Take the Fourth

by Jeffrey Walton

  “Terry, bad news, real bad, so listen to me.”

  “It’s not Lindsay?”

  “No… . Ripley,” he took a deep breath,” . . . . she’s missing”.

  “Dear god, when, where… . what can I do, where are you… I’m coming over,” the sheer panic set into his voice. With those words “she’s missing,” still lingering in the air it sucked the wind right out of Lindsay, she broke down and started sobbing. Ben as well, couldn’t keep his eyes from welling up. Samuel looked up at his mother and father crying and he too started to cry. He didn’t realize the situation with his missing sister; he was just upset because both his parents were upset—it was a natural reaction to a child of three. After that call, Ben was as visibly disturbed as his wife, reality was really beginning to set. Before the detective left he had just a few more questions.

  “Do you have an answering machine at home?”

  “Yes but… .”

  “Do you have the capability to check your messages when you are away?”

  “Yes but… .”

  “Please, check your messages for me.”

  With that Ben used the land line once again, entered his four digit pass code and waited.

  “You have no new messages.” Ben finally realized what the officer was suggesting… as in every missing person case there is a chance it’s a kidnapping and the ransom note/call is a possibility.

  “Please, there is nothing more you can do here, I have a few more people from the park to interview, you need to go back to your home and wait, I’ll send one of my officers with you.” And with that the detective parted ways for he knew time was of the essence and he didn’t want to spend precious time consoling emotionally distraught parents. It seemed callous but that’s what made him good at his job.

  Before his other interviews Detective Charles Lynch went to grab a cup of coffee and a smoke but before he could make his way to the break room he was stopped by one of the young rookies.

  “Detective Lynch, I was just coming to get you, a Camaro fitting the description was just found just a few miles from the park. A neighbor heard the news and called it in… The car is supposed to be in the garage.”

  “Yeah, but what are the chances this is our car?”

  “Well the neighbor who called it in, said he came home around an hour ago”

  “Who owns the car?”

  “Not sure yet sir.”

  “You have to know the address and who lives there?”

  “Yes, we’ve checked on that sir but the Camaro is not registered to any of the members of the household.

  “Okay, send a crew, now.” In the back of Lynch’s mind he knew the odds were against him, but this just might be a lucky break. Sure most cases were solved through hard work and dedication but every so often one just needed a little luck to push it towards closure. This could be just that break. Lynch grabbed his coffee, nixed the idea of having a smoke and went back to interview a few more people from the park and thinking to himself—hopefully, very shortly I’ll have another person to interview—strike that, interrogate, he meant to think.

  And just like clockwork four squad cars were called into motion, eight officers in all and they surrounded the single family rancher in typical two by two standard cover formation, their guns drawn, with the lead officer and his partner taking the front door.

  They rang the bell, heard some rumblings, then “Just a sec., if it’s a package just leave it.”

  They rang again.

  “Okay, okay, just a sec,” and he opened the door to much his dismay. When there’s a kid involved little time is wasted on formalities and pleasantries. He was quickly escorted out the door, handcuffed behind his back, and asked if he owned a Camaro and it wasn’t the other way around… “Yesssss,” saying in a baffled manner.

  “Do you mind if we search the house?”

  “Huh… what… . why am I…”

  “I’ll say again do you mind if we search the house?”

  His mind raced, the cuffs where tight against his wrist, he wondered if he left anything in plain sight. The officer raised his cuffed hands forcing pain to both his rotator cuffs, much like the pain when being forced to say uncle, only this time it was not meant as a school yard ritual, it was meant to inflict a great deal of deep pain. “I’ll ask one more time, can we search the house?”

  “Yesss,” was the painfully response this time. With that the officer knew he had full rights to search the premises, since the suspect had just forgone his rights granted by the fourth amendment. The four officers who were around back were quickly called to the front and permitted to enter and begin their search. The remaining officers went to the detached garage and indeed there was a dark green 1974 Camaro, black vinyl top, and big ass rear tires. The officers did a quick search of the vehicle, popped the trunk lid, and found nothing—in fact the car was pretty much spotless, like it had just been cleaned. Inside the house the officers started with a quick search, each taking s separate room in the house. They searched closets, under beds, the attic, and the basement, and no little girl was to be found. They then brought in two well trained police dogs to help in the search for Ripley. One dog, the biggest German Shepherd anyone has seen, took off immediately for the basement, down the stairs, and around the corner towards a shelving unit. The dog started barking because that’s what he was trained to do when he found what he was looking for… so he barked and waited for his master’s arrival. When his master arrived he barked and scratched behind the shelving unit. The shelving unit was a massive wooden structure consisting of old paint cans, electrical wire, and other household maintenance items that are rarely used. The officer was joined by his partner and both sets of muscles were needed to move the shelf even a faction of a foot. After a minute or two they were able to step behind the monstrosity and they found what the dog was barking at. A reward was justified. Affixed to the back of the wooden shelf was a bag of pot—a little more than an ounce. Besides this, the house looked in normal working order albeit from the dirty kitchen sink filled to the brim with unsoaked dishes from many boiled pasta dinners with canned sauce and those shaky cans of preservative filled parmesan cheese that seemingly never goes bad. And no little girl, no Ripley Newenberg age five was to be found… time was of the essence

  This time Detective Charles Lynch was mono a mono in the same brightly lit interrogation room and this time there were people behind the mirror. This time was different; this time there was a suspect in the room, a suspect in his early twenties.

