by Leslie Wolfe
“We’ll probably need to take those navigation units apart. We need to figure out where these vehicles have been, and when they got back here.”
“No need to take them apart for that,” Roderick replied. “May I?” he asked, half-opening his door.
Kay nodded and handed him a pair of gloves. He leaned into the Nissan without sitting behind the wheel and started operating its navigation unit.
“You go to navigation, then history,” he said. “You can select to see the routes on a map, where the stops will be marked with blue circles, like this,” he said, touching the screen with the tip of a gloved finger.
The lines on the map showed the Nissan had traveled to Mount Chester, and the Katse Coffee Shop was marked by a blue circle, confirming the evidence found in the car.
“Strange,” Roderick said. “There’s no return route.”
“What do you mean?” Elliot asked, staring at the screen from behind the young man’s bony shoulders.
“I mean, she drove the car to this point here, a few miles from this Katse place, and then nothing. There’s local traffic in the SFO airport, so many overlaid routes that we can’t really tell when those happened without going into the line-by-line data. Our customers don’t know or don’t care about erasing their GPS history, and every one of them has driven this car here, at the airport, either leaving or returning the vehicle. But there’s no return route from Mount Chester to San Francisco.”
“How can that happen?” Kay asked, frowning. If the unsub had tampered with the vehicle’s GPS unit, none of the data that was left was worth anything; it was only what he wanted them to find.
“If someone can figure out how to delete partial navigation data, I guess,” Roderick said. “Maybe you do need to take this unit apart. I watch crime shows on TV,” he added. “I know cops have top-notch computer people who can do pretty much anything, right?”
“Right,” she replied, while Elliot locked eyes with her, surprised. Maybe in a previous life she would’ve had access to FBI’s top analysts who could take the unit apart and figure out every secret it held inside. But that was then. Now, they had to figure it out on their own.
An unsub knowledgeable enough to alter the GPS data in rental vehicles changed the game. That, and the fact that this time he’d taken a woman and her child.
Fifteen
Stolen Life
He cherished the memories of his mother, the way she’d been with him at first, when he was little and she didn’t have other children, only him. They were faded and distant and barely recognizable, washed over by the blur of time, but they were the most precious he had.
Him, sitting on the floor at his mother’s feet, helping her tie little feathers with strips of calf leather she then used to decorate the dreamcatchers she made. His sister was a swaddle of gurgling sounds and whimpers back then, and his brother a bump in his mother’s belly. From there, at her feet, her hair seemed to surround her head like a halo against the sunlight, making him wonder if she was an angel, while she sang about little babies and mockingbirds, over and over, in a soft, love-filled voice.
She wasn’t, she’d explained many times, nor was she a spirit. She was just his mother, a woman he loved more than anyone else. And with her by his side, his entire world made sense.
When he was about five years old and his sister had started grabbing hold of his finger with her tiny hand, he was thrilled to put her in the stroller and take her outside in the gentle summer breeze, pushing it slowly if she was asleep, or as fast as he could run if she was awake, until she laughed hard and squealed. But one day the stroller overturned when its front right wheel hit a pothole, sending his sister flying through the air. She landed hard on her back, her piercing wails instantly drawing his mother outside, still wearing her kitchen apron.
But he didn’t see her coming. His eyes were riveted on his little sister’s naked body. The blanket she’d been swaddled in was still clinging to the side of the stroller’s canopy, and her diaper had become loose. She was kicking and flailing, arms and legs in the air, powerless, and yet her vulnerability stirred him up inside, rendering him stiff, frozen, his eyes fixed on her pale skin, unable to move.
That was the first time his mother hit him, the memory of her heavy hand across his face searing, even in the distant memories dusted by the passing of so many years. She’d rushed outside, picked up her daughter ever so gently, and quickly checked to see if she was all right. Then she’d turned to him in a rage and shouted, “Don’t come near her again! You hear me? Get out of my sight… I can’t even look at you right now.”
Turning, she went inside, his sister in her arms still wailing, leaving him alone in the yard, lost, a flood of tears burning his eyes. He’d never wanted to hurt the little girl, but who would believe him, if his own mother wouldn’t?
He heard his father’s truck pull up in front of the house. Panicked, he realized his dad would soon learn about the entire story and he probably wouldn’t be too pleased. Quickly, he put the stroller back on its wheels, then ran and hid inside the barn, wishing the earth would open already and swallow him whole.
That night, he didn’t go inside the house, not even for dinner when his stomach had started growling fiercely. He didn’t believe he deserved food or the warmth of his home, and terrified to face his mother again, he preferred to curl up on the straw and pretend he didn’t hear the mice munching on loose grain.
It was his father who came looking for him eventually. Instead of hitting him or shouting at him, he’d sat on a square bale of straw by his side and explained that his mother had been scared and upset, and didn’t mean all the harsh things she had said. She wasn’t upset anymore, and she waited for him to join the family for dinner.
