by Beverly Long
“I know. She’s on the list,” A.L. said. “We’re going to ask her all about that. But right now, we need to go review the Antler file and then talk to the parents. We look for any connection between them and the Whitmans. I think I might like to talk to whoever was managing the day care at the time of Corrine’s disappearance.”
“I got a text from Ferguson. He has meetings set up with the remaining day care teacher and the cook today.”
“Make sure he asks about their relationship with Kara Wiese. Do they like her, trust her, et cetera?”
Rena nodded and picked up her phone. Once she was done, she put her phone away. “If Emma knew who took her, maybe it wasn’t her parents or her grandmother but a family friend. Or maybe the parents of one of her little friends, somebody she trusts.”
“All possibilities.” He didn’t sound discouraged.
She understood. There was still hope. “I’m going to need to eat some lunch pretty soon.” She picked up her phone. Punched a few keys. “There’s a little diner two blocks from here.”
“Good enough,” A.L. said.
The BLT was better than he expected and the French fries were so hot he burned his tongue. Rena had ordered some kind of salad and a cup of soup. They were getting some interest from the locals who were sitting at the counter. Strangers in a small town got noticed. It was the nice thing about small towns. The bad part was you had to drive twenty miles to buy toilet paper and paper towels.
And schools in small towns had taken a hit. Many small districts had consolidated into larger, trying to stay afloat.
Thankfully, not in Baywood. They appeared to have a solid balance sheet and had maintained a reputation for excellence. And when Traci had taken her ACT, albeit for the second time, her score had shown that. She could go most anywhere her little heart desired. And he was determined to figure out a way to pay for it. But the last time he’d talked to her about it, she’d been indecisive. Maybe UW in Madison. Maybe Marquette in Milwaukee. Maybe University of San Diego. He’d shaken his head at that. He wanted her to spread her wings but she needed to do that in the Midwest. And since he’d be writing a big check, his vote counted.
“Don’t screw around too long,” he’d warned her.
Were the Whitmans ever going to get to have the same conversation with Emma? Were they going to get to see her roll her eyes and toss her hair but then be the lucky recipients of a kiss on the cheek before she flounced out of the room?
He pushed his half-eaten sandwich to the side, no longer hungry.
Or was the sunlight going to be ripped out of their lives forever?
Seven
He parked in a visitor spot to the left of the front door of the Dover Police Department. Once inside, it was just minutes before he and Rena were settled in a small room with a table and four chairs. Sometimes they split a file to get through it more quickly. This time, they sat side by side, looking at each piece of information together. Before they could flip the first page, A.L.’s cell phone pinged. He looked at the text, then at Rena.
“Doug Franklin got ahold of the Antlers. They can see us at four at their house.” A.L. checked his watch. “We’ve got two hours to get through this.”
“Do we have an address?” Rena asked.
“Yep,” A.L. said, flipping the first page. For the next ninety-plus minutes, they relived the journey taken by Doug Franklin and others. It was sobering. Could easily see the increasing frustration by officers as the days wore on. Case notes were shorter, almost terse.
Cops were human. They got pissed off, too. Couldn’t show it but sometimes it bled through on the pages.
“I’m getting the impression that Doug Franklin really didn’t like Rosemary Bracken,” Rena said thoughtfully. “Can’t say that I blame him.”
“He’s got a missing kid and she can’t even be bothered to answer the door when he knows that she’s inside the damn house. He’s more restrained than me,” A.L. admitted.
“You’d have broken down the damn door.”
“Maybe,” A.L. admitted. “Multiple discussions with Trapper Frogg. He seems like a bit of an ass.”
“Yeah. Smart answer for everything.” Rena pointed to a line. “Here’s where Doug asks him about his son. Oh my. Coyote. His son is named Coyote.”
“Franklin did say it was odd. But Christ, with a last name of Frogg, don’t you think the parents could have gone with Mike or Jim? The kid was going to have to endure enough.”
“Appears that he was nineteen, living at home, working a part-time job at a burger joint. Not much else here.”
They flipped through the remaining pages and finally he closed the file. “I got the day care director’s name. Brenda Owen. We’re going to need to see if she’s still around.”
Rena picked up her phone. In a couple clicks, she showed A.L. an address. “I’ll bet this is her. We’ve got time to drive by her house. See if she’s home.”
“Let’s do it.” A.L. sighed. “I didn’t see any obvious misses.”
“Me, either,” Rena said. She sat back in her chair and stretched her neck. Then leaned forward, her forearms on the table. “Do you think it’s possible that someone was so successful in their first attempt to grab a child that ten years later, they come back and replicate the crime?”
“I don’t know. But we’re going to ask for some assistance from the state. I want to see every abduction or attempted abduction involving a day care center in the entire country for the last twenty years.”
“Probably a good idea,” Rena said. “Like Doug Franklin said. A missing kid. You do everything and then one more thing.”
“In that vein, let’s get going. We’ll try Brenda Owen’s house. That should be fairly fast. And then head over to the Antlers’. It would be good to get back to Baywood then, because I think we ought to talk to Elaine Broadstreet again tonight.”
