Gone (6 page)

“Quick, clean, and not a bad way to make ten grand.” Kincaid whipped the envelope off the glass, picked up the duplicates, and closed up the copy machine. “Now let me ask
you
something: Do you have ten grand?”

“Yes.”

“Would you pay it to ransom your estranged wife?”

Quincy didn’t bat an eye. “Yes.”

“There you go. It’s gonna be a good day. Let’s go hunt a fox.”

“I don’t think it’s about money,” Quincy insisted quietly.

“More rampant paranoia?”

“Maybe. But I know something you don’t know.”

“And what’s that, Mr. Profiler Man?”

“I know who the Fox is.”

9

Tuesday, 9:45 a.m. PST

D
OUGIE WAS OUT IN THE WOODS.
Dougie was always out in the woods. He didn’t mind the rain, the wind, the cold. Outside was good. Outside meant trees and pine needles and green moss that felt nice to the touch, but didn’t always taste so good. This morning, he’d tried three different shades of moss. One had tasted like dirt. One had tasted like tree bark. The third had made his mouth tingle curiously.

He hadn’t eaten any more of the third.

Now, Dougie was excavating the remains of a dead tree. The thick trunk had fallen probably ages ago, at least before Dougie had been born. Now it was a great, big rotted-out log, sprouting interesting fungus and housing loads of bugs. Dougie had a stick. He was digging, digging, digging. The more he dug, the more interesting bugs ran out.

Dougie was seven. At least that’s what people told him. He didn’t remember his birthday. Maybe sometime in February. His first “second family” had made up a date for him, his “homecoming day.” That had been in February, and they’d fed him cake and ice cream.

His first second family had been okay. At least he couldn’t remember anything bad. But one day the lady in the purple suit had arrived and told him to pack his bag. He was going to a new second family, but don’t worry, they would love him lots, too.

“Dougie,” the lady in the purple suit had told him quietly when they were out the front door, “you can’t play with matches like that; it makes people nervous. Promise me, no more matches.”

Dougie had shrugged. Dougie had promised. While behind them, the garage of his first second family’s home lay in smoldering ruins.

The second second family hadn’t celebrated birthdays or “homecoming days.” They hadn’t celebrated much of anything. His new mom had a thin, stern face. “Idle hands are the devil’s playmate,” she’d tell him, right before ordering him to scrub the floor or scour the dishes.

Dougie didn’t like doing chores. That meant being in a house and Dougie didn’t like being inside. He wanted to be outside. In the trees. Where he could smell the dirt and leaves. Where there was no one around to look at him funny or whisper about him behind his back.

He’d made it three weeks with his second second family. Then he’d simply waited until they went to sleep, went out to the fireplace, and had a ball with the great big long matches. Those suckers could burn.

He still remembered the shocked look on his new mama’s face when she came tearing out of her bedroom. “Do I smell smoke? Oh my God, is that a fire?
Dougie!
What have you done, you evil devil’s spawn!
”

His second second mom slept in the nude. So did his second second dad. The fire people had giggled about that when they’d arrived at the scene. Then they’d seen him, sitting up in the branches of the giant oak tree, listening to the house snap, crackle, pop. They’d stopped, pointed, and stared.

He’d gone to a boys’ home after that. A center for “troubled youths,” they’d told him. But the lady in the purple suit had appeared again. Dougie was too young for such a facility, he’d heard her say. Dougie still had a chance.

Dougie didn’t know what that meant. He simply packed his bag and trotted along to the next home. This house had been near the town. No woods, no park, not even a decent yard. Dougie had discovered only one perk in this tiny house, overrun by all sorts of new brothers and sisters, who weren’t brothers and sisters at all, but just other kids who hated one another: The house was only a block from the convenience store.

Dougie learned to steal. If they were going to keep all the matches out of his reach, stealing was second best. He started out small. Twinkies, doughnuts, the little penny candies they kept down near the floor. The kind of stuff no one really noticed. The first time, he brought his loot home, and one of his “sisters” took it from him. When he complained, she socked him in the eye. Then she sat there and ate all his candy while his eye swelled shut.

Dougie learned his lesson. He found a loose brick in the back of the gas station, and that’s where he stashed his loot. It was good to have your own supply of food, you know. Sometimes, just looking at all the stuff, he would feel his tummy rumble. There was hunger and there was
hunger,
and already Dougie understood that he was hungrier than most.

The store owner caught him one day, his pockets bulging with Ho Hos and apple pies. The owner had twisted his ear. Dougie had cried and surrendered the goods. “I’ll never do it again,” he promised, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. More candy fell out of his coat sleeve.

And that was it for home number three.

