Thread of Betrayal (13 page)

“So when that girl came in here and I told her we couldn’t give her a room, she got pretty upset,” Will continued. “Not like mad, but just upset. Said she had nowhere to go. So I told her I had a friend who might be able to help her out.”

“Jesus,” Beltran whispered, her mouth set in a hard, angry line.

I took a deep breath. “So he came and picked her up or what?”

Will shifted his weight, the imaginary spiders still crawling up his legs. “Yeah. She said okay. I called him and he got here in maybe ten minutes.”

“And she just went with him?” Lauren asked, incredulous.

Will shrugged. “Yeah.”

“So then what happens?” I asked.

“What do you mean?” Will asked.

“You call him,” I said. “Tell him there’s a girl. He comes over and meets them or picks them up or whatever. Then what happens?”

He shoved his hands in his pockets and rolled his shoulders. “They just go to his place, I guess. I don’t really know.”

“And what do you get out of this?” I asked.

Will sighed. “Fifty bucks. Hundred if he hooks up.”

Lauren’s fist shot out and caught Will Thornton square in the mouth. He stumbled backward and Anchor was immediately at her side.

“You little asshole,” Lauren hissed. “Pimping her out.”

Will’s hands were at his mouth, his expression more surprised than hurt.

“You’re fired,” Beltran said, quietly. “You’re done.”

Will frowned, but didn’t seem all that surprised.

“Address,” I said. “I want an address for this guy.”

“I don’t know his exact address,” Will said, dropping his hands from his mouth.

“But you know where he lives,” I said.

“Yeah, pretty much,” he said.

“I can get an address out of his file,” Beltran said. “I’ll be right back.”

She hustled across the lobby.

“He should accompany us,” Anchor said. “Just to make sure we find it.”

“I agree,” I said.

“Look, man, I’m not going anywhere,” Will said, shaking his head. “I just…”

Anchor was next to him, his hand gripping Will’s arm, whispering into his ear. The color drained from Will’s face and, after a frozen moment, he gave a short, curt nod. Anchor released his arm and patted him on the shoulder.

“He’ll be coming with us,” Anchor said, smiling at me.

TWENTY-EIGHT

“We have a small complication,” Anchor said from the passenger seat.

We were idling in front of the hotel. Will Thorton sat pressed into between Lauren and myself in the back with Ellis behind the wheel.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Seems someone is following us,” Anchor said.

Lauren glanced at me across a hunched down Will Thorton.

“Who?” I asked.

“Not sure,” Anchor said. “But we’re going to find out. So just bear with us for a moment, please.”

I wasn’t sure what other choice we had.

Ellis pulled the SUV away from the curb slowly, then made a U-turn at the end of the parking lot. We passed the front entrance and made a left out onto the street in front of the hotel. We drove maybe twenty-five feet before Ellis jerked the wheel, crossed the double yellow line and screeched to a diagonal halt in front of a car parked at the curb. Both he and Anchor were out of the car before we’d seemingly come to a halt.

“What the hell is going on?” Lauren asked.

“No clue,” I said, staring out the window.

Anchor and Ellis were flanking a late model American sedan—Ford, Chevy, I wasn’t sure—but it looked like a rental to me. Anchor was on the driver’s side and Ellis was on the passenger’s side, perched on the sidewalk, eyes riveted to the car. I didn’t see weapons, but I was certain they were there and could get them out quicker than whomever was in the car that had apparently been tailing us.

Ellis moved closer to the car and his hand snaked around to the small of his back.

Anchor was in tight on the driver’s side window, his hand on the door.

The door opened.

Lauren and I both saw who it was at the same time, but she said it before I could. “What the hell?”

I slid out of my seat, opened the door, walked around the front end of the car and said to Bryce Ponder “What the hell are you doing here?”

Bryce was wearing the same clothes he’d had on in Denver and his chest was puffed out. “Looking for Ellie.”

Anchor glanced at me. “You know him?”

I nodded. “Yeah, but he’s supposed to be back in Minnesota.” I switched my gaze back to Bryce. “I told you to go home.”

“You can’t tell me what to do,” he said, lifting his chin.

“The hell I can’t,” I said. “We told you. You took an unaccompanied minor across state lines. I guess I need to make that call now. I didn’t think you were this stupid.”

The air left his chest and his shoulders slumped. “You can’t call the cops, man.”

“Really? I can’t?”

