by Leslie Wolfe
“What’s wrong with you?” Holt asked when he saw her. “You’re white as a sheet.”
“I’m sick,” she managed to say, then promptly threw up right there, on the floor, sending droplets of yellowish vomit onto the man’s shoes.
The woman rushed inside and helped her to the sink, holding her hair while Casey emptied her stomach. Then she helped her to the couch, while Holt paced the floor restlessly.
“Do you know where Meredith is?” Holt asked, sending a wave of renewed fear down her spine.
“N—no, I don’t,” Casey replied. “I thought you—”
“What?” he replied, visibly impatient to squeeze everything out of her.
Terrified, she clammed up. She couldn’t think straight; she knew she couldn’t tell him the truth, but where was Meredith, if he didn’t know?
There was only one possible answer to that question, and it chilled her to the bone.
“I thought you or her mom came to pick her up today, during first period,” she eventually said, her voice trembling badly.
She couldn’t bring herself to look at the man. He’d never liked her much, and she’d always known it. He wasn’t a fan of the jewelry, makeup, and short skirts she wore, of the music she loved, of the boys she dated, and he blamed her for giving Meredith wrong ideas. But they were only going to be young once, and neither girl was planning on becoming a nun. The man was a dinosaur, with all his morals and principles and rigid dress code.
Holt turned away, frustrated, cursing under his breath. Casey breathed, seeing she was about to be left alone. But did she really want that? What if the other man came by to set her straight? And where the hell was Meredith? What if she was—?
Casey couldn’t finish her thought. The image of Meredith’s body covered in blood and lying in a ditch formed inside her mind. Heavy tears welled in her eyes, and a sob choked her. She heaved, struggling to breathe without wailing. The woman sat next to her on the couch, while Holt approached her again, even angrier than before.
“What the hell aren’t you telling me?” Holt shouted. Casey whimpered and cowered, irrationally expecting the man to hit her across the face.
“Holt, what the hell, she’s a child!” the woman reacted.
Holt stepped a few feet away, but kept his eyes fixed on her. Casey breathed again, a shattered breath of air that struggled to enter her lungs.
The woman turned her attention to her and held Casey’s hand between both of hers. She had fine, long fingers and a neat manicure for a cop. Casey tensed, feeling the woman’s cold hands on hers and knowing that more questions were coming her way.
“My name is Laura Baxter, by the way,” the woman said in a friendly voice. “I work with Meredith’s dad.”
“Uh-huh,” Casey replied, shooting her a brief, side glance.
“Listen, we know you’re hiding something, Casey. Whatever it is, I promise you there will be no consequences. We only want to find Meredith quickly. Some very bad people have her. Please help us find your friend.”
Casey fought back her tears. It was true. They’d got to her first. She turned away from the woman, wriggled her hand free of Laura’s grasp and nestled her face in her hands. She sobbed like that for a long moment and eventually decided to tell them. Meredith’s life was at stake; hers too.
“We went out last night,” Casey finally said. “Meredith was here for a sleepover.”
“Where? Where did you—?” Holt snapped, but the other cop touched his forearm, and he stopped shouting.
“At a club,” Casey whispered, veering her eyes sideways to avoid Mr. Holt’s glare. “At the Perdido,” she added, cringing in anticipation of his reaction.
He was going to be so mad. The place was famous in Vegas for the barely legal things that went on in there, and it was recognized as a favorite hook-up place for anyone looking to get laid without having to do much dating first. Kind of like a live Tinder with music and booze.
“How the hell did you get in there?” he asked, suspiciously calm about it.
“We weren’t alone,” she replied hesitantly, unwilling to throw Miguel under the bus. If she did, he’d go to jail, and no one else would take her clubbing for another six long years, until she turned twenty-one. “And sometimes the bouncers look the other way.”
“What happened at the club?” Holt asked.
“We danced, nothing else,” she said quickly, suddenly afraid to share more. What if he forced her to testify? What if she ended up having to move to Wyoming or some other terrible place where there was absolutely no fun to be had?
