Mysterious Person number three
This time when Kevin stepped out of the elevators he did so with confidence and certainty that for now, his baby brother was alive. They walked down the hallway into AJ’s room where he found a much more alert brother than he had left him. All Kevin wanted to do was grab his family in a huge hug after the scare he had. Wanting to tell them so much about the hell he had been through, yet knowing that he couldn’t.
Jackie was passed out on the bed next to AJ’s which was a good thing, since Kevin was almost certain that since this had happened she hadn’t even dared to close her eyes. Brian was sitting where he was used to seeing his mother perch, his leg resting on the bed and his hand flipping the television remote.
Both boys looked over when Kevin and Howie entered the room, Brian turning the volume down and signaling for the older men to talk quietly.
“I’m glad she’s asleep.” Kevin said approaching AJ’s bed and kissing his head to which, the younger brother seemed openly disgusted, a sure sign that AJ was on the road to recovery.
“The doctor gave her some tranquilizers to calm her down and thankfully she took them this time. She needs her sleep.” Brian replied staring at his mother.
“You do too, have you slept at all?”
“I’ll be fine; I’m spending the night over Mark’s.”
“Good… and how are you feeling?” Kevin said directing his gaze over to AJ, who already was looking ten times better than he did in the morning.
“I’ll be better when I have the little rug rat laying next to me, bugging the crap out of me like he always does.” AJ’s way of saying he missed Nicky.
“Any leads Kev? Did anything come of the thing you found in AJ’s pants?” Brian asked once again turning up the sound of the TV. Family Feud was playing in the background now.
Kevin’s eyes grew big, in the confusion and drama of the past hours events, he had temporarily forgotten all about the note with the phone number on it. “I haven’t been able to follow that yet but we think we might have some leads.”
“Why are you here and not out finding him then Kevin?”
“Because I wanted to check up on you, is that okay?” Kevin would never tell AJ the real answer of course, say that this was the safety zone, the one place where he could actually breath, if only for a few seconds.
“Who would do this to us Kevin?” To that question, Kevin gently sat on the bed next to his brother and hugged him.
“I wish I knew AJ…what about the guy’s voice? Did it sound familiar at all?”
AJ shook his head, “Not that I can remember, although, I wasn’t really paying attention to that.”
“Okay well, we are going to get going again, tell mom I stopped by. If you guys need anything please call me okay? I’ll check in later.”
“With Nicky.” AJ said with so much confidence it almost gave Kevin hope.
“With Nicky,” He agreed, not sounding as sure as AJ did.
As Howie and Kevin left the hospital, they tried to go over the events of the day, Maria going through Brian’s room mysteriously, claiming she was sure they had missed something in there. Howie noticed after Kevin warned him about her, that she seemed to constantly be staring over his way, and watching his every move as he scoured the house looking for clues.
Kevin told Howie about searching Maria’s desk and then he pulled out the piece of paper with the number on it. “I think whoever answers this phone is the person we need to find.”
“Should we call it now?” Howie asked as they parked themselves in an out of the way spot in the garage, far enough from Maria’s car to not be detected, yet close enough to know when she was coming.
“I think we need to wait, look.” Kevin said pointing towards the elevator where Maria came out alone, walking at a very quick pace to her car.
“Even though she’s probably one of the bad guys, I still feel bad about doing this,” Howie said starting his car as Maria backed out of her parking space.
“Believe me D; nothing would make me happier than to be wrong about her.”
“Same here.” He said as he followed Maria out of the garage and onto the busy street.
They were careful to keep their distance, at least three car lengths back. It was odd how little they knew about this woman now that Kevin allowed himself to think about it. In all the conversations he had ever had with Maria, not once did it ever get deeper than, ‘so what are you having for dinner?’ He knew nothing about this woman’s life and that thought embarrassed him and made him feel like a failure. Maybe if he had taken the time to get to know the people who he was supposed to trust with his life, they wouldn’t be out searching for his baby brother right about now.
They found themselves driving for quite a while, in and out of streets, “Seems like she’s afraid of being followed.” Howie said never taking his eyes off of her car.
“Or maybe she has figured out she IS being followed.”
“I think if that was the case, she’d have lost us by now, don’t you?”
Kevin nodded, “I hope she’s going somewhere useful.”
“Have you thought about what’s going to happen when she stops? Are we going to confront her or just observe?”
As much as Kevin wished he had a plan in place, he didn’t. Maybe it was just the exhaustion sinking in, maybe he just felt hopeless but in all honesty he had no clue what should come next. Part of him wanted Howie to speed up to her, bump her off the road and wring her neck if she was a part of this. The more rational part said, just watch and see where she takes us.
