CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
Chief Bill Lester came through my front door, a look of concern on his face. I’d called him fifteen minutes before and asked if he could stop by. “Nothing,” he said. “Not a goddammed clue as to what happened to her.”
“Take a load off, Bill,” said Jock. “We’re trying to figure this out and there are some things you need to know.”
“What?”
“I don’t know how much you’ve been paying attention to what we’ve been doing on the Desmond and Dulcimer murders,” said Jock.
“Not much. I figured J.D. would tell me anything I needed to know.”
“We think there’s a chance that Chaz Desmond is dirty,” said Jock. He told the chief all that we knew about Doc and the Evermore Foundation. “We’d decided to confront Desmond, and Matt asked him to come to Longboat for a meeting. He was due here at eleven this morning. He didn’t show. Matt called his office and it looks like Desmond disappeared sometime last night.”
“You think it’s connected to J.D.’s disappearance?”
“Be quite a coincidence if it wasn’t.”
“Any ideas?” asked the chief.
“There’s one big loose end,” I said. “Bud Stanley in Macon. The guy who runs the Otto Foundation.”
“I’m thinking we ought to pay him a visit,” said Jock.
“We think J.D. was taken this morning,” said Lester. “Her condo looks as if she was getting ready to go to work. Her gun belt and clothes were laid out, coffee on, her cell phone next to her gun. When the crime-scene techs went through the condo they found a pastry in the microwave. Looked like she was fixing a quick breakfast.”
“Did the techs find anything that would be helpful?” I asked.
“Nothing. They got a lot of fingerprints, but so far we’re just turning up people who would have reason to be in her condo. Friends and such.”
“None of the neighbors saw anything?”
“No. The place is almost empty. Most of the owners are snowbirds and it’s quiet during the summer. She was probably gone before the maintenance manager came to work.”
“I don’t know what else to do,” I said. “If we go to Macon, maybe we’ll find something.”
“That’s a long drive,” said Lester.
“I’ve got an idea.” I picked up my phone and called Desmond’s office in Atlanta. I identified myself and asked to speak to Mr. Macomber. I was put right through.
“Did you hear anything?” he asked.
“No, but there’s a police officer here on the island who has been working on Jim’s murder and she’s missing too.”
“You think they’re connected?”
“Don’t know, but there is a man in Macon I need to talk to very badly.”
“Okay.”
“I need a plane to get there and back.”
“Okay.”
“I was thinking about yours. When are you going to Jacksonville?”
“I’m leaving for the airport in a few minutes.”
“How long are you going to be there?”
“Overnight.”
“Can you send the plane to Sarasota to take a friend and me to Macon and back?”
“I’ll have to run that by Harry Anderson.”
“Who’s that?”
“Our general counsel. If he says it’s okay, I’ll send the plane on down.”
“You’ll let me know?”
“Five minutes.” He hung up.
I fixed some more coffee while we waited. It was almost one o’clock and I was getting hungry. The phone rang.
“The plane will be at Dolphin Aviation in Sarasota at three thirty. You can have it until midnight tonight. After that the pilots are going to have to take a break. If you need the plane tomorrow, I can get back to Atlanta on commercial.”
“That’s great, Paul.”
“Anderson said Chaz would blow a gasket if we didn’t help you out.”
“Sounds like a smart lawyer.”
“Sometimes,” he said and hung up.