Rod (5 page)

I look through the crowd of people and
bypass the officers.
 
Surely, he doesn’t
want me herding his most important people like cattle.

“You, you, you, and you, come with me,” I
say, motioning to Arnold Coulter, Ken Clayton, Jason Maple, and Alexandra
Tulane.

“Rodney,” I introduce myself.
 
Listening to previous chatter, I already know
that these four know this township and most of its people like the backs of
their hands.

They go one by one telling me their
names.
 
I form a plan of attack before
they’re done sounding off.

“Let’s get to the school and start
there.
 
It’s still early, so maybe
someone has seen something,” I dictate.
 
I walk over to Ronan and reiterate my words.
 
He nods as if to say thank you and tells me
that Sasha is a student at Hinton Heights Junior High school.
 

“Alright, let’s get
outta
here.
 
We’re going to the junior high
school over in Hinton Heights,” I tell my little posse.
 

Trish sits on her bike as we gear up to
leave the vicinity of the Lair.
 
I walk
over to her and lay a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

“We’re going to find your sister,” I tell
her.
 

She looks up at me and says, “Thanks for
trying to get him to let me help.”

“Anytime, but I get his point.
 
Besides, it was official club business.
 
You probably shouldn’t have been there,” I
say trying to soften the blow, but that surprisingly brings a pouty smile to
her face.

“I confronted my father just like you
said,” she tells me with a shit-eating grin on her face.
 
I could kiss her.
 
She’s so fucking cute.

“You did? What did he say?”

“He made me a prospect.”

“Very fucking nice,” I tell her.

“Thanks again for trying, though.
 
I really want to get out there and help with
the search.”

“Sorry sweetheart, but I tried,” I
explain.

She smiles as she revs up her bike and
speeds off until she’s a blur.
 
I want so
much to be part of her little world.

My mind once again focuses on the task at
hand.
 
Me and my group of four musketeers
hit the streets on our bikes and zoom away leaving the club in our rearview.

The school is in our view within twenty
minutes.
 
It’s an older brick building
and I can tell that it has seen better days.
 
I survey the area.
 
Ronan texts me
his most recent picture of Sasha; I share it with the group.
 

“I don’t know what she was wearing when
she was taken, but this is what she looks like for those of us who haven’t met
Sasha Fitzgerald,” I tell them.
 
They all
look at their phones intently and I surmise that Ronan has kept his younger
daughter hidden away from his day time activities.
 

We park our motorcycles in a row in front
of the school as we hop off and begin looking for clues.
 
I task Arnold with talking to any school
officials left behind.

“Maybe the secretary knows something?” I
pose the question adding, “I don’t understand why the school didn’t call Ronan
or Missy when they took attendance this morning.
 
Find out whatever you can.”

“Yes, sir,” he tells me, despite being
more than twice my age.
 
He’s an older
guy who looks like everyone’s happy grandfather.
 

Arnold disappears inside the school and I
turn my attention to Alexandra.
 

“You know where Missy lives, right?” I ask
her.

She stops chewing her gum long enough to
respond.
 
“Yep, I sure do.”

“Why don’t you go there and retrace the
path from there to here.
 
Maybe something
will give us a lead.”

“You got it, boss,” she says and I dismiss
her.
 
I don’t care if it’s sarcasm I
detect in her voice, we’re all here to fulfill a purpose.
 
We need to find Sasha Fitzgerald before
anything bad can happen to her.
 

Jason stands there without a purpose.
 
He’s a smart techie guy from what the other
members say.
 

“What’s your take on all of this, tech
genius?” I ask him.

“Let me get my laptop,” he suggests in an
unfamiliar accent.

“You’re not from around here, are
ya
?” I ask.

“No, I’m from Ohio,” he says.

Aside from speaking straight-laced, his
mannerisms say that he belongs in suburbia with a minivan and a handful of
kids.
 
He looks the part of a suit and
tie wearing business man.

He walks his lanky ass back to his bike
and fishes out a laptop from one of the black saddlebags on his bike.
 
He walks back over and sits down on the steps
of the school’s entrance.
 
I sit next to
him and he demonstrates his computer savvy nature.

I glance down at his fingers and they move
at the speed of light.
 
It’s clear that
this kid knows what he’s doing.

“Alright, what I would do is start from
the zip code here and work out in a twenty mile radius,” he says.
 
He types “40370” in the search box and a red
circular area appears on the screen.
 
His
fingers trace the circular radius on the map.
 
He says, “This area right here.”

“What are we looking for in this
particular radius?” I ask, staring at the screen.

“Prior records of kidnappers, sexual
predators,
dirtbags
like that,” he says, punctuating
the final word with a tap of the enter button.
 
A series of blue dots scatter across the screen.

His fingers move maniacally and before I
can ask what he’s doing, he’s got an entire list of names and addresses of
offenders.
 

“My guess is that if they’ve done
something horrendous in the past, chances are, they will do it again – and that
includes kidnapping.”

“Good guess,” I say, scanning the list of
names.
 
“If you have a USB drive, you
could take the list into the school and I’m sure they’ll let you print it out.”

