And Then There Was One (16 page)

Jackie had taken only two bites of mac and cheese before pushing
her plate away. How could she eat with Mom crying so hard? She thought about her sisters in some horrible place with nothing to eat. Were they being tortured? Could they even be dead? She didn’t think that they were, but she had so many questions. There was so much she didn’t understand, but no one wanted to talk to her. She knew they all must hate her, even Grandma, because she had such a funny look on her face. Jackie wished she was with her sisters, even if they were in a terrible place. Sammie would make her laugh, and she’d be there for Alex. If all three were together, they’d be okay, but with her alone, without her sisters, nobody would love her.

Mom was crying even harder now, and Jackie couldn’t stand it so she accidently-on-purpose knocked over her glass of milk. Mom might be angry, but it might make her stop crying.

A hefty black man in a dark, crisp suit met Streeter when the FBI aircraft landed at Tampa International Airport. It was eleven thirty, and Streeter rubbed his raw, red eyes as he walked toward his Tampa counterpart. He’d never seen Special Agent Emmitt Rusk, but they’d developed a decent relationship working the Monroe case on the phone and in cyberspace. When Rusk introduced himself, Streeter recognized the polished voice.

But as Rusk approached, he seemed to be motioning for Streeter to go back on the plane. “Best to talk in there,” he called out. “Don’t know whether you’ll be staying or what.”

“I just want to get some shut eye,” Streeter said, continuing in Rusk’s direction, eyeing the waiting Suburban that would take him to his hotel.

“I hear you, but that’s not in the cards,” Rusk said. “I’ve got some real bad news for you, Streeter. Best we go on the plane, sit down, and discuss.”

Rusk did not beat around the bush. He came right out with it. Maxwell Cutty had been assassinated one hour ago. Leaving his house. Long-range sniper. Bullet to the head dropped him dead.

Streeter was glad he had taken Rusk’s advice and sat down in one of the plush seats. He wasn’t sure his legs could have supported him through the rage that surged through his being. Rusk’s Tampa team had lost forever the last credible link to Katie and Scott’s little girls.

“What about the surveillance? You guys had Cutty surrounded.”

“Our guys were in place. Whoever did this was a pro. Highpowered rifle. Night vision. The works. The question is who had him taken out?”

“Shit.” Streeter pounded his fists on the table in front of him. “Where are those little girls?” All the suspects paraded through his mind. Watkins. Franklin. The ransom note. Cutty. And all the kooks that still kept calling in. And what the nondescript middle-aged white woman that their lone witness had seen. That woman was the link to whoever took the girls, but finding her, a needle in a haystack. Sammie and Alex had gone with her, voluntarily, not kicking and screaming.

“Sure you’ve eliminated the parents?”

Streeter’s grimace strained his facial muscles. “I ask myself that at least once every hour. Bottom line, I cannot believe anyone can fake their kind of grief.”

“Except it happens.”

“I can’t see a motive.”

“What kind of people are they, the parents?”

“According to everybody, they were a happy, well-adjusted family. Personally, I like them both. Scott’s a man’s man, an athlete with a winning smile, one of those big, booming voices, easy going personality.” Streeter paused before going on. “Katie’s more complex. More edgy, less warm and fuzzy, more controlling, won’t let the third daughter out of her sight. Funny, the psychiatrists I’ve known seem like that, more emotionally detached, sort of erratic. On the other hand I’ve only seen her under extreme stress. She could be totally different under normal circumstances.”

“So you’re not following the parent angle?”

“I can’t totally rule them out, but nothing leads in that direction.”

“Tough call,” said Rusk. “Hey, we’re going to work the hell out of the case here, but I wasn’t sure whether you would want to go back to Detroit, or stay here. For me, it’ll be an all-nighter, but you look like hell.”

Streeter was too exhausted to be making critical decisions. What more could he be doing in Detroit?And Detroit meant facing the Monroe parents with this devastating news.

“Rusk, I’m going to a hotel. I can’t function without some sleep. Maybe things will come together for me in the morning.”

