The 6th Target (19 page)

“We work at home,” Mrs. Ray said, answering my unasked question. “EBay.”

“Where is your husband now?” Conklin asked.

“Scotty and an FBI agent are driving around with Briana,” she told us. “My husband is hoping to God that he might see Charlie wandering out there, lost.

“Charlie must be
terrified
!” Eileen Ray cried out. “Oh, my God, what he must be going through! Who would take him?” she asked, her voice breaking. “
And why
?”

Conklin and I had no answers, but we lobbed questions at Mrs. Ray — about her movements, her relationship with her husband, and why the gate to the yard was open.

And we asked if anyone — family, friend, or stranger — had shown excessive or inappropriate attention to Charlie.

Nothing she told us lit up the board.

Eileen Ray was twisting a handkerchief in her hands when Scott Ray came home with the FBI agent and the nanny, a baby-faced young woman who was still in her teens.

Conklin and I split up, Conklin interviewing Scott in the child’s bedroom while I talked to Briana in the kitchen. Unlike the Westwood Registry’s European imports, Briana Kearny was a second-generation American, a local girl who lived three blocks away and looked after Charlie on a per-hour basis.

In other words, Briana was a babysitter.

Briana cried deep, heart-wrenching sobs as I pressed her, asking about her friendships, about her boyfriend, and if anyone had questioned her about the Rays and their habits.

Conklin and I finally closed our notebooks and said our good-byes, leaving the homey little cottage right as the electric candles in the windows came on.

“That girl had nothing to do with the child being snatched,” I said.

“I didn’t get anything bad off the husband, either,” my partner told me. “This feels like a ‘pedophile lures the kid into a van’ thing.”

“Yeah. It’s just too fricking easy to steal a child. Perv says, ‘Want to see my puppy?’ Kid toddles over. Perv drags the kid inside and takes off. No witness. No evidence. And now,” I said, “the long wait for a phone call . . . that never comes.”

SIX-YEAR-OLD CHARLIE RAY had been abducted more than seven hours before, and the kidnappers had not called his parents. The Rays, unlike the Tylers, were in a socio-economic bracket that wouldn’t normally indicate a kidnapping for ransom.

And that was a bad thing.

We sat in Captain Jimenez’s office while FBI agent David Stanford briefed us. Stanford was a blue-eyed man with a graying ponytail who’d been working undercover on another case before being pulled into this one.

I took a flyer from the stack on the captain’s desk, studied Charlie Ray’s perfectly round eyes, baby teeth, and short-cropped dark curls.

Would his body be found weeks or months from now in a dump, or in a shallow grave, or washed up on the beach after a storm?

When the meeting broke up, I called Macklin and filled him in. And then Agent Stanford gave me and Conklin a lift to the airport. As we took the freeway exit, Stanford suggested we stop for a drink at the Marriott LAX before our flight. He wanted to hear everything we knew about Madison Tyler and her abduction.

Speaking for myself, I was ready for a drink. Possibly two.

The Latitude 33 lounge had a full bar and restaurant. Over beer and peanuts, we discussed Madison, then Stanford told us about a hideous child-abduction case he’d worked months before.

A ten-year-old girl had been snatched off the street as she walked home from school. She’d been found twenty-four hours later, raped and strangled, left on the altar of a church, her hands folded as if in prayer. The killer still hadn’t been found.

“How often do these kidnappings end in a rescue?” I asked.

“The majority of the time, child abductions are done by family members. In those cases, the child is usually returned unharmed. When the kidnapper is a stranger, the recovery rate is about fifty-fifty.” Stanford’s voice was strained as he said, “Call it passion or maybe obsession, but I believe that the more child predators I can take down, the safer the world is for my three kids.”

“HOW ABOUT KEEPING ME COMPANY over dinner?” Stanford suggested.

Our waiter brought menus to the table, and as the eight o’clock flight to SFO had just departed without us, we took Stanford up on his offer.

The agent ordered a bottle of pinot grigio, and Conklin and I filled him in on what we knew about Paola Ricci’s abduction and murder.

