by J. J. Cagney
“All right. Whatcha got?”
She blew out a breath. “It looks like it was yanked from my mother’s journal. One of them. Have you noticed any pages missing?”
“Not yet,” Arlen said. “I got about eight more to go.”
“Okay. Well, the page says, Voluntary stay in Houston for hallucinations. Log says he checked out the morning of March 28, but no one saw him from 10:00 p.m. the night before.”
Arlen narrowed his eyes. “Rusty’s Trucks is between Mansfield and Houston. Up in Humble.”
“What’s that?” Danielle asked.
“Up from Houston,” Arlen said, his tone meditative. “Hmm. That could’ve worked. Can you bring those papers by?”
“Tomorrow,” Danielle said. “Our oldest son has a baseball tournament tonight.”
Arlen smiled as he leaned back in his black ergonomic chair. “I remember those days. My son, Paul, loved being out there on the field.”
“So does Kevin. It’ll be a late night and tomorrow’s my carpool day. I’ll text you a picture. Oh, and I have a Bible verse. From Janice. She took it from my dad’s briefcase.”
“Interesting,” Arlen said. “Shoot that over, too. Might not be permissible as evidence, but then, I don’t know if it’s useful.”
“Why else would my dad take it?” Danielle asked.
“Don’t know,” Arlen said. “That’s why I want to see it. I’ll finish these journals up tonight. I want to see where the ripped out page fits in your mother’s writings.”
“Chief?” Danielle asked in a hesitant voice.
Arlen’s heart lurched. “Yep?”
“My dad . . . you’re sure it wasn’t him?”
31 Hunter
Proved easy enough to find out where Danielle Foster lived, who she married, the age of her boys. Hunter chuckled as he shook his head. Amazing what computers offered up these days.
A quick search on the internet gave him a whole lot of information—thanks, in part, to her husband’s open-access Facebook account. Why people would want to be on those types of sites was beyond his understanding. While Danielle had her account locked up tighter than a steel drum, Mr. Garrett Patterson dropped tons of pictures of his wife and a couple of cute boys. Even posted today about how excited he was to see his eldest—that pride and joy of his sweet little family—get the pitching role for the first game in a big tournament up in Frisco.
Hunter studied the photos of both boys. The younger, blond kid was awful damn small.
Slight. That was the word his mama used to use. A slight child.
Hunter curled his lip. He’d hated being called that.
He clambered into an old pickup he kept out in the back shed. He’d bought it for cash over in Arkansas about two years ago. He puttered down the road, keeping his speed a couple miles under the limit. Had to be careful since this baby wasn’t registered.
He rolled down the window to enjoy the late winter breeze. He patted the edge of the rusted and dented door, smirking a little. Not hard a’tall to dump an old beater like this one. Just took a bit of planning.
Hunter was good at planning but also good at taking the moment as it came.
He’d see what was what and go from there.
He stopped at a light and glanced over, his smile turning down when he noticed a Mansfield police cruiser. Damn patrol would be out. Well, he’d keep it slow and easy.
Make sure he made it to Frisco in plenty of time to watch Danielle’s boy pitch some youth little league.
Anticipation hummed through his veins as he entered the highway. Yep, today the hunger would abate.
And Hank Foster would remember how he’d set this whole set of events into motion.
He began to hum a Johnny Cash song.
32 Danielle
The ball fields and surrounding metal bleachers were jam-packed with people. Kids yelled, crowds cheered and groaned. Danielle and Reid waved at Kevin, who looked determined and nervous as he took the field, his brown leather glove folded against his chest. Danielle pulled out a baggie of baby carrots and offered them to Reid.
“How much longer till his game starts?” Reid asked. Each time he inquired, his voice shifted closer to a whine. Hanging out, waiting for his brother’s best-of-three game to start wasn’t easy for an active six-year-old.
“Not too much longer. It’s already five. How about some Mad Libs while we wait?”
