Lauren hugged me first. “We’ll call you when we get there.”

“Sure.”

She kissed my cheek and stepped back, adjusting the bag on her arm.

Elizabeth stood there for a moment, neither of us knowing what to do. Finally, I took a step toward her and put my arms around her so she wouldn’t have to make the decision as to whether or not to hug me. I was relieved when she hugged me back.

“Listen to your mom, okay?” I said, rubbing her back. “She’s going with you to help, not hurt. Okay?”

She nodded against my chest. “Okay.”

She let go of me and I smiled at both of them as they turned and got in the security line. They did the serpentine thing, following the back and forth pattern provided by the ropes. Halfway through, Lauren said something over her shoulder and Elizabeth laughed. They handed their paperwork to the TSA agent who scanned it quickly, made a few marks and handed it back. They set their stuff on the conveyor belts and stepped through the x-ray machines. They reclaimed their belongings on the other side, slipped their shoes on and both waved at me before disappearing around the corner, headed toward their gate.

I knew people would wonder why we were letting Elizabeth go back. But like I’d said to Lauren, more than anything, my gut told me the Corzines were guilty of buying a bullshit story. They’d taken care of Elizabeth. They’d given her a good life. This wasn’t something where she’d been abused and held against her will. They’d treated her well. While I didn’t care what their feelings were now, I did care about Elizabeth’s and in my heart, I truly thought that letting her and Lauren go to close things up was the right thing to do.

I stood there for a moment, unable to get my feet to move. I didn’t like seeing them go, even if I thought it was the right thing to do. It was harder than I’d expected. When they were with me, I felt like I could protect them and soothe the tension between them. But now that they were gone, my hands were tied and I was more of a bystander than anything else.

I crossed my fingers and hoped it would go smoothly for them.

SEVENTEEN

I walked out to my car and the fog was gone, replaced by a hazy sun. The harbor sparkled across the road, boats sailing in the breeze, heading out toward Point Loma and the Pacific. I leaned against the door for a moment, letting the sun warm my face, appreciating a view I hadn’t taken the time to appreciate in quite some time. I thought about popping the trunk and getting what I needed, but decided to make a phone call I’d been contemplating making for awhile instead. I pulled the phone from my pocket, scrolled through the contacts and touched the number I wanted, squinting into the late morning sunshine as I put the phone to my ear.

John Anchor answered on the second ring. “Mr. Tyler. This is an unexpected surprise.”

“Am I catching you at a bad time?”

“Never a bad time,” Anchor answered.

John Anchor worked for a man named Peter Codaselli in Minneapolis. When I’d gone to Minnesota tracking Elizabeth, I’d ended up helping Codaselli find his son. He, in turn, had made Anchor available to me if I needed his assistance in any way. He’d proven indispensable in helping me find Elizabeth back in San Diego and was the kind of guy you wanted on your side rather than a guy you wanted showing up at your door unannounced. He seemed to run Codaselli’s operation and he did so smoothly, professionally and ruthlessly. He’d helped me, but I wasn’t fooled in any way.

John Anchor wasn’t one of the good guys.

“How are things with your daughter?” he asked.

“Okay,” I answered. “We’re getting along as best as possible.”

“She’s adjusting?”

“She’s trying, which is all we’re asking.”

“That’s good to hear,” he said. “Any further information on what happened to her?”

I paused. “That’s sort of why I’m calling.”

He didn’t say anything and the line buzzed.

“I’m wondering if you might be able to find anything about a woman trafficking kids out of Phoenix,” I said. “I’ve run into a wall here.”

“You think she was involved in your daughter’s disappearance?”

“I think she played a role,” I said. “I’m just not sure to what extent.”

“What information do you have?”

“Just what the family that Elizabeth ended up with in Minnesota told me,” I said. “That she was supposedly in Phoenix. That her fee was exorbitant. That’s about it. I don’t even think the federal agent here working Elizabeth’s case has been able to dig anything up. So that’s why I called you.”

“Right,” Anchor said. “That’s not much to go on.”

“I know.”

“But I can certainly see what I can find,” he said.

“I’d appreciate it.”

“Of course,” he said.

It was quiet for a moment.

“Mr. Tyler, I want to tread lightly here,” Anchor said. “You know how grateful Mr. Codaselli was in your assistance with finding his son. And we were more than happy to return the favor in helping to locate your daughter.”

“I know what you’re saying, John,” I said, squinting again into the sun.

“Do you?”

“I understand that I used up Mr. Codaselli’s favor,” I said. “Which I appreciated. But I understand that any further assistance would place me on the other side of the ledger. I would be in Mr. Codaselli’s debt.”

“So you do understand,” Anchor said.

“I do,” I answered.

And I did. I knew that nothing was free with men like Codaselli and Anchor. They had repaid their debt to me by helping me locate and rescue Elizabeth. We were square. If I wanted their help in any way now, it was a new transaction, one that I’d be held accountable for. I knew that before I’d made the phone call.

“And you understand that when and if we asked for your assistance, we would expect it as soon as reasonably possible? Without objection to the task?”

The sails on the boats in the harbor billowed in the breeze.

“I understand fully, John,” I said. “You have my word.”

The line buzzed again for a moment.

“Excellent,” Anchor said. “Give me a few hours and I’ll see what I can come up with. I assume you’ll be reachable?”

I pushed myself off the car, popped the trunk and grabbed the backpack I’d stowed in there under a blanket before Elizabeth and Lauren had gotten up. I closed the trunk and watched the sailboats float across the water.

“Getting on a plane to Phoenix in just a bit,” I said. “You can leave me a voicemail if you have anything before I land.”

EIGHTEEN

The actual flight time from San Diego to Phoenix was fifty-two minutes and gate to gate, it took just over an hour to move from the coast to the desert.

When I’d booked Lauren’s and Elizabeth’s flights to Minneapolis, I’d taken a look at the flights to Phoenix. They were cheap and I realized I could get there and get back and no one would be the wiser. Not because I wanted to keep it from them, but I knew Lauren had enough to worry about going with Elizabeth and I didn’t want to add anything to her plate. I booked the flight, threw a change of clothes in a backpack and tossed it in the trunk of the car beneath a blanket. I felt slightly guilty, but not enough to keep me from going.

The quick trip over the mountains and desert was smooth and I could feel the difference in the dry, desert air as I walked off the plane through the jetway. The airport in Phoenix was more crowded than San Diego and I weaved my way through the masses of people carrying golf clubs and pushing strollers to the rental counters. I arranged for a car, found it in the garage and drove away from the airport without a clue as to what I was doing.

The freeways were clogged, but I got the car going in the direction of Scottsdale. It was the one area of the Phoenix suburbs that I knew, having helped a family there locate their son nearly four years prior. It was the kind of place that kids weren’t supposed to disappear from – gated neighborhoods, expensive cars and upscale shops – but a fourteen-year-old boy was abducted by a Phoenix man with a criminal history that ran the length of a single sheet of paper. I’d found the man and, a day later, he told me where to find the boy’s body in a ravine north of Scottsdale. I made him drive me there and when I saw the boy’s lifeless body there, he tried to explain to me how it had been an accident. I punched him twice in the face, shattering his jaw and called the police.