Out of Reach: A Novel

by Patricia Lewin

  She pushed off the stool, deciding it was best to leave this conversation while she could. She didn’t want to delve too deeply into her role as surrogate mother to Janie, not even with Marta. Because despite the older woman’s kind words, Erin was afraid she’d come up short. “I better go change or Janie will be down here . . .”

  Then she spotted the newspaper on the counter.

  48 HOURS AND COUNTING

  CODY SANDERS STILL MISSING

  POLICE AND FBI NOT GIVING UP

  A wave of nausea rolled through her. She’d heard those exact words herself, standing next to her mother, nineteen years ago. “We’re not giving up, Mrs. Baker.”

  But of course, they’d had to. Eventually.

  As for this little boy, this Cody Sanders . . . Forty-eight hours. Too long. By now there was a good chance the boy was dead. And if not . . . Well, that wasn’t something she wanted to think about.

  “Why do you torture yourself?” Marta asked.

  Erin looked up, saw the concern on the older woman’s face, and struggled to control her own features. “Should I avoid the news because it’s unpleasant?”

  Marta snorted. “You are not kidding anyone, Erin. It is time to stop blaming yourself for what happened to Claire.”

  “Who should I blame, then?”

  “The madman who took her.”

  “I was supposed to be watching her.” Erin wrapped her arms around her waist. “She was my responsibility.”

  “You were twelve years old. A child.”

  “Old enough—”

  “No.” Marta moved from behind the counter, planting two round fists on her hips. “Now you listen to me, Erin Elizabeth. I loved your mother. She was more of a sister to me than my own. But I never, never, agreed with how she left you to watch Claire while she worked.”

  “She didn’t have a choice.”

  “There are always choices.” Marta tossed her hands into the air. “Your mother just refused to consider hers. And watching the two of you afterward, the way you blamed yourself and each other . . .” She shook her head. “Well, it hurt my heart.”

  “It hurt all of us.” Erin went cold inside, rigid. “Claire most of all.”

  For a moment, Marta seemed at a loss for words, searching Erin’s face. When she finally spoke, she kept her voice low. “Let it go. It is over. Done. The monster who took your sister is in jail.”

  “And what about Claire?”

  “Claire is exactly where she needs to be. You have seen to that. And someday, she will be well. But even if she never gets well, you’re doing everything you can.”

  Erin didn’t answer. She knew she couldn’t win this argument. Marta only saw the good in those she loved, never the failures. So Erin lied. “You’re right.” She gave the other woman a quick kiss on the cheek. “I’m sorry. And I’ll try to remember that.”

  Marta eyed her, possibly detecting the truth, but didn’t challenge her. “Okay, then. Now go get ready before Janie goes crazy waiting for her pizza.”

  Erin headed upstairs.

  Despite what Marta said, Erin knew she’d been at fault. She’d lost Claire that summer day nineteen years ago. And they’d all been paying for that mistake ever since.

  III

  FBI SPECIAL AGENT Alec Donovan shuffled through the glossy eight-by-tens on the table. Cody Sanders. His mother, Ellen Sanders. Roy Vasce, Ellen’s current live-in boyfriend. And their seedy, rented row house, off the rail yards in South Baltimore’s Locust Point.

  Alec had gone through the entire file. He’d studied the pictures, read and reread the reports, gone through the interviews, all meticulously gathered by his small team of agents and police officers, without coming up with anything new.

  Something was missing.

  He could feel it, but just couldn’t put his finger on what.

  Pushing away from the table, he moved to stand in front of the storyboard on a large display panel attached to the wall. A picture of Cody was front and center, and beneath it, the time line tracking his movements the day of his disappearance. On one side was a list of friends and family whom the investigation team was interviewing. On the other, a list of questions that needed answers. In essence, the storyboard was a compilation and summary of all the details, the scores of interviews and reports, contained in the files.

  Something.

  Alec would just have to go over it again. And again, if necessary.

  “Have you been here all night?”

