The Moment He Vanished (Kendra Dillon Cold Case Thriller Book 2)

by Rebecca Rane

  “Episode one, that’s easy to decide, right? The disappearance,” Shoop said. “The actual facts of the day? What do we need to get?”

  Shoop was right. At least that just meant research. They had to give a compelling history lesson, but that was the easy part, conveying what was already known.

  “Well, I have the interview with Josh. That’s maybe a tiny bit of it. But I think we set up the story before we drop too much about Josh. Plus, he remembers very little about it.” Kendra paused, thinking about how to construct the season and break up the episodes. “We have two priorities before I go forward, and that’s talking to the sheriff and talking to Margie Peltz.”

  Shoop outlined the thoughts, ideas, and to-do lists for the season on their whiteboard.

  The largest part of the board would be questions, so many questions. A clean slate on the whiteboard could be refreshing for some people. A new beginning.

  But Kendra’s breath was shallow. There was a nervous flutter in her chest. She was about to take on a case that, by all accounts, had already been fully investigated. No stone left unturned. That much was clear just from her initial look at the media accounts. There were tons and tons of stories. Every effort had been made to find this child.

  The media was in a frenzy at first. Of course, that had died down over the course of a few months. It would have been the story of the summer, except that in September, Hurricane Katrina had hit. Coverage shifted to the aftermath of that devastation. People who watch the news often complain about coverage. “You cover this but not that,” they say. But a news staff is a finite resource, and events are infinite. All stories can’t continue to be covered.

  But Kendra had to give the local outlets credit.

  They revisited the case at one year, then at five years, and even on the tenth anniversary of the disappearance. There were age progression photos of Ethan, with the latest one showing what he might look like at fifteen. Shoop and Kendra printed that one out. They tacked it up on the wall. It did look like Josh, but it also looked like a million other fifteen-year-old kids. It could be the young man who had entered their office. But it was all so generic. It could be any white kid with sandy hair and straight side part with bangs that dusted his eyes.

  “Get me the number of Sheriff Meriwether. He’s retired, but thank God, alive,” Kendra said. That was the trouble with cold cases. Not only had the victim’s trail gone cold, but witnesses and original investigators, in many cases, had died, retired, moved to Florida, or had been burned by the media at some point. Kendra needed to build trust, fast, with the people involved. The only way to earn their trust was to be honest and do what she promised.

  “And I’ll find Ethan Peltz’s mom,” Kendra added.

  An hour later, they had addresses and phone numbers for the first two potential interviews.

  Kendra took a breath. This would be the hardest call; she had no doubt.

  Kendra dialed Margie Peltz’s number, and it rang three times.

  Kendra wasn’t even exactly sure what she was going to say to this mother. But it wasn’t the first time she’d talked to a missing person’s loved one. It wasn’t the first time she’d asked to excavate the ruins of the rugged emotions that ravaged a victim’s family.

  She lived in one such family.

  She had grown up around those exact emotions. Her own parents had defended that territory by pretending it wasn’t there. They’d erected a shield over those few days their daughter was the poster girl for missing children. It’s not so much that they had blocked it out, but rather that they’d closed that door, nailed it shut, and warned people to stay the hell away from that room. Everyone knew that the room was there, but if you were in the House of Dillon, you stayed out of that wing.

  A woman answered the phone.

  “Hello.”

  The voice was quiet, soft, and Kendra adjusted her approach accordingly.

  “Mrs. Margie Peltz?”

  “This is she,” the woman answered.

  “My name is Kendra Dillon. I’m the podcast host for The Cold Trail Podcast. We look at unsolved crimes and try to help find new leads.”

  There was silence on the other end. Margie was probably trying to decide whether to hang up or not. Kendra pushed forward, as soft as she could, in light of what she was about to ask.

  “I was wondering if I could interview you about Ethan’s disappearance.”

  “I’ve said all there is to say,” Margie said. She wasn’t hostile or even impatient. Her voice was hopeless and weary.

