“Look, Wu, I heard you. Your sister is lost, and I want to help, seriously, but if you want some answers I am not going to talk about it right here in front of God and everyone. Let’s go in the coffee shop and find a booth, all right? Just be cool, man.”
Wu glared at Jack, but was calmed down a little. Jack wasn’t as unreasonable as he anticipated he’d be. “All right, but I need answers quick. She’s been gone 16 hours now.”
“Sixteen hours? Man. That’s bad. Let’s go in here, they have a nice quiet booth in the back.”
They stepped into the coffee shop and found an isolated booth and sat. Jack spoke first. “So you’re talking about that dark-haired girl that hangs with you and Will in the park? She’s your sister? I thought you guys were all, you know, orphans and such.”
“We’re a foster family, not orphans. Just because we’re a foster family it doesn’t mean we don’t think of each other as brother and sister! Yes, she’s my sister! How the hell do you think you can just sell drugs to little kids? You are sick! And now she’s missing, and we think your buddy is involved!”
“Hey slow down, Wu. I didn’t sell her a joint. Look I don’t sell to little kids. Your sister, though, she’s different. Did she tell you she already smoked?”
“What? Don’t give me that crap! I’ve never seen her get high. She would never have had the chance! I’m sick of this. Who is your partner—we need to talk to him now!” Wu was starting to get louder.
“Look, she told me she got high now and then to help her through some rough times. Maybe she doesn’t smoke now, or maybe she wasn’t telling me the exact truth, but that’s what she told me. I’m not lying about that, man. But she wasn’t lying about having it tough either. I could see it. I know what it’s like to have it tough. And I didn’t sell her a joint. I gave her one. I felt sorry for her. Look, I want to help, but if you want my help you have to promise you aren’t going to tell anyone how you got this information. You good with that?”
Wu didn’t answer. He just glared at Jack, but finally, he nodded.
“Okay. Look, if you think that this guy, who is not my partner, he’s just a supplier, is involved, I will tell you how to contact him, but he can’t find out how you found out, or I am in big trouble. I mean serious trouble, not just law trouble. More like breathing trouble. Got it? Everyone knows him as ‘Bronco’ but I heard someone call him Bob once.” Jack stopped for a minute as the waitress came over and put a coffee down in front of him. Jack asked the waitress for a pen and then wrote down a number on a napkin. He paused and took a sip before he went on. “All I’ve got is this phone number. If I need something, I call it, if he needs me, he calls me. That’s it, that’s all I know. That’s all he wants me to know.”
Jack must have seen the anger growing in Wu’s face. “Hey, I’m sorry she’s missing, man. Maybe she just ran off for a while, and she’ll come back. I liked her, man. She’s got guts. I know some places she might hang out if she ran away and needed some space. I’ll check them out.”
Wu stood up. He was angry, but he needed to get this information to Chief Hannah right away, and to everyone else, too. “She did NOT run away! She was fine!” Then he dropped to a loud whisper, “. . . and there is no way she smokes dope!” Wu headed out of the cafe, pulling out his phone as he went.
“Whatever, man,” said Jack to Wu’s back. “I’m sure everything at home was just fine.” He said this with the slightest touch of sarcasm.
Wu heard him. Even though he was angry, he couldn’t help but wonder if maybe Jack had a point. Maybe Blue had run away. Maybe I’m overlooking something, he thought. She had been acting overly quiet the past few days. He actually kind of hoped that was the problem, because that was something they could fix. Still, he had to assume the worst until they found her. Wu had a possible first name, Bob, which was pretty useless, but he also had a phone number. That was crucial information. They’d surely be able to track Bronco down with a phone number. Wu held his phone and punched in the number for Chief Hannah. As he did, he noticed the time. 4 pm.
Jack sat in the coffee shop for a while, thinking. He was inclined to believe that the girl ran away and would show up before the end of the day, but Bronco being involved with something more sinister wasn’t out of the question. Bronco had treated him fairly and seemed like an okay guy, but he had this menacing aspect to him that Jack was very wary of. He knew all too well how two-faced people can be, but Bronco only told him what he needed to know, and Jack was not inclined to take it beyond that.