Reid’s eyes lit up. “Okay!”
She bent her head close to Reid’s as they worked on the next page in the book. Reid snorted as he answered the questions, getting a faraway look in his eyes as he thought of the most outrageous words possible.
“So, we have ‘A swan in Kalamazoo was arrested this morning after he hurdled in front of a tractor trailer.’”
Reid’s giggle fits grew louder as he nodded his head three times in a row. “That’s so funny.”
She leaned over and ruffled his hair. “Indeed, it is. Want to finish the page?”
But Reid’s attention moved to a group of his friends running toward him from an adjacent ball field.
“Wanna come hit the ball with us?” one of the boys asked. Reid snatched up his ever-present glove and hopped from the bleachers. But before his feet hit the ground, he turned back to Danielle.
“That okay, Mom?”
“Of course, buddy. Have fun. And don’t go—”
“Anywhere other than that field and never go alone. Got it.” Reid dashed off with the boys before Danielle even said goodbye.
She settled back on the bleachers, looking at Kevin’s serious expression as he listened to the coach talking to him on the pitcher’s mound.
Garrett hurried over, his stride long. He settled in next to her. “Good. Thought I’d be late. I had to park back in Dallas, I swear.”
Danielle smiled, but it faltered when she looked to the left and saw her father leaning against the chain-link fence down the first-base line. Her eyes darted over to catch Reid laughing, his pale hair glinting in the late-afternoon sun.
“I’ll be right back,” she said. Garrett nodded but he scowled when he followed Danielle’s gaze.
“Want me to talk to him?”
Danielle shook her head. “Reid’s over there; just keep an eye on him,” she said pointing. Garrett nodded, his gaze landing on his younger son.
Danielle steadied her trembling legs, a hand on the metal bleacher, before heading toward her father.
“Why are you here?” she asked, her voice filled with the anger of their last meeting.
“You invited me.”
Danielle crossed her arms over her chest. “Or you couldn’t stay away from an event like this, so filled with new potential victims.”
Hank tipped his head back in a sharp gesture. “What?”
Danielle moved in closer. “You heard me,” she snarled. “I know you were involved in Jonathan’s death. You may have slipped out of the FBI’s net, but I don’t trust you. I don’t want you near my boys. Ever. Again.”
Hank’s lips firmed into a thin, narrow line, his mouth all but disappearing from his face. He dropped his gaze to the ground, showing Danielle the graying, balding crown of his head.
“You hate me,” he muttered.
A rising wave of noise came from the field behind her as the kids’ started their game. Parents and siblings cheered and clapped, leaning closer in their metal seats to get a better look at the first pitch.
Danielle’s anger spent and a wave of exhaustion hit her. She wanted to watch her son’s game, to participate in his victory or his loss. She wanted to let go of her father’s ugly past, cut all ties with the man who, at best, exploited his own son’s grisly murder.
“What’s to like?” Danielle shook her head, her disbelief stronger than his conviction in himself. “You’ve lied and cheated and hurt innocent children my whole life, all while professing to do something noble.”
Hank opened his mouth, snapped it shut. His jaw clenched and he met her gaze with an angry, defiant one
of his own. “I’d never hurt a child, Danielle.”
Her laugh was caustic and short. “That’s where you’re wrong. You hurt me every day of my childhood. And you knew something about Jonathan.”
Hank met her glare, his face filled with a sadness she never expected. “I tried to protect you.”
Danielle shook her head. “You left me alone with a woman who couldn’t take care of herself. You left me.” Danielle let go of the fence and stepped back, away from the man who should have offered her comfort, listened to her stories at dinner, taught her to drive. “And you stole Mom’s journal entry—the one you felt somehow implicated you.”
None of those actions were to protect Danielle.
“Just go,” she said, weariness causing her shoulders to sag. “I don’t want to see you again.”
“Where is it?” he asked, urgency riding his voice. “The journal entry? What did you do with it? How did you get it?”