  “I understand how hard this is, but there’s a new lead, or I think there might be.”

  Margie Peltz responded again with silence. Here’s where Kendra could easily hurt this mother if she wasn’t careful. She was very careful.

  “A young man walked into our office today,” Kendra said. There was no way forward but with the truth. “He said he was Ethan Peltz.”

  Kendra heard Margie’s breath catch. And then she waited. It was a shocking thing to say to this woman. It was backward, too, from how they normally did this job. They were possibly starting with the end. The mystery was solved, and they were going to work backward to figure out how it happened.

  “I wish—” Margie said and stopped herself. What she wished was not a mystery.

  “I would like to come to meet you. We can talk about what happened. You can decide if you’d cooperate in a DNA test to see if the young man is telling the truth.” Kendra barreled ahead with the things she needed while she still had Margie on the phone. Shoop looked at her with hope as well. The mother, she could be the first step.

  “I’m not well. Please talk to Howard. He handles this for me now. If the man is a crackpot, I cannot… It’s too cruel. I don’t have the reserves like I once did.”

  Kendra listened and understood. Hope was cruel.

  “Okay, if Howard—he was the sheriff, right? If he thinks there’s something credible, I’ll call you again and we’ll set up a meeting.”

  Kendra was up front with Margie about what she wanted. It was all she could give her at this point. Honesty. And now she felt the need to protect her too, from the man who’d walked into the office. His claim would play on Margie’s hope and perhaps shred whatever was left of it after all this time.

  “Uh, okay, yes. Talk to Howard.”

  Howard. Margie had spent so much time with law enforcement that Sheriff Meriwether was Howard to her.

  “Thank you.”

  Margie and Kendra ended the call. Shoop looked at her and raised her hands to question Kendra.

  “We need the sheriff, or well, the retired sheriff,” Kendra explained. “It’s the only way Mom is going to let down her guard.”

  “Okay, here’s the number.” Shoop took a step forward and handed Kendra a post-it note with a number and an address.

  “I’m doing this one in person.”

  Kendra began the ritual of double-checking the contents of her bag. The new-to-her Salvatore Ferragamo vintage Gancini bucket bag was a present to herself from Rebag.com. She loved the sleek black leather and single chunky gold latch. Her mother insisted on buying her new clothes but finding a deal on a designer bag was Kendra’s true skill and maybe her only hobby.

  Kendra grabbed her digital recorder and her coat off the rack in the corner. She ran through a mental list of what she’d need in the morning if the retired sheriff did agree to talk to her.

  “It’s been a full day,” Kendra said. “I’m going to visit the sheriff first thing tomorrow. When you get in, pull everything, and print everything. We need weather reports, witnesses who talked back then.”

  “I know the drill,” Shoop said.

  “Oh, and up there, episode one. You’re right. It’s going to be the day he disappeared. Whatever we get.”

  “Good luck,” Shoop said as she wrote Episode One on the board.

  Kendra walked out of her office and to her Jeep, parked in the adjacent garage.

  The story of Ethan Peltz had not been on
their radar or even on the shortlist for season three when she’d walked into work today.

  But she was learning to go where The Cold Trail led, no matter how dark.

  Chapter 7

  Kendra appreciated the spread and the beauty of the old suburban neighborhood as she wound through it in her Jeep.

  Each home was different in this Sleepy Hollow neighborhood, and each one sat on one acre, so the houses had ample front and backyards.

  Kendra parked on the street, so as not to block anyone in or out. It would be quite the little trek up the drive. She was about to go to the front door but stopped when she heard a call from out back.

  “I’m here!”

  She turned her head toward the direction of the greeting and then walked around the garage to the backyard. The ground was cold, but there wasn’t much snow. Come February, it could be knee deep, but there was just a hard-packed little inch of crusty white cover right now.

  Howard Meriwether tended his garden in all seasons.

