No One Saw

by Beverly Long

  “Definitely meth,” she said.

  Heroin was the drug of choice for many but that didn’t mean the meth industry had died out. Far from it. While most of the meth circulating came in via Mexico, cheaper and stronger than ever, there were still some local cooks. They had to work harder to get the ingredients and ultimately produced in limited quantities, but there was enough money in it to keep them doing it.

  A.L. glanced at the photo again. The years had not been kind to Coyote Frogg. He skin was pasty white and another twenty pounds would have kept him from looking emaciated. But he did have a hell of a head of red hair. It wasn’t terribly long in the photo, just falling below his chin. It was a head shot so there was no way to see whether he had a sleeve tattoo. The detail in the medical record likely would have included it but they’d only been able to obtain the photo. A warrant would be necessary to get more.

  Mr. Gibacki had described shoulder-length coarse red hair.

  Hair could grow. That’s why they were going to let him take a look.

  The Panini Playground wouldn’t open for hours but there was a car parked behind the restaurant. A.L. knocked on the back door. It opened a few inches and A.L. shifted so that the man could see him. “A minute, sir?” A.L. said. “We have something we’d like to show you.”

  The door opened and Mr. Gibacki came out. “Detectives?” he said.

  “We have a photo we’d like you to look at, sir. To see if you recognize it as one of the men that you kicked out of here on Tuesday night.” A.L. pulled his phone. Thumbed through his messages. Held the phone out for the older man to see.

  Mr. Gibacki stared at it. For a whole minute. Finally, he looked up. “His hair was much longer, more wild-looking. But I think it’s him.”

  * * *

  As A.L. and Rena brought Chief Faster up to speed on Coyote Frogg, his eyes started to dance. It took just seconds, really, for the man to make several leaps in logic. One, that Coyote Frogg’s father had been a person of intense interest in the Corrine Antler disappearance. Two, that perhaps the Dover police had been too focused on the father and had not spent enough energy on the son. And three, if Coyote Frogg could be found, there was a chance to solve not one but two kidnappings.

  What didn’t get said was that it just felt better that it was a stranger than a family member.

  Faster rubbed his hands together. “I’ve already had a call from the mayor this morning. His office is getting lots of pressure to solve this case. When people don’t feel as if their children are safe, they don’t have much tolerance for anything else that isn’t quite right in the community. He’s going to be happy to hear this news.”

  A.L. said nothing. His own heart had beat fast when Mr. Gibacki had identified Coyote Frogg’s photo as the same man he’d booted from his restaurant on Tuesday night. He understood the interest in finding Coyote Frogg. But he also knew that eyewitness testimony was more unreliable than most people realized. Mistakes were made all the time.

  “I want the two of you back in Dover. The Frogg family lived there for more than twenty-five years. There have to be distant relatives or former friends, somebody who can lead us to Coyote Frogg.”

  “We’re going to need a warrant to get more information out of the medical record,” A.L. said. That would include information on the patient’s tattoos.”

  “I’ll get it for you,” Faster said. “And I’ll fill in the FBI and others.”

  The man had a head of steam going and there was no sense in trying to convince him not to get too focused on one person. He’d never been a great cop and he never would be. And right now, he was in charge. So that meant A.L. and Rena were going to Dover.

  And he could be right. A.L. didn’t want his own issues with Faster to cloud the possibility that this really could be the break they were looking for. “Ready,” he said, looking at Rena.

  She stood. And ten minutes later, they were on the road. A.L. was driving.

  “Let’s try Perry and LuAnn Whitman now,” he said. “Do you have their numbers?”

  “Yeah,” Rena said, flipping pages in her notebook. “Which cell do you think I should try first?”

  “Try LuAnn. I think women are better about answering their phones.”

  “Are you slamming women?”

  He lowered his chin and gave her a stare. “I was complimenting women, the whole damn group of you. For your information, there are many things that I think women do much better than men.”