“Any men paying attention to you two last night?” he asked. He seemed to be gritting his teeth, but he sounded calm on the surface.
“A few,” she said, unable to contain a satisfied smile. She recalled the make-out session she’d enjoyed in the arms of a real man, a hot guy in ripped jeans and a white tee. He must’ve been at least twenty-five and behaved as such, sure of himself, bold, none of that high school bullshit she was sick of. But she saw no reason why she’d share that particular episode of her evening out.
“Jeez, Casey,” Holt reacted. “How old are you, fifteen? You should’ve been home, studying, both of you. That’s what you were supposed to do, right?”
“Yes, but we finished early, Mr. Holt, and we didn’t think anything bad would come of it.”
Holt sat across from her and stared at her intently. “Cut to the chase and tell me what the hell happened, Casey, or I swear to God—”
“Holt,” the woman cut him off but then turned to Casey. “Please. This is important. What happened last night?”
Casey sniffled and looked at them for a moment. She’d already told them about the club. What was the worst that could happen?
“We drank some, uh, soda, then had to go pee,” she said, staring at her hands as she wrung them mercilessly. “We weren’t drunk or anything, I swear,” she added quickly, seeing Mr. Holt’s glare. “We really had to go, but there was a line at the ladies’ room and no one in front of the men’s room. I thought it was okay to go in there because you can always say you’re a trannie or something, right? No one cares anymore.”
Holt groaned and swore again, covering his mouth with his hand. Still, Casey heard the curses he muttered and stopped talking.
“Go on,” he eventually said.
She swallowed hard, her mouth feeling dry. “Two men were in there, talking. They didn’t hear us open the door at first, as we peeked in. One said something like, ‘If I give you this, I expect you to make the whole thing go away,’ and he gave the other man a brown envelope. Then the second man opened the envelope and pulled out some money, about this much,” she added, bringing her index and thumb an inch apart to illustrate the size of the payout. “Then he said, ‘Yeah, this will take care of it. No one will find that poor bastard.’ Then they saw us, and they both stared at us with really mean eyes. The man who took the money told us to get the hell away, and we ran out of there.”
Holt looked at his partner for a second. Casey lowered her gaze again; there was one more thing left to add to her story. She took a deep breath and raised her eyes until they met Holt’s.
“The second man, the one who took the money, was a cop, Mr. Holt. He had a badge just like yours, and wore it on his belt, just like she does.”
Both of them sprang to their feet before Casey could finish. They exchanged a quick glance, then the woman grabbed Casey’s arm and helped her to her feet.
“You’re coming with us. We’re putting you in protective custody. Get ready to leave in five.”
Wyoming! That wasn’t happening. That just couldn’t happen.
She started crying again, wailing loudly. “I didn’t do anything! Leave me alone. I don’t want to go anywhere. I want my mom!”
Holt turned his back to her and made a phone call, asking someone else, probably another cop, to come and pick her up. He gave the person Casey’s home address, then ended the call and approached her.
“We’ll sor
t through all this. I promise we’ll keep you safe, and we’ll work with you to identify the men you saw,” he said, and for a moment, Casey felt grateful, hopeful that everything would end well. “But once this is over,” Mr. Holt continued, “don’t let me see you ever again come near my daughter.”
Vultures
Eight hours missing
Dr. Stuart Hickman was having a disappointing day, but it wasn’t all that unexpected when he’d placed unrealistically high hopes on the behavior of some feathered creatures of the sky. How were the vultures supposed to know that was the day he’d opened access to the grant people to see his systems, sharing the tracking screens for them to appreciate the value of their investment? And why would the birds care?
For months, he’d trapped and tagged the vultures of the Mojave, and that had been no easy feat. The birds were huge and robust; one flap of a wing could knock him out cold. Their sharp beaks could break a bone without much effort. Just getting them into live traps was a challenge, not to mention costly. After a while, his traps started catching birds that had been already tagged, doing little more than wasting precious time and resources.