Who knew? Maybe she was the person solely responsible. Didn’t she fawn over Nicky when Kevin had to bring him to work? Maybe it was a simple case of the mother wannabe syndrome. Those were always the most heart breaking cases because most of those ladies weren’t bad at all, just desperate; desperate for the love of a child, even if it meant stealing someone else’s. It was sad, at this point, that would be the best possible scenario.
“I don’t know D, what do you think?”
Howie seemed a little surprised that Kevin asked the question, “I think it’s best if we watch and then if she does something very suspicious we move in.”
“I’m hoping she leads us right to him, I hope he’s okay.”
“I hope so too Kev.”
Suddenly Maria turned off of the busy main street they were on, and headed down a small secluded road. They were in the middle of suburbia, a place that gave Kevin the creeps. All the houses were huge and pulled together it seemed in a matter of months. The kind of development where everything looked expensive, yet generic.
“This can’t be where she lives; she can’t afford this place on her salary. Can she?” Howie asked.
“I know I can’t and I make more than she does.” Kevin said looking at all the huge houses as they slowly followed, careful to make sure they were barely moving along.
“Maybe she’s visiting someone.”
“For the way she was driving whoever she’s visiting she doesn’t want anyone to know about it.”
“True.”
They followed Maria as she slowly made her up a windy hill into a cul-de-sac, stopping right at the bottom and choosing not to move forward until she was out of her car. Kevin peeled out his binoculars at this point and watched carefully as the woman stepped out of the car and looked behind her before walking up the few steps that led to the front door.
“Well, at least we know it’s not her place,” Kevin said when he saw Maria look behind her once more before ringing the doorbell.
A few moments later, the door opened a crack. The position of the door to where Kevin was, made it tricky for him to see anything more than an arm, but there was no mistaken that the arm he saw belonged to a man, A big man. Suddenly Kevin felt the first wave of hope and anxiety hit him as he wanted to run out of the car and race up the hill and bash down the door. What if that man was the same man who had attacked him behind Lisa’s house and then shot AJ as he stole Nick? All the while here he was sitting and doing nothing. He found himself getting antsy, his emotions slowly taking over his years of training.
Howie seeing Kevin fidgeting and nervous, placed a calming hand on his friend, “Relax Kev, give her some time. The worst thing we can do is barrel in there and be wrong.”
He knew Howie was right, but that didn’t make the task any less difficult. All he could picture was his little brother in there alone and scared, even though he seemed happy enough in that picture. At that thought, he felt a chill go down his spine, forever he would remember what it felt like to see those overalls, bloodied coming out of that package.
“You think it’s a boyfriend?” Howie asked when the silence reached an uncomfortable level.
“I wish I knew.”
Once again Kevin placed the binoculars to his eyes, this time trying to see through the blinds, “I think we should drive up a bit closer now. I need to try to see inside and we’re too far away.”
Howie nodded and drove very slowly up the hill; parking about two houses away from the one Maria was currently in.
Once closer, Kevin placed the binoculars to his eyes and tried to peer through the crack in the curtain, luckily it wasn’t pulled all the way closed leaving enough room to get a good look inside. There he saw Maria hugging a man, the same guy who had opened the door. His back was to the window but there was no mistaking his overly huge frame.
“I’m almost positive that’s him Howie.” He said handing the binoculars over to D who took them and spied.
“The guy who attacked you?”
“Yeah, I mean I can’t be certain but he looks just as big.”
“That’s not really enough to merit going in there though.” Kevin nodded; of course he knew that but still…what if Nicky was in there?
“Maybe we should try the phone number now, I mean if it rings and one of them goes to answer the phone then we’ll know right?” Kevin said taking the card out of his pocket, ready to dial that phone number.
“Hang on…”
“What?”
“There’s somebody else in there.”
“There is?” Kevin grabbed for the binoculars once again, just in time to see another person talking to Maria and her man. It was hard to make out who it was exactly, even if it was a male or female from the way they were standing. All Kevin was really able to see was the person’s arm which seemed to hold an envelope.
“He’s giving her an envelope.”
“Think it’s for you?”
“I have no idea.”
Maria opened the envelope and glanced inside, pulling out the contents before quickly placing it back inside.
“There was money in there… and a whole lot of it.” Kevin shifted in his seat to try to get a better look, the arm still the only thing visible of mysterious person number three. Just as he was about to put the binoculars down, the man who had hugged Maria came into full view in the window. “I see him now.”
