Insurgents

14

I told Jessie that our best hope of getting David off was Freddie Divos, and he'd disappeared. She was impressed that I'd gone over to David's mom's house to look for him. "You know," she said, "the man owns a hotel. That would be the obvious place to look for him. He's probably holed up in one of the rooms."

"Yeah, you're right." I said.

"We should go over there and check it out. We might get lucky and spot him."

"Let's go." I said.

"Now?"

"Yeah, why not?"

"Sarah said she'd call me back today." She said. "There's a guy driving up from Akron, one of her brother's friends, and he supposedly has a bunch of good weed with him. He grows it himself."

"We're trying to help our friend beat a double murder charge, and you're worried about getting some weed?"

"Don't be so dramatic." She said. "You go, I'll stay here and wait for Sarah. He's probably not there anyway."

"You just said you thought he was there."

"If you're gonna go, be sure to be back in time to get me to work."

I drove to the Shoreston Motor Lodge and decided that I didn't want to stay and do surveillance. There were only twelve rooms, and you could tell that they were all empty except for one. There were two cars in the lot, and the office looked closed. I parked and walked up the stairs to the room that looked occupied. It had the curtains closed and the lights on. I knocked.

There was a shuffling sound from inside the room and I heard someone heavy coming toward the door. A chubby hand pulled the curtain in the window aside a little and a large man in a white undershirt looked out at me. He looked like he was in his late thirties and his brown hair was thin and messy, like he'd just gotten out of bed. "Whaddya want?" He said.

"Freddie in there?" I asked.

The guy squinted at me. "No." He said. "Who're you?"

"I'm a friend of his sister." I said. "She hasn't seen him for a while and she's worried about him. I told her I'd come by and see if I could find him."

The guy coughed. "What's your name?" He asked.

"Uh, -Phil." I said.

"Okay, Uh Phil, if I see him I'll tell him you were looking for him."

"Tell him his sister is looking for him." I said.

"Yeah, okay, got it." He said, giving me a fake smile and the thumbs-up sign before letting the curtain fall back in place. I walked to my car wondering who the guy was. I was turning the key in the ignition when I heard a tap on the passenger window that startled me. It was Detective Reyes. She opened the door and sat down next to me.

"Hi." I said.

"Drive." She answered. I pulled out of the parking lot onto the road, headed toward town. "What the hell was that?"

"What was what?" I asked.

"What are you doing here?"

"I'm looking for Freddie Divos." I said.

"And why is that, Mr. Perkins?"

"Because his sister's worried about him." I said. I was glad to have that reason handy and not have to think up something on the spot, although it seemed a bit thin now that I was giving it to Reyes. "I went to see her this morning, and she told me he was missing, so I thought I'd see if I could find him. On top of everything that's happened to her, her brother stopped calling her back. She's really depressed. I feel bad for her."