Buried: A Bone Secrets Novel Part 22

Chuck waved at him, and Michael tossed back a greeting as he strode through the lobby and pounded up the creaking wood stairs. He didn't want to stop to chat. He had one thing on his mind. Well, food and then one thing. Mouth watering, he fumbled to get his room key out of his shorts pocket and balance the food in one hand.

The door swung inward as he pushed his key into the keyhole.

Every sensor in his brain shot to high alert as he shoved the door completely open and stepped into the room. The empty room. He tossed the to-go boxes on the bed, scanning the small room. "Jamie?" The door to the bathroom was open. He checked the quiet shower.

"Jamie?"

Sweat started on the small of his back. She just stepped out for a minute.

He pushed aside the lace curtains of their window and scanned the hedged backyard. The rear gate in the hedge was open from the yard to the back alley, but the tables and chairs on the patio were empty. No tall women with long hair. All quiet.

Too quiet.

Michael thundered back down the stairs and into the lobby.

"You seen Jamie?" He shot the question at Chuck, who was straightening a shelf of books. Michael's chest heaved like he'd run a sprint. He slowed his breathing. Christ. Keep your head on straight.

Chuck stiffly turned his head. "No, she hasn't come down that I've seen. She got a phone call a while back. I put it through to her room, and it didn't ring back, so I a.s.sume someone answered up there."

"A call? Who was it? How long ago?" Michael barked.

Chuck looked thoughtful. "Maybe twenty minutes. Maybe a little more. I can only tell you that it was a male voice, and he asked specifically for Jamie Jacobs."

"Young voice? Old?" Michael's heart was doing flip-flops.

Chuck shrugged. "Neither?"

"Where's your phone system? It'll show the number of who called." Michael started for the man's office.

Chuck chortled. "I ain't got one of those fancy phone systems. Just the basics."

Michael froze. "No caller ID?" Seriously?

"Nope. None of that call-waiting stuff either. Always thought that was kinda rude."

Michael exhaled. "And she hasn't been downstairs?"

"I've been in and out of the back. I mighta missed her if she went through."

"You were here when I left twenty minutes ago."

Chuck nodded. "I've been doing some paperwork in the office. I try to keep an ear out for people coming through, but I don't hear footsteps so well these days. That's why I've got the bell on the desk."

Michael swallowed hard and scanned the room. The lobby was the old living room and dining room of the former house, with the reception desk tucked in the corner farthest from the front door. A small kitchen and Chuck's office were through the swinging door across the room. Horses could have pranced through the lobby and Chuck would have missed it if he'd been in the office.

"Mind if I look in the kitchen?" Michael pushed through the swinging door before Chuck could reply. A quick look in the adjacent office and the neat kitchen confirmed no Jamie. Sure enough, Chuck's phone looked straight out of the 1970s. Michael strode out the front door and stood on the wide wraparound porch, seeking any sign of her. Nothing. He stepped back inside and nearly ran over Chuck.

"What's wrong, son? You look like you're ready to strangle a cat."

"I can't find her." Understatement.

"Well. She can't have gone far. There's nowhere to go," Chuck said reasonably.

Michael shook his head. "No. She was waiting for me. She wouldn't have left." He checked the time. "I need to call Sheriff Spencer. This isn't right." He left Chuck standing in the lobby and pounded up the stairs. "Would you ask your first-floor guests if they've seen her?" he shouted back to Chuck.

Michael's bedroom door was still open. He looked inside again, hoping...still empty. He whirled around, moved into the hallway, and pounded on the other three doors in the hall, not waiting for someone to answer each one. One door opened and a middle-aged woman with thick eyegla.s.ses glanced out. She reminded Michael of an owl.

"Chuck?" she asked.

"Chuck's downstairs." Michael gestured at his open door. "I'm staying next door, and I'm looking for my girlfriend. Have you seen her?"

Annoyance crossed the owl's face, and her nose lifted into the air. "No. Not today. Last night, I heard her though. Last night...I heard both of you. I would have called Chuck, but I a.s.sumed he was asleep, and I figured it'd be rude to disturb his sleep." She shut the door.

