The Fourth Victim (26 page)

“Or she could tell Abrams that you're alive which, given
the man's probable state of mind, could lead him to silence you—and Maggie—forever.”

“She won't have a chance to tell him. We'll keep her under guard until he's arrested.”

“And if she won't talk? You going to guard her until she's eighteen? Keep her in hiding? Because as soon as your kidnapper knows you're alive, your days are numbered.”

He was pissing me off.

“You've had her for several months already,” Clay went on. “And you've been unable to break the bond between her and Abrams. If she feels at all responsible for your disappearance, even if it's just through knowing something and hiding that information, she's also going to feel an even greater bond with Abrams. Because if that's the case, they committed a crime together. They have to protect each other.”

I didn't want to listen to logic. Or common sense. I was listening with my heart. Fighting for something that was bigger than I was.

Fighting for someone who belonged to me. Needed me.

All these years—my entire life, really—I'd managed to do just fine on my own. I was happy helping other people. And now, suddenly, I had a family.

I had a life of my own.

And it scared me.

Because I wanted it.

I hadn't even known how much I wanted it, until right now, when I was on the verge of losing it.

Clay's words about my father, about my not needing him now that I had Maggie, came back to me again.

Was he right? This agent who lived his life so alone. Had he seen something about me that I hadn't seen about myself? Had he seen how badly I needed a life, a family
of my own? So badly that I'd cling to a criminal father just to belong?

Had he also realized that until I was forced to, I didn't dare expose the ugliness that was so much a part of me?

The truth of my parentage.

And my own lack of a sense of value because of it.

Did he know that, deep inside, I'd never felt as if I was enough?

Well, no, that wasn't true. Of course I was enough. I'd made a good life for myself. I was proud of what I'd accomplished.

Looking at myself from the outside, through the eyes of a man who'd found out more about me in four days than anyone had known in my entire life, I was horrified at what he might see.

He might think that…

Now was
not
the time to fall apart!

Or to suddenly have a life-changing revelation. Or an onslaught of fear.

And now, with my back to the wall, was exactly the time.

Edgewood, Ohio
Tuesday, December 7, 2010

C
lay had left the room. Giving me time to digest everything he was asking of me, I supposed.

Or maybe he just had to use the bathroom.

I didn't appreciate his absence. Being alone was excruciating.

He obviously didn't think Maggie would choose me over Abrams in a showdown.

He thought my kidnapping gave Abrams more power over Maggie—that it created a stronger bond between them.

I was ready for him as soon as he reappeared.

“We don't know for sure the kidnapper wasn't someone after Rick Thomas,” I reminded him as he sat back down, but even I realized that scenario was probably far-fetched at this stage.

Maggie was connected to my disappearance. I could see that. She knew
something.
Abrams, too. His visit to the woods the day after I was taken couldn't be a coincidence.

Nor were the hang-up phone calls.

“What are you proposing?”

“That we stand back and see what happens.”

That was it? His grand plan?

“Everyone's on edge right now. Someone's going to lose it. Soon. Either Abrams or Maggie, or both. I suggest Samantha tell Maggie that since so much time has passed, they should start preparing for the fact that you might not be coming back. That investigators have followed all the leads and haven't turned up anything substantial and we have to cut back on our investigation. There are other cases that we have to work on. And that she'll likely be put in foster care.”

“No! That's cruel. We can't—”

“Would you rather she made the decision herself—the wrong decision—while no one's watching? All we're doing is pushing her into action sooner. Because, mark my words, she'll be going into action at some point. The way I see it, Maggie will either be prompted by Abrams, or by us, on his timeline or ours. If he has her under his control, which appears obvious, she's his puppet and will act as and when he dictates.”

He leaned forward, pinning me with a look I didn't like but couldn't avoid. It forced me to acknowledge the truth. “She's going into foster care, anyway, if we don't find your kidnapper and get him off the street. The state won't leave her with Sam indefinitely.”

