Game ON (An Ozzie Novak Thriller, Book 2) (Redemption Thriller Series 14)

  Game ON

  An Ozzie Novak Thriller

  Book 2

  Redemption Thriller Series - 14

  (Includes Alex Troutt Thrillers, Ivy Nash Thrillers,

  and Ozzie Novak Thrillers)

  By

  John W. Mefford

  ALSO BY JOHN W. MEFFORD

  Redemption Thriller Series

  The Alex Troutt Thrillers

  AT Bay (Book 1)

  AT Large (Book 2)

  AT Once (Book 3)

  AT Dawn (Book 4)

  AT Dusk (Book 5)

  AT Last (Book 6)

  The Ivy Nash Thrillers

  IN Defiance (Book 7)

  IN Pursuit (Book 8)

  IN Doubt (Book 9)

  Break IN (Book 10)

  IN Control (Book 11)

  IN The End (Book 12)

  The Ozzie Novak Thrillers

  ON Edge (Book 13)

  Game ON (Book 14)

  ON The Rocks (Book 15)

  Shame ON You (Book 16)

  ON Fire (Book 17)

  ON The Run (Book 18)

  1

  A battle between my senses of sight and smell raged mightily in my brain. Off to the side of a small apartment building sat a rusted, dilapidated swing set. It was on the verge of being devoured by weeds and vines. In fact, the vines had wrenched the metal into a pretzel-like configuration.

  An intake of breath brought with it an aroma that, on its own, would normally move you to a place of harmony and peace. The sweet scent of bougainvillea, plumeria, and orchid was both organically intoxicating and—because of this odd sense of dread that had clawed at me since I’d landed at the airport—toxic.

  I lifted part of the lei that hung around my neck—full of vibrant pinks, reds, whites—and asked myself why I hadn’t left it in the minivan. The sweet smell was over the top. Or maybe the odor had crossed into the pungent zone because of my body composition. My stomach churned like that of a little kid who’d overdosed on Halloween candy.

  Indeed, the sensory overkill had done a number on me. As a person with a hearing impairment, that wasn’t too surprising. I relied upon my four other senses as if I were clinging to a float in the middle of the ocean. An ocean as big as the Pacific, which, according to street signs, sat about fifty miles to the east of Fern Forest, a small, forgettable community set inland on the Big Island of Hawaii. Or as the countless travel guides had called it on the plane ride over from Austin—the Orchid Isle.

  I put my hand on a rickety wood railing to cross a muddy moat, and my fingertip felt the prick of a nail. I wiped the hint of blood on my jeans.

  “Smart one, Ozzie. Add ‘Get a tetanus shot’ to your list of fun-filled activities on your first trip to Hawaii,” I muttered to myself.

  Just then, a woman slammed a door on one of the downstairs apartments. She trekked through weeds with an open purse tucked under her arm. I held out a hand, prepared to ask if she knew Denise Emerson, but it was obvious she wanted no part of me. Her sunken eyes stayed on her direct path. She wore a hairnet and a brown dress uniform that said she worked at a diner. She brushed against my shoulder without a word, then slipped behind the wheel of an ancient sedan and drove off.

  Why anyone would choose to live in this place was a mystery. Then again, as I walked across the small bridge and contemplated the upheaval I’d experienced in the last week or so, perhaps they were just unlucky in life, going through a period of time when one bad thing built on top of the next.

  A breath clicked in the back of my throat as a sobering fact took hold of my thoughts.

  Your daughter—a person you didn’t know existed until about twenty-four hours ago—may very well live in this wondrous dwelling.

  I stopped at the edge of the U-shaped complex, looking for an indication of which apartment might be “Unit E.” From where I stood, I saw nothing on the doors. I raked my fingers through my hair, which normally had a bit of a wave to it. In the salty, humid air, the ends had begun to roll into curls. Poppy, a bartender friend of mine back home, would, at about this time, smack the counter and ask me, “Love your hair, Oz. You want me to make you a Shirley Temple?” She loved to razz me. I would then quickly point out that she looked like a member of a reggae band from Mars—she of the red dreadlocks pinned behind her head.

  Enough screwing around. I pulled the folded letter from my pocket and verified the address. “Unit E” was written in the upper left-hand corner of the envelope. I popped the letter against my opposite hand, contemplating the letter’s authenticity. From what I could recall, ten years earlier, Denise seemed like a straight-up person. We’d dated briefly toward the end of our senior year in high school. She was fun, happy, the life of the party. I never got the sense she would be the kind to screw with someone’s life just for the hell of it.

  But again, that was ten years ago. Under normal circumstances, most people go through at least two metamorphic stages between eighteen and twenty-eight. And as of right now, nothing about this felt normal.

  My thoughts flipped to the key part of Denise’s letter. I’m sorry I never told you, Ozzie, but you have a daughter. And she’s in danger.

  That had ignited an action on my part that some might say was a desperate attempt to flee all of the drama back in Austin. Some of those same people might also point out that such an action was counter to my training as a lawyer—to first logically walk through the theoretical permutations on why Denise would send me this letter now, ten years after the fact.

  Danger.

