by Meg Gardiner
As they stood in the doorway absorbing the gory scene, a sound returned: the whimpering moan they’d heard before, the dog-like cry for help. It was coming from Maddox.
His lips were cracked. His voice was a rasp. He opened a single gleaming eye.
“Help me.”
41
With her knife, Caitlin sliced the zip ties that bound Robert Maddox’s wrists to the bedpost. His hands dropped to his lap. He groaned and slumped against the bed. Rainey knelt at his side and took his pulse, then ripped open his shirt. The entry wound was neat and small and seeping blood. She grabbed a throw blanket from a bedside chair, folded it, and pressed it to Maddox’s chest. Weisbach radioed for an ambulance.
A crowd had pushed into the room—uniforms, detectives, and SWAT officers. Weisbach waved people away. “Give him air. Literally. Everybody back.”
Emmerich ushered them out. Together, Caitlin and Weisbach eased Maddox away from the bed and lay him flat on the floor. Rainey propped pillows beneath his feet to elevate his legs and prevent shock, then crouched at his side, keeping pressure on the gunshot wound. Maddox’s eyelids swam up and down.
If Maddox had been shot with the same ammunition that had killed Sheriff’s Deputy Ohlmeyer, the neat entry wound meant nothing. A hollow-point wreaked its damage below the skin.
“Mr. Maddox,” Caitlin said. “Who did this?”
The whimper returned, a long moan.
She gentled a hand on his shoulder. “Sir.”
Maddox squeezed his eyes shut. “Hayden.” A sad cry fell from his lips. “My son attacked me.”
Solis ducked into the room. “Gretchen Maddox didn’t turn up for her shift at Burglary this afternoon. Phone in the kitchen has six new voicemails from her shift commander.”
Weisbach leaned toward Maddox. “Robert. Is your wife here? Where’s Gretchen?”
His eyes opened. “I don’t know. But …” A rough breath. “I’m afraid. Something’s wrong. Please find her.”
“Working on it,” Solis said, and headed out of the room.
Maddox told them Gretchen drove an Acura and gave a sketchy idea of what she had been wearing.
Rainey eyed Weisbach. “How long till the paramedics get here?”
“They’re coming.”
Rainey turned back to Maddox. “Stay with us, Robert. We need you to do that.” She pressed the blanket against the wound. “Tell us about Hayden.”
Robert Maddox peered up at them. His lips retracted, a rictus. And he began to talk.
Two paths can lead to psychopathy: one dominated by nature, the other by nurture. For some children, their environment—living with abusive parents, fending for themselves in dangerous neighborhoods—can turn them coldhearted and violent. If those kids are given a reprieve from their situation, they can be pulled back from psychopathy’s edge.
Other children, Caitlin had learned, had a combination of neural wiring and ingrained personality organization that only constant intervention could keep in check. As Robert Maddox spoke, in choked and broken sentences, a picture formed of a son who seemed born to be violently antisocial.
“He just … shot me,” Maddox said. “I don’t know why. I knew he’d been upset—he’s hardly been home the past couple of months, but … I looked up and he was standing in the doorway. He said, ‘Dad.’ Then raised the gun. Said, ‘Time’s up.’ And pulled the trigger.”
His voice sounded painfully dry. Caitlin ducked outside and grabbed a bottle of water from the Suburban. When she returned, Weisbach was running Maddox through a series of questions. When was the last time he’d seen his son? Was he driving the Jeep Renegade? Was the girl Hannah Guillory with him? Who were his friends? Where might he have gone?
Maddox had no answers.
Caitlin raised his head and gave him a sip of water. She took his hand. “How young was Hayden when you understood that he was struggling?”
For a second he held back. Then, as if deciding that years of shame and secrecy were no longer worth it, he continued. His voice sounded clearer. But his eyes were clouded.
“Three,” he said.
“Three years old?”
“I heard Hayden counting. ‘One, two, three, four …’ I was proud of him, being so little but knowing his numbers. I came around the corner to praise him. He was crouched by the fireplace, counting the times he stuck the guinea pig with a sharp pencil.”
Nobody reacted. Caitlin considered that a feat.
