Collateral Damage (33 page)

“But they can find a lot of private information on people. That could be dangerous if they mess with the wrong folks.”

“I agree, but she doesn't listen to reason sometimes.”

“Maybe because you're the enabler,” he said. “You seem to ask her for help on a regular basis.”

I got another cup of coffee, sipped it. “You may be right. I'll be more careful about what I ask her to do in the future. But for now, what the hell is the connection between a house in the Bahamas and what we're looking into?”

I went to my computer and put the Bahamian address into Google maps. I found the place, but it wasn't in Marsh Harbour proper. The house sat alone on a small island off the northern tip of the peninsula that held
the town. The only access to the island would be by boat. It was isolated and secure. A good place for people who didn't want to be bothered.

My computer pinged, letting me know that an e-mail had arrived. I opened it. The message was: “I'm OK. Your buddy Tripp would love this place. Trust me.”

“Jock,” I said. “Look at this.”

“Damn. At least she's okay or says she is. Who's this buddy of yours, Tripp?”

“Tripp Harrison. He's an artist. I've never met the man, but I love his paintings.”

“I don't get it.”

“I've got three of his works, two limited-edition prints and one original oil. They're all here in the house. J.D. likes them as much as I do.”

“I still don't get it.”

“All three of the paintings are of scenes in the Abacos.”

“She's in that house,” said Jock. “If we knew who sent you the e-mail about Marsh LLC we'd know a whole lot more.”

“None of this makes sense. Why would J.D. be in the Abacos and who the hell is she with?”

“And there's also customs to worry about,” said Jock. “If she landed in the Bahamas, she had to clear customs. There'll be a record.”

“Can you run that down?”

“Real quick,” he said as he opened his cell phone.

When he finished his conversation, he said, “Apparently they're real slow about getting information into computers at Bahamian customs. We might not get the information for several days.”

“If somebody took her there against her will, I doubt they're going to want to be anywhere near a customs officer.”

“What about going by boat? You've made that trip several times.”

“It'd be a pretty easy trip. You're supposed to stop at the first port of entry and clear Bahamian customs, but boats go there all the time without stopping. There're so many American boats in Bahamian waters during the summer that the Defense Force can't keep up with them.”

“It'd be a pretty long trip, wouldn't it?”

“Not that bad. If I were taking a big go-fast boat over, I'd leave from Lauderdale, stay north of Bimini into the Northwest Providence Channel, skirt the southern tip of Abaco, and come into the Abaco Sound at Pelican Harbour. That's only about fifteen miles from Marsh Harbour.”

“How long would the trip take?”

“It would depend on the seas. The distance is only about a hundred
seventy-five miles. If you average forty miles an hour, which those big cigarette-type boats can do without breaking a sweat, you'd make it in less than five hours with fuel to spare.”

“So, the cell call from J.D. came in at three fifteen from Fort Lauderdale. If they were leaving then, on good seas they'd be in Marsh Harbour before dark. Can you check to see what the weather was like on Sunday?”

“Sure,” I said.

I logged onto the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's website and looked at the weather conditions for the last couple of days. “Weather was good,” I said. “West winds five to ten miles per hour, seas less than two feet. It would probably have meant flat seas, and even if there was a little chop, with the west wind it would have been a following sea. Nothing for a big go-fast with a captain who knows what he's doing.”

The doorbell rang and I heard the front door open. “I smell coffee,” said Logan as he walked into the living room.

“In the kitchen,” I said. “Help yourself.”

“You know I never drink that noxious brew.”

“There's tomato juice in the fridge.”

He kept talking as he walked into the kitchen, poured a glass, and returned. “Did you guys miss me?”

“You been gone?” asked Jock.

“Docked in Tampa early this morning.”

“You got some sun,” Jock said.

“Yeah. All over, too. We had a balcony and just hung out there in the nude.”

“That is not an image I want to contemplate this early in the day,” I said.