  Startled, he turned toward the woman in the doorway, then glanced at the windows where the first flush of gray shaded the sky. Across the room, on the far side of the temporary command post, a new set of faces manned the twenty-four-hour tip line. Alec hadn’t even noticed the shift change. “I don’t suppose you’d believe me if I said no.”

  Cathy Hart, one of the team of agents working for Alec on the Sanders case, pulled off her jacket and tossed it over a chair. “You look racked.”

  “Thanks.” He turned his attention back to the storyboard. “Would it be politically incorrect to ask you to make fresh coffee?”

  “Yeah, it would, but I’ll do it anyway. If you agree to go back to your room, take a shower, and get some sleep.”

  Even though he and Cathy worked out of Quantico, an easy ninety-minute drive south of Baltimore, they’d taken hotel rooms. When every passing hour decreased the chance of finding a missing child alive, they couldn’t afford to waste any time on driving. Or sleeping.

  “After we find Cody,” he said.

  “He needs you sharp, Alec. You’re not going to do him any good if you’re exhausted.”

  “It won’t do him any good if we find him after he’s dead, either.”

  His bluntness shocked her. He could feel it in the sudden stillness behind him, and in the way, after a few seconds, she left the room without comment. To make coffee, he hoped.

  Cathy was a good investigator, sharp, dedicated, and in an odd sort of way, still innocent. Even after two years as an FBI CAC (Crimes Against Children) coordinator, working at his side on some horrific child abduction cases, she’d maintained her spark of optimism. Something Alec had lost years ago.

  When she returned, she brought two steaming mugs.

  “Thanks,” he said, accepting the offered salvation. “I’m on coffee duty tomorrow.”

  “I’ll hold you to it.”

  He breathed in the aroma, praying the caffeine would shake something loose in his brain. Because Cathy was right about one thing. He needed to remain sharp.

  “Anything new?” she asked.

  “Just more questions.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “And the nagging suspicion that I’m missing something obvious.”

  “If it was obvious, Cody would be back home by now.”

  She was right. Maybe he was too tired.

  He couldn’t remember how many hours he’d been awake. Too many. Since he’d gotten the call about Cody Sanders . . . when? Two days ago? He’d been assigned the case because the CAC coordinators in the Baltimore office were involved in Operation Innocent Images, a case involving child pornography on the Internet. So he and Cathy, fresh off a case in Chicago, had driven up from Quantico.

  “Go through this with me, will you?” he said. “Maybe a new pair of eyes will see what I’m missing.”

  Cathy grabbed a notepad and scooted up onto the table facing the wall. “Let’s go.”

  Over the past two years, they’d learned to bounce ideas off each other. They had different strengths, different weaknesses, and together they often saw things neither one could see alone. It was a great partnership, and he’d come to depend on her common sense and insight into human, and particularly child, behavior.

  Alec started. “Cody Sanders, age nine. Fourth grade, Francis Scott Key Elementary.” He pushed up onto the table next to Cathy and sipped his coffee. They’d been over all this before, but they were going to do it again, and again. Until they found the missing pieces.

  “According to his mother, El
len,” he continued, “Cody left for school around seven-thirty. She claims there was nothing unusual in their morning routine. Roy Vasce—”

  “The boyfriend.”

  “Verified her story.”

  “But the agent who interviewed Roy,” Cathy added, “doesn’t buy it. According to the neighbors, Roy and Cody don’t get along. Lots of noisy fights.”

  “Any signs of physical abuse?”

  Cathy shrugged. “No one’s saying.”

  “Check the local hospitals. See if they have records of Cody being admitted to the emergency room under questionable circumstances. And try the school nurse. She might have noticed something, a broken bone or two, anything that might tell us if Roy was heavy-handed.”

  “The locals are already checking the hospitals, and I’ll visit the nurse today.”

  “Good. So, the question is, did Roy and Cody argue that morning?” The scenario—more common than most people would believe—that Alec hated the most. “And did Roy . . . or Mom and Roy . . . decide the boy was a pain in the ass and get rid of him?”