“Let me interrupt for a moment,” Anchor said, then motioning at Kitting. Kitting nodded and went back to the SUV. “I’m going to give you two a couple of minutes to get this figured out.” He looked at me. “Handle it however you’d like and let me know if you need assistance.” Then he turned to Bryce. “And I’ll say this one time. Do not follow us when we leave. Do not follow us again. I will see you. If I do, you won’t be able to follow anyone again for a very long time. In a car or in any other manner.” Anchor retreated to the car.

Bryce Ponder swallowed hard, watching Anchor as he walked back to the SUV.

“He’s not kidding,” I said. “And either am I.” I pulled out my phone.

“Please don’t call the cops, man,” he said. “I just want to help find her.”

I scrolled through my contacts and found the number I wanted, then punched it. “I’m not calling the cops.”

Relief swept through him. “Thanks.”

“I’m calling your parents.”

His eyes went wide. “What? No, you…”

The line clicked over and Ed Ponder said, “Hello?”

“Mr. Ponder, this is Joe Tyler,” I said, staring at Bryce. “I’m going to put you on speaker for a moment.”

I pulled the receiver from my ear and touched the screen. “Can you hear me alright?”

“Yeah, I can hear you.”

“I’m standing here with Bryce,” I said. “And I need your help.”

“You’re with Bryce?” Ed Ponder asked. “In Colorado?”

“No,” I said. “We’re in California.”

“California?”

“Yeah,” I said, staring at Bryce. Briefly, I recounted how we’d met up with Bryce in Denver and how he’d then followed us to California despite our telling him to return home.

Ed Ponder muttered something under his breath. I couldn’t make out the words but they weren’t pleasant.

“So, here’s my dilemma,” I said. “I can’t have him out here, getting in the way. It’s not going to work. He told us he’d head back to Minnesota and he didn’t. My inclination is to call the authorities now. But I promised you I would do everything I could to avoid getting him in trouble with his probation. I’d like to keep that promise. So, I’m calling you.”

A long sigh came through the phone. “I’m nearly inclined to tell you just to call the cops.”

Bryce frowned and shook his head, chewing on his thumbnail.

“But I guess I’d rather you not,” Ed said. “Everything being even, I’d rather you not.”

“So what do we do?” I asked.

“He’s there? He can hear me?” Ed asked. “Bryce you there?”

I looked at Bryce.

“I’m here, Dad,” Bryce mumbled.

“I have no idea what you’re doing,” Ed Ponder said. “None. But it sounds like Mr. Tyler is willing to cut you a break if you’ll do the right thing for a change. We know you have the credit card your mother arranged for you. You still have it, right?”

Bryce shuffled his feet. “Yeah.”

“Go to the airport. Now,” Ed said. “Buy a ticket home. We’ll pick you up.”

“My truck’s in Denver,” Bryce said.

“We’ll worry about that later. Go to the airport and buy a ticket. If you can’t get a flight until morning, you spend the night there at the airport. You wanna do anything else, you’re on your own.”

Bryce’s hands were balled up and I knew he wanted to lash out. Hit me, hit something. But he didn’t. He took a deep breath. “Alright.”

“Call me when you get to the airport,” Ed said. “Mr. Tyler?”

“I’m here,” I said.

“Thank you,” he replied. “For calling and for giving him another chance to save his own rear end. My wife and I both appreciate it. You need anything else from us, please let me know.”

“Will do,” I said and we hung up.

Bryce and I stood on the sidewalk for a moment.

“I wasn’t trying to cause trouble,” he said. “I really wasn’t.”

“I believe you.”

His eyes clouded over. “I’m just worried about her.”

“Me, too. But the best way for you to help is to go home.”

He nodded. “I will. But can I give you something?”

“Give me something?”

He fished in the pocket of his jeans for a moment, then pulled his hand out and extended it to me. A small silver bracelet was in his palm and I took it. There were several small charms attached. A moon, a sun and a small cat.

“I gave it to her for her birthday,” he said. “I found it on the counter in the bathroom in the hotel in Denver. I think she forgot it. Would you give it to her when you find her?”

I fingered the charms for a moment, wondering what they meant to Elizabeth. Wondering how it had looked on her wrist. Wondering if she’d meant to leave it behind or if it had been a mistake. Wondering what other kinds of jewelry she liked to wear.

I folded it up carefully and put it in my pocket. “I’ll get it to her.”

“Thanks,” Bryce said.

“You can find your way back to the airport?”

He nodded. “Yeah. And when you find her?”

I waited.

“Ask her to call me,” Bryce said. “Just whenever she can. Ask her to call me.”

He slid into the driver’s seat of his car and I watched him pull away from the curb.

I still wasn’t sure why he’d followed us to Los Angeles, but I didn’t think he’d meant any harm. I thought he was a kid who missed his girlfriend and couldn’t figure out why she’d cut him out of this part of her life. He was confused, sad, frustrated.