  “Damn straight,” she muttered. She dialed and pushed Send. It was answered on the second ring.

  “Hello.”

  “Is this LuAnn Whitman?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is Detective Morgan of the Baywood Police Department.”

  The quick intake of breath was audible. LuAnn was steeling herself for bad news.

  “I am not calling with news about Emma. But rather, I have just a few questions for you and your husband, if he’s available, that might help us as we continue to investigate.”

  “For a minute I was sure...” Her voice trailed off.

  Rena understood. The woman didn’t want to put what she’d been sure of into words. Too ugly. Too harsh. “My partner, Detective McKittridge, is also on the line. I’m going to put you on speaker phone.”

  “My husband is right here. I’ll do the same,” she said.

  There was a slight pause and then a man said, “Hello, this is Perry Whitman.”

  “Detectives Morgan and McKittridge here, Mr. Whitman,” Rena said. “Thank you both for being available to talk to us. May we call you LuAnn and Perry?”

  “Of course,” LuAnn said.

  “First of all, let me say that we’re both terribly sorry that this has happened to your family and we’re doing everything we can to find Emma,” Rena said.

  There was no response. Hard to know if Troy and or Leah had said anything about them to LuAnn and Perry.

  “We understand that you live in Milwaukee. Have you lived there for some time?” Rena asked.

  “Eighteen years. Troy was just starting high school when we moved in,” LuAnn said. “He turns thirty-two next month.”

  A.L. and Rena looked at each other. It was going to be a really bad birthday party if Emma’s chair was empty.

  “Do you work in Milwaukee?” A.L. asked.

  “I retired about three years ago,” Perry said. “I worked in logistics for a manufacturing company here in Milwaukee.”

  “I’m working part-time at Brookfield Square mall. At Pagany Chocolates. Gets me out of the house,” LuAnn said.

  “Can you tell us about your day on Wednesday?” Rena asked.

  “Well, we got a call from Troy sometime after 6:00 that evening,” Perry said.

  “Let’s start from the beginning of the day,” Rena said, trying to redirect them.

  “Well, I have dialysis three mornings a week,” Perry said. “Monday, Wednesday and Friday. That starts at 9:00 but I’m always there by 8:30. Takes about four hours. So I’m there until about 1:00.”

  “Where does this occur?” Rena asked.

  “There’s a dialysis center about four blocks from our house. Broadhurst Pavilion.”

  Pavilion. What a nice word for a place where they stuck needles into you and cleaned out your kidneys. “Thank you, Perry,” Rena said. “After 1:00, what did you do?”

  “I always come home and take a nap. Then I watch a little television. That’s what I was doing when Troy called.”

  “And your day, LuAnn?” Rena asked.

  “I got up about 7:00 and walked the dog. Then I showered and drove to work. Our store opens at 9:00. I was there until 2:00. Then I drove home. Oh, wait. I think I stopped at the store on my way home. Yes, that’s right. I needed ketchup for the meat loaf I was making.” She paused. “I guess that was a waste. Neither one of us ate a bite of dinner t
hat night. I threw the meat loaf away.”

  “So you were at home when Troy called?” A.L. asked.

  “Yes. Watching television with Perry. It was just so unbelievable. It still is. And we feel so helpless here,” LuAnn said. “We just sit here and wait for the phone to ring.”

  “I’m sure that’s difficult,” Rena said.

  “We’ve been told that’s about all we can do,” Perry said. There was a hint of hurt in Perry’s tone.

  “I’m sure that Leah and Troy are comforted by your support,” Rena said.

  “We love that little Emma. She’s the sweetest thing. And the idea that she may be lost or hurt or...” Her voice caught in a sob.

  “It’s okay, honey,” Perry said softly, clearly speaking to his wife. “I’ll do this.”

  It hit Rena that Perry and LuAnn were supporting each other the way she and A.L. had expected that Troy and Leah would.