The lady in the purple suit decided Dougie needed more attention. A home with that many kids hadn’t been the right kind of home for Dougie. He needed a hands-on approach. Maybe with a Positive Male Role Model.

Dougie went to home number four, where he was excitedly introduced to his ten-year-old “big brother,” Derek. Derek was in Boy Scouts, Derek played Pop Warner football, Derek was a “great kid” and he’d be a good influence on Dougie.

Derek had waited until the lights were out, then he’d taken Dougie all over the house.

“See that chair, little boy? That’s my chair.” Derek belted him in the stomach.

“See that ball, little boy? That’s my ball.” Three fingers to a kidney.

“See that Xbox? That’s my Xbox.” A karate chop across the neck.

Dougie had lasted longer at this house. Mostly because he was scared to leave his bed at night. But one day, Derek went to spend a weekend at his grandma’s house. Dougie got up promptly at one a.m. He started in the bedroom. Peeling the sheets off Derek’s bed, pulling the clothes from Derek’s drawers, dragging the toys out of Derek’s closet. He took the chair. The ball. The Xbox.

He built one helluva pile in the front yard. And then, being more experienced now, he found the gas can and started spraying. One little light and
whoosh
!

Dougie lost both eyebrows and most of his bangs. He was also summarily whisked off the premises by the lady in the purple suit, who was having a hard time yelling at a child who looked perpetually surprised with all the hair seared from his face.

Dougie had been in BIG TROUBLE.

This was going in his FILE. No one would touch him now. Didn’t he want a FAMILY? Didn’t he want a CHANCE? How COULD he?

He could because he did and he would again. He knew that. The lady in purple knew that. Dougie liked fire. He liked the fiery spark of a match. He liked the way the flame gobbled up the little paper stick, then licked at his fingertips. It hurt. He’d seared his fingertips countless times, even blistered the palm of his hand. Fire hurt. But it wasn’t a bad sort of pain. It was real. It was honest. It was fire.

Dougie liked it.

And now, here he was. Living with the Carpenters. Good people, the lady in the purple suit had told him. Honest, hardworking. They’d specifically asked for a problem child (“Heaven help them,” the woman in the purple suit had murmured), so maybe they would know what to do with him. His new second father, Stanley, was reported to be very good with boys. Assistant football coach at the high school. Grew up with four brothers himself.

Maybe he would be the one to finally take Dougie in hand.

Dougie’s new bedroom in his fifth second home contained only a mattress. If he wanted sheets, Dougie was informed, he had to earn them. If he wanted blankets, he had to earn them. If he wanted toys, ditto.

The wall in the kitchen contained an elaborate chart. Perform a chore, score a point. Ask for something politely, score a point. Do as he was told, score a point.

Curse, lose a point. Talk back, lose a point. Break a rule, lose a point. So on and so forth.

His new parents weren’t taking any chances either. No matches, no gasoline, no lighter fluid anywhere on the property. ’Least, not that Dougie had been able to find. ’Course, his searching time was limited. Every evening, come seven p.m., he was escorted to his room and locked in.

First night, he got up at three a.m. and peed in the closet. In the morning, Stanley had simply handed him a sponge and escorted him back to his room.

“You can use the sponge, or you can use your tongue, but you will clean that up, Dougie. Now get busy.”

Stanley had stood there the entire time, big, muscley arms crossed over a big, muscley chest. Dougie had cleaned. At least the next night they left him a bucket.

Dougie waited till midnight, then flipped over the bucket and used it to climb up to the window. His new “role model” dad had already nailed it shut.

Stanley was a thinker. So, however, was Dougie.

Dougie invested a whole three days into his next project. Yes, ma’am, I’ll do the dishes. Yes, ma’am, I’ll eat carrots. Yes, ma’am, I’ll brush my teeth. In return, he gained a sheet and the small art kit that he’d specifically requested.

Night five, he was standing on his bucket, using a pen cap from the art kit to slowly and methodically wiggle out each nail. Took him until four a.m., but he got it. And then, for two whole weeks he could come and go as he pleased. They locked Dougie in his room, and quick as a wink, he was gone again, heading for the woods, or slogging into town in search of matches. Third week, however, Stanley caught him.

Turned out his new second dad knew a lot more about punishment than Dougie did.

The lady in the purple suit had visited shortly thereafter.

“Dougie,” she’d said, “don’t you realize this is your last chance?”

She had looked like she was going to cry. Her eyes had welled up. Her lower lip had trembled. It brought back a hazy memory to Dougie. Of a time and place he didn’t really remember. It was just a sensation in his mind, like a smell, or the feel of the wind on his face.

