by A J Rivers
“Tell me more about him,” I say.
“Sometimes he liked to just spend time together. He would call it hanging out. As if we were friends. We’d play games or talk about what was going on in his life. He really liked to scratch lottery tickets. He told me he also did the numbers every week. That’s something I want to do.”
“Play the lottery?” I ask.
She nods. “It’s something everybody does, right? Or at least, everybody over eighteen. That’s what J told me. I wasn’t allowed to scratch any of the tickets because I wasn’t eighteen.”
It sits heavily in my stomach that this man was concerned about not providing lottery tickets to a minor but not anything else that was going on in that hidden room in the cellar.
“You don’t need to be thinking about things like that,” Misty says. She sounds surprisingly harsh, but the tension on her face fades almost as soon as the words are out of her mouth. “I just mean you don’t have to worry yourself so much about being an adult. Not yet.”
“I’m eighteen,” Ashley shrugs. “I’ve spent my whole life with people telling me what to do because I was a child. Now, I’m not under anyone’s control. After what’s already happened to me, what else could?”
“There’s still danger, Ashley. There’s still someone out there who could try to hurt you again,” Misty says. “I can’t stand the idea of something happening to you.”
Ashley’s expression doesn’t change. The calm feels like cold water running down my spine.
“Really?”
Forty-Eight
“What are you doing?” Dean asks, coming out onto the hotel room balcony to sit in the chair beside me.
“Getting fresh air,” I tell him. “I’m also wearing my running shoes, so I’m counting it as part of the jog I missed this morning.”
“I’ll allow it,” he chuckles. “Are you watching the security footage again?”
“Yes,” I nod. “I’ve watched it about twenty times. I could probably recreate it.”
“Let’s not,” he says. “Did you get any sleep last night?”
“Some. Look at this,” I turn the tablet toward him. “This is right before Ashley gets up and walks away. Look right here.”
I point to a spot on the road near the corner of the building.
“It’s a puddle,” he frowns. “Remember, it was raining for days before this.”
“I know,” I say. “Now, watch her carefully. Right before she gets up.” We watch in silence and as she moves to stand, I point at her. “Did you see that? Watch again.” I scan backward and play the few seconds again. “Right before she gets up, her head lifts and she looks in that direction.”
“She’s reacting to something,” Dean says.
I nod. “She didn’t just get up and walk away. She was responding.”
“Alright. What does that have to do with the puddle?”
“Okay, watch it again. Right before she lifts her head, look at the puddle.” We watch and I quickly pause the footage. “Do you see that shimmer in the puddle? I think that’s a reflection of a car.”
Dean leans closer and scrutinizes the still image. “It is. Someone drove up to the side of the hospital. That’s what she’s reacting to.”
“Someone must have pulled up and said something to her. But when she gets up and goes around the corner, no car drives through. Which means it backed up. There’s an entrance to that part of the parking lot not too far from that side. It’s a service entrance, but whoever picked her up could have used it as a shortcut.”
“He must be familiar with the area,” Dean says. He looks at the footage again and makes an exasperated sound. “I wish we could see the reflection better. So we could figure out what kind of car it is. It looks dark, maybe blue or black. There doesn’t seem to be anything special about the license plate, no graphics or anything, so that narrows it down a little bit. We just can’t see what it says.”
“How much sway do you think we have when it comes to getting vehicle records?”
“It’s you, so… as much sway as you want to have before people figure out you maybe shouldn’t?” Dean suggests.
“Fair enough evaluation. Okay, I need you to find out what kind of car everybody in Ashley’s life drove at this time. Everybody among her family, her friends, her neighbors. All the people you can get your hands on, find out what they drove. Then we need to find out if there were any traffic stops, parking tickets, tolls, anything that night that would have documented where any of those cars was,” I say. “We’re going to do some process of elimination.”
“Sounds good to me,” Dean says. “Don’t jog too hard.”
I wave at him over my shoulder as he goes inside, and I keep staring at the screen, hoping something else will pop out at me. My phone rings, and I can’t help but smile when I see that it’s Sam.
“Hey, babe,” I say.
“What about winter wonderland on the beach? How does that strike you for a wedding theme? Sandcastles that look like polar bears. Christmas trees decorated with starfish. Little baggies of graham cracker crumbs and white chocolate seashells as our favor.”
I laugh. “It would definitely be unique.”
“Unique is one of those words people say when they don’t want to be really mean, but they can’t think of anything nice, isn’t it?” he asks.
“I think the little baggies of graham cracker crumbs sound very nice,” I offer. “We could add tiny marshmallows and it could be a beach-themed s’mores kit, because I love your s’mores than anything.”
“Xavier would be so ashamed that just came out of your mouth,” Sam says.
“I am.”
I jump, nearly dropping my phone. Xavier steps back slightly as if he’s startled by my whipping around to look at him.
“What the hell, Xavier?”