  It was a hobby that he’d seeded on weekends and evenings when he was the Erie County Sheriff. It had taken root during his decades in the department, and now, during his retirement, his garden bloomed in three of four seasons, even in zone six, as he was proud to say to anyone who showed an interest.

  He didn’t have dozens of acres, but he had a huge backyard, the kind of neighborhood lots they don’t sell anymore. These days even three-thousand square foot homes were on postage stamp lots.

  Kendra was a city girl through and through, but she could appreciate the work it must have taken to make everything look this pretty, even in winter.

  The man behind that work, retired Sheriff Howard Meriwether, called out to the visitor again. He wore Carhartt overalls, stained with potting soil. He was putting pots with dried out plants into a garden shed.

  “Just let me lock this up!” He put the clay pots just inside the structure and then pulled the double barn doors shut.

  “Hello, Sheriff Meriwether, I’m Kendra Dillon.”

  “If you’re selling me on a new roof, forget it. Olive’s nephew owns JT Roofing. He’s our guy. I know I’ve got another full summer before I need to worry about it. Probably two.”

  “No, I’m not selling roofing or siding. I’m a podcaster. I tell cold case stories.”

  Sheriff Meriwether looked at Kendra with a little more intensity. He cocked his head and appeared to be forming an opinion about Kendra. She hoped she measured up.

  “What do I win if I guess what case of mine you want to put on your podcast?”

  “Am I that obvious?”

  “No, but only one case I had ever got this much attention.”

  “In thirty years, that’s a good thing, I think,” Kendra replied.

  “Ethan Peltz, I presume.”

  Kendra nodded.

  “Well, come on in. Olive makes me keep that stuff in my den.”

  He led her into the kitchen through a huge sliding glass door.

  “You are not tracking your boots in this kitchen, Howie—”

  The aforementioned Olive stopped mid-scold when she saw Kendra was what he was tracking in through her clean kitchen.

  “Oh, my apologies. I didn’t know we had company,” Olive said. She was pretty, with gray hair cut in a modern bob haircut. She smiled at Kendra and her husband, who was busy removing the offending boots.

  “This is Kendra Dillon. She’s a reporter, uh podcaster,” Meriwether said, and Olive extended a hand.

  “Well, let me offer you some coffee. It’s cold out there.”

  “No, no, don’t go to any trouble.” Kendra was immediately warmer in the presence of Howard Meriwether and his bride, Olive.

  “Dillon, eh? The famous one?” Olive asked. If you were from around here, you’d heard of either Kendra, her dad, or her mother. They were obviously from around here.

  “I guess so, yes,” Kendra said.

  “We’re going to talk in the den,” Howard told his wife and then pecked her on the cheek.

  “Okay, I’ll bring in a tray. Hang your coat there, on the hook, you’ll roast with it on inside,” Olive said, and Kendra did as instructed.

  Howard had emerged with his Carhartt overalls gone, and a pair of worn jeans and a Cleveland Browns sweatshirt on in its place.

  He put out his hand and directed Kendra to the den.

  As they walked along the hall, Kendra noticed pictures of what she presumed was the happy Meriwether family in the very backyard she’d just left. They were smiling, and the flowers were in full bloom.

  “Beautiful family and garden.”

  “Thank you, I’ve gotten somewhat obsessed with that, according to Olive. But she appreciates me not being in her way in the house, as much as possible.” The retired sheriff sat in a chair behind a desk and indicated Kendra sit across from him. “It’s satisfying, finding the right place for your plants to bloom, splitting them, weeding,” he explained to Kendra.

  She had zero domestic or gardening skills, so she took his word for it.

  “I can move things into the sun and rip out the things that are choking out the good stuff,” he continued. It sounded rather violent, actually.

  “I can see where that would be satisfying, yes.” The double meaning of his words wasn’t lost on Kendra.

  “So, Ethan Peltz,” Howard Meriwether said, dropping the discussion of his retirement hobby, a laser focus coming into his eyes.

