The Girls On Poppy Drive: A Detective London McKenna Novel

by Alex Gates

  Tim rushed me. Ben was quicker. He slammed Tim into the wall, rattling the plates inside the cabinets. Tim knew not to fight. He wasn’t likely to win anyway.

  “You come into my house…” His words punctuated with a growl. “You upset my wife. You desecrate the memory of my son. And now…” He pushed Ben away while swearing. “Now you accuse us of molesting our own child?”

  “Calm down.” Ben pointed him to a seat around the table. “We’re not accusing anyone. We’re trying to piece this together, same as you.”

  I tried again, my voice even. “All I’m saying is if—and I mean if—Jeremy was sexually assaulted, there might be a connection between him and the girls.”

  Heather sipped her coffee. Her trembling hand nearly spilled it. “But…he’s taken only little girls.”

  I nodded. “It’s likely the abductions aren’t about the girls at all. He’s targeting families. Specifically, the ones on this street. Which means…the man who hurt your son and took your daughter might be someone you know. Someone who had day-to-day contact with your children.”

  Heather’s strength hadn’t returned. Now, she looked more fatigued—faded of color, energy, life. “We’ve searched, Detective. We have. We’ve made list after list of our own family and friends. Do you know how many loved ones we’ve lost through these baseless accusations?”

  “It must be difficult.”

  “Do you know what a mother’s intuition is?” She forced a sad smile. “It’s a gut instinct. Nature’s way of giving you someone to hate so that you don’t go insane with misery and desperation. Anger was all we had left, and now…we’ve truly lost everything. Friends. Support. Our own children.”

  Ben stepped in. “No one is asking you to make an accusation, but we want you to make a list of your circle of friends. Neighbors, family members, and people connected to both Kaitlyn and Jeremy. The school, the church. Is there someone in your life who took too much interest in the details of your children’s lives?”

  Heather rubbed her face, covering her eyes. “I…I don’t know.”

  “It wouldn’t have been obvious.” I studied Tim. Did he stiffen? Flinch? Think of something?

  Or someone?

  “I trusted everyone,” Heather murmured. “I would never have let my children near someone dangerous.”

  “That’s why predators groom their victims…” When they didn’t kidnap them outright. “This person was probably friends with Jeremy. Close with him. Someone he’d trust with intimate details of his life.”

  Heather began to weep once more. “I just don’t know. I don’t know! Should I know?” She ran a hand through her hair, tugging at the locks. “What do other mothers say? Do they know? Are they aware of the danger? Are they better parents? More responsible? What do they do, Detectives?”

  Tim regained his composure, and with it, his anger. “That’s enough. You’ve barged in here. Demanded answers about our boy. Offered us nothing but conjecture in return. And now…” He teetered in rage, half-way between indignation and violence. “You’re gonna tell us we’re bad parents?”

  “No,” I said. “I would never insinuate that.”

  He didn’t believe me. “We didn’t know our boy was hurt. We didn’t know someone might have been abusing him. We didn’t know someone was waiting to abduct Kaitlyn. We didn’t know there was a sexual pervert terrorizing our neighborhood.” He held his arms out. “Just say it. It’s all our fault. They were in danger, and it’s our fault.”

  “We don’t know that Kaitlyn is dead.” And I couldn’t admit it to myself if she was. “No one is blaming you. We’re just—”

  Heather’s voice shadowed. She spoke quietly, distant. “You should go. Detective McKenna, Detective Chase. Please. Go.”

  “We’re not trying to cause you pain,” I insisted. “We want to find Kaitlyn as much as you want her home.”

  She sunk deeper into her chair and depression. Her tears stopped, but the misery remained.

  “Do you have children, Detective?” she whispered.

  I hesistated. “No.”

  “Then you have no idea the pain of losing a child.” Heather surrendered to her misery, tears on her cheeks. “That endless pain. The gaping pit in your stomach. It’s like you killed them with your own two hands. And you wonder…could you have done something, said something, held them a little tighter…”

  My chest ached. I didn’t have the strength to interrupt.

