“This is my house,” Ian said. “What are you doing?”

“Thought I’d give you a chance to pack. You want to buy your underwear in Belize, that’s fine with me.”

“Belize? What are you talking about?”

“You can stay here and let Uncle Mitch ride your ass for another twenty years, or you can come with me to the Caribbean. I’ve had it. I’m getting out of here. What you do is up to you, but I’ve got phony passports, and all the other arrangements made if you want to come along with me. Plan B.”

Ian swallowed hard. He was silent for so long, Eric began to feel certain that he was going to stay behind. He wondered if he’d really have the nerve to go alone.

“I’ll go with you,” Ian said.

Eric smiled. “You will not regret this. I promise. Now grab a change of clothes and let’s go-don’t fuck around in there, we’ve got to get out of here before Uncle Mitch figures out what’s going on.”

“What are we doing for money?”

“I’ve been putting some in an account down there.” He thought about telling him about the bag in the trunk, but decided that could wait. “Hurry. I’ll tell you the rest on the way to the airport.”

Eric kept the engine running. Ian was inside for no more than a few moments. When he returned, he had a canvas bag with him. “I brought underwear, a pair of jeans, and three thousand bucks,” he said. “That’s all the money I had in the house.”

“That’s great, Ian,” he said, and pulled away from the curb.

They were on the freeway when Ian said, “What about Kyle and the girl?”

“Not our problem,” Eric said, and moved into the fast lane.

46

L EFEBVRE ARRIVED AT THE DARKENED MANSION ON SHORELINE ALMOST at the same moment O’Connor did.

“Doesn’t look as if anyone is here,” Lefebvre said.

“You have someone looking for the BMW?”

“Yes.”

“Who’s it registered to?”

Lefebvre didn’t answer. O’Connor hadn’t really expected him to, but he had learned long ago that unasked questions never get answered, so he had taken the chance.

Lefebvre took a portable police radio and a large flashlight from his car. O’Connor already had his own flashlight in hand. It was windy here, and he pulled his jacket closer about him.

They tried the front door and found it locked. Shining their lights in through the big windows, they saw no sign of Irene or of Max.

“Maybe they’ve been and gone,” Lefebvre said.

“Let’s look around back.”

The side gate was unlocked. They went through it into the backyard.

“Windows are open,” Lefebvre said, and called out, “Irene! Max! Anyone there?”

No answer.

While Lefebvre tried knocking at the back door, O’Connor walked toward the alley.

“Lefebvre!” he called a moment later.

The detective turned toward him.

“Her car’s still here.”

Lefebvre joined him, shining his flashlight into the car while O’Connor squeezed his large frame between the little import and the garage door. There was no lock on the door and so he unlatched it, trying to peer inside. The wind caught the door, banging it against the Ghia.

“She’s gonna have your hide for that one,” Lefebvre said.

“Another item on a long list, I’m afraid.” He pointed his flashlight into the garage and drew a sharp breath. “A black BMW.” He bent to shine the light on the license plate, and sighed. “Not the one we were looking for.”

Lefebvre’s radio crackled and O’Connor saw him turn away to speak into it. O’Connor didn’t try to listen in-he hurried back toward the house. If she wasn’t still in the house, it was the last place she had been. He had no doubt that she was in trouble. If he knew anything about her at all, it was that she was devoted to her father, and would not have left him.

He thought of his own sister’s disappearance and momentarily lost himself in remembered helplessness-how like that night this seemed to him. The thought filled him with dread, and he took himself to task-think of Irene, he told himself. Concentrate on the here and now.

He ran to the back door. He rang the bell, knocked, tried the knob. The door was locked.

He stepped back, then slammed against it. He felt it start to give. He slammed against it again just as Lefebvre came into the yard and asked him what the hell he was doing. The door gave way. He pushed what remained of it aside and went into the house.

He quickly went from room to room on the ground floor, calling to her. Moonlight came in through the windows, enough to see by in most of the rooms. Where it wasn’t enough, he used his flashlight. Lefebvre had followed him in and was doing the same. They met up at the stairway. “Let’s take a look around up there,” Lefebvre said, shining his light on the stairs, “then maybe I’ll arrest you for-”

Lefebvre grabbed his sleeve just as O’Connor was about to step on the first tread, and pulled him back. “Hold it,” he said, bending closer to the stair.

O’Connor saw what he was focusing on. Blood. A large splotch of it on the left side of the tread, another on the banister just above it.

“Oh God…” O’Connor said. “Oh God.”

Lefebvre seemed unperturbed. He used the radio again and called for backup and a crime scene unit and said to stand by, they might need an ambulance. He mentioned that the power was off, adding that they might want to bring a portable generator.

O’Connor, impatient, tried to break away from him, to rush up the stairs, but Lefebvre held tight.

“Listen to me!” the detective said, commanding, yet calm. “We’re going up there, but don’t touch the rails, and step to the right edge of the treads. I’m going first-try to step where I step. Watch that you don’t put your big feet in any evidence.” In a lower voice, he added, “Hold your flashlight away from your body, just in case we’re not the only uninvited visitors, all right?”

Lefebvre’s calm steadied him, forced O’Connor to struggle to regain his own.

Lefebvre watched him, then added, “Nothing is for the newspaper unless I say it is, or I handcuff you now and we wait here for a squad car.”

“Do you think for a moment that the damned front page is more important to me than she is?” O’Connor asked, outraged.

“Maybe you bleed ink, O’Connor, like some of your friends at the paper.”

“No more than you bleed blue.”

Lefebvre smiled and said, “All right. Just so long as we understand each other.” He took his gun out and started to climb. O’Connor concentrated on stepping where Lefebvre stepped, seeing the reddish brown spots they avoided, all the while telling himself that it wasn’t really so much blood, perhaps no more than a small cut would produce.

Then Lefebvre’s flashlight caught a smear of blood on the wall of the hallway. Much more blood than they had seen before. It was up high, at about the height of a man’s waist. “Someone was carried, I think,” Lefebvre said softly. “Not very carefully.”

They turned a corner; this hallway was much darker than the rest of the house. Moonlight came through an open doorway at the end of the hall. Lefebvre stood for a long moment, listening. Gradually, cautiously, opening doors one by one, they worked their way down the hallway. Below, they heard patrol cars pulling up, doors opening.

Lefebvre called to them once, telling them that O’Connor was with him, and to be careful not to step on bloodstains on the stairs, but otherwise continued his methodical clearing of each room.

Two of the officers caught up with them. They carried powerful portable lights and brightened the hallway with these. With the additional light and more men to check the rooms, they made progress more quickly. Lefebvre noticed some faint bloody shoeprints and again warned the others to avoid stepping near them or the drops of blood along the floor.

The rooms were empty and only briefly held their interest, save the last one-the open one.