Beside Still Waters (12 page)

             
He took several deep breaths as he reassured himself. 
You did well.  He suspects nothing about you.
  Well, nothing new at least.  Thank G-d for small miracles.

             
Fortunately he had no appointments later that day.  When he went out for lunch he told Maria that when she scheduled Mark’s appointments to make sure he was the only appointment for those days.  There was no way he could handle counseling anyone else so soon after his sessions with Mark.  She looked puzzled since he’d never made a request like that when dealing with anyone else, but she agreed.

             
He went home and took Captain for a walk to clear his head.  The dog happily paced beside him, tongue lolling.  He was more grateful for the creature’s presence than he could express.  He himself had been on the verge of becoming a ticking time bomb a few months before.  He found, though, that the more time he spent with the dog the calmer he was.  He tried not to think about the fact that the dog was the only one he could truly be himself with.

             
The rest of the day passed swiftly and finally it was time to pick up Cindy from the airport.  He felt a growing excitement as he drove.  He had missed talking to her while she was gone and couldn’t wait to hear all about her trip.  Hawaii was one of the few places he’d never been and he’d dearly love to see it someday.  He figured they’d grab some dinner and she could tell him all about it.

             
He reached the airport and opted to park the car and meet Cindy inside at baggage claim.  The thought of circling the airport with the assorted locals and tourists all racing to cut each other off was not his idea of a good time.

             
Besides, meeting someone at baggage claim was more personal, special. 
Maybe a little too special
, his inner voice whispered.  Where Cindy was concerned he’d been ignoring that voice a lot lately.

             
After parking his car he made it into the baggage claim area.  People hurried here and there, some arriving on business or vacation and others returning home.  He had always found airports fascinating.  They were filled with people from every walk in life who only shared one common goal and that was to get somewhere.  An older gentleman walked by him, leaning heavily on his cane.  Jeremiah couldn’t help but wonder if the man realized that the woman who brushed past him was a famous actress, one whose movies he almost assuredly had never seen.

             
Jeremiah couldn’t help but chuckle.  Airports were an amazing place to people watch.  You could tell so much about people just by observing how they navigated through the spaces and handled the stresses of travel.

             
He found a monitor that listed the carousel for Cindy’s flight and moved to stand by it.  A few minutes later a steady stream of passengers began to fill the space around him, all anxious to find their luggage and leave.

             
The conveyor belt began to move and the thud-thud-thud of bags sliding down the chute and onto it started up.  Jeremiah stepped a few feet farther away from it to allow more people to claim their bags.  He kept eager watch for Cindy.

             
Finally the trickle of people coming his way seemed to stop.

             
She had probably been one of the last ones off the plane.  She might have stopped in the restroom before heading to baggage claim.  A couple more minutes passed and he began to feel anxious.  He knew he couldn’t have missed her.  He also knew that the suitcase she’d had with her when she left was way too large for her to have tried to take it as a carry-on.  She had to have checked it.

             
He pulled out his phone.  No missed calls.  He tried dialing her phone but it went directly to voicemail. 

             
“Excuse me,” he said to one of the women standing near him.

             
She turned and frowned at him suspiciously.

             
“I’m waiting to pick up my friend.  I think I’m in the right place.  We’re you on flight 439 from Honolulu?”

             
“Yes.  That’s right.  And there’s my bag, so this is the right place,” she said, before moving to retrieve a fuchsia roller bag.

             
I’m just being paranoid.  There’s a dozen reasons why she might be slow getting down here
, he told himself.

             
He pulled his phone back out and called her home number.  Her roommate, Geanie, answered.

             
“Hi, Geanie, it’s Jeremiah.”

             
“Hi!  Did you pick up Cindy?  Did she have a great time?”

             
“No, not yet.  I’m waiting for her here in baggage claim and she hasn’t shown up yet.  She didn’t tell you about any change of plans?  She wasn’t changing her flight or having someone else pick her up?”

             
“No.  I haven’t heard anything from her at all,” Geanie said.

             
The warning bells were going off at full volume in his head now.  “Okay, if she calls tell her where I am.”

             
“Sure.  Call me when you find her.”

             
He hung up and moved to a white courtesy telephone.  A minute later the operator was paging Cindy all over the airport.  His stomach twisted in knots as he waited.  Finally he had to admit that she wasn’t able to pick up the phone.  He went to the service desk and found a plump, spectacled woman with a nametag that said Dorothy on it.

             
“Can I help you?” she asked.

             
“Yes.  I’m picking up my friend and I can’t find her.  She’s not answering her phone and I had her paged but no luck.”

             
“Well, it can be a rather long walk.”

             
He shook his head.  “It looks like everyone else from her flight is here.  I’m worried.  Can you check and tell me if Cindy Preston made the flight?  It was 439 from Honolulu.”

             
“I’m sorry, sir, I can’t release passenger information.  I’m sure she’ll give you a call soon.  It’s possible she missed her flight and she’ll be here on the next one tomorrow morning.”

