Her Secret Son

by Hannah Mary McKinnon

  “But why are you going?” Logan said.

  “It’s for work,” I said quickly, hating myself for the lie, not seeing any alternative. “There might be a new job, so I thought I’d check it out. See if it’s any good.”

  “Can I come?” Logan said.

  “We thought you could stay with me,” Lisa said. “Ivan will come, too...”

  Logan looked at him. “You will?”

  “Uh-huh,” Ivan said. “I’ll take you to a football game—”

  “And you can go to a summer camp,” Lisa said. “I found one where you can try lots of different sports. There’s basketball, football, soccer, archery—”

  “Like Katniss in The Hunger Games?” Logan said.

  “When did you watch The Hunger Games?” I said.

  Logan rolled his eyes. “I read it.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to be reading that diary of a puny boy or something?” Lisa said.

  “Wimpy Kid,” Logan said. “I did. All of them.”

  “In that case I’ll take you book shopping, or to the library,” Lisa said. “Both if you want.”

  “You’ll only go for a week, Dad?” Logan asked.

  “Maybe two,” I said.

  He shrugged, grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl and sank his teeth into it, a trickle of juice running down his chin. “Okay. Can I watch TV?”

  “Sure you can,” I said, a sudden stabbing pinch jabbing my heart as I watched him leave the kitchen, Cookie by his side.

  “He’s a great kid,” Ivan whispered. “Really. A great kid.”

  “I know,” I said.

  “Are you sure about this, Josh?” Lisa said. “Aren’t you afraid of what you could find?”

  “I’m terrified,” I said quietly. “Absolutely bloody terrified.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  A few days later—all too soon—it was time to drop Logan and Cookie off at Lisa’s. We’d decided I’d take him over the evening before I left for Faycrest so they could catch a movie, and I’d get an early start the next morning. Or, as Lisa had put it, “Hurry up and get it over with.”

  “I’ll call every day and I’ll be back next weekend,” I told Logan as I kissed him and hugged him tight. “Friday at the latest. A few sleeps, okay?”

  He nodded and threw his arms around me, my heart yelling at me to stay while my head ordered me to go after those answers so we could move on once and for all. I gave him another squeeze. “Call me anytime, kiddo. I’m only a few hours away.”

  Ivan clapped me on the shoulder, almost looking more miserable than I felt. “Good luck, man. Promise you’ll be careful, you hear me?” he said quietly. “You’re not Sherlock Holmes. The first sign of anything weird and you come back here, stat.”

  I could tell Lisa was fighting hard not to well up as she hugged me, too. Anyone watching would have wondered what the fuss was about. I was hardly going off to war, although on some accounts it felt like it. I patted Cookie, gave Logan a final embrace, another kiss, and headed back home for the night, where I tossed and turned, finally falling asleep well after midnight.

  Impatience had me up again at five, and I went for a run to offset the long drive ahead. That’s what I told myself, anyway. In reality, I was too nervous to get going, and needed to delay the journey a little while longer. My legs and lungs soon burned as I pushed them harder than I’d done in years.

  Tiny dew crystals sparkled on the trees. Birds chirped, squirrels chattered, an engine backfired in the distance. It seemed a reawakening of my senses of sorts, as if I’d been on standby for the past few months. Fresh energy filled my veins, pumping more adrenaline through my body, making me go faster until my sweat-drenched T-shirt stuck to my back like a second skin. Finally, when I couldn’t go any farther, I stopped and closed my eyes, turned my face to the sky. This was it. In a few hours I’d be in Faycrest, scouting out two families, somehow getting DNA samples from the mothers.

  “Or from the dads,” I’d said to Lisa a couple of days ago. “Might be easier. Chances are I’ll befriend the blokes more quickly than the women, right?”

  Lisa shook her head. “What if they’re not the dad?”

  “God, Lisa,” I said, “that’s so twisted it’s not something I’d even considered. But you’re right.” I frowned, shook my head. “Getting Jennifer Abbott’s cigarette butt was simple enough. Maybe it’ll be the same.”

