It was time. Time to stop this.
Clutching the cross against his chest, he crossed the street and entered the building. There he stopped and listened.
And heard it.
Footsteps on the stairs.
*
Richard answered his phone, hearing Frankie’s panicky voice on the other end. “She’s gone,” he screamed. “She’s gone.”
“Who? Where?”
“Cayce! She was here. Everybody was around us. It was fine. I went over to check on my girlfriend for a moment, and, when I came back, she was gone. Somebody said they saw her walking toward the hallway. A waiter said he took her empty glass, and there’s no sign of her anywhere.”
“And where could she possibly be?” Richard asked, already motioning at Andy, as he raced from the station.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know. Did you find Kenneth?”
“No,” he said in frustration. “We did talk to Derek and his boyfriend though.”
“And is Kenneth here?”
“Apparently,” Richard said. As he hopped into Andy’s car, he kept Frankie on the line. “Lock down the place,” he said, “and make sure nobody leaves.”
But Frankie was past talking.
“Get me security,” he said urgently to Frankie.
Suddenly another man spoke on Frankie’s phone. “Security here. We’ve done a full search of the building. No sign of Cayce.”
“I want all the camera feeds from inside and outside, available on all street corners,” Richard said.
“We’re already pulling that together,” he said.
“I’ll have a full unit down here within minutes. Where was she last seen?”
“On the northeast side of the building. A section where somebody said they thought she was sitting on a bench with a man.”
“And we need to know about that man.”
“Oddly dressed. In a suit that was slightly wrong.”
“Slightly wrong? What the hell does that mean?” he asked in frustration.
“Well, they couldn’t quite say, but he didn’t look like he quite fit the suit.”
“So, like an ill-fitted suit?”
“No, no. Something more than that. But again they couldn’t explain.”
“I don’t have time to talk to everybody there,” he said. “When my team arrives, make sure they interview everybody.”
“Absolutely,” he said. “We’ve already locked down security and explained what’s going on.”
“Are people pissed off?”
“No, not at the moment. I think they’re all just horrified. Cayce is very special to this group.”
“Right,” he said. As he hung up, he closed his eyes, acutely aware of how special she had become to him.
“It’s Cayce?” Andy asked.
“Yeah, she’s missing. Last seen sitting on one of the side benches, with a man. Next thing they knew, she’s gone.”
“Drugged?”
“It would make sense.”
“How?”
“Champagne,” they both said immediately.
“So now what?”
“Redirect,” Richard said. “Let’s get to Kenneth’s apartment. A team at the ice installation will take statements. They’re collecting all the video camera feeds they can. We’ll get that routed through immediately, but my instincts are telling me to get to Kenneth’s apartment.”
“And where is that?”
He looked at Andy and said, “Two blocks from here. Just two blocks but he couldn’t have carried her though.”
“No,” he said, “It’s not very far but that would be very conspicuous. So, I mean, if he had a vehicle …”
“I don’t know how he got her there, but maybe he walked her up here. Maybe it was that simple.”
“Only if he had a weapon.”
“Cayce would do it in a heartbeat to keep everybody else safe,” Richard said. “Plus he’s an old friend. Maybe no weapon was needed.”
“Yes, I agree with you there. She would cooperate.” Andy drove toward the apartment, parking on the street. They both exited quickly.
Richard turned and looked back at the installation, saying, “Wait. It’s not two blocks. Look.” At that, they stopped and took in their surroundings. They were at the corner at the back of the building. “He only had to get her through the back of the building and down an alley.”
Richard raced across the street to the back of the adjacent building, checked to see if the door was locked, but it opened. And right in front of them was a shopping cart, like a homeless person would have. The two looked at each other and raced up the stairs toward Kenneth’s apartment. “Let’s go, go, go.”
“Yes,” Andy said, “but I’m calling for backup.”
Richard stared at him in frustration.
Andy shook his head firmly. “No point barging in there and him killing her and getting ourselves taken out in the process.”
Richard knew his partner was right, but he hated it. He continued up the stairs, and, on the next floor, a lady came out of an apartment on the same floor as Kenneth’s. “Excuse me,” he said. “Do you know the guy who lives in 224 B?”
She looked back that way, as if mentally counting the doors, and nodded. “Very strange guy,” she said. “Kind of getting stranger by the minute too.” She laughed. “Those artists.”
“What do you mean by getting stranger?”
“Well, I mean, getting stranger,” she said. “He just, you know, he started off fairly normal, and then he’d come up covered in paint, and then he had an odd smell coming out of there. I thought about calling management about it, but then he explained that he was trying new painting combinations, and that’s what was causing the smell.”
Richard nodded. “Did he ever appear dangerous in any way?”
“No. God, no,” she said. “Although he did surprise me. He seemed like he wasn’t very tall, and then, when I saw him the next time, he was rushing across the street, and he seemed like somehow he had straightened up.”
Tucking that away in the back of his head, Richard walked up to the apartment. Andy quickly joined him. Richard said, “And?”
“Backup is on the way.”
“That’s nice.” He turned the knob ever-so-gently and found that it was locked. Reaching into his back pocket, he pulled out a small wire and quickly picked the lock. He looked at Andy, and they both pulled their weapons. He inched the door open just slightly.
Immediately the smell wafted toward him. Grimly, the two of them opened the door a little bit wider. In the background they could hear music, eerie instrumentals that set