“Honestly, we’re stuck,” I told Stanford. “Our dead ends are turning up even more dead ends. We’re in about the fifth generation of dead ends.”

Our steaks arrived, and Stanford ordered another bottle of wine. And for the first time that long day, I finally relaxed, glad for the company and the chance to brainstorm while listening to the country-and-western music floating in from the live band in the lounge.

I was also becoming aware of Conklin’s long legs next to mine under the table, his brown suede jacket brushing up against my arm, the now familiar cadence of his voice, and the wine slipping smoothly down my throat as the evening flowed into night.

At around 9:15, Dave Stanford picked up the tab, told us that he’d keep us posted after the Rays’ phone records were dumped and that he’d alert us of anything that could help us with the Ricci/Tyler case.

We’d missed another flight back to San Francisco, and as Rich and I said good-bye to Stanford, we prepared ourselves for an hour’s wait outside the United Airlines gate.

We were almost out the door when the band kicked up something from the Kenny Chesney collection, and the girl singer began exhorting the patrons into a line dance.

The bar crowd was made up of smashed young road warriors and airline personnel, and they started getting into the dance — a new spin on the Electric Slide.

Rich smiled and said, “You wanna get stupid out there?” and I grinned back, saying, “Sure. Why the heck not?”

I followed Rich’s lead onto the dance floor and into a good time, hustling to the music, bumping into giddy strangers, and best of all laughing.

It had been a while since I’d doubled over with belly laughs, and it felt great.

When the song ended, the crooner unhooked the mic from the stand, licked her lips, and sang along with the guy at the electric piano as he played “Lyin’ Eyes.”

Couples paired up. When Rich stretched out his arms, I stepped in close. My God, my God, it felt so good to have Richie Conklin’s arms around me.

The room was spinning a little, so I closed my eyes and held on to him, the space between us closing because there was just no room to move on that little dance floor. I even stretched up onto my toes to rest my head on his shoulder — and he gripped me more tightly.

When the music stopped, Rich said, “Man, I really don’t want to go to the airport, do you?”

I remember saying that a case could be made that at that late hour, after the long workday and, by the way, having drunk a whole lot of wine, we had several bona fide, expense-reportable reasons to spend the night in LA.

Still, I was torn as I handed my credit card to the desk clerk at the Marriott LAX, telling myself this didn’t mean a thing. I wasn’t going to do anything but go to my room and sleep.
That was all
.

Rich and I stood at opposite sides of the elevator, a weary couple between us, as the mirrored car climbed ten silent flights. I hated to admit it, but I missed being in his arms.

When we stepped out of the elevator, I said, “Good night, Rich.” Then I turned my back on him as I slipped the key card into the slot, aware that he was now doing the same in a door across the hall.

“See you in the morning, Lindsay.”

“Sure thing. Sleep tight, Richie.”

The tiny green light went on, and the door handle opened under my hand.

I CLOSED AND BOLTED THE DOOR to my room, my mind reeling with longing and desire, relief and regret. I stripped off my clothes, and a minute later, the blood was pounding in my temples as I stood under the hot spray of the shower.

Clean and glowing pink, I buffed my body with warm terry-cloth towels and blew my hair dry. I toweled the steam off the mirror over the sink and assessed my naked self. I still looked young and good and desirable. My breasts were firm, my tummy flat, and my sandy blond hair cascaded in waves to below my shoulders.

Why hadn’t Joe called me?

I wrapped myself in a white hotel robe, went to the bedroom, checked the empty voice mail on my cell phone, much like my stubborn answering machine at home.

It had been six days since I’d seen Joe.

Was it really, truly over between us?

Would I never see him again? Why hadn’t he come after me?

I pulled the drapes shut, folded the gold-quilted spread, and fluffed the pillows. Dizzy from the wine and the heat of the shower, I lay down.

Eyes closed, I found that the fading images of Joe were replaced by more urgent fantasies.

I was drawn back to only a half hour earlier, when Rich had held me. I relived the moment when dancing with him had gone from good to
too
good, when I’d felt him hard against me, when I’d put my arms around his neck and pressed my body against his.

