Chapter Eight: The Phone Call
Hunting for seat sales soothed Rei.
It wasn't money standing between her and the next available flight out of the country, but there was something about the hunt for the best price that she found exhilarating. There was no harm in imagining going back to Machu Picchu for $359, round trip. Or maybe she could venture to the land of off-shore bank accounts. Or East Asia, where she would blend in better than she would anywhere else. She could fly to China and slip into the population of millions, polish her Mandarin and rebuild a life far away from the security firm she and Cheng were supposed to run together.
What the hell was her father thinking in the first place? Who gave their children a company for their 21st birthday? That wasn't a gift. That was a test.
Rei closed out of the flight deals menu. She couldn't go, but she could dream and even dreaming lost its appeal after a while. She instead scrolled idly through news updates until that bored her, too.
The outside world's problems weren't hers. Her problems involved being on the brink of going stir-crazy, feeling like Rapunzel with a wifi connection.
She couldn't leave. Not yet. Rei also couldn't stand to leave herself vulnerable to the push and pull of other people attempting to persuade her to their side. It was coming. She knew it better than anyone else. She knew Angelo Ferrero was sick before anyone else did. She had been there when he had collapsed. It made her sick to think of all of the people more preoccupied with staking their claim on his assets than with him. Money was money. His money meant little more to Rei than anyone else's did.
Money, Rei had long been well aware, was her family's first and most impressive child. Cheng was an acceptable middle child. Rei was just a black sheep.
She sighed, sliding off her stool to wander to the fridge. There were leftovers, pizza boxes, and Styrofoam containers from the wealth of fast food she had delivered. How long had it been since Rei spoke to someone who wasn't bringing her all things cheese, grease, and MSG in exchange for a handful of cash? Was it really just a couple days?
She grabbed the takeout box from the second shelf, throwing it into the microwave. Another day, another meal of reheated Chinese. The numbers counted down in red across the display and Rei twisted her computer around.
As it turned out, while her father was in the hospital, Gwen decided making gossip column news was her priority. The man in the paparazzi photo on her screen was almost familiar. It wasn't a great angle and there wasn't much chance to get a look at his face while it was pressed against Gwen's. Whoever he was, hopefully he had the presence of mind to know that Gwen never got attached and for Gwen, public forums were low-budget photoshoots.
Rei rolled her eyes. The microwave beeped.
***
It was a good day. The sun was shining in through the windows into Baz's quaint kitchen. The appliances didn't talk to him or make ice for him, but they kept things cold or made them warm and that was more than enough. Even his cat slunk out from her hiding places to weave around his feet.
His hands were preoccupied, dicing chicken for the first proper meal he'd had in too long. All the private detective work hadn't left eating or training or anything else a priority.
All that could end. He could go back to living a reasonably average life, aside from the occasional break-in. The thought left him in good spirits.
There was time to cook and enjoy the nice weather, maybe ride down the trails in the park and enjoy his newly reclaimed position as a less-likely-to-be-arrested man.
His phone vibrated on the counter and Baz quickly wiped a hand off to answer Jasper's call.
"Hello, Jasper!" Even talking to Jasper wasn't a totally unpleasant event.
"Have you seen the news?" Jasper said coldly.
Well, there was a good chance that Channel 6 wasn't leading the news hour with the announcement of Rei Collingwood's reappearance when Jasper said it like that.
"I don't have a TV," Baz said. Hadn't they had an alarmingly similar conversation already? Hadn't Baz already not liked it?
"Gwen Ferrero, Baz? Really?" Jasper growled.
Baz froze over his chicken. He rinsed off his hands, hurriedly putting Jasper on speakerphone so he could search. Keyword: Gwen Ferrero. Most recent.
He popped up immediately. The dress socks and fresh haircut gave him away. Gwen, of course, had the kind of curvy silhouette you could pick out of a police lineup. It was just outside the theatre. A moment after the photo, Gwen hailed a cab and left him. In fact, one tabloid site featured the lonely after-photo of Baz wiping the lipstick off his mouth.
"Well?" Jasper said in the tone of voice Baz remembered his dad using. What do you have to say for yourself was the silent follower of that particular 'well.'
"She knows Rei. She was a good lead," Baz protested. It was a good thing he didn't plan on getting pegged for Rei's not-kidnapping. He had little chance of successfully standing trial if he continued arguing like that. "All that is unimportant now because I have some excellent news."