  “Nothing in the mother’s demeanor suggests she had anything to do with it.” Compassion was one of Cathy’s strengths, and her weakness. Accusing a family member was always her last choice. Where she assumed innocence, he saw guilt. Both could be a problem.

  In this case, however, “I happen to agree,” he said.

  Certain behavioral patterns and clues inevitably surfaced when a family member murdered a child. A mother might use the word kidnapping before most bereft parents could psychologically admit to the possibility. Or a father would overthink a cover-up, making false assumptions about kidnappers and their behavior. He might send a note to himself, or something of the child’s to the police, as evidence of the child’s abduction—which only a kidnapper interested in collecting ransom would do.

  Ransom was certainly not a question in this case.

  Ellen was a single mom, hustling drinks in a dive off Light Street in South Baltimore. She was consistently behind in her rent on her deteriorating, formstone rowhouse, and Alec suspected the parade of men through her bedroom were more often paying customers than boyfriends.

  Nor had Ellen or Roy exhibited any other behavior that would have Alec hunting for a body instead of a terrorized boy. Yes, there was the friction between Roy and Cody, but that alone didn’t make Roy capable of murder. Or more specifically, of successfully covering it up.

  “They don’t strike me as smart enough,” Alec said. “But let’s not rule it out.” He didn’t want to blind Cathy with his opinions. He wanted her eyes open and looking at all possible scenarios. “I want you to push a little harder on them. If nothing else, they might know more than they’re saying. Get a polygraph.”

  “They’ve already refused.”

  “Find out why. If they’re telling the truth, they should have no objection.”

  “You’re the boss.”

  “What about the biological father?” Alec asked. “Have you found him yet?” He’d skipped out when Cody was four, and according to Ellen, they hadn’t seen or heard from his since.

  “Not yet, but we’re working on it.”

  “I doubt he’s involved.” Men who’d deserted their families didn’t usually show up years later to kidnap the children they’d abandoned. “But we need to make sure.”

  “We’ll find him.”

  Alec waited while she made notes on the storyboard, joining Ellen and Roy’s names with a bracket and drawing an arrow to the word polygraph, question mark, in capital letters. When she was done, he brought up another common scenario. “Cody could have run. If he had a problem with Roy, the boy might have decided he’d had enough, picked up, and taken off.”

  “That’s what the locals think,” Cathy said, recapping the marker she’d used on the storyboard and dropping it on a nearby table. “And it wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Cody had run three times in the last year, which accounted for the limited manpower working the case. The locals just didn’t believe this was a kidnapping, but the case was getting a lot of media attention and so they’d called in the FBI and the CACU.

  “What do you think?” Alec asked, trusting Cathy’s instincts on child behavior more than those of an overworked police force.

  She hesitated, considering, taking her time before answering. “If he ran, it was spur of the moment. According to his mother, nothing is missing.” Cathy crossed her arms, again weighing what she knew. “And I went through his room as well. I don’t think she’s lying. He left behind his clothes, his Walkman, a stash of money under his mattress—two hundred dollars that I don’t want to even guess about how he got. Everything a nine-year-old boy takes when he runs.”

  Again, Alec agreed. It was a matter of looking for patterns, behavior that fit the specific outcome. Given certain stimuli, most people reacted in predictable ways. Cause and effect. It was what made profiling work.

  “Okay,” he said. “We’ll assume an abduction, but keep our options open.”

  She nodded, going to retrieve her coffee.

  “Let’s move on.” Alec pushed off the table and pointed toward the second point on the time line. “Cody arrived at school before the eight-fifteen bell. He was in his homeroom and the rest of his classes at the designated times throughout the day.”

  “And no one remembers him acting differently or doing anything else unusual.” Cathy took a careful sip of her coffee and put it down. “Although, I wasn’t too impressed with the interviews, especially those done at the school.”