It was okay to have these feelings, I told myself. I was only human, and so was he, and both of us were having a completely natural response to being alone together — .

A tapping at the door startled me.

My heart jumped as the knock came again.

I CINCHED THE SASH OF MY ROBE and padded barefoot to the door. I saw Rich Conklin through the peephole.
He was wearing a flimsy clear-plastic shower cap on his head
!

I was laughing as I undid the bolt, my hand shaking as I pulled open the door. Conklin was wearing his trousers, his blue cotton shirt unbuttoned to about his third rib. And he was gripping a Marriott toothbrush with the stem in his fist, like it was a small white flag.

“I was wondering if you have any mouthwash, Lindsay. I got a lot of moisturizer in the complimentary toiletry basket, but no mouthwash.”

His serious expression, combined with the wacky request and the shower cap, cracked me up. I swung the door open wide, said, “I didn’t get mouthwash either, but I think I have something in my handbag.”

The door closed behind me, and as I stooped for the handbag I’d dropped on the floor, I stumbled over one of my shoes.

Rich grabbed my elbow to steady me,
and there we were
. Eye-to-eye. Woozy. Alone in LA in a hotel room. I reached up and pulled off the shower cap. His forelock of light-brown hair fell across his gorgeous face, and he dropped the toothbrush onto the floor. Then Rich put both arms around my waist and pulled me to him.

“I have only one problem with this working arrangement,” he said. “And it’s a
big
one.”

Rich bent to kiss me, and I wanted him to. My arms went around his neck again, and his mouth found mine. Our first kiss set off a chemical explosion.

I clung to Rich as he lowered me to the bed in the dimly lit room. I remember lying beneath him, our fingers interlaced, his hands pressing my hands against the bed, saying my name softly, oh so gently.

“I’ve wanted to be with you like this, Lindsay, before you even knew my name.”

“I’ve always known your name.”

I
ached
for him, and I had a right to give myself over to this. But when my young, handsome
partner
opened my robe and put his lips to my breast, a bolt of pure reasoned panic pulled the emergency brake in my brain.

This had been a bad idea.
Really
bad.

I heard myself whisper, “
Richie, no
.”

I clasped the edges of my robe together as Rich rolled onto his side, panting and flushed, looking into my eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“No, don’t be.” I took his hand and held it to my cheek, covered his hand with mine. “I want this as much as you do. But we’re partners, Rich. We have to take care of each other. Just . . .
not in this way
.”

He groaned as I said, “We can never do this again.”

I DROPPED THE KNOCKER ON THE DOOR of the Westwood Registry that sunless morning after our return from LA. Conklin stood beside me as a round-faced man cracked the door open. He was in his fifties, with blond-going-gray hair and clear gray eyes that peered at me through frameless lenses perched over a sharp beak of a nose.

Did he have something to do with Madison Tyler’s abduction?

Did he know where she was?

I showed him my badge, introduced my partner and myself.

“Yes, I’m Paul Renfrew,” said the man at the door. “You’re the detectives who were here a few days ago?”

I told him that we were, that we had some questions about Paola Ricci.

Renfrew invited us inside, and we followed the natty man down the narrow hallway, through the green door that had been padlocked when we’d last seen it.

“Please. Please sit,” Renfrew said, so Conklin and I each sat on one of the small sofas at right angles in a corner of the cozy office as Renfrew pulled up a chair.

“I suppose you want to know where I was when Paola was abducted,” Renfrew said to us.

“That’d be a start,” Conklin said. He looked tired. I suppose we both did.

Renfrew took a narrow notebook from his breast pocket, a thin daybook of the type that preceded handheld computers. Without prompting, he gave us a short verbal report of his meetings north of San Francisco in the days before, during, and after Paola’s death, along with the names of the potential clients he’d met with.

“I can make you a photocopy of this,” he offered. On a one-to-ten scale, ten being a three-alarm fire, the gauge in my gut was calling out a seven. Renfrew seemed too prepared and well rehearsed.

I accepted Renfrew’s photocopy of his schedule and asked him about his wife’s whereabouts during the same period.