Anonymous Read online

  Tom returned from the car. “Okay, I called it in. Right now he hasn’t committed a crime that I’m aware of. But I would like to know where he is when the time comes.”

  Madison nodded. She shivered. Even though it was summer, it could get chilly at night in the inland areas of the county. Plus, she had a little bit of shock starting. Tom went back to the car, got a flight jacket out of the back seat, and handed it to her without saying anything. She put it on.

  “I called the detective handling the case on the way here. He’s waiting for me to call him back to let him know if we get anything.”

  “I would think he’d want to be here, just in case a body is found,” Madison said.

  “You operate with much more wishful thinking than we do. All we know right now is that Frank went for a drive on a dirt road and was unhappy to find you following him. That doesn’t make him guilty of a crime, and it doesn’t mean a body is there.”

  Madison walked over to her car to get her knit hat that had fallen off in the middle of her excursion. Tom followed her.

  “I know you want Elissa to be out there, but that doesn’t make it so, Maddie.”

  “I’m just following leads, pulling strings, and using my logic. I don’t think Frank picked tonight to do research on nighttime flora and fauna in the San Diego desert community.”

  Tom shook his head and moved something invisible on the ground with the side of his shoe. “Whatever you say. Let’s just wait for the sheriff’s deputies to get here.”

  They didn’t have to wait long. Within a few minutes two cop cars with San Diego Sheriff’s Department decals on the doors pulled into the Jack in the Box parking lot. And so it begins, Madison thought. The deputies came over, and the first of Madison’s many statements began.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Madison stopped for the red light at La Jolla Boulevard near her apartment just past midnight. There was no one on the street this late, and she had her windows down so she could hear the waves crashing. She waited for the light to change. There was something so melancholy about a red light going through its circuit with no cars in the other direction to direct. The walk sign began flashing: Don’t walk. Don’t walk. Don’t walk. The light for oncoming traffic finally turned yellow and then red so she could continue on. Like life telling her to take a moment to reflect.

  She had given her statement several times to several different people, including the detective handling the missing persons case for the San Diego Police Department; he had ultimately decided to come out and join the fun. She gave everyone the GPS coordinates for the location where Frank had parked his car. They had put crime scene tape up and were securing the area until morning. When daylight came, they would see if they could figure out why Frank had decided to go off-roading on a Friday night in his souped-up street car.

  She had called Dave on the way home and asked him to meet her at her apartment. She wasn’t sure why, and she was choosing not to be introspective on that point at the moment. She just wanted to see him. She parked her car in her space and got out. When she came around the corner of the building, he was sitting on her steps with two bags of Mexican food from Rigoberto’s Taco Shop, just up the street on La Jolla Boulevard.

  “And that is why I keep you around.” Madison grabbed one of the bags of food. She adjusted her surveillance pack over her shoulder so she had a free hand to eat a tortilla chip on the way up the stairs.

  “So why am I getting a booty call?” Dave asked.

  Madison unlocked the front door. “It’s not a booty call, Dave. Don’t expect me to put out just because you brought me Mexican food.”

  “Just for future reference, what kind of food would I need to bring to guarantee something like that?”

  “If anything was going to do it, Rigoberto’s probably would. But not tonight.” Madison got the butterfly china plates and some utensils and brought them over to her desk/dining table. Dave sat in the wing chair, and they separated the food onto the plates. She sat in her office chair and began eating. She hadn’t realized how hungry she was.

  “So, any progress? Have you found a murderer yet?”

  “No, but I used my vehicle as a weapon today, so you should be proud of me.”

  Dave finished chewing and gave her a wary glance. “And why did you need a weapon?”

  “Oh, it’s a long story. And you won’t like it. So I’m going to spare you.”

