“We need to see phone logs, outgoing calls, anything to indicate who Dr. Falcon spoke with today.”
“You’ll have it. Give me twenty minutes. Her office is at the back of the corridor on the right.”
“I know the way,” Caroline said, heading down the hall.
Luke nodded to the building manager and followed her. She paused in the office doorway and turned on the lights.
“What do you notice, Caroline?”
She shook her head and stepped inside. “It looks the same as it did this afternoon.”
Luke walked over to the desk and opened the calendar. He pulled out his notepad and picked up a pen. “See if you can find today’s mail, any clue regarding a last-minute errand Sharon might have decided to make.” He wrote down the notations Sharon had made on her calendar during the last week. A stop at the dry cleaner’s and post office were noted for today.
“The newspaper is gone; I was reading the movie times earlier when I dropped off Benjamin.”
“Did you see a dry cleaner’s bag when you were by earlier?” Luke asked.
“No, but it could have been hanging on the back of the door and I wouldn’t have seen it.”
“We’ll check if she picked up the order.” He closed the calendar. “Anything in the mail?”
“Just her notation on the hospital bulletin to remember to bring in cookies next week for the retirement party for the hospital administrative secretary.”
Luke studied the papers left on the desk. Sharon was neat in her filing, if overworked. This had the feel of a dead end. He looked around the room. “The roses are new.”
“Mark sent them.”
Luke walked over to the table where the vase sat and fingered the perfect blooms. “There’s no card. Did Sharon say Mark sent them?”
Caroline didn’t answer him. Luke looked over at her. She sank down on the couch. “No . . . I assumed it.”
“We’ll find the florist who delivered them.”
“It’s the same bouquet, the same unique vase,” she whispered. “I should have realized it. The guy who stalked me last fall just sent the same bouquet of roses to my sister that he sent to me. That’s what you’re wondering.”
He was, but the confirmation of it was beyond what she could bear. He crossed the room and reached for her hand. “Stop, Caroline. The roses are just one of the things that happened today, like a van cutting them off as she pulled out of the lot. Nothing means anything beyond what it is. We’ll rule out the roses easily enough. Mark may have sent them and she took the card with her.”
“Luke, last fall, roses were what he used when he said he wanted to meet me . . .” Caroline bolted up from the couch and disappeared into the hall.
“Caroline!” Luke slammed the office door shut behind him and headed after her. He should have just checked out the roses without asking her about them.
* * *
Caroline shoved open the door to the clinic and surged outside, seeking the darkness to hide her tears. She didn’t want Luke telling her what he was starting to wonder. O God, where are they? What happened to my family?
She shoved her hands into her jacket pockets, searching for a Kleenex left over from the packet she had been using in the car. Her throat burned so bad she couldn’t swallow. Not finding any tissues, she paced over to the car and opened the door, searching through the glove box to get the napkins she had stuffed in there. She wanted to drown in these tears.
Luke stopped beside her, breathing hard. “This isn’t going to be a stalking. Not with Mark’s disappearance too.”
She looked over at him, fighting the urge to swear at him because he was around and this was beyond anything she could bear. She needed and yet hated the fact that he was treating this like a case to work.
“I need you to be prepared to get a ransom call.”
She reached toward the car to steady herself. A ransom call. The words cut like a sharp knife. “That is what you’ve been organizing while taking me around,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
She struggled to stand without leaning against the car, feeling like she had to find the strength from somewhere even as she died inside. She walked shakily toward the medical clinic before turning back to stare at Luke. “Ransom calls . . . accidents . . . worse. You just reel them off. Don’t you feel anything? It’s your family missing too!”
The muscles in his jaw tensed. “Don’t, Caroline. We’ve been down this road before; let’s not go there again. I can’t help Mark if I let emotions overwhelm my ability to do my job. You’ve got enough emotion for both of us.”
“Well I’m sorry I’m upset!”
He took two steps back and leaned against the side of his car.
“What’s the matter, did I touch a nerve? You do have them, don’t you?” He stood there, arms folded, watching her. Always just watching her. She spun away. “There are times I hate you.”
“I know.”
She lowered her head toward her knees. To think she had wondered about loving this man. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
The events of the last hours replayed in her head from the first suspicion about Sharon and Benjamin being late to the last decision she had made when the fear hit—calling Luke. She had trusted him to be able to do something to help her. And now she was angry that he was doing his job. “I’m sorry; that was uncalled for.”
“I’m going to find them, Caroline. All of them.”
She stood up. “What are we going to do now? I know you’ve got a plan.”
“We’ll go back to the house. You’re going to eat something, and we’ll talk through what to say if a call comes in. Jackie has technicians setting up phone taps now. In a few hours, flyers with Sharon, Benjamin, and Mark’s photos will be flooding the news, and we’ll have command centers organized in both Benton and Atlanta to run a full search with local police and volunteers. Sharon, Mark, and Benjamin are somewhere and we will find them.”
“Alive?”
“What do you want me to say, Caroline? It’s killing me that—” His voice broke. He cleared it. “Speculation is not going to help either one of us get through this night.”
“I can’t lose my family, Luke. They are everything I’ve got.”
