The Goliath Run, page 11
“You guys are detectives then? What have you found out?”
“We talked to the manager of the car service. The car isn’t back.”
“It’s him,” Rachel said. “It’s that fucking driver.” She indicated the door just taken by the uniforms. “I told them that.”
“Yeah, and they told us,” Bell said. “We’re checking him out. Sean McIlroy, right? You recently gave him notice?”
“That’s what this is about,” she said. “That vindictive bastard took my daughter.”
“You might very well be right,” Bell said.
“Then why isn’t that man in custody?” the brunette demanded.
Bell looked at her, wondering if the Botox had seeped into her brain. “We don’t know where Mr. McIlroy is at this time.” He turned back to Rachel. “As of right now we don’t have the car and we don’t have McIlroy and we don’t have your daughter. We do know that McIlroy was bonded, which means he doesn’t have a record and that he’s not a registered sex offender. If he did this, we should hope that he’s just, you know—teaching you a lesson, in his mind anyway. And maybe after money.”
“What kind of person would do that?” Rachel asked.
“What do you know about him?” Olson asked. “Did you interact with him at all?”
“Not really,” Rachel said. “Just to say hello once in a while. My husband thinks he’s a boozer.”
Olson glanced at Bell; McIlroy’s boss had suggested the same thing.
Rachel pulled a cellphone from her pocket and walked away as she punched in a number. She stood looking out a bay window for a moment before turning back to them. “Why doesn’t she answer her phone?”
Olson walked over. “Your daughter has a phone with her?”
“Of course,” Rachel said. “It goes right to voicemail. Which means he turned it off. Or maybe he destroyed it.”
“Do you tell the officers she has a phone?” Olson asked.
“No. I didn’t think to.”
“They didn’t ask?”
“No.”
“All right,” Bell said. “We need the phone number, we need the server and the account number. We can trace the phone.”
“Even if it’s turned off?”
“It might get turned on,” Olson said. “Can you give us that information?”
While she went into another room Bell looked at the brunette. “Friend of the family?”
“Probably Rachel’s dearest friend.”
“Your name?”
“Lila DiMaggio.”
“Related to the Clipper?”
“Clipper?” she asked. “You mean like a barber?”
“Never mind.” Bell indicated their surroundings. “Where’s the husband?”
“He’s in Wyoming.” The brunette was quite dramatic, in her body language, her manner of speech. “But on his way home as we speak. He’s a very famous person, you know.” She glanced toward the other room, then leaned close to Bell and whispered. “And they’re very well off. That’s what this is about, if you ask me. This driver wants money. Which is a good thing, right? I mean, as opposed to it being a sex crime or something like that.”
Before Bell could respond Rachel returned with the paperwork on the daughter’s phone. Olson took it from her and sat down at the island with his cell to call it in. Bell watched as he poured himself a cup of coffee and took a scone from the box while he waited for someone in the tech department. Bell turned to Rachel. Her lips were tight, her breathing measured; he could see that she was doing her utmost to keep it together.
“I want you to tell me what happened when you gave McIlroy his notice. What he said, how he acted. Anything you remember.”
“He asked for another chance,” she said. “And when I said no, he said I wasn’t being fair.”
“Was he pissed off?” Bell asked. “Raising his voice? Did you feel threatened?”
“He was more whiny than pissed off. Like the world was against him. One of those guys.”
One of those guys, Bell thought. Those guys don’t usually abduct children. They’re more likely to be found on a barstool somewhere, telling their tale of woe to anybody who will listen. But Bell couldn’t know about this guy Sean McIlroy. There were exceptions to every rule.
At the island Olson hung up his phone. He sat there with his coffee. Obviously he was okay with Bell doing the dirty work. Bell turned to Rachel again.
“All right, there’s something we need to cover here,” he said. “I apologize in advance but I have to ask. Is everything okay with you and your husband?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Is there a chance that your daughter might be with your husband?” Bell paused. “It happens sometimes, when couples aren’t getting along.”
“This isn’t one of those times, detective,” she said coldly. “Sam’s in Wyoming. He announced three days ago he’s running for the United States Congress. I’m not sure when he would find time to abduct our daughter, even if we were having problems, which we are not.”
“Okay,” Bell said.
Olson’s phone rang and he picked it up.
“Yeah?” he said and then listened. “No shit? We’re on our way.”
He hung up and looked at Bell. “They found the car. Parking lot near the Williamsburg Bridge.”
Rachel moved toward Olson, her bottom lip quivering. She wanted him to tell her more and when he didn’t, she asked. “Vanessa?”
“No,” Olson said. He looked at Bell. “But they found the driver. He’s not our guy.”
“Why not?”
“They found him in the trunk.”
TWENTY-FIVE
Sean McIlroy sat in the back seat of the cruiser, looking like a whipped dog. He was dirty and ashamed and a little hungover. And he was genuinely worried about the kid, Bell could see. At least he had that going for him. Of course, there was still a chance he was in on it, but Bell was inclined to think otherwise. He and Olson were sitting up front. Forensics was over at the limo, fifty yards away, dusting for prints, looking for hairs, threads, blood. Anything and everything.
