Stolen in the Night

by MacDonald, Patricia

  “Yes,” Charmaine said eagerly.

  Tess fumbled for a notepad and pen in her purse, trying to conceal both the hope and the distress that this news caused her. No siblings. No cousins. It had to be Rusty Bosworth who had colluded with Lazarus. And it also had to be the police chief who had abducted her son. Tess tried to calm herself, so that her hands wouldn’t shake as she wrote in the notepad. “All right,” said Tess, “if you could just give me that address.”

  “He’s renting a condo out by the Stone Hill Mountain ski area. Two-fifty-three B Millwood.”

  “And his home phone?” Tess asked, trying to keep her voice calm as she wrote.

  “He doesn’t want me to have it,” said Charmaine.

  “Really,” Tess murmured.

  “I know. Do you wonder why we’re separated?”

  “Charmaine,” Sally called out softly from behind the screen.

  “I’m coming, sweetheart. Are you okay?”

  “I’m okay,” said Sally. “I just need to turn over.”

  “I’ll help you. Just a sec.”

  “I won’t keep you any longer,” said Tess. “Thanks so much for your help.”

  “Don’t bother going over to his place right now,” Charmaine advised. “He’s got a big case going on. He won’t be home till all hours.”

  “That’s fine,” Tess said. “Thanks again.” She forced herself to smile and make a serene exit, despite the fact that she wanted to take off at a run. The tinkling sounded behind her as Tess closed the door and Charmaine returned to Sally Morris. Now, Tess thought, she had all the information she needed. As she started up Main Street, a shiny black Mercedes pulled into the handicapped parking space in front of Charmaine’s storefront. Chan Morris got out, arriving to pick up his wife from her therapy. His soft, black hair was instantly disheveled by the wind and he pushed it back off his face.

  Tess averted her gaze and pulled up the collar on her jacket, hurrying up the street toward Kelli’s car before Chan saw her. She knew that if he saw her, he would greet her and probably want to start asking questions. She couldn’t afford to have her identity revealed to Charmaine, who might glance out the front window and see them talking together. She didn’t want Charmaine asking Chan how he knew June Terkel. No, Tess thought. That was not going to happen. She had the information and now she needed to get to her son. Hang on, Erny, she thought. I’m on my way.

  CHAPTER 26

  The trees along Millwood Road were still ablaze with the last of the autumn leaves. The road had once been a scenic pathway to the summit of Stone Hill Mountain. Now interspersed among the trees, on both sides of the road, were vacation condos built by developers from New York and Boston. From Thanksgiving to March, when snow was on the ground, the Millwood area was abuzz with luxury cars topped by ski racks and colorfully arrayed, well-to-do weekend athletes from out of state. Today, a weekday in late October, showed signs that the area was beginning to awaken. A few of the ski shops had opened and there was some light traffic up and down the mountain, but it was still very quiet.

  Tess drove slowly along the winding road. Some of the condos, mainly the newer ones, were designed with a perfunctory nod to the surroundings, with crisscrossed wooden timbers on the façade to suggest ski chalets in the Alps. The most recently built were designed as more businesslike structures with false stucco façades, garages underneath, and even a convenience store incorporated into the complex. 253B Millwood was clearly one of the oldest buildings, functional but not luxurious. It was neither cleanly modern, nor charmingly quaint. It was built in a quad style and had begun to look a little bit shabby. Tess pulled into one of the visitor’s parking spaces provided beside the complex and sat, shivering in the warm idling car. Now that she was here, she knew she had to be careful about how she proceeded. It seemed unlikely to her that there would be security cameras or the kind of patrolling that one might find in a newer kind of complex in the Washington, D.C., area, for example. Most people only used these units seasonally and rarely kept anything of value in them except for their ski equipment. Even so, Tess wondered how Rusty was able to procure one of the units for rental, but then she reminded herself that he was the chief of police. He undoubtedly had some influence among the developers of these condo warrens. Influence enough to have a spare unit at his disposal.

  Tess looked up at the bland beige building with its cedar shingle roof and windows that overlooked the mountainside. Erny, are you in there? she thought. How did he get you inside without anyone noticing? Or did he take you somewhere else? Somewhere more private, where it would be easier to stash an abducted child.