“Eat your heart out,” said Logan. “I went to the Dolphin for breakfast and heard that J.D.'s missing. What's going on?”

Jock and I spent thirty minutes filling Logan in on everything that had happened since he left for his cruise. “You got any ideas?” I asked.

“Why don't we look at this as two or three different issues? The first is that Doc and J.D. disappear at about the same time on Monday. A pilot who flew occasionally for Doc is seen buying a cell phone in Sarasota early
that morning. Later you get a call from the same cell phone and it's J.D. And the pilot is nowhere to be found. You get an e-mail message from J.D. on Tuesday telling you to trust her. The same day you get an e-mail from an unknown someone in the Atlanta area telling you to look into Marsh LLC. It turns out that Marsh owns a house on an island in the Abacos. And the guy who is president of the corporation that owns Marsh LLC is dead, but it was a subsidiary of an engineering firm that Desmond now owns. Then you get another e-mail from J.D. that cryptically tells you she's somewhere in the Abacos. They probably didn't fly there because that would alert customs. But a fast boat could have taken them there without a lot of hassle. It sounds like J.D. and Doc may both be in Marsh Harbour.”

“Where's Telson, the pilot?” I asked.

“Doesn't matter. He may have flown Doc here to pick up J.D. and then on to the east coast. They took a boat from there. He's probably home in Atlanta.”

“Okay,” I said. “That's makes sense except for one thing.”

“What?” asked Logan.

“Why would Doc kidnap J.D.?”

“Maybe he didn't. Maybe she went willingly.”

“But why?”

“We'll just have to find that out.”

“Another thing bothering me,” said Jock, “is why J.D. went to the bank to cash that check.”

“Well,” said Logan, “we could assume she's dirty and that she's shacked up with Doc. But we all know that's not the case.”

“Alternative?” I asked.

“Maybe they just wanted to put some pressure on whoever set up the account in J.D.'s name. Let them know that J.D. was on to them.”

“How did she find out about the account in the first place if she wasn't part of it?”

“Another good question, Counselor. We find J.D., we find the answers.”

Jock said, “You only discussed one of the issues. Want to tackle the ones dealing with the dead kids of Thanatos team members? Or the attempts on Matt's life? Or Stanley's role in all this?”

“I'm going to have to think about those. Let me see the security video of J.D. cashing that check.”

I put the flash drive into a port in my computer and got the tape rolling. Logan watched it with growing interest, his eyes riveted to the monitor, his hand manipulating the mouse, varying the speed of the tape. He went through it twice and then paused it at a point where J.D. had turned to leave. He pointed to a man in the picture. “This guy seems to be pacing around the lobby during most of the tape. Do you know who he is?”

I peered more closely at the tape. The camera had caught J.D. just as she was passing by a man in a suit. They were right next to each other. She going toward the exit and the man was standing there, mouthing some words. “He's the bank president.”

“He must be pretty tall,” said Logan. “What? Six three or so?”

“No,” I said. “He's about my height, a little shorter maybe. Five ten or eleven.”

“Look closely. This guy towers over J.D. He's got at least six inches on her. She's what, five nine?”

My pulse quickened. “Yes. Damn. This woman's several inches shorter. But it's J.D. I got a full face shot of her at the teller's window.”

“Look again,” said Logan. He backed up the tape, slowing it as he hunted for a particular shot. He stopped it again. This time the picture was of a smiling J.D. talking to the teller.

“Look at the front tooth,” Logan said. He pulled the picture in tighter. “See anything?”

“I'll be damned,” I said. “There's a small chip in the right front tooth. J.D.'s teeth are perfect.”

“Look some more,” Logan said. “There's a lot you can do with makeup, but some things can't be changed. The width between the eyes, laugh lines, shape of chin. Have you got a picture of J.D.?”

“There're some on the computer. Go to my photo folder and you'll find them.”