He says proudly, “I don’t leave home
without one.”

He sticks the drive into the side of the
laptop and types rapidly.
 
I can see his
best use on display.
 
He holds up the USB
drive to show it off, smiles and disappears inside of the school.

Ken Clayton remains perched on top of his
bike, despite the rest of us moving around trying to fill in the blanks.
 
He has a certain stench surrounding him of
which I hadn’t previously taken notice.
 
His hair is slicked back and greasy looking.
 
He’s overweight and rather unkempt.

“What d’
ya
want
me
ta
do?” He says in a raspy southern drawl.
 

“When Jason gets back, we’re all going to take
those lists and check out each of those houses,” I tell him as I look for an
excuse to keep my distance.
 
He appears
content not to receive a task.

Ten minutes pass and Arnold and Jason both
emerge from the school.

Arnold says, “The regular attendance lady
wasn’t there today, so there was a sub filling in.
 
Apparently, no one told this nimrod that
parents need to be phoned when their children are absent from school.
 
So this is a dead end for the time
being.
 
That is, unless we can talk to
some of Sasha’s friends.”

“Good work, man,” I tell him.
 
We both look to Jason for his findings.

He hands me five sheets of paper with
names, addresses, crimes of which they were convicted and phone numbers on it
all in a neat spreadsheet.
 
This kid is
good.

“These are the names and information
belonging to Hinton’s worst people within a twenty mile radius of Missy’s
place,” he shares.

“Alright,” I tell all of them.
 
“We’re going to fan out and talk to these
people and see if anything comes up.
 
There are enough names on these lists to keep us busy for an hour, so
let’s meet back up here at the school when we’re all done.”

I pass one of the papers to Ken and tell
him to visit each one and ask if they’ve seen anything unusual or know anything
about a missing twelve-year-old girl.
 
He
speeds off any my nostrils thank me.

Alexandra pulls up on her bike and we
apprise her of the current situation.
 
I
hand her another of the sheets of paper and she speeds off to investigate.
 

“Give me the kidnappers,” Jason
pleads.
 
I ruffle through the papers and
realize that their crimes are in alphabetical order.
 
I extend my hand to him with the paper
including the kidnappers and he grins.

“What?” He asks as I look at him intently.

“Nothing, man,” I tell him.
 
He gently places his laptop in his saddlebag
and climbs on bike.
 
Speeding away, I
wonder his IQ.

“Arnold, you can take this one,” I say,
passing a paper to him.
 
Smoke billows
from his mouth as he puffs a newly lit cigarette.
 

“Thanks, chief,” he says.
 
“If you don’t mind, I’ll finish this first.”

“Of course, take your time.”

I climb onto my black Harley and speed
off, eying the address on the paper that’s closest to the school.
 
Once there, I park my hog out front and walk
onto the sidewalk and to the porch.
 
The
light blue house is in serious disrepair and I take note of a growl emanating
from the back yard.
 

I knock several times and finally hear a
woman yelling, “I’m
comin
’; keep your pants on!”

I take a step back so she doesn’t swing
the battered front door into my face.
 

An older woman appears before me and
clearly she wasn’t expecting company.
 

“Yes?”
 
she
asks, her hair in pink curlers and she’s
clad in a dirty looking blue robe.

“I’m looking for Mitch Mayhew,” I tell
her.

“I’m Mitch’s mother, can I help you?”

“Not exactly; I need to talk to him
directly.”

“You should probably check out Blythe
Prison, he’s been there for five years.”

I take out a pen and scribble the prison
note next to his name.
 
She looks me up
and down and says, “Maybe you’d like to come in sweetheart?”

“Umm, no, thank you,” I tell her, trying
to get out of there as quickly as humanly possible.

She slams the door.
 

I shove the list back in my pocket and
speed off to a house three streets away.
 
This particular house has freshly cut grass, a wooden windmill out front
and all of the trimmings of a properly kept yard.
 
I look back at the list.
 
Ronald Payton was imprisoned for check
fraud.
 

After parking my bike out front, I walk up
to the porch and ring the doorbell.
 
I am
curious how such different houses can exists within a short radius of one
another, but I focus when a man in a suit answers the door.

“Yes, may I help you?” he asks.

“Yeah, I need to speak to Ronald Payton,”
I say.

“I’m Ronald Payton,” he says,
straightening his long silver tie.

He steps onto the porch and shuts the door
behind him, seemingly fearful that someone inside will overhear our
conversation.

“Rodney Vinton,” I tell him.
 
“I’m canvassing the area looking for a
missing twelve-year-old girl.
 
Her name
is Sasha Fitzgerald.”

Seemingly relieved, he says, “Do you have
a picture of her?”

I fish my cell phone from my pocket and
pull up the picture of Sasha that Ronan shared with me earlier at the club.

I show my phone to Ronald and he says,
“I’ve actually seen this girl around here.
 
My son has a paper route and we do the rounds early each morning.
 
I’ve seen her walking to the junior high, I
believe.”

“Did you see her earlier today?”

“No, I’m afraid not.”