Abducted: A Jake Badger Mystery Thriller

Abducted

A Jake Badger Mystery
Thriller

Book 3

Glenn Rogers

Copyright

©

2014

Glenn Rogers

No Part of this
material may be copied in any form without the express written permission of
the author

ISBN
978-0-9903940-3-7

Published by

Simpson and Brook,
Publishers

Estherville, IA

Previously
…

(
from
book 2,
Love and Lies
)

When it came time for Monica to leave Sunday night, she didn't really
want to leave. I didn't really want her to go, either. But we had agreed that
it was best to go slow. We kissed and I watched her walk out to her car. She’d
be back at seven for our morning run. Then we'd each go to our own offices. I
was ready to go back to work, and we did, after all, have businesses to run.
She waved as she pulled away from the curb. It had been an amazing five weeks.

Monday
morning, I was ready to go at seven but Monica hadn’t shown up yet. She was
almost never late. At seven fifteen, I called her cell. She didn't answer. When
it rolled to voice mail, I left a message. She'd probably slept late and was in
the shower. I sat down to read and wait. At eight fifteen, I called again.
Still no answer.
I left another message.

I
waited another hour before calling again. No answer. Left another message.
Maybe there had been an accident. I spent some time calling hospitals near her
home or those on the way to my place. Nothing. Thank God. Maybe she had car
trouble. But in that case, she would have called. If she could have called, she
would have. Maybe she was sick. Maybe she'd passed out or something. Or fallen
and hit her head. Maybe she changed her mind. Maybe she realized what she was
getting into and decided that I wasn't what she wanted. One weekend with me was
all she could take. No. That didn't feel right. Even if she had changed her
mind, Monica would not just walk away. She'd have been upfront with me. No,
this wasn't about us. Something else had happened.
But what?
It didn't have to be anything terrible. She didn't have to be in danger or
trouble or anything. Maybe she was helping someone with something. Still, in
two hours she could have found a few seconds to make a call.

I
decided to go by her office. I put on my regular work clothes: Levis, light
blue Oxford button down shirt, a pair of ankle-high hiking boots, and my tan
corduroy sport coat. As I started for the door, I stopped and went back. I took
off my jacket and shrugged into my shoulder holster. I got my .357 from the
drawer next to my bed, checked the loads—it had an eight-shot cylinder,
and slid it into the holster under my left arm. I slipped back into my jacket,
and Wilson and I went out the door.

It
was a thirty-minute drive to Monica's office. I tried calling her again in
route. No answer. When I got to the complex where Monica's office was, I looked
around for her car. It was nowhere in sight. I went up to her office. The door
was locked. I knocked. Nothing. I knocked harder and waited. Nothing. I went to
the CPA firm across the hall and asked the receptionist if anyone there had
seen Ms. Nolan. No one had seen or heard anything.

I
called her again as I went back out to my Jeep. No answer. Her apartment was
about ten minutes away. I made it there in half that time. I kept telling
myself that there was nothing to worry about. Monica was a capable person. I
couldn't imagine too many situations that she couldn't handle. I began to think
again that maybe the weekend had been too intense after all and that she needed
to get away to have time to think. Maybe she caught a late flight last night or
an early one this morning and went to Vegas. Vegas? She had family in Texas,
somewhere near Dallas. Maybe she went there. Maybe her mother had a heart
attack and Monica caught an early flight to DFW. She hadn't called because it
was early and she didn't want to wake me. That's what she'd have thought. I was
still recuperating from being shot in the chest and I needed my sleep. So, she
wouldn't call. Then, once the plane took off, she couldn't call. When the plane
lands, she'll call and explain what happened. Maybe. It was plausible. But
again, it didn’t feel right.

