animated show
Stallings stood in the doorway to the main room until one of the men on the couch looked up and gave a little shout of surprise. Darryl turned his massive head, chuckled loudly, and said, “Stall, my brother. What brings you by this bright, sunny day?”
Stallings stepped into the room, and Patty automatically slid to the other side of the doorway so that between them they could cover the entire room.
Stallings said, “Have you met my partner, Patty Levine?”
Darryl Paluk struggled to his feet, pulling his shorts all the way to his gigantic waist. “I have not had the pleasure.” He extended his hand. “I can’t believe the local police agency would have the good taste to hire a babe like you.”
Patty gave him a short glare as Stallings said, “This babe will crack you in your head with her ASP and not think about it again today.”
Darryl looked at Patty and said, “Is this true?”
Patty knew actions spoke louder than words with guys like this so she reached behind her loose shirt, grasped her ASP tucked in the small of her back, yanked it out with her right hand, and flicked it open over her right shoulder so it made a sound like a shotgun racking. The metal baton expanded from eight inches to thirty inches in the blink of an eye and had caused more than one street thug to poop in his pants. The action brought a stunned silence to everyone in the room except Stallings, who used it as a chance to produce a photo of Leah Tischler and ask Darryl and his friends if any of them had seen her. It was a perfect example of how well they worked together as partners. They always wanted the element of surprise but never wanted to surprise each other.
A tall, thin youth leaned up from the couch, his long greasy hair dangling over his shoulder. He took a good look at the photo, then faced both Stallings and Patty. This was usually a sign someone had some information. The young man looked at Leah’s photo again and said, “I think I saw her. She was in some kind of school uniform over near Davis.”
Patty didn’t say anything and she felt her heart skip a beat.
“She’s a rich girl. I can tell by the professional photograph. And that’s one of the reasons I noticed her. She got into a white van, I think. I remember the uniform and her pretty dark hair. If you give me some time I might be able to come up with a few more details.”
Stallings said, “Could it have been a construction van?”
“There was no sign I remember, but it could’ve been,”
They had another lead.
TWENTY
Tony Mazzetti sat across the table from Sparky Taylor at a local sandwich shop. Sometimes detectives new to homicide and not used to visiting the medical examiner’s office had a problem eating after witnessing an autopsy, especially the autopsy of an elderly man who had nothing to do with your case. The way Sparky Taylor wolfed down his ham sandwich and extra-large bag of Doritos told Mazzetti he didn’t suffer from that kind of problem.
Mazzetti said, “I got a line on five possible people of interest. It’s a long shot, but the names my snitch, Joey Big Balls, came up with work at a couple of construction sites he manages down in Deerwood Park.”
“That
“There’re always better ways to use our time, but sometimes it’s a weird lead that breaks things wide open. This isn’t tech services where we know how long it takes to install a hidden camera or copy a couple of tapes. This is homicide, which is part science, part luck, and all hard work.”
“I wasn’t questioning your methods, Tony. I was analyzing them. When are we gonna visit the construction sites?”
Mazzetti felt bad for snapping at his new partner. The guy had proved to be hardworking and insightful and was merely bringing up something he thought was important. “I was going to try and hit the swing shift tonight about seven o’clock. There’s one guy I’ll focus on first.”
Sparky paused while he swallowed a tremendous bite of the Reuben sandwich. He wiped his mouth from left to right like he did after every single bite. He wadded up the napkin and added it to the growing pile at the end of the table. Mazzetti had wondered why his partner grabbed the huge stack of napkins as they walked past the counter. Now he realized the quirky detective used a brand-new napkin after every bite. Finally, Sparky swallowed and said, “My son is in the academic games tonight over at the community college. Twice a year they take the winners of the local elementary school academic games and host the finals at the college.”
Mazzetti waved his hand and said, “Don’t sweat it. I got this covered.”
“Policy says at least two officers should be present during any potentially confrontational interview. I’ll go with you.”
“That’s crazy. If we chased every kooky lead and ignored our families on everything that came up at the office, no one would be married and kids would be running wild in the streets. I’ll get Patty to go with me.” He watched his partner carefully until he was certain Sparky was satisfied. Mazzetti had no intention of asking Patty to go out on a lead prior to a romantic dinner. She already looked tired and he didn’t want to add to her workload. It would only take a few minutes to talk to these mopes at the construction sites; then he could meet Patty at Gi-Gi’s and maybe even consider taking Saturday off.
John Stallings never liked to think of himself as the brooding type, but as he sat at his desk in the Land That Time Forgot he did feel down and maybe even depressed. The whole day had worn on him from his awkward and uncomfortable encounter with Maria to some unknown anxiety that had been creeping up on him for several days. A least the guy who gave him a lead at Darryl Paluk’s house had been encouraging. Not encouraging in a way that meant Leah Tischler might still be alive, but any information, anything he could use at all, was helpful.
He’d made dozens of phone calls to missing persons detectives he knew across the Southeast from Atlanta to Daytona. Each of the detectives knew him well from three years of inquiries about Jeanie. Usually he was careful to make contact with them off-duty so no one would ever accuse him of searching for his own daughter-a case that was not even assigned to him-while he was on duty at the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office. He had an official reason to call them today. Leah Tischler’s disappearance was assigned to him and Patty. He didn’t think anyone would care if he happened to mention Jeanie while was talking about Leah Tischler.
He often limited his initial search for a missing person to Atlanta in the north to Daytona in the south. It was amazing how people from the Jacksonville area didn’t drift much farther than either of those two cities. Atlanta had a certain mystique and held an allure to people hoping to get rich. Whether it was large corporations that seemed to always be hiring or the lucrative drug market, young people from Jacksonville often thought their fortune lay in Atlanta. On the flipside, Daytona had a reputation as being a laid-back surfer community where young people thought they could draw caricatures of the tourists or some other fun activity to make a few bucks while they lived a relaxed lifestyle.
Stallings didn’t know which image of the cities was more incorrect. Atlanta was a sprawling urban metropolis with a horrendous crime rate. A young woman without any skills or family could likely find herself in the stable of an industrious and vicious pimp. While Daytona was smaller, the opportunities for legitimate employment were grim.
Stallings made it a point to stay on close terms with detectives from each of the cities, as well as the other points of interest as far west as Tampa, and definitely to include Orlando. Oddly, it was the tourist capital of Florida that offered the best opportunity for people fleeing their lives in Jacksonville. There really were a number of legitimate job opportunities at the incredible number of hotels and restaurants in the landlocked tourist haven.
Stallings called the detectives he knew best, then a contact at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Washington, D.C., a public and privately funded agency that grew from the efforts of John Walsh, the father of a young boy who was kidnapped and murdered in South Florida in 1981. Most people knew John Walsh as the host of
