Chapter 8
Early post becuase tomorrow might be crazy. :/
"Remember to keep your cool," Joe reminded Danny. The two were back in the Jeep, following Trooper Adler as he led them down a remote two-lane road in a more rural part of Connecticut.
Danny briefly took his eyes off the road to glance at his brother. "Hey, you say that like I'm the hot head," he said incredulously.
"You are the hot head," Joe argued as he took a sip from the large coffee he bought back at the convenience store.
"If I remember correctly, it was you who got a rip for punching out a perp after two years on the job!" Danny stated.
"Hey! That sergeant was just feeling out his stripes and trying to impress dad by not going easy on a Reagan. Besides, that tweeker punched my partner first," Joe defended himself.
Danny rolled his eyes at the excuse. "Whatever you say….hot head."
It didn't take long to identify the man Jamie encountered; he sped out of the gas station in his white truck minutes after Jamie took off, also turning toward the highway. That gave them a perfect view of his license plate. They also learned he arrived at the gas station thirty minutes before Jamie, approached three other customers while they gassed their cars, but nothing came of those encounters. Otherwise, he hung back at his truck, clearly looking for a mark, based on the observations of three seasoned cops.
"Jesse Lee Reynolds." Adler repeated their person-of-interest's name when the detectives approached the open driver's side door of his cruiser. The trooper ran the plate and the vehicle's owner through his laptop as soon as they left the manager's office. He scrolled through a report and shared the bullet points of Reynolds' record. "He's twenty-eight and has himself a wrap sheet, started young with low level stuff - theft, simple assaults, drunk and disorderlies - but he graduated to a felony assault a few years back, he beat on some guy in a bar fight." Adler turned the laptop to show the two men his last mugshot. The kid certainly didn't look very friendly and it was made worse by the bad eighties flat top he wore.
"They always do," Danny sighed.
He had a bad feeling about this guy.
Neither Danny nor Joe thought it was a coincidence that Jamie had complained of a white truck last night and that the last person that Jamie came face to face with in a contentious encounter before his disappearance also owned a white truck.
Both were ready to pounce on this Reynolds character for that reason alone, but on the ride over, they updated their father on what they learned so far and their old man reminded them that they weren't on their home turf. While the Connecticut State Police was providing them with every courtesy possible to help locate Jamie, Frank would be unable (and unwilling) to get them out of any jam they got themselves into. The pair would be mindful of their father's words, but finding Jamie alive and safe came first and neither would hesitate to ruffle some feathers to accomplish that.
Danny and Joe turned off the road onto a driveway twenty minutes west of the gas station. They spotted the truck immediately.
"There it is," Joe stated as they came to a stop. There was no mistaking it, at least not with that mismatched tailgate. He eyed the truck positioned up against the house, atop its customary parking spot if the long, worn patches of dirt on the snow-dusted lawn were any indication.
Danny observed the rundown, white cape cod as they walked over to Adler. The house sat in the middle of a large, unkempt plot of land, with no fence or property markers. Despite the lack of privacy, the next house down was far away enough to keep prying eyes from seeing anything of interest.
"Did five years and was released three months ago," Adler reminded them. His captain was serious about helping the NYPD Commissioner and Adler would have no trouble getting anything he needed to move on their only lead into his son's disappearance.
"Does he live here by himself?" Joe asked.
"Place is owned by a Robert Reynolds, probably his father based on his age."
"Well, let's see if little Reynolds is home, shall we?" Danny proposed.
Adler and Danny headed up to the front stoop of the house and knocked on the door. "Jesse Reynolds! Connecticut State Police!" the trooper announced.
Joe veered off to the right to inspect the truck. He started at the front driver's side, noting nothing more than old body damage, and lots of it. His feet crunched atop a patch of melting snow as he slowly strolled around the back to the passenger's side where streaks of blue along the body caught his eye. He followed the scrapes back around to the front and crouched down to examine the dented bumper more closely, careful not to touch it. Joe was no expert, but even he could identify fresh blue paint embedded in the bumper, paint that matched the color of Jamie's compact.
His gut was screaming at him that whatever happened to his brother, Reynolds was the cause of it. Joe was sure of it. His jaw clenched as anger welled up inside.