  Tess shook her head. She couldn’t think about that. She had to find out about this place first. If she couldn’t find her son here, then she would face the worry of where else in this vast area he might be hidden. Right now she had to get inside 253B. She turned off the engine and, feeling the rapid cadence of her own heartbeat, stepped out of the car.

  Looking all around to be sure she wasn’t seen, she slipped inside the outer door of number 253 to the tiny vestibule where the four mailboxes for the quad of condos were located. She wondered, with a sinking feeling, if anyone was home in any of them, someone who might buzz her in if she pressed their bell. She tried all four buttons, but with no luck. No answering buzz released the catch on the door. Erny, she thought. Are you in there? Can you hear the buzz and know that someone is here and close to finding you? She thought about going around to the back. Maybe if she could figure out which window belonged to the B unit, she could peer in and see something—some sign of her son. She was just about to leave the vestibule when a dirty dented compact car pulled into the parking area and a skinny woman of about forty, dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt, got out. She reached into the backseat of the car for a paper shopping bag and then came toward the vestibule. Tess immediately began to rummage in her bag, as if she were searching for her key. The woman pulled the door open, came in, and smiled at Tess. Her entire face crinkled into folds. “Couldn’t be much gloomier out there, could it?” she asked pleasantly.

  Tess smiled back. “No, it really couldn’t.”

  The woman inserted her key in the lock and turned it. “Can’t find your key?” she said sympathetically.

  “I’ll find it,” said Tess.

  The woman shrugged, but did not hold the outer door open for her. She went through and down the hall, carrying her bag. Tess just managed to catch it by shoving her toe in before the door locked shut again. Tess held it open just an inch while she waited for the woman to get into her own apartment. Tess felt her heart hammering as she heard the sound of a door opening and then slamming shut down the hall. Luckily there was no one passing by to see Tess lingering in the vestibule of the quad. After a couple of minutes had passed, Tess thought it was probably safe. She pushed the door open and looked down the hall. There were two doors on each side. The near doors were marked A and D. That meant the far doors were B and C. She walked down the hallway to B and tried the knob. Of course it did not open. From the place next door she could hear a loud humming, as if from an air conditioner or a fan. It created enough white noise to mask her voice. She put her mouth to the door and said, in as loud a voice as she dared, “Erny. Erny, are you in there? Erny, it’s Mom. Can you hear me? Can you make a sound?”

  There was no reply from inside. Thankfully, though, none of the other doors opened. Tess looked in frustration at the doorknob. How did you unlock a lock? She’d seen people do it in the movies with a bobby pin or a credit card. She had to try. She reached into her purse and pulled out a credit card from her wallet. With trembling hands she inserted it between the door and frame and pulled up. Nothing happened. She tried it again and pulled the credit card out. Then she reached for the doorknob and twisted it in frustration. Still nothing. “Erny,” she cried in a low urgent voice, bending toward the crack between door and frame.

  The white noise stopped abruptly and Tess straightened up. Then, to her shock, the door of Rusty Boswort
h’s apartment opened in front of her face. The skinny wrinkled woman from the vestibule was standing there and she started at the sight of Tess.

  She put a scrawny hand against her chest. “Oh, you scared me. I thought I heard something, but I had the vacuum going.”

  Tess was too taken aback to speak for a moment. “I’m sorry. I thought…I mean, I thought that…Rusty Bosworth…”

  “Oh, sorry. I’m Vivian. I clean for Chief Bosworth,” the woman explained. Then she frowned. “Didn’t I just see you in the foyer?”

  “Yes,” said Tess. “I…I was looking for…him.”

  “Chief Bosworth’s not here,” Vivian said. Then she stared out at Tess suspiciously. “How’d you get in the building anyway? I thought you said you lived here.”

  Tess’s mind was reeling. If Erny were in there, surely this woman would know it. She would have noticed something, even though she had not been in the condo for long. And Vivian obviously came and went as she pleased. She must have her own key. Surely Rusty Bosworth wouldn’t have dared to try to hide Erny in a place where his cleaning lady could come and go at will.

