Undeniable

by Tom Grace

  “How did you place your child for adoption?” Roxanne asked.

  “My father is a lawyer. He made all the arrangements for my son’s adoption. All of the records were sealed and everything happened at arm’s length—the adoptive family knows nothing about me or my father, and we know nothing about them.”

  “Compartmentalized to protect both you and your son,” Nolan said.

  “My father is very good at ensuring the privacy of his clients, especially me.”

  “If Byron Palmer is the kidnapper, then he must have found a way to reduce the pool of children who could possibly be his offspring. How old would your son be today?”

  “Eleven.”

  “There must be millions of eleven year olds in the U.S.,” Roxanne mused. “Thousands of whom were adopted.”

  “Would your father’s relationship with the agency that placed your son be well known?” Nolan asked.

  “I guess so. He’s worked with Heartland Family Planning for years and sits on their board.”

  “If Palmer figured out how to hack into Heartland’s records,” Roxanne speculated, “that would have greatly narrowed his search.”

  “Assuming that you’re right about Palmer being the Sandman,” Nolan said to Deena, “then he doesn’t know where to find your son. If he did, he would have gone there straight away without the risk of these other kidnappings. And given that he has returned all of the children taken so far, he hasn’t found the one he’s looking for.”

  “Playing devil’s advocate, if all the children taken by the Sandman were adopted,” Roxanne said, “wouldn’t the FBI have noticed the pattern? For that matter, wouldn’t Palmer know when his child was conceived almost to the day, giving him roughly a two-month window around the child’s birthday?”

  “I seem to recall some of the abducted children were years older and younger than your son.” Nolan said. He pulled out a laptop computer, settled in behind the suite desk and ran a search on the abducted children. “Yeah. The ages of the kidnapped children are all over the map.”

  “If Byron knew he needed time for his search,” Deena said, “then he would obscure what he was really after—corrupt the data to make his selections appear random.”

  “When is your son’s birthday?” Kilkenny asked.

  “He’ll be twelve in September.”

  “The Sandman started snatching in December, so your son would have been eleven during this entire spree. If I eliminate the outliers, only half of the kids are your son’s age. I don’t know what their birthdays are, or if any were adopted.”

  “Taking your assumption one step further,” Roxanne said, “if Palmer used Heartland’s records to focus his search, then that’s also where he found the names of his adopted victims. If any of these kidnapped children are in Heartland’s adoption database, then we know who the Sandman is and who he’s after.”

  “I think I know a guy who can help us with that,” Nolan said.

  He tapped an icon on his MacBook’s dock that opened a window on the screen and launched an audiovisual communications program and connected to Grin in Ann Arbor.

  “Dude, what happened to your face?” Grin asked as he came on. “And don’t tell me that I should see the other guy.”

  “I wish you could, then I’d find out who did it. I have a favor to ask.”

  “Shoot.”

  “I need you to take a look at the adoption records at Heartland Family Planning.”

  “Heartland? Beat-down makeover aside, this must be your lucky day. I was just backtracking Zeke’s adoption records, and the agency in Florida that placed him partnered with Heartland on that deal.”

  “Great, but put that on the back burner for a minute. I need you to search through Heartland for all of the kids taken by the Sandman.”

  “The Sandman? But what’s that got to do with—”

  “Nothing,” Nolan said, cutting him off. “Look, we’re here with Deena Hawthorne and this may be a matter of life and death.”

  “Hang tight, I’m on it.”

  Deena sat pensively on the couch awaiting the results of Grin’s search. She heard music emanating faintly from the laptop’s speakers. The man on the other end of Nolan’s conversation was listening to something classical she couldn’t identify. Palmer, she knew, would have pulled the title and composer of the work along with other bits of arcane trivia from the vast storehouse of his eidetic memory. She shuddered at the thought of Palmer focusing the intensity of his intellect on the task of collecting his beloved and their child.