  “Please don’t turn this investigation onto us,” she whispered. “Don’t dig just to uncover those we’ve buried. I can’t…I can’t go through it again.”

  Tim encroached a little too close. I stood, but he didn’t make a move.

  Not yet.

  “You have one job, Detective. Find our child. If you can’t do that…” His words slashed like a blade. “Maybe you’ll be the next one who goes missing.”

  16

  Don’t be scared.

  Your life is too short.

  -Him

  What sort of sadistic bastard released holiday themed videos with children?

  Indecent gifts. Novelty candies. The ribbon wrapping her in a bow.

  Sophia wouldn’t make it home for Christmas. I prayed she’d live until the New Year.

  My phone buzzed. So much for taking a personal day. The video in the morning was followed by an afternoon with James touring wedding venues, and a day ruined by the constant barrage of theories texted by Ben, Adamski, and the second FBI consultant added to the case.

  I needed…time. Just a few hours away from it, her, those sounds.

  But if the girls never had a break…why did I deserve one? Besides, Ben was onto something.

  The room was cold

  She needed extra blankets

  No climate control?

  It killed me that I huddled against my Jeep’s heater when the poor girl had shivered through the whole recording.

  I texted back, hating myself for even thinking it. He hasn’t been in the videos for a few weeks. Why she going solo?

  Ben agreed. What would make him camera shy?

  James waited for me to pull from the church’s lot. “Everything okay?”

  My head wasn’t on the road, but I pocketed my phone. “Yeah.”

  “How do you feel about the place?”

  That in most of the videos produced with the girls, the kidnapper played a rather important part. Especially with Alyssa and Kaitlyn.

  But in the past few months, Sophia had been…

  Mostly spared.

  Mostly.

  “It looked nice,” I said.

  “You think?”

  I couldn’t remember a single detail. “Very churchy.”

  “Is it big enough?”

  “How many people do you expect to show up?”

  James rested his head against the seat. Riding as a passenger gave him a headache. Driving probably did too, not that he’d admit it. It’d hurt a hell of a lot more when he finally realized he couldn’t do it anymore.

  He hummed. “Well, if your mother is to believed—”

  “There’s your first mistake.”

  “Three hundred.”

  Dropping four hundred dollars on new tires for the Jeep was stupid when I’d end up careening off the road in shock.

  “Three hundred people?”

  My phone buzzed again. Couldn’t check it now. If it was important, Ben would have called.

  I hoped.

  “Can we fit three hundred people in there?” he asked.

  “Do we even know three hundred people?”

  “She said you have a big family.”

  “No, she’s just inviting the entire South Hills!”

  James chuckled. “Well, we’ll tell her to trim the fat. I couldn’t see much of the chapel. Did you get pictures for her?”

  If pictures meant a quick snap of blurry pews taken between texts to Adamski and checking my voicemail then…yeah.

  “Some,” I said.

  I eased onto the highw
ay and leaned against the driver’s side window. This fatigue actually ached. In my muscles. My bones. Even my hair—the quick braid I’d wrapped just to tuck it under a wool cap. Sleep might have helped, but that wasn’t happening.

  “Hungry?” James asked.

  Not in the slightest. “I’m okay.”

  “Did you grab lunch before you left the station?”

  That was a better lie than denying that I had lost my appetite completely. “Something little.”

  “You know, this is our first night off in a while.” James smiled. It warmed his already caramel voice. “Why don’t we go somewhere nice? We’ll get dressed up, go to dinner, and do some Christmas shopping. We’ll make a date out of it.”

  I couldn’t even imagine going out.

  Eating while Sophia starved.

  Christmas shopping while she cried alone.

  Sleeping, warm and safe, while she was forced to—

  James mercifully interrupted my thoughts. “Or we can screw the whole thing and elope tonight.”

  “If you want.”

