“No. Words weren’t going to make what happened go away. Nothing anyone could say would change what we lived through.”
Tony only had a general overview of the case file. His one remaining contact at the Bureau who was still speaking to him hadn’t been able to provide more than a cursory briefing. “Tell me about you.”
“Didn’t my mother do that already?”
The anger was gone but there was something else—defeat, disappointment maybe. “We only spoke for a couple of minutes. She was happy to know you were well. I hope I wasn’t wrong about that part.”
Five miles zipped past the windows before she decided to respond. “I grew up in a small town where everybody knew everybody else. My folks were strict. Went to church every time the doors opened. My brother was the captain of the football team, class president, you name it. When my father had his first heart attack, Ray stepped right into his shoes as breadwinner instead of going to college. He always did the right thing. The leader. Model student and son. Married the right girl. Had the perfect kids. Everybody loves Ray.”
More of that silence lapsed. While he waited for her to go on, Tony headed for the only address he’d been able to find for Miles Conway.
“I was the quiet one. The wallflower. Didn’t belong to any clubs, didn’t play sports. No friends. Stayed holed up in my room. A loner.”
“No boyfriends?” He made a left.
“I was fat and kept my nose in a book all through high school. No one noticed me and those who did only wanted to get a laugh at my expense.”
“Kids can be cruel.” He’d never had any trouble in school but his sister had been bullied—at least until Tony found out. The resulting expulsion was the only black mark on his high school record. It cost him three games that basketball season but he would have kicked the shit out of the guy making fun of her if it had cost him his spot on the team. “You came into your own in college?”
“I tried. The extra weight disappeared the summer before. I think I was so nervous I couldn’t eat. Working out was my new best friend when I didn’t have my head in the World Wide Web. Suddenly I was enthralled with what was going on in the world when I couldn’t have cared less in high school.” She shifted in her seat so she could look at him. “My father always said it was the quiet ones who changed the world.”
Tony noticed that she glossed over the part about her father dying the year after her abduction. The brother had eventually taken over the shop where he’d worked. “You met someone in college?”
“No. I just hung out in the places my roommate told me I should if I wanted to have a life.”
“Did that work?” He parked in front of the Cherry Tree Apartments. Decided the car sporting the fancy cover was Conway’s Ferrari. Hadn’t been here the last time he stopped by.
Joanna looked away. “Do the math and you’ll have your answer.”
Eight months into her freshman year Joanna was abducted and her life changed forever. She’d been a ghost ever since.
“You know, if my niece is going through what you went through—” he offered a different approach “—it would help if I had a better understanding of what happened during those fourteen days.”
She stared out the window at the Dumpster that sat next to the line of trees separating this property from the next. “They made us fight. You know, like gladiators or something. If you lost you didn’t eat.”
The idea that Tif might be in that same position ripped at his gut. “Do you know if this fighting was recorded?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I think so, but the room was either completely dark or blindingly light. All I wanted to do was survive. Everything else was pretty much irrelevant.”
He would take that for now. “So who’s Carrie Cole?”
“My make-believe friend.”
Rather than delve into an analysis of that statement, they got out and Tony led the way up the exterior staircase to the second floor. Conway’s apartment was the fourth door along the row of six on the right. A crying baby behind door number one and a barking dog behind number three were the only sounds. Tony took a position to the right of the hinged side of number four. He gestured for Joanna to get behind him. He knocked. No television or other noise. The second time he raised his fist he pounded harder.
Still nothing.
He turned to the woman behind him. “You should wait in the car.”
She held his gaze a moment. “No way. I’ll know if he’s the one.”
“The one?” Tony’s instincts went on point.
“The one who made me believe I was going to be a star in a video he was making. The one who drugged me and delivered me to that place where my life ended.”
She hadn’t mentioned that part before but she had a damned good point. “Just don’t touch anything.”
He pulled a credit card from his wallet and reached for the doorknob. There didn’t appear to be any dead bolt. The knob turned freely. Not locked. Which still didn’t give him justification for going in without a warrant, but that didn’t stop him. As he crossed the threshold, he reached under his jacket for the .22 at the small of his back. Living room was clear. Typical single guy decor. Large sectional sofa, ottoman that served as a coffee table. Even bigger television hanging on the wall. Kitchen and dining area were to the right. Clear.
He ordered, “Close the door with your elbow.”
Joanna elbowed the door closed. “It stinks in here.”
She was right. Smelled like cigarettes and leftover pizza.
The pizza remains were still in the open box on the counter. Dirty dishes were stacked in the sink. Ashtray on an end table was overflowing.
A cramped hall led to a row of three doors, two on the right, one on the left. First door on the right was a spare bedroom that served as what appeared to be a home office. Something of that order. Tony surveyed the three desks crammed into the room. Large monitors stood on each one but there was only one chair. Tony dragged a pair of gloves from his pocket and pulled them on. One by one he tried to awaken the screens. Nothing happened. Then he noticed why—the hard drive towers were missing.
As much as he wanted to go through the contents of the desk drawers, a new odor emanating from this end of the apartment told him the real trouble was behind door number two or three.
At the door on the left an extension cord had been plugged into an outlet in the hall and run under the door. He opened the door to what turned out to be a bathroom. No Miles Conway, but the answer to where the missing hard drives were became painfully clear.
Before moving into the bathroom, he kicked the extension cord free of the outlet that had blackened, probably from burning out. He then eased into the room. An iron had been thrown into the water with the three hard drives.
“Son of a bitch.”
Beyond the piss stains on the toilet seat and the scum circling the sink basin, there was definitely nothing left to see. Dirty towels lay in a pile in the floor.
He moved on to the final door.
Tony listened at the door for several seconds before opening it. The smell had him holding his breath. A male victim lay in the bed amid the tousled and bloody sheets. His head was stationed on the pillow, eyes and mouth open wide. In the center of his chest a wound had puckered angrily. The one lower on his abdomen had done the same but it was a bigger gash. Blood had spurted and oozed over his torso, soaking into the sheets.
“Stay right here at the door and for God’s sake don’t touch anything,” he reminded the woman standing behind him.