She'd already been awarded to me. But my custodial rights weren't permanent yet. And if being with me posed any kind of threat to her, Clay was right. She'd be placed in foster care.

Where her new caregivers might or might not put any stock in our theories regarding Abrams.

And that was what he wanted, wasn't it? To continue living a family life with his wife and kids, and keeping Maggie on the side?

“There was a story in the news last week,” I said out loud. “It was about a churchgoing guy with six kids and a wife. His kids adored him. His coworkers thought he was a conscientious employee and his neighbors thought he was a great guy. He'd just been arrested for conducting a four-year relationship with a girl who's now sixteen. They found pictures of her and him. He'd first touched her inappropriately when she was twelve.”

“In a few years that could be Abrams,” Clay said. “And Maggie.”

“Over my dead body.”

I meant that literally.

 

Once again Kelly Chapman's visible struggle, the way she seemed to torture herself with a quest for personal integrity, was excruciating to watch. And yet, Clay couldn't look away, either.

He had a sudden vision of her photo on his dash. Of those eyes that spoke to him.

And, for a second, felt a twinge of fear. What if he was leading her wrong?

He couldn't think of anything worse.

But he had a job to do.

“If I have your okay, I'd like to make the calls to get the plan in motion,” he said, gathering up his files, which he'd left open during the long night.

She was tapping a pen against the table. The same pen she'd had in her mouth several times that morning. “I'm a missing person. You don't need my okay.”

Clay stilled. Reached for her hand. And held on until he had her full attention.

“I need your okay.”

She stared at him. And then nodded.

Clay picked up his phone.

 

“They can't do that.” Maggie turned to Sam and didn't look at Kyle at all. He was like a judge or something. He just watched and you could never tell what he saw. Or what he knew.

Besides, he'd cleaned up her puke in the hall.

She was afraid she might throw up again even though breakfast had been two hours ago. “She'll
die
if they don't keep looking,” she told Samantha. “It's illegal just to let someone die. It has to be.”

“They've done all they can, sweetie. They have other cases to work on, other crimes to solve.”

“But that Agent Thatcher guy, I thought he only looked for missing people.”

Maggie had been out at the barn with Rad. She'd cleaned out his stall like Kyle had shown her. Mostly she was trying to be where Mac could get to her, waiting for Mac to contact her in case he knew where she was. Trying not to think about Kelly. Trying not to miss her so much. And then Kyle had told her Sam needed her in the house.

So here they all were, sitting at the kitchen table and it was horrible. Worse than anything she'd imagined.

“You're right, that's all he does, but Kelly isn't the only person missing in Ohio. There's a woman who didn't come home from a date over the weekend. And two girls who've been missing from a downtown Dayton neighborhood for over three weeks.”

“Three
weeks?
” And no one had found them yet? They must've run away. And downtown…everyone knew that was a rough area.

But Kelly, she was…

“The reality is that many people who go missing are never found,” Samantha said, and Maggie really didn't like her at all right then. “Agent Thatcher told me he has files full of unsolved cases. Some of them are more than
twenty years old. They keep looking, keep hoping, but a lot of times you never know what happened.”

But they had to solve this one. They had to.

“They're calling off the search,” Samantha said. “Tomorrow someone from the state will be coming to talk to you about foster care. It'll take a few days for all the paperwork to be done. They'll be really careful about finding a place for you to live where you'll be happy, though probably not here in Chandler. You'll stay here until it's all arranged. But don't worry—I'm not just going to send you off and forget about you. Kelly loved you and she's the closest thing to a best friend I ever had. She'd want me to keep in touch with you, to watch out for you. And I want to do that, anyway.”

Shut up.
Would she please just shut up? Maggie closed her eyes, blocking the truth—and the tears she couldn't hold back. They slid out from between her eyelids no matter how tightly she closed them.

And rubbed Camy. The poodle was always in Maggie's lap. Anytime she was sitting down.

It used to be Kelly's lap that Camy considered her own personal sanctuary.

“I'm so sorry, sweetie,” Samantha said.

