Missing: The Body of Evidence Read online

  ‘Good morning.’

  She carried on walking toward the offices. A glimpse at the reflection behind her on the glass door to the office showed her they were still watching her, which Nancy thought was odd. As the office door swung closed behind her, she looked over her shoulder. Logan was talking to Claire again, but both of them were glancing her way. Nancy had the distinct impression they had been talking about her, or at least talking about something they didn’t want her to hear. Nancy simply shrugged her shoulders, unloaded her purse onto her desk and went to the coffee machine.

  ‘Shame about Tracy,’ said Archie, a fellow detective.

  ‘Sure is.’

  ‘Even more of a shame about that janitor of yours.’

  Her coffee almost spilled as she spun around.

  ‘What shame?’

  ‘Found him last night in his car, under a bridge along the San Diego Freeway, with a bullet through his skull and a six pack on his lap.’

  ‘What, you found him?’

  ‘Nah, some passing driver called it in. Saw a flash of light and heard the shot. Poor bastard committed suicide.’

  ‘Time?’

  ‘Called in around ten-twenty-five.’

  ‘Who’s on the case?’

  ‘Nancy, my office,’ Logan interrupted, ‘and bring me the file on the professor.’

  Nancy scurried off to her desk and grabbed the file from her OUT tray. She rummaged in her purse for the copy of the report Tracy had given her and placed it in the file. The left side of her head ached and she felt a throbbing pain. Her fingers ran over the source of the pain. There wasn’t a bump, but where she had banged her head on the shower tiles hurt like hell.

  The door to Logan’s office was ajar. She tapped on the frosted glass, paused and walked in.

  ‘The professor’s file.’

  Nancy dropped it on the desk and sat down.

  ‘I don’t know what you have lined up for me today, but I have a doctor’s appointment at twelve-thirty.’

  He didn’t even glance at her, but picked up the report and opened it. Logan took Tracy’s report from the file and scanned the pages.

  ‘Why did Tracy give you this report?’

  The words to answer him, stuck in her throat. She was half expecting him to show some scepticism towards the spontaneous combustion theory, but sensed from the delivery of his question, that the interview was going to take a different direction. Her eyes rolled and a sigh escaped her lips.

  ‘Well, I’m waiting.’

  ‘Ask Tracy. I don’t know. I wasn’t expecting her to call. As far as I knew the case was closed.’

  He kept his head down, but threw her a look that, with the shadows from the lighting, gave him the appearance of an evil gargoyle.

  ‘When I ask a question, I expect an answer. So I’ll repeat, why did she give you this report?’

  Nancy was tired of playing games. Sucking up to the boss and skirting around subjects was becoming tedious.

  ‘Because like me; and unlike her boss, she’s not happy with the explanation that spontaneous combustion is the reason for the professor’s death. We both smell cover up. Okay?’

  ‘No, it isn’t okay. So explain it to me.’

  ‘It’s all too neat. Kelly had the opportunity, if not the motive. Kelly is connected to the professor through Astral Chemical, a company that doesn’t exist. The CIA had the professor’s DNA and fingerprints on file, so he comes under their radar. And, get this, the goons are running around convincing everyone, the coroner included, it’s a freak accident. Why? Now the janitor is dead. Perfect circle if you ask me. A little like the Lee Harvey Oswald scenario. All too well packaged to my way of thinking, hire a patsy hit man… then kill him.’

  Logan sat back, his expression one of thunder. She wondered if he ever lightened up.

  ‘Where were you last night... between say, ten and eleven?’

  Her cheeks flushed and her head pounded. She was in no mood for fencing with him, and fired back.

  ‘What’s that got to do with the price of fish?’

  She knew, as soon as the words slipped out, that she had stepped over the invisible line. He rose to his full height. His lips tightened and his pallor went to Defcon-one.

  ‘I’ll tell you where you were at, the janitor’s apartment block. Now stop dancing and tell me your movements and what you found.’