  “Hello?” said Vivian, waving her fingers in front of Tess’s eyes. “How did you get in?”

  “Oh,” said Tess, recovering as best she could. “I’m sorry. I do…I live here…across the hall.”

  The woman folded her arms over her chest and raised her eyebrows. “Borrowing a cup of sugar?”

  “I was here…with…Rusty last night,” said Tess. “I think I may have left my…glasses here.”

  The cleaning woman pressed her lips together and a spot of color appeared in her weathered cheeks. “Oh.”

  “Would you mind if I came in and looked for them?”

  “I can look for you. Where were you sitting?”

  Tess edged her way through the door. “Well, here…on the sofa. And…in the bedroom.”

  Vivian cleared her throat. “I’ll have a look in there,” she said brusquely, indicating the hallway to the bedroom. “You can check the sofa.”

  “Thanks,” said Tess. She waited for Vivian to disappear down the hall and then she looked around frantically, opening every door and cupboard in the combination living room/kitchen and dining area.

  “Were they in a case?” Vivian called out.

  “No,” said Tess. “They have blue frames. They might be in the bathroom.”

  “I’m looking,” Vivian called back.

  Tess closed the doors on the home entertainment console and stood up with an oppressive heaviness in her heart. Erny wasn’t here. There was no way that the chief would have left him for the cleaning woman to find. Not if he knew she was coming. And most cleaning people worked on a schedule.

  Tess looked helplessly around the room. There were few personal effects to warm up the chilly, cookie-cutter look of the condo. There were exactly two framed school photos of children, set up on the coffee table, and a fish that looked fake, mounted on a large, wooden plaque. The plaque was propped up against the side of the entertainment center, as if waiting to be hung up. Tess picked it up. Beneath the fish and behind a glass window was a faded photo of a redheaded kid holding up an enormous fish. Tess realized, to her surprise, that it was the selfsame fish on the plaque. Not fake, after all, but stuffed. For a moment, Tess marveled at the skill of the taxidermist and couldn’t help thinking how Erny would covet such a trophy.

  Tess looked more closely at the photo and realized that the redheaded boy in the photo, standing on the dock proudly displaying his catch, was a young Rusty Bosworth. Crouched beside him in the photo was another older boy who was homely and wore glasses. The older boy had a hangdog look, as if he was disappointed, or maybe a little ashamed, not to be the lucky angler. With a start of revulsion, Tess suddenly recognized him. She was looking at Rusty and Lazarus Abbott as youngsters. Nothing about Lazarus Abbott betrayed the monster he would become. He looked like any other awkward adolescent. She squinted at the photo trying to see past Lazarus’s expression. But there was nothing to see. Just a boy at a lake on a summer’s day.

  A round-faced, red-haired man, probably Rusty’s father, stood behind Rusty, proudly resting his hand on the boy’s shoulder. Perhaps, even at that moment, he was planning to have the fish stuffed and mounted for his son. Behind Lazarus, a lanky, black-haired man in a T-shirt looked on enviously, almost angrily, as Rusty displayed his catch. In an instant, Tess recognized those angry eyes. It was Nelson Abbott. A thinner, younger version, his face unlined, but Nelson Abbott without a doubt. Tess set the plaque back down beside the entertainment center. It was a memento of a fishing trip that had ended in glory for one cousin and ignominy for the other. Still, it gave Tess a disorienting feeling of having forgotten something.

  “Nope,” said Vivian, coming back into the room. “I didn’t find ’em. Did you? I looked high and low.”

  Tess looked up. “No. I don’t know. I’ll ask Rusty to look for them.”

  “Okay,” said Vivian. “Sorry I couldn’t help you.”

  “I’ll let you get back to work,” said Tess. “Thanks.”

  “No trouble,” said Vivian.

  Vivian closed the door behind her and Tess felt as if her last hope had been closed off with that door. Tess closed her eyes. Where is my son, you bastard? she shouted at Rusty Bosworth in her mind. Where are you keeping him? Tess heard the whine of the vacuum again, now realizing that the sound was actually emanating from inside the chief’s apartment. Vivian would clean every inch of that condo, Tess thought. Wherever Erny might be, Tess knew that she would not find him here.

