In Desperation

“So did my Edgar. It was so beautiful. I sent my granddaughter in Hartford a picture.”

Galviera excused himself after his chair bumped Grandma Hartford’s chair. She’d used the nearest empty seat at his table for her purse and travel bag so stuffed with souvenirs it was close to tipping.

“Not a problem, dear.” The old girl gave the bags a cursory adjustment.

Galviera looked at the menu for answers.

Could he stay on the run with five million dollars? Find some quiet place and disappear? How long would he last? Not long. He was not a criminal. All he’d wanted was to save the business he’d built. When the waitress came, he ordered a chicken sandwich and struggled to stay calm.

He could reach out to the Norte Cartel and give them the money in exchange for Tilly’s life. Give them some of the money. He needed his two million. He could say Salazar and Johnson took the rest, that all he had was three million.

Who was he kidding?

Look what they did to them in the desert.

He could surrender to police. Then what? Go to jail? Lose his business? Besides, how would that help Tilly? No, he had to reach out to the Norte Cartel.

How?

With Salazar’s secret cell phone number. It was all he had. The one he was told never to call unless it was life and death. Well, it was over for Salazar, but someone would have his cell phone, either police or the Norte Cartel.

Galviera had no cell phone, no BlackBerry, no laptop, nothing wireless that could be traced to him.

His attention went to Grandma Hartford’s bag.

He had noticed when he took his seat that her cell phone was atop her bag of souvenirs. She and her friends were absorbed in looking at a brochure about Superstition Mountain.

Galviera glanced around. No one would notice. He coughed, palmed the phone and went outside toward the small park by the pool. He fished Salazar’s number from his wallet.

He looked at the phone and prepared to dial.

Wait!

Think this through. The police could put a trace on all calls received by Salazar’s phone. They could triangulate the call signal to its origin and get on Galviera’s trail so fast.

What if the Norte Cartel had the phone and they answered? Then what? What would he say-give me Tilly, I’ll give you your cash and we’ll call it even?

Would that work?

Not likely.

Was there any other way?

He didn’t have any time. He had to make a decision now. His hands started shaking.

Suddenly the phone started ringing in his hand.

“Susie” came up on the call display.

35

Mesa Mirage, Phoenix, Arizona

Hope flickered.

They did not find Tilly at the Sweet Times Motel but they did find her pajama top. The top, the take-out food wrappers and the status of the room indicated that she had been there recently and was likely still alive.

Cora, overcome at the scene, was now resting in her bedroom.

Gannon would have to wait to pursue asking her about Donnie Cargo and San Francisco.

While paramedics watched over her, Gannon worked on his laptop in the living room, words blurring on his screen as he scrolled through the material he’d requested from the WPA news library. Like a prospector panning for gold, he reviewed stories on cold cases in San Francisco, and old stuff on Salazar and Johnson.

Nothing.

Who was Donnie Cargo? Why wouldn’t Cora talk about him? Was Lomax feeding him BS? Was the incident in her past linked to Tilly’s kidnapping? The creeps from her former life had taunted him about a connection. Could those sleazebags be trusted?

Gannon was at a loss.

Should he pursue Cora’s secret, or Salazar and Johnson’s connection to Lyle Galviera?

He looked across the room at Hackett and his task force, remembering Isabel Luna’s warning that someone among them could be on the cartel’s payroll.

Did one of them tip the kidnappers at the motel?

They seemed to have gotten away with no time to spare.

Gannon’s cell phone rang. The caller’s ID was blocked.

“Gannon.”

“Is this Jack Gannon, the reporter whose niece was kidnapped?”

It was a male voice, early thirties. Sounded sharp.

“Yes. Who’s calling, please?”

“Do you protect sources, Gannon?”

“Yes, if it is crucial.”

“This is crucial. I have information related to the case for you, but I have to remain anonymous and protected.”

“What is it?”

“Not over the phone.”

“I don’t have time to waste.

“Meet me alone within an hour.”

“Tell me what you have, please.”

“Something on the people who took your niece.”

Within fifteen minutes Gannon was driving across Phoenix.

He’d had the foresight to park Cora’s Pontiac Vibe in a neighbor’s back alley a few doors down and cut through backyards unnoticed. He pulled out of Mesa Mirage without being followed by any of the reporters at her house.

He worked his way to the 1-10 north, then took the Black Canyon Freeway west. His caller had provided no details, only instructions to meet him on the hour at a specific bench in the southwest area of Harmon Park. Upon arriving, Gannon parked on Pima and walked the rest of the way to the bench, carrying a copy of the Arizona Republic, as the caller had specified.

The guy had refused to give up any data over the phone. He sounded halfway articulate and credible, but it was a crapshoot gauging people in these situations. Odds were this was all bull. Gannon knew how some people, sickos, liked to get involved in high-profile cases.

They were a waste of time.

But a good reporter never dismissed a tip without checking it out, and with Tilly’s life on the line Gannon had to follow through. Waiting at the bench, he inventoried the area: a mom with a baby in a stroller, two girls sitting on the grass in the distance playing guitars.

Gannon glanced through the newspaper and reread the Republic’s last story on the case. Was there anything they had that he could use?

“Jack Gannon?”

A man in his early thirties sat next to him. He wore a navy suit jacket, matching pants, blue open shirt and dark glasses. He’d recognized the voice of his caller.

“That’s right. And your name?”

“Forget that.”