Now his touch feels comforting.
The number rings and rings and when I think nobody will pick up, a male voice growls “Damage Control. How may I help you?”
“Uh.” For some reason, I honestly hadn’t thought anyone would pick up.
“Can we talk to Zane Madden?” West says, saving my ass. “It’s important.”
“Is this a prank?” the man growls again. What’s up with that, huh? “Who are you?”
“I’m Weston Black.” He takes the phone from my hand. “Calling from St. Louis. Our friend, Kash Graham, has gone missing, and he mentioned Zane Madden’s name. We thought he—”
The line goes flat.
West shakes the phone. “Motherfucker.”
I take the phone from him before he breaks it. “Probably a dud. Guy did his tats. Doesn’t mean they were close.”
“We should call again.”
I hit redial, but we get the busy tone. I stare at the phone, then turn to West and find him glaring. “I’ll try again tomorrow. Maybe they were closing.”
“Yeah. Or the guy really thought we were pulling a prank. And tomorrow’s Sunday.”
“Damn.” I sigh. “What do we do now?”
“Has Syd finished reading the journal? We should sit down and talk, pool what we know.”
“Know. Ha.” I grunt. “We still got nothing. Fucking nothing.”
My phone starts ringing. West answers it. “Hello?”
“This is Zane Madden,” an unfamiliar voice says from the other end. “You called earlier and said it’s important. What do you want?”
“Kash is gone. And you want info about him.” Zane sounds annoyed, or maybe just tired. “What makes you think I have it? How old is the guy?”
“Nineteen, we think.”
“You think.”
Zane makes me nervous. He sounds dangerous, like the kind of guy who’d punch your lights out if you irritated him. “From what he said.”
“How old are you then?”
“Uh. I’m nineteen, too.” West says.
“Same,” I mutter. “Almost twenty, though.”
“You’re all kids. Fuck.” Zane sighs. “So what did this Kash say?”
“You inked his tattoos,” I say.
“So he was a customer here. Do you think I remember every fucking customer who passes through here?”
Shit. “I dunno, man. He mentioned you. We’re trying to find him, in case something bad happened to him, that’s all.”
Zane is silent for a moment. Then he grunts as if he’s just sat down. “What’s his full name?”
“Kash Graham. Kasimir.”