“Dear God,” she replies, putting her head down.
“It’s fine. We’ll deal with that later if it comes to that,” I say. “Senator Barlow and Church both said they’ll make the whole thing go away.”
“Do you trust them?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“No. I suppose not. Well, fingers crossed,” Astra says with a slight smile.
I cross my fingers, a strained grin on my face. Astra grabs my hand and squeezes it, trying to look encouraging, but I can see the worry in her eyes. If this hearing situation goes to pot and DeClerk’s allies are able to drop the hammer on me, there will be consequences not just for me but for the rest of my team as well. If I’m reassigned or demoted, the odds are high they will be too. But we’ve got a case right now, so I’m trying to avoid thinking about it and to focus on the task at hand instead. All I can do is hope Barlow and Church are able to come through and make it go away. Everything else right now is beyond my control.
“Okay, you guys were briefed on the plane. It’s not much, but it’s all we have to work with at the moment,” I start. “This case stays in this room. Senator Barlow does not want word of his daughter’s abduction leaking to anybody—especially the media.”
“It might be tough to maintain complete secrecy when we start poking around,” Astra notes. “Her friends are bound to notice she’s not around, and when we have to question them, they’re likely only going to get more curious.”
“I know. But we’ll have to be as delicate as possible. When we question people, we’ll tell them we’re doing a background check at the request of the Senator. It’s flimsy, but it’s going to have to do for now,” I respond. “We really need to keep this as quiet as possible for a long as we can. If this is an abduction, we don’t want to put any added pressure on the kidnapper.”
“Do you doubt it was a kidnapping?” Paige asks.
“Right now, I doubt everything. We need solid information before we know which way this is going,” I say. “Senator Barlow believes his daughter was taken, but we have no confirmation of that yet. We haven’t had a ransom demand, and I’m not certain we’re going to get one.”
“It hasn’t been a full twenty-four hours yet. It may still come in,” Astra says.
“It might. That’s why I want Rick and Mo to go ahead and post up at Barlow’s home in Arlington. I want you guys to be there just in case a call comes in, and if it does, do your best to trace it,” I say. “And Mo, while you’re there, do a little digging. Talk to Barlow’s staff and find out what their relationship was like. I want to know if he’s telling us everything.”
“Copy that,” Mo says.
“Call us when you get there and get set up. I’ll text you the address,” I tell her.
Mo and Rick get to their feet and grab their things, then head out, the electronic lock on the door chiming behind them as it engages.
“So, if we don’t get a ransom call, are we assuming this is a sex thing? That maybe she was taken by somebody who wanted to traffic her?” Paige asks.
“That’s something we’re going to have to consider, yes,” I reply. “But as we all know, stranger abductions are relatively rare, so I want to start looking closer to home. I want to check out the people in Ashley’s direct orbit.”
“Do you think her dad had anything to do with it?” Astra asks.
I shake my head. “I don’t. I think he’s being genuine with us,” I respond. “So, we’re going to check out everybody with a direct and personal connection to Ashley first, and we’ll expand outward from there.”
“Okay, who’s in Ashley’s direct orbit?” Astra questions.
“We’ve got Lieb Tal, her driver-slash-bodyguard. And there’s also her aunt, Violet Wagner. She stays at the Arlington house and keeps an eye on Ashley,” I say. “Nina, can you—”
“On it,” she says.
Her eyes fixed on her laptop screen, Nina’s fingers fly over the keys as she does a quick and dirty dive into the backgrounds of Lieb and Violet. It’s going to take a couple of minutes, so I turn back to Astra and Paige.
“What do we know about Ashley’s relationship with her father?” Astra asks.
“According to him, they have a great relationship. He said they grew very close after his wife, Samantha, passed away,” I say.
“Right. I remember reading about that. Breast cancer, wasn’t it?” Paige asks.
I nod. “Yeah. That’s right.”
“How does Barlow know Ashley didn’t just blow town with some girlfriends?” Astra asks. “She’s a rich kid who, presumably, is surrounded by other rich kids. And if there’s one thing we’ve learned on this job, rich kids sometimes feel untouchable and entitled and do stupid things. I mean, how many times has somebody sounded the abduction alarm only to find out their kid and some friends took the family car up to the Hamptons for the weekend?”
“Plenty of times,” I reply. “But he says that’s not a possibility—”
“Is he one of those parents who thinks his kid tells him everything?” Paige asks.
“Surprisingly, no. He says he encourages Ashley to be her own woman and understands that she’s going to keep some secrets,” I say. “But he says one thing he insists on, and that she complies with, is putting their schedule down on a calendar. He said they’ve got such busy lives, they keep track of each other with their calendar to avoid jumping the gun and freaking out if somebody isn’t at home at a time the other thought they would be.”
“How accurate is that schedule though?” Astra asks. “She’s sixteen, for God’s sake.”
“He says it’s very accurate. In eight years, he says they’ve never failed to mark everything they’re doing down on that calendar.”
“And are we believing him?” Astra asks.
“Well, the driver and the phone tracking app corroborate his story, so yes, for the moment, we’re believing him. But we’re going to check out those calendars anyway.”
Nina taps a key on her laptop, and the monitor at the foot of the table turns on. A moment later, the picture of a tough, hard-looking man with a grim expression on his face appears. Dressed in green fatigues, he’s got black hair, bright blue eyes, and sharp features and cheekbones that scream Hollywood heartthrob, but a little more rugged.
“Lieb Tal, thirty-eight years old, six-one, two hundred nineteen pounds—”
“Of pure muscle, I’d say,” Astra cracks. “You can probably play racquetball off that man’s stomach. My goodness.”
“Down, girl,” I say.
