The basement door was open a crack, as if inviting her in, and Olivia tried to remember if she’d left it that way. She flipped on every light in the kitchen, and went down slowly, the light streaming in from behind, illuminating the paint chipped, open backed stairs. She held her breath until she found the switch about halfway down, and flipped on the light. A regular light bulb, this one. The basement lit up in a flick.
The dryer light was on, a red pinpoint glow that let her know the cycle was finished and her clothes were ready. No doubt the warning buzzer had gone off the usual three times at five minute intervals while she’d been at work. The mundane normality made her feel better. The dryer door creaked when she opened it, and she reached in for the bag. The clothes were dry, and crackling with static electricity, emitting the faint sweet scent of the lavender fabric softener she used.
She shut the dryer door, and was heading for the stairs when she heard the thump.
Olivia turned around slowly, feeling a tingle of tension at the base of her spine. The noise had come from behind her, somewhere close, definitely right there in the basement. She looked from corner to corner. Stacks of damp, moldy boxes, the old washer and dryer Charlotte had left behind, perched on a platform of bricks along the back of the wall, collecting dust.
The thump came again, no mistaking it, just a few feet away. Olivia did not move. She held her breath. Waited. And once more, a thump, and she pegged it now, coming from the dryer. Had something got trapped inside?
She knew it would keep her awake that night, the thought of some bird or squirrel, maybe even a stray cat, a small one, a feral kitten. Coming in from outside through the dryer’s vent, and getting trapped inside. Suffocating slowly, afraid in the dark.
Except there was no vent, not now. The dryer was disconnected and stacked and covered with that peculiar mix of greasy basement dust, shoved up on bricks against the wall.
Fuck it. Olivia crossed the room and opened the dryer door.
She dropped the clothes. Not a snake, no, the way it was coiled there in the bottom of the dryer gave that impression, but no snake had a buckle, no snake was bright red. It was a belt. A long, red leather belt.
And the memory of Teddy’s voice flashed through her head. There’s a ghost there, Mommy, you have to believe me, there’s a ghost. He’s going to hang Winston from the attic fan with a red leather belt. And then Dr Raymond. It’s not Winston anymore. Now it’s you. She’s convinced that Duncan Lee is going to hang you with that red leather belt.
‘Jesus,’ Olivia said. She turned and ran up the stairs.
Two things happened, all at once. Every single light in the house went out, and a dog began to bark.
THIRTY-SEVEN
Olivia realized what a terrible thing it was, to know, and to believe. Teddy had been facing that alone. She muttered half sobbing apologies to her daughter as she went up the stairs. She made herself go slow, she made herself hold the rail, she even reached out for the switch and cried a bit when her fingers tracked the plastic nub that was clearly in the on position. One light bulb might go out like that, but not every single one in the house.
The joy she felt was unexpected and exhilarating. It was the house that was fucked up, not her little girl. Dr Raymond had known right away that Teddy had a good, compassionate heart. And whatever bad presence there was in this house, whatever this thing was, it had been after Teddy. Charlotte had been right all along.
Whatever this thing was that was after her daughter, Dr Raymond was right. Step one was getting out of the house. Olivia realized, with the perspective that people get when the bottom truly drops out, that the jobs and the moves, the arguments with Hugh and the pressures of money, these were nothing. Nothing, so long as she and her little girl were safe.
The barking dog was frantic now, hysterical. It sounded like the stray she and Teddy had seen the other night. Winston picked it up. Olivia knew his sharp, panicked yelp. Two of them now, barking their heads off.
The basement door was shut tight, though she had left it wide open. Olivia banged her head into it in the dark, tripping on the top step, and bruising the crap out of her shin. She slammed her fist into the wood and jerked the knob and it opened easily. She scrambled up into the dark kitchen. She’d left the Jeep’s headlights flipped on, and she could see the arc of light like a homing beacon outside.
But the back door off the kitchen was stuck.
Olivia kicked it hard, and turned the knob. Yes, yes, she’d unlocked it, and it came open an inch, then wouldn’t budge. This had happened before; she always had trouble with this door. Her hands shook and she trembled all over, but she just needed to keep her head, and pull, not push.
Then she heard him. The dog. Whining right at the door, could it be Winston? Out of the car? Or the stray? The dog started scratching, frantic, almost throwing itself at the door, and Olivia heard a crack and a sprinkle of glass. The kitchen window had shattered. All hell was breaking loose.