When
I got to her apartment complex, I looked for her car. It was there. I went to
her door and knocked. No answer. I went to the manager's office.
No one there.
I went back to Monica's door. It was
mid-morning. People were around.
Too bad.
I needed to
get into Monica's apartment. I took out my lock pick tools and went to work. In
a few seconds the tumblers fell into place. Before opening the door, I pulled
my gun. I'm not sure why I did. I hadn't consciously thought about any scenario
that involved foul play, but something told me I needed to be ready.

I
opened the door slowly and looked in. Something was wrong. A chair was tipped
over; a table had been knocked out of alignment. A lamp lay on the floor.

“Monica,”
I called.

Nothing.

Ready
to shoot if I needed to, I moved cautiously through the front room. Monica’s
purse sat on the counter that separated the kitchen from the small dining area.
I went into the bedroom. The bed was unmade. Her cell phone lay on the table
next to her bed. I put it in my pocket. There was a blouse on the floor. The
closet door was open. Monica was a neat freak. She would not willingly leave
her room looking like this.

I
went into the bathroom. A wet towel lay on the floor. Again, not neat freak Monica…
at least, not if she’d had a choice. And then I saw it, blood on the floor. Not
a lot.
Just a couple of drops.
But
enough.
And the items on the countertop had been knocked over or jostled
out of place. Something happened here. Something bad. Something dangerous.

I
took out my cell and called Alex.

“Jake,”
he said, when he answered. “What's up?”

“Monica's
been taken.”

Chapter 1

Monday Morning

“What
do you mean, Monica's been taken?” Alex asked.

“She's
been abducted,” I said. “Taken from her apartment.”

“Are
you there now?”

“Yeah.”

“I'm
on my way.”

“I'll
call McGarry, too,” I said.

“Fifteen
minutes,” Alex said, and clicked off.

Alex
is one of my two best friends, Monica being the other one. Alex and I went
through Quantico together and were assigned to the Organized Crime Unit of the
Los Angeles Office of the FBI. I resigned from the agency after three years.
Alex stayed on. He's now a Special Agent in Charge, a SAC, in the L.A. office.

“McGarry,”
Frank said, when he answered his cell.

“Frank,
Monica's been kidnapped. Taken from her apartment. I'm here now. Alex is on his
way.”

“Address,”
he said.

I
gave it to him.

“Twenty
minutes,” he said, and clicked off.

Frank
is a captain on the LAPD, working homicide. We've been friends since we worked
together on a joint FBI-LAPD task force nearly five years ago. I worked with
his son-in-law as well. I was wounded getting him out of the line of fire. Frank
was grateful, so he does what he can to help me now that I’m a private
investigator and no longer have the advantage of a badge. He'll get a detective
in missing persons to come with him and work with Alex and me on the case. Between
the FBI, the LAPD, and me, we'll find Monica Nolan.

While
I waited for the police to arrive, I called Mildred, my office manager, and had
her close the office and come get Wilson, my four-year-old Border
Collie
. The local police arrived and set up a crime scene.
Mildred arrived a little while later. I explained what had happened, handed
Wilson off to her, and told her I didn’t know when I’d be back at the office.

Mildred
looked me in the eye and said, “You’ll find her and she’ll be all right.”

Once
everyone arrived, the scene was chaotic. Frank had sent additional LAPD
personnel. Alex had called in an FBI forensics team. They were going over the
apartment with a fine-toothed comb. Alex, Frank, Detective Kimberly Branch, and
I stood together in the courtyard of the apartment complex. Neither Alex nor I
had met Detective Branch before. I had already explained to her what I had
found when I arrived.

“So
what do you need from me?” Branch asked Alex. She was in her mid thirties, around
the same age as Alex and I.

“Technically,”
Alex said, “the FBI will be the lead agency. But we'd very much like this to be
a joint effort.” Alex glanced briefly at me and then added, “And Jake, of
course, should be considered as part of the investigative team. Extend to him
the level of cooperation you would extend to me.”

“With
all due respect,” Branch said to Alex, “Mr. Badger is a civilian and he's
emotionally involved with the victim. It's not appropriate for him to be part
of the investigative team.”