“Driscoll,” Sean said, finally remembering the last name. “Bill Driscoll.”
“Where’d you meet him?” Olson asked.
“Hamilton Tap House.”
“On Sutherland?”
“Yeah.”
“When?”
“Maybe two weeks ago,” Sean said, thinking on it. “I stop at the Tap, every now and again, and one day—”
“You’re there every day,” Bell told him. “According to your boss.”
“So I frequent the place. Never knew that to be a crime. Anyway, him and I started shooting pool one day. He’s an electrician, in town working on some big renovation project on the waterfront. Working at night because there’s, like, people there during the day. Office workers.”
“You and this Driscoll became drinking buddies,” Olson said.
“I wouldn’t say we’re buddies,” McIlroy said. “I told you I just met the guy.”
“Was he buying?” Bell asked.
“What?”
“Was he buying the beer?”
“I guess so,” McIlroy said. “I mean, I guess he bought more than I did. He had lots of cash on him. Those tradesmen make a good fucking living, with the overtime and all that. So yeah, he liked to spend it.”
“He tell you where he was from?”
“Buffalo. Big Bills fan, said he has season tickets.”
Olson was writing everything down. Bell was going to be surprised to find out that a Bill Driscoll had season tickets for the Bills.
“What happened today, Sean?”
“Today,” he began. “Well, I stopped in for a beer around lunch. And he comes in, maybe two o’clock or so, and we have a couple. Shooting the shit, you know. And he tells me he’s got a package coming down from Buffalo, and could I give him a ride to get it? I’m kinda reluctant because it’s the company’s car and all but I say what the hell. Do a guy a favor, right?”
“What time is this?”
“Right around three. I know, cuz I pick the kid up at four and I was thinking I had time to get the car, take him across town and make it back in time.”
“Three o’clock,” Bell said. “How many beers did you have?”
“I don’t know. Two or three.”
“Bullshit,” Bell said. “You were at the bar three hours. Three beers an hour; I’m going to say nine, minimum. And then you get behind the fucking wheel.”
“I know my limits.”
Bell glanced at Olson for a moment. This guy was less likely a suspect every minute. “All right, what happened?”
“I’m taking him down to the place to get his package. He says it’s like a courier depot in Williamsburg. So we get there and he tells me to pull in beside this old warehouse, and there’s nothing there. No sign or anything. So I’m, like, this is the place? And he sticks a gun in my face. Puts me in the trunk, wraps my hands and feet with duct tape and stuffs a rag in my mouth, tapes that too.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing,” McIlroy said. “I asked him what the hell was going on and he told me to shut up. Then he stuffed the rag.”
“Then what?”
“Then we’re driving. He knows exactly where he’s going because we stop and I hear the door open and I hear him talking to the kid.”
“What did he say?”
“I couldn’t hear too good from the trunk, but he says my name and something about me being sick and then he says something, I think, about they have to meet the kid’s mother somewhere. I’m not sure about that part. I was kind of disoriented, locked in there.”
“And drunk,” Bell reminded him.
“I wasn’t fucking drunk,” McIlroy said.
“Keep going.”
“So then we’re driving again, and I can’t hear nothing, and after a little while we stop, and I hear them get out and I hear them talking and she’s, like, asking something and then I can’t hear fuck all. Like they’re too far away. And a few minutes later we drive away again, but not far, like maybe a hundred yards, two hundred yards. And then we park and that’s it. He’s gone and I’m there in the fucking trunk.”
“But he’s alone then,” Bell said. “The last time he parked?”
“Seemed like it. I only heard the one door.”
Now Olson turned in the seat. “What did you hear when he took her out of the car? Did he put her in another vehicle?”
“Not sure.”
“What did you hear?”
“Something kinda weird, like one of those roller things in a factory, you know to move boxes and shit.”
“Were you inside a building?”
“How the fuck would I know if I was inside a building? I was inside a trunk.”
Olson glanced at Bell, shook his head. “What kind of gun was it?”
“I don’t know. It was black.”
“Revolver or automatic?”
“I don’t know guns. It was big and it looked like it could put a big hole in my head.”
Bell started the car. “Okay, we’re taking you to the station. We need a description of this Driscoll character, and we’ll need you to look at some pictures.”
“Pictures of who?” McIlroy asked.
Bell shrugged. “Sex offenders, kidnappers, rogue electricians with tall tales. You’d better be telling the truth, Sean. And you’d better hope we find that girl alive.”
TWENTY-SIX
Bell called the mother from the station and told her what he knew. He also told her they’d issued an amber alert. He didn’t have anything encouraging to say to her, so he didn’t try. He hung up and got a coffee from the machine. Sean McIlroy was downstairs with Olson and a sketch artist, conjuring up a portrait of the guy calling himself Bill Driscoll. After that they’d show him some mug shots but Bell wasn’t holding out much hope there. He was going through the registry when Olson came up from below.
“How’s our boy doing?”
“We have a sketch,” Olson said. “Looks a little like Curly from the Three Stooges.”
Bell shook his head.
“You think he’s in on it?”
“McIlroy?” Bell said. “He couldn’t plan a game of solitaire.”