  He reached for my hand and squeezed. I didn’t mean to flinch him away.

  “London, what’s wrong?”

  He could guess. He probably knew. So why make me say it?

  “Traffic’s a little irritating.” I lied.

  “Talk to me.”

  “Well, that little asshole Honda up there just cut off the truck, and now everyone has slam on their brakes.”

  “You know that’s not what I mean.”

  “And you know I don’t want to talk about it.” I swallowed. “You know I can’t talk about it. Physically, emotionally. I can’t.”

  “Then forget the case.” His eyes stayed closed. That made it worse. He didn’t even have to look to see through me. “We just toured a wedding venue. I thought it would…”

  “Distract me?”

  He learned too much from that word. I should have planned it better. “Excite you.”

  “I…” Traffic cleared. That stupid little Honda couldn’t do anything right. “It’s just a church.”

  “And it’s just the wedding colors. Just the flowers. Menu. Venue.” He hesitated. “There’s a lot of details, but it’s still a happy occasion. You are…happy, aren’t you?”

  Far from it, and none of it was his fault. “Sure.”

  “You’re a terrible liar.”

  “And, as my future husband, you’re supposed to have to good sense to not call me on it.”

  “That’s not how this relationship works. Talk to me.”

  I didn’t have the energy to play the head game right now. “I am.”

  “But you’re not saying anything, only what I want to hear.”

  Well, no one wanted to hear the truth. “So? Go ahead and say it.”

  “Say what?”

  “That I’m working too much. That the case is an obsession. That I’m bringing the office home. That it isn’t working. It’s not healthy, London. You can’t get this involved in your cases, London. You have to learn to detach yourself, London.”

  James wasn’t amused. “I’m getting predictable.”

  “I love you, but you have to let me handle this one on my own.”

  A long pause. A quiet James. Nothing good came from that.

  “You need help, London.”

  The admission was a knife to the chest.

  Or back.

  “I have Ben,” I said. “He’s working out…sort of.”

  “Not that kind of help.”

  I exhaled. It did nothing. “I’m too tired to fight, James.”

  “You’re too tired for everything. Fighting. Eating. Intimacy.”

  That one I knew, and I didn’t need the additional guilt. “I have my reasons.”

  More than one.

  “I’m not saying let’s go home and rut like animals.” James snorted. “But let me hold you. Kiss you. Be with you. You’re pulling away from me, and, for the life of me, I don’t know why.”

  Neither did I.

  I had no reason to hide everything and keep it bottled up. I endured it all myself.

  But I also had every reason to spare him that pain. Not just the darkness, but that crushing, somber realization that nothing could ever undo what had happened.

  “Tell you what.” I forced a smile. “You catch this guy for me, we’ll take a week’s vacation and you can have a nooner every day.”

  “London.”

  “I’m serious.” My voice trembled. “Can you find him? Could you point out this monster in a sea of shadows and dead ends? Cause I sure as hell can’t do it.”

  “You need to distance yourself from the case, if only for a new perspective.”

  I didn’t have time for distance. I ran through the profile again, repeating words that meant absolutely nothing to me anymore.

  “He’s most likely white. In his forties. Average height, build. Wealthy, or at least comfortable. He’s probably a family man because he can’t collect the supplies for himself. Can’t let his wife see that he’s going out and buying extra food and clothes.” Then again…the doubt destroyed me. “Or maybe he’s a loner. A psychotic stalker off the grid who has the means to hold and torment the girls.”

  “London.”

  “Then again, maybe he is a man who is seeking vengeance on this particular street. He hates the families, and he’s doing everything he can to ruin them.” I slammed the steering wheel. “I don’t know! Who the hell is this guy? Why did he choose those girls? What the hell does he get out of all of this? I can’t keep asking these same questions day in and day out. I can’t watch another one of those movies and not…” I shook my head. “I want to gouge my eyes out, and we can’t both be blind. It’s a logistical nightmare.”

  “Think of how much we’d save on taxes though.”

