“No. Stay home. Be there when Mary Louise returns.”
As I reconnected with Hull, a terrible medley of images spewed from my neurons.
A gangly girl who loved fashion and hats.
Movement in the shadows of an enormous magnolia.
A photo of myself measuring a skull.
Why hadn’t I picked up the phone? Why hadn’t I returned the child’s call? How could I have been so selfish?
“McGee may have taken another child.”
“Are you serious?”
“Mary Louise Marcus left school four hours ago on foot. Still hasn’t arrived at her house.”
“The kid got any issues?”
“No.”
“Not likely a runaway?”
“No.”
“She fit the profile?”
“Yes.” Fourteen. Fair. Long brown hair center-parted and braided.
I heard Hull suck in a long breath. Then, “If it is McGee, you think she’s taunting us? Snubbing her nose at authority?”
“I think this time it’s personal.” I swallowed. “And I think I know where she is.”
A light drizzle was falling. I had the wipers on high. Not for the rain. To match the cadence of my heart.
I called Slidell. Rolled to voicemail. Of course.
Screw Slidell.
I called the MP division. Got a guy named Zoeller whom I’d heard was a dolt but didn’t know personally.
“Yep. Yvonne Marcus. Called twenty minutes ago to report her daughter missing.”
“And?”
“Who’d you say this is?”
I explained again.
“The two fought. The kid’s probably catching a flick to teach Mama a lesson.”
“I think this child could be in danger.”
“Aren’t they all.”
“What did you just say?”
Faux-patient sigh. “The kid’s only been out of pocket a few hours. There are regs. We follow every hunch, abuse the system, eventually, it loses its punch.”
“I have an address I want you to check.”
“Sure.” Zoeller could have sounded more bored, but only after a pitcher of tranqs. “I’m outta here, but I’ll pass it on.”
“When can you activate an AMBER Alert?”
“When an abduction is confirmed and adequate descriptive information has been obtained.” Rote.
“And you’re starting the process now.” Glacial.
“Look, it just came through we got a 10-91 with a 10-33.”
A domestic disturbance with an officer down. Shit. Now I’d never get him to help me look for Mary Louise.
“I will call you back.”
“I’ll look forward to that.” Zoeller disconnected.
I tried Barrow.
Salter.
Had the whole damn world gone AWOL?
As I barreled up Queens, my mind whirled in search of benign explanations for Mary Louise’s nonappearance. Found dozens. All bullshit.
I continued through to Providence, cut right onto Laurel, and shot across Randolph. At Vail, I sat paralyzed, palms damp on the wheel. Left or right? Where? Where would she go?
A horn brrped behind me.
Dick that he was, Zoeller was correct on one point. A false tip could divert critical resources and personnel up a blind alley.
The horn again. Longer. Less polite.
Decision.
I turned left, fired north, circled the block, then winged into the drive leading to the Mercy ER.
Four blue and whites sat under the portico, angled like guppies at feeding time. Something looked off. What? The careless parking? No. The cop shooting that Zoeller had mentioned. Of course they’d been abandoned in haste.
An ambulance sat with its back doors open. Two unmarked sedans. Vans from every TV station in town.
Officer down. Dead? The story would be on all channels at eleven, in all morning papers in skyscraper font. But before that, it would appear in cyberspace, attracting every assignment editor not yet clued in. The media would slather all night.
The CMPD would focus on avenging one of its own.
No one would give a rat’s ass about my “hunch.”
I looked around. Slidell’s Taurus was nowhere in sight.
I was on my own.