  Alec wouldn’t have put it quite so nicely. He was seriously undermanned, with only a half-dozen agents from the Baltimore office working the case and another half-dozen locals—all rookies—doing the legwork. There just weren’t enough experienced agents or officers to go around.

  “I want a second set of interviews. Call Quantico and see if Matheson can spare a day, just to interview the kids at the school.” Matheson, a specialist in child interviews, was in high demand. No one was going to be eager to let him head up to Baltimore for a day on a case the locals believed was a runaway. “He owes me. So tell him I’m collecting.”

  Cathy grinned and made a note. “And if he’s still unavailable?”

  “Get over there yourself. You’re the closest thing to a trained specialist we have, and probably just as good.” Like most CAC coordinators, Cathy had a background in child-related work. She held a Ph.D. in child psychology and had practiced for five years before joining the FBI. “If Cody even ate something different for lunch, I want to know about it.”

  “I’ll make the call.”

  “Okay, let’s get back to the time line,” Alec said. “Cody left school around two thirty with Melinda Farmer, age ten, and a class ahead of him in school. They walked partway home together, split at the corner of Hull and Marriott, a ten-minute walk. Tops. Less than three blocks from Cody’s house. And, as far as we know, she’s the last person who saw him.”

  “You want Matheson to interview her as well?”

  “No, you take her. She’s more likely to talk to a woman. She walked with Cody almost every day. If anyone knows anything, it’s Melinda. If he ran, she’ll know. She may even know where. And if Roy used his fists, she’ll know that, too.”

  “I’ll make it a priority. And what do you want me to do with the locals?”

  “Get them walking the streets again. Expand the search. Get them over to the docks and Cross Street Market. I bet the kid spent some time there. Someone saw something, and I want to know who and what.”

  “You got it.”

  Alec tossed down the last of his now lukewarm coffee. Hot or not, he needed the caffeine. “So, assuming Cody got home, say anywhere between three and three-thirty, he was supposed to call his mother, who was working an afternoon shift. He didn’t, but she claims he often forgets. So when she didn’t hear from him by four, she called home. No answer. She assumed he went out, and though irritated with him, she wasn’t concerned. Again, she claims he
’s been getting harder and harder to control lately.”

  “Which is backed up by the fact he’s run away three times in the last year.”

  “Yeah.” Alec sighed and dragged a hand through his hair. He didn’t like where this was headed. “Okay, Ellen arrives home at five thirty, and Cody’s still not home. Now she’s angry. She starts calling friends, neighbors, but no one’s seen him. Finally she calls the police at four minutes past ten, seven hours after Cody’s been missing.”

  She might already have been too late.

  Seventy-four percent of the children murdered during a kidnapping are dead within three hours of the abduction.

  But Alec didn’t believe Cody was dead. He had no good reason, except an odd feeling that there was something different about this case. Moving away from the storyboard, he dropped into his chair at the large conference-room table. Leaning back, he closed his eyes and this time dragged both hands through his hair.

  “So, what’s your gut telling you?” Cathy asked.

  He didn’t want to say it, but the facts were staring him in the face. “Stranger abduction.” The hardest type of case to break.

  “Yeah.” She sounded deflated. “Me, too.”

  “And it was high risk.” Alec leaned forward. “Cody’s a street-smart kid. He’s not getting into a stranger’s car. Hell, he’d probably be more likely to pop a tire with a switchblade.”

  Since his father had left, his mother had paraded one man after the another through their lives. Cody had spent a lot of time on the streets. He knew the score.

  “And look at him.” Alec picked up Cody’s picture and slid it across the table to her. “He’s beautiful.”

  “They’re all beautiful.”

  “Not like this kid.” He had an angel’s face, though he tried to hide it with a scowl, dark blue eyes ringed with sooty lashes, and hair that, even shaggy and dirty, looked touched by gold. “I bet he’s been fighting since he was five, just because of that face.” Alec tapped a finger on the glossy photo. “This boy was targeted.”