Gone The Next

by Ben Rehder

  “She was a champ. Sounded like she actually enjoyed the getaway, spending time with Aunt Erica, Uncle Sean, and Uncle Brian. Kid’s so smart, she’d do great in front of a jury. But I’m guessing it won’t come to that.”

  “What did Kathleen say?”

  “What we already know — that she’d been threatening Patrick with divorce for quite awhile, because of his affair with Erica, but he threatened her right back, saying he’d claim she’s an alcoholic and shouldn’t have custody of a child. Probably right about that, from what I can tell. She’s been in rehab twice, and he obviously never planned to stop cheating. Why two people like that stay together is beyond me. According to her, when things weren’t bad, they were pretty good.”

  “But something important happened recently.”

  “Yep. Kathleen got drunk one night, they got in a huge argument, and she said she was going to claim he had been molesting Tracy.”

  And there it was. The one thing Kathleen wouldn’t tell me when I interviewed her at her house. And I don’t blame her. A claim like that — assuming it was false — was about as dirty as it got. Shameful. And yet, despite Kathleen’s obvious character flaws, the authorities would be duty-bound to investigate her claim, and her sworn testimony, all by itself, might’ve been enough to win custody for her.

  Ruelas said, “She says she was bluffing, just venting, but the next afternoon, while she was sleeping, that’s when Tracy disappeared. Evidently, Patrick took it seriously enough to do something desperate. Probably just panicked, without really thinking things through. Actually, we think he had his brother do it. Sean Hanrahan flew down from Boston on the first nonstop that morning. Rented a car under his own name, too. Guy’s a former cop and he does something that stupid.”

  Over the past several days, lying there in my hospital bed, I’d been pondering all the possible evidence the cops might have been able to find, and I’d come up with quite a lot — even if they hadn’t had any testimony from Kathleen or Tracy. Evidence of Sean Hanrahan’s travel plans was on my mental list. Nowadays, a man can’t travel across the country without leaving tracks.

  “What else you got?” I said.

  “Plenty.”

  “Care to be more specific?”

  “I can’t get into that yet.”

  “How about the gun Sean Hanrahan shot me with? Same gun that was used on Brian Pierce?”

  “You’re a pretty smart guy.” His way of saying Yes.

  “You must’ve found all kinds of fingerprints at Pierce’s place, no matter how much they wiped it down after they left. Sean’s, Erica’s, and Tracy’s, but not Patrick’s. Same at the Rollingwood place.”

  “You ever thought about being a cop?” Being sarcastic and condescending, but still saying Yes. I wondered why he was telling me any of this. Probably hoping I wouldn’t badmouth him in the press. Fine by me.

  “Phone records between Pierce and the rest of them?” I asked.

  I figured the four members of the abduction team had to stay in touch somehow.

  Ruelas sighed, like I was really putting him out — forcing him to cross ethical boundaries and reveal information. “Nothing there, but that’s not a surprise. But we did find two cheap no-contract cell phones in the Rollingwood house. Pierce’s prints were on one of them. Sean must have taken it after he killed Pierce. The records show dozens of calls between those phones and to two other cell phones, all four of them bought by Sean Hanrahan at the same time, the same day Tracy went missing. Smart money says those other two phones were Patrick’s and Erica Kerwick’s, at least temporarily, but I’m sure they’re in a lake somewhere now.”

  “Get anything from Hanrahan’s place? Or Erica Kerwick’s?”

  “Surprisingly little. They were smart enough to avoid using email. Only thing — she had recently applied for a passport. Went through one of those companies that rushes it through, for a price.”

  “When was this?”

  “Two days after Tracy disappeared.”

  “Hanrahan already had one?”

  “Yep, and the girl did too. They’re big travelers, the Hanrahans.”

  I could picture it all. Patrick responded to Kathleen’s threat by grabbing Tracy, without any kind of plan in place. Just a visceral reaction — wanting Tracy by his side, because he loved her like his own. He had to hide her, so he stashed her at Brian Pierce’s place, offering so much cash that Pierce couldn’t resist. Pierce worked with Kathleen way back when, so he probably knew about her problems with booze. Probably thought he was doing a good deed by helping Patrick out.