"Ah...sorry about that," he said to the closed door. He pounded again on the other two doors. No answer.

"f.u.c.k." He dashed back down the stairs. His heart was doing a serious drumbeat in his chest, and it wasn't from all the stairmastering.

Chuck stood in the center of the lobby. "I asked. No one's seen her."

"How the h.e.l.l can she just leave and no one notice?" Michael yanked his phone from his pocket and dialed Sheriff Spencer.

"Well...both rooms down here were watching TV. Usually folks don't pay much attention to what other people are doing around here."

Bulls.h.i.+t. The townspeople had watched every step he and Jamie had made since getting to town. Someone had to have seen her.

"Spencer," the sheriff answered his call.

"Sheriff, this is Michael Brody. Jamie is missing." No point in mincing words.

"What?"

"We're at Chuck's place. I left to get dinner, I came back, and she's gone. Chuck said she got a phone call a while back from a man. f.u.c.k! I think he's got her." Michael's brain screamed as he voiced the thought. He'd been holding off, not giving credence to the theory, but now he'd said it out loud, and he couldn't think of anything else.

"Our tattoo man? Are you sure? Maybe she walked to the store. She's got to be somewhere. Did his phone show who called?"

"Guess how old the phone system is." Michael jogged out the front door and down the street to the little grocery, holding the phone to his ear. "I'm going to check the store, but I'm telling you, she wouldn't leave."

"I'm still at the Buell house. Somebody did a number on this kid. A f.u.c.king execution. One bullet to the back of the head. I've got a sobbing mama who wants to know why her son was killed, and I can't tell her I think he said the wrong thing to a stranger. I've got a female deputy on hug-the-mother duty, and she's starting to wear down from this woman's hysterics. State is still taking evidence from the garage, but it looks like a clean scene to me."

"Christ." Michael didn't want to think about a teenager collapsed on his garage floor and his frantic mother. He had Jamie on the brain, and there wasn't room for anything else. He threw open the door to the market and searched the few aisles for Jamie's black head.

Nothing.

"Help you?" asked a clerk as she leaned against the counter. She held a nail-polish brush in one hand, ready for action with her other hand in painting position on the counter. Her eyebrows had shot up as Michael abruptly entered the store. He didn't recognize the young woman from the day before.

"Seen a woman with long black hair come in during the last twenty minutes or so?"

The woman shook her head. "No one's been in for over an hour." Her hand still held the brush in midair. "You buying anything?"

"No."

"Okay." She focused on her nails and applied the brush.

Michael left. "She's not in there," he said into his phone. He looked up and down the street, pacing the sidewalk. He jogged across the road to get a better look to the south. The sun had just started to set on the late-summer night, and the dimming light made him strain his eyes to see into the gray shadows.

Where was she?

Spencer was speaking to someone in the background.

"Spencer."

"Yeah." The sheriff's distracted voice rang clear through the line.

"She's not at the store. I don't see her anywhere on the street."

"Did you call her cell?"

f.u.c.k! Why hadn't he done that? Michael jogged back toward Chuck's. "I will."

"Okay," said Spencer. "I'll send someone your way as soon as I have a free pair of hands."

Michael didn't want to pull help away from the teenager's murder. A few country deputies couldn't help him. "Just spread the word, tell Hove to have his guys keep an eye out."

"Done."

Michael hit End and immediately called Jamie's cell. The phone rang five times and dumped into voice mail. He hung up, disappointed that her voice mail was computerized instead of her own voice. He took Chuck's porch steps three at a time, flew through the door, and across the lobby. He raced up to the second floor. His door was still open from earlier. Stepping through the doorway, he nearly knocked over Chuck for the second time that day.

"I could hear a phone in here ringing a minute ago," Chuck said.

Jamie's phone?

Michael hit Send on his phone again. A delicate melody sounded from the nightstand. He yanked open the drawer and stared at a familiar iPhone.