  “Weird request,” Grin said as he reappeared in the window on Nolan’s MacBook.

  “What’s the verdict?”

  “You went three for five, which for the Sandman must suggest something.”

  “The three you found—how old are they and when are their birthdays?”

  “All three kids are eleven,” Grin replied. “And I got a September birthday and two Augusts.”

  “I hate to say it, Deena, but your intuition is looking pretty strong,” Nolan said. “What’s your son’s birthday?”

  “September third,” she replied.

  “Lookin’ for a boy born on September third of the same year,” Grin repeated back slowly as he typed in the search parameters. “I got only one hit. According to the adoption birth certificate this boy was adopted by a Henry and Iris Young. They named their son Kirk.”

  “Can you find a phone number?”

  “Linking over—and, yes. Address puts them in Pennsylvania, just outside of Easton. Let me check to see if they’re still there.”

  On his laptop’s screen, Nolan could see Grin studying one of several flat screen monitors that populated his workstation at MARC. In profile, Grin’s head bobbed as he chased down disparate bits of data to reveal the answers he sought. Then a smile curled in the center of Grin’s pointed goatee.

  “The Young family still resides near Easton, on a dairy farm. Records put the dairy farm in that family’s hands about as long as your family has farmed their land in Dexter. I even found a nice photo of Hank and Iris Young with their son Kirk—looks like he won a ribbon at the County 4-H Fair.”

  Deena smiled sadly and stifled a sob. She knew that she had made the right decision for her son—Palmer had just now proven that—but the void he left in her heart remained.

  “Deena, did you go full term?” Nolan asked.

  “Oh, what?” Deena stuttered, lost in her thoughts.

  “Your pregnancy, did it go the full nine months?”

  “Forty weeks, to be exact. I gave birth two weeks after my due date.”

  “What was your due date?”

  “August twentieth.”

  “Grin, I have one more thing I’d like you to check,” Nolan said. “Look at what’s common in the adoption records for Kirk Young and the three kidnapping victims and run a search on those parameters. The range on the date of birth should be one month, plus or minus, from August twentieth.”

  “Looks like the common factors are approximate date of birth and a private adoption through Heartland,” Grin said as he defined his search. “And I have six kids that are a match.”

  “Based on the three known victims, can you project which child would be next?” Roxanne asked.

  “It won’t be obvious,” Deena added. “He’s trying to make these abductions appear truly random.”

  “Did you get that?” Nolan asked.

  “I heard the ladies,” Grin replied, his attention on one of his side screens. “Luckily, I am pretty good at plucking order from chaos. It’s not alphabetical on either first or last name, and it’s not in straight birth order, either. But—”

  “What do you see?”

  “D-Day was the twentieth of August?” Grin asked. “And the Sandman would know this?”

  “Yes on both counts.”

  “I think he’s bracketing the due date, successive approximation,” Grin said. “Looking at these six kids, the first one taken was born several weeks before our target date. The n
ext was equally as far after. The third gets us a little closer to D-Day.”

  “And the remaining three are all closer still to August twentieth?”

  “Yes. And if I’m right, then Kirk Young will be the next of these kids.”

  “We have to tell the police,” Deena said. “We can’t let Byron take this boy.”

  “Agreed,” Nolan said, “but we have to do this right. The Sandman only takes children at night, and he just dropped the latest one off Thursday night. And if Palmer is the Sandman and he did this to me, then he’s probably not ready to take another child, not just yet.”

  “Looking at the Sandman’s pattern so far,” Grin said, “He goes at least a week between kidnappings.”

  “Recon,” Nolan said. “He scouts his targets and gets a feel for the home.”

  “He also spaces the adopted kids out—he hasn’t taken two in a row.”

  “That could work in our favor, unless he’s feeling both confident and a bit impatient. His attack on me shows that he’s not immune to impulse. Regardless, I think we have some time to bolster our case before we take it to the FBI. Grin, text me the contact information for the Young family—Deena and I are going to pay them a visit.” Nolan turned to Roxanne. “I want you and Grin to dig up everything you can on Byron Palmer and the other adopted children. And since I expect you two are going to bend a few laws with your research, let’s backchannel this to the FBI.”

