The Touch (6 page)

“Ah
…
yeah sure, no problem,” he answered distractedly, eyes still on the computer screen as if the password might magically appear.

“You’re off the hook Maddie; I’ll catch a ride with him.”

“Okay, call me later though, tell me what you find.”

“You got it, thanks again for the ride up here.”

“That’s
okay;
I like it when you owe me one for a change. 
Later gator
.
”

“Bye,” Lexi pocketed her phone, returning her attention to the task at hand.  Somehow she had to get him out of the office so she could take a closer look at things.  “Hey, why don’t you see if you can find his friend Larry while I finish looking around in here?”

“Larry Shaw, right?” Ryan replied, without consulting his notebook.

“Yeah, that’s him.  I’ve only met him a couple of times, but he’s a big guy, kinda chunky, short blonde crew cut and a mustache.  His face always looks really red like he’s been out in the sun for too long, you can’t miss him.”

“I’m sure I can always ask the lovely Jill for help in finding him if I get lost,” he
replied mildly
.

“Yeah, you c
ould do that
,” Lexi
agreed
a little less enthusiastically until she caught him watching her.  Was he trying to get a rise out of her on purpose?  “Only come and get me before you see Monica, I want to be there when you talk to her, okay?”

“Got me on kind of a short leash, don’t you?” Gabriel chuckled to himself, moving towards the door.  “I’m trusting you not to tamper with anything in the office while I’m not here,” he added sternly.

“Yes Sir,” Lexi gave him a mock salute, “I’ll be careful, scout
’
s honor.”

“You were a girl scout?”

“Campfire Girl, but same difference,” Lexi smiled back, gratified when his expression relaxed as well.  “I’ll be good, I promise.”  With a nod he slipped out of the office and Lexi breathed an audible sigh of relief.  Sitting gingerly on the edge of the office chair, she tugged off her right glove.  For some reason she always got the best reception from her right hand.  Bracing herself for all manner of unpleasant images, she touched the armrest of the chair, prepared to yank it free at the first sign of any
hanky panky
between Neil and Monica or any other girl he was cheating with. 

Lexi let out a held breath as the rush of images washed over her, finding the image of Neil thankfully alone in the office, getting ready to leave.  There wasn’t much to the impression, and Lexi played it back over and over in her mind, looking for some small detail that would tell her where he was going.  The calendar on the desk held the same date he’d gone missing, letting her know it was at least a recent image she was seeing, and he wasn’t talking to anyone or thinking about anything other than getting out of there before the evening commute got too hairy.  The time on the computer showed 4:15pm before he powered it off for the night.

Letting go of the chair, Lexi’s brows drew together into a single dark line as she considered the entirely normal scene.  No crazy phone calls calling him away to handle an emergency, no clandestine plans to meet with an
yone, the surface thoughts she
picked up indicate
d
he intended to go straight home.  So what the hell had happened to him? 

One thing she did have now was the password to his computer, and she typed it in, gratified to see the desktop appear after a couple of minutes.  Only… what should she be looking for?  Maddie would know, she was a whiz with computers and a natural born snoop to boot.  “Email…” she thought suddenly, opening up the little icon, toes tapping nervously at the thought of reading his private emails.  There wasn’t too much in the inbox from the day he disappeared, and it all looked business related, nothing of interest.  On a hunch she checked the deleted file, letting out a low whistle at the multiple times the name Monica Haynes popped up.      

The emails themselves were just short of pornographic, leaving no doubt as to his relationship with the woman.  Heavily laced with innuendo and double entendres, it appeared that Monica enjoyed sending Neil racy emails at all hours of the day, some from work and some from a private email account.  “Yikes…” Some with pictures. 

With a quick look to the closed door, Lexi forwarded a bunch of them to her own personal email address, just in case Allison needed them for proof in court that Neil
was
carrying on with her for a while.  Unfortunately the system routinely dumped out old deleted emails because the oldest one she could find was a month old.  She was about to check his sent emails folder to see if it went back any further when the door opened and Gabriel poked his head in.  “Larry was a bust, did you find anything good?  Hey, you got into his computer, how did you manage that?”

Lexi nearly jumped out of her skin at the sudden interruption, “Jesus Christ…”  Face flushing
red;
she set her hands in her lap out of habit.  “I ah, guessed his password.” 
Okay so that one was a lie.

“Really?  What was it?”

“Niners99,” she replied, “he’s a big football fan.” 
Not a lie
.  “I found some interesting emails between him and Monica,” she changed the subject.  “He’s definitely been doing the nasty with her for a while.”  Lexi moved out of the way so the detective to take a look for himself. 

“This is excellent…” he breathed, skimming quickly through the text.

“You have a thing for dirty emails?” A single brow was raised.  “Whatever floats your boat…”

“No, I mean this is good documentation to have.  If this Monica tries to deny having an affair with Neil, we can brace her with this evidence and see if she changes her tune.  That and it’ll prove useful to Allie if she decides to leave him.”

Pleased that his thoughts
ran
towards protecting Allison just like hers had, Lexi gave him a relieved smile.  “Should we go interrogate her now?”
h
er expression turned
eager.    

“No time like the present,” he nodded, “after you.”

