“He knows you love him, but whatever is going on in his head, he can’t reconcile it.” He paused. “I don’t know if that makes sense.”
“I think I get it.” She wanted to help Sean, but that was the thing—she didn’t think she could help him. She didn’t know how. And that hurt.
“I’ll drive you to the conference, but first you need to eat. I’ll cook. Go shower.”
“Bossy,” she mumbled.
“That’s what big brothers are for.” He got up and kissed the top of her head. “We are going to get Sean through this, whatever this is. I’m not going to abandon you, or him. I promise.”
Chapter Four
Lucy and Jack walked into the ballroom before the scheduled drone presentation that morning and immediately a man in his early forties ran up to them and said, “Have you seen Ellen?”
He had a panicked expression.
“Marc, what happened?” Jack asked.
“We were supposed to have breakfast this morning. She didn’t show. She’s not answering her phone. She’s not at her house, she’s not in the room she has here at the hotel or in the vendor room. No one has seen her. This isn’t like her, Jack, you know it.”
“I saw the Pride Tactical van on J Street,” Jack said.
“She has permission to park it there all week. Oh shit, I didn’t think, that’s where I saw her last night, she was working—but why wouldn’t she answer her phone?”
Marc ran from the room.
Jack mumbled something under his breath that Lucy couldn’t hear, then said, “Lucy, that’s Marc Dupre, Ellen’s partner. Ex-husband. Whatever. Just flash your badge and find out when Ellen Dupre used her hotel key last night. It’s electronic, they’ll have a record.”
Lucy watched Jack run after Marc, then went over to the reservation desk, showed her badge, and asked to speak with the manager.
Five minutes later she learned that Ellen hadn’t entered her room since yesterday afternoon at five p.m.—Lucy had seen her at six thirty at the meet and greet.
“I need a card key,” she told the manager.
He hesitated.
“We need to do a welfare check. She’s missing.”
“Of course. I’ll take you right up.”
Might be a slight fib, but Lucy was trusting Jack on this—and what he’d told her about Ellen Dupre was that not only was she a creature of habit, but she was punctual. If she wasn’t where she was supposed to be and unreachable, she could be in trouble. A medical emergency most likely—but to know if she was ill or on meds Lucy would need to see her hotel room.
“When did Ms. Dupre check in?” Lucy asked.
“Monday. She lives locally but wanted a suite so she could meet with clients. She’s been with us every year we’ve held the conference here—at least since I’ve been manager.”
“You know her personally.”
“Friendly, not friends. Ms. Dupre is very good to the staff, so we try to accommodate her on what she needs—such as a complimentary safe.”
“Doesn’t every room have a safe?”
“She needs a larger one. As you can imagine at a law enforcement conference, there are some items that need to be secured every night. Most vendors either bring their merchandise to their rooms or take equipment off-site, but because Ms. Dupre and Pride Tactical have been with us for so long, I make the larger hotel safe available for her use.”
“Did she put anything in it last night?”
“Yes, when the vendor room closed, she put in her demo models. I expected her to retrieve them this morning, but then I saw on the schedule that she was giving a presentation in the main ballroom, so figured she wouldn’t open her booth until after.”
They exited on the tenth floor, the concierge level. When they reached Ellen’s door, the manager took out his master swipe and opened it. Lucy had him stand back and she entered, cautious, her hand on the butt of her gun.
The room was empty.
The bed was made, though it looked like someone had lain on the bedspread, a slight indention on both the cover and the pillow farthest from the door. Lucy looked in the closet—it was the closest door—no one. The bathroom was empty. She looked under the bed. It rested on a solid platform. She then motioned that the manager could enter, and she went into the bathroom to do a better search of Ellen’s belongings, visual only—no searching of drawers or luggage.
She had no prescription bottles on the counter. Her toothbrush and toothpaste were laid out on top of a washcloth next to the sink. The clothes in the closet were hung perfectly—a dark-gray pantsuit and a black pantsuit—plus two polo shirts, one black and one dark purple, with the Pride Tactical logo on the pocket.
The suitcase was open on the suitcase stand, and had her underwear and workout clothes in it, all neatly folded. Black sneakers and low-heeled black boots were on the floor of the closet.
Lucy thought back to what Ellen had been wearing last night—dark jeans, black polo with a logo Lucy hadn’t been able to fully see, and a dark blazer.
“Agent Kincaid?” the manager said, slightly apprehensive.
“When was this room last cleaned?’
He checked his tablet. “Yesterday, ten a.m.”
She called Jack.
“Kincaid,” he answered.
“It’s Lucy. She’s not in her room, didn’t sleep here. She left at five p.m.”
“She’s not in the tactical van. Marc says it doesn’t look like it’s supposed to, but he’s not a tech guy. He thinks something’s missing, doesn’t know what.”
“Sean would know,” she said.
“Call him.”
“You call him. I need to do something.” She ended the call before he argued with her. She didn’t want to talk to Sean right now. She was angry with him, upset, and worried—and she didn’t even know if he would answer her. She thought it would be worse if she needed to talk to him, about something important like this, and he declined her call.
She looked at the manager. “Can you please tell me about your security? I’d like to look at the footage from last night.”
“Of course,” he said and they walked out.
“Don’t let anyone into Ms. Dupre’s room—not housekeeping, not staff, no one until I clear it,” she said.
“What happened to her?”
“I don’t know, but I’ll find out.”
* * *
Sean almost sent Jack’s call to voice mail, but he knew if he did he’d have worse to deal with later.
“Yep.”
“We need you at the convention center.”
“Sorry—I know, I was supposed to be there for Ellen’s demo, I overslept.”
“Ellen’s missing, the tactical van may have been robbed but Marc can’t tell for certain. The drone is gone.”
“I’m coming.”
“How long?”
He winced. It would come out anyway. “Two hours.”
“Where the fuck are you?”
“Tahoe.” He ended the call before Jack said anything else.
He hadn’t overslept—he’d barely slept at all. He’d spent his first hour playing blackjack and parlayed a hundred bucks into two thousand. Then he went to a high-stakes poker table and ended up walking away eight hours later with over twenty thousand.