Little Girl Gone

20



The address Angie had given Logan was in a residential neighborhood, all single-family homes, no apartment buildings. He parked a block down, then donned the leather jacket he kept behind the seat, and slipped his newly acquired gun into the front pocket.

It was nearly 9 p.m., and the street had that settled, in-for-the-night feel. The house in question was one story with a front door near the middle, and an attached garage on the right. There were no lights on in the windows, and no cars parked in the driveway or at the nearby curb.

A front approach was out of the question. Logan would be in direct view of anyone on the street, and the last thing he needed was a nosy neighbor calling the cops.

He did a quick scan up and down the road, then ducked down the side yard next to the garage, and quietly hopped the fence into the back yard. He paused for a moment, listening for any movement, but heard nothing. He then made his way along the back of the house until he reached a window.

Peering in, his stomach sank as déjà vu hammered away at his skull.

The room was empty.

He eased himself further along the wall, stopping just short of a sliding glass door. Leaning forward, he looked through it, bracing himself to see another completely empty room, but, instead, found a sparsely furnished family room: a couple of old couches, a TV, and a dingy coffee table.

There was something else, too.

Halfway down the hallway on the far side of the room, light spilled out of a doorway.

He listened, but all was quiet. Maybe Aaron or Ryan or even this Mr. Andrews hadn’t turned the light off when they’d left.

That thought had barely passed through his mind when he heard the very distinct sound of a toilet flushing.

Nothing happened for several seconds, then the light switched off, and a man moved into the hallway. He was tall and lanky, and though mostly in shadow, he reminded Logan very much of Elyse’s neighbor, Ryan.

Logan pulled back out of sight as the guy started walking toward the family room. Five seconds later, a light came on.

Repositioning himself further out in the backyard, out of the halo of light, Logan looked through the glass door again.

It was Ryan, all right.

He plopped down on the couch and turned on the TV. For several minutes, he barely moved. Suddenly he jumped, then raised a phone to his ear a second later. The conversation was a short one. As soon as he was through, he leaned to his side, and grabbed something. When he stood up, he had a large duffle bag in his hand. He strapped it over his shoulder, turned off the light, then disappeared off to the left.

Logan backtracked to the window of the empty bedroom he’d first seen. Light was now filtering in from the hallway beyond the room’s open door. It stayed on for about ten more seconds, then switched off. This was followed almost immediately by the thunk of a heavy door shutting.

The heaviest doors in most homes were the ones that led to the outside. But Ryan wasn’t at the front door or the back, and there wasn’t any door along this part of the house that opened onto the yard. Then what had that—

The garage, Logan thought as he glanced to the left.

He ran to the fence, and climbed back over. As he landed, he heard two things: the roar of an engine, and the sound of an automatic opener pulling up the garage door.

He sprinted to the sidewalk, glancing over his shoulder as he did. The door was up just enough for him to see the taillights of a Lexus SUV.

Forty-five seconds later, Logan was in his El Camino, driving back by the house. The garage door was all the way open now, and the Lexus was nowhere in sight. He raced to the end of the block and looked both ways. Nothing.

Continuing through the neighborhood, he headed toward La Tijera Boulevard. It was the closest main road, and the most logical place Ryan would have gone. Logan’s instinct turned out to be right. He spotted Ryan two streets shy of the main intersection.

Now that Logan had him in his sights, following Ryan was easy. Unlike the guy who’d been chasing him earlier, Ryan had no idea anyone was behind him.

They popped onto the 405 north, following the route Logan and Angie had taken earlier. But when they reached the 10, instead of going east, they went west toward the beach, getting off barely a mile later at Bundy Drive.

From there they went south, and very shortly the Santa Monica Airport came into view. Logan was hoping Ryan was just going to drive right by, but no such luck. On cue, the Lexus turned down Airport Avenue.

Logan stopped at the corner so Ryan wouldn’t see his headlights following immediately after him, not at all liking what this might mean.

Santa Monica Airport was located right in the middle of the city, with a single runway long enough to accommodate most business jets. This made it a favorite of Hollywood celebrities who could fly in and avoid the mess at the larger, commercial airports, and be wherever they needed to be thirty minutes later. In other words, a person could get almost anywhere from there with a ton less hassle.

Logan waited until Ryan was nearing the first of the hangers, before turning down the road.

Off to his right, he could see a small aircraft coming in for a landing, but overall the airport itself seemed pretty quiet. Checking his watch, he saw that it was a quarter after nine, and was willing to bet the airport had a curfew that probably went into effect in the next couple of hours. He looked back at Ryan’s vehicle.

“So are you flying somewhere?” he said out loud. “Or are you here for some other reason?”

Brake lights flashed ahead, then Ryan’s SUV turned into a parking lot. Logan immediately did the same, finding a smaller lot tucked between two buildings.

