But where was he now?
“Your turn,” Grimes was saying, repeating himself after Raiff had ignored him. “A dead doctor, two dead parents, and a missing kid. Run the numbers for me, the way you see them.”
Raiff doubted Grimes wanted to hear the truth: that his entire world was currently hanging in the balance and a missing boy was the only chance it had to hold on.
“I’ll let you know,” Raiff told him, turning to retrace his steps out of the house.
“Hey,” Grimes called, before he reached the door.
Halfway there, Raiff swung back toward him.
“Tell the other guy I didn’t appreciate his attitude.”
Raiff stopped in his tracks, something seeming to prickle against his spine. “What other guy?” he asked.
47
KNOCK WOOD
RATHMAN APPROACHED THE CLERK behind the counter of the Monterey Motor Inn, disgusted by the stench of body odor rising off the man so entrenched in a comic book that he didn’t even notice his presence.
“Ding-ding,” Rathman said, instead of ringing the flimsy bell.
A ceramic figure, being used as a paperweight to keep a stack of registration forms from blowing away every time the door opened, sat next to it. A placard reading KNOCK WOOD was strung across the male figure’s chest while his hands were frozen over what was clearly a boner in his pants, which had a chip at belt level.
“You want a room?” the clerk asked, frowning over the interruption.
“Not why I’m here.”
“We only take cash.”
“That’s okay,” Rathman nodded, snatching the comic book from his grasp so quickly, the clerk was left grasping air, “because I’m not staying. I’m here to ask you a few questions about some recent guests of yours. A boy and a girl. Would’ve checked in, er, maybe four, five hours ago.”
“Hell, no. I don’t rent to anyone under the age of eighteen.”
“One of those kids belongs to my employer. He’d be most grateful for your assistance,” Rathman said, and slid a twenty-dollar bill across the counter.
The clerk stuffed it in the pocket of his white button-down shirt, which was stained yellow under his arms. “What do you mean by ‘belongs’?”
“The money means I get to ask the questions.”
“For twenty bucks, no kids checked in tonight.”
“How much is a room?”
“Forty.”
Rathman slid another twenty across the counter.
“But information’s more, say, a hundred.”
Rathman made it look like he was going for his pocket again, then grabbed hold of the KNOCK WOOD paperweight in his free hand instead. He brought it down hard enough on the back of the clerk’s ink-stained hand to shatter the ceramic figure at the base. Then, instead of pulling it back up, he pressed the jagged shards that began where the figure’s feet had been into the clerk’s flesh.
“You were saying?”
The clerk was gasping for breath, his now broken hand trembling horribly as he fought to pull it free.
“Two kids, high school age, checked in here earlier, yes?”
The clerk nodded.
Rathman pulled a photo of Alex Chin from his jacket pocket. It hadn’t been hard to find one, since various shots of the boy were all over the Internet. It was the same picture he’d flashed to a waitress at a nearby diner just off the Pacific Coast Highway who’d recognized the boy and told Rathman he’d been in there earlier along with a girl who looked about his same age.
Which made her a bit too old for him. His tastes ran younger, accounting in large part for the unceremonious end to his military career. Army brass didn’t grasp the meaning of fringe benefits and it was only Afghanistan. Rathman was truly shocked anybody cared. No mention of this, of course, appeared anywhere in his record, the army wanting to spare itself the embarrassment. The man who’d turned him in was buried in Arlington National Cemetery now, though Rathman guessed the funeral had featured a closed casket. He also guessed Marsh wouldn’t have given a shit, even if he had known. Maybe he did.
“This is the boy, yes?” he continued, enjoying the pain the clerk was in and pressing the jagged bottom of KNOCK WOOD deeper into his skin to bring on more.
The clerk gasped, his knees almost buckling. He managed to nod again, still breathing hard with thick rivulets of sweat now dripping down his face like a bad paint job.
Rathman looked out the office window toward the parking lot where his team had gathered. He preferred handling interrogations alone. More fun that way.
“What room are they in?”
“They’re gone,” the clerk managed, just barely. “Checked out. Asked for directions before they left.”
Rathman pushed the jagged edge in just a bit deeper. “To where?”
48
FLASH DRIVE
THE MOTEL CLERK HAD smirked when they turned in their key so fast, figuring whatever business they’d come to the Monterey Motor Inn to do was done.
“We might be back,” Sam offered.
“Sure.”