Straight from the womb, Maddox’s description made clear, Hayden was a pitiless child. He was bright, imaginative, and charming. But he was a compulsive liar. And a thief. Aggressive. Self-centered.
“He’s always been suspicious of others—so suspicious. I don’t know why. Somebody must have hurt him, a bully. For him to be so vindictive,” Maddox said. “He had to learn it from somebody who hurt him.”
Caitlin didn’t think Hayden must have been bullied. His own bullying could have been entirely self-generated.
“Was he physically violent with people at an early age?” she said.
Maddox was pale, but the tap had opened. “I thought it was boys being boys. At first. But my wife’s a cop—she sees so much, and she knew Hayden was different. Nothing we said had any effect on him. ‘Don’t hit your friend—it hurts him.’ ‘Don’t slam his hand in the door.’ It didn’t penetrate. Hayden didn’t care. He liked hurting people. He was … cruel.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “It scared us.”
Caitlin held his hand. Maddox described a boy who from the time he entered grade school was capriciously, gratuitously violent. He explained how he and Gretchen tried everything to control Hayden. Stern discipline. Corporal punishment. Tough love. Bribery. Prayer.
“Things would go great for a few weeks. Hayden would say he was sorry. That he was trying harder. That he loved Jesus and was changed. But a month, six weeks, and he was back to his old tricks. And lying about it, or angry if we pointed out he was backsliding. Making out that it was our fault. Somebody’s. Never his. Then …”
Maddox paused, as if deciding whether to open a vault he kept tightly locked. He breathed. Pain, either visceral or emotional, seemed to swell, and the tumblers clicked.
“When Hayden was twelve, we reached out for help. We asked Gretchen’s brother to take him under his wing.”
Rainey and Caitlin exchanged a glance.
“What’s his name, Mr. Maddox?” Rainey said.
“Trey. Trey Laforte,” Maddox said. “It’s good for kids to have an adult they can trust and confide in.”
“Of course.”
“Trey, he’s Gretchen’s younger brother. Ex-military. Army Ranger, fought in Iraq,” Maddox said. “He was the real deal, somebody we thought could channel all Hayden’s … unruly energies. We hoped Trey could put Hayden on the right road. Get out his frustrations. Hayden’s always been very physical, but also very much inside his own head. Trey, he could give Hayden a cut-down version of army discipline. We thought learning survival skills might straighten him out.”
Fresh pain swam through his eyes.
“And?” Rainey said.
“It seemed to work. Hayden loved tracking, trapping, learning military tactics and guerrilla warfare. Ninja shit, he said, was cool.” Passion flecked his voice. “He finally had something.”
His lips quivered. Caitlin squeezed his hand. He seemed to be coming up on a but.
He inhaled. “Then came the hunting trip.”
Teach the boy to shoot, Uncle Trey said. Hayden was fourteen, plenty old enough. Have him bring down a buck, smear his kill’s hot blood across his cheeks, and he’d feel like a warrior.
“It was supposed to be a bonding weekend,” Maddox said. Him, Hayden, and Uncle Trey. “The Sierras, early in Christmas season. Take the dog, too. Give Hayden positive focus. Man time.”
Early in Christmas season, Caitlin th
ought—past deer-hunting season, probably. Poaching season. She continued to hold Maddox’s hand.
“But when the moment came and Hayden took his shot,” Maddox said, “it wasn’t a clean kill. The boy’s first time hitting a moving target with a big rifle, not at the range, real life, couldn’t blame him. And he did hit the deer. But it stumbled away, wounded. Then …”
He winced. Caitlin pressed his hand, encouraging him.
“Hayden was furious he’d missed,” Maddox said. “And—Trey and I told him not to stomp off, not to kick rocks, he had to complete the kill. We were … very emphatic.”
Caitlin grimaced, picturing a boy facing withering shouts to finish the job.
“It happened so fast. Trey yelling, the dog barking. Coho, our black Lab, he was loud as hell. And the deer crashing through the underbrush, trying to escape,” Maddox said. “Hayden tore into the forest, firing. Just firing. He ran, I saw him pulling the bolt on the rifle, again and again.” Another breath. “When he reached the deer, it was dead.”
