“One of the wealthiest men in the country,” said Odelia, who was probably thinking this was newspaper gold. Then again, I wasn’t sure the billionaire was pouring his heart out for the purposes of an article.
“The only problem was that I was so busy setting up one business after the other, and trying to find a way to hit the big time, that I neglected my personal life, to such an extent that I didn’t even bother to look for a partner. And so when I finally managed to make my first million, I found myself alone, with no one to share my success with, apart from my parents, who were understandably proud, but also worried that I would end up alone.”
“But at least you were able to fulfill your dream,” said Odelia.
He nodded, and when a server came, he ordered drinks for both himself and Odelia. The moment the man was out of earshot, he resumed his tale.“When I was thirty, I finally met someone through a mutual friend, and within a year we were married and pregnant with our daughter. Only disaster struck and my wife was taken from me. Luckily the doctors managed to save the child, and ever since that day Addie has been the most important person in my life. We’ve always been close, to the point that I see her taking over from me at the head of the company one day. She is that smart, that driven, and as dedicated as me.”
“But you said she’s gone missing?”
“Yes, about two months ago Addie went on a coast-to-coast road trip with her boyfriend Ted. Ted Machosko. I wasn’t too worried, as she’s a responsible person, and so is Ted. And besides, these days it’s so easy to stay in touch, through your phone or Skype or whatever.”
“So what happened?”
“Well, for the first part of the trip she reported back to me almost daily. I’d told her the only way I was going to allow her to go was if she took along a state-of-the-art satellite phone, hooked up to one of my satellites, just in case she passed through an area with bad cell phone reception. And I also told her to call me every day. And for a couple of weeks everything seemed to be going really well. She was happy, posting little videos of their trip, and regular updates on her social media. But then all of a sudden two weeks ago the updates stopped, and she alsostopped calling. So obviously I got worried, but when I tried calling, there was no connection. As if she’d disappeared from the face of the earth.”
“Did you try to pinpoint her location through her phone?”
“Yes, of course. Only both of her phones had stopped transmitting a signal. Either she’d turned them off or…” A look of despair filled his eyes. “Or they were destroyed. I contacted the local authorities of the last place where she was seen, and one man, a gas station owner, remembered seeing her and Ted pull up with their RV and fill up their tank. But that’s the last time anyone saw them. Addie, Ted, the RV—gone. Not a trace of them.” The server returned with their drinks— coffee for the battery tycoon and tea for Odelia, and once the man was gone, he continued, “It’s been two weeks, and frankly I’m at the end of my rope, Mrs. Kingsley.”
“Odelia, please.”
He smiled weakly.“Which is when I remembered our interview, and Dan telling me you have a knack for solving unsolvable crimes in this town.”
“Dan is too kind,” Odelia muttered modestly.
“I want you to know that I’ve practically abandoned any hope of ever seeing my daughter alive again.”
“You think something happened to her?”
“I do. This isn’t like Addie. She would never just disappear on me like that. Either she was abducted or… worse.”
Odelia nodded as she toyed with her teabag.“Where was she last seen?”
“Well, that’s just it,” said Mr. Dexter. “You’d think she would have disappeared in the desert, or some godforsaken place in the middle of nowhere. But the last person to see her alive said he saw them head in the direction of town.”
Odelia frowned.“What town?”
“Well, your town. Hampton Cove.”
CHAPTER 8
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“How can anyone disappear in Hampton Cove?” asked Dooley. “This town is so small, it’s impossible to disappear, even if you wanted to.”
Odelia was still engaged in a discussion with Edward Dexter, jotting down a few more details about his daughter and her boyfriend, but Dooley and I were one step ahead: we were already thinking how we could be instrumental in finding this lost daughter.
“I guess a person could disappear anywhere,” I said. “Especially if that person didn’t want to be found.” We exchanged a meaningful look.
“You think Addie Dexter and her dad fell out and now she doesn’t want him to find her?”
“It’s certainly a possibility,” I said. “Maybe their relationship wasn’t as harmonious as Mr. Dexter is leading us to believe, and Addie felt the only way to sever the relationship with her parent was to disappear. You have to understand that a man like Dexter has a lot of resources at his disposal to track down his daughter, so she would have to come up with a plan if she didn’t want to be found.”
“But they seem to get along so well, father and daughter. And he’s even training her to be his successor.”
“Well, maybe that’s the whole point, Dooley. Maybe Addie doesn’t want to be his successor, but he’s forcing her to follow in his footsteps.”
“Maybe she wants to be a juggler instead,” said Dooley.
I eyed him with a touch of skepticism.“Why a juggler?”
“Why not? Maybe she joined a traveling circus and is now living the dream as an anonymous juggler named Jackie. Jackie the Juggler.”
“And what about her boyfriend? Is he a juggler, too?”
“No, he’s probably a clown.” He sighed and gave me a fervent sort of look. “I’ll bet they’re very happy together, Max. Living in their circus caravan, surrounded by a warm and loving community of other circus artists, just like them.”
“Mh,” I said, though I had to admit it was certainly something we needed to look into. It wouldn’t be that hard to find out if a circus had traveled through town. Perhaps they were still in town, and Addie was performing her juggling tricks in plain sight for the whole world to see. Though she would have to disguise herself, of course.
“If she has joined the circus, I think we should respect her choice and not tell her dad,” said Dooley, getting ahead of himself a little. “I think we owe it to this young couple’s future happiness. And Mr. Dexter will simply have to find himself a different person to succeed him at the head of his multi-billion-dollar corporation.”
“Yes, well, there’s also the other possibility,” I pointed out.
“What possibility?”
“That foul play is involved.”
He gaped at me.“You mean…”
“That Addie Dexter has come to harm, and is now wounded or… dead.”
He clasped a paw to his furry face, a look of distinct shock in his eyes.“Oh, no!”
“Oh, yes. When a person is missing for so long, and no ransom demand has been made, it’s possible that something happened to her and she’s dead. Could be that Addie and Ted were in the wrong place at the wrong time, bumped into some bad people, and were murdered, the murderers having disposedof the bodies.”
“Oh, Max, we have to find her body! We owe it to her grieving father to bury his daughter!”
And gone was the notion that Mr. Dexter was in fact the bad guy, driving his one and only daughter to face an uncertain future as a traveling juggler. At any rate, it was a mystery we certainly could be instrumental in solving. Cats are part of a large community, and so if Addie Dexter had passed through town, chances were that one of our kind had seen her, and so it behooved us to find out what had happened to the missing girl.