Free Missing: The Body of Evidence by Declan Conner Page A

her rear-view mirror, she noticed a black Toyota following her every
turn. It wasn’t the first time she had thought someone was following her these
past few days, but she soon forgot about the Toyota as it dropped a few cars
back and it turned off as she hit traffic. Heading north, along Willowbrook
Avenue, the traffic thinned out and she passed Compton High School. At the
intersection with West Compton Boulevard, she flipped on the blinker and turned
left, past the post office on the corner. A short stretch and she turned right
and parked in the lot outside McDonald’s, facing the highway.
    Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial faced her
across the highway. The officials had tucked it away where no one could see it,
as if embarrassed by its existence. The concrete circle of pillars curved
inward and upwards almost meeting at the top. The columns formed a shape meant
to signify his ‘Climb the mountain’ rhetoric. Compton’s some mountain of
crap to climb. She wondered what King would make of the area, where the
street gangs ruled and you couldn’t watch a high school game of football
without security fit for a president. South Los Angeles they called the area
now, to get rid of the stigma attached to the area, but to Nancy, it would
always be South Central.
    Bill’s car drew up alongside of her and he signalled
for her to drive around the back of McDonald’s. Nancy followed, surprised to
see two SWAT vans and the sergeant of the gang unit waiting for them. Damn,
this is big.
    ‘Hi, Nance, looking good out of uniform,’
said the sergeant.
    ‘Flattery will get you nowhere,’ she said
and winked. ‘What’s going down?’
    The sergeant explained that the hit suspect
on the Claytons’ at the Sunnyvale Condo she had been investigating with Bill
was down to Rico, the head of the Piru gang, and the only way to bring him in
was by force. Undercover were ready to move into position, and to take out the
lookouts at the intersection of Bliss, Aranbe and Piru Street.
    ‘Suit up, vests on this one,’ said the
sergeant ‘You’ll both come with us in the SWAT van.’
    Nancy wasn’t about to argue, but gave her
excuses as she needed to use the bathroom in McDonald’s.
    ‘I’ll follow you,’ said Bill.
    Entering McDonald’s, two swat team members
must have had the same idea and held the door open for her. The place was busy.
Nancy flicked the clasp on her purse, ready to produce her badge if any of the
staff challenged her. She glanced around and saw some familiar faces from her
time in uniform.
    On her way back to the SWAT van, she
followed Bill out of McDonald’s. She looked ahead and sensed eyes following her
as she walked to the door. Bill stopped briefly and exchanged harsh words with
a customer and then he disappeared through the exit. Nancy picked up her pace
to join Bill and the SWAT team at the van. No one talked in the back of the van
as it set off; they all seemed to be preoccupied with either remembering their
instructions, or praying. Nancy couldn’t hold her tongue.
    ‘Bill, you’ve been around a lot longer than
I. Have you ever heard of a company called Astral Chemicals?’
    Bill shuffled his feet, clasped his hands
and then stroked his chin stubble with his thumbs.
    ‘Can’t say I have, why ask?’
    ‘It’s the professor’s death. He worked for
Astral. They paid the professor’s and the janitor’s condo’ fees, but I can’t
trace the company.’
    ‘If you take the advice of someone who is
due to retire in two weeks, forget it.’
    ‘I can’t forget it, that’s the point.’
    ‘Listen, from what I hear, the CIA is
involved. Sounds to me like the professor was one of theirs and they’re
protecting their own. Astral is probably something to do with the CIA.’
    He turned to her and gazed deep into her
eyes.
    ‘For your own good, read my lips...
for-get-it. I can’t say it any clearer.’
    It wasn’t just the way he said it, but the
distant look in his eyes. It gave him the appearance that