  Madison knew Dave almost as well as he knew her. It took a lot to rile him up, which was surprising, considering the reaction people got from him when he was finally riled. He really did give the image of the most passive surfer you’d ever want to meet—until he’d had too much. And “too much” could take a long time, or it could be immediate. Dave had lived in a violent home. Madison thought the reason he’d started martial arts as a child was to protect himself from his mother. When he was sixteen, she’d swung back to slap him across the face, and he’d grabbed her hand and said, “No more.” She’d never hit him again. One thing Madison knew for sure: the story of tonight would rile Dave up. She didn’t need him going out to find Frank Bronson.

  Dave knew his limitations. He knew when Madison was sparing him details that would cause him to get violent. So he left it alone and talked about surfing instead. “I caught a tube ride today! Totally in the barrel.”

  “Awesome!” Dave was describing the surfer Holy Grail: just after a surfer caught a wave, sometimes the wave curled over the top of them and it was as if they were surfing inside a tube or a barrel. It became difficult to keep upright with the wave overhead, and so they crouched low and tried not to get shoved forward and off the wave. Dave had told Madison that it was thrilling. Madison had never surfed but saw the reaction from the surfers, and it was fun to join in on the excitement.

  Madison got up to get them water and out of habit checked the windows. Outside the bedroom window, she saw a brand-new dark-blue Tesla parked in the alley.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” She was too exhausted for this.

  “What is it?” Dave asked from the living room.

  “This guy whose wife wanted me to do surveillance on him is sitting in my alley right now. He is a fucking asshole who hits his wife, and apparently she gave him my name and phone number by accident. It didn’t take too much longer for him to get my address, since he’s downstairs right now.”

  “This should be fun.” Dave was already on his way to the front door. He was wearing a surf-contest T-shirt, board shorts, and flip-flops. She wondered what Mr. Sands was going to think when he saw Dave walking toward his car.

  “Dave, let’s just let him sit in the alley and stew in his own juice for a while.” Madison was talking as she followed Dave down the stairs.

  “No, I want to find out what he thought was going to happen by showing up at your apartment. I’m interested. I’m just going to talk to him.” Madison knew this was not true. If Dave hated anything, he hated bullies. And by revealing that this guy hit his wife, Madison knew she had just told Dave that the guy was a bully.

  As they got closer to the Tesla, Madison caught up with Dave. The guy got out of his car.

  “Are you Madison Kelly?” He managed to say it accusatively with a sneer on his face. He seemed like the kind of guy that always had a sneer on his face. He was wearing alligator loafers, expensive slacks, and a freshly pressed white shirt. He’d had a haircut within a week. But he was also wiry and held himself in a fighting stance that made it seem like he used to fight people for a living.

  “I am.” Madison wasn’t surprised that Dave was silent. He was assessing the situation. Plus, he wasn’t the kind of guy who took over the conversation for a girl. He knew Madison was capable of speaking for herself.

  “Well, I’m Arthur Sands. I hear you think you’re going to do an investigation on me?”

  “You heard wrong. I’m not doing an investigation on you. I have no interest in you.”

  “That’s a good thing. You don’t want to mess with me.”
>
  “Oh really? Why is that?” Dave asked. Don’t answer that, Madison thought. Get back in your car.

  The guy smirked at Dave and then turned back to Madison. “Is this what you have for protection?”

  “I don’t need protection. Or do I? Are you threatening me?”

  “I don’t need to threaten you. Anything I say to you is a promise of what is to come. And this is what you’ve got to protect you? This pretty boy?”

  Oh, God, Madison thought. There’s still time to get in your car.

  “Pretty?” Dave said. “There’s a reason I don’t have any marks on my face.”

  “Oh look, how cute: the little surfer faggot is going to protect you.”

  Madison thought that was probably it. Sure enough, Dave laughed. He had a laugh that sounded like the singer at the beginning of “Wipe Out,” the surfer song from the 1960s: high-pitched, completely incongruous with the guy himself. Madison usually loved to hear it, except when she knew that he was laughing right before he beat the shit out of someone. For some reason, the prospect of what was about to come always made him laugh.

  Dave’s arm came out so swiftly that the guy didn’t even see it coming. One second he was sneering, and the next he was lying on the ground. Dave literally wiped the sneer off his face.