Wu hadn’t suggested abduction outright, but that also was not out of the question. It troubled Jack to think that a kid like that would be abducted. He had instantly liked the girl and felt a connection with her. Kids like that have enough trouble in their life. Kids like him.
Jack paid for his coffee and left the coffee shop. He tried to ignore the whole thing and get on with his day, but it kept nagging him. All he had wanted to do was make some money selling dope to people who would get it from somebody else if it wasn’t him, so he didn’t feel bad about it. Bronco made it very clear that Jack was to mind his own business and that the hard stuff was off limits for him. Jack knew that’s where the real money was, but he didn’t care. He didn’t want to get that involved, he just wanted to earn extra money and get some good weed cheap. Abduction, though, and a little kid, well . . . that not-so-little fourteen-year-old he had given the joint to? He really didn’t want to believe it.
He decided to go down to his hideout haunts and see if the girl had found them just the way he had when he had run away so many times. It was possible. He would not have been surprised at all to see her down by the river, good and stoned, staring at the water.
Jack started walking down to the river, but on the way, he decided to wander over to the park and see if he had any customers. It was late Saturday afternoon, and he usually started getting calls from his regulars wanting something for Saturday night partying. As he reached the park, however, he instinctively turned on his heel and headed the other way. Cop cars. Not only cop cars, but yellow tape. Something had happened here.
“Hey Jack, wait up!”
It was a familiar voice, one of his regulars. Jack stopped and waited for him catch up.
“Hey man, you got any dope, I need, like, a quarter ounce.”
Jack pulled a bag out of his pocket and exchanged it for two twenties in the wink of an eye.
“So what’s going on in the park, man?” Jack asked.
“I dunno, some sort of kidnapping or something. One of the O’Day kids is missing. They have tracking hounds there, man, I wouldn’t get near the place. They’ll smell your dope a mile away man. In fact, I’m outta here. Thanks for the quarter, man. See ya.”
“Yeah, see ya.”
Jack looked back at the park and the fluttering yellow tape. He could see one of the dogs and dog handlers. The dog seemed intent on something. He turned away and started walking. He didn’t know where he was going to go next, but wherever it was it was going to take a lot of walking because he needed to do a lot of thinking. The sight of an actual crime scene complete with tape, uniforms, and howling bloodhounds suddenly made him very uncomfortable.
Will had never known Wu to be so worried and anxious before. Then again, he and Wu had never been in a situation like this. But still, Will was surprised at Wu’s deep anguish. They were checking in with each other on their cell phones, and the despair came across loud and clear.
“I called Chief Hannah with the phone number that Jack gave me. She checked it out, and it is untraceable! It’s one of those damned pre-paid phones! And there is no answer. He must have thrown it away by now. How can they sell those phones! They’re only useful for crooks and drug dealers! No wonder there’s a drug epidemic! This Bronco guy can operate completely undetected! Jesus! How the hell can we find this guy! It’s been 18 hours, and nobody has gotten anywhere! What can we do?”
“What about the friends of Jack’s you talked to? Do they know Bronco? Do an
y of them buy heroin from him? Maybe they know where he lives.”
“Yeah, everyone knows who he is, but nobody knows where he lives. It’s like Jack said—all they know is his name and his dead-end phone number. Bronco, Bob, whatever. Neither of those is probably even his real name. The only place they see him is at the park or up on the edge of the college campus and maybe walking around town sometimes. God, Will, she could be dead by now! If I ever see that bastard, I am going to kill him!”
“Whoa, Wu. Calm down. We’re going to find her. We just have to keep cool and think harder. What about Jack? You said he was going to look for her. Has he contacted you?”
“No! And he doesn’t answer his phone. I was so sure all we needed was that phone number to find Bronco. God, Will, I blew it!”
“It’s okay Wu, don’t worry about it.” It was weird. Will never felt like he was the more level-headed of the two of them, but Wu’s despair seemed to focus Will’s mind and made him concentrate better. “Can you go find Jack again and see what he found out? I would think he would call someone if he had found her, for sure, but maybe not. Maybe he’s worried about being arrested.”