  “Empty your pockets please and take off that hat.” He recorded the contents of his pockets in his yellow pad, “What were you doing at this house?” and so the question and answer session began.

  “Why am I here, I… . I . . Don’t understand.”

  “Answer my questions first,” in his best intimidating voice.

  Silence as the young man contemplated his options, then, “I… I’m allowed there… it’s my step dad’s… he’s away, out of town, comes back next week.”

  “And your mother?”

  “At home… can I call her, don’t, can’t I make a phone call or something?”

  “Again I’m asking the questions… do you understand? Where is she?”

  “At home.”

  “Home? She wasn’t there when we brought you in.”

  “I said that’s my step dad’s house, that’s not hers.”

  “Can you explain?”

  “Explain what? I don’t understand, I’m confused, why am I here?”

  “You were staying at your step dad’s and not your mothers?”

  “My dad, my real dad I have no idea where he is, if he’s still alive, my step dad is the only father I really know of, he and my mom divorced a few years ago, we had a fight, my mom and I, I still live there but she hates me coming in late, she hates that I have a life outside of hers, so I moved into my step dad’s, for a little while.”

  “Does he know you are there?”

  Silence again filled the
air… . “Well uhh, no… . but but I have a key, he wouldn’t mind… I’ve done this before… call him, he’ll tell ya.”

  “Where is he?”

  “On vacation in… . in… . fuck I forget.”

  Unphased by his abrupt use of the f-word, “does he have a cell phone?’

  “Nope, . . . . I . .think… never mind.”

  “What?”

  “No, nothing, . . . . I was just going to say, he always forgets to pay his phone, sometimes I call and its turned off, he just forgets sometime… he has money to pay, he just forgets sometimes, that’s all… that’s why I live with my mom, at least when I go back home if I turn on a light there will be light… not that way at my dad’s house… step dad’s”

  “What do you do?”

  “You mean job? Well, I, I, do things for people.”

  “Like sell drugs?”

  “What, no… no… no, I’m like a handyman, you know fix a screen door for my neighbor, mow the grass, odd jobs, small jobs, I was pretty good in wood shop in high school and work construction during the summer.”

  “Why aren’t you working now?”

  “We are in between jobs, I work tomorrow, I have to be on the job site six sharp.”

  Satisfied with his answer, “Is that your car in the garage?”

  “What, the Camaro?,” shaking his head, “no, no way in hell, I couldn’t afford the insurance, that’s my dad’s baby. He’s had that car for like forever, as long as I can remember anyways.”

  “Anyway, no s, it’s in your name.”

  “I know, someday it may be mine, and as far as my mother is concerned, it is mine… . he placed the car in my name just before things got ugly with the divorce.”

  “Do you ever drive it?”

  “He’d kill me if I took it out of the garage.”

  “You didn’t answer the question?”

  Silence again, then a “no” in an all knowing lie.

  “Well, your dad’s is on vacation right?”

  “Yes,” knowing all too well that he knew the truth and he sunk further into the chair.

  “The car, that car, your father’s Camaro was spotted entering your dad’s driveway about two hours ago, if he wasn’t home, then who was driving your dad’s baby?”

  Knowing all too well he was caught, “Me.”

  “Explain.”

  “Explain what, yeah I did take his car out, just for a ride, I went to the mall.”

  “Where else did you go?”

  “I just rode around, that’s all… . did someone report it stolen or something, it’s my dad’s… . step dad’s I mean, listen it’s in my name right? . . . . yeah this is the first time I took it without permission but… . I know, I know, dad doesn’t even know I’m here this time, and I took his car, his baby without permission… . that’s my trouble isn’t it?”

  He seemed to be grabbing for straws as to his predicament, as to why he was sitting in the room down at the police station. Detective Lynch was starting to question himself as well and stopped with the questions for a few moments while he gathered his thoughts. Charles glanced at his yellow pad of paper and his notes from the previous interviews, he flipped a few pages, flipped again… and looked at the table and again at his notes. His notes from the last interview stated a man with a red baseball cap was seen at the playground—on the table in front of the twenty year old, laid a Philadelphia Phillies baseball cap, bright red, with a white “P”. He was ready to start questioning again.

  “When you rode around, where else did you go?”

  “Just to the mall I said, I wanted to get new sneaks, but didn’t have enough money, they were like eighty dollars. I even parked the car way out of the way as it wouldn’t get scratched or something.”

  “How much were the sneakers?”

  “Eighty dollars.”

  “Wow, that’s a lot for sneakers… Did you drive around the vicinity of Ash and Georgia?”

  “I don’t know where that is… I might have… I don’t know.”

  “So you just went to the mall and nowhere else, you didn’t stop for a hot dog, or watch kids play at the park, or stop and get gas?”

