Thread of Fear

by Jeff Shelby

  “Yeah,” I said, squeezing her hand. “That, too.”

  THIRTEEN

  The giant thermometer was always the landmark that told me Vegas was close.

  I'd gotten up early the next morning, packed a backpack and then made breakfast for both Elizabeth and Lauren. Breakfast was quiet and I knew it was because I was leaving. There was nothing that I could say that was going to change that, so I didn't try. I walked out with Lauren when she was ready to go and she kissed me and told me to call her when I got the chance. I told her I would. Instead of our usual walk, I drove Elizabeth to school and she hugged me a second or two longer than normal. I promised we'd talk that night and she nodded, forcing a smile. She got out of the car, heading toward the entrance of the school and I watched her as she disappeared through the doors.

  I'd left right from the school and made my way through the East County, up and into Riverside and then into the flat expanse of the edge of the Mojave desert. The giant thermometer rose out of the ground on the other side of the freeway, over a hundred feet tall and telling every car that sped past how hot the desert was. Given that it was mid-morning and cool, the thermometer was less impressive than it had been other times I'd driven by, but it did let me know that I was about ninety miles from Sin City and that the empty desert would soon change over to an amusement park for adults.

  I wasn't a huge fan of Vegas, but I'd been there probably a dozen times, both for fun and for work. There was something about it for me, though, that just felt saturated in sadness. I knew people who went nowhere else because they loved the excitement and the lights and the gambling and the people watching. But I usually ended up seeing something different. It just felt like this place that took advantage of desperate people, leveraging their hope against unrealistic odds. In that way, it felt so similar to showing up in a new place and taking a job to look for a missing kid, where parents got their hopes up that not only would I find their child, but that he or she would also be alive. No matter how often I told them that the odds were slim, they saw me as a ray of light in their nightmare, refusing to be realistic and then crashing to the ground when reality set in. I saw the same thing in Las Vegas as people wandered into casinos with pockets full of cash, thinking they were on the cusp of catching that one break they needed, then realizing far too late that the break wasn't going to come at the table they'd set their chips and hopes on.

  The freeway was empty, given that it was midday and midweek and I took advantage of that, pushing well over the speed limit to shorten the drive. A little over an hour after whizzing by the thermometer, I crested the final hill on I-15 and the Vegas valley opened up in the distance, an expanse of sprawling suburbs surrounding by the over-sized high rise hotels that loomed over the desert floor.

  I'd called Kathleen Dennison after leaving San Diego, telling her I was on my way and that I'd like to meet with her at her home. She'd agreed, gave me the address and told me she'd be waiting for me. I went west when I reached the airport, veering away from the Strip and out toward the western most Vegas suburb of Summerlin.

  Vegas had benefitted from the late nineties real estate boom and the suburbs exploded. Plenty of cheap land, a wealthy tax base and the lack of cold weather led to bedroom communities sprouting up around Las Vegas proper. People flocked to the area and drove prices through the roof, which motivated developers to build bigger and more expensive homes. When the bubble burst, numerous neighborhoods were left for dead, but the ones that got in early managed to survive.

  Summerlin had gotten in early. It had been built out in the western foothills where residents could see the bright lights of the Strip but didn't have to venture near them if they chose not to. The suburb boasted wide, clean streets, shiny retail shops and neighborhoods filled with stucco McMansions, expensive cars and perfectly manicured lots. It was full of money and sterility.

  The Dennison home was tucked away in a quiet cul-de-sac perched on a small hill. The house was longer than it was tall and a U-shaped driveway took me up to the front door. The house was all angles and windows, the kind of place that looked great and well crafted, but gave away not a single clue as to who lived there. There wasn't a piece of gravel out of place in the rocks beds surrounding the house, the cacti were perfectly trimmed and the brick drive appeared to have been powerwashed that morning, it was so clean.

  I shut the car off and Kathleen Dennison opened the door before I made it up the steps to ring the bell. She wore a short-sleeved red top and blue jeans. Her feet were bare and her hair was damp.

  “You made it fast,” she said, a thin smile on her face.

  “Good time to make the drive.”

  She nodded and stepped back out of the doorway. “Come in.”

  The tiled entryway was sunlit and stark white. She closed the door and I followed her down a wide hallway to a sunken living room filled with leather furniture and a round, glass coffee table. Tasteful prints were displayed on the taupe-colored walls, desert landscapes and floral still lifes that seemed more appropriate for a model home than an actual residence. The carpeting stood on end, as if had just been vacuumed and the leather smelled new. She sat down on one edge of the sofa and I sat across from her on the matching loveseat.

  “Can I get you something to drink?” she asked, poised to get up.

  “I'm fine, thank you,” I told her. “And I'm sorry I didn't give you more notice in coming to town. I just had...the opportunity, so I decided to get in the car and make the drive.” It sounded flimsy and unprofessional but if she thought this, she didn't let on.

  “It's fine,” she said. “I appreciate it.”

  “Did you file the missing persons report?”