“You’ve got me.”
She looked at him. She couldn’t handle who he was. Whatever happened this weekend, the job he did, and the control he kept—they couldn’t work this out. She walked around the car to the passenger door. “Let’s go to the house.”
* * *
The back door to Mark and Sharon’s home opened before Caroline got the car door open.
Luke’s partner met her partway across the driveway with a hug. “Caroline, I’m so sorry. So very, very sorry.”
Caroline tried to smile when Jackie stepped back. “Thank you for coming to help. Luke says you’ve been busy.”
“The guys here—Luke tapped the best in the Bureau to help. Come on, let me introduce you.”
Caroline left her notebook on the kitchen table and went with Jackie to meet the people using the dining room as their work area. Jackie introduced her to four men and two women. “Let me get you a seat, Caroline, and I’ll show you what we’re arranging.”
The thought was too overwhelming. Caroline took a step backward, and Luke’s hand settled on her shoulder. She wanted so badly to lean against him and just let the tears keep falling. She shook her head. “In a bit. Let me find us something to eat while you two talk. I need a minute first.”
Luke rubbed his thumb on her shoulder blade. “Something with pickles for me.”
She tried to smile. “Sure. Excuse me.” She made her escape.
Jackie and Luke were good together. Jackie was the kind of lady he needed to find for his personal life too: Someone who didn’t crumble when hard days came. Caroline just wanted to burst into tears, go hide, anything to get away from the horrible fact that there was nothing she could do to help her family right now. Others had to find them.
/> * * *
“She’ll be okay, Luke.”
He turned from watching Caroline retreat to the kitchen to look at his partner. “Yes.” He rubbed his burning eyes, wishing he wasn’t letting Caroline down so badly. As support for her tonight, he was failing miserably. “What do we know?”
“Mark did not send the roses.”
Luke dropped his hand to focus on Jackie.
“I tracked down the florist as soon as you called me. The woman who took the phoned-in order said it wasn’t Mark, that he didn’t want a card, and that it was thanks for Sharon being a wonderful doctor. She said he paid by cash, that—”
“That bouquet wasn’t from a grateful patient,” Luke said with certainty.
“You think Caroline’s stalker from last fall transferred his attention to Sharon?”
“It was the same bouquet, Jackie, and as a thank-you—” He shook his head. “It feels very wrong, especially given its timing. Yes, I think it’s a distinct possibility the man just transferred his focus. This time he skipped the preliminaries and just grabbed what he wanted.”
“What about Mark? That might explain what happened to Sharon, but not your cousin.”
“I don’t know. But if this is not a kidnapping, it’s going to be something extreme. We need a way to eliminate stalking as a possibility.”
“We’ll figure it out.” Jackie nodded to the kitchen where Caroline disappeared. “How prepared is she to get a ransom call?”
“She’s not. But she’ll get there. Are we ready here?”
“Any line they might conceivably call is tapped.”
* * *
Waiting for the phone to ring qualified as slow torture. Caroline stopped her pacing at the doorway to the dining room. Too many people; too much confusion; she couldn’t think. And the words she had been coached to say were echoing around in her mind like a broken record. I’ll give you the money. But I need to know they are alive. “I want to go home, Jackie. They could call my house.”
“The phones are being covered.”
“Still, I want to go home.”
Luke put down the papers he held. “I’ll take you.”
She nodded and abruptly turned to head outside. She could walk home faster than waiting on him to drive her, but tonight she wouldn’t get out of here without him.
“Luke, stay over there with her. Stretch out on the couch and get a couple hours of sleep. You’re running on fumes. There is a very long Saturday ahead of us. Any call that comes in here, we can route to her place.”
Caroline didn’t hear Luke’s reply to Jackie as the door swung closed behind her. Her vote would be no. She had no desire to have company. But not much of today had gone her way.
* * *
“He’s not coming.”
“He’ll come,” Frank replied, lighting another cigarette. The shadows of the church bell tower danced across the hood of their car. Silence returned, thick and heavy.
Ronald looked again at his watch. “We need to cut our losses and get out of here.”
“Not until I get my money.”
“Frank, it’s almost 1 a.m. There isn’t going to be a ransom paid. Let’s put a bullet in her head, dump her in the woods, and move on. We were hired by an idiot who turned out to have a very bad plan.”
“No. I’m going to get paid one way or another.” Frank crushed his cigarette. “But the price just went up.”
Chapter Nine
Luke’s car headlights passed over the terraced grounds at the side of Caroline’s house. Back when this had been an active farm, any bit of flat land had been kept for crops and cattle. The terraces created flat stretches of land for flower beds and water breaks to keep rain from rushing against the back patio. She’d inherited the place from her parents, and he’d always thought the home was perfect for her.
Luke shut off the car and the silence around them was complete. “Let’s go in.”
She didn’t move immediately, then pushed at the car door and got out. She dug in her purse for her keys.
Unlocking the side door of her house, she pushed it open, shut off the alarm, and stepped into her kitchen. Luke followed her. The ceiling fan turned on with the light. The room was warm and smelled faintly of cinnamon rolls. “Do you have a flashlight? I’d like to look around outside.”
