David Baldacci - The Last Mile

“Why?”

“Her room is next to mine. I knocked on the door when I was heading over here to see if she wanted something to eat. Nobody answered.”

“Did you hear her inside?”

“No, nothing. Why?”

“Where else would she be at this time of the morning?” Decker put some dollar bills down on the table and rose.

Mars did too.

“Do you think something’s wrong?” he asked.

“That’s what we’re going to find out.”

They hustled outside and down to Jamison’s room. Decker knocked loudly on the door.

“Alex? Alex, are you in there?”

When Decker reached down and pulled his gun, Mars took a step back. “You want me to knock the door in?” he asked Decker.

“What are you two doing?”

They turned to see Jamison walking toward them.

“Where the hell were you?” asked a relieved Decker as he put his gun away.

“They didn’t have any shampoo in the room. So I went to get some at the front desk, and that took forever because I couldn’t find anybody. And then I went into the little gift shop for a bottle of water. Is everything okay?”

“It is now,” said Mars. “We were just worried.”

“Well, I appreciate the—”

She stopped when a woman ran up to them. She was in her sixties, dressed as a maid, and clearly out of breath. “I think there’s something wrong,” she said.

“What do you mean?” asked Decker.

“Please hurry.” She turned and jogged back the way she had come.

They raced after her. They turned a corner and reached the other end of that wing of the U-shaped motel. The woman pointed to a door that was half open.

“That’s Davenport’s room,” said Jamison.

Decker pulled his gun once more, approached the door, and slowly pushed it open.

He peered inside to find the room in a shambles.

They quickly searched it.

Davenport was gone.

And not voluntarily.

Bogart and Milligan are on their way down,” said Decker.

He was sitting in his room with Mars and Jamison after just getting off the phone. The police had come and done an investigation in connection with Davenport’s disappearance, but they had left with virtually no helpful findings. It was clear that she’d put up a fight. No one had heard anything, because that wing of the motel had been largely unoccupied at the time.

“FBI reengaging on this?” asked Jamison dully as she rubbed wearily at her eyes.

“It appears that they are taking her abduction as a personal attack on the Bureau, even if she wasn’t technically working for them at the time.”

Decker studied Jamison. She was pale and clearly shaken.

“Alex, do you have a gun?”

She gave him a sharp glance. “A gun? No. Why?”

“I’m going to get you one and then show you how to use it.”

“Do you really think that’s necessary?”

“Given this latest development, do you think it’s unnecessary?”

Jamison looked away, her hands nervously clasped in front of her.

Mars said, “I don’t get this. Why take Davenport? Why not me? I’m the guy they want. Davenport could know nothing about what was in that safe deposit box.”

“They can’t know that for sure, Melvin,” pointed out Decker. “And let’s face it, Davenport is an easier target than you. And the room was still wrecked, so Davenport put up a fight. Could you imagine if it had been you instead? You might have killed them.”

Mars slowly nodded. “I guess you’re right.”

Decker suddenly looked pensive. “Actually, I might not be.” He rose.

“Where are you going?” asked Jamison.

“To look at Davenport’s room.”

“The locals have already gone over it.”

“And now it’s our turn.”

Decker entered the motel room and walked over to one wall, put his back against it, and surveyed the room in elongated sweeps, his head running side to side like a lighthouse beam. Jamison stood next to him. Mars hovered near the doorway, looking nervous and uncertain.

“See anything?” he asked anxiously.

“Davenport weighed about one-ten?” Decker said.

Jamison looked surprised by the question but said, “About that, I guess. She was about my height. And very lean.”

“She’s a runner,” said Decker thoughtfully. “So she would be lean.”

His gaze ran over the overturned table, upended chair, smashed lamp, the drywall by the bed, and finally the unmade bed.

Jamison said, “She was asleep when it happened. The intruder woke her.”

Mars said, “Well, she might have gotten up and gone for a run and not made her bed before she was kidnapped.”

“You’re both wrong,” said Decker.

“How can we both be wrong?” said Jamison.

Decker pointed to the floor of the open closet. “Her running shoes are there. And so are her workout clothes. It’s bucketing outside and has been all night. The shoes and clothes aren’t even damp or mud-splattered. She wouldn’t have run in this weather anyway. There aren’t any paths and the road outside gets busy with traffic. Not very safe.”

“Okay, so she was attacked while she was sleeping,” said Jamison. “Meaning I was right.”

Decker pointed to the door and then the window. “No forced entry on either. The cops confirmed that. A key was needed to get in. The motel office has been checked. These are old-fashioned locks with real keys. There are no duplicates.”

Jamison was not giving up easily. “Well, maybe they got one from the cleaning staff. They must have masters.”

Decker moved forward near the bed and said, “Look at the table that was knocked over.”

They stood next to him and looked down at it.

Mars said, “It was the one next to the bed. It had a lamp on it. The lamp got knocked over and smashed when the table went down. So what?”

“Look at the table leg.”

They did so.

Decker said, “There’s a piece of the lamp embedded in it.”

Jamison examined the leg and nodded in understanding even as Mars still looked confused. Jamison said, “If the table was knocked over in a struggle the lamp would have flown off and landed well past the table. There is no way the lamp would have hit the table so hard a piece would embed itself in the wood.”

“Exactly,” said Decker. He pointed to the drywall. “And look there.”

They stared at where he was pointing.

Mars said, “There’s nothing to see.”

Jamison shook her head. “No, Amos is right. There are no marks on the drywall. Yet the table is set next to the bed. If there was a struggle the table would almost certainly have been knocked back against the wall and a mark would have been left.” She looked at Decker. “This was all staged. The table was turned upside down and the lamp smashed over it. Someone knocked on her door and she answered it. She was taken and the room later wrecked to make it look like a fight had happened.”

“That’s how I see it,” agreed Decker.

“But why would they do that?” asked Mars.

“Because they didn’t want us to know that Davenport knew the person who took her,” replied Decker.

Jamison snapped her fingers and said, “At that hour she wouldn’t have let anyone in her room she didn’t know. That’s why there was no forced entry.”

“Right,” said Decker, his gaze still swiveling around the room.

Mars said admiringly, “Damn, you figure all that out ’cause you got a perfect memory?”

“No, I figured all that out because I was a cop for twenty years and know what to look for.”

Mars looked at Jamison. “And you’re good at this too.”

She smiled. “Amos has rubbed off on me.”

“No,” said Decker. “You see things, Alex. Sometimes you see more than me.”