  “I did,” she said, setting her hands flat against her thighs. Her nails were freshly painted, the same red color as her shirt. “As I predicted, they didn't much seem to care. Just gave me platitudes about him being an adult, that they'd have to wait a certain amount of time after I reported him before they classified it missing persons, that they'd be in touch.” A rueful smile creased her lips. “Surprisingly, they haven't been in touch.”

  “I wouldn't expect them to be,” I told her. “Not this early in the game. The important thing is that it's filed. We can always use it to pressure them if we need to. But, no, you're correct. We shouldn't count on them to do much right now.”

  Her smiled flattened. “Alright.”

  I told her about making the initial calls and checking the credit cards and his phone. She listened, nodded occasionally, her hands still against her thighs. She was trying to project calm, I thought, but the tension and anxiety were obvious. She was worried. And I felt like a bastard, pretending to be on her side.

  “So now what?” she asked.

  “Does he have an office? Here at the house?”

  She nodded.

  “Can I take a look?”

  She stood and I followed her out of the room, past a kitchen seemingly made entirely of stainless steel and granite, and into a crescent-shaped room near the back of the house. A desk made of glass and metal sat to the left, facing away from the door and looking out at the long, narrow pool on the other side of the massive window. There was a laptop on top, a cup full of pens and a couple of pictures of Patrick and Kathleen. Two sitting chairs sat on the other side of the room. Bookshelves lined the wall behind the chairs, filled with what looked like paperback novels. A bag of golf clubs stood upright in the corner, the irons covered in a fine layer of dust.

  “He works in here almost every evening,” she said, folding her arms across her chest and surveying the space. “I have no idea what's what, but feel free to go through whatever you need to.”

  “Thanks,” I said, walking over to the desk. I flipped open the laptop. The screen lit up and a box appeared on the screen asking for a password. I thought back to the sheet of paper tucked into my wallet, the list of passwords Kathleen had given me. There hadn't been a computer one listed. I looked at her. “Any chance you know it?”

 
; She walked over to the desk next to me and pulled out a slim desk drawer, meant to hold writing utensils, tape and sticky pads. She pulled out a small gold key and stuck it in the lock in the bigger metal drawer off to the side. The lock clicked and she pulled it open. She reached to the back of the drawer and pulled out a small index card.

  She handed it to me. “This should be all of his computer passwords and user names. He can never remember them, so I made him start writing them down. He won't use one of those online password keepers that normal humans use now.”

  I shrugged. “People don't trust technology.”

  “I don't trust not losing things like an index card,” she said.

  I sat down in the desk chair and looked at the index card. The user name and the password for the computer was the first one listed. I typed them both into the box and the screen immediately changed over to an ocean landscape, with icons for programs and documents soon following.

  “I'm gonna let you do your thing because I don't want to hover,” Kathleen said. “Call me if you need me.”

  “Will do,” I said, already scanning the files on the desktop.

  I spent a few minutes opening everything on the desktop and scrolling through the files. It was almost all business correspondence, thank yous and follow ups. It was mostly informal and didn't provide me with anything I was looking for.

  I opened up the main directory and started making my way through those, opening everything on the drive, no matter the name of the file. I opened the slim drawer where Kathleen had found the key and pulled out a sticky pad. I yanked a pen out of the cup on the desktop and started making notes.

  Forty-five minutes later, I hadn't found the name Carina Armstrong anywhere, but I'd found a few things that I thought might lead me to her. I shut down the computer, kept the password card, but locked up the drawer on the side again. I dropped the key back into the slim drawer and walked out to find Kathleen.

  She was standing in the kitchen, a bottle of water in her hand, scrolling through something on an iPad.

  “I'm done,” I said. “For now.”

  “Help at all?” she asked. Both her expression and her tone were hopeful.

  “Probably,” I said. “Does the name Carina Armstrong ring a bell at all?”

  She thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Not that I recall, no. Should it?”

  “I'm not sure,” I said. I watched her carefully, looking for clues but her expression didn't change. “It's just a name I ran across and I was curious.”

  “Patrick has a lot of people working for him,” she said. “I don't know most of them.”

  “And tell me again about his business. What he does exactly.”

  She took a drink from the bottle and set it on the granite island. “Commercial real estate. A mix of retail and business development. The retail is usually strip malls, the businesses usually low-rise office buildings. His company buys the land or an existing property, then Patrick oversees either the construction or the redesign. His team is also responsible for procuring tenants for the properties.”

  I nodded. “Okay. How about another name? John Anchor?”

  A glimmer of recognition flashed in her eyes. “Sure, I've met John before. He's one of Patrick's bosses. He's based in Minneapolis. Someone from his office called when Patrick didn't show up for work. They were worried. I told them I wasn't sure where he was, but that I was trying to find him. They said to call if they could help.” She eyed me curiously. “Why?”

  “Just another name I ran across,” I said. “I'm trying to cross names off the list, that's all.”

  “I think he's been out here a couple times,” she said. “Meetings, stuff like that.”

  I rattled off a couple more I'd found in his computer files and she offered more of the same. Business acquaintances and co-workers.

  “Okay,” I said, then held up the index card. “Mind if I hold onto this for today? I'll get it back to you.”

  “Yes, that's fine,” she said, shrugging. “I don't need them.”

