Allison sat at the table, a cup of coffee before her as she stared out the window into the darkness of the night. She turned to look at him when he entered the room. For a brief moment hope leaped into her eyes, but it quickly died as he silently shook his head.
“Knox, we’ve walked the streets and checked yards, and we finally came back here because we don’t know what else to do to help,” Mac said. His dark brown eyes radiated concern and deep compassion.
“I appreciate everything you’ve done, but it’s getting late. I don’t know where else to tell you to search. Go home,” Knox said.
“Are you sure?” Thorne asked. “You know we’ll stay as long as you need us.”
“I know that, but I’m positive,” Knox replied. “I’ll walk you out.”
The three men left the house in silence. “You’ll let us know if there’s anything else we can do?” Mac asked when they reached their vehicle.
“I will,” Knox replied.
Thorne clapped a hand on Knox’s shoulder. “You know we’re here for you.”
“I know, and I appreciate it.” A cold wind of desperation swept through him. “The hardest part is this helpless feeling I have. I don’t know where else to look for him. I don’t know who might have him and why.”
“You’ve got two good men in there helping out,” Mac replied. “Wendall and Jim are good at their jobs.”
“Unlike their boss,” Thorne added darkly.
“Jeffries is sitting on Chad’s place,” Knox replied. He tamped down his irrational anger at the thought of Bud feeding his face and relaxing in his car seat.
“You think Chad is behind this?” Mac asked.
Knox hesitated. “I don’t know. If he’s the drunk everyone talks about, I’m not sure he’d be coherent enough to pull off a kidnapping. I just hope like hell my dear mother isn’t behind this.”
Even in the darkness of night, Knox saw the surprise on the other men’s faces. “Why would Livia have anything to do with this?” Mac asked.
“Who knows why she does what she does?” Knox replied, aware of the bitterness that crept into his voice.
“She’d be a fool to come back here,” Thorne said. “She’d find no help whatsoever in this town. Everyone here hates her. They even took her name off that fancy hospital she built.”
“Yeah, I’m sure you’re right,” Knox said. “Now go on, get out of here.”
“Are you coming back to my place?” Thorne asked.
“Not until my son is home safe and sound,” he replied firmly. A few minutes later he watched until their taillights disappeared from view. He turned around and stared at the house.
The porch light was on...a beacon in the surrounding darkness. But there was no light inside of him. There was nothing but darkness and a growing rage against whomever had taken his son.
He now prayed for a ransom demand. He now wanted to believe that Cody was the victim of a kidnapping for ransom and not some sort of stranger abduction. Those rarely got solved and almost never ended happily, but he and Allison might have a fighting chance against somebody who wanted to bargain for Cody’s return.
He entered the house to find Allison seated on the sofa. Her face was wan, her eyes burning with intensity. “I refuse to cry,” she said. “If I cry, it means something bad has happened and I can’t allow my thoughts to go there.”
Knox sat next to her and took one of her hands in his. Her fingers were icy and trembled against his. “This is all my fault,” she said. “I should have never fired Chad.” Her lower lip quivered and she reached up with her other hand to worry a small strand of her hair.
“We don’t know for sure that Chad is responsible for anything yet, and you can’t blame yourself for firing a man who drank on the job.”
She squeezed his hand. “I’m so afraid, Knox.”
“I know.” God, he felt so helpless. “Sheriff Jeffries is sitting on Chad’s house. We should know if Chad is responsible for this before the night is over.”
They remained on the sofa as the night deepened, holding hands, with their love for Cody binding them together. The soft voices of the deputies in the kitchen were the only sound in the house.
Knox didn’t even know what a ransom demand would look like. Would it come as a text on Allison’s cell phone? Would a note be put in the mailbox? How would a kidnapper contact them?
“Let’s go get some coffee,” he said when it was almost midnight. He knew neither of them would sleep through this long night.
Allison nodded and together they got up from the sofa and went into the kitchen. Wendall and Jim still sat at the table, their faces lined with tiredness.
“Don’t you have men to spell you?” Knox asked as he poured two cups of coffee.
“We aren’t going anywhere until Cody gets home,” Wendall said.
Allison took her coffee cup and sat at the table. Knox sat next to her. Her inner strength amazed him. Other than her brief breakdown earlier, she’d remained relatively calm throughout the long hours that had passed.
Knox burned with frustration. There were no clues to follow, no discernible leads and only a weak motive at best. The recording and tracing wires were hooked into Allison’s phone and all they could do was wait. And if a ransom call didn’t come in, then Knox would lose hope.
The minutes ticked by and with every one Knox felt a tightening in his stomach. There was no silence as great as that left behind by a missing child.
And then the phone rang.
Chapter 9
Allison’s heart leaped into her throat. She looked first at Knox, and then at the phone on the table. Surely nobody would be calling at this time of night to see if Cody had come home. It was midnight, too late for a well-meaning person to call. Besides, the caller ID box displayed private caller instead of a phone number.
The phone rang a second time. “Answer it,” Wendall said as he pushed buttons that would record any conversation that took place.