“S’mores use milk chocolate. Sometimes dark, in extremely specific circumstances. Never, and I repeat never, white chocolate. Seashell shaped or not.”
“How long have you been standing there?” I demand.
“Since Dean walked out of the room without me,” he shrugs.
“Did he know you were in the room?”
“Probably not. He left me making waffles with Ava. She puts too much batter in and it leaks, but she flips it over anyway. I can’t handle that,” he says, walking out onto the balcony.
“I don’t know if I like how easily he was able to sneak up on you,” Sam says.
“I didn’t sneak up on her,” Xavier says. “I was here the whole time.”
“Not reassuring.”
“Why do you want to know about all the cars?” Xavier asks. “I can understand a couple of them, but why everybody’s car?”
“I just want to narrow down the options,” I say.
“The options for what?” Xavier asks.
“What is he talking about?”
I let out a sigh. “Hold on. I’m going to video call you. We might as well turn this into a full-on conference.”
I hang up and call Sam with video so I can explain everything to both of them. I tell them about my conversation with Ashley and Misty.
“Are you saying you don’t think they’re telling the truth?” Sam asks. “You think this is…what, a hoax?”
“I don’t know,” I say.
“For what benefit, though? What would they get out of lying about her being missing? And where has she actually been? That’s a whole lot of mass delusion if you think that she’s been around, but the town is convinced she’s been missing for five years,” Sam says.
“I’m not saying I think she’s just been hanging out, going to school, flipping burgers at the diner, and no one has noticed,” I clarify. “It just doesn’t add up. Nothing does. I can’t decide which of the people around her I trust the least.”
“Or her?” Xavier says.
I sigh, sliding through the pictures on my tablet to one I’ve been thinking about all morning. One taken of Ashley when she first walked out onto the soccer field an
d Misty ran to her. The one that shows Ashley’s hand gripping her mother’s arm as the two embrace, and the streaks of red polish on one of her nails.
Forty-Nine
The door to the room opens and Ava comes in, looking frantic. Her face relaxes as soon as she sees Xavier.
“There you are,” she sighs. “I swear, I took my eyes off him for two seconds.”
“You go ahead,” Sam says. “Seems you have a lot going on there. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“Think about the winter beach.”
“I don’t think I have any option but to think about the winter beach,” I reply.
“Bye.”
He laughs and his face disappears from my phone. I grab up everything from the small table on the balcony and head into my room.
“He’s not a child,” I tell Ava, putting everything onto the larger table inside and walking over to the coffee machine to make myself another cup.
It’s a very vague step up from usual hotel coffee, but I’ll take it. Maybe in a little while, I’ll feel like walking down to the lobby to go to the much more elaborate coffee bar down there. They have several strengths of coffee, along with tiny creamer cups of half a dozen different flavors. Sometimes there are even teeny-tiny muffins in the acrylic cube display case.
I might be getting too familiar with this hotel.
“I know he’s not,” Ava says.
“Then don’t talk about him as if he is one,” I say. “He doesn’t have any obligation to you. He doesn’t even know you.”
“He’s standing right here,” Xavier says. “And feeling somewhat like a metaphor.”
“We were getting breakfast and Dean said he was going to come up here to see if you wanted to come down. You haven’t been eating with us.”
“Or maybe a simile,” Xavier continues.
“I’ve been busy,” I say. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m investigating a rather complex and sensitive case.”
“I have noticed,” Ava replies, her voice getting sharper. “Just as I’ve noticed I was specifically told to be a part of this and you’ve done everything you possibly can to exclude me from it.”
“You didn’t say ‘like’ or ‘as.’ Definitely a metaphor.”
“I’ve been investigating the way I always do,” I say.
“Exactly,” Ava says. “You’ve been doing it exactly the way you always do it because that’s what you want. Have you considered for even a second that having me be part of the investigation has been about you, too?”
I whirl around to face her. “Of course, I have. That’s the problem.”
The answer explodes out of me and I instantly wish it hadn’t. Xavier steps backward and reaches to his side to pick up the remote to the TV while I focus on sifting through the records and documents on the table. It’s more so I don’t have to look at Ava, and she seems to realize it.
“Emma, what did I do to you? I know there’ve been a couple of times in this investigation when you think I’ve overstepped, and I probably have, but you’ve been pushing back against me since the second we met,” she says. “Is this some sort of test? You keep saying the Bureau is going to treat me rough, and I get that, but you seem to be starting it yourself. As if you’re going out of your way to throw me under the bus for everything that goes wrong. Completely refusing to offer support or guidance. You refuse to tell me what you’re doing and why, and then you get mad at me for trying to take the initiative because you’re holding your cards too close to your chest. You’re right, Emma. I don’t know how to lead an investigation. And yeah, I’ll admit that I’ve gone about some things the wrong way. But I want to learn from you. That’s why I’m here. I’m not here for you to bully around.”
Ignoring her isn’t going to do me any good, so I look up at her.