  “I'm gonna head out,” I told her. “Check a few places, see if I can find a few more people to talk with.”

  She blinked a couple times, then picked up the cap to the water bottle. “I remember you saying something similar with Aaron. And I remember thinking 'Oh, he must know something and he'll probably bring him back.'” She shook her head. “Nothing you did. Just my own brain wanting to see things that weren't there.”

  “It's the same,” I said. “I didn't find anything on his computer that tells me where your husband is. I'm just working my way through things and people.”

  She nodded. “I know. And you don't owe me an explanation.”

  “I'll check in with you later this afternoon,” I told her.

  She walked me to the door and we said goodbye. I descended the stairs and got in my car. The day had gotten warmer, the desert heat settling over me like a thick blanket. I turned the car on to get the AC going, then set the index card on the passenger seat. I pulled out the thick stack of sticky notes I'd written on and laid those next to the card.

  I was pretty sure Kathleen wasn't lying to me about anything. She hadn't shown any fear or anxiety when I'd mentioned Anchor's name and if she knew who he really was or what he did, I thought I would've seen something in her expression. I wasn't sure about Armstrong, but she hadn't given me any reason not to believe her.

  I stared at the pile of sticky notes, at the words I'd hastily scribbled, the clues I'd found that looked like they were worth pursuing.

  I'd definitely learned one thing while scouring Patrick Dennison's computer files.

  Kathleen Dennison didn't have a clue what her husband was really doing.

  FOURTEEN

  Carina Armstrong was working at the sixth club I went to.

  As I'd gone through the files on Patrick Dennison's computer, I'd located several spreadsheets that were tucked away in files that had nothing to do with the files they were located in, as if he'd been hiding them. When I'd gone through the directory, I was able to see that he'd looked at those files as recently as the day before Kathleen said he'd gone missing. They'd been updated as recently as two days prior to that. So they weren't buried from lack of use or misplacement. I figured he put them there because he didn't want anyone to find them.

  The spreadsheets were accounting ledgers for a dozen strip clubs in the greater Las Vegas area. A quick search on my phone had pulled up the names listed on the ledger and identified them as such. According to the Internet, they were high-end strip clubs, ones that required patrons to follow dress codes and spend ridiculous amounts on required minimum purchases. They didn't call themselves strip clubs. They were gentlemen's clubs and entertainment venues instead.

  The ledgers showed daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly revenue and expenditure numbers. All of them were doing extremely well, based on the numbers I'd read. The gentlemen's club business was thriving in Las Vegas, as one might expect. But there wasn't a single file on his entire computer that said a word about real estate development or tenant rates or property purchases. Because Patrick Dennison wasn't a real estate developer.

  It looked to me like he was an accountant.

  I hadn't called Anchor yet to verify my conclusion because I wanted to stay as far away from him as I could until I didn't have a choice. However, based on what I'd found, I was fairly certain that Dennison was doing the books for properties that Anchor's organization owned. It all felt very stereotypical and clichéd – the Mob running strip clubs in Vegas – but sometimes stereotypes and clichés existed for a reason.

  So I wondered if Dennison was hitting those clubs on a daily basis, either to run their numbers or even collect money. If so, the people who worked in them would be pretty familiar with him. And if he was spending most of his workday in those clubs, I wondered if Carina Armstrong was an employee or a regular customer at one of them.

  The first five I hit confirmed that Dennison did spend some time there, as they all a
cknowledged one way or another that they knew him. No, they hadn't seen him for a few days and, no, they didn't know who Carina Armstrong was, either.

  But when I showed my driver's license to the big guy working the door at Ted's, a sizable club with valet parking and a ten dollar cover in the middle of the day on the south side of the city, I also asked if Carina was around that day.

  “Like always,” he said, flashing a small penlight at my license before holding it up to the sunlight, just outside of the canopy we were standing under. He handed it back to me. “If she's not behind the bar, she's around somewhere.”

  I thanked him, tipped him five bucks, and he unhooked the velvet rope that blocked off the entrance. A dark-haired woman wearing a long-sleeved white blouse that glowed pink in the black light of the hallway greeted me from behind a podium.

  “Ten dollar cover,” she told me, her teeth glowing an unnatural shade of white. “And fifteen dollar drink minimum once you're inside.”

  I handed her a ten and asked about Carina.

  “Oh, yeah, she's here,” she said, nodding and tucking the money somewhere down below the podium. “Check with Cindy at the bar.”

  A heavy bass beat thumped through the walls and I continued down the black-lit hall until I was in a small foyer. Another woman in a white blouse and black mini-skirt greeted me, wanting to know if I needed to check my coat. Since I wasn't wearing one, I told her I was fine. She smiled and pulled back the heavy black drape and told me to have a good time.

  My eyes adjusted to the neon lights as soon as I stepped past the curtain. A huge rectangular stage stood in the middle of the room, a half-naked blond gyrating against the pole as some song I didn't recognize blasted from the speakers. It was more crowded than I'd expected. Most of the tables near the stage were taken up by guys in ties and sport coats, alternately glancing at the blond and talking to their colleagues. Behind the stage, I saw a bar that ran the length of the back wall and I made my down to it.