by Mark Stone
Kate turned and watched the shirtless man’s eyes follow Anchor. His gun however stayed pressed firmly against the window, firmly trained on her.
“Now I’m going to get out,” Kate said, her voice still calm. She looked at the man, then at the gun, then back at the man expectantly. He didn’t so much as flinch. “To do that,” Kate explained. “I’m going to need you to step back just a bit though, just far enough for me to stand up.”
Anchor listened and, in that moment, he knew this man hadn’t done anything like this before. Now that he knew that, Anchor began looking at this man with a different set of eyes. The way he was holding the gun was all wrong, with his hand clutching the handle too tightly and at the wrong angle.
The man did as Kate asked as well and, once he was back a bit, she stepped out, her hands raised as though she was the criminal and he was the officer.
“I’m a police officer,” she said flatly, staring at the man.
“You’re a liar is what you are,” the man said, and his hand began shaking.
For an instant, Anchor thought about darting toward him, about colliding with him and stripping the gun from his hand. With his shirt off, Anchor could see he was a waif of a guy, skinny and tall. Anchor could have flattened him in a second.
He didn’t move though. There was a gun in play here and, given the fact that he was pretty sure this man had no idea how to use it, it would only take one false move for tragedy to strike.
Besides, Kate told him not to do anything like that and, given what was happening right now, he was inclined to listen.
“How many times?!” the man screamed, his eyes widening and his foot kicking hard against the ground, pulling up dirt. “How many times are you people going to come back here? What the hell do you want anyway?”
“We’re not whoever you think we are,” Kate said, her hands still raised. “My name is Katherine Cross. The man on the other side of the car is named Russell Anchorage. We just want to ask Wanda a few questions.”
“Wanda?” the man asked, his mouth dropping. “How the hell do you know Wanda?”
“We don’t.” Anchor said. “Which is why we need to ask her some questions.”
“Yeah,” the man said, his eyes cutting to Anchor. “Well, seeing as how she cleaned all my money out of the bank and took my damned car, I got some questions for her too.” He swallowed hard. “If you see her, you let her know I ain’t happy.”
“Of course,” Kate muttered just loud enough for Anchor to hear her from across the car, which meant the bearded man could hear her as well. “Of course, she isn’t here anymore.”
She blinked, looking down at the ground, as if to recalibrate. Turning back up to the man, she said, “You’re a good man, aren’t you?”
“What?” he asked.
“I saw a swing set in the backyard, while we were pulling up,” Kate mused, something Anchor hadn’t even noticed, as he was so taken aback by the state of the place. “It means you have at least one child, one child that your wife left you with.”
“I got a little girl,” he admitted, his hand still shaking. “What does that—”
“It’s hard raising a little girl by yourself,” Kate answered. “I should know. I watched my father do it. He could have given me to my aunt. Hell, he could have put me into foster care after my mom died, if he’d wanted to. He didn’t though, because he was a good man, just like you.”
Insanely, Kate took a step forward.
“Someone else’s child is in danger, sir,” she said. “And I’m going to need your help to save him. It’s help I know you’ll give, because I know the kind of man you are, because your daughter knows the kind of man her father is.” She shook her head. “I can see you’ve had a bit of trouble around here.”
“Thieves,” he admitted. “Three times last week, I saw people on my property, trying to break into my house.” He swallowed, looking over at Anchor with softened eyes. “They were dressed all in black, and they—”
“All in black?” Anchor asked, his body tensing up. “Even over their faces?”
The bearded man jerked, his eyes widening and his arm pushing the barrel of the gun over to Anchor.
“How did you know that?” he asked.
Kate, not missing a beat, stepped in front of the barrel, blocking Anchor from its path.
“I told you, sir,” she started, no fear at all in her voice. “We’re the police. We’ve been investigating a series of crimes in Vero Beach, and we think your wife might have been onto something that could hold the key to saving a boy who’s been kidnapped.” She stepped forward again, almost touching the man now. “I’m going to open my jacket and inside you’ll see my badge. I’m not asking you for anything more than your time. If you give that to me and, if you know anything about what your wife told the Vero Beach Police Department about a group of explorers who went missing a few years back, you might be able to help me save a life.”
She opened her jacket, revealing the badge.
“Will you do that for me, sir?” she asked.
The man looked at her for a long moment. Then, just when the idea of tackling him reappeared in Anchor’s mind, the man lowered his gun.
“The name’s Clark,” he said. “Come on inside. Let me get the both of you something to drink.” He looked over at Anchor. “Then we can talk.”
Chapter 24
“I’m not crazy, you know,” the man - who had introduced himself as Clark Wilkins - said as he walked into the living room of his modest home, holding two glasses of sweet tea. He was wearing a shirt now, thankfully, though his hair and beard were still all over the place.
As he handed her the beverage, Kate guessed that anyone who had to tell you they weren’t crazy was probably trying like hell to convince themselves of that fact. The idea must have shown through in her eyes as she thanked the man for the tea and set it, untouched, on the counter beside the couch where she and Anchor now resided, because Clark sighed and added, “Really, I’m not.”
