Chapter Twenty-Two
“The local Rent-A-Wreck was next door to Luxe Rentals,” Rafer said. “I thought this was a good choice. Lots of VROOOM but not ostentatious. We’ll fit right in with this car.”
“Did you put this on your credit card?”
“I put it on Harley’s. It was left behind when he got snatched. He’s rolling in dough. He was making a fortune at the bank and his trust fund kicked in last year.”
“Nice. I have two more addresses for Theodore Searl. One is his office, and the other is a storage facility. I’d like to take a look at them. Give me the keys. I’ll drive.”
“Whoa. I thought I was the driver this trip.”
“You drove this morning, so I get to drive this afternoon.”
“You didn’t want to drive the boring car. Now that I got us a hot car, you want to drive.”
“Totally not true,” Gabriela said, adjusting her cross-body bag. “Give me the key.”
“No way. Besides, I’m the better driver.”
“Like hell you are. You have no sense of direction.”
“I don’t need a sense of direction,” Rafer said. “I have GPS.”
Gabriela narrowed her eyes and leaned forward a little. In his face. “Are you going to give me those keys?”
“Maybe if you ask me nicely.”
“Ugh. This is why I divorced you. You’re impossible.”
“Listen, missy. You didn’t divorce me. I divorced you.”
“Do not call me missy.”
Rafer dangled the keys over her head where she couldn’t reach them. “Missy, missy, missy.”
“You are such a jerk.”
Gabriela kicked him in the knee, and he dropped the keys.
She snatched the keys up, got behind the wheel, and drove away, leaving Rafer behind.
After a couple blocks, she had to admit that this was a better choice of car.
It held the road and cornered great. Porsche didn’t always have all the fancy bells and whistles, but the engineering was top-shelf.
Beckett and Theodore Searl’s offices were in a building on Main Street.
There was an art gallery and a gelato shop on the ground floor and offices above.
The Searl offices were on the second floor with a small balcony overlooking Main.
Office entrances and parking were off the alley behind the building.
Not good, Gabriela thought. Each office had its own entrance.
That meant their offices probably had their own security system.
It was much easier to gain entrance to offices in large buildings that relied on central security.
She drove out of the alley and out of old town.
The storage locker was in a light industrial area in north Selpan.
There was a driveway leading into four rows of single-garage-type lockers.
No gate on the driveway. A small building was positioned at the beginning of the lockers. It served as office and guardhouse.
Gabriela turned into the driveway and paused at the office.
No lights on inside. No car parked in front.
Nobody home. She continued to drive through the complex.
All units had electronic locks beside the garage doors.
Again, not good. She could pick a standard lock.
She needed equipment to decode an electronic lock, and even if she had the equipment, it would be awkward using it here.
She had a source who could probably hack into the system.
She might give him a call when she got back to the apartment.
Gabriela left the storage facility and drove back to town.
She parked in the public garage and walked a block down Main to Luigi Pizza.
She ordered a large pie to go, was given a pager, and went outside to sit on a bench where she could watch the people and the cars parade by.
She was in the shade and the sea air was soft.
The people browsing the shops were dressed in resort casual.
The cars rolling down Main were all clean.
One of the cars was a yellow Ferrari. It passed by quickly on the far side of the street.
Gabriela couldn’t see the driver. If this happened in 99 percent of the towns in the United States, she would know for sure that Searl was behind the wheel.
In Selpan it was perfectly possible that there were multiple yellow Ferraris roaming the streets.
She texted Rafer that she was bringing pizza home for dinner, and he texted back with a thumbs-up emoji.
Gabriela thought pizza was the least she could do after kicking him in the knee and driving off without him.
Truth is, he wasn’t any more of a jerk than she was.
And his kidnapping idea was looking better and better, because she wasn’t getting anywhere riding around, staring at architecture.
Insurance fraud was a lot easier. You selected a suspect and followed them until they incriminated themselves.
Her pager lit up and vibrated. She went inside, swapped out her pager for her pizza, and walked back to the garage.
She tossed her cross-body bag onto the passenger seat and before she could put the pizza box in the car she was shocked from behind.
Zzzzzzt. And she was on the ground. When she came around, she was in an Escalade, propped up by two very large men.
The SUV left the garage and took a back street to the highway. Gabriela opened her mouth to scream, but her brain was still scrambled by the shock. She couldn’t scream. She couldn’t lift her arm. The best she could do was wiggle a single finger. She took that as a good sign.
“She’s coming around,” one of her bookends said to the driver. “What do you want me to do?”
“Shock her again,” the driver said.
Zzzzt.
Been here and done this, Gabriela thought when the second shock was wearing off.
She couldn’t see and the air was stuffy.
She had something over her head. There was a moment of panic and then she realized it was just over her head.
Her arms and her hands weren’t covered. She could feel the air-conditioning on her skin.
The SUV was still moving. They didn’t want her to see where they were taking her.
Stay still, she told herself. She didn’t want to get shocked again.
The SUV finally stopped, and Gabriela got dragged out of the back seat.
“Be careful,” one of the men said. “We aren’t supposed to be delivering damaged goods. She’s gotta stay on ice until tomorrow.”
Gabriela had a man on each side, supporting her, walking her across what she thought was a cement floor.
She stubbed her toe on a step, and she stumbled.
She was hoisted up the step and walked a short distance.
A door opened and she was moved inside. The door closed and she felt someone clap an ankle bracelet on her.
She moved her leg a little. Heavy. The ankle bracelet was attached to a chain.
The hood was pulled off her head and she looked around.
She was in a small bedroom painted a sickly pale green.
There was a double bed with a mattress. No covers.
A straight-backed chair and a small table.
An open door showed a small, dated bathroom.
Her ankle chain was attached to the iron bed frame.
The room was lit by a single bulb in the ceiling.
The lone window was boarded up on the outside.
“Do I get room service?” Gabriela asked.
“Funny,” one of the men said.
They left and she heard the door lock, twice.
She only saw one lock on the door. That meant that there was a blind lock on the outside of the door.
They hadn’t searched her, so she was still in possession of the slim switchblade knife in her back pocket.
If she successfully used the knife to pick the cuffs and the one door lock, she still couldn’t get past the blind lock.
Best to sit and wait for whoever was in charge to show up. Probably one or both of the Searls.
Rafer had a bad feeling in his gut. Gabriela had texted two hours ago to say she was bringing pizza.
He hadn’t heard from her since, and she wasn’t answering her phone.
The usual reasons ran through his mind. She struck up a conversation with someone and lost track of the time.
Or maybe she caught sight of Theodore Searl and was in surveillance mode.
Next in line was a car crash, followed by kidnapping.
Rafer went to her laptop and found the app that traced her phone.
A map appeared and placed her phone in the parking garage in town.
Simple enough to check on it, he thought.
It was a short walk into town, and it was a nice night to be out.
Twenty minutes later he entered the parking garage.
It had three levels, all aboveground, all open to the air.
He walked the first level and took the ramp up to the second level.
The garage was full. Shops were still open, and restaurants were packed.
He was halfway down the first aisle on the second level when he found the Porsche.
A slightly dented pizza box was on the ground next to the driver’s-side door.
He bent down and opened the box. The pizza was intact.
The Porsche wasn’t locked and Gabriela’s cross-body bag was on the passenger seat.
He slid behind the wheel and checked the bag.
Everything seemed to be there, including her phone and the key to the car.
No blood. No sign of a struggle. It wasn’t a robbery.