by Rebecca Rane
It was relaxing and exactly what she’d needed after the day she’d had.
She fell asleep to the low rumble of Swissy’s purr.
Chapter 22
Kendra and Shoop lost two days to the chaos of the “I Am Ethan Peltz” episode when they should have been deeper into the investigation of what actually happened to him.
Even with Art assigning Sharon Holcomb, his secretary, and WPLE receptionist, to the task of helping manage emails and calls, they were swamped.
Art loved the splash The Cold Trail had made, even though it was all they could focus on as they fielded interview requests and the associated frenzy. They had been here before, but it still felt surreal, breaking a big story like this.
But the excitement died down on the old story for the worst reason.
An old tragedy was pushed aside, as they are, by the latest awful headline.
The story of the missing boy from decades ago was pushed aside by the missing boy of today.
A witness had come forward to say they saw Brylon Coleman talking to someone in a creeper van spotted in Lucky.
The taskforce, getting larger by the day, it seemed, had expanded from Gillian and Kyle to Tara Toomey, Public Information Officer. The new tip had led to increased intensity. Was there a child kidnapper on the loose in Lucky? Was he going to strike here next?
Kendra hadn’t talked to Kyle since he’d been called away in the middle of their date. This was fine by her. She didn’t want to be dependent on a man and didn’t want a man dependent on her. Swissy was all she could reasonably care for and feed these days.
Shoop and Kendra were trying to work when the news of the day grabbed their attention.
“Look,” Shoop said and pointed to the TV. They watched Connor Stinson breathlessly explain the latest developments.
“We’re waiting on an official statement from the interagency task force. We’ve been told they’ve got new information. Sources I talked to told me that this case has changed dramatically in the last few hours.”
Shoop turned up the sound as Tara Toomey, PIO for the Port Lawrence Police and now the task force, stepped in front of a bank of microphones.
“As you know, an interagency task force has been formed to search and save Brylon Coleman. The law enforcement team has been operating on the belief that this a missing person case. There had been no indication that he’d been abducted but keeping all lines of communication open has been key. Intense searches in the vicinity of his home and school have yielded several important clues to his situation and possible others.”
“A credible witness has stepped forward to reveal that Brylon Coleman was seen talking to someone in a light gray, full-sized van. We’ve put up a picture of the van that the witnesses described. We are on the lookout for this vehicle, but we do not have a plate or a specific model. So, we urge caution. We’re hoping if you see this type of van in your neighborhood, you’ll call the hotline we’ve set up. The driver of the vehicle is not a suspect, but rather someone who might be able to help us in the next link of this investigation. However, it is because of this information that investigators have heightened concern for Brylon’s safety.”
Whether Tara Toomey had more to convey in her prepared statement or not, she would not get the chance. The reporters gathered were done having her dole information out slowly. She was interrupted by a flurry of questions.
“Is it true you found remains in the shaft of a previously abandoned building here in Port Lawrence?”
A few things clicked into place for Kendra. This was what had called Kyle away the other night. She was sure of it.
Tara Toomey took a breath. It was clear now that the answer was going to be horrifying.
“It is true. Late last week, the remains of a young male were found in an abandoned building in downtown Port Lawrence.”
Shoop and Kendra watched in silence as Tara fielded a million more shouted questions.
“Is it Brylon? Is that what’s prompted the switch in focus?”
“No, it is the coroner's initial assessment that the remains are not Brylon but rather an infant aged twelve to eighteen months old.”
Kendra looked at Shoop. “Was there a missing child a year ago? I don’t remember anything like that?”
“No, absolutely not,” Shoop said.
A year ago, Shoop was a television news associate producer, and Kendra, a rising tv news reporter; this story would have been on their radar.
“I have no cause of death to report or identification for you on this new discovery.”
Shoop looked at the web reports tumbling out on Twitter as Tara continued to add to the official information.
“Are you investigating the building owners?” a reporter shouted.
“The condition of the body indicates that whatever happened occurred prior to the current owner’s acquisition. It had been sold recently.”
A few more questions were fired at Tara, and she took them one at a time.
“I can confirm that discovery of these remains and the witness for Brylon Coleman have changed the tenor of our work here.”
Tara fielded questions, urged the public to call the hotline numbers, and showed the school picture of little Brylon.
While Kendra had written Tara off in the past as a P.R. flack, she was impressed now with how she handled the media scrum. Tara was calm, authoritative, and had done a lot of good keeping the officers away from the press for the last few days, so they could do their work while also informing the public of the situation. Kendra’s opinion of Tara Toomey had just gone up by several notches.
“That’s horrible, just horrible,” Shoop said as the report ended.
Kendra nodded and felt the same.
“Do they have a serial killer on their hands?” Kendra asked.
Was an animal out there preying on little boys? She realized that Kyle and her sister had to be under incredible pressure. The pressure of the podcast seemed small in comparison. She was sorting out the details of living, breathing people. As macabre as it was, they were lucky.
Kendra had a responsibility to Margie and Josh, but this little boy, Brylon? The clock was ticking on his life. She thought of Gillian and Kyle and imagined how this impacted them.