  The word had prompted my nearly instantaneous response to travel to Hawaii; it was one of those trigger words for me. But there was an additional draw that had pulled me to the Big Island. The very real possibility that I might actually have a living relative.

  My adoptive family had raised me since I was an infant. While it was a dysfunctional family—and still was in many ways—I’d never really put much thought into finding parents who’d tossed me into the expendable bucket. Their loss, my gain, I figured.

  You don’t even know her name, Oz.

  Oh, yeah—there’s that part. For whatever reason, Denise, or possibly someone posing as her, had forgotten to mention my daughter’s name. That had limited my ability to verify that this daughter of mine existed at all. Was that because of the urgency or emotion of the moment when Denise, or perhaps her proxy, had penned this letter? Or could it have been by design?

  That’s right, I was actually going there. A nefarious plot to lure me out of the moderate chill—not meant as a euphemism of my current relationship status with my wife, Nicole—of Austin, Texas, so that I could be screwed over by some bizarre scam in one of the most popular travel destinations on Earth.

  But here I was. Over three thousand miles later. And while this section of Fern Forest could have been a rundown corner on the east side of I-35 in Austin, I recognized the contradictory irony of crisscrossing words like nefarious and scam with the paradise of Hawaii.

  Ah, the games that your mind will play when sitting on a charter airplane for eight-plus hours with wall-to-wall college kids who clearly couldn’t go for long without taking a shot of something over eighty proof.

  I circled the rim of the inside of the first-floor apartments. No sign of “Unit E.” Hell, no sign of human life. I toddled up to the second floor, where the sidewalk dipped toward the railing. I paused and eyed each window from the top of the steps, trying to get a bead on whether there were any inhabitants in this place. All I could see were plastic blinds and doors with tic-tac-toe games etched on them.

&n
bsp; I wiped a drop of sweat off my forehead; then I glanced to the courtyard below. Was there any way that one of my old lawyer buddies, maybe someone from the old firm, could have played a trick on me? Wouldn’t that be the ultimate prank? Tell a guy with no blood family that he has a long-lost daughter in some exotic paradise, one who was in grave danger, nonetheless.

  Okay, I added the “grave” part. Still, though, it worked with the plot.

  But, if for some bizarre reason, someone had pulled off one of the greatest pranks in modern history, provoking me to impulsively jump on the next flight to Hawaii, then the real fool would be them. I’d check out the apartments just to make sure there was no sign of Denise or a daughter who looked anything like me. Then I’d jump back into my minivan and head for the nearest all-inclusive resort and start the rejuvenation process.

  I could already taste the Knob Creek on the rocks.

  With a little extra energy in my step—I stayed as far from the railing as possible—I ambled down the walkway, stopping every few feet to cup a hand against a window. No sign of life anywhere. I wondered momentarily if the woman I’d seen earlier had the whole place to herself.

  I completed one leg of the U; then I turned left. At the first door, I noticed something different. The letter “G” was carved into the door. I leaned backward while glancing left and counted down two more doors.

  The adrenaline rush was so fast and unexpected, I felt like the base of my skull had been zapped.

  The door was open, just a crack. My other sense, that sixth one, had been pinged.

  2

  Given my lack of quality hearing, I instinctively put my head on a swivel and started to shuffle close to the partially open door. The last thing I wanted was not to hear someone coming up behind me. Despite the absence of life in this place, I wasn’t about to take any chances.

  I made it to the door, and sure enough, I found an “E” carved on it, although it was waist high. I dipped my head and peeked through the crack. It was dark, but I could just make out a kitchen table with books and papers on top.

  Another glance behind me. All clear.

  I knocked twice. “Anyone home?”

  I waited a few seconds, but no one responded. I tried the same routine again and waited even longer this time.

  All was quiet. Too quiet.

  I nudged open the door and took a single step into the apartment. My eyes went straight to the green, wooden kitchen table in front of me. Coloring books covered it, some of them open to reveal the colored images. These weren’t little-kid coloring books, for sure. The person had used colored pencils to embellish the detailed designs. One was a beautiful depiction of a waterfall cascading off a breathtaking cliff.

  “Hello?” I was at a disadvantage. If someone were calling out in a soft voice from another room, I probably wouldn’t hear them. I walked through a living room with furniture that didn’t match and found a single bedroom. An unmade queen bed, the smell of perfume in the air, but no people. The hall bathroom had makeup, a hair dryer, and hair-care products. No people, and no real sign that a kid lived here.

  Except for the coloring books, and even that was a stretch. An adult with aspirations of learning the art of drawing could have created those pictures. I spun on my sandals and headed back to the kitchen.

  A chair was toppled over. Not sure how I missed that a minute ago. My eyes picked up red marks on the drab linoleum. I lowered to my knees and ran my fingers across the floor. Under the table, I spotted some colored pencils that had been smashed into tiny pieces, as if a heavy shoe had crushed them.

  I tried to swallow, but my throat had gone dry.

  On the other side of the table near the wall, I found an envelope on the floor. I crawled over and picked it up.

  It was addressed to Denise Emerson. So she does live here. Unless this was a different Denise Emerson than the one who was my prom date.

  My pulse ticked faster.