Head hung low and hands clasped tightly in front of him, he followed his father inside, then ate dinner without saying a word or lifting his eyes from his plate. His mother didn’t speak to him either, busy as she was with feeding a toddler and an infant, his little brother. He went to bed without a word spoken to him and lay awake until the early morning light. He remembered that well, because it was the day that had marked the first shift in his mother’s love for him.
After that unfortunate incident, he was only allowed to play with his younger siblings under his mother’s strict supervision. She seemed afraid of him, of what he could do to his brother and sister. “Don’t play rough, you’ll break her bones,” she’d say, raising her voice to carry over the large yard. “Watch it, she’s not as strong as you are.” Or worse, “Don’t be an animal.”
Gradually, but beyond any doubt, she’d stopped loving him. The last time he remembered her being affectionate was right before his twelfth birthday. She’d dressed him up for church, just like she always did, and gave him a hug after he was done, a warm embrace that resonated in his entire body, awakening him in ways he wasn’t familiar with. Then she’d pushed him aside abruptly, not looking at him anymore. Maybe it was something he’d said, or maybe he’d never know what it was he’d done wrong.
Around that time, with that day as a first, he’d started to change, his own body betraying him. Unwanted thoughts troubled his mind during the day and his dreams while he slept. It was as if his entire being had decided to embarrass him. His voice was undecided if it was going to stay high-pitched like a child’s, or turn baritone, more like his father’s. One night, he woke up drenched in his own urine. Another time, he couldn’t leave the dinner table because he was afraid everyone would see his erection. But the tiniest, most innocent gestures triggered his body to react in the most unusual, embarrassing ways. His mother, cutting a piece of chicken breast on her plate to share among the children. The way the word breast sounded on her lips, when she’d asked him if he wanted a piece. The way her dress contoured the shape of her full chest, the red fabric in contrast with the warm shades of her skin.
That night, he found himself passing through the hallway when his mother was in the shower. As if drawn by a powerful yet invisible hand
, he’d crouched in front of the bathroom door and looked through the keyhole. He didn’t see much, only the shape of his mother’s body under the flow of hot water, blurred behind the steamed shower curtain, but where his eyes couldn’t see detail, his mind was quick to imagine it. His father almost caught him, but he’d heard his footsteps and managed to rush back into his room, his hands held in front of his body to cover his painful hardness.
There, in the solitude of his room, he touched himself for the first time, to relieve the pain, to study the part of his body that so frequently acted against his will, to learn how to control it or to regain some sense of restraint over his urges.
The exact opposite happened.
He discovered pleasure, the reward he didn’t expect to find at the end of so much misery and humiliation. That initial exploration of his sexuality, the deeply satisfying bonanza of emotions and feelings, forever changed who he was. Instead of running away from his body, from the things that turned him on, he started seeking the thrills, compelled to indulge again and again in the death-like pleasure.
At all costs.
He stopped feeling guilty when his body responded to seeing his sister and her friends in their short dresses, their budding breasts pushing through colorful fabrics. He didn’t avert his eyes when his mother reached over the table for the saltshaker and he could stare down her cleavage. Come summer, he loved hanging out near the picnic areas, where tourists often took their clothes off to get some sun. Every opportunity he had, he enticed his body to respond, seeking the fleeting pleasure of release.
That didn’t, in any comparable measure, compensate for the loss of his mother’s love. As time passed, she pushed him away more and more, but still didn’t seem satisfied. She did her best to keep everyone away from him, a cruelty he didn’t understand.
He was about fifteen when he gathered his courage and asked his mother, “Why do you tell everyone to stay away from me?” To his deepest shame, his lower lip quivered under the threat of tears, a threat he hadn’t foreseen when he was rehearsing the conversation in his mind. His wishful thinking had his mother saying, “Oh, darling, I’m so sorry you feel this way! It won’t happen again.”
The reality proved vastly different. His mother stared coldly at him and replied, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Have you said your prayers?”
Ever since he could remember, when his mother, who’d been baptized Catholic at twenty-six years of age so she could marry his father, wanted to avoid a conversation with any of the family members, she brought up prayers.
That night, he’d given up trying to understand why his mother was rejecting him, but spent countless nights obsessing over every single thing he might’ve done wrong to upset her, to push her away.
He decided to fight for her affection, to earn it all over again. He took up more house chores without her asking, and got his school grades up so fast his teachers commended him, yet she didn’t let him anywhere near her heart. A year or so later, he wasn’t even allowed to be in the backyard with his little sister and her friends when they played. He was supposed to stay at a safe distance, like a vicious animal, while he yearned for their company.
Even so, she wasn’t satisfied.
One such night, after his sister had gone to bed, his mother had grabbed him by the arm and took him to the door, while his father watched with sad eyes. She opened the door and shoved him out of the house, calling him an abomination and telling him he was never to come back.
His mother, the woman he loved more than life itself, had thrown him to the curb like a heap of garbage.
The memory of that night almost twenty years ago still crushed his chest as if the weight of the entire world had condensed into a single thought, unbearably heavy, merciless, and cold.
That bitch…
What had he ever done to her?
Nothing, unfortunately, but oh, how he regretted that.