He had wanted to go to the lady. He had wanted to curl up against her, press his face against her neck, the way he had seen other children do. He had wanted her to hug him, to tell him that everything would be all right. He had wanted her to love him.

And that had made him stare at the purple suit and wonder how it would burn.

“Stanley beats me,” Dougie said.

And that changed everything.

The lady in the purple suit brought him another lady, who wore jeans. Her name was Rainie and she was his advocate. That meant she worked for him, she told him. It was her job to assess what was going on, to determine if there really were issues in the household. If so, she would help him defend his rights. If not, she was supposed to help mediate a solution between him and his new foster parents, who, according to her, weren’t ready to give up on him just yet, even though Dougie needed, in the words of Stanley, a “massive attitude adjustment.”

At least Rainie wasn’t so bad. She liked to be outside, too, and she didn’t make him talk a lot, particularly about his feelings, which was nice. Dougie didn’t have many feelings that didn’t involve fire, and deep down inside, even he understood that made him a freak.

Now he ripped back more bark. A big, hairy beetle came racing out, and Dougie chased it with his stick. It was fast. He was faster.

“Dougie.”

The voice came from behind him. Dougie turned. His second mom was standing a careful distance away. She wore a faded gray sweatshirt, her arms folded around her for warmth. She looked tired and unhappy. She always looked tired and unhappy.

“Come inside for breakfast, Dougie.”

“I already ate.” He opened his mouth, revealing a feast of three beetles.

“Dougie . . .”

She stared at him, he stared at her. One of the beetle’s legs moved between his lips. He used his index finger to shove it back in.

“Have you seen Rainie today?” his second mom asked abruptly.

“What?”

Her voice grew impatient. She was already moving away from him and his beetle-churning cheeks.

“Have you seen your advocate, Rainie Conner, today? Did she stop by, maybe call?”

“No.”

“All right. That’s all I needed to know.”

“Are they looking for her?”

His second mom stopped. “What do you mean, Dougie?”

“Are they looking for her? Is she missing?”

“Do you know something, Dougie? Is there something you need to tell me?”

“I hope she’s dead,” he said simply, then turned back to the log and prodded another beetle from its rotten depths. “She lied to me. And liars get what they deserve.”

10

Tuesday, 10:42 a.m. PST

T
HE RAIN WAS FINALLY RELENTING.
Driving down Highway 101, Quincy watched the misty clouds ease their grip on the coastal range, allowing dark green peaks to appear here and there amid the gloom.

Rainie loved these mountains. She had grown up here, in the shadow of the towering Douglas firs, within whisper distance of the rocky coast. She believed the outdoors should be awe inspiring, a presence grand enough to make mere mortals shake in their boots. When Rainie was happy, she went outside. When she was nervous, she went outside. When she was excited, fearful, stressed, or content, she always went outside.

When Rainie was depressed, Quincy had learned the hard way, she stayed curled up inside her darkened bedroom.

Kincaid put his right blinker on. The detective was finally driving at less than the speed of light, lost in his own thoughts.

With the arrival of the note, the case had finally taken shape and Kincaid appeared to be settling in. He had an adversary. He had claim of a crime. He also had a note, which generated a slew of tangible leads and logical tasks. Kincaid could now work his phone like a general marshaling his troops for war.

In contrast, Quincy could feel himself slowly start to disintegrate. He was an investigator well versed in crime. He was also a man who knew, better than most, that bad things could happen to you. And yet still, up until this point, the night had contained a surreal feel. Rainie was tough. Rainie was capable. He worried about her drinking and he worried about her state of mind. But he’d never honestly worried that an outsider might cause her physical harm.

And now, this was one of those times when Quincy wished he’d never become a profiler. He wished he might be an engineer, or a high school math teacher, or even a dairy farmer. Because then he could be just a man, an anxious husband. And he could console himself with the fact that he did have ten thousand dollars and he would gladly pay ten times that amount to have Rainie safe in his arms.

He could tell himself everything was going to be all right. He could assure himself this was just a small, strange interlude, and in only a matter of hours, he would see his wife again.

He wouldn’t have to know so many statistics, such as that the majority of ransom cases ending with the kidnapped victim being discovered dead.

Kincaid made the turn. In front of them, the Tillamook Air Museum finally loomed into view.

Under normal conditions, it would be hard to miss the air museum. Housed in an old World War II blimp hangar, it had the distinction of being the largest wooden structure in the entire world. It soared over fifteen stories high and engulfed a whopping seven acres. The museum’s collection of thirty different warplanes barely made a dent in the dark, cavernous space.