The bat cracked against the ball and the crowd cheered. The small figure in right field darted forward to pick up the rolling ball.
Danielle’s smile was not friendly. “I don’t have it anymore. Neither does Janice.”
Hank’s shocked expression morphed quickly into anger, then something darker.
“You can’t hide from your actions, Hank.” Danielle turned away, but Hank caught her arm in a bruising grip, his urgency transmuting through her skin, causing her to shiver.
“You don’t know what you’re doing—what you’re setting in motion.”
“Actually, Hank, I know exactly what I’m doing.” She wrenched her arm free and tilted up her chin. “I’m cutting ties with the man responsible for my brother’s death and my mother’s years of unhappiness.”
“Danielle!”
She turned her back on him and hurried away. Garrett was no longer seated on the bleachers. Danielle’s heart rate shot upward as she lifted up on tiptoe, trying to find him. He sprinted past where she stood, down to the next field. He waved his hands, obviously agitated as he talked to the boys Reid had been playing with.
Her father no longer stood at the fence line—she caught the back of his head as he jogged toward the parking lot. Danielle ran toward Garrett, who looked ready to bolt, tugging at his hair.
“What’s wrong?” Danielle gasped, out of breath.
Garrett’s eyes were wide and reddened, his face ashen. “Reid’s missing.”
33 Danielle
No. Danielle wanted to make the word push past her lips, but it hovered there. Reid, her baby. Her baby who she’d let play with his friends, running between the fields while she and Garrett watched the game. Garrett couldn’t hold her gaze, straining, frantic, searching. Searching for their son.
“Reid?” Danielle asked, her voice thin, high, frightened. Not her voice. Perhaps the same one her mother used as she called for Jonathan.
“A man. I think he grabbed him,” Garrett said, his voice raw and his eyes wild. “I didn’t see. I didn’t. Reid’s missing.”
“Reid?” she cried again, her voice stronger. Instinct directed her to the left, caused her to crane her neck and run . . . search for her baby.
“Reid,” she screamed, louder than she’d ever yelled.
“What’s going on here?” A man caught her arms at her biceps, swung her around to face him.
“M-my son,” Danielle huffed, sobbed. “M-my son is missing.”
Oh, God. The pain. Her heart, her head, filled with images of Jonathan’s death—what it could be.
No.
NO.
“Reid?” she called again, straining to look around the man, look toward the parking lot. They’d have to go there—more cars were parked beyond. It was Friday night—cars pulled in and doors slammed. People laughed.
Laughed.
Her son was missing.
Danielle tried to dart around the man; she needed to find her son. Garrett was in the parking lot now, running between the rows, calling.
The man in front of her placed his hands on her shoulders. He wore blue. Had a badge. An officer. She focused on him.
No, he wouldn’t help. Not as fast as Chief Hardesty. She fumbled in her pocket as the police officer tried to talk to her, tried to gather information. She found Chief Hardesty’s number.
“My son,” she cried into the phone as soon as Arlen rumbled out a polite hello. “Reid is missing. From the baseball field. My father was here . . . my father,” she moaned.
The officer shook her, speaking but Danielle couldn’t focus on him.
“Jesus H. Christ. You sure?” Hardesty barked.
“He was playing on the field next to us. I went to talk to my father, to ask him to leave. Now Reid is gone. Garrett said . . . we can’t find him.”
“Son of a bitch,” Chief Hardesty mumbled.
The idea of history repeating itself was something Danielle furiously disavowed, even in her head. By not letting the past touch her, grip at more than the edges of her consciousness, Danielle tried to pretend it had never happened, that nothing would happen to her child. Jonathan’s murder had been a random, violent act.
That’s what she’d told herself.
She’d lived in a bubble of false security for years. Only Danielle knew it was false, which made it that much more tenuous and precious.
“He’s gone.”
“We need to talk to Hank. Pronto. Faster we get information, better chance of finding Reid.”
“What do I do?” Danielle cried.