He looked down. “Coho was wounded.”
Anguish knifed through Caitlin. She could only imagine her dog, Shadow, being shot, picture her crying in pain and confusion.
“We were miles deep in the high Sierra,” Maddox said. “Hours from a vet’s office. There was no way”—he shook his head vehemently—“no way at all to save Coho.”
He gazed between her and Rainey. “Even though Hayden begged. Even though he tried to hoist the dog across his shoulders. That dog was the only creature Hayden ever cared about. But there was no way.”
Rainey’s expression had gone distant and hard. Maddox’s hand, in Caitlin’s, was cold.
“And it was Hayden’s dog,” he said.
Hayden’s fault the Lab was doomed. Hayden’s responsibility to rectify the situation.
“Man up,” Maddox said.
His voice trembled. “God help me. I made Hayden shoot that dog.”
On the window and walls of the bedroom, icy lights spun blue and red. A siren whined and died. The ambulance pulled up outside.
A voice in the doorway spoke grimly. “Keep talking.”
It was Emmerich. Telling Maddox to finish the story.
“After the hunting trip, Hayden acted the same at home. Charmer. Liar,” Maddox said. “But he became a full-time schemer. And hater. And thief.”
Quietly, Hayden became consumed with punishing anybody who tried to exercise control over him. Anybody in authority.
“And he never looked me in the eye. Not from the moment he stood over that dog and pulled the trigger,” Maddox said. “He’d stare, but if you looked back? Catch his gaze, you were in for trouble.”
He gasped, seemingly closer to tears than physical pain.
“Hayden’s out of control,” Maddox said. “And the boy doesn’t care. Nothing stops him.” His hand trembled in Caitlin’s. “His mother said, ‘Keep this up and you’ll be nothing but a small-time thug.’ Hayden sneered. Said he’d never be a small-time anything. Gretchen told him to be careful or he’d eat those words. Hayden smiled. Just grinned.”
Maddox’s eyes widened as desperation, recognition, something honest broke through his defenses. “Hayden thinks that no matter what he does, he’ll be protected. By his age, by his ability to con people—and by the fact that his mom’s a cop.”
Outside, vehicle doors slammed. The paramedics were unloading.
Emmerich approached. “Has your son ever been diagnosed by a psychiatrist?”
Maddox averted his gaze like a dog caught eating the trash. “Hayden’s been given multiple psychiatric diagnoses. Emotional detachment disorder. Oppositional defiant disorder. Conduct disorder with—” His voice caught and dropped. “With callous and unemotional traits.”
He went silent, as if the tape had run out. He didn’t say the rest. Maybe he couldn’t bring himself to.
Hayden was a psychopath.
Quietly, Emmerich asked, “The hunting trip. Did Hayden’s mother have any involvement?”
It took Maddox a moment, deciding. “Before Hayden put the dog down, he called her. Begged her to get him out of it. It was pathetic. Almost made me change my mind. Almost. Then …” His voice rose, a spiral, toward something uncontrollable. “She said, ‘You made your bed. You have to lie in it.’”
Maddox’s last words slid toward incoherence. He sounded utterly broken. Two paramedics entered the bedroom, wearing blue latex gloves and carrying a medical kit.
Detective Weisbach stepped into the hall and spoke into her police radio. Putting out a BOLO for Hayden. “The suspect is armed and extremely dangerous.”
Maddox broke into sobs. “Don’t hurt him.”
The paramedics took control of the space. “Let us get to work. You can talk to him again later.”
Caitlin and Rainey moved back, and the paramedics knelt at Maddox’s side. The bedroom suddenly felt hot and crowded, rife with the smell of blood and desperation. The paramedics took Maddox’s vitals, but he didn’t seem to notice. He stared straight at Emmerich. His voice spiked.
“It’s not Hayden’s fault that something’s wrong with him,” he choked. “Don’t hurt him. I know he did this to me, but I love my son.”
42
Don’t hurt him.
The words seemed to shove Caitlin backward.
