in luck. Only about twenty folks waiting in line ahead of them.

  But Parker bypassed the cordoned-off line, the stacks of trays and scanners, and headed for the area where screeners were checking bags. He marched straight up to a female officer.

  “Excuse me, ma’am. I’m wondering if you can help us.”

  Miranda eyed the woman’s stiff back under the royal blue shirt plastered with badges as she turned to him. She gestured beyond the metal detector. “The back of the line is that way, sir.”

  Parker gave her his most toe-curling smile. “Yes, I know, Officer. Actually, we’ve just arrived in your fair city.”

  The complement didn’t faze her.

  Parker took a card out of his pocket. “My name is Wade Parker. I’m a private investigator and this is my partner, Miranda Steele. We’re looking for a young girl, a fifteen-year-old who landed in Boston a few hours ago. She’s a runaway.”

  That got her attention. She took the card and frowned at it.

  “We’re wondering if her arrival was caught on your surveillance cameras.”

  She handed the card back. “You’d have to speak to my supervisor about that.” She started to turn away.

  “And who might that be, Officer?”

  Wearily closing her eyes, she gestured to a tall broad-shouldered guy with dark skin and a goatee standing at the end of a conveyor belt.

  With a surly look that said he knew there would be trouble, he sauntered over. “What is it, Marsh?”

  He sounded like he’d been in the military and was used to giving orders.

  Marsh gestured to her guests. “This man says he and this woman are detectives. Claim to be looking for a lost girl.”

  Trying again, Parker handed the supervisor his card as he read the name off his badge. “Officer Hoffman, I’m Wade Parker and this is Miranda Steele. We’re attempting to find a young girl who may be in trouble.”

  “She landed here a few hours ago,” Miranda added, hoping he’d get the idea they didn’t have a lot of time.

  Hoffman’s dark bushy brows drew together. “And how do you know that?”

  Miranda dug in her pocket and pulled out the printed itinerary. “We found this on her laptop.”

  The lines in Hoffman’s brow grew deeper as he studied the paper. “You think she disembarked from Terminal A.”

  “Yes,” Parker said. “And we think your surveillance cameras might give us a clue as to where she went from there.”

  “Her parents are very worried about her,” Miranda added without saying she was one of them.

  Catching the implication of that statement, Hoffman drew in a breath and rocked back on his heels, as if weighing the consequences of his next move. He was probably breaking a bunch of rules, but this kind of scenario could end up on the news and put his operation in a very bad light.

  Might even mean his job.

  He handed the paper back. “This is highly irregular, but since there’s a young girl involved, I’ll make an exception. Follow me.”

  He turned and gestured for someone to take his spot, then with a brisk clip, moved toward the back of the checkpoint.

  Miranda’s hopes began to rise as she followed the supervisor up another escalator and down an uncongested hall to a hidden room on the second floor.

  Hoffman knocked on a door marked “Private.”

  “Come in,” said a voice from inside.

  Hoffman opened the door and led them into a room filled with TV screens. The feed from a dozen security cameras stationed at various spots around the airport. The checkpoint area they had just left, where the queue had doubled. Several views of the concourse where the endless barrage of passengers rolled luggage to and fro along the aisle. A variety of gates with more moving bodies.

  In front of the screens a man sat lounging back in an office chair, sipping on a drink that must have come from a fast-food place in the concession area.

  “What’s up, Hoffman?” he said without moving his gaze.

  “Sorry to bother you, Larson. But it seems we have something of a situation here.”

  “Situation?”

  Hoffman gestured toward the visitors. “This is Wade Parker and Miranda Steele. Private investigators. They say they’re looking for a lost girl and would like a peek at our surveillance footage.”

  At that, Larson sat up and turned around. “Do you have a court order?”

  “Not as yet,” Parker said, as if it would be no problem to get one.

  Larson eyed Parker up and down, then took a long stare at Miranda. “I haven’t seen any suspicious activity lately.”

  Already annoyed by the man, Miranda pulled out Mackenzie’s itinerary and explained how they got it.

  Larson studied the paper as he finished his drink, making noises with his straw that made Miranda want to snatch the cup out of his hands.


  Instead she addressed him as a professional. “From that itinerary, Mr. Larson, we believe the girl landed here at one-sixteen. But we don’t know which gate she ended up at or where she went from there. Your cameras could help us verify she arrived in Boston, and might tell us where she went and who she was with.”