“This really puts our story into perspective. We’re lucky that Ethan is safe and has reunited with his mom,” Shoop said. In their conversations, Josh and Ethan were becoming more and more interchangeable.
“For sure,” Kendra said, “I can’t even imagine the pressure that Kyle and Gilly are under to find this little boy.”
The development had put a sick feeling in Kendra’s stomach, but she wasn’t alone. Everyone with a heart in Port Lawrence turned their attention to trying to find Brylon Coleman and to guarding their own little ones against God knows who or what was out there.
Chapter 23
The DNA test results were now due. Any day, any hour, they’d have that piece of the puzzle.
As they waited, they debated how to move the podcast forward when the happy ending was about to happen in the middle of the season.
Kendra spent her evening mulling over options for the best way to proceed. She was in full swing when her phone vibrated.
“Hi, Mom,” Kendra answered.
“What’s this? You’re dating a police detective?”
Kendra’s mom was the reason she had married Scott, at least in part. Her mom’s view of marriage would be at home in Tudor, England. Stephanie Dillon wanted Kendra to marry an upwardly mobile man… or someone who could help Stephanie’s idea of controlling the universe in Port Lawrence.
Stephanie’s own marriage to Big Don helped her become Mayor of Port Lawrence, with a few key labor endorsements. Certainly, a rich, well-educated, schmoozing husband would be perfect for Kendra.
Except up wasn’t the direction that Kendra’s career was headed. And schmoozing sucked if half the people you were supposed to schmooze were connected to institutions you were investigating for corruption.
“Dating is a strong word, and how did you hear this?”
“Your sister.” Stephanie didn’t have time for weekly dinners with her family. If Stephanie was eating at a restaurant, you could be sure it was to make a deal.
“I took Kyle Carver to the awards dinner, for an award I didn’t win. He was very helpful with the Sister David story, so it was a thank you kind of thing.”
“You know, I’m livid you didn’t win. Livid. I have donated to the press club for its entire existence and…”
“Mom, donating is not how I want to win awards, and actually, I don’t care about awards.”
“Nonsense, that’s why awards even exist.”
“So, is this why you called? The awards?”
“No, though I was mad about that. I called to tell you the Ethan Peltz stuff is riveting.”
“You listened?”
“Well, podcasts are my new productivity hack.” Her mother was sounding like a Silicon Valley tech executive instead of a midwestern politician all of a sudden. “Johnathan showed me how to find them on my phone, and I’ve been listening on my treadmill. I know it was hard for you to talk about your own incident, but you did a good job.”
Her own incident was the kidnapping. Stephanie did not like to mention that. After meeting Margie Peltz, Kendra had a better sense of why. If you allowed yourself to think about your child missing—real, imagined, or, in Stephanie’s case, happily resolved—it could be all-consuming. Thinking about it opened the door to a parent’s worst fears. Margie Peltz had opened the door and lived there every day since Ethan disappeared.
“Thanks, we had to let the listeners know that I have a personal experience with this. And that, well, I’m unique and lucky.”
“You’re scrappy as hell. That’s what you are. Always have been. And you’re just as good as Serial, and that Sarah Koenig. I’m telling you; you’re going to be huge.”
Scrappy kids were hurt, every day. But Kendra let it go. She also realized that her mom had a problem with contentment, in that she never once expressed satisfaction with where she or her daughters were at any present moment. An accomplishment was always a step to another accomplishment, a means to a new end.
Kendra had the same problem, a burning desire to move, to not be still. Stephanie Dillon’s restlessness manifested itself as ambition, control, need for power. Kendra’s was translated into her obsession for her cold cases.
Her cold cases, like she owned them. Kendra did not want to look at that too closely right now. Kendra was about to argue that without Serial Podcast, The Cold Trail wouldn’t exist, but decided the fastest route out of this phone call was to graciously accept the compliment.
“Thank you, Mom. We’ll see. This current season feels like it's slipping through my fingers.”
“Well, I did help you with last season, is there something I can do now?”
Stephanie’s influence was far and wide in Port Lawrence, and really, throughout the state. As much as Kendra wanted to be independent, her life was here, her past was here, and her mother’s influence was here. Kendra had benefited from it even as she’d railed against it at times.
“I guess, while I have you… my question is personal. I have a concern that the mom, Margie, is going to be hurt by me bringing this man who says he’s her son to her.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s fragile, is all. You aren’t. You handled the incident and moved past it, quickly.”
Kendra waited. She heard her mother take a breath in and then out. Usually, she was too busy for introspection, but Kendra had opened a can of worms. It was inevitable with this story subject.
“I never moved past it, dear. We don’t talk about it because, if I think about what could have happened, I’d never get anything done. Nor would I have let you out of my sight, even today. So, you’d be in bubble wrap in the old house like some sort of modern-day Emily Dickinson. Fear is no way to live, so I keep it to myself.”
It flipped what Kendra thought about her mother on its ear. Was Stephanie helping Kendra by not talking about it? Kendra always thought her mother was helping herself.