“Is it the same guy?” Howie asked curious to know the answer.
“No, it’s not.” Kevin was disgusted with himself; he was SO sure it was him. All he needed was to see Scott Wilson’s face, then he could have charged in and maybe this nightmare would be over once and for all.
“Are you sure?”
“Positive, this guy doesn’t match all the photos we have of Wilson. And that was who attacked me, I’m sure of it.”
“Maybe the other person…”
“Maybe” Kevin stopped pondering when he saw Maria hug the guy and make her way to the front door, “She’s leaving D, we need to get out of sight.”
Howie turned the car around and made his way down the hill just as the front door opened. Once safely out of the cul-de-sac and down the hill, he quickly turned the corner just to ensure that they would not be detected.
“So when she passes we follow or we go back up the hill?” That was a good question, he wanted to go back up the hill, feeling that maybe all the answers he needed were inside that house. For all he knew maybe that’s where Nicky was. But how would he get inside the house? Or worse yet, what if someone in that house recognized him snooping around?
Yet on the other hand, maybe Maria really was the one that held all the answers in the palm of her hand, and better yet, maybe he would be able to get her to talk.
“You know, we can split up. I can try to get into the house and you can follow Maria.”
“No way D, it’s too dangerous.”
“You know I won’t do anything stupid Kevin, I’m not you!”
“I should stay here and you follow Maria…”
“But what if the third person recognizes you? We don’t know who it is; it might be the guy who attacked you. We can’t take that chance.”
Kevin shook his head, knowing that seemed like the perfect plan. “Howie, if something were to happen…”
“It won’t but we need to figure it out soon because she’ll be passing any second.” And he was right. The decision needed to be made quickly, so Kevin nodded.
“Okay I’m going to tail her, you have your phone?” Howie nodded jumping out of the car.
“Call me if anything happens at all! And if it seems the slightest bit scary walk away.”
“I know.”
“Put your phone on vibrate…”
“Kevin I know…here she comes… go.”
“Check in every thirty minutes D.”
“I will, now go!” Kevin nodded, just as Maria turned the corner and headed up the street.
He glanced back once more as he watched his friend disappear into the bushes that led towards the hill. He hoped he wasn’t making a terrible mistake. Shaking that thought out of his mind, he moved his focus to the car in front of him. “Where are you going now Maria?”
He followed her for about twenty minutes as she drove back up towards where they worked, every once in awhile turning her head around to glance behind. Kevin was concerned that maybe she figured out she had a tail but then calmed down a bit when he saw she was still driving along the same road but now at an average speed. Finally she stopped in front of a small row house so Kevin parked at the end of the street and once again took out his binoculars.
She opened up her purse and fished for a key, finally taking it out and letting herself in. “Must be home,” He said to himself as he sat there in Howie’s car, unsure of what he wanted to do next. His cell phone vibrated in his pocket and quickly he looked at the number and clicked it open.
“D?”
“Hey.” Howie was whispering.
“Where are you?”
“I’m in the backyard; I can see into the kitchen and have a pretty good view of the living room.”
“And?”
“There are kids’ toys all over the place Kev.” Kevin’s heartbeat quickened so much he actually placed his hand on his chest.
“Any sign of my brother?”
“No not at all.”
“What about the other guy?”
“Hasn’t showed up yet.”
“Are you okay there? Do you want me to double back to get you now?”
“What’s going on with Maria?”
“She’s home. I’m debating on whether or not to go knock on her door.”
“Kevin I don’t think…hang on…” Howie got very quiet for a few minutes, which to Kevin felt like forever. He wanted to say something but didn’t want to speak just in case someone was just about to find his friend. For the second time in minutes he felt his heart pounding in his chest and gradually making its way up into his throat.
He would give Howie one more minute of silence before turning his car around and racing back to that place. Luckily within seconds of that thought Howie came back but sounded frazzled.
“Kevin…”
“What?”
“I see him.”
“See who?”
Once again there was silence, “Howie? See who?”
The silence was deafening, he wanted to scream his friend’s name, “Howie…who is it? What do you see?”
Finally he came back, his voice small and terribly frightened, “I think…I think I saw your father.”
Kevin’s blood ran cold but before he could say anything he heard a loud pop on the other end of the line and then Howie’s cell phone went dead.
Thanks for reading and reviewing. I'm changing the update day to Mondays on this one so i'll be back with a new chapter for you on Monday! Take care :O)
