“No, it’s about making life more comfortable for you and Ross, because you feel guilty whenever I’m around,” Milla said.
“Guilty!” Julia drew back, her pretty face astonished. “What do we have to feel guilty about?”
“Having your children safe and sound. Being happy. Being whole. It’s a form of survivor’s guilt.”
“That isn’t true.”
“Then what does it matter to you how I live my life? If I were a drug dealer or a prostitute, I could see your point, but I look for lost people—children, mostly. And I still look for my son. How on earth is that harming you? What if it were Chloe?” Chloe was Julia’s five-year-old daughter, an impish pixie of a child who lit up the world with her smile. “If some stranger snatched her away from you at, say, the mall, how long would it take before you said, ‘Oh, well, I’ve looked long enough, time to get on with my life’? Would there ever be a night when you didn’t go to bed wondering where she was, if she was hungry or cold, if some pervert was using her in unspeakable ways? And even then would you pray that she still be alive, so you at least had a chance of seeing her again? How long would you give yourself, Julia?”
The color washed out of Julia’s cheeks. She wasn’t the most imaginative of women, but she could picture how she would feel if anything happened to Chloe.
“So imagine how I felt when you and Ross said, ‘Hey, it’s been a while, you might as well give it up and stop bothering us with your sad face.’ I personally don’t give a damn how you feel about my sad face, and I don’t know if I’ll ever forgive you for saying Justin doesn’t matter!” Despite her attempt to remain calm, Milla’s voice was fierce as she finished.
“We never said that!” Julia was appalled. “Of course he matters! But he’s gone, and you can’t change that. We just want you to accept it.”
“If I’d accepted it three years ago, I wouldn’t have found the people who took him,” she snapped. “Just last month, as a matter of fact. I finally have some solid leads, and even if all I can find out is that he was adopted, using a fake birth certificate, can’t you see that’s more than I’ve had before? Until two weeks ago, I didn’t even know if he was alive when he was taken out of Mexico! So let’s just say you and Ross made an error in judgment, and leave it at that.”
“Leave it, period,” said Mrs. Edge, a stern, angry look on her face. “That’s enough. Julia, I love you dearly, but this isn’t your home anymore; how dare you come here knowing you were going to start a ruckus? I can see the points both of you are making. As a mother, I know I would never stop looking if one of you went missing. Also as a mother, I hate to see my child tearing herself apart for a hopeless cause.”
“But it isn’t hopeless,” Milla said.
“We know that now, but we didn’t know it before! We have to go with what we can see, and what we saw was your life in ruins. You and David divorced, and you buried yourself in this Finders work until it seemed that there was nothing left of you, the person we all love. Milla, you have no idea how we’ve worried—”
“Uh.” Mr. Edge hesitantly stuck his head through the doorway. “I hate to bother you, but Milla’s purse is ringing.” He held out his hand, and in it was Milla’s purse, which, from the habit of a lifetime, she’d placed on top of the piano when she’d come in. The cell phone inside was both ringing and vibrating, making it sound as if the noise had disturbed a rattlesnake.
She hurried across the kitchen to take her purse and dig out her phone. The office had her parents’ number, and normally when she was on vacation she turned off her cell phone, but she’d turned it on while driving over from the airport to let her folks know she was on her way, and had forgotten to turn it off again. The call was probably related to Finders, but unless it was an emergency, she’d just refer the caller to the office number.
She punched the talk button and said, “Milla Edge.”
“How soon can you meet me in Idaho?” The voice was low and rough, almost rusty sounding, as if the owner didn’t use it very often. He didn’t have to identify himself.
Milla sucked in her breath. She was already upset, already tense, and hearing Diaz’s voice was like receiving a mild electrical shock. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“I found a name. I don’t like taking you along, not after what happened with Lola, but I figure you have a right.”
“That was my fault,” she admitted. “I lost control. I promise it won’t happen again.” Her heart was racing and she was all but quivering with excitement. “I’ll call the airline and see what’s available, then get back to you. Where exactly am I going?”
“Boise. Plan on spending one night; then we’ll fly home the next day.”
“I’ll get right back to you. Will you be at the number on Caller ID?”
“Yeah.”
She pulled her return ticket out of her purse and looked at the phone number on it. Her fare was nonrefundable, but sometimes it could be transferred to a different flight.
“What’s going on?” Mrs. Edge asked, coming to stand beside Milla as she dialed the number for her travel agency. She always used an agency instead of booking the flights herself, because last-minute changes had had to be made often enough that she’d found a travel agent could handle things much easier, having all the information for all the airlines right there.
“That was one of my contacts.” Explaining exactly who and what Diaz was would take far too much time. “He’s been tracking the men who took Justin, and he’s located someone who might know something. I’m meeting him in Idaho.”
“But you just got here!”
“This can’t wait.”
“I can’t believe you’re doing this again,” Julia said.