Kendra softened; her mother had revealed a lot. Maybe Stephanie Dillon was introspective after all? Her mom didn’t talk about it because she, like Margie Peltz, was still living it. There was no way to get over it, so you just had to function by constantly going through it. It was a perspective on her mom that she hadn’t had before.
“Thanks Mom, I appreciate your insight. I love you.”
“I love you too. Now, about that detective—fling yes, marriage no. Scott is still very busted up about your divorce. I still think that you could…”
“Mom.”
“Or how about aim for the billionaire? Atwell’s single and has single billionaire buddies. He’s a little weird, but you can take a lot of weird if you have a private jet.”
“I’m not going to align our dynasty with another dynasty any time soon,” Kendra quipped.
“You’re impossible. Talk to you later.”
They ended the call. It was about as honest an exchange she’d had with her mother that she could remember.
It was nice and odd. Kendra wondered if her mother was feeling okay.
But she realized time was also a factor. They were over a decade past the worst days of their family’s lives. That was something.
She was headed into the office, thinking about planning their next steps, when all hell broke loose in the case of Ethan Peltz.
Chapter 24
They decided to read the results together. WPLE had paid for the DNA test. So, it was agreed that Josh, Margie Peltz, and Kendra would read them together. They’d also agreed to have it on tape.
The mystery would be solved, and better still, they’d have scientific confirmation that Josh was Ethan. Margie could finally hug her boy, her lost boy.
Shoop had arranged everything when the alert came in that the Find My Family Tree DNA test was complete. The results were available.
Kendra was nervous. But seeing Margie and Josh together now, her nerves were assuaged somewhat.
The dark moon that was Margie Peltz now revolved around Josh—or Ethan, as she called him—without reservation.
Josh and Margie were holding hands. Kendra opened the envelope and read the document. She scanned her eyes over the individual lines for the markers on the test. It was a list of numbers and terms that meant nothing. The important part was the summary at the end, in paragraph form.
“The alleged mother is excluded in the maternity of this child. Based on the samples collected, the probability of maternity is 0.0000%. The samples tested revealed zero probability that the two subjects are biologically related.”
Kendra read it out loud and processed it at the same time.
“That can’t be right!” Josh said. He stood up.
No one replied. Kendra handed the result to Josh. He looked at it, read again.
The tenor of the silence was oppressive. It had deflated the hopes that Kendra was responsible for stoking in Margie and in Josh. She proceeded gently. Science had prevailed even though they all wished for a different outcome.
“Josh, the test is incredibly reliable and accurate,” Kendra said. Her voice was soft, but her conviction firm. This man wasn’t Ethan Peltz.
Kendra didn’t want to press or pry. She let Josh and Margie process the information, in their own way, wordless or not.
“I refuse to believe this is accurate. I know for certain who I am, and there is no test that is going to come between my mother and me, not now, not after all these years.” Josh was struggling not to come unhinged; Kendra could see the battle between belief and fact, fighting for control over his body.
Margie Peltz was different.
And it was her reaction that would haunt Kendra. She wasn’t vocal or issuing vehement denials of the situation. While she sat in the same chair, occupied the same physical space she’d
occupied since they started the interview, she quite clearly fell apart. Her hope, her gaze, her use of the oxygen in the room changed. Kendra could almost see whatever peace the woman clung to collapse inward.
And inward was where she would stay.
“Can you tell me what you’re thinking about?” Kendra asked, though it was no mystery if body language was a clue. If downcast lips could tell a story. Kendra could see the years of horror weigh down Margie’s neck and shoulders once again.
“I shouldn’t have answered your call. I should never have answered your call,” Margie said to Kendra, and she felt it like knives to her chest. She’d caused this woman to hope, and now it had been ripped away from her. Kendra was to blame.
“I am your son. I am Ethan Peltz. How else would I know the things I know?”
Margie looked at Josh. For a second, it was a look of pity. She understood he needed to believe he was Ethan. For whatever reason.
“We will redo this stupid test. Something was messed up. That’s the only explanation.” Josh was trying to bargain his way out of the truth.
Margie’s pity was gone. She was trying to find whatever balance she’d had before Kendra had done this to her.
“I won’t be doing any more tests. My boy is dead. I forgot that for a few days. It was beautiful. I was elated. But now it’s worse. I can tell you that, Ms. Dillon. I am worse off now because Ethan died again, today, here. The hope of him. You did as much as kill him.”
“I want to find out what happened to him. That hasn’t changed,” Kendra said, but her words sounded hollow to her. She struggled not to let herself cry. Her emotions were too close to the surface. It was a struggle to be professional. The detachment she needed as an investigator was gone.
“You can do it without me.” Margie took the mic off. Stood up and walked to the door.
“Mrs. Peltz, I’m going to keep looking. I promise you that.”
Kendra felt a desperate need to make this right. To find a way to comfort a woman who was now worse off than when Kendra knocked. It was the last thing she’d wanted to do. Her work was supposed to help, not plunge a victim into the hell of the first days of the crime. But that’s exactly what Kendra felt she’d done, by bringing Josh to Margie.