  “Understood. We want to save the kids and, if possible, stay out of jail too.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I’m on it.”

  Roxanne pulled Nolan’s real wallet and cell phone from the room safe and handed him the keys to their rental car.

  “Thanks,” Nolan said as he pocketed the items.

  “Wait a minute,” Deena interjected. “You talk like you’ve done this kind of thing before, but aren’t you two just tech investors? A boy’s life is on the line. How do you know what you’re doing?”

  Nolan shot a glance a Roxanne before replying.

  “We weren’t always venture capitalists. Occasionally, we still consult with our respective former employers in the U.S. government on certain ugly scenarios that arise. We have more experience with life-threatening situations than we’d like, but we also know who best to call for help. You can trust we will do everything we can to stop Palmer and keep Kirk Young safe from harm.”

  FORTY-SIX

  12:10 PM

  “Daddy, it’s Deena.”

  She sat in the passenger seat of Nolan’s rental car as they emerged from the Holland Tunnel in New Jersey. Her voice quavered nervously as she spoke.

  “Is something the matter, dear?”

  “Byron Palmer is after me again.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “He was released six months ago.”

  “How can you be sure he’s after you?”

  “I had dinner with a man last night—a patient named Grant Egan. After I went home, this man was attacked. It’s like Ferris all over again.”

  “Your client, is he—”

  “He was injured, but he’s okay.”

  “That’s a relief. I’ll see what I can do about a restraining order, not that it’ll do much to deter Palmer. The man’s a psychopath. Have you contacted the police?”

  “Yes, and they’re looking into it.”

  “Good. I’ll look into the circumstances of his release—I should have been notified.”

  “Daddy,” Deena choked back a sob, “I’m afraid he knows about my son.”

  “I don’t know how that could be possible, but Byron is very clever. Where are you now?”

  “I can’t say, but I’m safe. I’m with Grant—he and his wife have helped me piece some of this together. It’s terrible, Daddy, just terrible. I just wanted to let you know what’s going on and that I’ll be in touch. We may need your help.”

  “I’ll do whatever I can.”

  “Thanks, Daddy. I love you.”

  “I love you, too.”

  Deena ended the call, her hands trembling slightly.

  “Things square with your father?” Nolan asked.

  “Yes. He’ll look into what we can do legally about Byron.”

  “Oh, now that I think of it, please disable the GPS tracking on your cell phone and turn it off.”

  “Why?” Deena asked as she complied with his request.

  “Just in case Palmer is using it to track your location.”

  “What about yours?”

  “He doesn’t know about mine yet, so it should be safe for a while. I haven’t noticed anyone following us, so unless he has a team tailing you, we should be off his radar.”

  “You sound like a spy movie.”

  “Like I said, Maggie and I weren’t always in venture capital.”

  “They’re merging onto I-78 West,” Angelo reported.

  Lucca guided the van down the same route Nolan and Deena had travelled, little more than a mile behind the rental car. The tracker Angelo had placed on the car continued to transmit a strong signal, allowing them to remain far enough back to avoid detection. This was more than Peng could say about the tracking app on his cell phone. Both Nolan and Roxanne’s phones had disappeared from the cellular grid after they returned to their hotel following their visit to the Castillo house in the Bronx. Both devices had curiously reappeared early this afternoon, just before Nolan left the hotel.

  As the New Jersey countryside flowed past, Peng wondered about what had drawn Nolan and the doctor together, the purpose of their journey west and how it might impact his mission.