  I eyed the front door. People don’t leave their doors open like that—not unless they were in a huge rush.

  She’s in danger, the letter had said. Had Denise actually been referencing herself, thinking that if she mentioned a daughter, I was more likely to come than if it were just her? Given the dreadful condition of the complex, her life had taken a wrong turn somewhere.

  Again, if it was her.

  Pictures. She had to have photographs around here somewhere. I probably missed them in the one bedroom.

  I quickly pushed up to head back to the bedroom.

  Footfalls peppered the walkway. With no weapons on me, I plucked a dirty skillet off the stovetop and held it above my head. The door popped open.

  “Ozzie!”

  It was Denise. Makeup snaked down her face, but I could never mistake her eyes, the same icy blue. She looked worn, and her hair was a different color, but it was her.

  “What’s going on, Denise? Did you write me this letter?” I whipped it from my pocket and waved it at her.

  Tears sprung from her eyes, and before I could take another breath, she barreled into me with open arms.

  “They have her, Ozzie. They took our daughter.” She fought through the sobs, then looked me in the eye. “They have our Mackenzie.”

  3

  My heart sank. I set down the skillet, slowly inhaled and exhaled, and then gently took Denise by the arms.

  “Tell me what’s going on, please.”

  She gasped a few times, as if she were having a difficult time getting words out. I found a cup on the kitchen counter and poured her some water. As she chugged the water, I ripped a paper towel from a roll and gave it to her. She wiped her face and got her breathing under control.

  I gave her a minute. “You feeling better?”

  “Thank you.” Her voice was raspy, as if she’d been yelling.

  “Start from the top. Where is…Mackenzie?” The name sounded strange coming off my lips.

  “It’s the yakuza. They took her from me.”

  I was a master at reading lips. That had always helped me piece together words I didn’t quite hear. I wondered if I’d heard her correctly. “Yakuza—the Japanese crime syndicate?”

  She nodded repeatedly. “Yes, it’s them. You’ve got to help me get her back. Please. She’s all I’ve got, Ozzie. Will you help me?” She was firing off words so fast it was hard to keep up, each phrase more animated than the last.

  “Of course I’ll help. I’m here, aren’t I?”

  A breath, and then she dialed back the intensity a couple of notches. “You are.” Her eyes scanned me from head to toe. “You got my letter.”

  “You must have mailed the letter a week ago or so?”

  “I’m worried about her, Oz. Mackenzie is…” She raised a jittery hand and wiped a tear from her face. I noticed her fingernails were down to the nubs. She’d ignored my question, or she’d been too rocked by the situation to listen clearly.

  “I’m just trying to take this all in. I’m a lawyer—”

  “Of course you are. Wow. Just like your dad.”

  I offered a tight-lipped smile. We could talk about Dad and everything else that had transpired over the last decade once we got Mackenzie back. “I need to understand the timetable, okay?”

  “Okay. Right. Makes sense. What did you ask me?”

  “You sent a letter. You must have been worried for a while. When did you send it?”

  “About a week ago.”

  “Okay, when was she taken?”

  “After she got home from school.”

  “Today?”

  “Yes, today. Do you see why I’m so worried?”

  She should be worried regardless, but I saw this as a small positive. “Better today than a week ago. So, have they communicated with you at all? Asked about a ransom, or said what it would take to get her back safely?”

  “No, nothing.”

  I looked off and found a framed picture above the couch. It was a painting of a black-sand beach with steep cliffs in the background. Seagulls fl
ew overhead at dusk as waves crashed into rock formations. It had to be a knock-off of a print.

  I turned back to Denise, her glassy blue eyes as clear as the ocean water. “The door was open when I got here. Why?”

  “I ran out of here when I came home early and found that she’d been kidnapped. The door is a piece of crap and doesn’t shut well unless you really play with the lock. I didn’t have time to screw with it.”

  “Where did you go?”

  “Back to the school, about four blocks down. Sometimes she goes back there and plays with friends.”

  “You don’t think she’s at a friend’s house?”

  She held up her cell phone. “I called the parents of her four best friends. No one has seen her after they walked home together.”

  I felt a trickle of sweat bubble off my sideburn. I used my shoulder to wipe it off. “This yakuza angle. I have my doubts, but it—”

  She pounded her shoe into the floor. I then realized she had on heels and was wearing a navy-blue pantsuit with a blue-and-white polka-dot silk shirt. Outside of her smeared makeup and frizzed-out hair that was a combination of red, brown, and blond, she looked almost professional. She didn’t match anything else about this place.

  “You don’t fucking believe me,” she said, taking a step back.

  “No, Denise, that’s not it. Look, I used the wrong word. I don’t doubt you. I’m just wondering why the yakuza would bother to kidnap your…our daughter.”

  She put a hand to her face, but it didn’t stop the new surge of tears. “I fucked up, Ozzie. And I think it might cost Mackenzie’s life.”

  4

  There was something about Denise that seemed off, other than the obvious. I couldn’t pinpoint it exactly. Perhaps I was being influenced by this ghetto-like apartment.

  “Look,” I said. “Nothing you could have done justifies kidnapping a child. Nothing. So get that out of your head.”