A Trace of Vice

Mariela hesitated, so Ed jumped in.

“We used to live in South Culver City. It’s not very far away from here but that area is much more hardscrabble. The streets are rougher and so are the kids. Lanie had an edge that always made us a bit uncomfortable, even when she was young. It’s gotten worse. I don’t mean to be judgmental, but we think she’s headed down a dangerous road.”

“We scrimped and saved,” Mariela jumped in, clearly uncomfortable at casting aspersions among strangers. “The year Sarah started middle school we moved here. We bought this place just before the market exploded. It’s small but we’d never be able to buy it now. It was tight even then. But she needed a fresh start with different kids.”

“So they lost touch,” Ray prodded gently. “What made them reconnect recently?”

“They’d see each other a couple of times a year but that was about it,” Ed answered. “But Sarah told us that Lanie texted her yesterday and said she really wanted to meet – that she needed her advice. She didn’t say why.”

“Of course,” Mariela added, “because she’s such a sweet, caring girl, she agreed without hesitation. I remember her telling me last night, ‘What kind of friend would I be, Mama, if I didn’t help someone when they needed it most?’”

Mariela broke off, overcome with emotion. Keri saw Ed give her hand a little squeeze of support. She envied these two. Even in a moment of near-panic, they were a united front, finishing one another’s sentences, backstopping each other emotionally. Somehow their shared devotion and love was keeping them from falling apart. Keri remembered a time when she thought she’d had the same thing.

“Did Sarah say where they were meeting?” she asked.

“No, they hadn’t decided as of noon. But I’m sure it was somewhere close – maybe the Howard Hughes Center or Fox Hills Mall. Sarah doesn’t drive yet so it would have to be somewhere with easy bus access.”

Can you give us a few recent photos of her?” Keri asked Mariela, who immediately got up to get some.

“Is Sarah on social media?” Ray asked.

“She’s on Facebook. Instagram, Twitter. I don’t know what else. Why?” asked Ed.

“Sometimes kids will share details on their accounts that are helpful to investigations. Do you know any of her passwords?”

“No,” Mariela said as she pulled a few pictures from their frames. “We’ve never had cause to ask for them. She shows us posts on her accounts all the time. She never seems to be hiding anything. We’re even Facebook friends. I just never felt the need to ask for that kind of thing. Is there no way you can get access to those?”

“We can,” Keri told her. “But without the passwords, it takes time. We have to get a court order. And right now we don’t have probable cause.”

“What about the GPS being off?” Ed asked.

“That helps make the case,” Keri answered. “But at this point everything’s circumstantial at best. You’ve both made a compelling argument for why this situation is so unusual. But on paper, it might not look that way to a judge. But don’t let that upset you too much. We’re just starting out here. This is what we do – investigate. And I’d like to start by going to Lanie’s house and speaking to her folks. Do you have her address?”

“I do,” Mariela said, handing Keri several photos of Sarah before pulling out her phone and scrolling through her contacts. “But I don’t know how much help it will be. Lanie’s father is out of the picture and her mother is…uninvolved. But if you think it will help, here it is.”

Keri wrote down the information and everyone made their way to the front door. They shook hands formally, which struck Keri as odd for people who’d just been discussing something so intimate.

She and Ray were halfway down the path to his car when Edward Caldwell called out after them with one last question.

“I’m sorry to ask this but you said you were just getting started. That makes it sound like this might be a long process. But my understanding is that in the case of a missing person, the first twenty-four hours are crucial. Is that wrong?”

Keri and Ray looked at each other and then back at Caldwell. Neither was sure who should answer. Finally Ray spoke.

“That’s not wrong, sir. But we don’t yet have any indication that anything suspicious has happened. And in any case, you reached out to us quickly. That helps a lot. I know this is hard to hear but try not to worry. I promise we’ll be in touch.”

They turned and walked back to the car. When Keri was sure they were out of earshot, she quietly muttered, “Good lying.”

“I wasn’t lying. Everything I said was true. She could turn up back home any minute and this will be over.”

“I guess,” Keri conceded. “But all my instincts are telling me this one isn’t going to be that easy.”

CHAPTER THREE

Keri sat in the passenger seat on the way to Culver City, quietly flagellating herself. She tried to remind herself that she hadn’t done anything wrong. But she was wracked by the guilt of forgetting something as simple as today not being a school day. Even Ray hadn’t been able to hide his surprise at it.

She was losing touch with the parent part of her and it scared her. How long would it be before she forgot other, more personal details? A few weeks ago, she’d been given anonymous clues which led to a photo of a teenage girl. But Keri, much to her shame, hadn’t been able to tell if it was Evie.

True, it had been five years and the picture was grainy and taken from far away. But the fact that she just didn’t immediately know if the photo was of her daughter or not had shaken her. Even after the unit’s resident tech guru, Detective Kevin Edgerton, had told her that his digital comparison of the picture to photos of Evie at eight years old was inconclusive for a match, her sense of shame lingered.

I should have just known. A good mother would have known if it was real right away.

“We’re here,” Ray said quietly, snapping her out of her reverie.

Keri looked up and realized they were parked just up the street from Lanie Joseph’s house. The Caldwells had been right. This area, while less than five miles from their home, was much rougher-looking.

It was still only 5:30, but the sun had already mostly set and the temperature was dropping. Small groups of young men in gang attire were gathering in driveways and on stoops, drinking beers and smoking what didn’t look like cigarettes. Most of the lawns were more brown than green and the sidewalks were cracked everywhere, with weeds fighting their way through the spaces. Most of the residences on the block looked to be townhouses or duplexes and all of them had bars on the windows and heavy metal screen doors.

“What do you think – should we call Culver City PD for backup?” Ray asked. “Technically, we’re out of our jurisdiction.”

“Nah. It’ll take too long and I want to stay low profile, get in and out. The more formal we make this, the longer it’s going to take. If something did happen to Sarah, we don’t have time to waste.”

“Okay, then let’s get to it,” he said.

They got out of the car and walked briskly to the address Mariela Caldwell had given them. Lanie lived in the front of a two-unit townhouse on Corinth, just south of Culver Boulevard. The 405 freeway was so close that Keri could identify the hair color of passing drivers.

As Ray knocked on the outer metal door, Keri glanced two houses over at five men huddled around the engine of a Corvette sitting on blocks in the driveway. Several of them cast suspicious looks at the interlopers but no one said anything.

The sound of multiple kids screeching came from inside. After a minute, the inner door was opened by a small blond boy who couldn’t have been more than five. He wore holes-pocked jeans and a white T-shirt with a homemade Superman-style “S” scrawled on it.

He stared up at Ray, his neck craning all the way back. Then he looked over at Keri, and apparently viewing her as less threatening, he spoke.

“What you want, lady?”

Keri sensed that the kid didn’t get a lot of sweetness and light in his life, so she knelt down to his level and spoke in as gentle a voice as she could muster.

“We’re police officers. We need to speak to your mommy for a minute.”

The kid, unfazed, turned and shouted back into the house.

“Mom. Cops are here. Want to talk to you.” Apparently this wasn’t the first time he’d had a visit from law enforcement.

Keri saw Ray glance over at the guys around the Corvette and without looking herself, asked him quietly, “We got a problem over there?”

“Not yet,” Ray answered under his breath. “But we could soon. We should make this quick.”

“What kind of cops are you?” the little boy demanded. “No uniforms. You undercover? You detectives?”

“Detectives,” Ray told him and apparently deciding the boy didn’t need to be coddled, asked his own question. “When’s the last time you saw Lanie?”