He’d already burned through most of his grant money with the capturing and tagging. He didn’t cut corners on the technology, knowing the devices would have to work for a long time. With the new tags, he could conduct nesting studies, roosting and migratory patterns mapping, everything and anything he could think of, all on the same frequency. He could even overlay a thermal map on the screen and track the birds’ response to extreme weather. After all, the Mojave held the world record for the hottest temperature ever recorded, and he would’ve killed to have had the birds tagged on that day when the scorching heat blazed through the vast expanse of the deadly Mojave.
Now the money people were watching live, and he had nothing to show for it, but a bunch of minuscule dots scattered on a tracking screen. Some were stationary, the respective birds perched somewhere, immobile. There were a couple of committees visible, and a quick keyboard stroke overlaid the terrain layout, so he could see the group of lazy vultures killing time on the petrified branches of a long-dead tree. Other birds were in flight, but no patterns could be readily observed; their scattered flight resembled more of a study made on fruit flies. He’d hoped for a kettle or maybe a wake, which is what ornithologists and bird lovers call a group of vultures in flight or respectively feasting on a rotting carcass.
No such luck that day, and Dr. Hickman was growing weary of waiting. He’d already seen some discouraging messages from the grant board watching the demonstration of what their money had bought, and he dreaded watching a screen filled with randomly moving dots.
He pushed the laptop aside and crossed his arms on the desk’s scratched surface, then lowered his head, resting his throbbing forehead on his bent elbow. That was Mother Nature playing games with him, with his life’s work. And with a bitch like her, no one could reason.
He’d lost track of time when, barely audible, a light chime came from the laptop, sending Dr. Hickman into a frenzy. The system had recognized a pattern.
He jumped to his feet, pushing the chair aside, and leaned over the laptop’s screen, flipping through screens at an incredible speed. He’d forgotten all about the grant people who were watching; all he cared about was the large kettle of vultures, dancing on his screen.
“Yes, yes,” he muttered, running his fingers through the reddish tuft of hair that marked the top of his skull, surrounded by shiny scalp from all directions like a bunch of cattails breaking through the surface of a lake.
The kettle was a big one and growing. New vultures joined it, circling and circling, but not settling on the ground to eat. That meant their meal was still drawing breath or maybe had just drawn its last, somewhere in the heart of the desert, and he intended to witness the precise moment the kettle would land for the feast.
He grabbed the truck keys and a pair of sunglasses, then he slammed the laptop lid down, severing the internet connection with no regard for any of the people remotely watching the tagged flight who might not have given up on his birds yet. He’d have time to explain later. If he stepped on it, he could be at the site in under thirty minutes.
He drove as quickly as he dared, with a utility task vehicle in tow and his laptop on the passenger seat, its screen turned his way, so he could keep a wary eye on his finicky vultures. They whirled up in the air, still flying, still not eating. Then one of them set on the ground, turning the associated dot color from green to blue.
Dr. Hickman swore under his breath and floored it.
A few minutes later, he unloaded the UTV from the trailer and drove across the desert, leaving his truck and trailer unsecured on the side of the road. He pushed the UTV to the limit, ignoring the jolts of pain that the rugged terrain delivered to his sacroiliac joints. The laptop, open on the dashboard and secured in place with two Velcro straps, showed the majority of the birds still circling, but now four of them had landed and were ambling slowly on an intricate path leading to the location of the carcass.
Why weren’t they feeding? Possibly other predators were keeping them at bay. Maybe a coyote was causing them some grief. Whatever it was, soon he’d know.
He eased the pressure on the gas pedal as soon as he could see the kettle circling, about a hundred feet above the ground. He drove a little closer, then stopped and cut the engine, afraid he’d scare the birds away. He pulled out a pair of military-grade binoculars from his duffel bag and started to examine the majestic birds. They were mostly adults, a few young ones too. The ones on the ground were large males, typically those who approached the carcass first and scared off any unwanted dinner guests.
