Tell My Dad (2 page)

P
atricia Gonzalo clenched
her chest as she watched the Lexus SUV speed away from the parking lot.
What just happened?

“Oh my lord! Did you see that? Did that man kidnap that girl?” She squinted her eyes and stared at her husband, who held their grandson’s hands tight.

“I don’t know. Call 911. What is this world coming to?” Mark Gonzalo was visibly shaken.

Five minutes later, at twelve past noon, two young police officers arrived at the scene. One was tall and big with lots of hair and a curly mustache. The other one was about five-foot-four, with a goatee and eyeglasses.

Patricia had trouble breathing. She could not forgive herself for what she did not do. “I’m sorry, Officers. We didn’t know someone could do this in broad daylight. For a second, we thought these kids were just fighting. We didn’t know whether we should get involved.”

The officer with a curly mustache said, “Don’t worry, ma’am. No one would have expected a kidnapping here in an open parking lot. Don’t be hard on yourself. We will find the girl. Did you notice the license plate?” He was ready to note down the details.

Patricia sighed. “Gosh…How did we not see that? It was a Lexus SUV, light green, kind of faded green. Old car. It did not occur to me to note the license plate. It all happened so quick!”

The young boy raised his hand and said, “Grandma, I saw the license plate.”

The officer noted down the license plate details as Patricia looked at her grandson with pride.

The officer with the goatee knelt down and examined the paper bags lying on the floor. He looked up and asked, “This is where the SUV was parked, right?”

Patricia came forward and nodded. “Little further to the right.”

The officer pulled the wallet out from the paper bag. He opened it and found the driver’s license. He signaled Patricia to come closer and showed her the picture on the license. “This is the girl you saw, right?”

Patricia nodded sadly. She felt sweat over her entire body and pain in her heart. She glanced at her husband, who sat on the concrete, cross-legged with his hands on his bald head. She adjusted her pink top, placed her hands on her hips, and spoke in a louder voice. “Mark, get up now. This is not the place for you to faint. We need to go and find that girl.”

Mark looked up.

Patricia continued, “I told you a long time ago. We need to get that damned pepper spray.”

* * *

S
amantha Cruz was
busy finishing up her criminology assignment. She was supposed to write a three-page essay about serial killers and their motivations. She got distracted and annoyed when her mother kept switching channels on the television.

“Hey, Mom, just make up your mind and stick to one channel,” chided Samantha.

“Do you think the guy who invented the remote is an idiot? He knew that we can’t watch one channel for five minutes.”

“Mom! I can’t focus with all this noise. I need to finish this damn thing.”

“Watch your language, Samantha,” she said in a stern voice. “Go to your room and study. The living room is meant for TV.”

Just then, both Samantha and her mother looked at the television screen, which flashed “A seventeen-year-old girl was kidnapped from Hillsdale Mall parking lot at noon.” Samantha looked at her mother, who was instantly shaken.

“Oh my God, someone kidnapped her in broad daylight? No one was there to save the girl?”

For the next fifteen minutes, her mother was glued to the screen. Samantha had witnessed the tragedy parents had to go through when she volunteered for the National Center for Missing Children a few years earlier during her junior year in high school. Her heart and mind started racing. She looked at her mother and said, “Whoever kidnapped that girl won’t be able to hide for very long. You know, cops can draw a sketch of the man just by talking to witnesses.”

Her mother stared at the television screen in horror. She said nothing.

M
anuel Bracamontes pulled
the Lexus into the garage, shut the door, and looked around. The garage was littered with cardboard boxes, chainsaws, and tools. He opened the backdoor of the vehicle and found the girl, who was in a deep sleep. The chloroform was doing its job. He patted his shoulder in pride before carrying the girl inside the house.

A minute later, he stood inside the bedroom, holding her in his arms. He felt like he was holding a Vince Lombardi trophy. He stared at her face for a few seconds.
Sleeping beauty.

He looked up and checked the time on the analog clock on the wall. Twenty-two minutes past noon. It would take at least one more hour before the girl would regain consciousness. He gently placed her on the queen-sized bed and adjusted the pillow to properly support her head. He jumped off the bed, stared at her one more time, closed the bedroom door, walked quickly toward the garage, and backed the Lexus into the street.

Three minutes later, he drove the Lexus to the corner of Laurelwood Lane and Sylvan Avenue. Then, he parked the vehicle in the small lane behind a Chinese restaurant and walked toward Laurelwood Park. There, he jumped inside a green Volvo, turned the engine on, and drove toward his house.

* * *

J
ack Ackerman’s
phone rang as he watched his three-year-old daughter, Rebecca, giggling and sliding down the elephant-shaped plastic slide in Laurelwood Park with both hands up. The park had been built in the seventies. It was popular among residents and was always packed during weekends. There were not many people around on Friday morning except for a few parents, who were pushing their children in strollers.

Officer Walker was on the phone. “Lieutenant, there was a kidnapping, seventeen-year-old girl, in Hillsdale parking lot.”

“That’s insane. In broad daylight? From a mall parking lot?”

“Yeah. It happened ten minutes ago. Captain asked me to check to see if you’re available.” He quickly added, “It’s okay if you have other plans.”

Ackerman immediately answered, “I’ll be there soon. I just need to check with my wife about where to drop off my daughter.”