She retrieved it for him. “I’m making myself some tea. Would you like some?”
“Please.” He needed to send her to bed for a few hours, but while she was this tense—it wouldn’t be a restful sleep.
He stepped outside and clicked on the light. He walked the driveway toward the roadside mailbox, searching the woods on either side for signs of a disturbance. The mailbox was freshly painted red with white daisies. He opened the latched door slowly and shone his light inside. No note. Most kidnappers preferred phone calls. So why didn’t they call?
He walked back to the house, listening to the woods. He hated the outdoors on nights like this, hated having to fight the darkness of nature as well as the darkness of the soul in the man he feared might be out there, watching. The perimeter seemed quiet. He paused to wipe his feet before entering. He skirted around Caroline and put the flashlight away under the sink. “I’ll go wash up.”
Photos lined the hallway, several of Ben and Sharon, numerous casual photos of Caroline’s students. There was a new photo of Caroline, her arms draped around Ben’s shoulders, the boy laughing as he held up a big turtle. Luke wished he’d been there to see that scene.
He stepped into the small bathroom off the hall. His eyes were dry and gritty, and he could almost taste the traffic fumes still lingering on his shirt. He splashed cold water on his face to ease the fatigue and picked up the soap to wash his hands. Caroline used this small bathroom regularly. A Post-it note on the mirror counted down the days until Christmas, the numbers crossed off and shrinking fast. He smiled at the reminder of how much Caroline liked the holidays. She’d framed a note written in her handwriting and hung it above the towels.
HOW TO BE A GREAT TEACHER
Know your students.
Know your subject.
Make it relevant.
Teach in an organized place, in an organized way.
Encourage curiosity.
Ask the questions: Who? What? When? Where? Why? How?
Time is priceless.
Care.
The list sounded so like her. Caroline loved teaching fifth grade. Luke touched the small chimes hanging on the wall, sending them into motion and then turned off the light. He walked through the house. He wasn’t looking for anything in particular, simply signs that there had been unwanted attention also focusing on Caroline.
He couldn’t discount the fact that by leaving early for Atlanta, Caroline had unknowingly saved herself from being part of whatever had happened. If someone had grabbed Sharon and Ben and also Mark, had they intended to grab Caroline too?
Luke took a seat on the stairs and rubbed the center of his left palm with his right thumb seeing the lines smooth out and re-form. Caroline part of this . . . when had she made that decision to leave early for Atlanta?
Had someone been tailing her too and she hadn’t realized it? Or maybe she lost them in traffic? Someone had come after the Falcons in Benton and taken three of them. It wouldn’t be much of a stretch to see them also plucking Caroline from her travels. His hand tightened over the other to stop the tremor. This hadn’t been accidental—the hours since they had last been seen made that improbable—and that left intentional. Who are you? Why did you do this? What do you want?
He pushed hands through his hair and looked for a moment at the ceiling. If he came apart tonight, so would Caroline. She’d pulled herself together but she was still on that fragile line of panic. He suppressed the overwhelming emotions he felt. He could do little for his family tonight, but he could still do something for Caroline. As much as she hated his calmness, it was still for her benefit.
He was doing the biggest snow job in the world right now, implyi
ng he was okay. I am so scared, Lord. All I can see is finding their bloody corpses. You might as well kill me with a heart attack first; it would be more merciful.
He took a deep breath, stood up, and walked back through the house. He reentered the kitchen from the other direction. “I still think you have a great home. It’s got character.”
“I like it.”
Old-fashioned glass jars with stick candy in a variety of flavors lined the counter. Luke took an orange stick and walked to the patio door to check the dead bolt.
Caroline brought the tea over to the table, and a plate of sandwiches. “Come and sit. You barely touched what I fixed earlier; you have to eat something. Would you say grace for us?”
“Sure.” He pulled out a chair and waited for her to settle in her chair before reaching for her hand. “Jesus, please bring Sharon, Benjamin, and Mark home to share the next meal around this table.” Her hand cut off the circulation in his. “Please keep them safe.” He ended the prayer before it overwhelmed her. She looked like she wanted to lay her head down on her hands and bawl.
He picked up the sandwich he would have to wrestle to swallow. A glance at the clock showed it was 2:23 a.m. “If you eat, you’ll rest better.”
She nodded and ate a few bites of the sandwich. He needed more things from Caroline: lists of friends and neighbors and answers to a dozen other questions about who might have reason to hurt the family, but he couldn’t bring himself to ask them right now. The team already had their hands full getting ready for the 6 a.m. newscasts. A couple hour’s delay for those names wouldn’t materially affect how fast they could be investigated.
Caroline pushed aside her plate and rested her chin on her palm. “They aren’t going to be found alive, are they?”
He flinched. He looked at her and couldn’t answer her. Not given what he’d seen on the job the last few years. He couldn’t offer much hope that he could give her back all three of them safe and unhurt. He might be able to give her back some of them alive. Sometimes he hated his job that made anything better than death good news.
She looked away, toward the night outside the patio doors. “Tell me what comes next, Luke. If we don’t get a ransom call.”
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