He could go back to living a reasonably average life. Gwen could be a thing of the past, where she wouldn't stir up the terrible mixed feelings in him.
"Do share," Jasper drawled on the other end of the line. He couldn't be bothered to even pretend to be interested. It was almost like he expected Baz to fail. Baz consciously chose not to be offended.
"I don't think Rei was kidnapped," Baz said, tossing his diced chicken into a frying pan.
He imagined Jasper sitting up straight wherever he was. Did Jasper materialize in places other than the back of a black sedan? Baz didn't care. He never wanted to find out who Jasper was besides the guy who handed him cash and took stolen goods off his hands.
"What makes you say that?" Jasper said. His tone was off.
"I got back into her penthouse. No passport, no ID, no purse. No suitcases," Baz explained. He adjusted the phone. Happiness was too much to ask of Jasper, but he just sounded uncomfortable. The silences hung too long and heavy between them.
"How did you get back to her penthouse?" Jasper asked. Kind of a stupid question to ask a burglar.
"Does it matter?" Baz asked. "If she wasn't kidnapped, there's no reason for them to look for a kidnapper. The police ought to figure that out pretty fast if I could."
Jasper said nothing, which was more unnerving than if he did have something to say.
Finally: "Meet me at the northwest corner of Faraday Park at two."
Jasper hung up before Baz had a chance to argue.
Chicken sizzled in the pan, canola oil popping. So much for Baz's good mood.
Baz sighed, plucking a small chunk of chicken out. Cali purred at his feet, looking expectantly up at him until he fed her.
"Well, looks like we're not quite done yet..."
Cali, licking all flavor of chicken off his fingertips, gave no indication that she understood or cared.
***
The thing Baz liked best about Temperance, particularly the older parts of it, was the levels. Someone in Temperance's great architectural history had a vision for the city. So many buildings in the downtown core accommodated the sloping landscape by incorporating walkways that melted into the highest grade, creating practical balconies that overlooked the lower grade of the next street. Grand stone staircases joined the balcony to the street level below.
Baz loved it. He loved it for the juxtaposition of new and old. He loved it for the graceful way the design hugged the natural flow of the landscape. He loved all the places he could flip off of. Downtown Temperance was a parkour dream.
Baz tried to remind himself of that, balancing on the stone railing up the steps of the Temperance Public Library. He hopped up to the next sturdy post, leading all the way up to the platform overlooking the street and Faraday Park.
It was better in person than it was hung above Rei Collingwood's bed. Baz perched himself on the guardrail, feet dangling above the people walking underneath. Students, mostly. Faraday University's downtown campus loomed over him in all its stern, Gothic collegiate glory.
He liked it. He people-watched from his vantage point, looking for Jasper.
Baz recognized him by his posture as he walked, sharp and quick, almost jerky. Ridiculously enough, he didn't wear his sunglasses. The one clear, sunny afternoon Baz ever saw him, and the stupid dark lenses weren't on his face.
"No, no. I'm sure he doesn't know. He hasn't asked yet."
Jasper stopped almost directly beneath him. Baz blinked. Jasper didn't look up. He looked like he was talking to himself. It didn't surprise Baz at all that Jasper was the type of person that walked through the streets wearing a Bluetooth headset.
"I'm meeting him soon. Late, as usual," Jasper said, and Baz consciously chose not to be offended. It wasn't his fault Jasper set up arbitrary time expectations for everything Baz did, as if Jasper knew how long was reasonable to break into houses.
"How could he know it was empty? It wasn't open when I received it," Jasper said, "she must have both the key and the will."
Part of Baz wanted to slip off the guardrail and hit the sidewalk below. Or, maybe, land right on top of Jasper. What Baz didn't know, he did now, and it made him a little sick to his stomach.
Baz was just a pawn, as invisible and likely as disposable as anyone else walking by. All Baz could do was watch Jasper beneath him, the man checking his watch impatiently. Let him wait. Let him talk. Baz could be a clueless pawn if that was the role Jasper decided to cast him in.
"How is that my problem?" Jasper said. A pause. "I'll see if I can find out."
Baz rubbed at his face. What the hell had he gotten himself into?