All
three of us were looking at her. I could feel my temper rising.

Frank
said, “Detective, no one asked you for your opinion. Jake Badger is a former
FBI agent and one of the best detectives you will ever meet. He is part of this
investigative team. Is that understood?” Frank looked more like a corporate
executive than a cop. He was wearing a charcoal gray suit, white shirt, red and
blue-stripped tie, and black wingtips. But when he spoke there
was
an authority and a strength that few had the guts to
question.

“Yes,
Captain,”
Branch
said. I almost felt sorry for her.

Alex,
wearing the same basic uniform as Frank, said, “I'd also like you to stay in
the loop, Frank, even though this is not a homicide.”

“That's
why I'm here,” Frank said.

Then
to me, Alex said, “How do you want to begin?”

I
could see Branch's confusion. Alex was an FBI SAC. Why was he asking me how I
wanted to handle things?

“While
your lab people are doing their thing,” I said, “we need to go over Monica's
case files and see if we can find someone who's looking to even a score.”

“You're
convinced this is related to one of her cases?” Alex asked.

“I'm
not convinced of anything,” I said. “I just think it's the most logical place
to begin. Given recent events, it could just as easily be someone in Esposito's
organization.”

“Want
us to follow up on the Esposito angle?” Frank asked.

“That
would be helpful,” I said. “Work multiple tracks simultaneously.”

Branch
must have felt like she needed to contribute. “Time is of the essence,” she
said. “The more time goes by, the less the likelihood there is of getting her
back.”

“Shut
up, detective,” Frank barked, “or go wait in the car.”

For
a brief moment, Branch looked crushed, almost like a little girl. But she
sucked it up. She folded her arms across her chest and nodded.

“It's
all right, Frank,” I said, trying to remain
calm
myself. “If this were a typical abduction, she'd be right.”

“Why
do you think it's not typical?” she asked.

She
had guts to ask the question given the way Frank had just bitten her head off.

“Because
this is not a kidnapping for ransom,” I said. “Whoever took her did it for
revenge.”

“How
can you be sure?” she asked.

“What
is it, detective,” Frank growled, “that you don't understand about shut up?”

“I'm
sorry, Sir,” she said. “But if I'm going to be part of this investigation, I
need to be able to participate. And I need to understand the thinking of the
lead investigator, which it appears is going to be Mr. Badger.”

“It's
okay, Frank,” I said, before he lowered the boom. “She's right.” Then to her, I
said, “Please, call me Jake.”

She
didn't say anything.

“She
can't make a meaningful contribution,” I said, “if she doesn't understand what
we're doing and why. Besides,” I added, “I like her. She's got spunk.”

She
glared at me impatiently, as if she thought I was patronizing her. Then she
said, “You still didn't answer my question.”

Frank
was not happy with her, so I spoke up. “I don't think it's a kidnapping for ransom
because there's no money to be had. Kidnappers don't just take people randomly.
They select a target where there's the possibility of a substantial payday.” As
I said that, though, I was thinking about the nine hundred thousand dollar fee
Monica had just earned a few weeks earlier in the recovery of an Andy Warhol
painting worth ninety million. But I decided to stay on the track I was on. “This
isn't about a ransom. Given who Monica is, there's a greater likelihood that
this is retaliation for something she did, a case she solved that involved a
lot of money, or where someone went to jail, or died. In the last few weeks,
she’s killed several people. Some of them were powerful people.”

“I
understand what you're saying. I just don't see any evidence that points in
that direction.”

Frank
jumped in. “It's a logical deduction detective. A hunch, if you will. A lot of
cases have been solved on the basis of a hunch.”

Frank
seemed to have calmed down a bit.

She
took a deep breath and nodded. “Yes, Sir.”

“Okay
then,” Alex said. “Frank, you and Detective Branch will follow up on the
Esposito angle while Jake and I go through Monica's case files.”