* * *
Brenda Owen lived less than ten minutes away from the police station. On the way, they passed through the heart of Dover, which wasn’t much. The downtown was a three-block-long Main Street. A.L. counted five bars.
But Brenda’s house, which was two blocks off Main, was on a sweet little tree-lined street with lots of story-and-a-half Cape Cods. They found her address and knocked. A woman, early sixties, answered the door.
“Afternoon, ma’am,” Rena said. “Are you Brenda Owen?”
“Yes.”
“The Brenda Owen who was a director of a childcare center here in Dover about ten years ago?”
“Yes. Who are you?”
“I’m Detective Morgan and this is Detective McKittridge.” They held out badges. “Can we have a minute of your time?”
The woman looked over their shoulder, as if to verify that they’d arrived in a cop car. She was going to be disappointed. A.L.’s SUV didn’t look special. Although Rena knew from personal experience that it ran pretty damn smoothly at over a hundred miles per hour.
“Perhaps out here,” the woman said. She stepped onto the small porch. There was only one lawn chair. None of them sat.
“On Wednesday, in Baywood, Wisconsin, a five-year-old girl disappeared from her day care.”
“I know,” the woman said.
“And how did you know that, ma’am?” Rena asked, keeping her voice level.
“I saw it on the news. Then I looked online at the articles in the Baywood newspaper. Then I spoke to Alice Quest.”
“Do you know Alice Quest?”
The woman shook her head. “No. But what I would have given ten years ago if somebody had reached out to me and said that they understood the terror. It’s...hard for someone to understand, but part of what makes the situation so terrible is that you feel very alone. Even your friends, people you’ve known for years and imagined cared for you, turn against you. No one wants to support the person who let this happen.”
“You were the director of the day care when Corrine Antler went missing in what seems to be a similar situation,” Rena said.
“Yes. I’d been the director for over ten years. Nothing bad had ever happened. We’d never even had a broken arm on the playground. But everybody forgot that pretty quickly.”
“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Rena said.
The woman shrugged. “Of course, it’s not about me. It’s about Corrine Antler and her parents. Her siblings. But I called Alice because I’m probably the only one who understands what she’s going through.”
A.L. shifted, maybe to get the late afternoon sun out of his eyes. “I imagine you might have had your suspicions about what happened?”
“I was confident that Corrine had somehow gotten outside and wandered off. And at first, I guess I imagined that she’d be found pretty quickly. It wasn’t until we were about two days into it that I realized that it wasn’t going to turn out okay. That nothing would ever be right again.”
“Did you ever adjust your thinking about the cause of her disappearance?”
Brenda stared at them. “I never thought it was anybody from the day care. My staff. Other parents. I just couldn’t see that. But then again, I also couldn’t imagine that a stranger had gotten inside our day care and that nobody had seen him or her. So, no. I guess I didn’t. But now...now that it’s happened again, maybe I was wrong.”
Her words hung in the warm afternoon air. It was a beautiful fall day but Rena felt a chill cross her body. It had been ten years. Was it even possible that someone had taken both little girls?
“We’re on our way to talk to the Antlers,” A.L. said.
Something passed in Brenda’s eyes but she said nothing.
“Do you still see them?” Rena asked.
“No.”
Something wasn’t right. “Dover is pretty small. That probably has to happen.”
“The Antlers have never forgiven me. Once, when I was in the grocery store, I saw Mrs. Antler come in. Our eyes met. She...turned around and left the store. Left her cart right there in the aisle. Guess she couldn’t stand to be in the same place I was.”
“Did you continue to manage the day care?” A.L. asked.
“The day care only stayed open another six months. Then it closed. It was closed for more than six years before somebody else purchased the building and reopened it. I wasn’t interested in trying out for my old job.”
“Where did you work after the day care closed?” Rena asked.
“I didn’t. This is a small community. Everybody knew the story and quite frankly, nobody wanted to hire the woman who lost Corrine Antler.”
Not much to say to that. Rena looked at A.L.
“Have you ever been to Baywood?” A.L. asked.
“No.”
“Know anybody in Baywood?” A.L. came back.
“No. Although I told Alice Quest that I could drive down sometime next week if things weren’t better.”
Was it odd that she was so quick to bond with Alice? Maybe not. She and Alice were an unfortunate minority. “I imagine Alice appreciated that,” Rena said.
“I guess. She’s still in the hopeful stage that the nightmare is going to end. For her sake, I want her to be right.”
* * *
Patsy and Greg Antler lived in a two-story house at the edge of town. The paint was fresh, the leaves were raked, and while it was way too early, there were pumpkins flanking the front door. While they waited for their knock to be answered, A.L. thought about all the damn pumpkins he’d carved over the years with Traci. How excited she’d been when she’d finally been able to hold the knife and cut on her own.
Little steps toward independence.
Memories.
When the door swung open, he was surprised to see Doug Franklin. “Patsy and Greg asked me if I could stay,” the man said.
“No problem,” A.L. said.