  Meanwhile, Hanrahan slowly began to realize what a mistake he’d made. Should’ve owned up to it right away, as soon as Kathleen called the cops, but the longer he let it go on, the bigger price he’d have to pay if he got caught. Hanrahan’s solution? Get out of the country. Take Tracy and Erica and relocate. Forever. He had plenty of money to start over somewhere. But he had to wait until the search for Tracy died down.

  But then Pierce began to waver. Began to realize he’d put himself in major legal jeopardy. He probably started to panic. So Sean or Erica takes Tracy to the Rollingwood house. But even that’s not enough, because the interview by Ruelas rattles Pierce even further. He wants to come clean. Maybe there’s an argument with Sean that leads to violence, or maybe it was cold-blooded murder, but Sean kills him.

  It all fit the facts almost perfectly. Almost. But there was still one piece that couldn’t be explained. Maybe Ruelas had forgotten about it, or he was intentionally overlooking it, just as I was prepared to do. Because — if that unexplained piece meant what I thought it did — it wouldn’t really change things. Patrick Hanrahan and Erica Kerwick were still guilty and deserved to be punished.

  So I was prepared to leave everything alone and not worry about knowing the full truth.

  Then Kathleen Hanrahan — who hadn’t contacted me since I’d found Tracy — left a voicemail for me. She apologized for not reaching out sooner, but things had been hectic, as I might imagine. And now she wanted to say thanks.

  51

  She answered the door alone. Tracy wasn’t in sight. I was surprised — you’d think she’d want the girl right there with her at all times — but then again, maybe she was afraid some unseen force would pull Tracy through the open door and take her away forever. Irrational, but that’s the kind of thought that crosses your mind. I knew that for certain.

  Mia was there with me, of course. No way was I going without my partner.

  Kathleen glanced at Mia briefly, but then she focused on me again. She stepped out onto the porch and wrapped her arms around me. I carefully hugged her back.

  “Easy, now,” I said. “Stitches.”

  She relaxed her hold just a bit.

  “Thank you so much,” she said softly in my ear. “Thank you for my daughter.”

  I nodded. I could feel a lump forming in my throat, and I didn’t expect that at all. I was elated that I wasn’t smelling booze.

  After a good half-minute, she let me go.

  I said, “Kathleen, this is my partner, Mia Madison.”

  They shook hands, but Kathleen looked at Mia neutrally.

  So I said, “You should know that Mia played a critical role in finding Tracy. We worked together. Without her, I would have gotten nowhere.”

  Kathleen looked at her again, reappraising her, and then she stepped forward and hugged Mia, too.

  We went inside. Kathleen offered us coffee, which we declined, and then we ended up in the living area again, all of us sitting on the red L-shaped sofa. There was no glass of red wine on the coffee table. Just a large coffee mug.

  “How are you feeling?” Kathleen asked me.

  “Doing okay,” I said. “Still a little pain, but not as bad as I thought it would be. Don’t even need painkillers anymore. How are you doing?”

  She shook her head, as if to say, I truly don’t know. Just like the last time I’d been here, her face clouded with emotion, on the verge of crying, her eyes c
ast downward. “I’ve made so many mistakes. For years now.”

  After a beat, I said, “We all have. What’s important is to learn from them and move forward.”

  Mia gave me a look, like, Well, aren’t you on top of your game this morning?

  Kathleen nodded and rubbed her nose.

  “I’ll be right back,” I said.

  I went to the bathroom down the hallway and returned with a box of Kleenex. Mia had moved next to Kathleen and had her arm over her shoulder. She pulled a couple of tissues from the box I offered and handed them to Kathleen, who looked like she was regaining her composure. She gave me an embarrassed smile.

  “Seems like I’m always crying around you,” she said.

  “I have that effect. My mere presence tends to make people cry.”

  She laughed.

  Sure, she was emotional, but I could see such a difference between this woman and the one I’d interviewed last week.

  “These last few days,” she said, “I’ve learned what you went through. I...I didn’t know.”