Olivia kicked the bottom of the door again to jolt it loose and pulled hard, felt the door give reluctantly, felt the blessed rush of air. Out she went, not bothering to close it behind.
And she saw him, the dog in the moonlight, loping toward the fountain. And seeing him up close for the very first time, she recognized the unusual brindle markings, and knew, before the dog even turned its head and looked back at her, that this was Hunter, Emily’s dog. Which was ridiculous of course, because Hunter had to be dead, dead for years and years. She was just rattled. No time for this now.
Olivia knew she ought to go slow, that she could stumble and twist an ankle in the dark, but she ran anyway, to the headlights, to the car, high on the joy of freedom, now that she was out of the house.
The doors to the Jeep were shut, just as she’d left them, so it took her a minute of staring dumbly to understand. It was as if she were outside her body observing the hysterical panicked woman who opened the door of the Jeep and found the front seat empty. No daughter, no dog. The woman cried, and ran to the fountain, around the house, and down to the street. She even went back into the house. The lights worked again, and she went through every room, mouth in an almost comic oval of disbelief before she opened her cell phone and dialed 911.
But Teddy and Winston were gone. Not a sign of either of them, just like all those years ago, when Emily and Hunter disappeared.
THIRTY-EIGHT
In a very tiny space in the back of Olivia’s mind she was aware of the news crews gathering in little clusters outside her house. Of the television station that had set up a yellow canopy supported with white poles right on the curb. She could hear how the cars on the street outside slowed as they passed in front of her home. She was aware of the neighbors gathering in the corners of her yard.
Inside the house every light was on, and there were temporary but powerful spotlights rigged up outside. The driveway and the streets were crammed with cop cars, blue lights flashing, yellow police tape. She was grateful for the activity, what little of it she could absorb. She would have liked to be involved somehow, to help, it was her baby girl, but she was held captive by the noise in her head, the effort it took just to breathe, as if she were in the grip of a silent tornado while everyone around her was still.
She was familiar with the clinical symptoms of shock, so she understood why she shivered and felt like ice, in spite of the blanket that the uniformed police officer who responded to her call had wrapped around her shoulders. Officer Rodriguez had radioed in for detectives and backup within ten minutes of listening to her panicked explanation.
She’d drunk up all the water they’d brought her, though Rodriguez had needed to help her with the glass, and she was still thirsty, but could somehow not find the words to ask for more. She felt a constant buzzing at the base of her skull, and she knew it would be unwise to try and stand.
Teddy’s name seemed to pulse with every beat of her heart, and it took all of her concentration to sit on the couch, to go from one terrible thought to the next.
Olivia knew what was coming. She had lived through this before. She did not want this pain, not again. She would live it now as a mother, which meant that this time it would be so much worse.
Her own mother had kept a journal, after Emily and Hunter disappeared. Olivia had read the tear streaked pages years ago, curious about the way her mother’s handwriting had changed over the days, months, then years. Olivia had tried her hardest to forget that chronicle of the no man’s land where her family had dwelled, had done a pretty good job, actually, because now, all she knew for sure was that she was now in a place so dark, so arid and comfortless, that it would take everything she had to survive. And for Teddy’s sake, she had to survive.
When Olivia was a little girl, she had been ashamed. Her family was different, her parents had to struggle just to make it through the day. They were isolated from the rest of the world, exiled to a public place of pain where people watched their every move, hungry, some of them, to feed voraciously upon a tragedy that could be held at arm’s length, some just curious, and others, lots of others, clueless but well meaning and concerned.
Her mother and father spent years learning how to recreate a normal place for Chris and Olivia to grow up in, to compartmentalize their time, juggling the search for a missing child with the need for a family to build a new life, the basic realities of eating, sleeping, breathing in and out. Holidays had to be reconstructed, new traditions set, all the while meals needed to be cooked, there was laundry to fold, a mortgage to pay. Her father had cried like a baby when he had to go back to work.
All of it with the shadow of Emily, always there, but not there.
They stopped celebrating Christmas at home, going instead to a beach in South Carolina. Olivia and Chris were given a sum of money each year to buy a gift for Emily, ribbons and tissue paper to wrap it up, and Olivia wondered now – where did all those presents go? What had happened to Emily’s clothes, her record collection, the pink frosty lipstick in her top dresser drawer? She could not remember. She drew a total blank.
