Taken by E.M. Leya

CHAPTER FIVE

Noam walked into the STK team house, not shocked to find every member of the team inside, gathered around one of the screens in the computer room. "What do you have?" He knew the team had been searching for Trenton, but he was surprised when he got a call asking for his advice on the situation.

Matt glanced up at him. "I know you're no longer working as a cop, but we need another opinion. Half of us think we should report Trenton as a missing person once the seventy-two-hour waiting period is up, but the rest think we should handle this alone."

Kasey walked over and pressed his hand to Noam's back as he leaned in to kiss his cheek. "Look at what they found on the bar's security video."

Noam leaned into Kasey's touch, glad to see his husband. He didn't hang out at the team house very often. Noam worked at another location where they portrayed young children and caught pedophiles who tried to talk to them in chat. He liked that he didn't work beside Kasey every moment of every day. It made coming home at night to see each other mean that much more. Noam watched the screen. "What am I looking for?"

"Watch the bartender as he pours Trenton's beer." Matt pointed at the monitor.

Sure enough, as soon as the beer was poured, the bartender added a small amount of some powder substance to the beer, then used a straw to stir it before setting it on the bar for the waitress to take. "GHB?" Noam asked.

"That would be my guess." Kasey sighed.

"The waitress delivers the beer and a few minutes later, this redhead nods to the bartender and makes her way over to where Trenton is sitting. The camera for that area is obscured a bit. We can only see half the table, but she sits down with him for a while. He has two beers, then she leads him onto the dance floor. The camera in that area shows them dancing, but if you watch Trenton, you can tell he's not steady on his feet. Whatever that powder was is taking hold. About five minutes later…" Matt sped up the video a bit, then let it go back to normal speed. "This woman leads him to a back door, probably an office or break room, and that's the last we see of Trenton for ten minutes. Then this…"

Noam watched as the bartender who'd drugged the beer slipped into the office for a moment. A few seconds later, he stepped out again, this time with Trenton over his shoulder. He headed out a backdoor, then returned a few minutes later alone.

"Carried him out to a car would be my guess," Xander sat in a chair behind the group watching the screens.

"We need your opinion, Noam. Do we call the police and report all this or do we handle it alone?" Bryon asked from where he stood, his arm around Becca's shoulder.

"Report it. I'm sure this isn't the first time this has happened. There are probably a bunch of other missing person's cases. This could give them a lead. We continue to work the case and see what we can find since we have resources the police might not, but we need to let them know." He knew the team could hack into places and learn things that the police weren't allowed to explore without warrants. "What do we know about this bar? Have you identified the man or woman with Trenton?"

Matt clicked on a screen on his computer. "The bar has been around since we moved into the area. From what I see, it's never had issues. One homicide in the parking lot, but it was a drunken domestic about five years ago. Xander and Kasey are going to head over and question the bar owner in a bit, but we wanted to talk to you before we sent them in case the police should talk to them first."

"I'll take what we have to the police and get the ball rolling there, but Xander and Kasey can go and ask some questions. Don't let them know we have the video, but see if you can talk to this bartender and get a feel for him."

Xander shook his head. "When I went searching for Trenton the first time, the owner said he'd fired the bartender."

"Then ask him why and if he'll share his name. See if the woman is there, but I'm guessing if the bartender is gone, so is she. It's clear they were working together. I don't think the waitress is in on this, but you never know. Hell, this bar might be deep into trafficking and has just managed to hide it well. Push, but don't let them know what you do." Noam stared at Kasey. "And be careful."

"Always." Kasey leaned in and kissed Noam before heading out the door with Xander.

Noam turned back to the computers and looked at Matt. "What else do you know?"

"Nothing yet. I'm running the bartender and this woman through facial recognition software, but have come up with nothing so far. I don't know if this is a simple date rape type incident, a trafficking ring, or if he was taken for some other reason. There are several cases around the area of men in their late twenties and early thirties disappearing after a night at the club, but not little bars like Manny's. Was this someone the team went after and they somehow found out who Trenton was? I just don't know."

Noam ran his fingers through his hair. He didn't like the feel of this. No matter the reason Trenton was taken, it wasn't good. "How long has he been missing?"

"He went missing Monday night," Bryon told him as he sat down in a chair and pulled Becca onto his lap.

"It's now Wednesday. Not enough time to file a missing person's report, but with the video, I think I can get the police in on this. They just won't be able to use the video as evidence until they get it themselves from the bar owner. I'll mention a friend hacked into the system to get it. It won't shock anyone I have resources like that." Noam nodded to the screen. "Make me a copy and I'll make some calls. The sooner we get people on this, the sooner we can find Trenton. Did he have any enemies, any relationships go bad? Anything that might give us a lead?"

"No, nothing. The team is Trenton's life. He has a twin brother that lives out of state. I don't think he's been in a relationship in over a year, maybe longer. He hasn't talked about anyone he's been seeing or involved with." Bryon looked at Matt. "You work by his side every day. Has he mentioned anything to you?"

"Nothing. Like you said, the team is all he focuses on. The only time I ever hear him talk about going out is when we meet as a group or if a new kid's movie comes out. He's a huge animation fan. He'd grab Faith and head to the theater for each new release."

Noam grinned. He could see Trenton and Faith doing that. "So going to the bar was unlike him?"

"Yes and no. He didn't go often, and seldom alone, but you know how it gets here. We see things that get to us. Sometimes we need a drink to unwind. There's usually someone to go with, but it's not unheard of for one of us to go alone and just unwind for an hour. Trenton and I worked on a hard case the other day involving a baby. It got to both of us. I have Xander to go home to, he doesn't have anyone," Matt shrugged. "He probably just needed to focus on something else for a bit."

"And he ends up getting drugged." Bryon sighed. "I know my mind shouldn't go to the worst possible scenarios, but it has."

"Let me go find out what I can. I'll look into the other missing men from nightclubs, see if we can find a link." Noam had plenty of contacts he could talk to, some within the police force, others outside of it. There were always trafficking groups around, but there were a million other reasons a man could be drugged and taken. This close to the border, they'd be lucky if he hadn't been transported into Mexico at some point. He wasn't going to tell the team anything until he had more information.

"I'll keep digging here. I'm looking into all recent reports of missing men around Trenton's age. Most are younger, but Trenton doesn't look his age. They could have easily mistaken him for a twenty-something." Matt turned back to the computer.

The nervous energy in the room was thick, and he knew they were all worried about what they'd seen on the video. Trenton was in trouble. "Make sure Kasey calls me when he gets back from the bar. I'll check in as well as soon as I have more information." He turned, hoping that Trenton was alive. He'd seen too many cases like this where they'd found a body. He wasn't sure the team could handle it if one of them was killed.

Determined to do what he could, he headed out to his car, mentally making a list of people he needed to contact. They needed to find him and soon or they risked losing him forever.