Through the one-way mirror, he looked at the little girl, seeming sad and frightened as she sat on the edge of the bed. She sometimes cried, other times she just sat there or curled up on her side, her eyes squinted closed. Hazel was her name, yet she reminded him of his sister, the tiny fragile thing he wasn’t even allowed to look at, as if he were a leper.
But now he was in control, he had the power to do whatever he wanted, and that girl couldn’t call for her mother anymore. He’d made sure of that.
A wave of images and thoughts swirled through his mind, setting his body on fire. He welcomed the fantasies taking over and leaned back into his armchair, relaxing, letting them carry him away. He invited them to conquer his consciousness, dreaming with wide-open eyes, getting ready for the perfect family evening, when he was going to make the bitch in the basement pay for the life she’d stolen from him.
Again.
And again.
Sixteen
Question
It was almost three in the morning when they reached the sheriff’s office in Mount Chester, driving the safe limit for the tow truck that hauled the two rental cars. All lights were on, and Elliot recognized Sheriff Logan’s car in the parking lot, among at least half a dozen others.
Elliot instructed the tow truck driver where to go to unload the two rental vehicles and asked a uniformed deputy to assist, then escorted Kay inside. She rushed straight for the coffee maker, someone had thankfully taken the time to run, and poured two large cups.
Sheriff Logan didn’t wait for them to reach his office. He rushed toward them with two deputies by his side.
“How sure are you?” he asked, jumping straight to the core of the matter.
“Positive,” Kay replied, although the question wasn’t addressed to her. “He took another woman and her daughter, and I believe we might still be able to find them alive.”
Sheriff Logan frowned, not taking his eyes off Elliot’s.
“We have both of them leasing the vehicle and leaving, we have evidence that the child has been in the vehicle,” Elliot replied. “And no one has seen or heard from them since.”
“That was on the fifteenth? A week ago?”
Elliot had called Logan from the San Francisco airport parking garage and filled him in, yet he wanted to go over each detail, thoroughly.
“First, we have to make sure they’re really missing,” Logan said, and Kay raised her eyebrows at him. He didn’t seem to notice or mind.
“They weren’t on their flight back to Atlanta the night before last,” Elliot replied. “We checked with the airline before leaving San Francisco. Local police already spoke with Alison Nolan’s mother.”
“In the dead of the night?” the sheriff asked.
“When Alison and Hazel didn’t return on time, she tried to reach them, then filed a police report. She said it wasn’t like her daughter to be out of touch for so many days, but she knew she was traveling in secluded places, so she didn’t worry. But Alison always called before boarding her flight.”
“Did she give us anything useful?”
“Not really,” Elliot replied. “The last time she spoke with Alison was on the fifteenth, after they landed in San Francisco.” He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “She also said she had a bad feeling about this trip, but her daughter wouldn’t listen.”
“Great,” Logan mumbled. “That’s going to help a whole damn lot.”
Kay was studying the sheriff, thankfully not intervening much. It seemed every word she had to say, even her presence there was irritating his boss, and he wondered why. Was it her youthful appearance? She was twenty-nine, and by that age she’d accomplished a lot. Maybe the seasoned sheriff disliked that, maybe it made him feel insecure. That had to be it, because Elliot hadn’t noticed a gender bias in his boss in the five years he’d worked for him.
“Action plan?” Logan asked, and two other deputies drew closer to hear the details.
“We’ve organized search parties that will start working the grid at first light.”
“Did you center that g
rid at the point of her disappearance?” Kay asked.
Three pairs of disapproving eyes focused on her.
“And how would we know where that is, if you don’t mind me asking, Miss—?”
Kay grinned for a split second, then turned serious. She was going to eat him for breakfast without toast on the side.
“It’s Dr., if you don’t mind. You can call me Dr. Sharp. And you should start at the last point where Alison’s rental vehicle recorded its location on GPS, which is just over the ridge, north of Katse’s. That is, of course, if Sheriff Logan agrees.”
Logan nodded. “You can start there,” he said. “But what’s that I’m hearing about the GPS units having been tampered with?”
“We’re looking into that,” Elliot replied. “The unsub—”
“Where do you get off with this unsub business? We’re not FBI,” Logan reacted, angry all of a sudden.
“It just makes sense to call him that, an unknown subject,” Elliot explained calmly, although his patience was running thin. His boss was being a pain in the rear, totally blinded by his aversion to Kay’s presence. “He’s Kendra’s killer, but Alison and Hazel’s kidnapper. What would you like me to call him?”
“Ah, don’t get cute with me,” Logan slammed him.
He knew to let it go. The boss was probably tired, a sleepless night far more demanding at Logan’s age than at his.
“As I was saying,” he stated calmly, a calm he was now struggling to display, “he might’ve tampered with the GPS, but this bit of information is still the best lead we have, when it comes to starting a grid search.”
“Okay, start there. I want hourly reports,” he said, pulling out a nearby chair and sitting with a groan. “Until then, let’s round up the usual suspects. Bring in Tommy MacPherson first. The name of his coffee shop is all over this investigation. There has to be a connection.”
