Page 107 of The Newcomer
“I promise, I’ll fill you in later,” Joe said. “But in the meantime, can you and Isabelle kind of scout around and see if anybody’s seen Letty?”
“Sure thing.”
His apartment was only five minutes from the motel, but he covered the distance in record time. He slowed and checked the parking lot for the silver Kia, but it wasn’t there. He drove past, headed south, and scanned the parking lot of every business he passed, hoping to glimpse the Kia. He tried calling her, but each time he was sent directly to voice mail.
When he reached St. Pete Beach, he turned around and headed back north, slowing as he passed through Treasure Island, Madeira Beach, Redington, Redington Shores, and Indian Rocks Beach.
Joe was stopped at a traffic light a couple of miles from the Murmuring Surf when he spotted the silver Kia as it pulled out of a McDonald’s parking lot and into traffic. The light turned, but he hadto wait while a bedraggled-looking homeless man shuffled across the street pushing a shopping cart loaded down with bags of plastic bottles and aluminum cans for recycling. By then, the Kia was three cars ahead. He accelerated, pulled up next to her, and lightly tapped the truck’s horn. Letty glanced over, looking surprised, and gave him a wave. Maya was seated in the back seat, contentedly sipping on something in her plastic cup. His shoulders relaxed and he called Vikki Hill. “Found her,” he reported, pulling into a convenience store parking lot. “They were at McDonald’s.” He exhaled slowly and headed back to the Murmuring Surf.
Whenthey reached the motel, she got out of the Kia and waited for him to park. Letty knew something was up from the serious look on his face.
“Something wrong?” she said, as he walked up to her.
“You scared the crap out of me, taking off like this without telling anybody,” he said.
Letty leaned into the car, lifted Maya out of her car seat, and set her down on the pavement. “Hey Mr. Joe,” the child said. “I got a Happy Meal.”
He forced a smile. “Good for you.”
Letty started walking toward her unit. “We need to talk,” he said, hooking his hand around her elbow. “Vikki got the call this morning. When she couldn’t reach you, and you weren’t at your place, yeah, we panicked.”
“Well, we’re back now,” she said.
“There’s more.” He pointed toward the office, where Ava and Vikki Hill stood waiting in the open doorway.
“I need some coffee,” Joe said. “And then we talk.”
Thefour of them sat around Ava’s kitchen table while Maya parked herself in front ofPAW Patrolin the living room.
“I got a call from a sheriff’s deputy down in South Florida this morning,” Joe said. “They found Chuck’s body in a car, back in the swamp, with a bullet in his brain.”
Coffee splattered over the side of Ava DeCurtis’s mug. “Oh?”
Letty jumped up, fetched a paper towel, and began cleaning up the spill.
“Sorry to break it to you like that, but I didn’t know how else to tell you,” he said.
“It was only a matter of time, I guess,” Ava said, scowling. But her hands shook as she sipped what was left of her coffee. “I guess he got what he had coming to him. Does that deputy know who did it?”
“That’s why he was calling me,” Joe said. “The car was stolen, and they were only able to identify him from fingerprints. When they ran them through the state’s criminal records system they found the warrant we had out on Chuck. He wanted to know about Chuck’s pals. Tanya and Declan Rooney.
“I told him we think Rooney was spotted up here yesterday,” Joe continued. “We need to see that security-camera footage from Publix. I’ll call the manager back today and lean on him.”
Vikki spoke up. “That’s why I freaked this morning, when we couldn’t reach you, Letty.”
“Sorry,” Letty said. She looked around the table. “Really. I am sorry. I gave Maya my phone so she could watch a cartoon. And the battery ran down. I didn’t mean to worry everybody.”
“We’re all gonna be on edge until this thing is over,” the FBI agent said. She handed her phone to Joe. “I think it’s time to take that photo of me with Maya. Don’t want Wingfield to start having second thoughts.”
Vikki went into the living room and sat beside Maya, who was lolling on the sofa cushions, softly singing to herself.
“Maya, Mr. Joe is going to take a picture of us together. Is that okay?”
“Okay,” the little girl agreed.
“Wait.” Letty took a hairbrush from her pocketbook and hurriedto her niece’s side. “Let’s get rid of that bird’s nest in your hair.” She gently combed the child’s hair and clipped the sides with plastic barrettes that she fished out of the pocket of her shorts. She tugged at the hem of Maya’s pajama top so that it covered her exposed tummy. “We’ve got to get you some new clothes,” she said. “You’ve just about outgrown everything I packed for you.”
As Vikki posed the little girl on her lap, Letty felt another pang of guilt. Tanya would have died if she’d seen her daughter happily eating junky fast food in public, with uncombed hair and bare feet, dressed in her pajama top and a pair of shrunken leggings. She’d always taken such care with Maya’s appearance. “I can’t have her going around looking like some poor little street urchin,” she’d tell Letty, as an excuse for spending exorbitant amounts of money for a designer outfit her child would outgrow in three months. “And I won’t have Evan’s friends’ bitchy wives judging me and calling me white trash behind my back.”