She'd left her phone. Right next to her wallet.

Michael ended his call and dialed Mason Callahan.

The stretch of freeway between Mason's home and Portland was one straight, flat line. A boring line. If he pushed it, Mason could be in his office within fifteen minutes, depending on the traffic once he hit Portland. He was making excellent time, until he hit a traffic jam south of the city on the interstate and came to a complete stop. And sat.

And stewed.

Steaming, he mentally reviewed his interview with Fielding and conversation with Ray. Where was Hinkes? How could his information simply vanish?

f.u.c.k it.

Mason forced himself to face the one question he and Ray hadn't been able to voice out loud. Who'd made Hinkes's information vanish?

Files can be lost, mistakes can be made, but every bit of information on Hinkes was gone. That took some string pulling to accomplish. Somewhere, someone had dirty hands.

Maybe he was put in witness protection.

Mason nearly spit out the coffee he'd just sipped. Clearly, he was losing his mind from watching too much television. But he didn't like the other option, that someone with power had stuck his fingers into the police system and stirred. He hated that option. It took cooperation from his brothers in blue to make it happen. Mason knew some cops broke rules here and there. He'd pushed his own line a time or two. But to do his job well and keep his sanity, it took faith in the system. Faith that the system worked to put away the bad guys. And left them there.

Mason's faith was being rattled.

Who'd erased Gary Hinkes?

Gary Hinkes was the Tattooed Albino Man. Mason knew it in his gut. Now if only his gut would give him answers to his other questions.

What name was he using now? Who'd cleared his history and allowed him to kidnap and kill all those kids? And why the h.e.l.l would someone grab a group of kids? Talk about making it tough on yourself. Was the guy sick enough that he needed a group of kids? Or was just one kid the main focus and the rest got in the way?

It'd been the question asked for twenty years. All the parents had been thoroughly interviewed about who would want to harm their kid or hurt the parents in the process. The Brodys had seemed to be the biggest target with the father being a public figure. The senator's latest lead had turned out to be a bust with the death of his stalker ten years ago. The man they were hunting for was plainly alive.

Mason had talked with Hove in Eastern Oregon. The sergeant was giving plenty of consideration to Jamie's-and Mason's-theory that the same man had attacked her, wrecked her brother's home, and murdered the old Mexican.

Someone was cleaning up a loose end.

Chris Jacobs was that loose end.

But why now? Why hadn't Jacobs been targeted when he'd first returned? Someone had waited nearly twenty years to take out the kid and now was frantically burning a path to get at him. What had changed? Had Chris revealed that he remembered something? Something to make someone very nervous?

Or was it simply the exposure of the case? All those children's bodies coming to light? Was there a clue there that pointed at someone who the police had missed? Or was the Tattooed Man concerned the press coverage would stir up lost memories for Chris Jacobs?

Mr. Tattoo was taking huge risks to silence Chris Jacobs.

Somebody had big motivation.

Mason couldn't wait to get his hands on Somebody.

The traffic inched forward. His exit was still three miles away. At this rate, he should be back in the office by midnight. He glared at the man in the adjacent Prius yakking on his cell phone. Looking around, he saw two other drivers texting. Talking and texting while driving was illegal in Oregon...unless your job required it. Like delivery guys. Or police.

He crammed his Bluetooth in his ear. He hated the little earpiece. But not as much as the dorks who walked around with the plastic hanging out of their ears 24/7. He called Ray.

"Where are you?"

"Sitting motionless on I-5 watching the other a.s.sholes around me text on their phones."

"Wave your badge at them."

"Why?"

"They're gonna kill somebody someday by not focusing on the road."

"I'm gonna kill someone if this d.a.m.ned traffic doesn't start moving. Got anything new for me?"

"Yeah, heard back from my guy in the gang unit. They can't a.s.sociate the tattoos with anything they've seen before, so he's definitely doing his own thing. If he was trying to start something with the ink, it's not caught on."

Mason snorted. "Nothing like throwing a party and no one coming."