“Look, I…I don’t want to be replaced,” I finally admit. “Okay? Is that what you wanted to hear?”
She shakes her head. “No. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I let out a breath, running my fingers back through my hair as I drop down into a chair at the table and gather my words.
“When I started in the Bureau, I was twenty-three years old. Most people don’t start that young,” I say.
“I know,” she says. “The average age for a new agent is about thirty, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” I confirm. “So, most people my age have only been working for a couple of years. I’ve had enough career packed into my almost ten years for two or three agents. But it’s my life. It’s what I chose a long time ago and what I’ve structured my entire existence around.”
“I know,” she says again. “I’ve been following your career. I’ve studied your cases.”
“That. Right there,” I say, pointing at her. “Do you realize how strange that is for me? How odd it feels to be at the age when I’m being studied? Or at least at the point in my career when that is happening? I don’t feel old enough be there yet.”
“But you’ve accomplished incredible things. They aren’t trying to force you out because they teach your cases,” Ava says.
“That’s how it feels sometimes. There’s always someone new. Someone fresh out of training who is ready to tackle the field. Someone who hasn’t been shot and stabbed, choked, beaten. I worked hard to build this career. I’ve dragged myself through hard times and fought through moments when the Bureau was losing faith in me. Because this is what I’m called to do.
“But the hard moments have left their mark. I still have pain from some of my injuries. I have memories I really wish I didn’t. And still, I don’t want to give any of this up. But having Creagan put you with me makes it feel as though he’s looking ahead to the new generation.
“I used to live right there in Quantico, but I moved back to my hometown a few years ago. Now I’m about to get married, and I think he thinks it’s time for me to settle down. Which means taking what I’ve worked so hard to build and offering it up to someone else. I don’t want that to happen. I see your potential, Ava. You’re smart. You do take the initiative, and you’ve got a good eye for forensic evidence, which is a great skill to have. With some experience, you’ll really take to this. I just don’t want you taking my position.”
“I would never do that,” she says. She hesitates, then lowers herself into the chair beside me. She gathers her thoughts for a second. “I’ve never been great with people. You know how adults love to label children?”
“The great conveyor belts of life,” Xavier chimes in.
“What?” Ava asks.
Xavier looks at her, surprised by the question. He grabs his head on either side and lifts, miming picking himself up, stands and moves over a few inches, then mimes putting himself down. Ava keeps staring at him, then turns a questioning look to me.
“Children being labeled and put on the conveyor belt adults choose for them so they can get processed through the factory of life,” I explain. Her expression doesn’t change. “It comes with time.”
She nods. “Well, the label they gave me was introvert. I’ve always been awkward around people. My best friend always used to tease me for being both the coolest and the least cool person she had ever met.”
“I know you’re living in Harlan now. Where does she live?” I ask.
Ava looks down at her lap and shakes her head. “She’s…she’s not around anymore.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
She shakes her head again, a little harder this time. “It happened a long time ago. I would never want you to think I’m trying to step on your toes or get in your way at all. You have no idea how much I admire you. You intimidate the living hell out of me, both professionally and personally. That might have translated into my being too eager.”
“You don’t need to be intimidated by me,” I tell her. “I’m sorry for being so harsh on you. You’re right. I haven’t been offering the support I should have been, and that’s not going to give you the experience you need, either. You’re goin
g to be a strong agent, Ava. Don’t let anybody make you afraid. But maybe follow your lead investigator a little better.”
I smile at her and she returns it. I don’t know if this counts as a breakthrough, but I feel I know her better now.
“Not to ruin this beautiful moment,” Xavier says, “but do you think we should tell Misty the spring flag she still has hanging outside her house is no longer seasonally appropriate?”
I look over at him where he’s sitting, the remote poised in his hand, staring at the TV.
“What are you talking about, Xavier?” I ask.
He gestures at the TV with the remote. “The news cameras keep focusing on the flag. It has butterflies and daffodils on it. Actually, I think those are jonquils. Commonly mistaken for daffodils, but easily distinguishable by their leaf shape and the distinctive characteristic of a hollow stem.”
I get up and move quickly over to him to look at the TV. I was hoping I wouldn’t see it, but there it is. Ashley’s house fills the screen with a bright red “Breaking News” banner splashed across the bottom.
“What the hell is going on?” I ask.
“What is it?” Ava asks, coming over to us.
“We’re at the house of Ashley Stevenson, the kidnapping victim who recently miraculously returned home after five years of captivity. Police were called this morning to respond to signs of vandalism on the house. Upon arrival, officers discovered the house had been breached and Ashley was attacked.”
“Shit,” I mutter, grabbing my phone and running for the door without caring if anyone is behind me.
Fifty
“What’s going on here?” I demand when I get to the house.
“I’m sorry, this is a closed scene,” a young officer says, one hand gripping her belt and the other held up toward my chest as though she’s directing traffic and I’m an offending vehicle. “You can’t go any further.”
