by Diane Capri
His clothes had been ripped and torn. He’d probably left fragments. Disturbed soil at both gravesites might be discovered. Forensic trace evidence was likely, if a crime scene team scoured the area. But why would they?
He ground his teeth. Speculation was useless. He needed facts to assess his risk and evaluate options.
He took a golf cart with oversized tires down the hill and angled to the left of the police to a gate in the fence. He recognized the police captain, Nelson, his lackey Gardner, and their trailer-trash dispatcher Charlene Mackie. They were on their knees, sifting through the undergrowth. What the hell were they looking for?
He used a master key to unlock the gate. Nelson stood as he approached.
“Problem?” Blackstake said, with a concerned frown.
Nelson nodded. “Could say that. You on the senator’s staff?”
“Karl Blackstake. Security.” He shook hands. “So, what happened here?”
Nelson pointed. “A boy fell from that tree. The cottonwood.”
Blackstake looked up. The tree was huge. The trunk disappeared into the canopy of leaves, but he guessed it was a good hundred feet tall. “Folks walk through here all the time, as you know. We try to keep them out, but you know how unsuccessful that’s been.” He glanced at Gardner and Mackie and shrugged. “Kids climb the trees, even though we’d prefer they didn’t.”
“He fell forty feet,” Nelson said.
Blackstake whistled. “Will he be okay?”
Nelson shook his head. “He’s hanging on in the ICU. Stable for the moment. But not good.”
“Broken bones?”
“Several.” Nelson nodded. “And significant head trauma.”
“What was he doing all the way up there?” Blackstake pursed his lips and tried to look concerned. The kid should be dead already, but head traumas could go either way. Tricky thing, the brain.
Nelson shrugged. “He’s still unconscious. The doctors are probably going to keep him that way for a while.”
Blackstake grimaced. “Parents with him?”
Nelson shook his head. “He didn’t have any ID. The only thing he’s said so far is his first name. Peter. No last name.”
“But you’ll find the parents, surely?”
“We hope. We’ve guessed his age. We’re checking the schools and we’ve asked the media to help.”
“You didn’t find a backpack or anything with his name and address in it?” Blackstake cocked his head. “Seems like every kid I see is carrying a backpack these days.”
Nelson shook his head. “We’ve gone over the ground twice. There’s nothing else here.”
“How do you know he fell from this tree?”
Nelson pointed to a yellow gash high up the trunk. “Looks like the tree limb couldn’t hold his weight.”
Blackstake looked up. The gash hadn’t been visible in the early dawn light.
Blackstake walked to the fence. He followed the immediate portion of the path he had taken at dawn, dragging his boots across the ground, disturbing everything he could reach.
Nelson followed.
Blackstake shook the fallen fence post. The steel cables that ran to the neighboring posts flapped.
“These steel posts are strong. This one couldn’t have been knocked down by that boy without some kind of help.”
“No.”
“Petty vandalism then. Unrelated to the boy.”
“Seems like,” Nelson said.
Blackstake raised his eyebrows. “You think there was someone else here with him?”
Nelson snorted and shook his head. He gestured to where the boy had landed. “Believe me, no civilized human being would have left him there alone. It’s a miracle he’s alive.”
“Poor kid.” Blackstake nodded. “He’s lucky you found him.”
“Pure luck,” Nelson said. “A couple of high school kids decided to take a shortcut. They found him earlier this morning. We interviewed them, but they don’t know anything.”
Blackstake nodded again. He handed over a card with the senator’s security office phone number on it. “Will you keep us updated on his progress?”
Nelson took the card. “It won’t be a liability issue if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Blackstake shook his head. “I’m sure the senator would like to express his sympathies to the parents. If you let us know when they’re found, we’ll arrange something.”
Nelson nodded.
“I’ve got to get back. And I’ll call for repairs to the fence.”
Nelson nodded again.
Blackstake turned and stepped over the fallen fence post, stomping a few extra times on the surrounding dirt for good measure, and returned to his golf cart.
The encounter had gone better that he expected. Nelson and his team had found no evidence that Blackstake had been there earlier.
The boy had survived. That was a surprising disappointment. But one that should remedy itself soon enough. If he lived, he’d more than likely have amnesia of the events surrounding his injury. Head trauma often produced memory loss of the actual event.
If none of that worked out, there were other options. He’d deal with that problem when and if the boy woke up.
Nelson seemed convinced the boy’s fall had been an accident. None of the three cops had taken any interest in the first gravesite.
All in all, it was as good a result as he could hope for considering the boy hadn’t died as expected.
He took the golf cart back up the hill, much happier now than when he had descended. The boss would be pleased.
CHAPTER FOUR
Randolph, Washington
Monday, September 26
3:00 p.m. Pacific Time
Six hours after Stephenson’s phone call, Jess pulled into the Randolph Memorial Hospital parking lot. She’d been delayed following the TSA protocol to check her Glock through to Seattle, and collecting it at her destination. It was a hassle. But she never traveled without it.