I pointed Logan to the right place in the computer files. There were a number of photos of friends enjoying the slow lifestyle of the key. One had a full face shot of J.D. sitting with Logan and Marie on the beach at Egmont Key, her big smile brightening the day. He cropped the picture
and printed it. He then pulled up the security tape and held the printed picture of J.D. up to the monitor.

The pictures were very close, but there were subtle differences. On the security tape, the smile wasn't quite right, the curve of her cheek a little different, the eyebrows a tad thinner. “That's not J.D.,” I said. “Damn. How did we miss that?”

“At some level,” said Logan, “you and Jock were thinking J.D. had changed sides. The picture confirmed your worst fears. Even though your brains were telling you that she wasn't dirty, the evidence was pretty convincing at the subconscious level.”

“Why would somebody go to all the trouble to convince us that J.D. was the one cashing that check?”

“I don't know,” said Logan, “but it worked.”

I was feeling guilty for doubting her, and relief that my dark suspicions had been wrong. But she was still in trouble, still missing without explanation. I had to find her.

“We need to get to the Abacos,” I said. “J.D.'s been gone two days. That can't be good.”

“Does everybody agree that she's probably there?” asked Jock.

Logan and I nodded.

“We've still got Doc's plane,” I said.

Logan said, “If Doc is holding J.D. against her will, why would he allow you to use his plane?”

I hadn't really thought about that one. I picked up the phone and dialed Fred Cassidy's cell phone. When he answered, I said, “Are you in communication with Chaz Desmond?”

“No. I don't think anybody knows where he is.”

“Who authorized you and the plane to stick around to help us?”

“That'd be Paul Macomber and the company's lawyer, Harry Anderson.”

I hung up and called the offices of Desmond Engineering Consultants and asked to speak to Macomber. “I'm sorry, sir,” the receptionist said, “but he's in Charlotte today.”

“Then may I speak to Mr. Anderson.”

“He's out sick today.”

“Can you give me his home phone?”

“I'm sorry, sir, but it's against our policy to give out home numbers.”

“He's probably in the book,” I said. “Can you tell me what town he lives in?”

“No problem, sir. Decatur.”

“Decatur, huh? Thank you.”

I hung up, my pulse quickening. “There are a lot of suburbs around
Atlanta,” I said, “so was it just a coincidence that Anderson lived in the town whose library computer generated the e-mail alerting me to Marsh LLC?”

Jock looked at me. “There are no coincidences, not in a case like this one. There are only a few people who know Doc hired you to look into his son's murder. Anderson is one of them.”

He was using his fingers to tick off his points. “He lives in Decatur. He's Desmond's lawyer. He probably knows about Marsh LLC and the house in the Abacos. He's been a close friend of Doc's for many years. They've built a company together. He wouldn't do anything against Doc's interest unless he thought it was better for Doc if you knew about the house.”

“The answers are in Marsh Harbour,” I said. “Logan, you up for another trip to the islands?”

“Can I take my gun?”

“I think that'd be a good idea. I'll call Cassidy and let him know where we're going.”

I called Bill Lester as I was walking out the door. “Bill, Jock and I are on our way to the Bahamas. We have a lead on J.D.”

“Talk to me.”

“We think she's safe and hiding out with some friends near Marsh Harbour.”

“You think she's okay?”

“Yeah. She's with Doc Desmond.”

“Okay. Keep me posted. I've found out something else that is very odd.”

“What's up, Bill?”

“I followed up on the list of names you gave me. The Thanatos group. We know about Desmond, Brewster, and Fleming, but there were four more still alive. One of them owns a small garage in a town in North Dakota up by the Canadian border. His only son was shot to death a few months back. Another member of Team Charlie lives in Northern California. The sheriff there told me that there'd been no murders in the county in the last couple of years. I asked him if he knew the team member.
He did. Then he told me that the guy's daughter, an army officer, was murdered in Charlottesville, Virginia last month.”

“That pretty much seals it. Somebody is definitely targeting the children of the members of Team Charlie.”

“There's more,” the chief said. “The other two men and their families have disappeared.”