The Collected

“Yes, sir,” Harris said.

“And the schedule?”

“Set. Tonight I’ll have dinner with Curson, and first thing tomorrow morning we begin.”

“The camera? You haven’t forgotten?”

“It will all be recorded as you requested.”

“Good.” A smile appeared on Romero’s face. “I want to see everything immediately after the session.”

“Of course. That won’t be a problem.”

CHAPTER 24

The day before, as Liz listened to her brother’s message telling her he and Orlando would be heading back to L.A. that evening, an idea began to form in her mind. She’d been feeling frustrated just sitting there alone, waiting for others to find Nate. That wasn’t the way she operated. She was far from helpless and was used to tackling problems head on. Not that this was the normal kind of complication that usually came up in her life, but if she and Nate were going to have a future together, she needed to learn how to deal with it.

The problem was that when Jake and Orlando returned, she knew her brother would tell her as little as he could afford to. He may have seen it as a way to protect her, but to Liz it was unacceptable.

She needed to be looking for Nate, too. To do that, she needed to know the same things her brother did. Then the idea hit her-a way of putting herself firmly in the loop. She thought it through as thoroughly as she could, and when she was ready, she wrote her brother a note and left the house.

The first part of the plan was deception. She had to make sure Jake thought she was out of the way. Nate had once shown her how easy it was to lock on a cell phone signal and track its location. She had no doubt her brother would do just that when he realized she was gone. So to convince him that she had left, she drove all the way to San Diego, and spent the night in a small motel called The Otter House.

Early the next morning, she spotted a delivery truck behind the building. While the driver was filling a vending machine, she put her phone on silent mode, and tucked it into the truck’s glove compartment. Though she didn’t have the training her brother and her boyfriend had, she was the smartest of the three, and remembered everything she’d heard them talk about. Putting the phone in the truck meant that during the day, her location would seem to be moving around, like she was driving aimlessly through the city, thinking.

Her location deception set, she headed back north, arriving in Jake’s neighborhood at a quarter after two. Since she was driving his car, she parked on a side street not too far away, then snuck back and input her code into the gate security pad. She eased the gate open and peeked inside.

No cars in the driveway.

She walked quietly over to the house and looked through the windows as best she could, but the ones along the front were not designed to provide much of a view inside.

I’m sure it worked, she told herself. It had to.

She thought for a moment. If they were already gone, she was wasting valuable time. But if they were still here?

Just say you forgot something, and keep the conversation to a minimum.

She took a deep breath, put on her best distressed face, and let herself in the front door.

The house was as quiet as it had been the day she’d first arrived.

“Hello?” she called out. “Anyone here? It’s Liz.”

Dead silence.

As she walked through the living room, she began to worry that maybe Jake and Orlando hadn’t come back yet. If that were true, she wasn’t any better off than she’d been the day before. She scanned the living room. Everything looked exactly like it had been when she’d walked out the door. She glanced over at the dining room table. Even the note was still there.

Hold on.

She walked over to take a closer look. She had left the note facing up, and near the center of the table. Now it was flipped down, and a bit off to the side.

Someone had been here.

Moving into the kitchen, she checked the trash can. There were food wrappers and a couple of takeout boxes.

So not just one person. At least two.

Jake and Orlando.

Her hopes began to rise.

She all but ran through the living room, and down the hall to the linen closet on the other side of the bathroom.

Please, please…

Inside on the left was a hidden moveable panel. She had seen Nate open it only once. It had been on her first visit as he’d shown off the house to her. He’d let her in on quite a few secrets that day, probably more than he realized.

She opened the panel, activated the touch screen, and navigated to the sound recording control window. The presets she’d checked off were still in place: VOICE ACTIVATED,COMPLETE HOUSE. She opened the log of recordings. There were dozens, some brief, some considerably longer.

Nate had said Jake had installed it in case of emergencies, but hardly ever put it to use. There were cameras, too, both still and motion, but she hadn’t bothered with them.

The only question now was, had they discovered where Nate was? Listening at double speed and working backward from the last recording, she had her answer seven and a half minutes later.

“This is interesting.” Orlando’s voice. “He’s not based in Reynosa.”

“Where, then?” Jake asked.

“Monterrey.”

“Maybe it would be better if we talked to the captain in person.” A pause. “US passport?”

“I have two.” A new voice. Male, but not one Liz recognized.

“Break one out. We’re going to Mexico.”

She listened for another ten minutes to see if there was anything else important, then erased the recordings, closed the panel, and bought a ticket online to Monterrey.

CHAPTER 25

Thought still hot, the temperature had begun to dip.

Sun’s down, Nate thought.

As if heralding the passing of day to night, he heard a door open. Three sets of heavy footsteps pounded down the hallway, and didn’t stop until they reached the door of the newest prisoner.

Nate moved into position by the vent again, and was there in plenty of time to see them walk back by, this time accompanied by the man in the sneakers.

Seconds later, the door opened and shut again, and quiet returned.

Nate waited a few minutes, then said, “Did you see him?”

“See him?” Lanier asked. “Do you have a window?”

“No. Through the vent.”

“Mine’s angled down. Can’t see a damn thing.”

“Same here,” Berkeley said.

“I saw him.” The voice was a croak from farther away.