***

Only Monica wasn’t having any.  The blonde took one look at Lexi and refused to admit that she had any idea where Neil was or that she had anything other than a business relationship with him.  Even when the incriminating emails were mentioned, she hardly turned a hair, professing not to know what they were talking about.  Lexi started to think she should have s
a
t th
at
one out and let Gabriel take over, but the damage had already been done
. 
Monica sat with her arms crossed over her chest de
fensively. 

“Can I go now?  I have to get back to work.”

“Ms. Haynes, we’re not trying to pass any moral judgment on you
,
or your friendship with Mr. Travers,” Ryan tried again.  “We’re just trying to ascertain if you’ve heard from him in the past forty-eight hours.”

“I told you, I haven’t heard from him, that’s all I have to say,” she snapped, eyes hooded with distrust.

Lexi decided to try another tack.  “Monica, you know he’s missing right?  He never came home two nights ago, none of his clothes are
gone
and he hasn’t turned up in the local hospitals.  All we want to do is find out if he’s okay.  If you know where he is, just have him give us a call to let us know he’s alright and that’ll be the end of it.  We’re not trying to get anyone in trouble.”

A flicker of doubt crossed her features.  “He’s really missing?”

Wasn’t
that what they
’d been
saying
for the past fifteen minutes?  “Yeah, his little girl Chloe is worried sick,” she left Allison out of it for the moment.  “You haven’t heard anything at all from him have you?”

“No,” Monica replied, a pucker of worry appearing on h
er
brow.  “We were supposed to have lunch yesterday… a business lunch,” she added quickly and Lexi suppressed the urge to roll her eyes.  “
But
I thought he
called in sick
;
I never
dreamed
anything was really wrong
.  He’s really missing?”
s
he repeated.

“I’m afraid so
,
M
a’am,” Ryan nodded gravely, switching
gears
to follow Lexi’s lead.  “Is there anything you can tell us at all that might help us find him?  Has he been feeling sick lately or is there any place that he likes to go to be alone?”

“Well… no, he’s been healthy
as a… I mean he
seem
s
healthy enough when I see him here at the office.  Neil’s a pretty social guy, I’ve never known him to want to hole himself up somewhere and be alone,” her red lips turned down into a frown. 

“So there were no plans that you knew of for Neil to go out for drinks or dinner or anything after work that night?”

“No, he didn’t mention anything to me, and I would have heard of it if there was a group of us going out for drinks.  Do you think he’s alright?”  There was no disguising the naked concern in her voice and Lexi actually felt a little sorry for
her
despite her best intentions to hate this woman.

“I hope he is,” Lexi replied, a little surprised to find that it was true.  Neil might be a bastard, but she
didn’t
really
hope
he would turn up dead or hurt somewhere.   

Detective
Ryan pulled out a business card, sliding it across the desk.  “If you hear anything, anything at all, please give me a call.  As we said, we just want to make sure that Mr. Travers is safe, there’s no law that compels him to go home if he doesn’t want to.”

Monica took the card, staring down at it thoughtfully.  “I will,” she promised, all of the fight gone out of her. 

Lexi remained silent while they left the office building, mulling over what she’d learned.  It
was looking
more and more like Neil hadn’t run off on his own, but it
also looked
like there was damned little they could do about it.  Besides, who was to say he didn’t have another girlfriend somewhere offering a shoulder to cry on and a bed to sleep in?

“You were pretty good back there, have you ever considered a job in interrogation?” Gabriel asked as they stepped into the parking lot.  

A subdued smile touched her lips.  “It wouldn’t be my first choice, no. 
Can you seriously see someone being intimidated by me?”

“It’s not all about intimidation.  You’re the one who got results with the soft touch,” he pointed out. 

Still, a career in law enforcement wasn’t her style, but she kept that opinion to herself, not wanting to hurt his feelings.  On him it seemed to fit.  “
Did you believe her?  Do you think she really has no clue where he is?”

“I do,” he nodded, pulling out
the
keys to the
Towncar.  “You
really got through to her at the end there.  I think she’s worried about him.”

“So what happens now?”

Gabriel
went to the passenger’s side, pulling the door open for her.  “Now… we go home, wait for something to break.”

Lexi paused on the inside of the car door.  “That’s it?”

“Like I said, it’s not a crime to stay away from home.  Just because he didn’t run off with his girlfriend doesn’t mean he didn’t take off on his own.  It happens all the time.  A guy disappear
s
, you scour the hospitals and morgues and he turns up six months later living in another state, shacked up with a whole new family.”

“You don’t really believe that,” Lexi balked.

“You said it yourself, Neil’s an asshat
,” he grinned.  “
Maybe he just snapped?  Decided he’d had too much responsibility, the girlfriend’s starting to pressure him to leave his wife, so he said fuck it and just kept driving?”

Only that
wasn’t
the state of
mind she
saw
him in on that last day in the office.  But how could she tell him that?  

“Why don’t you let me take you home?  We’ve done enough detective work
today;
I think we’ve earned a break.”  Gabriel stood patiently on the outside of the car door and
she
realized he was waiting for her
to get in
.

“Right,
”
Lexi gave him a tight smile as she climbed into the car.  He was probably right.  Her first instinct told her Neil was off somewhere on a bender. 
It sucked, but at the end of the day it was Allie’s problem, not hers.  All she could do was be there with support and some incriminating emails
,
should the occasion call for it.