He focused the binoculars on the object of the birds’ interest. He couldn’t see much; only sharp-edged desert rocks and some dirt. Then one of the vultures moved to the side, and he froze, his breath caught in his lungs. Next to the bird’s claws, he thought he’d seen a woman’s hand, half-buried under rocks, long, thin fingers adorned with bright, red nail polish reaching up toward the sky. But then the vulture moved a few inches, and what he’d thought he’d seen was obscured from view.
He wasn’t that sure of what he’d seen. The heat rising from the desert’s bedrock had the air shimmering and the light bending, creating optic illusions, the dreaded Fata Morgana of the desert, a misleading mirage playing tricks on the traveler’s mind. But he had to know.
Breathing heavily, he lowered the binoculars and squinted, as if seeing with the naked eye could bring more detail than the powerful magnification of the field glasses. He couldn’t see much, other than the distant kettle circling lower and lower, getting ready to set down and feed.
He had no choice.
His hand hovered for a moment above the ignition, but then he turned the key, and the engine started.
“Damn it to hell,” he muttered, flooring the gas pedal and hopping over rocks and boulders as fast as the UTV could take it, getting ready to disrupt the kettle, scaring the birds into random flying patterns.
When he reached the site, three, large, turkey vultures were still on the ground, giving him evil, territorial stares and refusing to take flight. With a tinge of regret, he plugged the Bird Chase Super Sonic device into the vehicle’s outlet and flipped the switch. High-frequency sounds and distressed bird calls flooded the area, and all his precious vultures dissipated within a second.
Then he saw her.
He approached the body, hand clasped tightly over his mouth.
She’d been partially buried; only her head and her hands rose above the surface. Desert winds had blown dust and dirt over her beautiful face. Strands of her long hair had fanned out around her head and were pinned in place with rocks, giving the appearance of a halo or a morbid Victorian collar. A few thin locks blew in the wind, touching her pale face, her parted lips, making her seem alive still.
She couldn’t’ve been more than fifteen years old.
Visit
Nine hours missing
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br /> “I smelled pot on her, Baxter. What the hell?” he shouted angrily, turning onto the I-15 ramp with squealing tires and enough speed to make me wonder if the Ford Interceptor could flip on its side under the right conditions.
I held on to the armrest as best as I could, halfway turned toward him, a little queasy.
“You interrogated a minor without a guardian present, Holt. This could go badly in so many ways.”
He shot me a frustrated glance. “The hell I did. I asked my daughter’s best friend a few questions, that’s all.”
“You know they’re going to spin it, right?” I insisted, speaking as gently as I could. “If the heat is up, they’ll push back, the moment her mother hires an attorney. Then they’ll turn up the heat on us again.”
“Why would she get a lawyer? I didn’t charge Casey with anything.”
“People don’t take protective custody that easily. A lawyer will be the first phone call the woman makes.”
Holt didn’t say a word, but I could sense he was starting to see my point. At least he wasn’t pushing back against all reason anymore.
“Listen, all I’m saying is be prepared, expect that to happen, don’t blow your gaskets when it does.” I added, “And you should expect something else.”
“What?”
“You won’t be able to keep your daughter’s kidnapping a secret much longer. The school knows, Meredith’s best friend knows, soon Casey’s mother will too, and now the federal marshals know about it. I don’t know what you’re trying to hide, but you’re making a terrible mistake.”
“Orville will keep his mouth shut,” Holt said between clenched teeth, talking about the federal marshal who’d dropped everything to pick Casey up. “He and I served together. He’ll keep the girl off the books for as long as I need him to.”
“That was smart, by the way,” I admitted with a tiny smile. “Put Casey with the feds, not the cops.”
“Yeah, we don’t know who she saw last night, but she described a cop on the take. Until we get some sketches, we won’t know. Orville said he’ll handle that for me.”