“Doesn’t mean he wasn’t an accomplice. A dupe.”
“He’s a dope, I don’t know about dupe.”
Olson indicated the laptop. “Anything?”
“A number of Driscolls, William,” Bell said. “And a few sex offenders. One in New Mexico, seventy-two years old. Another in Florida but he’s black. Other than that, we have some dealers, dopers, bikers, scammers. None of them fit. None of them look like Curly.”
“Could be a first-timer,” Olson said.
“Always that chance,” Bell agreed. “Let’s face it: the guy’s name is not Bill Driscoll. He’s not going to go to all this work and then tell McIlroy his real name. And I still say it’s not a sex crime.”
“What is it?”
“Given the principals, money or politics,” Bell said. “Take your pick. Either way, I hope it means the girl is still alive.” He looked up to see one of the techies crossing the room toward them, a short woman with red hair.
“We found the girl’s phone,” the techie said.
“Where is it?” Bell asked.
“That’s the tricky part.”
“Why is it tricky?” Olson asked.
“Because it’s moving.”
Vanessa Jackson’s cellphone was indeed moving. Or at least it was moving again. It had gone from the city to Philadelphia and stalled there for an hour and for that time Bell had feared that it had been dumped somewhere, or that something worse had gone down. However, while the server was trying to pinpoint the location it started again and was now traveling steadily west. The FBI was involved now, and they were following the signal too, both in a cyber and literal manner. A half-dozen agents sat around a computer screen in the Philadelphia office, while a van with an additional four agents drove across the state of Pennsylvania, waiting for the phone to stop again. Right now they were on Route 30, twenty miles east of York. It was estimated that the phone was moving at about fifty miles an hour.
“The phone was off before,” Bell said. “Now it’s on or they couldn’t track it. Why is it on?”
He was sitting in Captain Gardner’s office, with Olson and the red-haired woman and the captain himself. The woman’s name was Lynn. After nobody introduced her, Bell had finally asked.
“He turned it on?” Olson suggested.
“Why would he do that?”
“I don’t know,” Bell admitted. “Maybe she turned it on. Maybe he doesn’t know she has it? How many ten-year-olds have cellphones?”
“A lot more that you might think,” Lynn said.
“If she still has the phone, why isn’t she using it?” Olson said.
“She could be tied up, or drugged, or otherwise incapacitated.”
“Or dead,” Olson suggested.
“God, but you’re depressing,” Bell said.
Olson indicated the laptop. “The FBI can’t get a plate number?”
“The science isn’t that precise,” Lynn said. “We can’t tell which car the phone is in. If it stops we can pinpoint it, at a house or whatever. But for now, it’s very general. We know the area and we know it’s moving so we assume it’s in a vehicle.”
The captain indicated the screen and looked at Bell. “No Driscolls in that area, with a record?”
Bell shook his head. “This guy isn’t Driscoll anyway. No way he used his real name.”
“That name,” Lynn said. “Something about it, I don’t know, sounds too familiar. Did you guys Google it?”
“No,” Olson said. “We didn’t try Facebook or Twitter either.”
Ignoring his tone, Lynn opened another engine on the laptop and entered the name. After scrolling down a moment, she smiled. “You know O. Henry?”
“It’s a chocolate bar,” Olson said.
“Philistine,” she said. “He was a short story writer. Gift of the Magi? Well, he wrote a story called The Ransom of Red Chief. About two guys in the nineteenth century who kidnap a boy. Kid turns out to be a holy terror and the kidnappers have to pay the parents to take him back. One of the kidnappers was Bill Driscoll.”
“Well,” the captain said. “We have a literary type on our hands.”
“This Henry guy still alive?” Olson asked.
“No, he’s not,” Lynn replied. “Let’s hope the girl is.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
When Sam arrived in New York, he went straight to the Plaza, where Bill Ford was waiting. Bill had heard about the change in plans from Molly and called while Sam was still in the air, asking him to stop by.
“I need to get home,” Sam had told him.
“Come by here first.”
Bill was in the penthouse suite, sitting with his feet up, a platter of fruit on the table beside him, Rush Limbaugh on the TV calling Nancy Pelosi a liar over something. Bill wore wrinkled cotton pants and a golf shirt. Sam entered and looked around. Bill read his mind, not a tough chore in this case.
“There’s booze over there.” He turned the TV off. “If you need it.”
Sam poured himself a healthy slug of single malt and came over to sit down. Taking a drink, he looked around. The place was massive, with twelve foot-ceilings and a view of the park. The furniture was chocolate brown, the carpet beige.
“That’s tough news about your daughter,” Bill said.
Sam had a drink and nodded. He was looking at a painting on the wall, a print of a Native American sitting on his pony on the plains somewhere. It might have been Wyoming. The man was looking off in the distance, where a locomotive was crossing the prairie, a long plume of white smoke trailing from the engine. The painting was meant to be allegorical, Sam supposed.
“What’s the thinking on it?” Bill asked.
“If some sexual deviant grabbed her, the outlook is not good,” Sam said, still considering the painting. “That’s pretty much a given in these cases. But if it’s about money, they’ll keep her alive.”
“What if it’s neither?”
