Ultimate Supernatural Horror Box Set

Chapter 16

You’ve reached Grant Moreton. I can’t get to the phone right now, but if you’ll—

Sophie Benington shelved the handset.

Her sergeant, Joseph Wanger, walked over, looking every bit like the terrifying slob he was—big and broad, his white, button-down oxford hanging out of his waistband, his collar stained with duck sauce the color of radioactivity.

He was tearing through a carton of Chinese food from Grant’s second favorite restaurant in the world—the Northgate Panda Express.

When he reached her desk, he rapped his knuckles on the particleboard.

Sophie shook her head.

Wanger sighed heavily and stabbed a plastic fork into the carton.

The rippled surface of his shaved head was sweating from the handful of hot mustard packets he’d undoubtedly squeezed onto his meal.

“I’ve been calling him all morning,” Sophie said. “It rings, but he’s not picking up.”

“You guys are close, right?” His voice pure gravitas and boom. Sophie had seen it break more than a handful suspects, blundering unis who’d muddied the chain of evidence, and even the occasional detective.

“I don’t know if I’d say—”

“Come on, Benington. What’s going on with your boy?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you do know Grant’s got a taste for scotch. I mean, that don’t require any sort of special training to deduce.”

“I’m aware, sir.”

“He’s been fine the last year or two, but he’s has not always been the straight and narrow. Any chance he’s going through a thirsty spell, and you just don’t have the heart to rat him out? It’s not a part of your job to protect him, you know.”

“I’m not protecting him.”

Wanger shoveled a pile of lo mein noodles into his mouth, his massive black mustache glistening with MSG.

“Look, I’ve known Grant for two years,” Sophie said. “He’s shown up for work hung-over a few times.”

“A few?”

“A few times a week. Rolled in still drunk once or twice. But he’s never not shown up.”

“Boy could be going through some shit not on your radar.”

“I don’t think so.”

“So you guys are all cuddly then?”

She imagined lifting the paperweight off her desk—a viceroy butterfly enclosed in a clear globe—and smashing it into Wanger’s ball sack.

“No, but I do sit across from the man every day. I wouldn’t be a good detective if I couldn’t tell if something was bothering my own partner, would I?”

“So does this mean you’re worried?”

“Yes.”

“And you’ve tried him at home?”

“His cell is the only way to reach him. I also texted him and sent him an e-mail. No response. I was thinking of driving over to his apartment in Fremont.”

Wanger was already nodding as he chewed.

“Do it,” he said. “Right now.”

# # #

Sophie stood at Grant’s door on the third floor of his townhome walkup. The building was nice, but Grant had about as much design sense as a monk.

She pounded on his door again.

“Grant! You in there?”

No answer.

Turning away, she pushed the thought out of her mind that he was lying dead in there. She had circled the surrounding blocks several times, but couldn’t find his black Crown Vic. At least that was something.

Halfway down the last flight of stairs, her phone rang—Detective Dobbs calling. She answered as she moved past the mailboxes and toward the front door.

“What’s up, Art?”

“I just got a strange call. A groundskeeper spotted a man in the Japanese garden at the Washington Park Arboretum.”

“So what?”

“Silver responded. Turns out it’s Benjamin Seymour, your missing lawyer.”

“So Seymour’s okay?”

“Not exactly.”

“What does that mean?”

“Just go see for yourself.”

Sophie pushed open the front door and headed down the concrete steps toward her silver TrailBlazer which she’d double-parked in front of the building.

“I’m on my way,” she said.

“Where are you?”

“Fremont. Have Bobby keep eyes on him.”

“Any word on Grant?”

“I’m just leaving his apartment. He isn’t here.”

“Your boy’ll turn up. Probably just tripped over a big night.”

“Hey, Art?”

“Yeah?”

Her car alarm chirped.

“He’s not my boy.”

“If you say so.”