  CHAPTER 27

  Tess ran the gauntlet of a bunch of reporters who, despite the police warnings, had reassembled outside the Stone Hill Inn. She avoided making eye contact with any of them.

  “Do you know who took your son?” one of them shouted.

  “Any news yet, Tess?” another called out.

  “Do you feel you’re being punished because of Lazarus Abbott?” cried a third.

  Tess jerked open the door to the inn. She was shaking as she entered the foyer. Officer Virgilio was leaning against the sitting room door frame, talking on his cell phone, while the other larger man, Officer Swain, stood in the library, jiggling one foot as he leafed through the newspaper. He looked up as Tess appeared in the hallway.

  “Is there any news, Officer Swain?” Tess asked.

  “Sorry, ma’am,” he said putting down the paper. He sounded sincerely sorry.

  Tess nodded and sighed. “Those reporters are back. My nerves are really on edge. I can’t stand much more of this harassment.”

  Mac Swain set the paper down on the table. “I’ll get rid of them for you, ma’am,” he said with quiet determination.

  He walked outside and Tess could hear him ordering the reporters to vacate the premises. Tess shook her head. It was like trying to chase away a swarm of gnats. They might disperse for a moment, but she knew they would be back. Still, the sound of their grumbling retreat made her feel slightly better. Mac Swain opened the door and came back into the house.

  “Thank you, Officer,” she said.

  “Happy to do it,” he said.

  “Have you seen my mother?” Tess asked.

  Swain shook his head. “Sorry.”

  “Never mind,” said Tess. She walked back to the kitchen and then over to her mother’s quarters, tapping on the voile-curtained French doors. “Mom?”

  Julie opened the French doors, clutching a wadded tissue in her hand. She was wearing a shirt-style jacket of colorful squares of fabric. Her eyes were red-rimmed and angry. “Oh, it’s you,” she said in an accusing tone.

  “I’m looking for Mom,” said Tess.

  “She went out. With Mr. Phalen,” said Julie.

  “With Phalen?” Tess cried. “What is she thinking? Didn’t you try to stop her?”

  “She’s a grown woman, for God’s sake. Besides, I have my own problems,” Julie said petulantly.

  “What happened at the police station?” Tess as
ked. “Is Jake still there?”

  “Yes, he’s still there,” said Julie, shutting the door behind Tess. “Of course he’s still there. Why in the world did you send that attorney down there with him?”

  “Because I thought they were going to arrest him. You know Jake publicly threatened Nelson Abbott. He needed an attorney.”

  “Maybe so. But not that Ramsey guy,” Julie insisted. “The police absolutely loathe him. It’s doing more harm than good to have him there.” Julie collapsed in a patchwork heap on Dawn’s couch. “Jake would have been better off on his own. He’s known most of those cops for years. They probably would have been nice to him if he hadn’t come in with that shyster lawyer. They blame that lawyer for everything that’s happened.”

  Tess dug her nails into her palms and counted to ten. “Look, I’m sorry you feel that way. I was just trying to help Jake.”

  “Some help.” Julie sniffed.

  Tess raised her hands, palms out. “I can’t…I don’t know what to say. I’m a little preoccupied right now. My son is missing. He’s out there all alone with a killer…”

  Julie’s eyes watered again and she immediately looked sheepish. She dabbed at her red nose with the mangled tissue. “I know. I didn’t forget Erny. I never would.”

  Tess realized that this was true, but still, she felt a little bruised. She glanced at the door to be sure it was shut and then spoke in a low, angry voice. “I’ll tell you something else. I know who is responsible for all of this. The chief of police is responsible, so if you want to blame someone, blame him.”

  Julie blinked away her tears and stared at Tess. “What are you talking about? Are you crazy?”

  “No, I’m not crazy.”

  “Then where did you get an idea like that?” Then she frowned in disapproval. “Is this why you wanted Rusty Bosworth’s address?”

  Tess sighed. “Yes. And I got it from Charmaine. I went to his condo but Erny wasn’t there. That would be too easy. He’s put him somewhere else.”