“Then let’s roll,” Rusk said. “I’ve got to get back to the field office, but I’ll drop you at a hotel. I just wanted to tell you face-to-face how we fucked up. Let you decide whether to go or stay.”

Vendetta Against Mom? Can Law Enforcement Protect Key
Witnesses Who Protect the Most Vulnerable of Children.
— Tampa Daily News
, June 18

Streeter awoke Thursday morning with the weight of the missing Monroe children preying so heavily on his mind that a pounding pressure began to squeeze his temples. He needed Tylenol and caffeine. He made coffee in his room, swallowed two geltabs, then took a hot shower. Feeling better, the pounding headache gone, he made the first of three calls. The easy one: arrangements for the jet to take him back to Detroit. He could leave at eight, putting him downtown before noon.

Next, he called Special Agent Rusk. Nothing new about the Cutty assassination. Sniper placement was confirmed as a clump of trees atop a knoll on neighboring property. Nothing left behind. A clear getaway. Nothing in the Cutty house or car or office relating to the whereabouts of the Monroe children. Rusk did not elaborate, but implied, based on scrutiny of Cutty’s financial records, that Cutty had played a role in his ex-wife’s death. He also confirmed that he’d pulled one hundred fifty thousand dollars out of his firm’s bank account on Monday. The money had not been found.

Streeter didn’t care about Cutty’s dead wife. “Was Maxwell Cutty responsible for the kidnapping of Sammy and Alex?”

“He’s a credible suspect, but without evidence —” Evidence that would now never surface. But what about that missing money? Did it relate to Katie’s theory of a professional hire?

Streeter’s last call was to Ellen Camry. He asked her to go directly to Lucy Jones’s house and inform the Monroes that Cutty was dead,
that they were still looking for Adam Kaninsky, and that Streeter would be back that afternoon should they wish to see him. Camry was a trooper, but Streeter could tell by the tremble in her calm, steady voice that she was badly shaken.

With time still left to get to the airport, Streeter ordered a room service breakfast, dressed, packed, ate, all those ordinary things normal people do. He missed his kids. His heart ached for Katie and Scott. In the light of the day, he dismissed the lingering suspicions about them that he and Rusk had discussed the previous night.

Camry rang Lucy’s doorbell at seven thirty in the morning. She had not called to forewarn them. Scott answered the door in a tee shirt and sweatpants. Immediately, he wished that he had not. Agent Camry would not be there at that time of the morning with good news. He opened the door and she followed him inside.

“Katie’s not up yet,” he said. “Should I get her?”

“Yes,” Camry said.

Scott ascended the stairs like a robot, passing Jackie at the landing, turning back only when she spoke.

“Dad? Are you okay?”

He didn’t stop to respond. He needed to get Katie. He needed to protect Jackie. He needed to protect Alex and Sammie, but he was incapable of doing that.

“Hi, Agent Camry,” Jackie said, still in her nightgown, her hair hanging down, not yet brushed. “How come you’re here?”

“I came to talk to your parents,” Scott heard Camry say. He wished that he’d let Lucy take Jackie on her morning walk, but Katie would have gone ballistic if he’d let their daughter go outside. And Katie would have been right this time as the number of reporters camping out on Lucy’s street had multiplied. Poor Jackie was in a prison.

“Did you find my sisters?” Jackie asked.

Scott listened for Camry’s response. “No, honey, not yet,” she said.

“Thank God,” Scott said aloud before resuming his course up the steps.
They can’t be dead. She didn’t say that they were dead.

Katie, dressed in slacks and a tunic top, came into the living room just as Lucy returned from her morning walk. Scott had served Camry coffee and he’d fixed oatmeal for Jackie. As he poured coffee for Katie, he tried to conceal his annoyance. When he’d told her that Agent Camry needed to speak to them, together, Katie had said that she’d be right down. Half an hour later she appeared. Scott guessed why it had taken her so long. Like him, she was terrified of what the agent might tell them.

