7

After finding her a cab on Columbus Avenue, Jack returned and seated himself before his computer instead of the Compendium. He accessed the Web mail from his site. After sifting through the Cialis and penis-enlarger offers, he found an e-mail that had come through the site’s Contact function.

The subject line read: my sister is missing.

A missing person. Swell. The last missing person he’d looked for had been Timmy O’Brien’s teenage niece and that had led him into the worst days of his life.

No thanks.

But he opened it anyway. Just for a look.

Dear Jack—

I left you voice mail, now I’m trying this. My sister disappeared today. She left a note saying not to call the police but to get in touch with you instead. She said “Our Jack can find me.” I have no idea what she means by that but I’m honoring her wish. Please contact me ASAP.

EPC

He’d left a phone number at the bottom of the message.

Jack reread it with a growing sense of déjà vu. The words sounded chillingly familiar. And then he remembered . . .

About a year and a half ago a guy named Lewis Ehler had contacted him about his missing wife. Melanie had told her hubby not to call the cops but to call Jack and only Jack because he was the only one who would “understand.”

That hadn’t ended too well either. In fact, that had started the souring of almost everything in his life.

He checked the date on the message: less than an hour ago. That meant this guy’s sister had been gone less than twenty-four hours. Too soon to call the cops anyway.

Our Jack can find me . . .

He had no idea what that meant either, and didn’t particularly want to find out. Question was: Should he contact the guy and blow him off, or simply ignore him?

His instincts urged the latter course, but the “our Jack” thing would follow him around until he found out a little more.

He logged off and checked his voice mail. He had three accounts and found the guy’s message on the second, saying basically the same thing.

Oh, hell. Nothing better to do . . .

He dialed the number. Voice mail picked up on the fourth.

Swell. Voice-mail tag.

“This is Jack. You left me a message. Now I’m leaving you one: Be on the southwest corner of Columbus Avenue and Eightieth Street at noon tomorrow and we’ll maybe talk about your sister.”

Julio’s wasn’t right for this meet, especially since he wasn’t guaranteeing he’d talk to the guy. If he didn’t like his looks—assuming he could pick him out of the other pedestrians—he’d leave him waiting there.

The guy could go to the cops or find his sister on his own.