  “No, none of that.”

  “What if I were to tell you, that this car was seen at the playground by Ash and Georgia?”

  “I said before, it’s possible, I don’t know where that is.”

  “Your car was last seen at Ash and Georgia, a playground is nearby, a young child was taken, kidnapped, a five year old.”

  He was grabbing for air, he didn’t know how to respond . . “I… I…”

  “Have you seen her? Did you take her! Where is she? Where, where is she!,” as Lynch stood up and was pounding on the table, letting his emotions get the better part of him and he knew he just made a grave mistake in the interview process. He let it slipped that the victim was a girl.

  “I… I… . don’t, . . . don’t know… what you are talking about,” as his voice started to grow shaky and scared.

  “Damn it you, you better come clean, right now, goddamnit, right now!” in a voice that could be heard down the hall.

  “I… I… I . .swear to you… I swear,” with the last part barely audible over breathless sobs.

  Detective Lynch watched his reaction and eased back into his chair. He was beginning to think he was on a wild goose chase, his gut told him so, and he always listened to his gut… not just because it was the biggest part of him. He glanced over his yellow tablet again and didn’t say a word; he was just about to write the time down on his yellow pad indicating the interview was over when he glanced at the contents of the pockets.

  “You said you were at the mall.”

  A very quiet “Yes,” was heard.

  “You were going to buy sneakers,” more of a statement of facts then a question

  “Yes,” shaking his head at the same time.

  “You said, they were eighty dollars and you didn’t have enough money.”

  “Yes,” again shaking his head at the same time.

  “Curious, why didn’t you buy them?”

  “I didn’t have enough money, I was short a few bucks.”

  “You bad at math?”

  “Huh, . . . bad at math . .no, no, not that bad, I measure angles, square footage and stuff like that.”

  “Well, on the table you have eighty-seven dollars and some change… that’s clearly enough for your sneaks, expensive as they may be.”

  “At the time I was going to buy them I didn’t have enough money.”

  “Did you raid your dad’s… I mean step dad’s cookie jar when you got back home?”

  “No.”

  “Visit an atm machine on your way home?”

  “No.”

  “Just curious, then where did you get the extra money?”

  “Some guy.”

  “What do you mean some guy?”

  “Some guy came up to me at a stop sign and asked what year my car was, he said seventy-four was the same year as his old one, then he handed me ten bucks and asked if I wouldn’t mind waiting there while he went to go get his camera, he said there was another ten in it for me and he would be no more than five minutes. He wanted a picture of the engine, he seemed nice enough but he never returned, I waited like an extra ten minutes.”

  “And then?”

  “Nothing, I got tired of waiting… more like pissed, so I punched it a little and squealed my… the tires.”

  “Where was this?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Was there a playground around?”

  “I don’t re… . wait a minute… I remember looking in my rearview mirror… seeing if this guy was going to return, I remember seeing a big red sliding board . . But, but that’s all I remember.”

  Detective Charles Lynch wrote the ending time of his interview down on his yellow pad.

  “Officer Roberts here is going to take you down to see one of our sketch artists.”

  And just like that, the detective was out the door
… no apologies… he didn’t have time, time was of the essence. In his mind now this was a bonafide kidnapping case and the Levi’s call placed by the GBI was justified.

  . . .

  Chapter 5

  “Access Denied” Strange he thought and tried it again—“Access Denied”. He tried another search, and the same reply was shown on the screen “Access Denied”. He didn’t get a “Server Unavailable” or a hundred other messages implying database backups or system maintenance. It was he himself that was being denied access which was strange in and unto itself for there were only three other people who had access to the machine and knew its purpose and two were at the White House and one them had asked for his help in the research. It was only a matter of time until the phone rang. He tried to circumvent his point of entry to no avail. He tried backdoors and other tricks of the trade and each and every time, “Access Denied.” Someone shut him out but whom? Why? Just as the phrase “son-of-a-bitch” was echoing through his brain, the inescapable ring of his cell phone sounded. It was indeed Scott.

  “How did you do?”

  “I was able to pull names, dates, times, and locations and was in the midst of creating a solid timeline of events but… .”

  “But what?”

  “I was locked out!”

  “What do you mean locked out?”

  “Exactly like I said, I got an access denied message, from what I gather it was placed by someone in house. I’ve tried other venues but they pretty much have them locked as well.”

  “Who has access to shut down something like this?”

  “I could only speculate that it was from the top in the department either Peter or ummm Mike, and neither of them have a clue and why would they suddenly shut us out, it’s not like they know about the network?”

  “Good question. Send over what you have so far, I’ll try to access this as well, if not I’ll call Peter. I’ll be back in touch shortly. Give me fifteen minutes.” Click.

  Scott immediately pulled up his virtual private network (VPN) on his laptop, logged in, and scanned his index finger. During the few seconds in which it took to connect, he cursed under his breath. He simply didn’t have time to do his own research; he was the point man to the President, he was the man with the answers, he didn’t dig for data, he didn’t comb through meaningless information, he didn’t analyze the mundane, he had an inside man to do just that, one who used to have access.