Who Glares Wins (Lexi Graves Mysteries) (10 page)

Even if Marissa w
ere
n't using her phone, she might have made calls prior to her disappearance. I tapped her cell phone number into my phone and called. It went straight to voicemail, an automated recording inviting me to leave a message. I left my name and phone number and asked her to call me back
,
just in case
she was accessing her messages
,
but didn’t want to talk to Elisabeth, for whatever reason.

After t
hat
,
I closed the files, ignor
ing
Solomon's case, locked them in my desk drawer
,
and put on a movie, ready to settle in for the evening.

Five minutes later,
I woke to a bright and clear morning, by falling off the sofa and
doing a
face
plant
onto the rug. I groaned, raised my head and had the fleeting thought that I was so glad I lived alone. There was no one to witness my humiliation.
However,
if Maddox
had been
here, I wouldn't have fallen asleep on the sofa. I would
have
be
en
in bed, and if I w
ere
unfortunate enough to be awake at this
hour
, I would be doing something energetic with Maddox.

It was ideal weather for our park date.
As the sun streamed through the window,
I lay flat on the floor
,
gasping for breath at the thought of living with Maddox. It wasn’t exactly a topic that had come up
.
Did I even want to live with him?
Raising myself from the floor, I shook the thought off like a dog
shakes
after a
good
roll in a puddle.

I couldn’t think about stuff like that. Stuff like that was too much pressure for a young relationship.
First things first, I had a hot date with Scotty Sibowitz
at the impound lot,
and the only thing energetic I need
ed
was
to
have a shower, get dressed
,
and make coffee. I
rose
to my feet, switched off the TV
,
and got to it.

An hour later, I pulled up to the gates. The impound lot was nothing more than a crusty
-
looking parking lot off a back street of Frederickstown, surrounded on all sides by seven
-
f
oo
t
-high,
chain
-
link
fencing
,
topped by barbed wire. All kinds of cars, from
sleek
,
new Mercedes to crappy
,
old
Fords
were parked in neat rows, waiting to be collected by their careless owners
,
or
, (perish the thought!)
go to the crushers. Every car that was impounded in Montgomery came here, from thefts to parking violations and accidents
;
it was a splendid to sad array of wealth and bad parking
choices
.

"Hi, I'm here for Sco
tty," I told the bearded man who approached
the gate.

"I'm Scot
ty. You Jord's sister?
" he asked, wiping his oil
-
stained hands on his dark blue overalls.

"Lexi Graves," I confirmed, reaching to shake his hand,
and
simultaneously palming him twenty bucks. Apparently
,
that was the going rate for
snooping
because Scotty just nodded as he gave the gate a tug
and pulled it wide open
.

"Pull the car inside," Scotty told me
as he stepped backwards
. "Or it'll get impounded."

"That would be ironic." Back in the car
,
I wiped my hands on a tissue and put the car into drive, pulling through t
he gates to park just inside and at an angle so nobody would mark it for abandoned.
Scotty locked up behind me
and I looked around as I stepped out
.
I needn’t have worried. It
appeared
he was alone.
"So, I'm looking for a car that belongs to Marissa Widmore. It was brought in twelve days ago." I gave Scotty the description and waited while he ducked inside the small office and came out
,
dangling a set of keys in his hand.

"We don't normally have keys," he told me as I followed him around a car with its front
-
end crumpled in. "But these were in the ignition."

"Was it stolen?" I asked.

"Dunno. Maybe. Normally
,
stolen cars look like that." Scotty gestured to a blackened car
s
itting
on its rims
, its paint scorched beyond recognition
, as we passed by
. "Thieves don't like to leave fingerprints when they're done."

"Figures," I said as we came to a halt in front of Marissa's Honda. "Why was this car brought in?"

"It was dumped on
Fenway Plaza
. Traffic cops noticed it hadn't moved in a couple of days and the keys were still there
,
so they called us to collect. I didn't pick it up though
,
so that’s all I can tell you
.
The owner got notified
,
but she hasn’t
come by
yet.
"

"Can I look inside?"

"Knock yourself out," Scotty said,
tossing
me the keys. "But I gotta warn you, don't take anything. We inventory the contents
of
every car
when it
comes in just so the owners can't say we stole nothin'."

"I won't take anything," I promised.

"Lock up when you're done. I'll be in the booth."