Ackerman sighed as he hung up. It was supposed to be a day off and a long weekend. He looked at Rebecca, who was running from one slide to another before dialing the number.

“Hey, seventeen-year-old was kidnapped in the parking lot in Hillsdale Mall…Yeah, just now. Captain asked me to come in.” He leaned against his Ford and looked around as he listened to his wife. “Sounds good. Thanks for understanding. I’ll drop Rebecca at your sister’s place and head to the station.”

As he clicked the end button on the phone, he saw a man nervously walking across the street. He kept looking around. For a second, Ackerman thought the man was going to cause some trouble. However, he got into a green Volvo parked closer to the park entrance and drove off without creating a scene, like a good citizen.

* * *

M
anuel shut
the garage door behind himself and walked across the living room to grab two beer bottles from the refrigerator. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and whistled as he made dance movements with the bottles in both hands.
Time for a celebration.
He slid onto the couch facing the television in the living room, stretched his legs on the Moroccan wool ottoman, and gulped beer as he switched on the television.
What a day!

A proud smile formed on his face when he saw the news headlines. He raised the empty beer bottle in his right hand and said loudly, “Breaking news! I am breaking news today, baby!”

It was a thrilling experience, rather an adventure, to kidnap the girl in public view. He watched the news anchor speculating about how the kidnapper might have rehearsed it many times to carry out the act. He smirked and pointed his finger at the news anchor. “Really? Do you guys know I pulled it off just like that?”

He had been awake until four o’clock in the morning chatting in an underground Internet forum. During the nightly chat sessions with like-minded strangers, he was intrigued by a forum thread in which someone, masked by the username “horseman,” wanted handlers to kidnap girls in the Bay Area. Manuel had engaged in a good number of criminal activities in the past. But kidnapping was not one of them.

When he woke up at ten o’clock, the first thing that came to his mind was kidnapping a girl.
Why not try that?
While sipping a latte in a coffee shop in Hillsdale Mall, a few blocks from his house, he brainstormed a kidnapping strategy.

While walking back home, he saw the uncovered parking lot outside Sears. It was pretty big, but there weren’t many cars. On the other side of the road, there was a furniture shop. The parking lot and the furniture shop were separated by El Camino Real, a four-lane road with a big median in the middle. It would be difficult for anyone from the furniture shop to spot someone quickly grabbing a girl.

He had hatched a perfect plan by the time he reached home. He took a quick shower and drove his grandma’s beat-up Volvo to Laurelwood Park. After parking it near the park entrance, he roamed around the smaller lanes of the park area looking for the perfect vehicle to steal. He found an older model Lexus behind a Chinese restaurant in a small lane. It took him less than five minutes to hotwire the engine and another five minutes to drive it to the mall parking lot.

When he saw Amanda jumping out of her car so full of life, he decided that she was
the girl
. He had never seen anyone that happy. The girl’s enthusiasm and bright smile mesmerized him. He waited until she entered Sears and took a spot next to her car. Then, he waited.

His plan was simple and lethal. Let the girl walk to the car, surprise her, and grab her before she realized what was going on. He calculated that even if other people saw it, they would not realize what was going on at least for a few minutes. That time would be enough for him to drive through a small street behind Sears and head to his house down Sylvan Avenue.

So far, Manuel’s plan had worked just fine. No one could locate him. No one would have noticed the license plate of the SUV he drove. Even if someone noticed it, the cops would spend hours harassing the poor guy who owned that vehicle.

He planned the getaway and had chosen the route with no traffic cameras. He abandoned the stolen vehicle and switched to his vehicle seamlessly. It was all pretty quick. Now, he could keep the girl in the house for
years
before anyone found out.

He stopped staring at the beer bottle and looked at the television screen when the news anchor talked about the missing girl and the license plate of the vehicle that was used in the kidnapping. The girl’s picture flashed on the screen. The picture did not do justice to her beauty.

He switched off the television, trashed the empty beer bottles, and entered the bathroom, which was right behind the couch.

* * *

T
he San Mateo Police Department’s
situation room was bristling with activity. Captain Sheldon stared through the window at the group of children walking into the Whole Foods store across the street and waited for the train horn from the nearby Caltrain station to subside before addressing the officers standing in front of him.

“We have the girl’s picture. We have the license plate of the vehicle. An Amber Alert has already been issued. A sketch artist is working with the witnesses. Once we have the sketch, we will release it to the press. Unfortunately, the witnesses had only a partial view of the suspect’s face.” He paused for a second and said, “The FBI has been notified. They’re on the way.”

He shook his head in disbelief. “What the hell was this asshole thinking? Kidnap a girl in broad daylight with people looking?” He looked at Officer Walker. “Did you get anything from traffic cameras?”

“He didn’t come out of the mall. We have cameras on both sides of El Camino. There was no Lexus SUV coming out of the mall in the last thirty minutes. We’re reviewing the tapes again.”

“He might have taken roads behind the mall. Do we have any cameras on Thirty-First Avenue?”

“We do. We checked that too and got nothing.”

“Okay. He can’t hide unless—”

“Unless what?”

“If he had a place to hide between the mall and the freeway. There are so many small streets, behind the mall. There are no traffic cameras. He could have planned that route.” Captain Sheldon bunched his right hand into a fist and struck the wooden desk. “I’m pissed off, seriously pissed off. Kidnapping at noon in public view? It’s an insult to all of us.”