Chapter 9
The sheriffs substation was ten miles from Haven. But the sickly green pain that covered the walls, the old metal desks and the stacks of forms and piles of paperwork sitting on tops of file cabinets made the substation look like just one more public office building.
The deputy sheriff, a ruggedly built six footer with short black hair and a bristled moustache, looked like just another cop. His name happened to be Bruce Burns and he was a friend of Bob Anderson's.
"So Mary ran away," Burns began, swinging a leg up on the desk. He flipped open a smudged manila file on his desk. "You know what the bottom line is on runaways?"
"I don't care, Bruce," said Bob. "I just want my daughter back."
"And so would half a million other fathers who's kids ran off."
Anderson bit down on his molars until his jaw hurt, trying not to lose his temper with Burns. It was Mary, his own daughter, and he needed all the help he could get to bring her back.
Burns detected the sudden change in his friend and switched his tactics. Scaring Anderson with grim facts was not going to solve anything, and it might push Burns himself off the deep end.
"I'll be straight with you," said Burns. "If she's been gone a week I'd say she's either headed toward Florida or the West Coast."
"Why?" Anderson asked stupidly.
"Because runaways are looking for a change in their lives. They want something different. Excitement, new experiences, call it what you will."
Burns got up from his desk and paced back and forth across the small office. "So what part of the country spells magic to a teenage kid? Florida or California."
Anderson felt a crushing weight on his shoulders. "That narrows it down to about twenty five million people."
Losing a daughter in California was like dropping a needle in a haystack. He had never been to the West Coast. He had a mental picture of a once pretty area of mountains and lush valleys by the ocean, now paved over with freeways and cluttered with people. California had never held dreams for Anderson. He thought the place sucked.
"I don't think finding Mary will be that hard," said Burns.
"She's alone, without much money and she's new at this game," Burns said. "She's bound to get picked up and have her name run through the Telex, which puts her name on a computer tape for 72 hours. We run a check every day and, bingo, we find her." Burns sat back in his chair trying to show confidence. It didn't work.
"What are you holding back?" Bob asked.
Burns considered lying to Anderson, or at least leaving out a few details about runaway girls and what usually happened to them. Perhaps Mary might be luckier than the rest of the teenagers he had run across, but the odds were heavily against it. Burns was a realist and his training and experience had stripped him of any illusions about his work. If he knew anything it was human behavior. The scenario was black and white. Anderson might not know all the details, but Burns, looking at Anderson's grim expression doubted it. The bastard wants to know, Anderson thought. Well, then, I'll tell him.
"Come on," Anderson said, swinging out of the swivel chair. "I've got something to show you first."
He picked keys off a hook and walked to the metal door with the barred windows that led to the holding pens. Anderson followed closely behind, his heart pounding in his chest.
They walked down the narrow aisle between the jail cells, past the drunk tank, down to the very end. Anderson could hear voices.
"Hitch hikers we picked up late tonight," said Burns, spinning the ring of keys on his fingers. "We'll hold them tonight and let them go in the morning."
Anderson recognized the voices, but he was still surprised to see girls locked behind bars. There were three of them, and judging from the first girl nearest the cell door, they weren't over sixteen.
"Terrible," he whispered. He told himself over and over again that his daughter wouldn't end up like these girls. Mary was his daughter she was different from the rest. But, fathers across the country were saying the same thing to themselves. It was self deception. His daughter might very well end up in a sheriff's holding pen somewhere. Perhaps she was in one right that moment.
"Hey, what the hell!" Burns shouted.
"What's the matter, sheriff?" sneered the girl nearest the door. "Is it illegal to have a little fun now and then?"
Anderson looked past the whorish looking girl, wondering what the commotion was about. Then he saw it. The two companions were sleeping on the bunk. They were squirming about like worms in water. Anderson's eyes were riveted to the two twisting bodies, seeing them, not believing.
"My God, the two cunts are eating each other!" said Anderson.
He was amazed. He couldn't take his eyes off them. They groped each other's cunts. Anderson was shaky all over. His dangly cock rose suddenly. It was embarrassing, but he couldn't help it. The sight of the girl's hot, sucking mouth rimming the swelled lips of her lover's cunt made him hot.
"Jesus, Burns, does this happen all the time?" he asked. Burns nodded weakly. He couldn't open the door or the broads might make a break for it. All he could do was sit back and watch.
Suddenly the girl inside started to laugh. "Man, that's a righteous hard on, buster," she said. "Why don't you stick it through the bars and let me suck you off!"
He studied the girl's young face. She couldn't be a year older than his own Mary, and she was asking him this terrible thing. He couldn't deny that the offer was tempting. Anderson would love having her suck his balls dry.
He wondered... right that moment, was his daughter behind bars?
And maybe she was making the same offer. An offer that any normal man couldn't refuse!