“Oh, my, that’s quite the love story waiting to happen. How do you know he’s interested?”
“Little sister, you know and I know when a man is interested in you. All the right vibes were there. It was, like, immediate attraction on my part, and I must say, for a man his age, he provided a clear, physical indication of his reaction to me. If you get what I mean.”
“Oh, I get the drift. Hey, I still get a lot of men who hit on me. Then Sara shows up and plants one on my lips, and that’s the immediate end of any of those notions.”
“You’re such a hottie Angelina! Sara is one lucky gal!”
“So, what’s his name?”
“It’s Quinn McSpain. He has two grown children and a few grand-kids. He runs. I run. He has a road bike and loves to ride hard. Where has this man been all my life?”
“So, what’s next? Have you talked since you last saw him?” Angelina asked.
“No, we haven’t and it’s killing me. He knows I’m out here, visiting you, and probably doesn’t expect me to call right away.”
“You already know what I think you should do Louisa.” Angelina said.
“Yep, I do, and I plan to call the man tonight!”
They hugged each other and giggled for a long time.
Louisa smiled as she thought of Quinn.
The fact that he had two children was an unexpected turn of events. He had set up his room for one child. He was not without resources, however. He would handle this. He had a spare bed in the house so each child could be in a separate bed. He considered separating them but changed his mind; he thought they would be more receptive to their new home if they were together. They would have to share the toilet. He had enough food for them both—as least, enough for the time they would need to eat.
The room was secure and quiet. They could yell and scream as much as they wanted, but no one would hear them. He would see and hear them when he was gone; he had set up tiny cameras in the room, which was also wired for sound.
They had been his children for two days now. He watched the news accounts of their abduction and now knew their names. He had kept them sedated for most of the time but let them drift back into consciousness from time to time so they could eat and see him. He sat in the single chair in the room. It was so quiet. He was very still. He was also very naked.
He looked at Katie and Pete. He had taken all their clothes off. They were still sleeping for now, but the sedative would soon wear off.
They were his, for now and until the end of their young lives.
He would deliver them pure into the afterlife.
They would never see the corrupted life of adulthood.
He would save their souls.
He would rot in hell.
And he didn’t care.
It was too late for caring
, he thought.
* * *
The day after the children were taken, Tim flew down to Miami for his mother’s funeral. Susan drove him to Greensboro for his flight and stayed in Hillsville to be close if the police needed her. Sergeant Jefferson helped her find a place to rent within walking distance of the sheriff ’s department.
“Honey, are you sure you’re going to be all right while I’m gone?” Tim had asked.
“Tim, I know it’s important for you to be with your family for the funeral. You can be back here in a couple of hours when the kids are found. I need to work with the volunteers who are searching for them. I also need to talk to the TV stations from Roanoke and Winston-Salem who want to interview me. That will help get the message out to someone who might have seen something. I pray to God someone saw something or knows something.”
Ms. Tillwell had called several members of her church group friends, and more than fifty volunteers had gathered at the motel the morning after the abductions to help the deputies search the area. They spent hours searching within a three-mile radius from the motel into some heavily wooded areas. They searched till darkness set in. Unfortunately, they found nothing.
Levi and Special Agent Craig, along with the state police crime scene technicians from Wytheville, focused on the area immediately around the motel room and where the Preston car was parked. A technician became interested in a set of tire tracks he found directly across Highway 52 from the motel. The ground was moist from the rain and fog from the night before. He called Craig and Levi over to investigate.
“Take a look at this. It appears that a vehicle was parked here fairly recently, probably as recently as last night. Look at those shoe or boot imprints that are pointed in the direction of the wall.”
Craig circled the area for a long time and then offered, “I see it now. The perp parks here, hidden in the fog. He or she then crosses the highway and hides in the grass until the kids come out of the room.”
Levi then jumped in. “He grabs both of the kids, then comes back across the street and stuffs them into the trunk or maybe the back of a van.”
“Exactly, Sherlock,” interjected Craig. “That’s one very good possibility of what may have happened.” Levi fumed silently.