"Joe? You got something over there?" Danny asked when he lost sight of his brother behind the truck. They weren't getting an answer at the door.
Joe didn't have a chance to answer before someone was yelling from around the side of the house.
"Hey! What the eff are you doing on my property?! Get the hell away from my truck!"
Joe stood tall and turned to find the angry scowl of Jesse Reynolds, the same one he wore in his mugshot. He placed his right hand on the butt of his gun under his jacket as the redhead made his way towards him, seemingly ready to pounce on him until Danny and Adler appeared behind him.
"Who the hell are you?" he asked as he came to a sudden stop, paying extra attention to the uniformed trooper. Reynolds left a good distance between them and the law enforcement officers could feel his desire to run from this distance.
"Detectives Reagan, NYPD," Danny announced on behalf of himself and his brother with a flash of his badge. The detective took in the ex-felon, he looked like he just rolled out of bed and was probably wearing the same ratty jeans and flannel shirt he slept in.
"NYPD? Someone forget to tell you you're in Connecticut?" he scoffed. "You got no authority here. Now get the hell off my property!"
"But I do. Jim Adler, State Police," the trooper stepped up, closing the gap between them.
"I asked what you want," Reynolds repeated nervously but maintained his tough guy persona.
"We were wondering where you were last night at about 9:45," Danny questioned. Joe remained quiet beside him, his jaw repeatedly clenched as he stared at their suspect.
"That's none of your business!" the redhead stated.
"It is our business, Jesse. You were the last one to see a missing person at a gas station in Cromwell last night," Adler explained.
"So? That's not far from here. I was getting gas," he said rather quickly.
Danny turned to Joe who had yet to move and smirked at the bold-faced lie. "Funny, the video doesn't show you getting any gas."
"I don't have to talk to you," Reynolds declared and frowned at the other detective who was silently shooting him a death glare.
"If you don't talk to us, I'm sure your parole officer will want to hear how you're a person of interest in a missing person's case three months after you leave the clink. Maybe he'll also want to hear how you sit around dark gas stations accosting people. What'd you need Jesse, a few bucks?" Joe pressed.
"I don't know about no missing guy from a gas station," Reynolds hissed, feeling trapped despite the open landscape around him.
"So then you do know about our missing person," Danny said.
"Didn't you hear what I said?" Reynolds barked back.
"We did hear what you said and we never said it was a guy, but now that you mention it, you didn't seem too pleased with the kid in the blue Civic," Joe replied, but the glare continued.
Reynolds was sweating under the intense scrutiny despite having left his warm coat inside the house. "I asked him for a few bucks for some smokes. He said no, end of story. There's no crime in that."
"End of story? Is that why you slammed your fist on the trunk and tried to make a grab for his car door?" Adler questioned.
It was three on one and the redhead felt attacked, regardless of what he might have done. All of this happened because the stupid kid blew him off. "It was just some stupid rich kid with a Harvard sticker on his car cutting through our parts to New York!" He'd been right about that in the end, if the New York detectives involvement was any indication.
"You get all that from a sticker on his car, Biff?" Danny snarked, he was also certain they were looking at the person responsible for Jamie's disappearance.
"Huh?" Reynolds grunted, confused by the name but quickly explained himself. "I know the type, think they're better than everyone, but he blew me off and left! That's it!"
"You seem awfully upset about a stranger refusing you a few bucks there, Jesse," Adler pointed out.
"You want to explain the blue paint all along the side of your truck?" Joe asked.
That caught Danny and Adler by surprise and the two men turned to look at the truck.
"That's old. I've had that piece of crap since before I went upstate," he replied.
"There's more of it on the bumper. It all looks fresh," Joe stated calmly.
Danny slowly turned back towards Reynolds. An angry scowl adorned his own face that rivaled that of the ex-con's. It took all of his strength to keep from attacking Jesse Reynolds. "You son of a bitch, what did you do to him?" he seethed.
Reynolds returned with a cold, hard glare. He knew his rights and these cops had nothing. "I didn't do anything and unless you got a warrant or you're here to arrest me, get the eff away from my truck and off my property!" he yelled before storming into the house.
"No worries, Jessie! We'll get that brought right over. In the meantime, we'll be waiting right over there!" Adler shouted to make sure he was heard.
Our boys are on the right track but still have no idea where Jamie is.