“Whom would she call? Or whom did she try to contact?”
“Well, it’s not the authorities. She’s called this number” —a string of numbers appeared on the screen— “six times and tried to send a few text messages. The calls didn’t connect, and the texts were intercepted.”
“Where does that area code go?”
“Would you believe Indiana?”
“What did she say?”
“Here it is,” Patrick said after a few more clicks of his keyboard.
“I NEED YOUR HELP. I THINK THEY KILLED DAD. THEY HAVE ME AND GORDY. YOU SAID TO ONLY CALL IF IMPORTANT. I DON’T WANT THEM TO KILL ME, AND I NEED TO GET GORDY TO A SAFE PLACE. CAN YOU TRACE THIS? I DON’T KNOW EXACTLY WHERE I AM.”
“She’s received an error message each time. Each message has been basically the same. Pretty soon the phone will die without a charge.” Patrick tilted his head toward my desk area. “I have you set up with a new phone. I was able to remotely switch all the storage on your phone and your cloud to this new one. Right now, your old phone is nothing more than our connection to Maples’s daughter.”
I took a drink of my coffee and considered Zella’s situation. As the warm liquid coated my tongue and throat, I mulled over the idea that we now had her kidnapped, as Lorna and Araneae had been. “If Lorna or Araneae would have had access to a phone, or thought they did, whom would they have called?”
“One of us.”
“Right. If the average person were taken and given access to a phone, whom would he or she contact?”
“If they believe they know someone who is capable of helping, they’d contact that person or persons. If not, I’d assume the police.”
Patrick’s train of thought was mirroring my own. “Now, Zella Keller is being held in an unknown place and she isn’t trying to contact the police or an emergency number. Instead, she’s trying to contact—”
“Someone she thinks will help,” Patrick interrupted.
“Who is that?”
“I can’t identify who, but I do have a where.”
We both looked up again at the overhead screen.
“Shit,” I said, “is that DC?”
“It is.”
“Who in the hell would Zella Keller know with a number linked to Indiana now located in DC?”
“That’s where I could use your help. I have the location of the device narrowed down to a city block, but that includes high-rise office and residential buildings.”
Putting my nearly empty cup on the desk, I sat forward and brought my computer to life.
As we both worked, I ran multiple searches. One was of the telephone number in question. Soon I was getting the last three months of data. The phone was a burner. Of course it was. However, it had been used with some regularity from around the country.
“Fuck,” I said. “That number was in Montana three weeks ago to a month.”
“No shit,” Patrick said. “I think we should cross-reference dates and locations. Ten bucks says this is Jettison.”
“How in the hell would Zella Keller know Jettison?”
“I’m not sure, but if she does, it’s a connection that I didn’t see coming.”
As I compiled the data for the program to accomplish what Patrick mentioned, he spoke. “Speaking of connections, last night, we had some success at Dino’s Liquor.”
“Some?”
“The Sparrows that accompanied Romero made the owner an interesting offer.”
I took a drink of my coffee. “Let me guess, help us or lose your business.”
“Something like that. And since the owner lost his nighttime cashier earlier in the day, the capos made a rather convincing argument. The problem is that the store’s security is ridiculously old. There’s a literal tape, and it’s been recorded over so many times, the quality is shit. That said, I’ve confirmed the presence of the black truck and a dark-haired man. He was the only one present.”
“Do we still believe that too is Jettison?”
“Other than the fact he’s officially dead, I do. And the good news is that as we speak, Dino’s Liquor Store is getting new security cameras.”
“And you’re sure the owner won’t inform the delivery person?”
“I’m not sure, but if the deliveries stop, we’ll know he did it, and then things won’t work out well for him or his business.” Patrick stood and stretched his arms over his head. “The circumstantial evidence connecting Andrew Jettison to the kidnappings, arms sales, and somehow Maples and Zella is stacking up.”
“It makes no fucking sense, but I agree.”
Patrick took a deep breath. “Is Lorna having any memories of the kidnapping?”
Numbers and codes were running in sequences upon my