  A pair of silver SUVs with New Jersey license plates glided into the same lane as the van and matched its speed. Sal checked an incoming text message from Tocarre and noted the arrival of reinforcements.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  FORKS TOWNSHIP, PENNSYLVANIA

  1:20 PM

  Byron Palmer stood near the top of the wooden utility pole, his boots firmly attached by metal gaffs, much of his weight safely supported by an assembly of web belts, grabs, and carabiners. He was dressed in a hard hat, safety glasses fitted with yellow anti-glare lenses, dark brown bib overalls, and a matching hooded jacket that helped keep out the morning chill. Below, his van stood parked on the shoulder of the unpaved road. The vehicle’s exterior was now a shade of white with blue stripes and the sunburst logo of PP&L—Pennsylvania Power and Light.

  From his perch, Palmer enjoyed a clear view of the Young family’s dairy farm. The compound consisted of a quaint Greek Revival farmhouse with a wraparound porch, an old gambrel-roofed wooden barn, a low-slung modern pole barn, and a scattering of outbuildings of various ages and functions. The farm had a small garden for personal consumption with the remainder of the acreage dedicated to pasture for the Young’s herd of black Kerry cattle.

  Palmer noted only three people on the property—a hardy man in his thirties, an attractive brunette of the same vintage and a lean, lanky boy. The boy was assisting his father with chores around the farm. A rambunctious Australian Collie followed the pair.

  At the moment, Hank Young stood atop a large cylindrical metal tank roughly twenty feet in diameter and forty feet tall. Pipes ran from the structure to a cluster of nearby storage tanks. Markings on two of the steel tanks identified them as containing compressed carbon dioxide (CO2) and compressed methane (CH4). A line from the methane tank ran to a hundred-kilowatt electric generator. Pipes from the other tanks allowed collected gasses to be transferred to trucks.

  The juxtaposition of modern industrial processing and chemical storage vessels with farm buildings dating back to the nineteenth century seemed odd at first until Palmer deduced that the tank was an anaerobic digester. The device used bacteria in an oxygen-free chamber to convert cattle manure—which the farm produced in abundant quantities—into methane, carbon dioxide, and bedding for the herd. Doubtless, the pragmatic farmer’s investment in the digester had repaid itself several times over in handling the farm’s total power needs, providing surpl
us power sold back into the grid and animal bedding.

  When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, Palmer mused. And when it gives you cow manure . . .

  Using a Thermos-shaped monocular scope, Palmer peered through the windows of the farmhouse and developed an approximate sense of the room layout on the main and upper floors. In particular, he knew where the boy slept. He would have to study the wiring of the house and outbuildings carefully to estimate how far his disruptor’s charge would travel and if the house could or should be isolated. Palmer wondered, with a smile, what it would be like to stun an entire dairy herd.

  He heard the distant crunch of gravel as a car moved down the road. From his vantage, Palmer saw two people in the car’s front seat, but the angle and glare reduced their forms to featureless shapes. He saw the driver’s shoulder and arm as the car passed by the pole. Then the car slowed and the right turn signal began to blink. It turned into the Youngs’ driveway and headed toward the farmhouse. The car stopped and two people emerged—a man and a woman.

  Palmer trained his monocular on the new arrivals and felt his pulse quicken. He instantly recognized Deena. At first, he saw only the back of her companion, then the man turned. Palmer noted the discoloration of bruises and abrasions on the side of the man’s face. Butterfly bandages closed a pair of lacerations on his forehead.

  “It can’t be,” Palmer said in a low hiss.

  He adjusted the magnification until the man’s face all but filled his view. Injuries aside, Palmer was certain this was the same man he had left bloody, beaten, and unconscious in an alley just sixteen hours earlier. The man’s quick recovery doubtless a result of his being chased off by those two men before he could finish. Palmer banished regrets over his failure to kill the man. The past was beyond his control, but the present was fluid and malleable.

  How did they come to be here? Palmer thought, his mind quickly processing the new information.

  Then it struck him and his heart leapt. Deena’s presence at the Young farm confirmed that the boy now playing fetch with his dog must be their son. The goal of all his work was within reach—he simply had to take it.