  I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. James took my hand. I let him hold it.

  “He knows you can’t find him,” he said. “That’s the fetish, London. For seven years he’s eluded everyone because he can. It’s not about the kids or the videos—it’s always been about the power he holds over everyone. Children. Families. Law enforcement. The internet. He’s controlling everyone, including the pedophiles so eager for his content that they volunteer their services. The loyal ones are rewarded with the possessions of the girls, and that fosters their addiction to both him and the children. He likes that control more than he likes molesting the girls.”

  I agreed. He was right.

  And yet…

  “But the profile doesn’t work. I’ve interviewed everyone. People from the schools, their churches, clubs and local events. I’ve studied everything he’s done to those girls. Something doesn’t add up. We’re missing something major, and every hour I dick around with therapy or wedding venues or sleeping is another hour I’m wasting.”

  “You can’t keep banging your head against the wall. Something’s gotta give. If you’re not careful, it’ll be you before it’s a break in the case. You have to learn to relax.”

  I’d never appreciated his sense of humor before. “How am I going to relax? They’re gone. They’re suffering. They could be dying. What am I supposed to do while that’s happening?”

  “Live your own life. Focus on the other parts of your life that bring you the slightest bit of joy. For your health and sanity…” James sighed. “Know that I’m here. That I made a promise to be here for you, for the rest of our lives. You have me.”

  And I was already ruining it. Minute by minute, breath after breath.

  Did he even know what he was marrying? The few parts of me I could give him…and everything I couldn’t? What I’d already lost?

  The church was too close to home. I pulled into our driveway, but I didn’t turn the car off. Just flicked the windshield wipers and cleared the splattering of snowflakes.

  “How am I supposed to face their families?” I whispered. “How am I supposed to look myself in the mirror?”

  “What else could you do, London?”
<
br />   “Find him.”

  “And if you don’t?”

  The possibility sickened me. “I have to. I can’t let him get away with this. It’s this need beyond even saving the kids. I want to stop him.”

  James was quiet for a long enough moment that I thought he regretted speaking. “I know that feeling, London. Believe me.”

  And he would. He’d lived it with for the past ten years.

  “If you let it…” His warning was practically a prophecy. “It will eat you alive. Don’t base your self-worth on catching this man.”

  “But I am. I do. I feel…” There wasn’t a word to describe this failure. “Absolutely useless. They’re all counting on me to find him. The department. The families. The girls. And it’s my fault. I promised them…and now it’s like I’m causing them more pain.”

  “Don’t.” He let the word bite. “You’re doing everything you can. No one will blame you for this. Listen to me—not as your fiancé, but as a law enforcement officer who has experienced exactly this. I’ve never been able to find…him.” Even after all this time, neither one of us could speak his name. Or maybe James spared me the word. “You don’t judge me for not catching him.”

  Ten years had passed since I pulled myself out of that rotten, blood-soaked cellar.

  My silence felt infinitely longer.

  James dropped my hand. “You do blame me.”

  “No. I didn’t say that.”

  “You think it.”

  “I’ve never thought it either.”

  “Don’t lie to me, London. Not about this. Not when it’s about me.”

  I couldn’t look at him, couldn’t bear to witness yet another person I disappointed. The man I loved. The one I’d already hurt in ways he couldn’t imagine.

  A future—lost—before it had a chance to begin.

  His words were so familiar they’d lost all meaning. “You can’t keep living in the past. Everything we do, everything we say, everything we feel…it’s all based on something that happened ten years ago.”

  I didn’t bear it like a badge of honor, but I couldn’t forget it. “You knew that about me when we started this.”

  “I thought you’d—”

  “What? Get over it?”

  “Allow me to help.” He stared ahead. Could he even see anything, or was he looking into the past just like me? “I don’t think you want to recover. You want to keep blaming me and yourself and the world for what happened. Well, I’m sorry. I couldn’t save you from him…and I can’t save you from yourself, London.”