He and Rainie had toured it once. At the end, Rainie had turned, regarded him thoughtfully, and said, “You know, this would be a great place to hide a body.”

The blimp hangar was part of a Naval Air Station. Though NAS Tillamook was decommissioned in ’48, it still had the look and feel of a Navy space. Low, sprawling buildings to house officers, men. Vast tracts of land for various training exercises. A maze of roads looping in and around the compound.

In addition to the air museum, a plane charter company had taken up residence. Then there was the neighboring prison, its walls topped by guard towers and rolls of barbed wire.

It was a busy area, but not too busy. Given the tourist traffic to the museum, a stranger wouldn’t be out of place. Even after hours, Quincy would bet any man could travel the grounds unquestioned as long as he looked like he knew what he was doing. In other words, it was the perfect place for an illicit rendezvous.

Following the map, they took a hard right before hitting the museum. That took them straight to a small cemetery, plopped in the middle of open pastureland.

“It’s the Catholic cemetery,” Kincaid remarked as he parked the car and they both climbed out. “Maybe your UNSUB’s got issues.”

“Don’t we all?” Quincy murmured, and crossed to study the map.

It took a moment to orient the crude drawing to the space. A road had been sketched into the left side of the map, a small bush toward the back. It was a rough system. Nothing appeared to scale, and given the lack of trees or shrubs on the grounds, none of the landmarks appeared particularly distinct.

“Well, I can tell you one thing,” Kincaid said after a moment. “The UNSUB clearly failed art class.”

“I think the trick is not to try too hard. Treat the landmarks like points on a compass. We want the bushes to be south of us, the trees to the left. If we stand that way . . .”

“X doesn’t mark the spot,” Kincaid filled in. “But a cross does.”

“Let’s go.”

The five-foot gray granite cross was pockmarked with age and green-tinged from decades of rain. Moss had sprung up on the edges. Ferns sprouted along the base. The tombstone maintained a certain timeless dignity, however. The last sentinel of an entire family, it maintained its watch over four generations.

Ashes to ashes, Quincy thought, dust to dust.

“I don’t see anything,” Kincaid said. “Do you?”

Quincy shook his head, still circling. The family plot was old and appeared undisturbed. No fresh flowers, no churned earth. He frowned, backed up, frowned again.

The cemetery was active. Dark mounds of fresh-turned earth indicated new additions. Bright-colored flags adorned many monuments, leftovers no doubt from Veterans Day. Here and there, vases boasted fresh bouquets of carnations, daisies, roses. He took the map from Kincaid, studied it, and decided he hated this whole game.

“Time check,” Kincaid said.

“Ten fifty-eight.”

“So we have an hour until deadline.” The sergeant eyed the cemetery. “If we got a whole hour, how hard can this be?”

“Let me ask you something,” Quincy said abruptly. “This deadline . . . how will he know if we
don’t
meet it?”

Kincaid had the sense not to whip around. Instead, his body went perfectly still. “You think he’s watching?” he whispered.

“Or has a lookout. Or . . . electronic surveillance?”

“Not easy out here.”

“If he’s set up a wireless surveillance system, I think you would have to categorize him one step up from a ‘dumb mutt,’” Quincy agreed.

“Shit. That’s all we need, a little felonious MacGyver.”

“I don’t think I’d care for it much myself.”

Quincy expanded his walking path, moving more carefully now, trying to get a broader sense of his surroundings. The neighboring buildings could conceal someone quite easily. The tall surrounding grass as well. And as for cameras . . . behind a flag, peering out from a basket of flowers, nestled within the ferns. The possibilities were endless. They would need a full team of trained investigators to cover such a broad complex. No way two men could do it in an hour.

“Maybe you should tell me about this Fox guy,” Kincaid said tightly, staring hard at the surrounding buildings, the overgrown roads, any tombstone over five feet tall.

“He kidnapped a twelve-year-old daughter of a prominent banker in L.A.,” Quincy supplied. He started working his way toward the lone bush, still acting casual. He noticed Kincaid had his hand inside his jacket, near where an officer might holster a gun. “Her father received a series of ransom notes, all demanding fifteen hundred dollars in cash and signed ‘The Fox.’”

“Fifteen hundred dollars isn’t much money.”

“It was in 1927.”

“Say what?”

“Perry Parker, the father, gathered the money. As per the instructions, he handed over the bag to a young man who was waiting for him in a car. In the passenger seat of the vehicle, he could see his daughter. As soon as Perry handed over the money, however, the suspect drove off with Marion Parker still in the car. At the end of the street, he dumped her corpse onto the pavement.”

Quincy had reached the rhododendron now. He was just about to take another step when the bush suddenly shook.