Giving Anchor his own glass, he turned around, and leaned against the wall. This put Kate on edge. The man was standing. Who wanted to stand in their own home, and especially with guests sitting down right in front of them?
“I never said you were,” Kate said, looking up cheerily at the man.
“No one ever does,” Clark answered. “But they all think it.” He shook his head. “All of my neighbors think I’m a lunatic. Hell, they’ve called Social Services on me more times than I can count, trying to get my daughter taken away from me.” He stretched his hands out wide at his sides, showcasing the home. “But you can see for yourselves, there’s not a damned thing wrong with the way my daughter is living, even if the yard is a mess.”
Kate had already gone through all of that in her mind. The idea of calling Social Services to investigate occurred to her the instant she saw the swing set in the backyard. So she couldn’t blame the neighbors for similar reactions. Still, sitting here now, she had to admit that the house was spotless.
Pictures of a little blond girl, hugging a man who looked a lot like a put-together version of Clark, littered the walls. The carpet was clean, there was no smell of rotting food or waste, and things were bright and neat. Everything looked very well tended.
“Why is the yard like that then?” Anchor asked, putting a voice behind a question that had tickled the back of Kate’s mind since they got here. She hadn’t asked it, of course. They were trying to get to the bottom of the Albert Kane sighting and, to do that, they needed laser focus. Anchor’s focus, it seemed, was a bit more all over the place than that.
“Because she’s gone,” Clark answered simply, shrugging his shoulders. “My wife and I didn’t have what you’d call a traditional relationship.”
“What do you mean?” Anchor asked.
“You see all this,” Clark said, once again spreading his arms and showcasing the home. “All the cooking, the cleaning; all the stuff you’d traditionally think of as a woman’s job around the house,
I did that. The yard work, fixing stuff when it broke; all that was Wanda.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” Anchor said, nodding at the man.
“It worked for us,” he answered. “I mean, until it didn’t. She got so obsessed with the neighbor. She kept telling me over and over again that it was this guy; this guy who helped some other guy hunt for buried treasure.”
“Sunken treasure,” Kate and Anchor both corrected in unison.
Clark sighed again. “I guess you guys are fans of it too.”
“More or less,” Kate said, sparing the man the details. “This man she saw, a man I’m sure she told you was named Albert Kane, can you direct me to his house?”
“I could have,” Patrick said. “Before it burned down.”
Kate’s heart fell to the pit of her stomach. “What do you mean?” she asked, her hands tightening around the arm of the couch. She had come all of this way. She had placed all her eggs in this basket. She needed some clue, some way to find out where her godfath— where Albert was. She needed to get Patrick. She needed to find out how he survived when her father had perished and, perhaps even more than that, why he hadn’t told her he was back.
She couldn’t do any of that if what she had walked into was a dead end, which was exactly what it looked like right now.
“Last night, actually,” Clark said, shaking his head. “Just started burning in the dead of night. I saw the smoke coming up through the holler and called the fire department myself. By the time they got the fire under control, there was nothing left of the place.”
“Let me guess,” Kate muttered. “It looked like arson to them.”
“Probably,” Clark said. “I never asked. All I know is that it wasn’t too long after that when these sons of bitches started breaking into my house.” His jaw tensed. “Had to send my damned daughter away to live with my sister until I figured it all out. That’s why I came out at you with the gun. I didn’t mean to scare you, I promise. And, when I saw you weren’t dressed up all in black, I thought maybe you weren’t the same people. It’s just that I don’t get a lot of visitors these days. People look at the hair and the beard and think I’ve lost it.” He shrugged again. “And maybe I have just a little, but I’m allowed to get depressed about my wife leaving me, aren’t I?”
“I think so,” Anchor said, standing up. “My friend died earlier this year and, when I tell you I made you look like Prince Charles in comparison, I’m not kidding. I was tore up, man. I bet I had a beard every bit as shaggy as yours.” He shook his head, smiling. “The difference was, my house was never this clean.”
He put a hand on Clark’s shoulder and gave him a knowing look. “You’ll get through it though, bud. You’ve got your little girl to think of. That’ll pull you through.”
“I did,” Clark said, gritting his teeth together. “Until they started coming around, breaking into my house in the middle of the night, riffling through my drawers. I just don’t know what to do. I had to shoot a hole in my bedroom wall to get them to run away the last time. I told the police, but they just came over and took a report. They didn’t do a damned thing about it.”
“Well, we will,” Anchor said, looking over at Kate. She had to admit, he was doing pretty good right now. “We’ve dealt with these people before, and we’re going to find them. You have my word on that. I just might need your help with one little thing.”
“What’s that?” Clark asked, glaring at Anchor.
“If these guys are breaking into your house and going through your stuff, it means they want something that’s in here. And, if you made them run last time they were in your room, I’m guessing they haven’t found it yet. Let us look around. Let us try and find what it is they were after and, once we do that, hopefully it’ll lead us to them.”
“And the innocent person they took?” Clark asked, looking over at Kate.
“Yes,” she confirmed, standing to meet him. “Hopefully.”