  “I wonder, can I record our conversation for the podcast?” Kendra showed him her recording device.

  “Sure, ha! No more elections to win or voters to answer to anymore.”

  “Meaning?”

  “When you’re sheriff, you’re always running for office, telling people what they need to hear to get that vote. Now that I’m retired, I can speak my mind.”

  Kendra was used to law enforcement playing things close to the vest. Maybe retirement was a chance to be free to say what you wanted to say. Meriwether reminded Kendra of her dad in some ways.

  “I see,” Kendra answered.

  “He does talk and talk, hope you have a good charge on that battery,” Olive added, coming in with a tray filled with two coffees and a plate of buttery cookies shaped like clovers.

  “Oh, you’re so lucky to get my pearls of wisdom,” Howard joked, winking at Kendra, and Olive laughed.

  “Let me know if you two need anything,” Olive said. “I’m going upstairs to the studio.”

  “Thanks, honey,” Meriwether said to his wife.

  “Thank you,” Kendra added.

  “She’s got an art show in a month and has one more piece she’s working on.”

  “She’s an artist? How lovely.” Kendra couldn’t imagine her own parents living like this in symbiosis in retirement, though they were only a little younger than the Meriwethers.

  “Retired art teacher, current future art superstar.” He beamed with pride.

  “Can I pin this on your sweatshirt, Sheriff Meriwether?”

  “Yep, go for it. And call me Howard.”

  Chapter 8

  Kendra set up the recording device and Howard Meriwether got comfortable in his chair.

  Kendra decided to dive right in with her interview.

  “Start from the beginning. What do you remember about the first call?” Kendra asked.

  “Every detail, to be honest,” Howard said, and sadness washed over his previously jovial face. “I was never able to fully let it go, even though I sort of did, have to let it go.”

  “You were on the scene first?”

  “No, actually a patrol crew was first. They were already on site at the Sand Point: investigating a prostitution complaint. So, they were there, really fast, maybe five minutes after the 911 call.” Howard slid his chair to a file cabinet and got a file out. He flipped it open. “Yeah, here: 911 call comes in at 2:56, officers on the scene by uh, 3:01. Pretty fast.”

  “What prompted your involvement?”

  “A call from the officers. I was in my offic
e. They were on scene for about an hour, no luck,” Howard flipped a page in the file. “So, they called me to let me know and asked if we needed to take the next steps. There are procedures in place for missing kids at amusement parks. Those were exhausted quickly.”

  “You mean like locking the gates or something?”

  Kendra realized she had no idea what they did at amusement parks when a kid went missing.

  “That’s a myth. They don’t do that. If they did, they’d be doing it over and over. Kids wander away all the time at a crowded park. It all usually works itself out in twenty minutes, tops.”

  “Except this time,” Kendra pointed out.

  “Except this time,” he agreed, nodding. “And some parents, believe it or not, don’t want to call the police right away.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because then it’s real.” Kendra understood that. “Though,” Howard added, “from everything I investigated, they called fairly fast.”

  “So, the parents had searched, the park staff had searched, by the time you got on the scene?”

  “That’s correct, but I did everything again.”

  “Meaning?”

  “I took Margie Peltz to the spot she’d last seen her son. She told me everything she’d told my deputies.”

  “Do you remember her demeanor?”

  “Yes, I do. She was coming apart.”

  Howard Meriwether had kind eyes, Kendra thought, as she watched them go backward, to what she’d asked him to recall, instead of the warm cozy den around them.

  “With every second that ticked by, a part of her came unhinged. It was one cell breaking apart from the whole of her body, one at a time.” He described the woman Kendra had seen in some of the news reports. It was a disintegration of a person that was still held together by the skin but broken apart in all the other ways that made a whole.

  Howard leaned back in his chair. His belly was not unlike Santa’s, Kendra thought, as he continued. “I remember how hard it was to get a current picture of the boy. That was a lot harder, even fifteen years ago, than it is today. Phones weren’t cameras.”