Devil s Due Page 0,33

a sturdy, waterproof sports model. No reason at all for her alarm bells to be clanging. He was nothing but vanilla, through and through.

He said, "It's my wife, Susannah. She, ah, she's missing. I mean, she didn't come home from work on Thursday. I went crazy looking for her."

"And you went to the police." Lucia held up Welton Brown's card.

Leonard Davis nodded. "Sure. The next morning, when I couldn't find her at any of the usual spots."

"And Detective Brown recommended you come to us?"

He didn't answer.

"Leonard," she said, and drew his eyes. "Tell me exactly why the police don't think she was abducted. You know I can find out with one phone call if I have to."

He looked down at his cross-trainers. "She might have taken some clothes."

"Money? Did she take cash?"

His hands washed each other, slowly. "She used her ATM card twice that night. But these carjacking guys, they do that, right? They make you get money out of the ATM. That's what happened. They made her do it."

"Does she have a cell phone?"

"Yes. It's off."

"And her car? Has it been spotted at all?"

"No. What about a chop shop? Maybe they cut it up for parts." Lucia wondered if he was thinking about the same thing happening to his missing wife.

"It's possible," she said. "The police have this information on file, if you gave it to them. They'll keep it in the database, and if anything turns up, they'll reactivate the case. It isn't that they don't necessarily believe you, Mr. Davis, it's that there isn't much to go on in this particular instance. You understand, don't you? The police have to focus on crimes that have definitely occurred, not ones that might have happened. The facts you've laid out for me could involve a woman who's gone missing, or a woman who doesn't want to be found."

Davis fidgeted, fingers pulling at the seams of his blue jeans. There were fading bruises on his knuckles, and she focused on them for a second before flicking her attention back to his shadowed face.

"I believe she's missing," he said. "I believe somebody took her and made her get that money. I want you to help me find her."

She sat back, considering him, Welton Brown's card cool between her fingers. Omar was still lounging in the corner, looking as if he was paying no attention, but intent on every movement.

Something was bothering her, but she couldn't put her finger on it. As she thought it over, trying to run it down, her cell phone rang.

"Excuse me," she said, and stood up to walk to a far corner, her back to Davis. Omar would be watching. Not much risk involved.

"Yo." Jazz. "Leonard Davis has two complaints against him for spousal abuse. KCPD has been to his house plenty of times. Sounds like a lively place."

"Have you talked to your friend Detective Brown recently?"

"Welton? No. Why?"

"This guy's carrying his card."

"Probably filed a missing persons on his wife. Ten to one, he's buried her in the backyard. Thinks he's clever. Brown may be using us to keep him busy while he does a murder investigation. That would be his style."

"I don't appreciate having my time wasted."

"Think of it as becoming a cog in the great wheel of justice."

Lucia said something pithy in Spanish, which was a waste, since Jazz hardly spoke a word. "So why would this guy engage with us, especially for money?"

"Makes him look honest when they dig his wife up from the melon patch."

Lucia turned slightly and glanced over her shoulder. Davis was leaning back now, straightening his baseball cap with his right hand.

And something clicked. Something she was sure Welton Brown must have noticed, as well.

"Keep digging," she told Jazz. "I don't mean in the melon patch."

"Funny."

She ended the call and walked back, slid into the seat and gave him a cool, professional smile.

"How'd you get the bruise on your hand, Mr. Davis?" she asked. He looked down and instinctively turned it palm upward, hiding the damage. "It looks like you got it about the time your wife dropped out of sight."

He didn't glance up at her. She saw the tension in him and felt a sudden shift in the room, as if gravity had subtly altered.

"I got into a fight," he answered.

"Let me put this to you as strongly as I can, Mr. Davis," Lucia said. She deliberately dropped her voice, slowed it, held his eyes with her own. "If you hurt your wife and she is in hiding, I