As he got out, he pulled on his jacket and felt the knock of his pistol against his hip. For half a second he wondered if he should leave it. Just sneaking around an airport could easily get him into trouble, but doing so with a gun? That would be serious jail time. But it was a choice between a potentially bad outcome versus a potentially life-ending one if he couldn’t defend himself. The gun stayed in his pocket.

Back on the road, he kept to the shadows as much as possible, hoping they would be enough to conceal his presence. He’d only gone a short distance when he saw Ryan step into the street and crossed over to the airport side, walking up to a small building directly across from the lot where he’d parked. As he reached the door, someone inside opened it and he walked through.

The moment it closed Logan darted across the street, then headed west along a tall fence that separated him from an open area where several small planes were parked. He stopped at the first building he came to. Next to a faded blue door was a sign that read:

LITTLE ALICE’S AVIATION

FLIGHT SCHOOL AND

AIRCRAFT MAINTAINENCE

Logan looked through the window. The streetlights provided enough illumination for him to make out a counter, a couple of desks, and a seating area. Beyond the desks, a door opened onto a darkened room. Just as he hoped, no one was there.

He made sure there were no cars coming, then pulled out the modified lock pick set he’d used at Elyse’s place, and set to work on the door of Little Alice’s Aviation.

It took him longer than the apartment had. This door had two deadbolts, and a lock in the knob. He had finished both deadbolts, and was just starting on the last lock, when a car started coming down the hill toward the airport.

He focused on the lock, keenly aware that the headlights drawing nearer and nearer.

“Come on,” he whispered, his teeth clenched, urging the lock to cooperate. When the car arrived, he needed to either be inside or walking away.

He took a deep breath, moved the pick again, then felt the lock finally release.

Rushing inside, he shut the door, then looked through the open vertical blinds at the street.

As the car drove by, he could see two men sitting inside. The driver he didn’t know, but the passenger looked very much like the same man who’d been chasing him and Angie. Apparently he survived his crash.

Logan moved one of the blinds just enough so that he could watch them pull into the same parking lot Ryan had used. It seemed a pretty safe assumption they’d walk over to the same building, too, so, instead of watching, Logan headed through the office into the darkened room in back.

He flicked on his flashlight, and took a quick look around. The room was set up as a classroom. There were a dozen chairs with attached desks all facing a dry erase board on the far wall. There was also a door to the left that could only have led outside.

Night air greeted Logan as he opened it. Beyond was a concrete sidewalk, then a wide paved area, and finally what he could only describe as a carport for planes. All the spaces were filled with small, prop-driven aircraft.

He scanned the entire area to make sure no one was around, then stepped outside. The building Ryan had gone into would be on the other side of the sheltered planes. Logan walked over to it, and made his way to the far end. When he got there, he could see the runway directly in front of him, maybe fifty yards away, just beyond an access road and a strip of grass.

He rounded the side of the shelter, then stopped at the rear corner and peeked around. Back toward Airport Avenue was the building Ryan had entered.

There was a lot of activity going on down there, all centered around a sleek-looking private jet parked nearby. Logan could see lights on inside its cabin, and was pretty sure there was someone in the cockpit moving around. The door at the back of the building was open, and light was shinning from inside it as well.

Unfortunately, everything was too far away for him to make out any details. He needed to get closer.

On the other side of the jet, directly across from his position, was an open area where nearly two dozen small planes were parked. It would provide a much closer, unobstructed view of the jet and the back of the building. The problem was getting there without drawing attention.

He glanced around. There was a wide spot in the access road, about hundred feet away, where a half dozen plane were parked. If he could get there, then work his way along the aircraft until he could cross over to the other lot, that might work. And if at any point someone saw him, there were enough planes around that he could act like one of them was his.

He crossed over to the grass strip, and turned down it. When he reached the aircraft, he paused, looking back toward the jet. So far no one was rushing in his direction, or trying to see what he was doing.

He continued on until he was directly across from the open parking area where he ultimately wanted to be. This was going to be the tricky part. While he hoped he wouldn’t be noticed, he was going to be in plain view for at least ten seconds. The best he could do was to make it look like he had zero interest in whatever was going on at the jet. When it appeared that no one was looking in his direction, he crossed the access road at a diagonal away from the jet.

Once he reached the safety of the first plane, he looked back.

“Dammit,” he said under his breath.

He hadn’t been as clever as he’d thought. Two men were standing on the tarmac, facing in his direction. One of them was pointing at the road where he’d just crossed.

He watched as they talked for a moment, then the one who had pointed started walking back toward the building, while the other began heading toward Logan.

That was an even bigger problem than it could have been. If the guy found him, there’d be no way he could play off the lie that he was just checking his plane.

Logan had met this guy before, in the refrigerator at the back of the Coffee Time Café.