Craig asked the technicians to take the needed impressions from the area. He then went back across the highway to the tall grass. Levi followed closely behind, his mouth shut. They examined the tall grass near the side of the room and where the car was parked. Levi and Craig then moved on with one of the other technicians to the tall grass near the motel, where they all got down on their hands and knees and searched meticulously in overlapping directions.
“Well, I’ll be danged!” the technician suddenly shouted. “Hey, guys! Come look at this!” He carefully cleared debris away from a single leaf on the ground in front of him. There was a shiny, dried milky blob on the edge of the leaf.
“What the hell’s that?” Craig asked.
“Well, I’ll have to test it first, of course, but right now I’m thinking its snake spit.”
“Snake spit? What?” Craig was confused. Levi grinned.
The technician grinned. “Semen. A dang good sample too. All dried up.”
“Yeah?” Craig said. “So what’s that mean? That our man had a quickie with one of the kids before he took em?”
“Nah, probably not,” the technician said. “Not enough time. Probably just a visit from Mrs. Palmer and her five daughters while he was hiding out here in the grass. Must’ve got excited by the waiting, something like that. With weirdoes like this, who knows?”
“Semen!” Levi said. “That means we’ve got—we’ve got—.” “Dang right,” the technician said. “Means we now got ourselves some D and some N and some A. Take another good look, gentlemen, because what you see before your very eyes is the chemical equivalent of a good, old-fashioned hangman’s noose!”
* * *
Susan had just arrived at the rented apartment when her cell phone rang. She didn’t recognize the number but decided to answer.
“Hello is this Susan Preston?” a voice asked.
She quickly replied, “It is.”
“Mrs. Preston, this is Scott Cohen. I’m a reporter for the Carroll County News. Is there a good time we can meet to talk about your missing children?”
“Right now is good.”
She gave her address to the reporter, and he arrived at the apartment within five minutes.
“Mrs. Preston, let me begin by saying how sorry I am this has happened. I don’t think we’ve ever had anything like this happen in Carroll County.”
Susan figured Cohen was all of thirty years old. She wasn’t sure if his condolences offered her any comfort at all. She detailed once again all of the events of the night of the abduction. He seemed to be taking notes on everything she said.
“Have you or the police issued an Amber Alert for the Pete and Katie?”
“Well, no. The sheriff ’s investigators suggested that we wait at least a day or two before we took that step. I didn’t really agree, but I discussed it with my husband and we agreed to wait,” Susan replied.
“In a way, that doesn’t surprise me. The sheriff and other county officials will be none too happy to have this sort of publicity. Bad things like this happen across the border in Winston-Salem and Roanoke, not here in Carroll County. Elections are happening next November, and this will have an impact. The sheriff is up for reelection, as are several county supervisors.”
“I see,” she said with a frown. “So let me get this straight: The sheriff and the politicians around here are more interested in getting reelected than finding my children?
That is outrageous!”
she thought.
“Mrs. Preston, don’t get the wrong idea. I’m certain that the sheriff wants your children found as quickly as possible. It’s the bad publicity he doesn’t want. The sheriff’s opponents will remind voters on a regular basis if this isn’t resolved soon. Do understand that jobs up here are hard to come by in this recession. Several opponents will sling whatever mud they can to gain an advantage.”
“I understand, Mister Cohen, I really do, but there’s nothing more important to us than our kids.” Susan turned her back and began to sob.
He waited a moment before he spoke again. “So, can I get the Amber Alert out right now?”
“Yes, yes, please. Can you help us do that?” she asked.
“You have current photos of them both?”
“Yes, I took these two pictures with my iPhone,” Susan replied, handing him the photos with a shaky hand.
“Great, let’s get the ball rolling. I’ll call Levi Blackburn at the sheriff ’s department to let him know what we’re doing.”
“Thank you, Mister Cohen. My husband is in Miami for his mother’s funeral and I’m dealing with this alone right now.”
“I understand, Mrs. Preston, and please call me Scott.”