  Nancy tried to retrieve the situation. She felt like a schoolgirl, caught on camera smoking cannabis. Logan had more informants than a street cop and knew everything everyone was up to at any given time. There was no point skirting around the subject. Reluctantly, she decided to give him a potted version that the intrusion into her private life deserved.

  ‘I left the Porter Ranch Wal-Mart at ten, just as they were closing. Then I drove to the janitor’s apartment. It was empty. I questioned the woman from number five and she said he had moved out around two in the afternoon. Then I drove home. Why?’

  ‘So let’s get this right, I tell you the case is closed and you go sniffing around the apartment. What did you hope to achieve?’ He glanced at a map of Los Angeles on his wall. ‘I’m guessing you drove along Ronald Reagan Freeway.’

  ‘Yes, why?’

  ‘Because that’s where they found the janitor, under the bridge in his black Toyota, at the intersection with San Diego Freeway.’

  ‘Black Toyota?’

  Nancy felt as if a veil had dropped between her and Logan. She ran a picture through her mind of the black Toyota following her.

  ‘Was the janitor stalking you?’

  The question broke through the haze and started alarm bells ringing. Nancy was at a loss as to how to respond. She knew she hadn’t told anyone following her, and doubted he could read her mind. Instinct put her on alert as to how his question would have arisen. Logan sat down, picked up a pencil and began to chew on it, swivelling left and right in his chair and casting Nancy a stare that seemed to be drilling holes in her brain. She decided against revealing that she thought she had been followed and chose to answer his question with a question.

  ‘What are you saying? What makes you think he might have been stalking me?’

  Her heart pounded in her chest as if it were trying to find a way to get more oxygen. She tapped her fingers on the armrest. The palms of her hands felt moist. Logan snapped the pencil in half and tossed the halves into the wastebasket. He leaned forward, and she waited for a definitive answer.

  ‘That’s all for now, I have some cold case files I want you to go through. Claire will get them for you.’

  ‘Wait a minute; am I some sort of suspect, Archie said it was suicide?’

  ‘So it would seem.’

  What, it seems that I’m a suspect, or it seems like he committed suicide? Nancy realized her thoughts went one question too far and that of course she couldn’t be a suspect. She wondered if maybe he was toying with her mind to teach her a lesson for snooping after he had told her the case was closed.

  ‘Did he leave a suicide note?’

  ‘Not one I’d recognize as a suicide note. Before you leave, can you tell me if you write shorthand?’

  Shorthand?

  He stared as if he had thrown a sneaky hardball and awaited the result.

  ‘No. Who’s on the case?’

  ‘Kyle.’

  Chapter 23

  The pile of cold case files on Nancy’s desk, looked as though they would keep her occupied until retirement. Her fingers itched to phone Kyle and to ask what he had found while investigating Kelly’s suicide. Something at the back of her mind told her to butt-out and not to call him on his cell phone.

  She wished that she had phoned in sick, to save her the embarrassment of the meeting with Logan. With the time approaching eleven-thirty, Nancy picked up her purse and headed to her car, to set off for her doctor’s appointment. It was nagging away at her mind, why Logan would ask if Kelly had been stalking her, when she knew that she was the one that had a fixation. A question in the opposite dire
ction would have been more appropriate in the circumstances. Thoughts of the black Toyota where they had found Kelly’s corpse, freaked her out, but she put it down to coincidence. Her mind turned to David. She hoped he wasn’t locked away somewhere waiting for his dad to return. Logan was talking to Archie in reception. Nancy stood behind them and cleared her throat.

  ‘Ahem. Sorry to interrupt, I have to be going for my doctor’s appointment. I was just wondering; has anyone located David, Kelly’s son? Maybe Kelly has him locked up somewhere.’

  ‘According to his attorney, David’s in a secure institution... Anything else?’

  He didn’t wait for a reply and turned to carry on his conversation with Archie.

  Nancy huffed and pushed hard on the swing doors to open them and headed down the stairway to her car. Nancy yanked the handle to open her car door, climbed onto her seat and slammed her door closed. But all the slamming of the door did was to close her rage in the car with her. Nancy turned the key in the ignition, engaged first and pulled out of the parking lot, belting up as she drove. All she wanted was to put some miles between her and the office. Two, three, four, five, she raced through the gears and stepped on the gas pedal.