             
He passed his hand through his hair, feeling his agitation grow.  “If she missed her flight why didn’t she call to let me know?”

             
“I’m sure I don’t know, sir,” the woman said, her smile slipping.  He wanted to press but he could sense that she was about five seconds away from calling a security guard.  He cursed under his breath.  Ninety-nine percent of all the airport regulations and paranoia did nothing to stop terrorists, they just tormented everyone else.

             
He moved away from the help desk and took another scan of the area.  He tried her phone again and again it went straight to voicemail.  Finally, he called Mark.

             
“Hello?” the detective answered, sounding bone weary.

             
“Mark?  I need your help.  It’s Jeremiah.”

             
“I got that much from the caller id.  What’s going on?”

             
“I’m here at LAX.  I’m supposed to pick up Cindy and I can’t find her.  She’s not answering her phone and Geanie hasn’t heard anything from her.
”

             
“Maybe her phone battery is dead and you two keep just missing each other.”

             
“No, I’ve been waiting here in baggage claim.  I would have seen her.”

             
“Humor me and check outside to see if she’s waiting on the curb for you to drive by.”

             
Jeremiah ground his teeth but turned and strode out the nearest door.  He looked up and down the sidewalk.

             
“No, she’s not out here.”

             
“Maybe she missed her flight.  Maybe she had someone else pick her up.”

             
“No!” Jeremiah said, simultaneously rejecting both proposals with more vehemence than he had intended.

             
There was a pause on the other end of the line.  “Something I should know about?” Mark asked.

             
And even though the question infuriated him, Jeremiah couldn’t help but notice that Mark must be doing better.  He was getting his obnoxious sense of humor back.

             
“I’m supposed to pick her up.  If she had missed her flight I’d think she would have called if she could have.  I tried talking to someone at the airline but they refuse to tell me whether or not she actually got on board the plane.”

             
“What do you want me to do?” Mark asked, sounding slightly bewildered.

             
“I want you to help me find her!” Jeremiah roared.

             
There was a pause.  “Okay, I think you just need to take a deep breath and calm down.  Cindy’s a big girl.  Maybe you got your wires crossed and it’s the wrong day or she took a taxi.”

             
Jeremiah closed his eyes and prayed for the patience not to kill someone.  “Mark, I have a very bad feeling about this.  Can you please find out if she was on that plane?”

             
“In case you’ve forgotten, I’m suspended.  And if I get caught trying to play the cop card-”

             
“Ask someone else to do it.  Surely someone at the department owes you a favor.”

             
“You’re serious about this,” Mark said, starting to sound worried himself.

             
“When it comes to Cindy not being where she’s supposed to be I’m always serious,” Jeremiah said.

             
It was Mark’s turn to swear.  “You’re right.  Give me a couple of minutes and I’ll call you back.”

             
Jeremiah paced while he waited.  The area around the carousel cleared out and there was no one left.  One single black bag circled lonely and he double-checked to make sure it wasn’t hers.  Finally the conveyor belt stopped.

             
When his phone rang he practically shouted hello as he accepted the call.  “Jeremiah,” Mark said, his voice stressed.  “I was able to verify that Cindy had a ticket for the flight but she never showed up.  The airline doesn’t have a record of her changing the ticket and no airlines have her leaving Hawaii on any other flights.”

             
Jeremiah stood, mind racing.  If she wasn’t scheduled on another flight then it wasn’t something so simple as her missing her flight.

             
“Hello?  Can you hear me?” Mark asked.  “Jeremiah?”

             
“I’m going to call her hotel.  You start calling hospitals,” Jeremiah said.

             
And for a wonder Mark didn’t argue with him.  Jeremiah pulled the piece of paper out of his pocket that had all Cindy’s trip information on it.  He found the hotel phone number and called it.

             
As it rang he realized that his hands were shaking.  How many people from his past would be amazed to see that?  He stared at his left hand. 
I’m in shock
, he realized.  He knew he was jumping to conclusions, that he should calm himself down.

             
But he couldn’t.  Because it was Cindy.  And deep down in his gut he knew she was in trouble.

8

             
“No!” Cindy gasped as she realized the implications of what the yacht owner had just said.  She spun and lunged for the railing.  If she could make it back in the water she had a chance to escape.

             
An iron hand clamped down on her shoulder and yanked backward hard enough to sweep her off her feet.  She landed on her back with enough force to jar every bone in her body and her teeth snapped together.

             
She needed to get back up but her head was spinning.  When she looked up the man’s face floated in her vision.

             
“I’m afraid, my dear, you’re out of the frying pan and in the fire, so to speak.  I gave that idiot orders to kill you after he recovered our property from you.”

             
Belatedly she realized he was the shouting man she’d heard when she first came to in the hull of the other boat.  She heard pounding feet and a minute later her kidnapper was standing over her as well.

             
“Sorry, Boss.”

             
“What happened over there?” the other man demanded.

             
“Nothing.  I took care of it.”