Pursuit (38 page)

“So you discover the vehicle in your drive ten years later. Were you surprised?” Todd asked.

“No, we didn't find it in our driveway. We moved from that house a number of years ago. The police called us after they ran the whatchamacallit.”

“The VIN number, vehicle ID,” Julie said. “Did you, all those years ago, remember having left the car running like they found it?”

The couple looked at each other and answered in unison, “Yes.”

Todd and Julie drifted back into the garage to look at the Bronco one last time as the couple signed papers and affidavits in reference to their vehicle.

“Sarge, shall we pack up and head on out?”

“Yeah, Devlin. We're done.”

They paid their respects to Spencer and left.

Julie took the passenger seat, barking instructions on getting to the freeway. “We're looking for 244 East, which hooks us into—stop, hold it.”

“What? What's up?”

“Pull up here. On the other side of the Greyhound.”

“What are you thinking? He took the bus back to Missouri?”

“Yup. Maybe our abductor took the big dog back to Kansas City, Springfield, Saint Louie, wherever. You think our friend back at the station house would check the
cab records from Broken Arrow to Tulsa on the night or morning in question? I don't know if city buses would be running at that hour. Check on it and meet you back here in a half hour.”

Julie got out and darted into the Greyhound station. Her brief look at the overhead schedule proved bewildering, so she confirmed comings and goings with the clerk at the ticket counter. A cab ride would have taken a half hour at the most, plenty of time to connect to a nine thirty Thursday-morning sleeper coach that left Tulsa for Saint Louis, stopping at Joplin and Springfield, and arriving in Saint Louis at seven that night.

Todd's news wasn't as good.

“The guy at the police station says that late at night most of the cabbies are independents and tend not to keep decent records. What did you get?”

“I had to do a little dipping and dodging, but after several lies, the station manager dug out his records on the Thursday morning Greyhound to Saint Louis. Halfway down the list, a tote bag checked to a certain Mr. B. Caldwell.”

Todd pounded the steering wheel. “Holy shit, we got him! Well, no, we don't got him. But it sure locks up some loose ends. You think we should hang around, see if we get a description from the cabdriver?”

“I think all we get is another cap-and-glasses guy, like my half-assed description after the F-150 screwup. Let's head on home and kick it around some. We can ask the FBI to go ahead, to find and interview all the cabbies.” Julie curled up in the vinyl-covered seat. “Wake me when you need me to drive; I'm gonna catch some Zs.”

Julie thought about her recent proximity to her daughter's abductor. Her eyelids began their heavy descent as
Todd swerved right, cursing an errant driver. “What? What is it? Todd?”

“Nothing. Go to sleep. Sorry.”

She rubbed her head where it thumped into the passenger-side window. “No, Mario Andretti, you just woke me up. Jesus, where are we, the Indy 500?”

“Sorry again.”

“Do you have the old Everett address?”

“Nah, should I?”

“The dude who showed us the car—what's his name? Spencer? Give him a call and ask for the address.”

Todd navigated the downtown Tulsa streets and juggled his cell.

She heard Todd thank someone and then get off the phone. “193rd Avenue. About four miles from where we are now. Are we interviewing these folks again?”

Julie stared out the side window. “No, I'm just thinking.” She pulled out a map for Broken Arrow. “Get us over here.” She pointed to a specific spot. “Okay?”

Todd worked his jaw like he wanted to disagree.

“What?”

“It will be nice when you join the twenty-first century, Sergeant Worth, and use MapQuest or GPS.”

“Yeah, yeah. You know I know how to use it. Right now, I prefer this.” She waved the multifolded paper street map at Todd's face. “Now, Mr. Devlin. If you would, please get us on a straight line, back between the Everetts' old place and the turnpike. I figure if our perp had been coming from Missouri, the obvious way would be the turnpike”—she pointed to the exit on the map—“and a straight line to the Everett house.” She scanned the shops and businesses on both sides of the road.

Soon after a four-way stop, she noticed a do-it-yourself car wash. “Pull in over there, will you, Todd-O?”

“What's up? Restroom? Sandwich?”

“Nah, I just got this nutty idea.”

“You want to get the car washed—do it together like a couple of newlyweds.” He forced a laugh.

“Humor me, will you?” Julie walked around the four-stall car wash.

A woman carrying an infant in a belly pack washed an old VW beetle.

“Hi, ma'am. Do you know if the owner is around?”

The woman pulled the soapy brush away from her vehicle. “Nope. Never seen anyone around who looks like they know what they're doing.”

“What's up? You mind telling me?” Todd drove forward without getting out.

Hands on hips, Julie continued to survey the concreted area. The four covered wash stalls were located in the very center of the square. A fenced area in the far corner of the square housed a large garbage Dumpster. “I'm going to take a look around, see what's up.”

“What are you thinking?”

“I think our guy might have taken one last swipe at cleaning that Bronco, and since this place is on the way to where he left it, maybe he threw out trash, emptied ashtrays, vacuumed mats. I don't know. Just a hunch. It's the closest do-it-yourself car wash to the Everetts' house, and it's a straight line to the turnpike.” Julie walked toward the fenced off garbage bin. “Wanna help?”

“Yeah, sure. I thought maybe I'd get us snacks for the trip home. There's a 7-Eleven right across the street. Back in a jiffy.”

Julie laughed to herself as Todd bounced out of the driveway and cut across traffic to the convenience store.

