UNSEEN (7 page)

There was silence on the other end.

"
Mom?"

"
Jacob." His mother's voice sounded frail and vulnerable. He had heard this tone before, many times, usually when she was about to shatter his world—again.

Jake was the older of two unwanted children, the product of a drug-addict mom who was too wasted most of the time to remember to use protection. His little sister Holly was the other, but not the second. The second had died during child-birth in the cellar of some guy his mother had known only a month. That guy turned out to be Jake's second step-dad. But after his mom had caught him cheating on her, twice, she had taken Jake and Holly, and moved to Maine.

At nine years of age, Jake had thought his life would have new birth in the city of Sunbury, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, but his mother had not changed her ways. She fell right back into drugs, and the list of male companions grew longer than Jake cared to keep track of.

The last five years had been the most stable his life had ever been, mostly because he was no longer under his mother's roof, but partly because she had made a real effort to change. She had managed to stay with the same man for five years and had, as far as Jake knew, stopped using drugs. He’d even started calling her Mom again.

But hearing her voice like this and remembering the many times she’d let him down before... A flood of emotion came back to the surface. "Mom.” His voice grew cold. "I really can't do this right now."

"
Jacob," she said again, in that familiar voice of weakness, "...something's happened."

He dreaded to hear her next words. What would it be this time? What crisis could she come up with to affect him now that he was no longer dependent upon her to take care of him? He didn't know, but if there was a way to make this day any worse...

"
Something's happened to Gabe."

Her words drove a knife into his gut. Why did it have to be Gabe? If there was still a tender place left in his heart for family, that place was strictly reserved for his little nephew.

At seventeen, Jake had been there when Gabe took his first breaths and opened his big beautiful eyes for the first time. Jake had changed his diapers and taught him to walk, while his sister was busy rebuilding her reputation with her high school entourage. It had been a couple years since he had seen him for more than a few brief moments, but his love for Gabe had never diminished.

"
What happened?"

She could barely get it out. "He's been taken."

Jake's heart constricted. "What? Wh-what do you mean? By who?"

"
That killer on the television, the one who takes children."

"
Are you kidding? In Sunbury?"

"
Your sister called me this morning in a panic, talking about his bed was empty and she couldn't find him."

"
Where is she now?"

"
At her place, with the police."

"
I'll head over."

"
I don’t know if they’ll let you in. They’re calling it a crime scene, like he's already dead." Her voice broke. "I told Holly I would try to find a way to get there. I feel so...” She struggled to keep her voice. "Jacob... Do something..."

"
I'm heading over now. I'll call you."

She couldn't respond.

And Jake had no words left to say.

Chapter 7

Holly Paris sat curled up on her couch, cradling a cup of mocha iced coffee that one of the police officers had brought in for her. Her gaze sat fixed on the cup. The room had been cleared except for her and the ever-intrusive Agent Grant. Holly wanted to see the gift as an act of kindness, but she knew better. These people had rules and regulations for everything. Everything was by the book. Somewhere, in some government big-wig's filing cabinet was a list of procedures for every possible circumstance. What to do if the killer calls. What to do if they find something dangerous. What to do if the phone rings and it’s the pizza guy. There was a process for handling every conceivable situation. There was even a procedure for handling people. They didn't care about her or her son. They were just doing their job, and their job, at the moment, was to befriend her, break down her walls, and extract information. What better way to do that than with a cup of mocha iced coffee with cream on top?

She gripped the plastic cup and let the cold sink into her fingers. It was painful to the touch, but feeling something was better than not feeling anything at all. The shock and helplessness had emptied her insides, leaving a dark hole of deadened nerves. But she had to fight the numbness, she had to let the pain in, or her son was as good as dead.

She rolled the thought around in her head. If he intended to kill her son, why had he not done it already? Why show her a video and draw things out? Did he get some kind of sick pleasure from it?

"
Why is he doing this?" She spoke in a low voice without raising her eyes.

Angela Grant looked up from her laptop. Holly could feel her eyes probing her as she searched for the calculated response. "Why is he doing what?"

"
This," said Holly, still looking at the cup.

"
He is a disturbed individual. We don’t know why he is doing this."

Holly looked up. "No. I mean—he already has my son, why doesn't he just kill him? What is he waiting for? Didn't he kill the first two right away?"

The subtle hesitation and slight stiffening of Agent Grant’s posture revealed her unwillingness to answer the question. It probably went against some rule in some handbook somewhere.

"
This isn't productive," she said in her gentle yet commanding way, dismissing the line of thought as one might discard a poorly chosen blouse. "Let's focus our energies on finding your son."