“I went back to the cafe to try and find him again, but he was gone. He said he was going to look in his hideouts. He’s probably hiding out in one of them himself! Jesus, I should have stuck with him! I shouldn’t have let him go!”
“It’s okay, Wu, it’s okay. Look, I screwed up in the first place by not talking Blue out of going. We can’t worry about that now. We have to keep looking, right? See if you can find Jack again. Jack must have to meet Bronco somewhere, they can’t just do that out in the open. Jack must not have told you everything. Maybe if he tells you where they meet that can be a clue.”
“Yeah, okay, you’re right. I’ll try and find him again. It just took me hours to find him in the first place. I can’t believe I let him go. Damn it, damn it, damn it!”
Will was starting to worry about Wu now. He wasn’t sure what to say. He just tried to focus his friend. “Wu, we can’t stop looking. Don’t stop until you find Jack. I won’t stop until we find Blue. okay? We are going to find her. I promise.” He felt stupid saying that, because he knew he couldn’t promise anything. But for some reason promising it seemed to help keep hope alive. It seemed to work for Wu, anyway.
“You’re right. Thanks,” said Wu after a minute of silence. “We’ll find her. You go. I will find Jack if it takes me all night. I’ll call you as soon as I find him.”
“Okay, and I’ll call you if I find anything or if I see Jack first. And Wu?”
“Yeah?”
“Bonam fortunam—it means good luck in Latin.”
“Hey, you too, man. Thanks.”
They hung up. That was better. Wu had calmed down, but some of his worries had rubbed off on Will. He couldn’t help feeling a little bit of despair. Wu was not unjustified in his worries. It was getting late and would be dark soon. He had thought they would have found her by now, or at least found Bronco. Now he had to take his own advice and start looking again. Of course he wasn’t going to stop until they found her, but now that was looking like a very long road.
Jack was cranky. It was starting to get dark. He had spent all afternoon checking all his hideout haunts and even asked a couple of the street people he knew if they had seen anything. Nothing. Now, after smoking too many cigarettes and only eating half a sandwich for dinner, he had made a decision. He had to go over to Bronco’s apartment. He didn’t know what he’d do once he got there, but just going there seemed like the only path that would quiet his mind about this whole Blue business. He was now thinking that he should have been more upfront with Wu. He hadn’t told him that he knew where Bronco lived. Of course, Wu hadn’t asked, but still, he had lied a little bit when he said that the name and number were all he knew. He figured they could find him using the phone number, and that was the same as telling them where he lived. Unless the phone was a burner. He hadn’t thought of that.
Maybe this visit would make up for it. It would prove that Bronco wasn’t involved. In his mind, what would happen was that he’d knock, Bronco would be there, he’d say hi and that he needed more dope. Bronco would say c’mon in. Jack would ask hey, did you hear about the missing kid? Bronco would say yeah, too bad, hope they find her. See ya later, and Jack would leave.
And that would be that. The girl would show up at home after having run away for a day.
So if that was the likely scenario, why did he feel like he had to go to Bronco’s? It was the other scenario that he had to clear out of his mind. And what scenario was that? Bronco would show off his hostage? Bronco would be there holding a bloody ax? Bronco would be raping her? Jack didn’t know. Those just weren’t even likely. If anything weird was happening, he would just take off and maybe phone the police. He didn’t want to think this out too much, so he just started walking towards Bronco’s apartment.