  Traffic was heavy, but she managed to use her knowledge of the back streets of LA to arrive at the doctor’s on time. The receptionist signed her in, and she headed for the waiting room. Her head felt like it might explode as a migraine developed. Her name echoed over the public address and she entered the doctor’s room.

  ‘Take a seat. Dear God, you look dreadful.’

  ‘Migraine. It’s settling down now.’

  The doctor accessed her records on his computer.

  ‘How long have you suffered having the migraines?’

  ‘On and off ever since I ran into that bough of a tree a few weeks ago. Sometimes I’ve been getting migraines and sometimes just headaches.’

  ‘You had a concussion, it says here from your hospital report, but the X-rays didn’t show any damage. Let’s take a look.’

  He walked up behind her and inspected her scalp.

  ‘Hmm, there’s some redness. It should have cleared up by now.’

  ‘Yeah, but I banged my head when I slipped in the bath tub yesterday and then today I had an accident in the shower cubicle and banged it again.’

  ‘How have you been in general since you came out of the hospital?’

  ‘Fine... okay no, not really fine.’ She let a sigh escape her lips. ‘I keep getting overly emotional and cranky with people. And, I keep having dreams I can remember in detail. Then there’s the asthma attack I had this morning in my sleep.’

  ‘Asthma attack? Tell me what happened.’

  Nancy relayed all the details as he walked back to his desk and sat down. When she had finished, he sat back and smiled.

  ‘I wish I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard that story. I wouldn’t worry about it. Look it up in any dream book. It means you’re in a situation in life you need to get out of, so they say. If it carries on, I can recommend a good therapist.’

  ‘A shrink... no thanks.’

  ‘What are those blotches on your arms?’

  Nancy glanced at her arms.

  ‘Oh those; scalded myself in the shower when I fell. It stings like hell, but I’ll be fine.’

  ‘All the same I’ll write a script for some cream and tablets for the migraine. Wait here?’

  Before he left the room, she detected a look of concern as he glanced her way. She dwelt on his explanation for the dream. Maybe she did need to talk to someone, she thought. But there again, thoughts of lying on a therapy couch and baring her soul didn’t appeal to her. If she did have a problem with the direction her life was taking, she reckoned she had the strength to find her own solution.

  The doctor re-entered the room and handed her a sheet of paper and a prescription.

  ‘I’ve managed to find a cancellation on Monday for you to have an MRI scan as a precaution.’

  Her jaw dropped and her mind raced over why he wanted the scan. Why the urgency? What seemed like a million questions ran through her mind, but not one of them worked their way out into words. The worry must have been evident. He placed his hand on her shoulder.

  ‘Don’t worry; it really is just a precaution. All the details are on the letter. In the meantime, I need you to rest. I hope you have nothing energetic planned for the weekend?’

  I hope he doesn’t mean sex. ‘No, nothing energetic.’

  ‘Good, that will be all.’

  He walked with her to the door. The journey to her car and getting in was a blur. She ran her fingers over the source of the pain on the left side of her head, it was still sore to the touch. Visions of her having a surgeon drilling into her head flashed though her mind. A shiver ran through her body and she shrugged her shoulders. She looked at the appointment letter and the realization struck her that she suffered a fear of enclosed spaces. Oh my God, how am I going to get through this?

  Chapter 24

  Nancy hoped to put a positive spin on the rest of her day, to prepare for her weekend away with Kyle. All thoughts of hospitals were put on hold, after she decided a little shopping therapy was in order during her lunch break. There wasn’t time to go mall shopping so she headed for Bittersweet Butterfly, on Micheltorena Street, to find some sexy lingerie to wear. She tried to convince herself it was to make her feel good, which it would, but she knew deep down it was a surprise for Kyle, after the way she had treated him.