“But we don’t have a warrant,” Anchor said. “And, though I’ve only been at this for a few hours now, I think that means we’re going to need you to verbally give us permission to search. Isn’t that right, Cross?” he asked, grinning in his partner’s direction.
“Right as rain,” she answered. She was impressed by Anchor. This idea, searching this house for a connection, would have been her next move too. The fact that he came up with it either meant he was smarter than she gave him credit for or she was rubbing off on her. Either way was fine by her. “What do you say, Clark?” she asked, folded her arms over her chest.
Clark nodded at them, waving them in the direction of the rest of the house.
“Do what you need to do.”
Chapter 25
It seemed a shame, Anchor thought, to go through such a well put together house like this. With each room he and Kate went into, Anchor was more and more impressed with the tidiness and upkeep of this man’s home. The outside might have been rough but, like Clark told them, there wasn’t anything wrong with the inside. Well, at least, until Cross and Anchor got to it.
Anchor winced as he and his new partner turned over mattresses, emptied entire dressers, and even looked inside of air ducts in their search for whatever the Willful Guild was was after. Still, they came up with nothing.
“This might be a dead end,” Anchor admitted, looking over at Kate from across the playroom of Clark’s daughter. The bright pink room was filled with toys and covered in vibrant wallpapers showcasing unicorns and rainbows. It would have been a peaceful place for the child, an oasis in a life that had been torn apart by the departure of her mother and the well intentioned but overreaching intrusion of her neighbors and the Social Services department that came as a result.
It was an oasis no more though. Like every other room in this house, the pair had to tear it apart. They had found nothing for their trouble though and, worst of all, this was their last room.
“It can’t be,” Kate said, shaking her head as she stood in pensive thought. “The guild is making a point of coming here. Over and over again, they’ve broken into this house. They wouldn’t do that for nothing. We know that Wanda knew Albert was alive. She knew where he was. Maybe she didn’t leave, like Clark thinks. Maybe he took her.” She sighed. “A week ago, I’d have told you Albert Kane wasn’t capable of something like that. Of course, I’d have also told you he was dead. So what did I know?”
“Let’s say he did,” Anchor said. “Let’s say he took Wanda and did something to her to keep his secret. What if she left something behind? What if there’s evidence of his existence, evidence that would tie him to the Willful Guild and prove he didn’t die out there with your father. Then, let’s say he burned the house he was living in down to get rid of any evidence of his existence.”
“Why would he do that though?” Kate asked, narrowing her eyes. “It seems sloppy. Lighting something on fire is literally the thing you do to draw attention to it. It’s like a damned signal flare.”
“What is it is?” Anchor asked, his mouth dropping open. “He knows we had his blood. He likely knows that we know who he is. What if he lit the house on fire to ensure we knew where he was? What if he wanted us up here?”
Confusion filled Kate’s mind. He wasn’t making any sense.
“Why, Anchor?” she asked. “Why the hell would he want us up here? There are plenty of good cops still over in Vero Beach. They’re all looking for another bank robbery. They’re all looking for Patrick. If he thinks getting us out of the game by throwing us an hour and a half north is going to allow him to get away with this, he’s got another think coming.”
“What if that’s not what he wants?” Anchor asked, his hands clenching into fists. “They’ve always been a step ahead of you guys. He’s always been a step ahead of you. What if he still is?”
“What are you saying, Anchor?” Kate asked.
“What if this wasn’t an attempt to get us off the board, to get you off the board?” Anchor asked. “What if it was to get you whe
re he wanted you to be?”
“Here?” Kate asked. “Why the hell would Albert want me in Orlando?”
“I don’t know,” Anchor admitted. “I’m not even saying that’s what happened. All I know is that Albert Kane was your father’s right hand man. It’s in all his books. He called him one of the smartest people he’d ever met. You really think he’d let us get this close without it being his purpose?”
“I think the rookie in you is showing again,” Kate said. “I’ve cracked a lot of cases, Anchor. I’ve been to a lot of homicides, kidnappings, and even robberies. They’re complex things, and they’re not like hunting for treasure. Albert was a smart man, but it takes a different kind of mind to get away with these kinds of crimes. It takes a criminal mind.”
“And you don’t think he has one of those?” Anchor asked. “You just admitted to not really knowing anything about the man. Besides, he’s not alone. Who knows what kind of people he has with him?”
“I understand what you’re saying, Anchor,” Kate said. “But I have to work with what I’m seeing, with the evidence I have. Not some conjecture. As it stands, I don’t have any reason to believe that Albert wants me up here, and certainly no motive to explain it.”
A tone shot off on Anchor’s phone. He pulled it out, looking at it with widening eyes.
“What if that was to change?” he asked, his voice tense as he ran a hand through his hair. “You don’t have your phone on, do you?”
“I don’t have signal out here,” she explained. “Why?”
Anchor darted out of the room wordlessly.
“What the hell, Anchor?” Kate asked, running behind him. “Slow down and tell me what’s going on!” She commanded as she settled behind him in the living room.
“I’d rather just show you,” he admitted, grabbing the remote from Clark’s hand, who had been watching baseball while the pair searched his house fruitlessly. “One sec, bud. I promise, it’ll be the most interesting thing you’ve seen all day.”