  Madison looked down at the guy, blood flooding out of his nose onto the alley.

  “Did you have to hit him?” she said.

  “Hey—my friend Jay is gay. That’s not a nice word.”

  “No, it isn’t.” Madison sighed. “Now what?”

  “Let’s go back upstairs. My food is getting cold,” Dave said.

  Madison leaned down to get a closer look at the guy’s face. His nose was all kinds of broken. “He’s breathing kinda funny, Dave.”

  Dave leaned down and peered at the guy’s face through the darkness. “He’ll be fine. Well, not fine, but he’s not gonna die. Let’s go.”

  “Shouldn’t we at least wait until he wakes up?” Madison said.

  “Jesus, what am I, his mother? I’m getting cold. Let’s go in.”

  They turned and walked across the alley to her garden and then up the stairs to her apartment.

  Madison went to her closet to grab a clean sweatshirt; coincidentally, it was one of Dave’s. It was difficult being a tall girl. Manufacturers of women’s clothing thought that all women had the same arm and leg length. Most women’s clothing ended at her mid forearm and midcalf. It was luxurious to put on a sweatshirt and have the arms reach down to her wrists.

  “Hey! That’s mine,” Dave said as she returned to the living room. “I’m cold too.”

  “How can you be cold? You just exerted energy in order to propagate violence.”

  Dave grabbed a throw from behind the wing chair and put it around his shoulders. “Energy? That didn’t take energy.” He dug back into his Mexican food.

  Madison wasn’t hungry anymore. She picked up her plate and took it to the kitchen. She went back to the bedroom and looked out the window. Arthur Sands had just gotten back into the driver’s seat of his car. He was looking up at her window, blood still dripping onto his freshly starched white shirt. He started his Tesla, silently of course, and flipped her off as he drove away. A car coming down the alley had to wait as he pulled in front of them; it was a Ford Fusion. Madison knew someone who had a Ford Fusion.

  Thomas Clark had a Ford Fusion. Presumably his wife drove it as well. As the Ford drew adjacent to her apartment, a face looked up at her window: Tom’s wife.

  “Jesus,” Madison said from the bedroom. “I think I’m missing out on a revenue opportunity: I should be selling my address on maps. I’ll make a fortune. Apparently my home is highly sought after in some sort of macabre mystery tour.” She waited until the car had turned right and driven out of sight. Just a drive-by to see if Tom was here. Madison wondered how often Elaine did that.

  She walked back into the living room. Dave had stopped eating. “Who’s here now?”

  Madison sat in her office chair. “Nobody, it’s fine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “She left. And anyway, it’s a girl. You’re not going to hit a girl.”

  Dave resumed eating. “That’s true.” He was the slowest eater Madison had ever met.

  She stared at her whiteboard. She hadn’t wanted to think about the ramifications of tonight until they knew what Frank was doing on that dirt road, but it was hard not to let her mind swim with the possibilities: Had Frank taken both girls? Was one or both of them buried in Ramona? She got up and wrote Both girls went to San Diego City College and Samantha lived next door to Frank.

  She put Arthur Sands on the board, even though she didn’t think he had anything to do with the notes or the missing girls. She thought he was just your average run-of-the-mill asshole who needed a bigger guy to smack him down to size. He was the type of guy who only picked on people smaller than he was. He never would’ve taunted Dave if he’d known what Dave was capable of. Madison was pretty sure she’d seen the last of him, but she’d been wrong about things before. Until he could be eliminated for sure, he would stay on the board.

  But more importantly, regardless of whether he was Anonymous, he wouldn’t have liked being made a fool of—and he might take it out on his wife. As much as Madison disliked Melissa for bringing this mess to her doorstep, she didn’t want her to get killed. So even though it was late, she decided to call. She picked up her phone and dialed Melissa’s number.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, Melissa. It’s Madison Kelly.” Dave had finished eating finally and was rinsing off his plate in the kitchen.