The gun was secured in its case in the trunk now. She wasn’t licensed for concealed carry in Washington, so she’d have to leave it there. But knowing her Glock was with her made her feel safer. The Glock and her Taboo Magazine credentials were the only protection she’d ever needed.
She walked swiftly along the sidewalk and entered the hospital through the main entrance. The building and grounds were impressive. The lobby’s atrium was larger than she’d expected. It rose four floors and seemed to run the full length of the building. She walked around a few oversized potted plants to the reception desk.
There was a line of visitors waiting to ask questions. The woman behind the desk looked harassed. She gave out forms and hand-waved directions.
Jess used the time to check local news sites on her phone. As Stephenson had said, local authorities were circulating a picture of the boy. It was a hand-drawn sketch, probably because a photo of the damaged child would be too disturbing. The news reports requested the parents come forward and posted tip lines for people to call in with information. The latest reports said the boy’s parents hadn’t done so.
It was three in the afternoon. The boy had been admitted around eight in the morning, not long after he’d been discovered by two local teens. Jess bit her lip. The media ads had been going out since midday. The parents should have been located by now.
She swallowed. She needed to keep her hopes in check.
The parents might not know about their son’s situation. It was Monday, a school day. The image of the boy wasn’t a photograph, and some people would need a more accurate portrait to recognize him.
She stopped speculating. Guesses would get her nowhere. She needed more and better information. If she couldn’t get it here, she’d find out what she needed to know somewhere else. She was a reporter. She could uncover anything, given enough time.
Jess was next in line when she spotted a sign for the ICU. She walked around the reception area and headed for the doorway. The fewer people she had to explain her pres
ence to, the better.
She walked through to another reception area in ICU. Beyond the desk, Jess saw more wires, tubes, beds, monitors and other equipment found in every intensive care unit. Stephenson was right. This was a state-of-the-art facility. She breathed a little easier.
Around the ICU central nurse’s station were several cubicles, each with a privacy screen. At the far end of the room were two doors labeled “isolation.”
A nurse parked a gurney against a wall in the corridor and walked behind the reception desk. A sign on the desk said her name was Elisha Harvey, R.N. She smiled. “Can I help you?”
Jess put some conviction into her tone and straightened her spine. “Nurse Harvey, I’m looking for Peter, the boy who was brought in this morning.”
Nurse Harvey inched closer. “Are you his mother?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.” Jess bit her lip. “It’s complicated.”
Nurse Harvey nodded. She’d probably heard all kinds of stories from patients and families. “Are you a relative?”
Jess took a deep breath. “My son, Peter. He…he would be fourteen years old now.”
“I’m sure you understand.” Nurse Harvey sat down, put her hands on her knees, and wheeled the chair up to the desk. “I’m afraid we can’t let visitors approach our patients without authorization.”
Jess rummaged in her bag and produced her Colorado driver’s license. Her Taboo Magazine credentials usually caused unnecessary panic in hospitals.
Nurse Harvey read the license and nodded again before she handed it back. “I’m sorry. I can’t let you in unless we can confirm you are related. Or, if you had a court order or permission from his family?”
Jess shook her head and swallowed, closing her eyes as she did so. It had been an impulsive idea. Turning up out of the blue on the off chance this young boy might be Peter. Her Peter. And Nurse Harvey was only doing her job. “Can you tell me his age?”
Nurse Harvey shook her head. “I’m afraid I can’t give you any information at all, Miss Kimball.”
“Blue eyes? Green? Brown?”
Nurse Harvey kept shaking her head.
“I mean if I could just see him. For a moment. I think…If he’s mine, I think I could recognize him.”
“Do you have any photos of your son?”
“I do. Just a moment.” Jess kept Peter’s age-progressed pictures with her at all times, for just such an occasion. Not that she needed them to remember what he looked like. She’d used them to persuade people like Nurse Harvey to talk to her before.
But the photos were only computer-generated images, updated monthly. Guesses, really. Made by a machine. From the few photos she’d taken of Peter as a baby. Still, they were the best she had.
She pulled out her phone and flipped to the photo marked Peter, age 14. She handed the phone to Nurse Harvey, who accepted it, looked carefully, and then handed the phone back.
“I’m sorry.” Her tone and her expression conveyed sympathy, but the result was the same. She wouldn’t allow a total stranger to approach a very sick child. Jess should have known better.
“Can I help you?” said a deep voice behind her.
Jess turned. A uniformed police officer. The name tag on the left chest pocket said J. Nelson. She had to look up more than a foot to make eye contact.
“Can I help you?” he repeated, not unkindly. “Captain Nelson. Randolph PD.”
“I want to see Peter.”
“You’re a relative?”
“Maybe.” Jess gestured to Nurse Harvey. “We were just discussing that.”
“I’m sure you understand we have to put the boy’s interests first.” He raised both eyebrows as if the statement might have been a question. “If you are not a blood relative or legal guardian, I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave.”
“I was just telling Nurse Harvey—”
“You lost your boy, and his name is Peter.” He nodded. “I presume you reported him missing?”
“Yes. And we’ve been looking for him for more than twelve long years,” Jess replied.