Milla spared her a brief glance. “I can’t believe you think I should pass up a chance to find out anything I can—Yes, hello.” She turned her attention to the travel agent on the other end of the line. What she found was that, because it was late afternoon now, if she left today the only flights available would involve a couple of layovers, changing airlines, and still not get her into Boise until tomorrow morning. Or she could wait until tomorrow morning and take the first flight out; she would still have to change airlines, but she would arrive in Idaho only an hour later than she would if she left right now.
That was a no-brainer. Milla chose the second option, got all the details, then called Diaz back. “I can’t make it today; tomorrow morning is the best I can do. If the flight’s on time, I’ll be getting in at eleven-oh-three.” She gave him the airline and flight number.
“Are you checking your luggage?”
She thought of all she had brought, since she’d planned to spend several days here. “I’ll have to, or have most of it shipped home.”
He didn’t gripe about having to wait for her luggage, just said, “I’ll meet you in baggage claim. See you in the morning.”
“Yes,” she echoed. “I’ll see you then.” She hung up, her attention already far away from the people in the room. She brushed past Julia without really seeing her and made her way up the stairs, her mind on repacking her bags so her essentials were in one small bag that she could carry on with her, in case her checked luggage went missing.
“Milla!” Julia called after her, but Milla kept climbing the stairs.
18
Catching the first flight out meant getting up at three A.M. so she would have time to drive to the airport in Kentucky, turn in her rental car, and still have plenty of time to get through security. She bought some snacks out of vending machines in the Louisville airport, because it was a safe bet the airline wasn’t going to serve anything and she was already hungry. From Louisville she flew to Chicago, then from Chicago to Salt Lake City, where she changed airlines and flew to Boise.
Diaz was waiting for her, and her heart gave a huge thump at the sight of him. He was dressed much as usual, in jeans and those rubber-soled boots, though in deference to the changing season he wore a long-sleeved denim shirt over his dark T-shirt, wi
th the sleeves rolled up over his forearms. He stood apart from the small crowd, his expression as remote as ever. Several people darted vaguely uneasy glances at him, though he wasn’t doing anything other than just standing there.
“What did you find out?” she asked anxiously as she reached him. She’d been fretting during the entire trip, wondering who they were going to see and what he or she knew about the kidnapping.
“I’ll tell you on the way. I have two rooms booked for us at a hotel,” he said. “We’ll drop off your luggage and you can change clothes before we leave.”
“Why do I need to change clothes?” She looked down at herself. She was dressed for comfort, in slacks and a blouse, with a lightweight sweater thrown over her shoulders to keep off the chill. For someone used to El Paso’s climate, both airplanes and Idaho were too cold for her.
“You need something sturdier, like jeans and boots, since we don’t know what we’ll find. I’ve done some advance scouting and the terrain looks rough.” They collected her luggage; he took her heaviest bag and shifted it to his left hand, then used his right to guide her in the direction of the parking lot.
“How long have you been here?”
“I got here last night.”
She hadn’t seen him for three weeks, and until this moment she hadn’t realized how starved she felt. Just his physical presence sent a wave of longing through her. He was like the pain of childbirth: away from him, she remembered that almost electric aura of danger, but she didn’t feel it. Being near him made her heartbeat rev up, all her senses heighten; it was almost as if the fight-or-flight response kicked in—or maybe that was exactly what happened.
She recognized the giddy sense of euphoria, the butterflies in her stomach; she hadn’t felt this way since David. She’d loved David and she most assuredly did not love Diaz, but she had also wanted David sexually. No other man she’d met since then had gotten that reaction from her, no matter how much she might like the man himself, until Diaz. She wanted him. She needed her head examined, but she wanted him.
She was expecting a rental car, or maybe an SUV, but the vehicle he led her to was an enormous, black four-wheel-drive pickup, with the frame sitting so high she wondered how she could climb into the cab, even though she was wearing slacks.
Diaz put her bags in the bed of the truck, then unlocked the doors. “Where on earth did you get this thing?” she asked, looking up at the lights mounted on top of the cab. “I know you didn’t rent it.”
He put his hands on her waist and lifted her onto the seat. “It belongs to an acquaintance.”
When he got behind the wheel, she said, “An ‘acquaintance,’ huh? Not a friend?”
“I don’t have friends.”
The blunt statement rattled her, hit her in the chest, and made her ache inside. How could he bear to live such a solitary life? “You have me,” she said before she thought.
He froze in the act of putting the key in the ignition, and slowly turned his head to look at her. She couldn’t read the expression in his dark eyes; she knew only that they burned. “Do I?” he asked softly.
For a moment she felt off balance, as if he’d asked one thing but meant another. Was he asking if she was his on an entirely different level, or was he expressing doubt? She had no idea; he was so unreadable she was left floundering, so she instinctively went to shallow water. “If you want a friend, you do. How can you live without friendship?”
He shrugged and turned the key, firing up the big motor. “Easy.”
Yes, that was what he’d meant, that he doubted he had any real friends. She was both disappointed and relieved. However much she might want him, she wasn’t certain she’d ever have the nerve to do anything about it. That would be like stepping into a cage with a tiger, no matter how tame the handler said it was. The doubt and fear would always remain.