She was suddenly more terrified than she’d been throughout the entire night. The phone rang a third time.
“Allison, answer the phone,” Knox said urgently.
Her hands trembled as she picked up the receiver and breathed a faint hello.
“I have your son.” The voice boomed throughout the kitchen. It was impossible to tell whether it was a male or a female. It was obviously digitally distorted.
Knox moved closer to Allison as her hand tightened on the receiver. “Please...please don’t hurt him,” she said. She fought back the tears that tried to choke her. “Who is this? What do you want?”
“There’s a lightning-struck crooked tree on the west side of town. Bring a million dollars there at midnight tomorrow night. I’ll exchange the boy for the cash. Twenty-four hours, and the money better be there. Come alone. If I see a cop, the boy dies.”
Knox grabbed the phone from Allison. “We’re not giving you a dime unless we get proof of life,” he said. “We don’t even know if you really have Cody.”
Allison stared at Knox in horror. She couldn’t believe they were asking for proof of life where their son was concerned. The nightmare just kept getting worse.
“He’s wearing a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt with a horse on the front.”
Allison gasped. Oh, God, that was exactly what Cody had been wearing when he’d left for school that morning.
“We still want proof of life. Do you hear me?” Knox continued. “No clock starts ticking until we know our boy is alive and well. And if you hurt him in any way, I’ll hunt you down and kill you.”
There was a long pause. “You’ll hear from me soon.” The phone went dead and Allison collapsed into her chair, her heart fluttering so fast she could scarcely catch her breath.
“Knox, that’s what Cody wore to school this m
orning, his black horse T-shirt,” she said half-breathlessly. “So, now we know. Somebody really kidnapped him.”
“Maybe,” Knox replied. “Or maybe that call was just from somebody who saw Cody today and is trying to cash in on his disappearance.”
Wendall got up from the table. “I’ll just step into the other room and give the sheriff a call to catch him up to speed. He’ll get somebody on tracing the source of the call.”
“Play it again,” Knox said to Jim as Wendall left the room. “I want to see if I hear any background noise.”
Knox listened to the phone call four more times and by then Allison wanted to slam her hands over her ears and never hear that horrendous voice again.
“It could be a hoax,” Wendall said when he came back into the room.
“That’s one of the reasons I asked for proof of life,” Knox replied. “It’s the only way to know if the call was real or not.”
Allison didn’t know what was worse, the call being a hoax or real. If it was fake, then they still didn’t know what had happened to Cody. If it was real, it meant that some evil person had her son. Who? Dear God, who would do this?
“I’ll get the money,” she said. “Somehow, someway, I’ll figure out how to pay to get him back.” A million dollars. She could sell her business. She could mortgage the house. She’d do whatever it took to get Cody back home.
“We aren’t paying,” Knox said firmly.
“We have to,” she protested. “It might be the only way we get him back safely.”
“We’re not going to give a kidnapper a single penny. We’re going to find the bastard and get Cody back,” Knox replied with deadly intent shining from his eyes.
“How?” She felt a rising hysteria. “How are we going to find him, Knox? We don’t know who he is. We have no idea where he’s taken Cody.” She released a sharp laugh she didn’t even recognize as her own. “We don’t even know if it’s a male or a female.” Once again, fear that Livia might be behind the kidnapping grabbed her by the throat.
“I’ll figure it out.” A knot of tension pulsed in Knox’s jawline.
Allison was about to argue with him but a knock fell on the door and once again her heart thudded with anxiety. “That’s probably Sheriff Jeffries,” Wendall said. He left the kitchen to answer the door and then returned with the sheriff trailing behind him.
“I want to hear the ransom call,” Bud said.
Allison listened yet another time to the horrendous phone call. When it was finished Bud looked at her. “Do you recognize the voice?”
“I don’t think you’d recognize it if it were your own mother,” Knox replied impatiently. “It’s obvious that it’s been distorted.”
“I know that,” Bud snapped with a scowl. “But maybe she recognized the cadence or the particular word choices the caller used.”
She shook her head. “I don’t recognize anything about the caller.” She was vaguely surprised by Bud. She’d always thought he might be a stupid man as well as lazy. He’d just changed her mind about the stupid part.
“There’s no way to know if the caller really has your son. Once you get some sort of proof of life, then we’ll figure out how we intend to handle this,” Bud said.
“What about a tip line?” Allison asked. Tragically she’d seen enough of these cases on television shows and in the news to know that usually a dedicated phone line was used for people to call in if they knew or had seen anything that might yield a clue.
Bud frowned. “These kinds of cases always bring out the crazies.”
“It only takes one caller to be right about something they saw or heard,” Knox said.
Bud released an audible sigh. “I’ll head back to the station now and get that set up. I’m planning on a news conference here in the morning. We’ll flash the number across the air and see what comes in.” Bud shifted his gaze to his two deputies. “I’ll send a couple of men over here so you can go home.”
“If it’s all the same to you, we’d like to see this thing through,” Wendall said. “We’ll be fine. We’ll spell each other through the night.”
