Victim Six by Gregg Olsen Page B

seemed empty of recognition.
    “Hi, you two,” she said.
    “Ready for a dinner out?” Steven asked, his broad white smile another salvo to her heart.
    “Yes, I am,” she said, scooping up Cody. “Pancakes, everyone?”
    Cody smiled.
    Whenever they went out, they’d have pancakes at the same restaurant, in the same booth.
    “Make mine banana pecan,” Steven said with a wink.
    “Strawberry for me.” Kendall shot back.
    It was always banana pecan, strawberry, and blueberry. Each member of the Stark family had a prescribed meal, time, and place. To deviate was to cause unease and ruin what was a pleasant dinner—or, in this case, breakfast—out.
    “How’s your day going?” Steven asked.
    “Oh, you know.” She set Cody down and gave her husband a quick peck. “Kind of slow.”
    “Any sign of the missing girl?”
    Kendall and Steven talked shop only on the most cursory level. He’d tell her if he closed a big ad sale; she’d mention if a perp had been nailed or a case stymied. But she didn’t like to bring her work into their personal lives. They’d agreed to take his car to eat, then drive back to the Sheriff’s Office parking lot so Kendall could take Cody home.
    “I’m worried about her,” she said, sliding into the passenger seat of the nine-year-old red Jeep Wrangler that they’d purchased just slightly used a couple of years after Cody was born. Despite his age and size, Cody was secured in a car seat, behind his parents.
    “I thought she bolted. I mean, Jesus, she was working two jobs. I’d leave town too.” Steven glanced at Cody in the rearview mirror. He was watching the world slip by his window.
    “Josh talked to Celesta’s sister in El Salvador. She’s as worried as Tulio is.”
    “Boyfriend troubles, maybe?” he asked, turning onto Sidney Avenue and heading south to Tremont.
    Kendall turned on a CD, a Raffi recording that Cody loved. She turned around, hoping to catch a smile, but the little boy just stared out the side window.
    “I really don’t know. Can we talk about something else?”
    “I drove over to Inverness this afternoon,” Steven said. “Just to check it out.”
    Kendall felt his words stab at her, although she knew Steven meant no harm. The idea of the alternative school for their son hadn’t really set in yet. She wasn’t ready for it to set in.
    “I thought we’d do that together,” she said.
    Steven let a sigh pass from his lips. He took his eyes off the road and looked at her.
    “I was making a run up to Bainbridge to meet with an advertiser. It was on the way home.”
    “I see. I guess that makes sense,” Kendall said, looking away.
    Why are you pushing this? she thought. Putting him there is one step closer to saying he’s never going to get better.
    As much as she loved Steven, there was no doubt there was a wall between them. She knew that some walls can never be scaled. Not even with all the love in the world.

Chapter Eight
    April 1, 10 a.m.
East Bremerton, Washington
    The Azteca was a quintessential cookie-cutter Mexican restaurant, one of the type that sprouted all over America around the time that salsa overtook ketchup as the country’s bestselling condiment. Frothy frozen margaritas in flavors that God (or a decent bartender) had never intended—peach mint, cantaloupe, and blackberry—and tortilla chips warm from the deep fat fryer, served until the meal itself becomes an afterthought.
    Kendall took a call from an Azteca busboy named Scott Sawyer, looked at her watch, and decided she’d head north from Port Orchard and time it for lunch. Josh was out pursuing a lead on a drug dealer near Wye Lake, so she drove up alone.
    “I have something important to tell you,” Scott had said in a voice that cracked in a way that suggested he was barely out of puberty. “It’s really important. About the case you’re working on.”
    “Can you give me a hint?” she asked, wanting to find out before she left if the kid had anything worth