The Sinister by David Putnam

Author:David Putnam
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oceanview Publishing
Published: 2022-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTY

HELEN CAME UP from behind and poked me in the back. She pointed over to Chulack and the open car door where his daughter Amy Mosely sat on the seat, her legs sticking out. She was bent over with her face in her hands, crying. “What’s going on?” Helen asked. “Who’s that?”

“It’s the mother of the kidnap victim.”

“Hmm, I guess she was close to the nanny, then.”

“What?”

She hooked her thumb over her shoulder. “The victim back there in the alley is Lilian Morales, the kidnapped girl’s nanny.”

“Ah, man.”

Amy probably was distraught over the brutal murder of her daughter’s nanny, but the more obvious reason was that if the nanny was dead, where did that leave poor Emily? This zeroed out her chances. It wouldn’t be long now before we found Emily in some other alley on the other side of the city.

A man stood off to the side of a newer Mercedes, a two-door coupe worth more than I made in five years as a deputy sheriff. It was parked behind my GMC truck. He wore a wrinkled two-thousand-dollar suit and handmade shoes. John Mosely. He’d not eaten in a while and had dark half-circles under his eyes. Both the ugly beasts, grief and despair, had jumped on his back, had him by the neck, trying hard to drag him down. It wouldn’t be long and I’d see him down in that dark place reserved for night terrors. See him with his Emily, and me on the side of the freeway with the dead bikers, the downed Highway Patrol officer …

… And Bosco.

No hope remained for his daughter, and he knew it.

“Stay here,” I said to Helen. I walked over to Mr. Mosely and extended my hand. “Arthur Higgins. I’m an FBI agent working with your father-in-law. I’m sorry about what’s going on.” His two-hundred-dollar haircut was mussed, and his tennis tan faded on a now pale face.

“Did you see Lilian? Did she suffer?”

“No, I’m sorry, I didn’t go over there. It’s better if I don’t in case … I mean when it does go to court. The fewer people who enter the crime scene, the better.” A half-truth tossed to a man who needed more than a life preserver; he needed the whole lifeboat.

He let go of my hand and started to wring both of his own. “Maybe I should take a look. I think I’ll regret it if I don’t. This is all my fault. I shouldn’t have let this happen.”

“What are you talking about? How could it be your fault?” Most survivors of violent crimes self-assign blame without basis of logic or evidence.

“Amy wanted to go back to work,” he said. “We didn’t need the money. She just wanted her career back. I should’ve told her no. This wouldn’t have happened. This is all my fault.”

Amy appeared. She went past me and hugged her husband, John. They both broke down and wept at the loss of their friend and nanny. And at its mortal implication. Chulack put his hand on my shoulder.

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