  Normally I don’t share details with people I hardly know — but Kathleen Hanrahan and I had a bond that was as undeniable as it was painful. “Hannah was missing for eight days,” I said. “It seemed like eight months. I think I slept for an hour in that time. I still have nightmares about it.”

  Kathleen was looking at me with an expression of empathy unlike any I’d ever seen.

  “We were incredibly lucky,” I said. “A total stranger had taken her. Kids don’t normally come back home from that. But there was this detective — tenacious as hell. Wouldn’t give up. Smart. Checked every detail. He retired a few years ago and moved to San Diego. I think of that man, and what he did for me, almost every day. I think of him, even though my relationship with my daughter is almost nonexistent now. My wife — my ex-wife — well, she couldn’t get past it. She grew so angry at me during those eight days that we never recovered from it. We tried, of course, or I did. But things were never the same.”

  I was surprised that I wasn’t choking up. Just stating the facts, such as they were.

  I shrugged, saying, “She divorced me, met a guy a year later, then moved with him to Canada. My daughter is up in Canada. That still seems so odd. Edmonton. More than two thousand miles away. She never seemed to suffer any lasting effects from spending eight days with a sicko. He never laid a hand on her, according to the experts, although he would have eventually. She’s almost fourteen now, and I talk to her about twice a year. I call her more than that, but she doesn’t call back very often. She’s a teenager. Even if we were in the same room, I’d be way down on her list of priorities.”

  Kathleen gestured for me to move beside her on the sofa, and there we sat, the three of us in a row, Kathleen holding my hand, comforting me, while Mia comforted her.

  There was still the one remaining question I needed to ask, because of that one unexplained piece of the puzzle.

  Earlier this year, in February or March, Emma Webster had seen Brian Pierce with a little girl whose description perfectly matched Tracy Turner’s. It would be easy enough to dismiss it — to assume Emma was mistaken. Just a confused old lady who wanted something to gossip about.

  Or.

  Or I could adjust my theory to accommodate my suspicions. Kathleen Hanrahan was a drinker. Maybe a former drug user, according to Jessica. A big-time party girl, in years past. Just how much did she sleep around? With whom? Would she have slept with a teenage dishwasher?

  Was Brian Pierce Tracy’s father?

  That was the question, wasn’t it? I could imagine a one-night stand. Then Kathleen discovers that she’s pregnant. She works backward on the calendar to see who might be the dad, and realizes it’s Pierce. She tells him. He’s terrified. Eighteen years old, very little income, and not ready to be a dad.

  She says, “Relax, kid. My husband doesn’t need to know.” So Tracy is born and, shortly thereafter, Kathleen starts sleeping with Patrick. She divorces her husband and becomes a Hanrahan.

  But Brian’s feelings change over the years. He matures. He wants a connection with his little girl. So he goes to Patrick and reveals the truth. Or he makes Kathleen do it. Or maybe Patrick knew all along. What does Brian want? He realizes he can’t provide the advantages in life that Patrick Hanrahan can provide. That’s okay. Brian just wants to spend some time with Tracy occasionally. To participate in her life. To be “Uncle Brian.” Which could very well include the occasional afternoon, just him and Tracy. It wouldn’t surprise me if Brian decided to show Tracy where he lived. But maybe that was outside the boundaries he’d established with Patrick and Kathleen, so when Emma Webster asked him about the little girl, he said, “What little girl?”

  Of course, this was all conjecture. Without interrogating Kathleen, I’d never know for sure. Nobody would ever —

  “Roy?”

  It was Mia.

  “Yeah?”

  “Did you hear what Kathleen said?”

  “I’m sorry, I was just thinking about something.”

  I turned to Kathleen, who had dried her tears and now looked positively content. Hopeful. Like someone who was ready to put the past behind her and start fresh.

  She said, “Tracy is napping, but I think it’s time for her to get up. Would you like to meet her?”

  About the Author

  Edgar Award-nominated author Ben Rehder lives with his wife near Austin, Texas, where he was born and raised. Gone The Next is his ninth novel.

  Other books by Ben Rehder

  Buck Fever

  Bone Dry

  Flat Crazy

  Guilt Trip

  Gun Shy

  Holy Moly

  The Chicken Hanger

  The Driving Lesson