She hadn’t taken over her son’s space.
Too painful.
Hopeful, too. Keep the bed free, in case he comes back.
She towed a cardboard box from the closet. “When am I gonna hear from you?”
“When I learn something.”
I wanted to temper her expectations. I thought she might snap back at me, but she nodded, as if drawing courage from the admission.
She saw me to the front door, watching as I buckled the box into the passenger seat.
Chapter 24
Regina Klein had begun her investigation the same place I would have: at the computer.
The box contained copies of Nicholas Moore’s vital records, public records searches, a preliminary timeline. His driver’s license listed Tara’s address. He’d never paid a utility bill, in Santa Cruz or elsewhere, never bought or sold a property. His tenancy with Randy Smythe had been informal to the point of invisibility.
The Civic was a 2009, black, bought used in 2020. Registration had expired as of December. No record of resale or transfer.
The postmile in the TikTok video mapped to Shoreline Highway at the southern end of the Lost Coast, right before the inland detour that gave the region its name.
Thirty miles to Swann’s Flat as the crow flies.
Crows could bypass the punishing road.
Still, feasible. Though I couldn’t fathom why Nicholas would want to go there.
His bank account had lain dormant since his disappearance, the last debit card charges posting two days after the final text exchange with his mother. He’d spent six hundred dollars at a Santa Cruz camping outfitter. Klein noted the purchases: pack, boots, sleeping bag, and tent.
To know that, she would’ve had to sweet-talk some gullible employee into retrieving the sale record.
So sorry to bother you, my wallet was stolen, I’m worried someone else may have used my card. Would you mind terribly checking? Here’s the number.
Canvass of Randy Smythe’s neighborhood turned up only one person who recognized Nicholas: the clerk at a nearby mini-market. He recalled Nick coming in a few times a week for milk, bread, peanut butter, premade sandwiches.
A thumb drive held photos of Smythe’s property, backyard, and garage workshop, plus an audio file of Klein’s interview with him. Under pressure, Smythe stuck to his guns: He didn’t know where Nick had gone. Their relationship was professional, not personal.
At times Smythe came across as cagey, though that could’ve been due to Klein’s aggressive style. Her voice was girlish and high-pitched; his, marble-mouthed and narcotized. It was like listening to Betty Boop grill Matthew McConaughey.
You let him live in your house she said.
In the garage.
I don’t have anyone living in my garage she said. You just let anyone move in? You didn’t get references?
He said he wanted to learn. That’s how I learned.
Paying it forward.
Yeah.
Did he have a girlfriend?
I don’t know, man.
Boyfriend? Come on, Randy. A year? You never saw him with anyone?
It’s none of my business.
You have eyes.
That’s all I know. I’m busy.
Klein had called hospitals and shelters. She’d visited local skateparks and skate shops to show Nicholas’s photo around, and had begun working her way through gyms and bars. The lack of an active social circle was striking. A short list of friends and co-workers drew wholly on his previous life in Fresno — the people Tara Moore had referred to as a bunch of idiots. The first six names were starred. Presumably that meant Klein had spoken to them, but her reports didn’t indicate any pertinent findings.
In any event, she’d had almost no time to follow up. Invoices stamped Paid showed two weeks of work in January and February.
She’d tacked on a third week, gratis.
I left her a voicemail and began calling idiots.
Gabe Espinoza was from Fresno, a fellow skater — not an idiot at all, but bright and helpful. With a note of hurt, he told me that Nick had dropped off the face of the earth. They hadn’t spoken in close to two years.
“We’ve been friends since first grade. Now you won’t text me back? What?”
“Why do you think he left?”
“Shitty job. No girls. His mom’s psycho. What’s keeping him?”
“What makes you say that about his mom?”
“Did you meet her?”
“I did.”
“And you thought she’s normal?”
“How did she and Nick get along?”
“They didn’t. Every time I was over, they were fighting and yelling at each other.”
“About?”
“Money. School. Everything. And not the normal way you fight with your mom, okay? She’s cussing and calling him names, like he’s her boyfriend and she caught him cheating.”
“She was controlling.”
“Hella controlling. He told me once he wanted to go visit his dad’s grave. She wouldn’t tell him where it is. How messed up is that?”
“Why didn’t she want to tell him?”
“ ’Cause she’s psycho. I don’t know. Ask her.”
I would. “Did he talk to you about his dad?”
“Not much. I think it made him depressed. So, yeah. I can’t blame him for getting out of here. I would, too. But you don’t have to be a dick about it.”
“Why Santa Cruz?”
“I guess he wanted to get as far away as he could. It’s like the opposite of here.”
“Tara told me he had a thing about the ocean.”
“Yeah, that was random. He started reading books about sailors. He tried to get me to read them, too. I was like, ‘Bro, I literally do not care about this.’ ” Espinoza laughed. “He’s intense, you know? Nothing halfway. He finds some thing and goes ham. Then he gets bored and drops it and jumps to the next thing. We used to make these TikToks? At the skatepark?”
“I saw them.”
“It was stupid shit, just us messing around. Out of nowhere Nick tells me he won’t do it anymore. ‘I hate social, it’s poisoning our brains, megacorporations profiting off us, stealing our souls, stealing our DNA.’ Some of what he was saying I agree with, but then he started to get into some straight-up conspiracy theory shit. He wanted to delete everything. I was like, ‘Hold up, I shot those, they’re mine, too.’ So he left them. But the rest he took down. Discord, Twitch, IG, Snap.”
“Have you seen his last TikTok? Where he’s standing by the highway?”
“I think. I don’t remember.”
“Would you mind taking a look?”
“Hold on... okay, yeah. This.”
“Any idea what he’s doing?”
A beat while he watched it to the end. “He looks like a skinhead.”
“Was he into that?”
“What.”
“Skinheads.”
“Nick? No. He just looks weird without hair.”
“Any thoughts?”
“Not really.”
“Do you recognize the place?”
“Sorry.”
“That’s okay. Gabe, did Nick have mood swings?”
“I mean, he was never Mr. Happy. Shit was tough for him.”
“Did he ever have periods where he would get overly excited or skip sleeping? Talk fast? Ever describe hearing voices?”
“Nothing like that.”
“Did he use drugs or alcohol?”
I expected his answer to differ from Tara’s, or at least be less absolute.