Brett Battles - Little Girl Gone

“At the expense of someone else’s.”

She said nothing for a moment, then, “Did they really kill Anthony?”

“Well, tell me this? Was Anthony the kind of person you’d think might take his own life?”

“Suicide? No way.”

“Then, yeah. They killed him.”

“But why would they do that?”

“I thought maybe you could tell me.”

“I have no idea.”

“None at all?”

“No.”

“You did say he was with Elyse when they took her.”

She thought for a moment. “Yeah. Maybe he tried to stop them. I don’t know.”

“Ryan and Aaron, were they like you? Doing jobs to get their names cleared?”

“We never talked about it, but I don’t think so.”

By then they had transitioned from the 405 to the northbound I-5. If they kept going they’d soon be out of L.A., on their way to Bakersfield. No longer worried she’d jump out, Logan exited the freeway, then reentered it going south, taking them back the way they’d come.

“Tell me about when she disappeared,” he said.

“I already told you I wasn’t there.”

“But you knew about it.”

“Only after it happened. Anthony picked her up, and they went out to dinner. An hour or so later, Ryan came over and told me she wouldn’t be coming back, and I had to play dumb, act like she’d gone up to her grandfather’s as planned.”

“How long were you supposed to stay in the apartment?”

“Until the end of the month. I asked Ryan what I should do when the police started looking into where she’d gone. He said there would be no police. I was just supposed to tell anyone who asked that I’d heard her grandfather had gotten ill, and that she’d decided to stay up there a little while.”

“Then why were your bags packed tonight? It’s only been two days.”

“Are you kidding me? I didn’t sign up to be involved in a kidnapping. Besides, when I woke up this morning, Ryan’s place was empty. That completely freaked me out, and I knew it was time for me to leave.”

He was confused. “Then why didn’t you take off right away?”

She laughed to herself and shook her head. “They owed me money. I thought maybe I could get it and pretend everything was fine, then leave.”

Plausible, but it didn’t quite add up. “But you were scared when you got back to your apartment. You even told me they were going to kill you.”

She fell silent again. This time he was content to let her stay that way as long as she needed. Turned out, it lasted almost all the way back to the Sepulveda Pass.

“They have this place in Westchester, a house they rent, I guess,” she finally said. “A few times Mr. Andrews would want to talk with me directly. That’s where we’d meet. It was also where I went to get my money every week. I had heard Ryan say he was supposed to meet Aaron and Mr. Andrews there this evening. So I waited until the end of the day, then went over. No one was around, so I waited in my car, out of sight. When I finally saw them arrive, I gave them ten minutes, then went back to the house. But before I got to the front door, I passed by one of the bedroom windows, and heard Aaron and Mr. Andrews talking inside. I stayed there long enough to learn they’d never intended for me to stay the rest of the month. That had just been a lie to keep me someplace easy to find.” Logan could feel her gaze on him. “Mr. Andrews said someone would ‘take care’ of me tonight. That’s why I was so scared.”

“What’s the address of the house?”

After she gave it to him, he pulled out his phone and called his father.

“I need Dev to get a few more guys,” he said.

“More?” his dad asked. “Uh, okay. How soon?”

“Now. We’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

“ We’ll? ”

“Yeah,” Logan said, then hung up.

“Wait,” Angie said. “You’re not taking me to my car?”

“You really think that’s a smart idea? Someone else could be waiting there for you. I think it’s better if I put you someplace where they can’t find you.”

Of course, that wasn’t his only reason.

She didn’t look particularly happy, but he didn’t care.

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.