And I hoped I’d have the opportunity to ask her to call him at some point.

TWENTY-NINE

I got back into the car and Lauren was on her phone for a moment before punching it off.

She looked at me. “That was Morgan. Her calls are going to be forwarded to your phone.” She nodded at the front seat. “They got what they needed from her, she said okay and they set it up.” She paused. “So if she calls Morgan…”

“My phone will ring,” I said. “John, is that every call that goes to Morgan’s phone or just from my daughter’s?”

“Every call,” Anchor said, turning around. “We did an entire forward from her system. So any number that calls the girl in Colorado will ring through to you. We should be able to recognize the number, though. Should have a Southern California area code. But I’d say we answer everything, just to be safe.”

I nodded, staring at my phone for a moment. I wasn’t exactly sure how I’d handle hearing my daughter’s voice. I didn’t think there was any way to prepare for the moment.

“Nothing on triangulating her number?” I asked.

Anchor shook his head. “The phone hasn’t been used. We’re still watching. If she makes a call, we’ll see it.”

I nodded again.

“Can anyone tell me what exactly we’re doing?” Will Thorton asked in the seat next to me.

“No,” Lauren said. “Shut up.”

Thorton shrunk in his seat.

Kitting navigated the neighborhood streets in Redondo, passing through narrow streets of upright homes with multiple stories, each trying to get a glimpse of the Pacific out to the west. He pulled to the curb, the big car idling in front of a two-story stucco with a brown garage door and a gate barely hanging on one hinge. An old VW bug was in the driveway, the shiny chrome exhaust pipes at odds with the faded orange paint on the rest of the vehicle. A small, portable fire pit was near the garage door, along with several empty beer cans.

Kitting twisted his head towards us. “This it, kid?”

Thorton nodded, still sulking. “Yeah. He has a roommate, too. But that’s his car.”

Kitting nodded and looked at Anchor.

“You want me to go get him?” Anchor asked.

I opened my door. “No. I’ve got it. She might still be here.”

“I’m coming, too,” Lauren said, her door already open.

“We’ll be here,” Anchor said.

My stomach knotted as Lauren and I walked to the door. We weren’t too far behind Elizabeth. There was a good chance that she was there, behind the door, and that we’d come face to face with her for the first time in nearly a decade. I didn’t know if she’d recognize me or even if she did, how she’d react. I wasn’t sure how I’d react. For so long, I’d committed myself to a search without an ending, a search that only ran into dead-ends. These last couple of days were the first time I’d ever let myself get caught up in thinking that I was close to finding her. That I was going to find her.

And I told myself I was. Even if she wasn’t at this house, we knew she was nearby. Close enough to catch.

Close enough to finally see.

I knocked on the door and heard the knock echo behind it.

We waited.

Footsteps shuffled behind the door and it opened.

A guy in his twenties wearing board shorts, no shirt and sporting a barbwire tattoo around his fairly sizable right bicep stood there, looking at us. “Yeah?”

“You Aaron Simmons?” I asked.

He looked me up and down, then did the same to Lauren. “Maybe. Who are you?”

“We’re looking for the girl you picked up from the Crowne Plaza earlier,” I said. “She here?”

He looked bored. “Not sure what you’re talking about, man, and it’s late to be knocking on my door.”

“Yeah, you do,” I said, then motioned at the car. “Your buddy Will is in there and he brought us here.”

If that fazed him, he didn’t show it. “No idea what you’re talking about, dude,” he repeated. “And I was just about to go to bed so thanks for stopping by.”

He went to close the door but I wedged my shoulder against it. “We’re not done.”

His arms arched at his sides and he thrust his chest out. “Get off my door, dude.”

“We’re not done,” I repeated.

He stared at me, giving me a stare that I’m sure he thought was hard, intimidating, a stare he thought might scare me off. Then he turned to Lauren.

“You’re welcome to come in, though, sweetheart,” he said, casting a leering grin in her direction. “I’ll stay up for you. In a couple of ways.”

I put my hand on his throat and pinned him to the doorframe. He grabbed at my wrist, then tried to swing at me. I pulled my head back and pressed my fingers tighter around his neck.

Lauren stepped off the small step, but didn’t intervene.

He gave up trying to hit me and focused on my hand that was cutting off his air supply. Both of his hands clawed at my forearm as his eyes tried to stay calm. He was strong and I was having trouble maintaining my grip.

I stepped forward and drove my knee upward between his legs. His hands fell to his sides and his entire body sagged. I let go of his throat and let him fall to the ground.