Jasper said nothing more, only checked his watch more and more frequently. Baz took it that the phone call was over. He swung his legs back over to the safe side of the guardrail. Could he just skip town, escape the way Rei had and forget any of this happened? Let his friends believe him dead or kidnapped? It was a surprisingly enticing thought in the moment. It sure as hell beat the idea of going down there and biting his tongue in front of Jasper, putting on a stupid smile and pretending to be the brainless oaf Jasper seemed to think he was.
On paper, Baz was just a failed gymnast. An internet search of him only brought results for that time he almost became legendary. He wasn't important enough for a Wiki page. There was nowhere that mentioned he was bilingual or that he dropped out of college. Maybe in the depths of research, someone might find out he made the Dean's List in Art History before he dropped out.
Jasper thought he was some run-of-the-mill thief. Jasper thought they caught Baz because he was desperate, at a low point in his life, that Baz was nothing but desperation.
Baz took the stairs at a sprint, running the amazing revelation through his system. Sure, he knew everyone around him underestimated him. Hell, Baz preferred it that way, but he didn't understand the true depth of how little Jasper thought of him. Baz came around the corner, breathing slightly heavier than normal.
"Sorry I'm late," he said.
Jasper was satisfyingly disgruntled. "Yes, well," he said, squinting in the sunlight. He acted smug and superior for someone who forgot his sunglasses on the one occasion it was actually sunny.
"I told you, Rei's not kidnapped. She's just missing and that's not my problem, is it?" Baz crossed his arms.
"The investigation hasn't come to that conclusion yet, have they?" Jasper replied, "walk with me."
The two men walked, but only until the red hand of the crosswalk stopped them. Jasper seemed personally affronted the traffic would stand between him and the path he wanted. He checked his watch again.
"But they will," Baz pressed, playing up his desperation. That was what Jasper thought he was, after all. The only thing Baz could possibly desire was wealth. How could the poor live in any state but desperation?
"The only evidence you have to support the claim is the lack of evidence. What does the lack of a passport prove?"
There was Gwen's testimony as someone who knew Rei, but Baz chose to keep that point to himself. He pursed his lips. The light changed and Baz followed Jasper across the street into the park.
"What if she disappeared on her own and I'm just chasing nothing? Looking for a kidnapper that doesn't exist?" Baz asked.
"Does it change anything? Rei is still gone one way or another, isn't she?" Jasper said, "I told you to find her, not her kidnappers."
Baz gritted his teeth. He'd probably get the job done a lot quicker if Jasper didn't breathe down his neck over it.
"I'm just the guy you handed an invitation. You must know more about her than I do. What's your intel tell you?" Baz asked.
The way Jasper eyed him, looking him up and down with beady eyes, he felt sure Jasper knew he had eavesdropped on his conversation. Baz gently reminded himself to breathe.
"I know that she's very rich and well-connected," Jasper said, "what else do you need to know?"
A lot. Jasper would have to do better than that if he meant to persuade Baz that there wasn't anything else to know. On every other occasion, there was no reason to pry. The less he knew about the families that lived in the houses he robbed, the better. Even what he gathered from wandering through their empty halls was more information than Baz cared to know. Jasper told him when to break in, when the estate would be empty, how to disengage security. No studying their movements himself.
Rei was not those people. He wasn't studying her to decide where she'd keep her Mesopotamian spoons. He was looking for a person everyone seemed to want to find.
"Connections like Gwen Ferrero?" Baz asked tentatively.
Jasper scowled. His efforts to improve on that look of distaste failed. The man stopped, straightening his suit. A cyclist angrily rung his little bell at the roadblock in the middle of the path, but that hardly seemed to faze Jasper.
Baz stepped to the side. "Come on. Someone ransacked her room, Jasper. What if we're not the only ones looking for her? What if we don't find her first?"
The frown lines in Jasper's face deepened into canyons. "They will find her first if I tell you what I know and you open your big mouth to the wrong people."
"Jasper," Baz began, "thank you for that vote of confidence, but trust that I can play as dumb for everyone else as I do for you." He smiled and just the smile, rewardingly enough, put uncertain concern back into Jasper's face.
"Talk to her contacts in the Department of Anthropology. Maybe they know something," Jasper suggested. "I'll be expecting more updates."
Jasper walked away, presumably toward a black sedan somewhere, and Baz let him. It was something in the right direction.
Faraday University loomed to the north of the park, the clock counting down the minutes.