“I will, and please do call me Susan.”
Her thoughts drifted back to her children.
Quinn was happy to be back in Fancy Gap. He hadn’t realized how much he missed the place. Though he knew he could never live in a city like the District again, at least he’d had a good time at the retirement party—and he had met Louisa Hawke.
Louisa. Memories of their brief encounter had taken hold of his thoughts as tenaciously as the Fancy Gap fog that often clung to his mountain lair. As much as he tried to resist it, his mind wandered again and again to the sight of her cuddled up next to him on her couch. Even the details still haunted him—her outdoorsy scent; that silky, red hair; and especially that hard-to-believe skin, nearly as white as a pearl. Plus she was a runner and cyclist. Put it all together, and she was one special package.
But was that package really headed his way?
he thought.
To get his mind back on track, he busied himself with the neglected chores on the grounds of the mountain house. Ellen had had the green thumb, had been the master gardener who’d planted the vegetable garden and flower beds every spring. To honor her memory and keep from disappointing their children when they visited him, Quinn had gamely tried to keep the tradition alive. He had even kept Ellen’s subscription to the
Farmers’ Almanac
current. But he simply had no talent with dirt and green things, even with an almanac to help. So whenever he needed fresh vegetables, he usually ended up sneaking to the local farmers market.
Even now as he puttered about, his thoughts kept drifting back to Louisa. Had she had too much to drink that night in Washington? Or had she really felt attracted to him? Was she really remote and aloof, or was she—well, was she a possibility? He harbored a tiny hope that she would phone him, but he was also a realist. This woman was an accomplished and almost legendary professional, head of the FBI Criminal Division for many years, who had been feted by her own government and even a few foreign ones. What could she possibly see in a man who now lived almost like a hermit in Fancy Gap, of all places, and who hadn’t been with a woman in more than two years?
Get real,
he told himself, chuckling at his own foolishness.
It ain’t gonna happen.
He finally gave up all pretense of doing chores and decided to catch the sunset from his hot tub on the lower deck. He undressed, threw on a robe, and grabbed a bottle of his favorite Michael & David’s Petite Petit. Just as he seated the corkscrew, his cell phone rang. He sprinted for it, suddenly thinking again, against all odds, that it might be Louisa.
To his dismay, it was only Nigel DuPont, who lived in the house that was directly behind him on the cliff. Quinn groaned when he saw the number. Nigel was retired and a good neighbor who loved to tell jokes to whoever would listen for as long as that person would listen. Quinn had often marveled at Nigel’s patient wife, Kathy, who had undoubtedly heard the same jokes over and over again for years without a peep of protest.
What was worse, though, was that some thought Nigel to be the unofficial mayor of Fancy Gap, holding court from time-to-time at the Fancy Gap Deli.
“Quinn! We were just about to file a missing-persons report. Where’n heck you been, man? Ain’t seen you for five or six days.”
“Oh, just drove up to DC for a retirement party for a friend. Got back last night.”
“DC? Well, well, how are things in the District of Calamity? Ain’t it amazing how just one president can snafu things so much in such a short time? About time for a new one, don’t you think?” Nigel made no bones about his right-wing leanings.
“Well, actually,” Quinn said, “my sources tell me there’s no need for a new one. The one we’ve got is going to fix everything by doubling taxes for all those super-rich families like the DuPonts.”
“Ha! You must mean the other DuPonts. And don’t get me started on taxes. I’m not taking the bait today. Only reason I called was to ask you to lunch tomorrow with me and Sheriff Pierce. You met him yet?”
“Nope. Heard a lot about him, though.”
“Well, whaddaya say? Can you come? I’m buying.”
“Sure, why not?”
“OK. Tomorrow, eleven thirty at the deli. Bring an extra fifty cents in case he asks for a campaign contribution. And don’t be surprised if he’s gotta leave in a hurry. He’s got his hands full right now. I’m actually surprised, in fact, that I could get him to come to lunch at all. You hear about those missing kids?”
“There was something on television this morning, I think, but I wasn’t paying much attention.”