She retreated from the bedroom. The paramedics took Robert Maddox’s pulse, put ECG leads on his chest, palpated the gunshot wound, checked his pupils for signs of head trauma from the kicking he’d taken. Maddox breathed shallowly, pleading for his ruthless son, his hand grasping toward Caitlin as she backed away.
Rainey joined her in the hallway. Her face was stark with shock, her mind working behind her eyes. Emmerich was beyond somber.
“Hayden’s moved past surrogates to attacking the sources of his rage,” he said. “He’s building toward a finale.”
On the floor in the bedroom, Robert Maddox moaned incoherently.
A warning blared in Caitlin’s head. “Confronting a malignant paranoid can trigger homicidal violence. Preemptive annihilation.”
“The BOLO specifies armed and dangerous,” Emmerich said.
“If he’s cornered, nobody’s likely to talk him down. He’ll strike out. If Hannah’s with him, it’ll be exceptionally dangerous for her. If she isn’t with him when he’s confronted, using deadly force could seal her fate anyway. We’d never find her,” she said. “Taking him alive has to be a priority.”
“Nobody wants to turn their gun on a high school sophomore.”
The look she gave him said, On what planet? “I don’t.”
I love my son.
Hayden existed without the ability to love, so emotionally impoverished that he didn’t even know he was lost and starving. He was a boy. If she pulled the trigger, what would she become?
Officers edged past them in the hall. The house was about to be excavated. Armed with a warrant, the LAPD would search the home from top to bottom for handguns, ammunition, spent rounds, ninja rocks, shoes matching the prints in the hallway at the Guillorys’ home, a black hoodie and ball cap, wedding rings, and more.
In Hayden’s room, Weisbach and another detective were examining every millimeter of space—the dresser, desk, bed, bookshelf, and closet. Weisbach had Hayden’s laptop open. Caitlin heard her say that the computer was password protected, but that task force officers had begun searching his social media and tracing his activity. His social footprint seemed skimpy.
Caitlin wasn’t surprised. A paranoid like Hayden was unlikely to share information on easily accessible forums.
The paramedics brought Robert Maddox out, strapped to a stretcher, an oxygen mask on his battered face. Solis trailed them. Caitlin followed them out the front door as they hurried Maddox through the cold air to the ambulance.
Its flashing lights popcorned against the
darkness. The paramedics lifted the stretcher inside, and Solis clambered in with them.
Up and down the street, clusters of people stood on porches and lawns, backlit and shadowed. Neighbors—alarmed, curious, confused.
Rainey approached. She took the neighbors in. “Word’ll spread. We’ve lost the chance to take him by surprise. We need to get out ahead on this with public announcements. Now.”
“The BOLO, public bulletins, saturate every channel with Hannah’s photo.”
Thinking of Hannah caused Caitlin’s chest to hurt. She pressed a fist to her sternum and forced a breath.
Solis hopped down from the ambulance and slammed the door. The engine fired up, lights and siren, and pulled away.
He hiked over, bearish. “Got more from the father. The kid doesn’t just have wheels. He’s got money—he took his dad’s wallet. Credit cards if he’s sloppy enough to use them. Couple hundred in cash otherwise.”
Enough to stay out of electronic sight for a while. Hours at a minimum. And when a child’s life was at stake, every hour was a lifetime.
Rainey said, “We have to figure out where Hayden might go to ground.”
Solis nodded. “I pressed him. Maddox thinks the most likely place the kid would seek refuge is with his uncle. Trey, the ex-Ranger.” His eyes, under the porch light, crackled.
“But?” Caitlin said. “What’s the hitch?”
“Trey Laforte has fallen off the grid,” Solis said. “Seems Trey has a few issues of his own. Substances, anger, inability to keep a job. He got evicted from a fleabag apartment a few months back. Asked to move in here, but Maddox objected. Had enough trouble with Hayden, didn’t need more turmoil under his roof. Maddox doesn’t know where the guy is.”
“Some mentor,” Caitlin said. “Drunk and stoned, teaching Hayden survival skills, urban guerrilla tactics, how to be a silent, invisible ‘ninja’ …”
“Trying to scare him straight with stories of his time in combat. Not likely to be pretty, especially if the uncle was trying to knock the kid’s head one-eighty in some kind of tough-love boot camp.”