by K. T. Tomb
“Okay.”
“Let’s hit that house next door and see what the hell has been going on in there!”
It didn’t take them long to get in and out of the house, which was trashed by the previous occupants, who had been locked out and evicted for a mortgage default.
“It’s a miracle, but the electricity hasn’t been cut off yet,” he whispered when they were in.
“How do you know that?” Mary whispered back.
“I hear the fridge. Let’s have a look.”
She nodded.
Mary actually found the only clue in the freezer. It was a frozen feeder mouse from Petco, according to the plastic wrapper. With an expiration date of next week.
“He was here,” Mary said, “feeding the snake and watching my house. Watching me. Watching my daughter. Planning a diversion with a snake so he could snatch Cassidy. I am so, so creeped out.”
“Frankly, me, too,” Zack said.
They did a quick perusal of the rest of the house, but it was such a mess that discerning other clues would have taken many garbage bags and hours of sorting to figure out whose garbage was whose.
“It stinks in here. Let’s get the hell out,” Zack said, squeezing her hand.
She nodded and they left the same way they had come in, through a ground-floor slider window that had a broken lock. It was the same way that the kidnapper had gotten in and out of the empty house next door to hers.
When they got back to Mary’s house, she took a shower and sobbed in there for a long time, washing herself over and over as the hot water ran out.
Zack sat outside the bathroom door with his back against it, saying, “Mary, please don’t cry. I’ll find her. I swear, we’re making progress.”
Chapter Six
FBI Agent Eric Calder rubbed his temples in an attempt to relieve his headache.
He looked at his email and read one of many leads pouring in to the tip line, which was an email address that funneled all of the tips to a designated folder in his official email, where he sorted them into an action file or discarded them.
In this current email tip, someone had called 9-1-1 from a National Forest Service hiking trail in Northern California, near State Highway 49. The only thing the police dispatcher had heard was a little girl singing, “Let It Go.” Due to the faint cell signals in that area, they hadn’t been able to get a lock on the caller’s location. The little girl had walked away, talking to someone and eventually, the phone had gone dead. He played the 9-1-1 call. It seemed like a little girl was playing with the phone. He couldn’t hear what she and the man were saying at the end.
He attempted to forward the email and the attached sound file to Special Agent Zack Donovan with a question: “We’re getting a lot of tips. As you know, most of them are not useful, but is this anything? Sorry for the poor sound quality. Let the audio guys have at it if it seems like anything.”
He clicked SEND, but received an error message because the file was too big to email. He sighed. What was the procedure for the drop box again? He’d forgotten. He scratched his head and pulled a manual out of his briefcase, but after a few minutes gave up on forwarding the email to Zack or trying to figure out the drop box protocol.
The trail of her disappearance had seemingly turned ice cold and he was running on very brief periods of fitful sleep. He had seen way too many child abduction cases in the past year and he was certain that a new trafficking ring had emerged on the scene. They seemed to be nearly invisible and were always a few steps ahead of the FBI.
The case of Cassidy Lynn Gordon was an added face to the hundreds that were being investigated by the FBI. For Eric Calder, each one of them was as precious as the others. He had attempted to harden himself against it as so many agents did, but he simply couldn’t do it. As a result, he was slowly killing himself with stress.
“You all right, Calder?”
Agent Emily Graves was standing in the doorway, looking at him with concern in her big green eyes.
“Just got a headache.”
“When was the last time you slept?”
“Last night. Or night before. I forget.”
“Yeah? For how long?”
“I think I got in a couple of hours. Hotel room pillows always hurt my neck.”
“Then bring your own.”
“Never have time to pack them. Or room.”
“Bullshit excuses, Calder.”
“Best ones I’ve got, Graves.”
“Hey, I have an interesting development in the case.”
“Sweet. Give it to me,” Calder said.
“The rattlesnake was microchipped.”
“Emily, are you serious?”
“Yes. It was defanged and had its venom sacks removed because it was a snake in a traveling educational show. It was stolen at a private school, two weeks ago, during an environmental education presentation.”
“You’re shitting me.”
“Not even. Our agents are interviewing the owners and handlers of the snake and watching the video of the last presentation that the snake appeared in before it disappeared.”
“Identify everyone who was at that presentation. Include all employees and people responsible for hosting the show. Audience, the whole enchilada.”
“We’re already on it. I emailed Special Agent Donovan, too. And you, of course.”
“Wow. This case gets weirder and weirder.”
“I know it. The guy stole a snake from an educational road show and used it in a kidnapping. Who would have thunk it?”
“Insane!”
“Did you eat, by the way?” she asked.
“Yeah, I had some coffee and a sandwich.”
“I brought you that at 12:30 this afternoon. Come on, let’s go get a real meal. Just us two.”
A real meal sounded good to him. And she was the prettiest thing with a gun he’d ever seen.
“Yeah, sure,” he said.