  Larson stopped sucking on his straw. “You don’t know who met her here?”

  “No.”

  He squinted up at her. “Miranda Steele. I know that name.” He tossed his cup in the trash. “Now I remember. It was a couple years ago. Lake Placid. Big hubbub at an ice skating tournament. Was that you?”

  For once, Miranda was glad for the publicity back then. “It was.”

  He pointed a finger at her. “There was a shooting and one of the skaters was involved.”

  Miranda held up the itinerary. “This girl was that skater.”

  His cheeks went limp. “Oh. Is she in trouble again?”

  “She might be.”

  He shook his head. “Kids. Let me see what I can do. Hoffman, watch the screens for me for a bit.”

  With a not very well hidden grunt, Hoffman took a spare seat and faced the screens.

  “He used to work this job, but hated it. Says he’s a people person.”

  Swiveling in his chair, Larson turned to a screen on a side table and began punching keys. After a moment, a black-and-white image appeared. Larson punched more keys to set the time back to one-ten. Then he let it go and sped up the video until the first person appeared on it.

  “This is Gate A1.” Larson slowed the image to normal speed. The time was one-twenty.

  Miranda stared at the images of nameless passengers moving soundlessly out the exit and into the concourse.

  “There’s no audio,” Miranda said.

  “No, we don’t record it.”

  The seconds ticked by on the timer in the corner of the screen. When it got to twenty-six, she grabbed a chair and inched closer to the images.

  Families, singles, a couple embracing each other as if they’d been reunited after being apart a long time.

  No one looked like Mackenzie.

  The crowd began to thin out until only one or two stragglers were left. When the time said one forty-three she sat back. “I don’t think that was her gate.”

  “Let’s try A2,” Parker said.

  “Where I was headed.” Again Larson’s fingers flew over the keyboard. After another moment, the images from the second gate appeared.

  More business folk on this flight, each moving quickly out of the frame, rushing to get to some meeting somewhere or perhaps a connecting flight.

  Once again Mackenzie wasn’t among them.

  “The next gate, please,” Parker said, taking a seat behind Miranda.

  “Yessir.” Larson queued it up and they watched.

  No Mackenzie.

  Miranda got up and paced. “She was here. She had to get off one of those planes.”

  “We aren’t finished yet.” Larson queued up the next bit of footage.

  Again an arriving hoard shuffled past the camera, and again there was no Mackenzie.

  “We’re not giving it enough time,” Miranda said. “Go back to the first gate and let’s watch for another ten minutes or so.” But it looked like they had seen all the passengers arriving on that plane.

  “There’s one more gate,” Parker said with a steady calm in his voice.

  Miranda couldn’t imagine how he could sound so composed. What if they couldn’t spot her?

  She sat down and dug her fingers into her scalp as Larson started the video for the last gate.

  A group of young men were the first to saunter through the exit. Carrying backpacks and dressed in jeans, graphic tees, and military jackets, they made Miranda’s heart jump. But no, those young men looked college age. Mackenzie wouldn’t be with them.

  A middle aged couple embraced at the doorway, blocking the view of some of the others. Then they moved on.

  About twenty more passengers paced into the concourse, each intent on getting to the next stop.

  The crowd dwindled for a moment.

  Miranda sat back in her chair, wanting to burst into tears of angry frustration. Had Mackenzie missed her flight? Was she back in Atlanta while they had come all this way to find her? She hadn’t gone back home. Colby and Oliver would have called if she had. Where was she?

  Suddenly another figure appeared on the screen.

  Lean and tallish for her age, her sleek dark hair hung to her shoulders. She was dressed in fashionable jeans and a pink puffer coat with a faux fur trim at the collar. And she had the gold-star backpack slung over a shoulder.

  Miranda jolted forward. “That’s her. That’s Mackenzie.”

  “It certainly is.” Behind her Parker was on his feet.

  Larson slowed the footage, and they watched her every move.

  The girl glanced down the corridor one way, then the other. She looked down at the cell phone in her hand.

  Miranda’s breath caught. “That’s the prepaid.”

  “It is.”

  Larson turned to Parker. “She’s using a prepaid phone?”