  The shop didn’t feel sleazy in the way some lingerie outlets did. They sold everything from potted plants, to local handmade jewellery and she loved the pink facade in the style of an age gone by that mall stores didn’t seem to be able to capture. Nancy parked outside, climbed out of her car and entered the shop. She bought all her scented candles from here, and the occasional lotions. It seemed to be a favourite stop for boyfriends and husbands looking for something special for their women. Nancy picked out a sexy lingerie outfit and bought it, sure in the notion it would please Kyle. She prayed it would make up for all the crap she had given him.

  The shopping diversion had worked as she started to feel in the vacation spirit on the drive back to the office. Nancy placed her cell phone on the passenger seat, hoping on hope that Kyle would call, but he didn’t. Kyle’s SUV was in the parking lot and she parked in the bay behind him. Knowing he was in the office put a spring in her step.

  ‘Hi, Claire.’

  ‘Hi, hon. How’d the appointment go?’

  ‘Don’t ask.’ she said and smiled. ‘I have to go for an MRI scan Monday afternoon. Just as a precaution he said.’

  ‘What, for these headaches you’ve been having lately?’

  ‘Yeah, probably nothing, but it scares the crap outta me.’

  ‘Well, good luck, hon. We’ve just had a visit from internal affairs. Do you know what’s going on? The office emptied rapidly when they arrived.’

  ‘Not got a clue, nothing to do with me; is Kyle in the office?’

  ‘Just arrived.’

  Nancy pushed through the swinging doors. Sure enough, the office was empty. Kyle’s coat was over the back of his chair, so she guessed he was with Logan. There were raised voices at times, emanating from behind the closed door to Logan’s office, but she could not make out what they were shouting.

  An hour passed by, before Kyle surfaced. She was dying to ask him about Kelly, but Logan called her to his office.

  Kyle looked sheepish as he passed her and whispered.

  ‘Don’t tell him about our weekend away.’

  His comment puzzled her. Alarm bells began to ring about the visit from internal affairs, but she couldn’t make a connection.

  ‘Sit down.’

  Nancy did as ordered and looked around the room. She could feel his eyes staring at her. It could only have been a few seconds, but the silence seemed to go on forever. She broke the silence.

  ‘Well?’

  She looked at him. He sat with his arms folded in
a standoffish manner.

  ‘The appointment?’

  Relief that the appointment was all he was asking about took her by surprise. He wasn’t one to ask about personal problems.

  ‘Oh, that, fine. I have to go back for some tests on Monday afternoon.’

  ‘You will be working in the morning?’

  She didn’t know if it was a question or an order.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good.’

  He started to stroke his fingers at the side of his lips, which was a new one on her. He tended to fire from the hip, this was the first time she had seen him do pensive.

  ‘Relationships,’ he said, in a sort of spluttering cough as if the words stuck in his throat. He sat back clasped his fingers and started twiddling his thumbs. He was clearly uncomfortable and used his elbows on the armrests to shuffle his backside on his seat.

  ‘And? Relationships?’ Nancy asked.

  He seemed to gather a head of steam at her prompt.

  ‘Relationships between colleagues and work don’t mix. I hear you and Kyle have been dating. It can lead to all kinds of problems.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like one partner covering up for the other; that kind of thing. Then there’s sticking their noses into cases that don’t concern them outside work, instead of concentrating on the work in hand.’

  Anger welled up inside her at the intrusion into her private life.

  ‘So, what are you saying, exactly? Do you mean colleagues can’t go for a friendly drink or for a meal as friends?’ The curtness and defiant way she delivered her question must have been obvious. He rose from his chair.

  ‘Friends, do you know what the definition is of a friend of the opposite sex?’

  No, but I’m sure you’ll tell me.

  ‘Well, I’ll tell you. A friend of the opposite sex is someone who wants to, but doesn’t have you in the sack yet, but dearly wants to step over the line. There is no such thing as a friend of the opposite sex. I’m saying, I don’t hold with relationships between colleagues and if it carries on between you two, one of you will be shipped out of here. Do I make myself clear?’