“Get them to shut down those games. Code Adam. Tell the police there it’s a Code Adam.”
The police officer stopped shaking her when Arlen’s words floated through the airwaves, reaching him.
“Code Adam?” he asked. “Who are you talking to, miss?”
“Who’s that?” Hardesty asked.
“A p-police officer.” Her teeth chattered.
“Put the man on the phone, Danielle. Now.” Hardesty used his bossiest voice and Danielle complied, too dazed and scared to do anything but obey.
The officer asked a few questions, listened intently. He spoke into his walkie-talkie attached to his shoulder. It crackled. Voices rose from it. In the distance, sirens wailed.
Code Adam.
Danielle’s knees gave out. Garrett caught her, wrapped her in his arms. She clutched at him, using him as a lifeline.
“He’s not in the parking lot. He’s not there, Dani.”
Oh, God. Reid.
34 Arlen
Those first few hours would prove the most critical. Arlen sprinted toward a city cruiser, still talking to the patrolman on Danielle’s phone.
“You sure it’s the same guy? A serial killer?” the younger man sounded skeptical.
Like Arlen would make up something so heinous. “Son, I’ve been doing this longer than you’ve been alive, I reckon, and I’m going to tell you right now to get your ass in gear and help me save that little boy. Yes, there’s been a serial killer working in the region, murdering boys. Stabbing them. I’ve seen it and its damn ugly. Ugliest thing you’ve ever seen.”
“Um . . .”
“You listen to me, son. He’s got mere minutes on us right now—he always drives an old pickup. Chevy or Ford. You get out an APB and shut down those games. Get those other kids with their parents pronto. Hear me?”
“Yeah.” The patrolman swallowed in a loud, reflexive attempt to process Arlen’s words. “Yeah, I heard you. I don’t have that kind of authority. I have to get an okay from my boss, my precinct.”
“I give you the goddamn permission, and I’ll deal with the consequences,” Arlen barked. He started the car and flipped on the flashers. The sirens wailed. “Get those kids safe and get more officers there. ASAP.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’ll call Danielle back. You let her know I’m coming.”
“Yes, sir.”
Arlen hung up and tore out of the parking lot. Even with his lights and sirens, getting up the snarled, bumper-to-bumper highways would take to
o long. Way too long.
35 Hunter
The kid sniveled. The boys always whined and cried and asked for their mamas. Hunter smirked. Never did them one lick of good, and it was such an unattractive quality in them. Made Hunter want to touch ’em less. Made killing them easier.
“Where are you taking me?” the boy asked.
“Somewhere fun,” Hunter answered as he turned onto Coit Road, which would take him north, farther outside this new city’s limits and into pasture land. Well, once he passed on through Prosper, the next new city in this area. Goddamn towns popping up faster than army barracks in the jungle.
After Prosper, he’d clear out of the populated area and turn on a back road. Always head toward the land—that’s what he’d been taught back in Nam. Away from potential threats. To the quiet.
Didn’t always work out so great back in that godforsaken jungle. He’d lost his lover there. Barely legal—some said years from being legally old enough to fight—young Jackson was supple and smooth, always quick to laugh and kiss. Hunter had loved him, felt free with him--planned to build a life with him.
Until that Viet Cong piece-of-shit blew Jackson out of the rice paddy and straight to hell for loving Hunter back.
Sick freak.
No, Hunter wasn’t. He was a man. A real man—tough enough to slaughter the commie enemy and animals he killed. Tough enough to resist the urge to touch little boys.
“I don’t wanna go,” the boy responded. Hunter had heard the boy’s mama scream his name as Hunter carried him, hand over the boy’s mouth, to his car. Reid.
Cute name. He glanced over at the boy. Cute kid. Looked like her—rosy cheeks and bright hair. If he’d have liked girls, he’d have gone for one like Danielle Foster.
Would have made his father proud of him.
But he was a man. A strong man who never gave in to those urges.