  “Yeah, course it will,” Lisa said, although I could tell from her tone she considered my statement almost as naive as I did. Nothing in life was that straightforward.

  Back at the house I showered, packed my bag with a week’s worth of clothes, and had an uninspired breakfast of toast and jam, trying to rid myself of the impression it was some kind of last supper. I looked around the kitchen. This was how it would be if I found Logan’s family and gave him up. The empty seats around the table, the absolute silence in the house. Me, alone. Sure, Lisa and Ivan would invite me over all the time if I didn’t end up in prison for kidnapping, obstruction of justice or whatever the hell other charge I hadn’t thought of, but I knew from experience how wrapped up people became with their own families. In a short while they’d want it to be the three of them, or the four of them, if they had more kids. Where did that leave me?

  Maybe I’d meet somebody else, but as far as trusting them the way I’d done Grace, well, it wasn’t going to happen—how could I trust anyone again?—although I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life alone. Perhaps in time the pain of betrayal would ease, and I’d be ready to try again with someone new, a person who didn’t have secrets. Someone... I exhaled sharply. Whoever I met, I’d never be able to tell her the truth about Logan if he stayed with me. Goddamn it, lying by omission meant I’d make her a part of the lie, like Grace had made me.

  Sitting there wasn’t going to solve anything, and it was time to move. I shoved my mug and plate in the dishwasher, and checked the route on my phone for the third time. Faycrest was a small town southeast of Portland on the banks of the Saco River. It would take four hours to get there, if traffic cooperated, so I settled in for the drive with the radio blaring, a deliberate attempt to drown out the voices in my head.

  If Dad had been there, he’d have talked in clichés, said I was completely off my rocker and I should let sleeping dogs lie. Trouble was, over the years I’d found when those sleeping dogs eventually woke up, they’d grown into oversize, snarling beasts that bit me in the ass. The only way to tame them was to get in control, and that would happen only if I had more of the missing pieces to Grace and Logan’s puzzle.

  And so I drove, the trip uneventful save for some jerk cutting me off and giving me the finger, which I replicated before easing off the gas and letting him speed ahead. At one time I’d have challenged him, driven up his backside flashing my lights, but now it felt insignificant, ludicrous, even.

  My mind drifted back to Grace, and I tried to conjure up the feelings I’d had for her what seemed a lifetime ago already. Each time I thought about a happy memory, an accusation popped into my head, like the time we went to Niagara Falls, and how jumpy Grace had been when I’d suggested crossing the border so we could see the views from the Canadian side.

  “We don’t have passports,” she’d said.

  “Do you need one for Canada?”

  “Yes, definitely. I looked into it once. He needs one, too.”

  “Are you sure? Well, I suppose we could apply for them, come back another time.”

  “What for?” she snapped. “The view of the falls isn’t going to be that different.”

  “No, but we could make a trip out of it. Visit Toronto. I’ve always wanted to go.”

  She shook her head. “Passports are ridiculously expensive and my car’s about to die, remember? We can’t afford to spend money on a trip. It wouldn’t be sensible.”

  “Maybe not sensible,” I said, pul
ling her in for a hug, “but it would be fun to explore another city. There’s the CN Tower and an aquarium. Logan would love that. I’m sure I can find a cheap place to stay.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “I know you love traveling, but money aside, crossing the border’s a nightmare. I’ve heard it takes forever. I’m not doing that with Logan.”

  “But—”

  “And think about the crowds and the traffic. No, if you really want to get away, let’s go somewhere closer. What about a day trip to Finger Lakes? And we can go back to the aquarium in Schenectady. It’s not like Logan remembers our first time there.”

  Although I’d mumbled something about there being more to life than just the state of New York, I hadn’t put up much of a fight. I’d have done anything to make the love of my life happy. Now I wanted to go back in time, slap my cheeks, give my shoulders a good shake, tell myself to wake up and see what was right in front of my sodding face the entire time.