"Thanks." I wouldn't have taken anything, but I figured the inventory was a good idea. I beeped Marissa's car open, pulled on my soft leather gloves and climbed into the driver's seat.

I opened the glove compartment first. Inside w
ere
a couple of pens, a small notepad,
cheap
sunglasses
,
but no case, a couple of CDs
,
which I opened and closed, and a pack of mints. I checked the
sun-visors
,
but
found
nothing. In the driver's door pocket was
a local map book and a state one, both of which I flipped through
,
but there weren't any turned corners
,
sticky notes or inked messages. So far, everything seemed standard.

I checked the backseat and floor
,
and both were tidy. I popped the trunk and climbed out to take a look. There was a small medical kit, a wrench and a flashlight. I made a mental note to check what was in my trunk as I shut it
, noting that Marissa was more prepared than I for a breakdown or accident
. I
got back into the driver's seat. I made note
s
of everything I found and where,
scribbling down that
there wasn't any obvious damage inside the car or
any
signs of a struggle
. T
hen
I
locked up and walked back through the lot to the office.
As I passed the rows of cars, I examined the key ring. There was a silver fob with the letter M printed on it—for Marissa, I guessed—and three keys. One
belonged to
the car. The others looked like door locks. Maybe her apartment.

"Can I check
your inventory?" I asked Scotty as I returned the keys.

"Sure," he said
, reaching
for a clipboard
that
hung above the desk. The room smelled of
fries,
cigarettes
and sweat,
which were
not altogether appeali
ng
,
so I hung out in the doorway while
Scotty
pulled open the middle drawer of a rust
y
filing cabinet. He
found the form and I checked it against my notes. Everything matched up.

I pulled a business card out of my wallet and passed it to him. "Please
,
can you give me a call if Marissa turns up
? O
r if anyone else
comes for
the car?"

"No problem," he said, tucking the card into his overalls. "What's this about anyway?"

"Nothing interesting," I told him. "Just checking up on the owner of the car."

"She do something bad?"

"Nope," I said. "It's just routine stuff."

Scotty
followed me to the car,
opening
the gates
,
and
wait
ed
while I backed out. The further I drove away, the
more
worried
I felt
,
but I couldn't put a finger on why. Maybe Marissa had just decided to change her life completely
. B
ut
if so,
why would she leave her car on the street? Wouldn't she use it to drive away
in
or
at least
sell it?
Without her keys, she clearly hadn’t planned on returning home.
It was puzzling.

On my way home, I
stopped
at the grocery store and
purchased
several microwave meals, a couple frozen pizzas, milk, cereal and fruit. I wasn't sure what to expect from next week
,
given my undercover status,
and
I figured it was better to be safe
than sorry in the food department. If nothing else, I could have a hot meal
with
in four minutes every evening.

By the time I got back, I had just enough time to take shower number two
. I wanted
to lose the lingering cigarette smell, blow out my hair and pull on my nice jeans and a light sweater
. I
buzz
ed
Maddox in just as I unearthed my
red
Converse sneakers from the bottom of my closet.

As he walked up the stairs, I hopped into the living room, one shoe on,
the other
not quite on, and transferred my notes to the file
, before
relocking
the drawer
. I
remov
ed
a balled
-
up sock from my too-
tight shoe,
with
my mind still on Marissa. It wasn't the contents of the car that bothe
red me—my c
ar was pretty much the same,
minus flashlight and wrench—but
why did
Marissa
leave
her keys in her car,
with
no
other
visible means of transport and
just
vanish
?

Again, I latched onto the inconvenience of leaving town without a vehicle.
A car was comfortable,
practical
and a lot nicer that being crammed onto a bus. If she'd left the car at a train station or airport, I could understand, but not
on the street
with its keys
still
in the ignition. Montgomery didn't have an outrageously high car theft rate, but
most
thieves were opportunistic.
Plus, with twelve days between then and now,
there was
ample opportunity
for her
to retrieve it.

There were no signs of damage or of a fight
in the vehicle
, so I had to assume that Marissa had either gone willingly with someone else, who
must’ve
had a car nearby or, worse, she was snatched from the
street.
I needed to
get a look at some
camera footage,
if any existed
.
T
hat would be
most
useful
,
but I suspected they wouldn't show it to me
without a warrant
. After all, Marissa wasn't officially missing and she wasn't on the police radar.