Calder rolled back his chair and stood, reached for his suit jacket on the coat rack in the corner, and started to follow her out of the office. Just as he was pulling the door closed behind him, the phone rang.
“Leave it,” Emily said.
“You know I can’t,” he replied.
“Yeah, I know you can’t.” She waited patiently as he went back into his office and pulled the phone off of its cradle.
“Agent Calder here.”
“Are you working on the Cassidy Lynn Gordon case?” the voice asked weakly. The caller seemed nervous and barely able to speak.
“Yes,” he replied. “Who is this?”
“That isn’t important.”
“It’s damned important to me,” Calder said.
“I have information about the little girl.”
“What do you have?” It was one of many hundreds of phone calls with possible leads and obvious fake leads.
He saw Emily’s look grow impatient as he slipped around behind his desk and sat down again.
“I think I might know where she is.”
He pulled a notepad toward himself and picked up his pen. “Where?”
“I can’t tell you exactly.”
“I thought you said…”
Before he finished the sentence, the line went dead. Eric looked at the phone for a minute and then heard Emily’s voice.
“What happened?”
“He hung up on me.”
“So, why are you staring at the phone?” She grinned.
It was an old joke between the members of the team. When they were watching a Rose Bowl game several years back, someone pointed out that every time a wide receiver missed a catch, they always looked at their hands like there was something wrong with them. From that point on, whenever someone repeated the same move, one of the other team would comment on it and lighten the mood.
Eric ignored her attempt at humor.
“They were calling about…”
He knew that if he told her, she wouldn’t leave for dinner.
“About wha
t?” she asked.
“It was nothing. Wrong number. Or a weirdo. Take your pick.”
“You don’t sit down for wrong numbers.” Emily was suspicious of his behavior.
“You got me. It’s either a lead or not. In any case, the caller blocked his ID.”
“I can follow up. We have ways, you know, of getting past that.”
“I’ll do it. You get away from this place for a night.”
Emily studied him for a moment. “You need me to stay and help?” she offered.
“With what?”
“Whatever the call was about.”
“It was probably nothing.”
“Why did you sit down then?”
“It was going to be something, but when the line went dead, it became nothing. You go ahead. I’m going to wait a few minutes and see if they call back. Where you going?”
“There’s a pretty good Mexican place a few blocks down. Charro’s.”
“I know the place. The green chili burritos are excellent. I’ll come along behind you in a few.”
“You want me to order you something? A green chili burrito?”
“No, that’s all right. I’ll order when I get there.”
“Shall I wait in the bar for you?”
“No, no, go ahead and start without me. I’ll be along.”
Emily knew he wasn’t coming. He would stay there all night waiting for the phone to ring. She noticed that he had already gone back into his work zone and was writing something on the notepad.
“I’ll see you soon,” she said, pulling the office door closed behind her.
“Um, yeah, in just a few,” he mumbled and reached into the file drawer for a file.
Chapter Seven
When Ira Rabb had heard the voice of the FBI agent on the line, he’d frozen.
It had seemed like the right thing to do when he’d first thought about it, but as his mind wrapped around the idea of turning his son into the FBI for the kidnapping of Cassidy Gordon, he suddenly discovered that he couldn’t do it.
He had pushed the disconnect button on his phone and set it aside. He had blocked his number before he called, but he wondered if the FBI could still get around that. He stared at the phone for several minutes, expecting them to return his call.
Why had he made the call in the first place?
He needed to help find the little girl in order to clear his conscience, but he simply couldn’t bring himself to turn his son into the FBI. He simply couldn’t believe that Bobby would hurt the little girl. He didn’t believe that he ever intended to hurt his son or the other little girl.
He wasn’t sure what he was doing with them, but he knew that Bobby was not a sexual predator and didn’t deserve to be treated like one. Besides, he didn’t know where he actually was and Ira knew that it was he who would suddenly become the focus of their investigation if he opened that can of worms.
Ira didn’t have the energy to deal with hours upon hours of FBI interrogations. He’d dealt with them in the past and wasn’t looking forward to going through an investigation again. No matter which side of it he was on.
His conscience still nagged at him to help find the little girl—to do the right thing. His failure as a father was clearly partly to blame for his son’s crimes. Ira did believe that if he could set things right again, then he might be able to rescue his son.
He wrapped the blanket tighter around himself and continued to stare at the phone. Maybe instead of calling him back, the FBI would simply come to his house and snatch him up. Again.
He shuddered.
The idea of being snatched up and taken into a freezing interrogation room in an air-conditioned building where the units would be turned up to full force did not appeal to him, either. He had to leave the house. As tired as he was and as hard as it would be to get in the car and leave, at least he could turn on the heater and keep himself warm while he drove around.
He grabbed another coat and stuffed the mittens in its pockets. Taking the car keys from the hook by the door, he went into the garage, slipped into the BMW, pushed the button for the garage door and started up the engine.