  “Truth is, Detectives, we’re not as close to our son and daughter-in-law as others are to their children,” Perry said.

  Leah had said that they were lovely people. “Why is that?” Rena asked.

  “It would be convenient if we could blame our daughter-in-law. But that wouldn’t be true,” Perry said, finishing the thought. “We maybe said some things that we shouldn’t have said to Troy when he was considering buying Garage on Division.”

  “We just weren’t confident that it was a good decision,” LuAnn said, evidently having composed herself enough to speak. “But there was no talking him out of it.”

  “Why didn’t you think it was a good decision?” A.L. asked.

  “I thought he was paying too much for the business. I wanted to see the financial statements but he told me that he’d looked at them and was satisfied,” Perry said. “I didn’t want to see him take on that much debt.”

  “Did he ask you to help him with the purchase?” A.L. asked.

  “No. I think he knew that we’d be uncomfortable with that. He worked all that out with Steven,” Perry said.

  “Steven?” Rena asked.

  “Steven Hanzel. He’s a banker in Baywood. But we’ve known him since we moved into this house. He lived across the street. Troy and Steven were best friends. Actually, both our boys were friendly with Steven,” Perry added.

  “We always thought that’s why Troy moved to Baywood, because Steven was already there,” LuAnn said.

  Rena looked at A.L. “What do you think of Steven?”

  Neither one of the Whitmans responded. Finally, LuAnn said, “Well, Steven has never suffered from a lack of self-confidence.”

  “He was a cocky shit,” Perry said. “But he got better with age. Got a college degree. We didn’t know his wife but we’ve met his little girl at one of Emma’s birthday parties. I think he’s got a little boy, too. Hard on kids when the marriage doesn’t work out.”

  Hard on parents when their adult children pushed them away. “You mentioned your other son?”

  “Yes, Travis. He’s two years older than Troy. He doesn’t live too far from us here in Milwaukee. We called him on Wednesday night, once we’d talked to Troy. He came over right away. That helped.”

  Neither A.L. nor Rena volunteered that Travis had known first. “Are Troy and Travis close?” A.L. asked.

  “Well, they fought like caged tigers when they were kids,” Perry said. “But I think that they get along pretty well now.”

  “This is a difficult question for me to ask,” Rena said. “But do either of you have any reason to believe that either Troy or Leah could have something to do with Emma’s disappearance?”

  The question hung in the air.

  “Both Leah and Troy love that little girl with all their hearts,” Perry said. He didn’t sound angry that the question had been asked.

  “But we also don’t think that she wandered away from the learning center. We talk to Emma on the phone at least once a week. She loves going there. Talks about her teachers all the time,” LuAnn said. “She’s a very responsible little girl. Knows right from wrong.”

  “Somebody took her,” Perry said. “Somebody took our sweet baby away from us.”

  * * *

  “They’re hurting on so many levels,” Rena said, once she’d ended the call.

  “Yeah, that was bad. I’m going to pull off here,” he said, nodding his head in the direction of a highway rest stop. “I want to check my notes.”

  “I might use the little girls’ room while we’re here,” Rena said. She held up her sixteen-ounce coffee cup in further explanation.

  “You rent coffee, you don’t own it,” A.L. said, sounding preoccupied.

  When she got back into the vehicle, he was drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. “During that first conversation with Troy and Leah, Troy called his parents before the Amber Alert was sent. I asked him about his relationship with his parents. I have in my notes that he verified it was a good relationship.”

  “Maybe he just didn’t want to get into the weeds. Not what was important to him at the time,” Rena said.

  “Possibly.”

  “Or he’s in denial about relationships he has with others. Maybe if we asked him, he’d say that he and Leah have a good relationship.”

  “Okay.”

  “You don’t sound convinced,” Rena said.

  “Maybe he didn’t want us to have any reason to follow up with his parents,” A.L. said.

  “They didn’t tell us anything of great importance,” Rena said.