Holly resented the way they all protected her like mother hens, as if it was anything more than another procedure. The agent did an impeccable job of hiding it behind her friendly smile, but Holly knew her mind was busy figuring out the next acceptable move in their elaborate game. Even her concern for Holly's emotional well being was a choreographed play. Agent Grant was merely an actress playing her part. Her lovely angelic face set Holly at ease, but she detested her calculated mind with its rules and processes.

Holly glared. "Why won't you answer my question? It’s a simple question. Why doesn't he kill my son like he did the first two?"

Agent Grant's eyes rested on Holly, the clickety click of her mind was almost audible. What was she allowed to say? Would she get in trouble for talking about the deaths of the other children with the distraught mother she was instructed to keep calm? She looked at her laptop screen, then casually at Holly. "How about we go over his mannerisms again and see if we can find a match. Can you think of anyone who has come into your life in the past year?"

Angela Grant was a machine. Holly was sure of it.

"
I already told you. There's no one. No one talks like him. No one walks like him. Why won't you answer my question? This creep has my son. I want to know why he's doing this."

Angela remained silent.

"
Is he toying with me? Does he get some kind of sick pleasure out of watching me suffer? Or is there..." She stopped herself.

Angela's eyes leveled on Holly. "Is there what, Holly? Hope?" Her eyes grew warm. "There's always hope."

Holly pressed her back into the couch cushion. "I just want to know if my son is different from the others."

"
This man never strikes the same way twice. He leaves the children's blocks as a calling card, and in each case there is a video, but beyond that there is no pattern. We have leads we’re following, and we have a ton of data on this guy. But now it's up to you; you can help us fill in the blanks. What you know will help us take this guy down, and rescue your son."

Holly almost believed her.

"
You need to tell us who you know, and how they might have access to your apartment. Your son was not bound or in distress. That leads us to believe that he’s had contact with this man in the recent past."

Holly hadn't thought of that. She remembered Gabe playing peacefully with his toys on the floor. He wasn't taken by force. He’d been lured out of his home by someone he knew. Holly set her drink on the coffee table, and put her feet on the floor. "He goes to daycare, and I bring him to the park sometimes."

"
We have an agent checking his daycare. Do you remember seeing anyone with the same size and build interacting with Gabe at the park?"

"
I don't remember."

She tapped on the keys of her laptop. "What about the other residents in your apartment building, do any of them have regular access to your son?"

"
Mark does. He lives down the hall. He watches him sometimes, but he would never do this. He's always volunteering at places downtown, helping people in need. He would never do this."

"
What’s Mark's last name?"

"
Phillips."

"
Would you say he's the same size as the man in the video?"

Holly stammered. "He's maybe... I don't know. I couldn't tell how tall the man in the video was."

"
Does he move like him?"

"
I don't know."

"
How long has he been your neighbor?"

"
Seven months." As the words came out, a chill ran down her back. If he was the killer, he would have had time to finish his business in the last place, and travel to Maine. There would have been plenty of time for him to get Gabe in his sights and to hatch a new plan.

She didn't want to believe it was Mark, but how well did she really know him? She did know that he volunteered with needy people—but he could have made that up. She had left her son hours and hours with a man she hardly even knew. How could she have been so careless?

"
Do you know where he is now?"

"
At work, probably. He does construction. I don't know where."

Grant flipped her phone open and pressed a few buttons. "We have a lead on a suspect. I want you to find everything you can on the neighbor, Mark Phillips. Yes. Then we’ll go have a chat with him. Bump him to the top of the list. He works construction, find out where. Okay. Thanks." She closed the phone and slid it back in her pocket. "Is there anyone else like Mark, someone Gabe felt comfortable with, perhaps a relative or a friend?"

Holly felt so helpless. She wanted to spill her guts, because if anyone could save her son, she believed Agent Grant could. But the truth was a minefield. Her friends were not the type of people who would exactly appreciate a visit from the FBI.

"
I can't think of anyone," she said, disengaging from the conversation.

"
No one at all?"

"
No." She looked out the window with cold, dead eyes. "Do you mind if we take a break? I need a smoke."

Agent Grant quietly assessed her chances of successfully continuing the questioning. The result must have been a low percentage, because she set her laptop on the coffee table. "Go ahead, take a break. Clear your head."

Holly stood awkwardly and shuffled to the front door. A uniformed officer stood guard in the hallway, and there was one on the front steps of the apartment house as well. Three cruisers and two dark blue government cars lined the street.

Holly crouched down on the stairs and lit up. She wanted something much more powerful, something to make it all go away, but she couldn't leave her son when he needed her most—not like her mother had done so many times. It disgusted Holly to see how much she was like her mother. But she was not going to run away this time. She would fight the ache in her head and stomach, and bear through the sweats, to turn over every rock to find her baby. He was all she had left to live for.