As he backed down the driveway and watched the garage door close, he tried to decide where he was going to go, and what he was going to do. The view along the coast was nice. He’d drive along the coast and return when he was sure that the FBI wasn’t going to trace his call and come looking for him. For now, he would make himself scarce, drive around, and think in heated comfort.
He cranked up the BMW’s heater and started down the street, which would lead him toward the coastal highway.
Ten minutes later, as he turned onto the highway, an idea was beginning to put its hooks into him. A combination of his guilt and failure and his fear of turning his son into the FBI allowed him to let it tease him for several hours as he drove south along the coast.
When he neared the part of L.A. where Cassidy had gone missing, he turned off the highway and made the series of turns that eventually brought him into the neighborhood where the little girl had disappeared. He found her street, turned onto it, and then scanned the numbers on the houses. He slowed as he neared the Gordon home and considered stopping, but lost his nerve when he saw a black SUV in the driveway of her house. FBI, he assumed.
It took everything he had in him not to stomp on the gas and drive like a bat out of hell. His hands were shaking, he continued out of the neighborhood at a quick pace and headed for the freeway.
She might tell the FBI and then, everything would get out of hand.
What would he tell her, anyway? My son has your daughter?
There was simply no feasible way to approach Mary Gordon.
The thought of helping to find Cassidy and his son and stop whatever horrible thing was going on inside his son’s mind continued to pester him as he returned to the highway and continued to follow it throughout the night. The ocean was dark with occasional lines of white waves rolling in.
Ira realized that on both occasions when his son had kidnapped children, he had been going to take them camping. So, it made sense that he had a place to take them. He had shown up in Idaho before. Would he go back to Idaho? He wracked his brain to try to come up with where his son would have gone camping. Where had he gone when he was younger?
Ira didn’t know what to do. He was afraid to go home. He hated motels. He continued driving for several more hours and then noticed that he was low on gas and turned into a gas station.
As much as he hated to be outdoors, he slid out of the car, slipped his credit card into the slot, stuck the nozzle into the tank, and then scampered back into the driver’s seat to the relative warmth inside. As he listened to the fuel flowing into the tank, he realized that his guilt had overcome him again. He had to help find Cassidy. He couldn’t go to the FBI, though—he just couldn’t turn his own son in.
Coward! You always were a damn coward!
By the time the tank was full, his mind was made up. He looked at the clock on the dash. It was 4:00 a.m. Not exactly the time to be making a house call on a stranger, or anyone else, for that matter. By the time he drove back up the coast, it would be between 7:00 and 8:00 a.m. He slid back out, removed the nozzle and cradled it, replaced the gas cap and scrambled back into the car. The little bit of effort had made him tired—he also realized that he was hungry.
First, he’d look for a drive-thru window and get something to eat. That would give him a little more time to think through what he was going to say and allow the sun to rise.
He pulled back onto the highway going north, searching both sides of the road for a drive-thru that stayed open 24 hours. He needed a hot cup of coffee, too. Very hot.
He was shivering in Southern California.
Suddenly, he saw what was probably that same black SUV that had been sitting in Mary Gordon’s driveway. It was going the opposite way he was, but had lights going and siren, too, parting the traffic for himself.
Was the FBI looking for him?
Nah, don’t be paranoid, he told himself.
He decided to swing by Mary Gordon’s house again and see if the black SUV was gone. If it was, he was going in…
Chapter Eight
Mary was in the bathroom when Zack rapped sharply on the door. “Mary! Mary! A car just passed by your house and sped up when he saw my vehicle. I haven’t run the plate yet, but I’m going to pursue—things could get hairy. I’ll be back, I promise.”
“Go, Zack, go!” she said and got off the toilet and flushed. “Hurry!”
By the time she ran to the front window, Zack was screeching out of the driveway in the FBI’s black SUV. He headed into the heavy afternoon traffic that led to the coastal freeway. He turned on a siren and the flashing lights in the right front part of the windshield.
She ran out in the front yard, watching the traffic part for him. Mary said, “Please God! Please!” She stood there for a good ten minutes, with silent tears running down her face, hugging herself and praying.
Finally, Mary went inside and sat in the rocking chair in Cassidy’s room, trying to breathe evenly and stay calm.
Grace had left her alone for a few days, though she called her several times a day, nearly driving Mary out of her mind every time the phone rang.
She sat in the rocking chair, holding a little yellow dress and staring at the wall of hand-painted dolphins. She had painted the walls herself. Cassidy had been extremely pleased. Cassidy loved dolphins and she loved the dolphins that Mary had painted even more, because the dolphins were hers, in her room, swimming endlessly around and around.
Mary was almost in a deep trance, trying to visualize Cassidy being found, when the doorbell rang.
She had been sitting there for she didn’t know how long and was now jolted out of her reverie.
Mary jumped to her feet out of the rocker with the same thought she always had whenever there was a phone call or someone at the door.
Maybe Zack had already found Cassidy.
The doorbell rang again, as if someone had something urgent to tell her. With the yellow dress still clutched to her chest, she dashed down the hall toward the stairway.