  “They told us that they didn’t think Garage on Division was a good buy. That they wanted to look at the financial records but Troy didn’t let them. Remember the story you shared about the conversation at the Morgans’ dinner table? Maybe it wasn’t just an ugly rumor that Danny heard. Maybe the business is in trouble.”

  “Are we going to ask Troy for his financial records?” Rena asked.

  “I don’t know,” A.L. said. “I want to talk to Troy again before we make that decision.”

  “During that same conversation, Leah said that LuAnn and Perry were lovely people,” Rena said. “I remember her using the word lovely just because not that many people use that word regularly. Now, in retrospect, she didn’t really answer the question of whether there was a good relationship.”

  “Maybe she doesn’t understand the relationship. Perry made it sound as if the concerns about buying the business were voiced to Troy. Maybe Troy never told Leah. So all Leah knows is that the relationship soured for some reason but can’t put her finger on why.”

  “Complicated,” Rena said. “Sounds as if their relationship with Travis might be better. For their sakes, I hope it is. Do you think we should follow up with Travis?”

  “Everything and one more thing. Let’s call him now,” A.L. said.

  Rena entered his number in her phone and pushed Send. It rang four times before flipping over to voice mail. “This is Detective Morgan from the Baywood Police Department. Please return my call at your earliest opportunity.” She closed by reciting her number twice, even though it should pop up on his caller ID.

  “Switching gears,” A.L. said. “What do you remember about Trapper Frogg and his son, Coyote, from when we looked through Doug Franklin’s file?” he asked.

  “Coyote Frogg was the only child of Trapper Frogg and his wife, who were married late 1980s and divorced in the late 1990s when he was ten. Trapper Frogg died three years ago. Coyote was mentioned in the obituary but there was no other family. Although I think I did see a note that the ex-wife was living in Las Vegas. I don’t think Doug talked to her. Can’t remember her name.”

  “Dusty,” A.L. said. “That was his wife’s name. You’re right, Franklin didn’t talk to her. I think because Trapper told him that there’d been no contact between her and either Trapper or Coyote for many years.”

  “Why do you ask me when you alread
y have all this in your head?”

  “Testing you,” he said.

  She raised her middle finger in a friendly salute. “Test this.”

  He smiled. “Faster wants us to wrap this up with a bow.”

  “Did you see the front page of this morning’s paper?”

  He had. The headline had been Fund-raising Site Established for Missing Child. He’d skimmed the article. It had given a basic update on continuing search activities and then devoted three paragraphs to how people could donate to the Whitman family. “I imagine the money will flow in,” he said. “By Monday, the headline is going to be Baywood Cops Can’t Find Their Own Asses.”

  “Which explains Faster’s motivation. The press is still playing nice but it won’t last. The mayor is already calling him.”

  “Can you text Brent Smoke and ask him to pull Trapper Frogg’s last address?” A.L. asked.

  “Why? I thought you said that Coyote hadn’t been seen or heard from since 2017. You don’t think he’s hiding out at his dad’s old house, do you?”

  “No. But prior to dropping off the grid, he had a checking account. Ferguson was able to find a deposit for forty-seven thousand dollars.”

  “Chump change in the drug world,” she said.

  “Right. But this was a wire transfer, from one bank to another. I’m betting it was legitimate money from the sale of his dad’s house. We’re going to go talk to the buyer. See what he or she knows.”

  She picked up her phone. Touched some numbers. “I’m sort of disappointed in you that you can’t remember the address. It was probably mentioned at least once in those hundred pages or so that we reviewed. Perhaps your memory isn’t that good.”

  “I’ll remember forever that you’re a pain in the ass. I know that it was Cleveland Avenue but I don’t want to waste time circling the block.”

  Fifteen minutes later, she had confirmation from Brent Smoke’s assistant that it was 470 Cleveland Avenue. They would start there and then widen the circle. Maybe there would be a helpful neighbor who had known Coyote Frogg, who might be able to point them in the right direction.