“Mom, can you take Jackie upstairs and get her ready to go out?” Katie asked.

Not saying a word, Lucy took her granddaughter’s hand and urged her up the steps.

“Why can’t you tell me what’s happening?” Jackie repeated.

Neither parent responded, nor did Camry.

“Come on, Jackie,” Lucy said. “Everything will be okay.”

Katie and Scott sat beside each other on the sofa.

“What is it?” Scott moved closer to Katie and she took his hand and placed it on her lap.

Camry took the last sip of her coffee and informed them what had happened in Tampa last night.

Surprisingly, Scott thought, Katie did not explode. She listened quietly, analytically, asking a few pertinent questions. She was mostly interested in Adam Kaninsky. Scott could see her shoulders slump and the life go out of her eyes when she was told that he was still missing. Scott couldn’t help but wonder what kind of a relationship his wife had had with that kid. Until this week, he’d really had no idea of the secrets that Katie kept, the sordid relationships that her forensic practice forced upon her. Yes, he was in awe of her talents, but he was now vividly resentful of the inherent evilness she faced in her practice. Yet, that ransom demand had come from his profession, not hers.

Agent Camry was getting ready to leave when Scott tuned back into the conversation.

Katie was saying, “From the beginning I was sure that Maxwell Cutty was behind this. I was so sure, but now with Norman Watkins, I don’t know. And the ransom note? How does it all connect?”

“You know we have hundreds of agents working the case, Dr. Monroe, a SWAT team on standby, all our resources —”

“Still, you don’t know where our daughters are!” Gone was Katie’s initial calm, her voice rising an octave, but shaking. “We have absolutely no idea. All those people working, yes, we know, but why can’t you people find them? And now Maxwell Cutty is dead. And Norman Watkins is on life support. The only connections to our daughters — get assassinated right in front of you or gets their brains blown out by one of your agents!”

Worried about Katie’s abrupt change from calm to hysteria, Scott’s first reaction was to try to calm her, but everything she said was true. The FBI had let the two most viable suspects slip though their hands. He was about to back her up, but before he could speak, Katie’s shoulders slumped, and she asked, “What about Aiden and Jake Cutty? Their mother’s dead —”

Who cares about that pervert’s kids? We need to find our daughters!
Scott wanted to yell, yet did not. But he did withdraw his hand from Katie’s grasp. The palpitations in his heart were constant now and he felt a surge of lightheadedness. He leaned back on the sofa and took slow, deep breaths. He was so close to the fatal ledge. So close that a single blast of wind would send him over. He needed to control his escalating fear.

“No, there’s no
apparent
connection to the ransom demand.”

Scott must have zoned out again. What had he missed? “Ransom?” he repeated.

“The FBI doesn’t think that the ransom demand came from Cutty,” Katie said.

“I don’t give a damn about what anybody
thinks
,” Scott said, his voice even louder than usual. “My little girls’ lives are at stake. And with all your
resources,
you have nothing. You haven’t even moved on the reward that my sister wants to offer! Are you all so smart that you
know
it’s not about money? And, you can bet your ass that we’ll have the money for whatever bastard called in that ransom offer.”

“Scott —”

Scott sensed that he’d gone too far, but he didn’t care. Katie started to get up, but he pulled her back and jerked her head to face him.
“God, Katie, I can’t help it. I’m on an emotional teeter-totter. I’m sorry. I’m letting you down. Anger goes up. Fear goes down. Back and forth in my head. I can’t make it stop.”

“I’m going back to the field office,” Camry said. “Agent Streeter will be back by noon. I will impress on him your sister’s desire to post a reward,
again
. Personally, I think it may be the right time. We may want you two to televise the offer. Maybe Miss Monroe, too.”

It’s about time you get your head out of your ass and start doing something
. Scott did not say that. Jackie had appeared at the stair landing. Long ago Scott and Katie agreed never to use unseemly language in front of their daughters.

“Mr. Monroe, we would like you to come down to continue going over professional baseball contacts,” Camry said. “We’ll be ready when you arrive.”