  “Hi, Madison. I didn’t think I’d hear from you again. Especially this late at night.”

  Something about her tone made Madison want to hang up. She was just so haughty and arrogant; what an attitude to have when she could have gotten Madison seriously hurt.

  “I will keep this short. Your husband paid me a visit.”

  Dave could tell that Madison was getting angry. He’d come back from the kitchen and was sitting in the wing chair. He grabbed her arm to try to get her to sit on his lap. She yanked her arm away.

  Melissa didn’t sound concerned. “Oh. Sorry about that. What happened?”

  “He got what was coming to him. So much so that he might come home and give you what he thinks is coming to you. I’m calling to warn you.”

  “Oh. I left him. I’m at my sister’s house in Palo Alto.”

  Madison sighed. She’d been trying to save someone who didn’t even appreciate it. “Well, that’s good. That’s all I wanted to say.” She disconnected the call.

  She walked over and sat on Dave’s lap.

  “Too many assholes?” Dave asked.

  Madison buried her head in his chest. “Way too many.” Dave stood up with Madison in his lap, picking her up in one smooth motion, all six feet of her. He was literally the strongest man she’d ever met in her life. He carried her into the bedroom and laid her gently on the bed. He lay on top of her and kissed her neck and her face. She wrapped her arms around his neck and held on. He scooped his arms behind her and they lay like that, not moving, holding each other tightly for a few minutes.

  “Why does it feel like someone’s going to try to pull us apart?” Madison tightened her arms around his neck until she was holding her elbows.

  His mouth was right next to her ear. “Never.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The heat of the sun beating down on her bed let Madison know she’d overslept. She was supposed to meet Josie from Hank’s Dive at Bernini’s at eleven AM. She grabbed her phone off the nightstand and saw it was ten thirty. She jumped up and stripped her clothes off as she walked toward the shower. Dave had left the night before; Madison had wanted her big bed to herself.

  She had decisions to make this morning. While her tailing of Frank had resulted in him being on the hook like a big fat fish, her case was not over. They hadn’t found a body yet, as far as she knew, and even if they
did, it might only be Elissa’s. The connection she’d found between Frank and Samantha was a huge string to pull, but it wasn’t a smoking gun. She couldn’t rest on her laurels until the girls were found and the suspect or suspects were in custody. Ultimately, she wanted to know who was leaving notes on her door; but it had become so much more.

  As she washed her hair, she thought about the different ways this could go: Frank had kidnapped both women and killed them and their bodies were buried in Ramona. Or he’d kidnapped both women and they were alive somewhere. Or he’d killed Elissa and buried her body in Ramona, and somebody else altogether was responsible for Samantha’s disappearance.

  She got out of the shower and texted Tom. Anything?

  She threw the phone on her bed and picked out her clothes for the day: oversized boyfriend jeans, a tank top, and a Ralph Lauren warm-up jacket from the 2016 Olympics. She had long ago stopped trying to suppress her obsession with Ralph Lauren. It was hotter than the hinges of hell outside, so she put on her Birkenstocks rather than her Chuck Taylors. Her legs looked great in heels, but that was no reason to destroy her feet and her joints—whenever possible, she wore comfortable shoes.

  Tom answered: No. A man of few words, just like Anonymous. Madison figured the cops were systematically searching the area where Frank had parked his car. There was no rushing this process, and she would just have to wait.

  She pulled up at Bernini’s at 11:05 AM. Josie was sitting on the patio, and Madison could see her from the street. She seemed irritated. Madison lucked out and got a parking space right in front.

  “Hey, Josie, sorry I’m late.”

  Josie nodded but didn’t say anything. Madison sat across from her. A waitress appeared, and Madison ordered coffee and eggs and potatoes with sourdough toast.

  “I don’t have a lot of time. I got called into work today.” Josie’s lips were smashed in a tight line, accentuated by red lipstick. Madison wasn’t sure it was true that she had to work. It sounded like an excuse to keep the meeting short.