Doug led them down the hall and into a family room filled with soft leather couches and matching recliners. Patsy and Greg sat on one couch. They were both midforties and maybe thirty pounds overweight. They stood as he and Rena entered. “Detectives McKittridge and Morgan,” he said as he and Rena both showed badges. “Thank you for seeing us.”
“Of course,” Patsy said. “Can I get you something to drink? I have coffee made.” Her tone was pleasant but he didn’t get the impression that she was relaxed. Her jaw was tight and her eyes were wary.
He and Rena both shook their heads. “Thanks but no. We don’t want to take up too much of your time,” Rena said.
Greg motioned for them to take a seat. “Another little girl,” he said. He obviously wanted to cut to the chase.
“Yes,” A.L. said. “She’s five and went missing from her day care. And while not exact, the circumstances are similar enough to yours that we wanted to have a conversation with the two of you.”
“Do you think it’s the same person?” Patsy asked. “Could it be?”
Again, there was the hope. That perhaps finally this would lead them back to Corrine.
“We don’t have any reason to think so,” Rena said, her voice gentle. “The parents are Leah and Troy Whitman. Do you know them?”
Both Patsy and Greg shook their heads.
“Troy owns his own automotive garage business and Leah is a paralegal at the Bailey Shepherd Law Firm,” Rena said.
“I’m sorry,” Greg said. “I don’t think either of us has even ever been to Baywood.”
“I was there once,” Patsy said, correcting her husband. “Maybe seven or eight years ago. For a bridal shower for my younger sister. Her college roommate was hosting.”
“What’s your sister’s name?” A.L. said, pulling out his notebook.
“Toni Krider. She lives in Denver now.”
“And the person who hosted?” A.L. said.
“Uh...” Patsy stopped. “I guess I don’t remember her name. She was a bridesmaid, dark hair, very pretty. I think they were roommates in college.” She shook her head. “I’m sorry,” she said. “So much of those first few years after are really a blur.” She paused. “Like you’re living but not really living.”
Going through the fucking motions of life. “I understand,” A.L. said.
“I could ask my sister,” Patsy said.
Rena handed her a business card. It was a long shot but any information was better than no information. “That would be great. Either my office or my cell is fine,” she said.
“I wish we could be more helpful,” Patsy said. Sincerity rang in her tone. “I hate to think of another family going through...well, going through what we went through.”
Hell, A.L. thought. They’d been to hell and back. A.L. closed his small notebook and put it in his pocket.
Rena stood up. “We’re just grateful for your time. We’ll be going—”
“Do the Whitmans have other children?” Greg asked, interrupting Rena.
“No, sir. They don’t,” A.L. answered.
“I can’t imagine,” Patsy said, looking at her husband.
“It was the only thing that saved us,” he said, blinking his eyes fast. “We had to keep going because we had two other children who needed us. We did the best we could but I suspect our sons would tell you that there were some rough years. The grief just...consumes a person. It’s hard to imagine ever finding joy again.”
“You do,” his wife said, her hand on his arm. “Eventually. But...” Her voice trailed off. She stood up and started walking for the door. She evidently didn’t intend to finish her sentence.
She didn’t need to. A.L. knew. Eventually. But not really.
* * *
Rena let out a loud breath once they were in their vehicle. “That was excruciating. Even now, ten years later, their pain is palpable.”
“It was pretty goddamn bad,” A.L. ag
reed. His throat felt closed up and he had a monster of a headache behind one eye. Corrine Antler would be fifteen, just a few years shy of Traci. If that had been him and Jacqui instead? Hell. He might have just put a bullet through his brain. “We keep asking questions,” he said. “Until we figure out what happened.”
The hundred-mile drive back to Baywood took ninety-eight minutes. A.L. and Rena took the elevator to their office. It was after six but all four of the other detectives on the Baywood Police Department were still working, most of them tapping on computer keyboards. Documentation was a part of the job.
A.L. pulled out a chair. Rena had detoured for a cup of coffee. By the time she got to the desk with a cup for both of them, he was flipping through his notebook. Looking for something. Anything that could lead them in the right direction. “Leah said that she left the house before 7:00. That Emma wasn’t yet up.”
“Yeah,” Rena said, looking at her own notes. “She had a meeting in Madison.”
“What meeting?” A.L. asked, thinking that he’d missed something in his own notes.
“I don’t have it,” Rena said.
“We didn’t ask,” A.L. said.
“Didn’t seem like the most important question at the time. Is it now?”
A.L. picked up his keys. Tossed them from one hand to the other. “Gives us a reason to talk to her again.”
“You think that’s important?”
“I don’t know,” A.L. said.
Rena put down her coffee cup. “Everything and one more thing. Let’s go.”
But before they got to the door, Ferguson waved at them to hold up. “FYI, you two. Faster got some heat from James Adeva at the press conference this morning. I don’t think he’s happy.”
Adeva was a crime reporter for the Baywood Bulletin. Pushy, detail-oriented, with the memory of an elephant, he was pretty good at his job. He caught inconsistencies and turned them into headlines. Chief Faster, who could sometimes play fast, no pun intended, and loose with the facts probably had nightmares about him. “Anything specific in his craw?”