He writhed on the concrete, one hand on his neck, the other folded in between his legs.

I bent down. “There are two guys in that car over there who are far scarier than me. If I go ask them, they’ll come over here and start taking off your fingers, one at a time. We’ll just drop them in a trash can. You’ll beg them to stop. And all because you didn’t want to answer my questions about the girl you picked up earlier. Seems kind of stupid, doesn’t it?”

Beads of sweat popped on his forehead. Red circles sprouted on his neck where my fingers had been.

I waited.

“Fuck you, dude,” he rasped, his eyes darting at me.

Before I could move, Lauren’s foot smashed into his mouth. She pulled it away, exposing a mess of scarlet teeth. Aaron’s eyes were closed tight in pain.

We waited.

He rolled onto his back and eventually opened his eyes. He swallowed several times, probably more blood than saliva, then pushed himself into a sitting position.

He wiped at his mouth with his forearm. “What about her?” he spat.

“You picked her up at the hotel?” I asked.

“Yeah. Will called. It’s our thing. At least, since that bitch fired me.”

“Right. You picked her up. Tell me exactly what happened.”

He leaned back on his hands. “Will told her I could give her a place to stay, a ride, whatever she needed. I went to the hotel. Met her outside. She didn’t really wanna get in the car, but I guess she decided I didn’t bite.” He shrugged. “I told her she could crash at my place.”

I glanced at the front door. “So she’s here?”

He shook his head. “No. We drove for like five minutes and she changed her mind.”

The tiny tendril of hope in my gut disintegrated. I knew better, but I couldn’t help hoping she was somewhere in this dirtbag’s house.

“She just changed her mind?” Lauren asked, frowning. “Just like that?”

He wouldn’t look at her and he rubbed at his jaw. “Yeah. I guess so.”

“Or maybe you hit on her or told her she was gonna need to sleep in your bed if she needed a bed to sleep in,” Lauren said.

He stared at her, then shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t remember.”

“Right,” she said, returning his stare.

Lauren was probably right and a small bubble of anger formed inside of me. But beating the crap out of this guy wasn’t going to get us closer to Elizabeth. We needed to focus and not get distracted by his crap.

“She changed her mind,” I said. “Then what?”

“She said she didn’t wanna go,” he said, moving his eyes from Lauren to me. “She asked if I could just drop her off at another hotel.”

“So you took her to another hotel?”

His mouth twisted and he looked away from me. “I told her no.”

“No?”

“Told her I didn’t have time to take her anywhere else,” he said. “It was my place or nothing.”

The anger inside of me grew. “So you just kicked her out of the car?”

He ran his tongue over his teeth, turning them from red to pink. “I pulled over. She was kinda mad.”

“No kidding,” Lauren said, shaking her head.

“I’m not a taxi service,” Aaron said.

“Yeah. You’re just an asshole,” Lauren said. “An asshole who drops girls off in the middle of nowhere. In the middle of the night.”

He started to say something back, then glanced at me and thought better of it. He leaned back on his hands. “I pulled over. She got out. That was it.”

He took a deep breath. I was frustrated with him, but also with Elizabeth. She was playing a dangerous game, getting into cars with strangers, then changing her plans. She was lucky that Aaron was just a jerk and kicked her out of the car. He could’ve done far worse.

“Where did you let her out?” I asked.

“Halfway between here and the hotel,” he said, then shrugged again.

“Where exactly?”

“I wasn’t paying attention.”

I glanced at the cars. “I’m serious. Each finger. They will take each finger off and won’t stop until they are all gone.”

He tried to act like he wasn’t afraid, but his eyes had darted to the SUV and he was swallowing hard.

“Probably about six blocks from here,” he said and then named the cross streets.

“She say anything about where she was going?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Nope, and I didn’t ask.”

“You see which way she went?”

“No. She shut the door and I was gone. That was it, man. Didn’t even check the mirror.”

I reminded myself that Elizabeth had gotten herself this far. She may have been afraid, but she wasn’t dumb. She’d made it all the way from Minnesota to California and that didn’t happen by mistake. She may have made some errors in judgment, but she had gotten herself all the way to the coast by herself. That told me she could take care of herself. She wasn’t going to walk out in traffic or sleep in a crack house.

It was a small consolation.

I looked at Lauren. “Let’s go.”

Lauren stood still, staring at Aaron. I’d seen that look before. I knew she wanted another shot at him.

“Not worth it,” I said. “Come on.”

She stayed for a moment, then shook her head and walked past him.

Then she whirled and drove her foot right under his chin, snapping his head back and buckling his arms as he hit the driveway.

She turned back to me. “Totally worth it.”