Maggie looked at her then—because seeing Samantha was better than the darkness of not looking.

“And I was thinking,” Kyle added. “Rad needs someone to look after him. Someone light enough to get up on his back without hurting him. I'd like him to be yours, and for you to come out here and take care of him. I'll teach you.”

He was serious. Watching her, Kyle just kept on talking, offering her the best dream in the world at the same time her whole life was ending. “We'll arrange transportation from wherever you are, but if you want the job, it's yours. I'd pay you, of course.” He named a sum that was
twice what she'd made when she had her paper route last summer and was babysitting, too. More, even, than her friend Glenna had made as a full-time nanny during the summer. “That way you'll have some independence.” Kyle wasn't done talking yet. “But I have to know you want the job, and that you'll be responsible with him. I can't have you start and then just quit because you're tired of him.”

“I wouldn't do that,” Maggie said. “I'm not a quitter.”

Or a loser like her mom.

She couldn't take his job. Because Mac had to get them out of here. He'd be in trouble if they caught him with her. Because of her age. But she was his woman. Really and truly. She had to be with him. That meant if he had to leave, so did she.

She really wanted the job. It was better than a dream.

But she was an adult now. Mac's lover. She had other things to do with her life. She had to love Mac. Take care of him.

And someday, when she was out of college, to have his babies.

They'd raise them in a house with a lot of rooms and a big yard. And…they'd have a barn and buy a horse for their kids. Maybe Rad. Or another of Kyle's horses…

Maggie was crying. She didn't know what to do. “We have to keep looking for her, Sam,” she said. She had to tell them about Mom. And she had to get to Mac. Now. She had to get out of town with him so he could be safe from their lies. And then she'd tell them about Mom so they didn't give up on Kelly.

If they gave up on Kelly, Maggie couldn't live with herself.

“Can't you do something? Start your own investigation?”

“Not officially,” Sam said. “This is out of my jurisdiction.”

Maggie had thought Sam could do anything. She'd
killed Sewell with one bullet when he'd been shooting at her. She'd brought down a whole drug ring when no one else even believed there was one.

She'd saved Maggie's life.

And she couldn't help Kelly.

Maggie couldn't wait for Mac to get in touch with her. They were going to give up on Kelly. And ship Maggie to a foster home and maybe he'd never find her again.

“Can I go back out to the barn?” she asked, wiping tears off her face. “I just want to be with Rad for a little while.”

Samantha looked at Kyle, who nodded.

And Maggie knew this was her only chance.

Edgewood, Ohio
Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Clay had a multiway phone conference call set up at the kitchen table. He was using a landline with a speakerphone and it was killing me just to sit there and quietly listen.

An FBI team, my friends and other officers were all in place, all with jobs to do, to save my life and Maggie's, too. Clay was running the show. Everyone reported to him. He gave the orders and asked the questions. The entire operation rested on his shoulders.

And I…I just sat there.

While the young woman I'd taken into my home, into my heart, the young woman I'd dared to love, was on the run.

“She's on the road out by where the fire was.” I recognized Kyle's voice. Keeping a safe distance, he'd followed Maggie on horseback, riding Lillie, after Maggie had taken off crossing his land on foot. The girl didn't have anything with her that they knew of. Not her phone. Or her purse. “A car went by and she stuck out her thumb.”

“She's hitchhiking.” That was Sam, her voice grim.

I missed Sam. My lips started to tremble and I would've given a lot right then to be sitting in her kitchen with a cup of her specially brewed coffee in front of me. I'd even drink it.

So what if I hated the stuff? Taste didn't matter. People did. Friends did.

“Sandra, move,” Clay said. “Pick her up.”

Sandra, an agent Kelly knew nothing about. JoAnne was out there, too, but apparently she'd been at Samantha's the other night. Maggie would recognize her.

Silence on the line. Clay didn't look at me. He had a map spread out on the table, with dots representing the various people under his command.

It was like a board game.

One in which winning meant everything.