Bud shrugged. “Works for me.” He looked back at Knox. “I’ll get an AMBER alert out. Call me if anything happens. I want to be kept up to date.”
“What about Chad?” Knox a sked.
“Nobody has seen hide nor hair of him.” Bud frowned. “I’ve got somebody sitting on his house. I still suspect he’s passed out in some alley or in a bush and will eventually be home. His car was in the driveway, and he doesn’t own any other vehicles, so he hasn’t gone too far.”
“Have there been any reports of any stolen vehicles?” Knox asked.
“No, nothing like that. All I can tell you right now is that everything that can be done is being done. I’ll check in with you in the morning.” And with that the sheriff left.
Allison stood. “Maybe I should make another pot of coffee.” Making coffee, that’s how she’d gotten through the long afternoon. She didn’t know what else to do, and she was desperate to do something, anything to take her mind off the phone call.
“I think we all could use some rest,” Knox replied.
Rest? How could she rest when Cody wasn’t home? Although her eyes were gritty with a need to sleep, her brain raced so fast she couldn’t imagine it quieting.
“But what if we get another phone call? I should be here to answer,” she protested.
Knox got up and moved to place his hands on her shoulders. “Ally, I don’t think we’re going to hear anything more tonight. And if the phone rings, I’ll answer it. Why don’t you go upstairs and get some sleep? You’ll need all of your strength for tomorrow. Cody is going to need you to be levelheaded and rested when he finally comes home.”
She searched his features, noting the light lines that creased down the sides of his face, the overbrightness of his eyes. “What are you going to do? You look like you could use some rest, too.”
“If it’s okay with you, when I’m ready, I’ll just stretch out on the bottom bunk in Cody’s room.”
She nodded. “I’ll go up and lie down, but I’m sure I won’t sleep. I’m not sure I’ll ever sleep again until Cody is home. Just please let me know if anything happens.”
He squeezed her shoulders and then dropped his hands to his sides. “Go on, go rest and I’ll see you later.”
With a weary nod to the other men, she left the kitchen. She climbed the stairs slowly, her feet feeling as if they weighed a thousand pounds. When she reached the top, she went directly into her bedroom.
She thought of going into Cody’s room, but she didn’t think she could handle it right now without completely losing it. Smelling his scent, feeling his presence when he wasn’t there, was just too great a heartache for her to bear right now.
She turned on the lamp on the nightstand and then stretched out on her bed facing the framed picture of her son. Cody...where are you? Who has you?
The questions not only worried in her head, but also painfully squeezed her heart. When Knox had left her years ago, she’d thought her heartache couldn’t be worse than it was. But this...this created a whole new kind of pain in her chest, one that felt as if she might not draw her next breath.
Everything that could be done was being done, she reminded herself. That’s what the sheriff had told them. If the phone call was really from a kidnapper, then eventually they’d get some sort of proof of life. Bud had said they’d figure things out from there...but what was there to figure out?
She just wanted her son back.
Tears burned at her eyes and she squeezed them tightly closed. She wished Knox was up there right now, holding her tight against his broad chest as the rest of this torturous night passed. She shoved the thought away, knowing that was probably the very last thing she needed.
* * *
<
br /> Cody awoke from a nightmare. In his dream somebody had been hiding behind a tree and had jumped out at him and pressed a stinky rag over his mouth and nose.
He opened his eyes, expecting to see the glow-in-the-dark stars that always comforted him if he woke up in the middle of the night.
There were no stars...only darkness. And even though it was dark, he knew he wasn’t in his top bunk. It felt like he was on a cot like he’d slept on one time when his mom had taken him camping for a weekend.
His stomach rolled and goose bumps crawled over his skin as he realized it hadn’t been a nightmare, after all. This was terrible and it was real.
He wanted to cry out for his mother, but he knew with certainty she wasn’t anywhere around. There was no way she would let him sleep on a cot that smelled so yucky or in a place that was so cold. She made sure he had plenty of blankets on his bed and they always smelled like wind and sunshine.
And he was so hungry. The last time he’d eaten had been in the school cafeteria and they’d served some yucky, soggy fish sticks and runny mac and cheese. His mom would never let him go to bed hungry.
As he remained with his eyes open, he realized it wasn’t completely dark as he’d first thought. A shaft of moonlight drifted through a small window high above his head, allowing him to make out a set of wooden stairs across the room that led up.
A basement. He was in some sort of basement. Who had put him there? He didn’t even remember seeing the person who had put that cloth over his face. He’d sneaked up behind him. Whoever had done this was a very bad person.
His stomach ached with his hunger and he was so very cold, but more than anything he was terribly afraid. He’d never been this afraid before in his entire life. He’d watched a zombie movie one time when he’d spent the night at Josh’s house, but even that hadn’t scared him as much as he was now.
Was the person who had taken him upstairs? Maybe if he just climbed up the stairs he could get out of here. Maybe the bad person was asleep and Cody could sneak past him and get out of this place. Maybe if he got outside he could find his way back home or at least find somebody to help him.
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