  When I looked down, I saw my hands had wrapped around the steering wheel so tight, my knuckles were a ghostly white. I released my grip, flexed my fingers, tried to force my brain to go in another direction, think about the fact I’d be an uncle soon. There’d be a difference in age, sure, but I had no doubt Logan would be a great cousin and... I couldn’t stop the shudder from zipping down my spine. Would I have Logan when the baby came? Five months down the line would he still be with me?

  The scream that filled my truck was a primal roar, and I slammed my palm on the dashboard a couple of times before hitting the brakes and pulling over. My head dropped as I breathed heavily, ordering myself to get a grip, and desperately failing. I sat there for a long time before I finally found the courage to nudge the truck into gear, and set off, thinking if I’d once believed Grace was my salvation, I was now certain she’d be my undoing.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Faycrest turned out to be smaller than I’d imagined, despite the hours I’d pored over it on Street View. The town’s clunky website proclaimed it a “handsome place,” and to a certain extent that was true, what with the wide streets and the tall, thick trees on either side, indicating the length of history. It seemed a quiet, rural place, the type of area one might settle down with a family to escape from the city, or retire to once the kids had left home.

  The houses were modest in size, but well-maintained, front yards beautifully manicured, white picket fences pristine. Even the shopping plaza, with a grocery store, a coffee shop, a pizza joint and the local barber, looked tidy and clean. No stray plastic bags flying around, no overflowing garbage bins, or abandoned shopping carts. It all indicated a certain standard, a relative wealth, but also law and order. Was it a reaction to the missing Faycrest boys? People trying to keep everything under control because of the one terrifying event they hadn’t been able to prevent? Or perhaps paranoia was setting in, had me interpreting everything as another clue.

  I pulled into the mall’s parking lot, took out my research file and went over the details again, despite knowing them by heart.

  Felicia King and Gavin Sommer’s son, Alex, had gone missing on November first, a little over seven-and-a-half years ago, while their friend, Emily Rhodes, babysat him at her house. I’d watched the YouTube videos and the news channel archives, the teary-eyed couples huddled together, faces blotchy, the bags under their eyes dark as storm clouds, both women holding on to each other, the husbands standing sentry either side.

  “I took Hunter upstairs to change him,” Emily said, unable to look at her friends, her lips wobbling, shoulders shaking. “When...when I came down, the back door was open. Alex was gone. He was gone. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

  She’d been unable to speak after that, and the lead detective had taken over to give more details, fielding questions from the dozens of reporters who’d already invaded the small town.

  The general public immediately concluded it was an outsider. No way had this been an act carried out by one of their own. Faycrest was the kind of place where everyone knew everyone, people helped their neighbors and doors were left unlocked. No longer, I suspected.

  The initial investigation showed no useful leads. Not only had the rain been torrential on the day of Alex’s disappearance, but Emily and Tyler’s house was being renovated, the multitude of footprints in and out an overwhelming blur.

  The search of the Rhodeses’ house hadn’t revealed any useful prints, there were no security cameras and the canvassing of the neighborhood yielded nothing. Sniffer dogs eventually became available, and brought in, but by then the scent had literally gone cold, the crime scene too contaminated by the well-intentioned people rallying around both families. It was something Tyler said was one of his biggest regrets. As a police officer, he felt he should’ve done more to protect it, but everybody understood.

  Emily and Tyler’s house backed onto a dense, gnarly forest and a rugged ravine, so the Faycrest community came together to comb the area, but no trace of Alex turned up, not even after the Amber Alert was issued.

  The next abduction happened two weeks later, during another series of violent storms. Emily had been driving back from Portland with Hunter when she’d been forced to stop.