She sought refuge in the original subject. “This ‘acquaintance’ knows and trusts you well enough to put this monster at your disposal?”
“He trusts me.”
She noticed that he didn’t say the man knew him. This was a dead-end subject, though, and she was anxious to find out what Diaz knew and why they were in Idaho.
“Okay, we’re on the way. What did you find out?”
“Nothing, yet,” he said, and she almost wilted in disappointment.
“But I thought—”
“After we talk to this guy, we might know something more. What I heard was that his brother was the pilot of the plane that crashed.”
“You got the pilot’s name?”
“Maybe.” At her frustrated look, he said, “It’s like a string. We’ll pull on it and see if it goes anywhere. Most of the time it doesn’t, but negative knowledge is almost as good as positive knowledge.”
“Meaning then you know where not to look.”
“It also tells you something about the person who put the string in your hand, too.”
“But maybe you have the pilot’s name?”
“I heard that a guy named Gilliland would fly any cargo out of Mexico, but that he crashed and was killed seven or eight years ago. The only thing anyone knew about him was that he had a brother named Norman Gilliland who lived in the Sawtooth Wilderness close to Lowman.”
She stared at him, suddenly uneasy; after a moment, she realized why. “So no one knew anything about the pilot, but all of a sudden someone remembers his brother’s first name and exactly where he lived? That’s very specific knowledge for someone who didn’t know anything else about the pilot.”
He gave her an approving glance. “You might make a pretty good tracker yourself. You have good instincts.”
She knotted her fists. “This is another wild-goose chase, isn’t it? Why are we even bothering?”
He paused. “ ‘Another’?”
“That’s what I’ve been doing for ten years, running in circles and getting nowhere.” She stared out the window, her jaw set.
“Like someone’s been feeding you false information?”
Slowly she turned her head to look at him. “You think that’s it? I’ve been deliberately led away from the right track?”
“You’re too smart and too good at what you do for it to be otherwise. When it’s someone else’s kid, you have damn good luck finding them, don’t you?”
Mutely she nodded. She had an almost eerie knack for success, as if she could put herself in the mind of a lost child or runaway and figure out where they’d gone. That had made it doubly frustrating for her, that she could find other children but not her own child.
“That’s another string I can follow,” he said. “Maybe I’ve been asking the wrong questions. Maybe I should ask who’s been telling people to give you the wrong answers.”
She really had been chasing in circles all these years, and someone had made certain she stayed in the same rut by dangling a carrot in front of her nose. The only real lead she’d ever had was the one that had taken her to Guadalupe that night when Diaz was there, and she had no idea who her informant had been. Nor had Diaz ever found out, or he would have told her. On second thought—“Did you ever find out who tipped me that you’d be in Guadalupe?”
“No.”
Another mystery, but evidently this one was in their favor. She was having a hard time dealing with this new slant on all the frustrations and dead ends, the constant rise of hope only to have it dashed on the rocks. She could understand if no one had told her anything, just stonewalled her, but to deliberately have her chasing wild story after wild story smacked of a deep malevolence.
She was so mired in thought she didn’t realize they’d stopped in front of a small hotel until he opened the door and vaulted out. By the time she got her purse hooked on her shoulder and her own door open, he was there, reaching up to grasp her waist and lift her out of the seat. He set her on the ground in front of him, hemmed in by the truck, the open door, and his body. There were a good six inches between them, but abruptly she felt blasted by his body heat, carrying with it the
warm, clean smell of his skin. He hadn’t shaved; at least two or three days’ growth of beard stubbled his jaw. She wanted to reach up and stroke his face, feel the bristles against her palm.
“Don’t let it get you down,” he said. She struggled to pull her mind back to reality. “Misdirection takes money and influence. Knowing that gives me another string. Hell, I’ve almost got a whole ball of yarn now.”
She managed a smile, and he turned to lift her bag out of the truck bed. He led the way inside, past a small reception area, where the man on duty gave them a cursory glance, then went back to what he was doing. Everything was clean and well maintained, including the smallish elevator, which arrived with a smooth whooshing sound.
Diaz pushed the button for the third floor, and after the doors closed and the elevator began gliding upward, he said, “Your room number is 323; I’m in 325.” He fished in his pocket and pulled out an electronic door card, which he handed to her. “Here’s your card. Take a left out of the elevator.”
He took both her Pullman case and carry-on bag, while she walked ahead of him and unlocked the door to room 323. The heavy curtains over the windows were closed so the room was dark, and she flipped the light switch. It was a standard hotel room, clean and unimaginative, with a king-sized bed, a twenty-five-inch television in an armoire, an easy chair with an ottoman, and another chair at a desk. The connecting door to the next room stood open, revealing a mirror image of her room.
Maybe he walked in his sleep.
“Where do you want this?” he asked, indicating her heavy suitcase.
“On the bed. I’ll dig out my clothes and be with you in a minute.”
“I’ll wait outside.” He left by her door, and Milla hurried to unzip her suitcase and search through it for her jeans, socks, and sneakers. Three minutes later she grabbed her purse, put her room card in it, and was out the door.