“Duck,” Kincaid roared.

Quincy ducked. The black raven took flight. And Kincaid nearly blew off its fool head.

“Holy mother of—”

“It’s a bird, it’s a bird! Cease fire, for God’s sake.”

Kincaid drew up short, body still shaking, eyes wide and white-rimmed in his dark skull. He had his finger off the trigger, but remained in a shooter’s stance, every muscle tense. Quincy felt it as well.

His gaze was ping-ponging all over the place. Trying to see everything, focusing on nothing. He was losing it, Kincaid was losing it. They had started out as professionals, and now were two schoolboys, spooked out in the local cemetery.

“I don’t see anything,” Kincaid said brusquely.

“Me neither.”

“But I’m pretty sure if he was around, he’d know we’d followed his stupid map.”

“Seems like a safe bet.”

Kincaid inhaled. Exhaled. He finally eased up, his Glock .40 disappearing once more inside his jacket. He took a few steps, then shook out his arms. “I’m going to have to report discharging my weapon thanks to that damn bird,” he muttered, still sounding royally pissed off, but at least in a healthier sort of way.

“The bird that got away,” Quincy observed.

“Ahh shit. I shoulda become an accountant. You ever think that? My father, he’s a CPA. Maybe it’s not the most exciting job in the world, but he’s off most of the summer, and better yet, I don’t think he’s ever had to run around a cemetery hunting for masked men. He sits at a desk and adds numbers. I could do that.”

“I’ve always wanted to be a teacher myself. It would still involve spending large periods of time with violent offenders, but at least it would be at the beginning of their careers, and not later when they’d already killed half a dozen people.”

Kincaid stared at him. “You got a really interesting way of looking at things, Mr. Profiler Man.”

“I’m an absolute hit at cocktail parties,” Quincy assured him.

Kincaid sighed and resumed inspecting the grounds for signs of an X. “So you were saying? About this Fox guy?”

“Oh. Mr. Parker paid the ransom, and in return, the Fox dumped out his twelve-year-old daughter’s body. Marion’s legs had been chopped off, her innards cut out, and her eyes wired open to make it appear as if she were alive. Later, the police found her internal organs strewn all over sections of L.A.”

Kincaid looked faintly ill. “Jesus. This really happened?”

“It’s a fairly infamous case.”

“In 1927? Well, you can’t really blame that one on violent video games, can you? I don’t get it though. You’re talking nearly eighty years ago. I kinda doubt that’s the same cat we’re dealing with now.”

“Oh, I’m sure it’s a different ‘cat.’ The Fox is dead. Mr. Parker recognized him immediately as a former employee, the police picked him up, and he was hanged in ’28.”

“So in other words, it’s got nothing to do with us,” Kincaid said with a frown. “One guy signed notes The Fox, another guy signed his note The Fox. Probably just thought it sounded cool.”

“In real life,” Quincy said quietly, “the Fox’s name was William Edward Hickman.”

Kincaid stopped, looked faintly ill again. “W.E.H.”

“Return address L.A.”

“Ah jeez . . . Can’t a criminal just be
normal
anymore? I swear even the felons have watched too much TV.”

“The nom de plume, the map, the cemetery.” Quincy gestured around the gray-gloomed space. “Whatever we’re dealing with here, I doubt it’s just about money. Frankly, if the criminally inclined wanted money, they could knock over a 7-Eleven. These, ransom cases, are always about something more.”

Kincaid narrowed his eyes. “All right. I’ll bite: How many of these cases
have
you worked?”

“Six.”

“And the success rate for happy family reunions?”

“Thirty-three percent. Two of the six abductees were returned alive.”

“Did the other four families pay up?”

“Yes. But it didn’t matter. In the other four cases, the victims were killed within an hour of abduction. There was never any intent to return them alive. It’s difficult to have a hostage, you know. One, if they’ve seen your face, they’ll identify you later. Two, there’s the sheer logistics of housing them, feeding them, dealing with them. It’s much cleaner to simply kill them from the start.

“Three of them were children,” Quincy added. “One was a girl who was only two years old. We caught the man later. He was a former business partner of the parents, who felt they owed him more money than they’d given him in the original buyout. So he killed their child in an effort to extract fifty thousand dollars. These kinds of predators . . . It’s never just about money, Sergeant Kincaid. It’s almost always a little bit personal.”

“I do not like the things you know.”

“Most of the time, neither do I.”

Kincaid glanced at his watch. “We have forty minutes.”

“I think we’ll only need another ten. Assuming, of course, you brought a shovel.” Quincy pointed to the ground. Kincaid made a small “o” with his mouth, then headed for the trunk of his car.