The gate to the metal garbage receptacle was padlocked, and the chain-link fence looked formidable. On the right side of the gate, outside the enclosure and next to an alley, sat a fifty-gallon drum of detergent up against the backside of the fence. Julie climbed on top of the four-foot-tall drum and stepped easily across the wire fence onto the lid of the large Dumpster. The opposite lid had a convenient handle and opened easily to rest on the alley-side fence. She looked inside and saw the bottom of the metal Dumpster covered sparsely with trash.
Lucky for me it isn't full,
she thought. Someone had cleaned out the two small wastebaskets next to the vacuum areas and probably deposited it in the metal bin. Maybe with providence on her side, some of it might be from Mr. Yahoo's Bronco. Julie eased her way down into the shoulder-high receptacle. She kicked her way through nearly a third of the waste material before she heard Todd.

“You there! What's you doing in my garbage bin?”

Julie's head bobbed up and down. “Fuck off, Mr. Garbage Owner. What did you buy?”

“Oh, bunch of Cokes, cookies, crunchy goodies. Is there room for two in that tiny abode?”

“Yeah, sure.
Mi casa es su casa
.” She nudged a milk carton with her foot. “Nah, I'm almost done. Not much here. I'll just be a couple more minutes.” Julie continued her search for she knew not what. Most of the debris turned out to be paper towels provided at the vacuum unit, newspapers, chewing gum wrappers, McDonald's Happy Meal bags, and dry pizza crusts. She looked for a date on one of the newspapers—from two days earlier. She toed through the last pile of crap when her heel caught on a roll of paper
towels. Stepping on the almost fully used roll, she looked down and noticed “Bounty” printed in small letters on the edge of the paper towels. She picked it up and turned it, looking down both ends of the stiff cardboard tubing. A crumpled piece of paper fell to the metal floor. Opening it, she saw it was a grocery receipt. The faded store name and underneath that, “Miller County.” It could have come from anyone's car; however, she thought it was worth checking out. She'd need a magnifying glass at least and probably an FBI lab report to make it work, but at least it was a lead.

She slipped the paper into the breast pocket of her jacket and levered herself up waist high on the downside of the bin. Todd had just started to climb the fifty-gallon drum.

“No pizza crust for you, partner. The treasure hunt is over.” She had never lied to Todd about anything really serious, but she wanted to keep this little item to herself, at least for now.

W
hat's up, sweets,
did you have a good weekend?” Julie had arrived home Sunday only a few hours before Bart dropped off Cheryl. As soon as her daughter came through the door, Julie knew something was cooking.

“Oh yeah, great. Concert was super, nice room at the Branson Palace, and a nonstop monologue of complaints from Maisie Belle.”

“Who's that?”

Cheryl tugged off her jacket and wrapped it carefully over her arm as if in imitation of someone. Then she struck a model's pose.

“My name is Miss Maisie. But you can call me Amazing if it so pleases you. Ta-ta.”

She started up the stairs.

“Is this your father's latest?”

“Latest and lastest, if you please. I have a disarmingly throbbing cranial brow. Or headache, as the hoi polloi describe it. So if you see Master Worth, please tell him I'm indisposed.”

Cheryl's renewed sense of humor comforted Julie, but
still she felt conflicted, for it also came out of a strange weekend.

“Do men really like big knockers, Mom?” Cheryl called out from the top of the stairs. Julie smiled, but her thoughts went back to the receipt she'd retrieved from the car wash. She'd had a chance to examine it more carefully once she got back home. A partial name and “Rt. 52 Miller County” as an address.

The store name appeared to have three or four letters. A couple of the lowercased letters were discernible. “Aags” didn't make sense. Could be “Bags,” but too cute for a grocery store. “Cags”? “Dags”? Possible, but didn't light any candles. She had a quick laugh when she got to
F
.
G
wouldn't work for a food emporium.
H
probably described some of their customers. “Mags” could be a possibility;
N
could describe the owner's wife. Julie searched the hard-copy yellow pages and Googled food-related Miller County stores for any similar names but came up blank.

She checked with Captain Walker the next day before hightailing it to Miller County. Todd hadn't fared well after the Tulsa trip, sidelined with the flu and strep throat. She would canvass the area and ask around on her own. The incorporated area took in part of Lake of the Ozarks, which spread out over several hundred square miles. Miller County bordered only a small portion of that, but it was still a lot of road to cover.

Julie started in the middle of the county and worked outward. Tuscumbia was listed as the county seat. After numerous inquiries at stores and gas stations, most of them leading to comments about the weather, an older gentleman sitting on a John Deere tractor just off the bridge over the Osage River seemed affable and, as it turned out, helpful.

“Margaret's. But everyone knows it as Mag's. Back on 52, the way you just came from, right there at the corner of 52 and County Road A, as in Adam. Right smart day, ain't it?”

She thanked the gentleman and agreed for the umpteenth time that yes, it was “right smart.” Margaret's. No wonder she couldn't find it online. Mag's turned out to be pretty much as she pictured it. A frame stand-alone building with the obligatory wood-rail-enclosed porch and the rusty tin Mail Pouch chewing tobacco sign left of the front door. The fellow inside greeted her with a “Howdy” and a “What can I do you for?”

Julie introduced herself and took the plastic-encased receipt from her pocket, showing it to the down-home gentleman. “Could you tell me whether or not this is a receipt from your store?”

He pulled his steel-rimmed eyeglasses from his forehead and held them several inches from his eyes, squinting at the receipt. “Sure looks like one of ours. Named the place after my wife, Margaret, but she really goes by Mag.” He moved over to the cash register and punched in one of the keys. “Would maybe be better for your evidence if you had a purchase on this here
re
-ceipt.”

Julie picked up a pack of gum from the display and shoved it across the linoleum counter.

“Sure enough, ma'am, that's ours. Do we win anything? Is it like a lottery?” He grinned expectantly and then deflated. “Ah, ma'am, I was just funning with you. Didn't mean nothin'. I sit in this smelly room near to twelve hour a day. You'll have to excuse me.”