Thirty minutes later, she pulled up to his hotel in Oldsmar. Through the front windows he could see guests enjoying the complimentary happy hour. She still hadn’t responded to his offer.
“So what do you want to do?” he asked.
“I need to think about it,” she said.
He took that as a no, and climbed out. It was Beth’s show, and he had to play by her rules. He had the hotel door open when she called out to him.
“I’ll call you in an hour.” Then she added, “Promise.”
He grabbed a cold beer on the way up to his room. As he keyed his door, his cell phone vibrated. He’d gotten a text from Nicki. Her CSI class had researched the other kidnapping victims, and she wanted to share their findings. The beer could wait, and he put it in the fridge before calling her.
“Are you still in Tampa working the case?” the teenager asked.
“Yes, indeed. Guess who I joined forces with? Your aunt Beth.”
“That’s so cool. I bet you guys make a great team.”
“We’re trying. So what did your class find?”
“You’re going to like this. We checked to see how many of the victims were involved in community service, just like you asked us. It turns out all of them were. They did volunteer work for the handicapped and all sorts of other neat stuff. I put a list together, and emailed it to you.”
“Hold on a second. Let me see if I got it.”
He retrieved his laptop from the wall safe. Booting it up, he went into his inbox and found Nicki’s email, which had been sent hours ago. It had an attachment, which he opened, and the victims list filled the screen. It was in chronological order, starting with the first victim and ending with the last. His eyes briefly touched upon each name.
Gloria Joiner* — Habitat for Humanity
Diane Clancy — Meals on Wheels
Angie Bracco — Guardian ad Litem
Torrie Walters — Bible School volunteer
Tarah Gray — Works with special needs kids
Phoebe Ellington — Trains service dogs
Kendra Mundy — Runs local civic association
Lisa Vondle — Neighborhood watch group
Lindsay Vanhoesen — Hospital volunteer
Amy Potter — Wildlife animal rescue
Lisa Catherine Tanner — Community activist
Skye Tanner — Volunteer with handicap riding program
Audrey Sipos—????
Picking up his cell phone, he resumed talking to Nicki. “I’m staring at your list right now. Your class did an awesome job.”
“Thank you. We couldn’t find out much about the victim in Gainesville, Audrey Sipos, except that she’s a nurse who lives by herself,” Nicki said.
“That’s already been done. Sipos is big on helping people. She even has an award named after her.”
“Wow. So all the victims were Good Samaritans.”
“That’s right. They share a behavioral trait. I’m sure there are others.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’d bet you a dollar that none of them has ever been arrested, or broken the law,” he said. “Good people tend to be good all the time.”
“That makes sense.”
“The first name on your list, Gloria Joiner, has an asterisk. Why’s that?”
“She was mentioned in a newspaper article that I found online,” Nicki said. “Her neighbors’ house was broken into, and she called the police, and helped get the burglar arrested. The newspaper called her a hero.”
The story had a familiar ring. Audrey Sipos had come to the aid of a girl being raped, and helped send her rapist to prison by testifying at his trial. Had Gloria Joiner testified at the burglar’s trial? It was another link that needed to be pursued.
“How long ago was this?” he asked.
“It happened ten years ago.”
“Did the article publish the burglar’s name?”
“Yep. Get this. His name was Charlie Bandit.”
They shared a laugh. He now had enough information to move the investigation forward. He thanked Nicki, and started to say goodbye.
“So what’s the deal with you and Aunt Beth?” the teenager said. “Are you going to start seeing each other again?”
“We haven’t discussed it,” he said.
“Do you want to?”
“I wasn’t the one who broke things off.”
He regretted the words the moment they came out of his mouth. They sounded bitter, and that wasn’t how he felt about his relationship with Beth. “I like your aunt a great deal,” he added. “Hopefully, she feels the same way about me. I’ve got to get back to work. Thanks again for the help.”
“Tell Aunt Beth I said hi,” Nicki said.
“I’ll do that,” he said, ending the call.
He drank his beer while studying the list. He hadn’t known that Elsie Tanner’s name was actually Lisa Catherine, and the name struck a nerve. He shut his eyes, and after a long reflective moment he realized where he knew her from. Twenty-five years ago, inside a cramped courtroom in Broward County, Lisa Catherine Tanner had been the star witness at his brother’s trial, and had helped send Logan away to prison.
Lancaster got on the Broward County Clerk of Courts website, and did a search on the name Charlie Bandit. Had Charlie had a lick of common sense, he would have changed his last name, or gotten into a different line of work. When no records came up, he did a second search, and typed in the name Charles Bandit. That proved to be a gold mine, with over a dozen case files appearing.
He read each one. Bandit had been born to steal; he started shoplifting as a teenager, and then he graduated to burglary. Each file contained a criminal affidavit, which had been written by the arresting officer. In several of the later files, the arresting officer had stated that Bandit was high on drugs, and had resisted arrest.
He found the case when Gloria Joiner had sicced the cops on Bandit. The arresting officer’s name was familiar, Frank Maraca. Years ago, Maraca’s wife had gotten sick, and several officers had subbed for him so Maraca could be with her at the hospital. He had been one of those officers, and hoped Maraca would remember him.
He called around to his cop friends and finally got Maraca’s number. He placed a call, and Maraca’s voice mail picked up.
“This is Frank. I’m busy right now. Leave a message and I’ll call you back.”
“Hey, Frank. This is a voice from the past, Jon Lancaster. I’m working a case in Tampa, and need to pick your brain. Call me when you get this. Later, man.”
The hotel’s business center was behind the front desk. It was empty, and he keyed the door and entered with his laptop tucked under his arm. The room contained a PC, and a printer. He powered up the printer, and connected his laptop through the hotel Wi-Fi. Then, he made copies of Nicki’s list. Her class had hit a home run, and he needed to share the information with Beth.
As he left the business center, he got a series of texts from his buddies in Key West. They had sent him photographs they’d taken while out snorkeling earlier in the day. There was also a message. Weather is here, wish you were beautiful.
“You bastards,” he said.
Behind the hotel was a smoking area. He went there and sat on an empty bench. He’d smoked as a cop before deciding it was slowing him down and he had to quit. But he still had the occasional craving, and he filled his lungs with secondhand smoke.
It felt good, and he slowly exhaled.
He looked through his buddies’ photographs. They had gone snorkeling at Fort Zachary Taylor beach on the southernmost tip of Key West, and the photos showed a school of dolphins playing offshore. It was here that the Atlantic Ocean met the Gulf of Mexico, and he’d always believed that the waters had a special power, and could soothe the most troubled soul. Closing his eyes, he imagined he was floating, with the sun burning his face. He could hear the gulls and the sounds of breaking waves but not cell phones or the annoying beeps of electronic devices summoning their owners to do their bidding. He was free of the constraints of modern life, and had never felt happier.