  “Whoever bought her ticket told her to get a prepaid phone so she couldn’t be traced.”

  “Good grief. And you don’t know who that was?”

  “No, we don’t.”

  Intently Miranda watched her daughter’s face on the screen. She looked lost, unsure of where to go. Hadn’t Ambrose told her where he was meeting her? Why wasn’t he at the gate? Why wasn’t he showing his face?

  Suddenly Mackenzie stopped and stared off into the distance.

  Miranda pointed to the screen. “She sees something.”

  “Someone,” Parker agreed.

  The girl hesitated a full five seconds and then she walked toward whoever she was looking at—and off the screen.

  Miranda spun around to Larson. “Where’s the next camera?”

  He looked uncomfortable. “That’s the restaurant area just before the main concourse. We don’t have cameras there.”

  “What?”

  “You have them at other areas of the concourse, don’t you?” Parker demanded.

  “We do.”

  “Queue them up.” Miranda pulled out her cell and consulted the airport map. “They had to go this way to get to parking, wouldn’t they?”

  “Maybe. We have several lots.”

  “They may have used public transportation,” Parker said.

  Larson pointed to the map. “Then they would have gone this way. Let me see what I can find.”

  He took them through footage from several more cameras, but Mackenzie wasn’t in any of them.

  To do a thorough search of the entire airport including the exits would take hours.

  Miranda’s head was starting to pound. Why couldn’t they find her?

  She felt Parker’s comforting hand on her shoulder. She touched his fingers, drawing strength from the gesture.

  She turned to Larson. “We have a team here with us. If they could get access to all the footage from this afternoon—”

  The operator raised his hands in the air. “Whoa, Ms. Steele. That’s a tall order.”

  “We need to find where Mackenzie went.”

  Again, he looked uncomfortable. “I’m sorry. I’ve already broken several rules showing you what I have. If you could get that court order.”

  Miranda shot to her feet, about to ream the guy out.

  Parker shook his head. “Thank you for your cooperation, Officer Larson, Officer Hoffman. You’ve both been very helpful. When we get authorization, we’ll be in touch.”

  They shook hands with the men and left.

  “I wanted to punch his lights out,” Miranda muttered as they trotted down the concourse to the car rental area.

  “He was only doing his job. We have other means at our disposal.”

  “You mean hack into the airline’s surveillance system?”

  “If that’s what’s required.”

&n
bsp; Miranda wondered how many years in a federal prison that might get them.

  They reached the car rental area, Parker selected a vehicle, and they headed to the pick-up station.

  It was almost dark when they stepped out into the cold March air. They’d spent a long time viewing those videos.

  Parker had decided to go super high end. Awaiting them on the curb was a shiny black Lexus LX with a V-8 engine and windows tinted right up to the legal limit. It was even a three-seater.

  As Parker held the passenger door open for her and she climbed inside the SUV, Miranda’s head started to clear.

  By the time Parker had settled into the driver’s seat, she could utter sensible thoughts. “We have some data on Ambrose. If the team’s dug up more, we might not need the surveillance video.”

  “You could be right,” he said. “Let’s find out.”

  He pressed the ignition and they headed off into the night to the hotel.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Janelle Wesson sat on the cozy taupe sofa in Becker and Holloway’s suite, performing the searches Becker had given her on the tablet she’d brought with her.

  The work was boring and so far unproductive. She’d rather be on the shooting range.

  When they’d arrived at the five-star hotel where Mr. Parker had booked three luxury suites for the team, she hadn’t wasted time oohing and aahing at the beautiful décor. Instead, she’d changed into a burnt orange turtleneck sweater and cowgirl jeans, and joined her male colleagues here.

  Holloway had ordered sandwiches for lunch, and they had mapped out a strategy while they ate. Then they got down to work.

  After a while, Janelle had kicked off her chunky heel booties and had her feet up, but that didn’t help her concentration. Or the sense of frustration she felt. She was gathering data, but not much in the way of real results yet.

  She could only imagine what Steele must be going through.

  She eyed her toes. She could do with a pedicure. No time for that now, even though there was a nail salon in the hotel.

  What they needed was to find this kid named Ambrose, and she aimed to do whatever she could to do just that. She really wanted to dig something up on him before Becker or Holloway did. But her searches weren’t getting her very far.