“There’s nothing unusual,” Casey commented as she sat next to me on the park bench. “Except for the big guy in the dark glasses sitting on the park bench staring at the children in the playground.”
“Funny,” I said as I ignored her reference to me. “I couldn’t find anything unusual about the shops. None of the store owners have a history of criminal activity. From what I could find they’re all Mom and Pop type owners, people who have operated those stores for years and are part of the fabric of the place. Trustworthy members of the local community.”
“Who’s your front-runner at the moment?”
I stood and Casey followed me as we walked to the edge of the grassed area, next to the under-used dog park.
“Kyle.” Just as that thought went through my mind, five loudly barking dogs came up next to us, and a grumpy woman opened the gate. I say grumpy, but death-warmed-over would be a better description.
Her dogs were disheveled, underweight, and loud. They were desperate to let off excess steam, let off stress by running in the park. And living with her appeared to be very stressful.
The woman forcibly opened the yard gate, slammed it shut behind her, and then lit up a cigarette. She took one long, deep drag, letting go of the dogs’ leashes, finally giving them a chance to be free.
I stared at her for a moment, the dogs yapping loudly as they fought each other.
“I didn’t realize this little patch was a dog park.” Casey leaned in close to me. “Not much of a dog park either. It’s only a tiny little square. Still, better than nothing, I guess.”
“Nobody has been in there in the times we’ve come here. And I can understand why.” I watched as the woman finished her cigarette, and then casually flicked it into the bushes. I couldn’t stand people who threw trash all around the place, and it annoyed me immediately. She then went and sat on the bench and opened her phone, no doubt posting about her position in the dog park on social media to appear like she was doing a great thing for her animals. Then one of her dogs took a dump in the dog park. She looked up from her phone and clearly saw but made no effort to bag it up. If I disliked her before, I detested her now. I’m a dog owner and I love my mutt, but without fail I always clean up after him. It’s the decent thing to do and she clearly had no decency or class.
“So, you really think it’s Kyle?” Casey led us away from the dog park to the street. “I thought you said he was the symbol of decent All-American goodness.”
“He’s got to be the number one candidate at the moment, which is a concern. I want the number one guy at the moment to be the person who I also believe did it, but I’m not so sure I do. He’s a nice guy who has worked extremely hard for his money. If he lost a hundred thousand in an investment, I can guarantee that’s his life savings. He would’ve had plans for that money. Plans for the future. Losing that money was sure to hurt him, and possibly hurt him enough to take revenge.”
“And Tanya would’ve told Kyle not to beat him into the ground because he’s Millie’s father.”
“Exactly. That anger had to come out somehow.”
“It could be a ‘Murder on the Orient Express’ type of situation. You know, where everyone is involved. Maybe Kyle, Tanya, Damon, Ruby, Ben, and everyone else on that list of people who had lost money are involved. They all could be working together to pull this off.”
“Could be. But then the more people who are involved, the more likely it is that one of them will slip up. And no one has so far. We also know that Ruby isn’t going to be here for the drop, she’s been posting pictures of herself in L.A. There is no way she would’ve taken Millie with her.”
“True, but she could’ve still set it up from the start.”
I pondered that thought as we walked across the road, stopping on the sidewalk to look back at the park. The location where the crime had occurred just three days before. I tried to picture the scene in my mind’s eye as it would have unfolded, searching it for clues, for information, for something new and previously overlooked that I could work with.
“Guessing is about all we can do now. Our best chance of securing the girl, and keeping the money, is getting the drop right. I’m coming back at midnight to set the place up—small cameras and the works.” I shook my head as the woman from the dog park started screaming at her dogs. “But we’re going to have to ride this one out.”
“The risk is going to be high.”
“We’re not going to risk Millie. No matter what Chase wants us to do with the money, we’re not going to risk the life of that precious little girl for his cash.”
Chapter 20
My favorite bar was the perfect escape.
Dark, somber, and separate from the rest of the world. It was a little haven where I felt centered and could think.