  “A black Ford SUV was in the middle of the road,” the investigator said at the press conference. “Mrs. Rhodes was forced out of her car at gunpoint by two masked men, and her son, Hunter, was taken from the vehicle.” He’d paused, looked around the room. “Mrs. Rhodes was unharmed, but the assailants threw her phone and car keys into the Saco River. She was stranded eight miles from the nearest house, in the decade’s heaviest rainfall. She’s now in hospital, recovering from the trauma. An Amber Alert has been issued, and we’re hopeful for some results very soon.”

  There were none.

  Tyler Rhodes was a cop, and had been instrumental in the arrests of several high-profile Portland-area criminals. The focus of the investigation shifted when the police began to suspect Hunter was the original target, making Alex’s disappearance a terrible case of mistaken identity. As the days and weeks passed, and the theory went from ransom to revenge, the lead investigator was forced to admit the situation did not bode well for either child.

  I put my notes away, recalling the rest of my research without them. Felicia still lived in Faycrest; she was already a veterinarian when Alex disappeared. She and her husband Gavin had a girl a little over a year after Alex vanished, but the couple divorced a while later. From what I’d been able to find out, Gavin had moved to Boston, where he’d remarried, and worked as a software engineer for a telecoms company.

  By the looks of things, Tyler and Emily had stayed together, still lived in town, too. He’d left the police to become a consultant, devoting his time to cases of missing children, traveling the country, assisting police departments in over a dozen states as far away as Alaska. Emily had her own art studio in Gorham, the next town over, her website a colorful affair offering commissioned work and after-school classes for kids. There had been no mention of them having any other children, and I’d wondered what made them stay in the place where their son had been taken from, but concluded I’d do the same. Had it been me, I’d have put Logan’s white-and-purple kite in the window, hoping it would somehow help him find his way home.

  As I drove back up the sleepy town’s main street, both sides flanked by the two-story buildings clad in whitewashed wooden siding, my stomach grumbled, begging for food.

  Casa Mama looked interesting, with its chunky sign and specials chalkboard outside, and it had to be popular because most of the tables I could see from my vantage point in the truck were taken. No matter. I couldn’t face a huge meal, anyway. Since I’d first seen the street signs for Faycrest, my appetite had shriveled away. I continued my drive, planned on grabbing something from the gas station as I filled up the tank.

  A few hundred yards later, the large, treat-filled windows of a place called Ethel’s Café caught my eye. From th
e outside it appeared harmless enough, and a homemade sandwich would be better than a prepackaged one, but I had another stop to make first.

  I’d kept quiet about my next move for fear both Ivan and Lisa would try to talk me out of it, so I crossed my fingers, hoped things would work out exactly as I’d planned. If they didn’t, I ran the risk of it all tumbling to the ground faster than a set of dominoes, except with far less elegance and way more unpredictability.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  The main road led me out of town, where the space between houses widened and turned into lush green fields. I drove until I spotted the rustic sign with the four carved pine trees I’d closely examined online: Bill Langham Landscaping. I switched on my indicator, pulled over and stopped next to a second notice, a cheap MDF one, handwritten and hastily thrown together, and which hadn’t been on Street View when I’d looked the night before.

  URGENT! LANDSCAPER WANTED!

  This was an opportunity I couldn’t afford to mess up. I swallowed, wiped my hands on my pants, waited ten seconds before getting out of my truck. The gravel scrunched beneath my feet as I walked over to the large red barn located about twenty yards from a generously proportioned farmhouse with bright blue window boxes filled with pink geraniums.

  “Hello?” I said, sticking my head inside the barn, surveying the multitude of landscaping supplies. When nobody replied I called out again, and a man came out of a room on the right-hand side. He stood a little shorter than me, but was much broader, his hair a mass of gray, tight spiral curls. His jeans were dotted with dirt, but his blue T-shirt with the quadruple pine tree company logo looked pristine.

  “Can I help you?” He walked over and smiled, the dark skin on his face thick as leather, his crow’s-feet running into deep gullies that traveled midway down his cheeks. You could tell this man had worked outside all his life, and my bet was he’d enjoyed every minute.