31
Carried Away
It was dark. The sun had set and dusk was over. It was time. Bronco didn’t want to wait any longer. He had monitored the police traffic on the scanner all day. They had turned this into an abduction earlier than he thought, but they didn’t seem to be getting anywhere. He wasn’t going to let that lull him into a false sense of security. He was sure they were using cell phones, too. They weren’t idiots. Still, he could read a lot from the radio traffic. They couldn’t hide the fact that they were stalled and frustrated. He wanted to keep it that way and that meant getting this done and getting gone. It was time. His apartment was buttoned up and his car was clean and ready to go with only what he needed in the trunk: a roll of heavy-duty garbage bags, a pick, a shovel, towels, nitrile gloves, and alcohol wipes. In the back seat he had just one duffel bag and his bug-out bag. His bug-out bag had a nice comforting heft to it with the six pounds of gold coins and a fat roll of twenties weighing it down. The only thing not in the car was his messenger bag and a package of weed he had missed when he was flushing the rest of his stock down the toilet. It was tough dumping all that money down the toilet, but there was no question it was the right thing to do. Now, other than the stray bag of weed, and one last kit, he was clean, clean, clean. The last kit was for the last item on his checklist. And now it was time for that, and he was ready except for one thing—he was still spooked by that girl.
He had been watching her all afternoon and evening on the surveillance camera, but didn’t dare go back into the house. He’d just left her there by herself. At one point, he had a paranoid thought that she might be able to read his mind when he was watching her through the camera. He knew it was stupid, but he tried beaming a thought to her while he was watching. No reaction. She was pretty out of it. It didn’t change his mind about her, though. There was no doubt she could read his mind. Nobody knew about his brother. Nobody except him and his dad, and his dad was dead. He suspected that she knew about that, too, because he had been thinking about that at the same time he was thinking about his brother. And who knew what else she had picked up while he was with her? There was no question about letting her go now. He was just going to go in and take care of business.
He grabbed the kit and stepped out of the apartment, got in his car, and started it up. He backed it out of his driveway onto the street, and then, instead of turning around, just kept backing up to the driveway of the yellow house next door, and then he backed into that driveway. He wanted the trunk as close to the side door of that house as possible. He set the brake, got out of the car, unlocked the door to the house and stepped in. He paused in the doorway, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. He stared down the hallway until the outline of the bedroom door slowly appeared. He stepped quietly to the door and reached for the doorknob, but stopped just short of grasping it and looked at his hand. It was shaking. Jesus, get hold of yourself, he thought. He waited just a moment more and then took a breath and opened the door.
A waft of acrid odor greeted him. He flipped on the lamp. What the light revealed sent a shiver down h
is spine. It wasn’t a little girl sitting there, it was a nightmarish character come-to-life from some warped fantasy horror film. Her jeans were dark from where she had been sitting in her own pee. Tracks of dried tears crossed her soot-darkened cheeks radiating in a spider-like pattern from her squinting, bloodshot eyes. Trickles of dried blood from her nose painted ruddy maroon stripes across her silver-taped mouth and chin. Whether or not she was an actual devil, she sure looked like one now.
The sudden brightness of the lamp sent a shock through Blue’s body like a lightning bolt. Her body started shivering uncontrollably. She tried weakly to stop it but couldn’t. She couldn’t control anything now. Her muscles, her emotions, her courage, her sanity. For hours now she had tried. Tried to get Blue back. The survivor Blue. The invincible Blue. But she was gone—lost to the dark thoughts that eat away at you when you know that you have put everyone you ever cared about in danger, and you are powerless, strapped to a chair, in the dark, in a house that was god-knows-where. And there was no one there to stop you from blaming yourself again and again and again. Soon she would be dead and any last hope to warn them would die with her. Bronco had won. She had lost. Not just lost—she had made him more dangerous than ever.
Bronco, the killer. The images came to her again and again—a rubber sheet stretched tight over a man’s face, Bronco’s father, obliterating all his features except the unyielding structures of the nose, forehead, and writhing mouth wearing the haunting, animated look of desperation—desperation that then morphed into realization, and then acceptance. Death. She had witnessed the murder of a person who knew what was happening and could do nothing about it. She knew it was a preview of her own death.
She had screamed, as much as you can scream behind a thick layer of duct tape. She struggled against bonds that didn’t give her the satisfaction of being able to hurt herself. The chair back wasn’t even high enough to let her bash her brain into oblivion. All she could do was scream a muffled scream again and again and again. She would scream and cry herself to exhaustion and then do it again. And again. And again.
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