“I sympathize, but the investigation should be pursued through the appropriate channels,” Nelson said as if he knew how hopeless such investigations were after more than a decade of looking. “If this boy is your son, you’ll be notified as soon as we get the situation sorted out.”
Jess opened her mouth to speak.
Nelson cut her off. “I’m sorry for your loss, ma’am. But I will have to ask you to leave now.”
Jess sighed. She realized he wasn’t going to back down and there was nothing more she could say to persuade either of them. Not yet. Not without more than a computer-generated picture.
He gestured down the corridor. “I’ll walk you out.”
She nodded.
He walked her through the reception, past the stairs, and into the parking lot. He pointed his chin toward his cruiser. “Let’s step over here for a moment.”
They walked up to the front of the vehicle. A heavyset woman stepped out. She looked Jess up and down.
“Take her name and address, Charlene. In case we need to contact her. Just for our records.” Nelson turned to Jess. “You’re not being charged with anything.”
“Glad to hear it.” She heard the anger in her voice, but she couldn’t help it. She’d come so far, waited so long. To be turned away without seeing Peter was more than she would accept casually.
Nelson sat in the cruiser, closed the door, and worked on a laptop attached to the dashboard.
According to her name plate, Charlene’s last name was Mackie. She opened a notepad and held out her hand. “May I see your ID, please?”
Jess handed over her Colorado driver’s license without comment. Officer Mackie swiped the license and made notes. Then she studied the license. She held up the picture in front of Jess’s face. “Jessica Kimball?”
“That’s right.”
Charlene frowned. “From Taboo Magazine?”
Jess nodded.
Charlene bit her lip and bobbed her head, slow and steady. “I wrote to you once.”
Jess smiled automatically, as she always did when someone recognized her. “Well…thank you.”
“You didn’t reply.”
Jess shifted her weight. “I’m sorry. I get a lot of mail, and it’s hard to remember every name.”
Charlene grunted. “I wouldn’t expect you to remember me. It was years ago.”
Jess pursed her lips and nodded. “What was it about?”
Charlene shook her head. “Not important now.”
“But it was back then, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah.” Officer Mackie nodded slowly. “It was. Back then.”
“I hope whatever it was worked out okay.” Jess expected things hadn’t worked out well, though. The cases she worked on rarely had happy endings.
Charlene Mackie grunted. “What are you here for?”
Jess turned and pointed at the hospital. “I heard about the boy. Peter. He’s fourteen and his parents haven’t been found.”
“And that makes him worthy of a Taboo Magazine story?”
“No. If you’ve read my stories, you probably know my boy was taken from me. He’d be fourteen.”
Charlene stared, her mouth open a fraction.
“I guess I’ll have to wait and see if this is my boy,” Jess said.
Charlene nodded. “I’m very sorry.”
Jess shrugged.
Charlene lowered her gaze. “It’s rough.” She held out Jess’s license. “But don’t give up.”
Jess took her license. “I won’t.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Jess sat in her rented sedan and went through the notes Stephenson had sent her again. The boy had been found in a local forest. The thick woods were spread over public property and continued onto Senator Alistaire Meisner’s private estate. The police report wasn’t clear on whether he’d been found on the public or private side.
Which could explain some of the reaction she’d
experienced from the locals, Nelson and Mackie, and even Nurse Harvey. The senator was probably a magnet for reporters of one kind or another. When he was here at home in Randolph, he probably shunned attention.
Charlene walked into the hospital. Nelson was still in his cruiser, staring at his computer. He likely knew as much as anyone about the boy.
She walked over to his cruiser and startled him by knocking on the windshield.
He wound down his window. “Help you?”
“I didn’t mean to be so abrupt.”
“No problem.” He pointed to his computer. “I looked you up. Seems you check out okay.”
“I told you, my son was taken from me. This boy might be mine.”
“People tell me all sorts of things. Doesn’t make them true.”
Jess gave a weak smile. He was right.
“It’s my job to protect the citizens of Randolph,” he said. “And that boy still needs protection even if he turns out to be yours.”
“I understand.” She nodded. “Buy you a coffee?”
He checked his watch. “You know Biscuits in town?”
“I’ll find it.”
The diner was a standalone building with a parking lot that surrounded all four sides. The window glass was painted white up to the seated customers’ shoulder level, leaving only their heads in view, bobbing and turning as they ate and talked.
The “Biscuits” sign was large but lit by only two incandescent bulbs that did little to attract attention to the place. A fact underscored by the three cars and one pickup truck parked in the front of the oversized but otherwise empty parking lot.
Jess circled the building once and parked away from the road, close to a side door. Nelson wasn’t here yet.
A waitress met her as soon as she set foot into the hot, humid atmosphere.
“Table or booth?”
Jess looked the room over. It spanned along two sides of an open kitchen and grill. “Booth.”
“Before you ask, we’re not serving breakfast.” She dropped a menu on the table. “Be back in a minute to take your order.”
Nelson had arrived before she ordered. She watched him back his car into a parking spot and squeeze into the side of the booth facing the door. He had all the basics covered for a quick getaway, which meant he’d had good training somewhere and took his job seriously.