The first goal is not to get lost. The sentence her mother had written came like a whisper in the back of her mind. No pills from doctors or friends trying to help. Stay away from alcohol. Keep your head clear and don’t fall away. Wait for the moments when you feel numb – they will come. Welcome them. Your mind will know when you need relief.
Someone shouted outside, and Olivia turned suddenly, looking out the window with an electric current of hope. Someone had found her. They’d found Teddy. An unmarked car was pulling up in front of the house. A fair haired young woman and a pear shaped man got out of the car. Olivia craned her neck, waiting for them to lead Teddy out, biting the knuckles of her fist, feeling tears of relief running down her face.
The pear shaped man walked with quick jerky steps, and stopped to talk to one of the uniformed officers, a look of intense exasperation on his face. He waved the young woman off toward the back of the house and headed up the walk. Olivia opened her mouth, then realized that Teddy was not in the unmarked car. Her daughter had not been found. She sank back down on the cushion of the couch, and put her head in her hands. She was shaking and shaking hard. What made her think Teddy was there? Why had she been so sure?
It was clear, as soon as the pear shaped man entered the house, that the rank and file police officers were wary of him, the tension rose the minute he walked into the living room. He headed straight to Officer Rodriguez, but he was watching Olivia. She knew he was watching. She was not close enough to hear what he said.
He was interrupted by the ring of a phone, pulled it out of his pocket and listened, and Olivia stood up, hanging onto the arm of the couch. His comments were no more telling than yes, no, okay. He jammed the phone back into his suit coat pocket and came across the room.
‘Mrs James? Teddy’s mother?’
Olivia blinked. Swallowed. ‘Yes.’
He gave her a hand which she shook. His grip was tight and hard. ‘Sit back down, please, Mrs James. I’m Detective Donnie Withers, and I’m in charge of Teddy’s case. I realize you’re upset right now, ma’am—’
‘That call you just got. Have you heard anything? Have you found her?’
‘No, ma’am. Look, I’d like to ask you some questions. And I need to go over this timeline with you, okay?’
Olivia let the blanket fall off her shoulders. She felt she should know what this man meant by timeline, she needed to say this would be okay, but her mind refused to work.
‘Mrs James?’ Withers raised his voice as if Olivia were deaf. ‘Mrs James, I need your help here. You want me to find your daughter, right?’
Olivia managed a nod. Sat back down on the couch.
‘Look, I’m going to be blunt. If this is a stranger abduction, not a runaway, not a custody fight, then I’ve got about a three hour window to find your little girl. That ticking you hear is your daughter’s clock running out. I don’t find her in three hours, then, statistically speaking, Teddy is dead.’
Olivia felt a surge of vomit rise in her throat. She ducked her head and took slow breaths.
‘And I’ve got to tell you that nothing about this whole scenario makes much sense.’ Withers shifted his weight to his left foot. ‘Now, if you think your daughter got upset maybe, and ran away, that changes the entire course of the investigation, and I expect you to be up front with me about that right now. Or. If there’s some kind of funny business going on between you and your ex, I expect you to tell me that too.’ He moved closer as he spoke, towering over her while she trembled on the couch. ‘I’ve got one thing I’m worried about, and that’s your little girl. If you lie to me, ma’am, that constitutes obstruction of justice and I will make sure the DA’s office comes after you with everything they’ve got. Which means jail time if you fuck with me on this.’
Olivia wanted to stand up again, she was not quite sure why, but her knees were weak enough that she didn’t think she could stay on her feet. She knew that there used to be an Olivia who could deal with a man like this, who might even punch a man who implied such terrible things. She thought of the detectives all those years ago who had looked long and hard for Emily, the one who had shyly asked if the family would like a black lab puppy when his own dog had whelped. None of them had talked to her parents this way. She should not put up with being treated this way. But she was afraid to make this Detective Donnie Withers mad. If she made him angry, would he look for her little girl? If he suspected her, how could he do what he needed to do? She was at the mercy of this pear shaped man. She needed to think, but her mind refused to clear.
She was aware suddenly of Officer Rodriguez edging closer, till he stood beside her, and she knew that he was angry at Withers, and that he at least did not suspect her of these terrible things.
‘Sir,’ Rodriguez said. ‘Protocol allows for a female officer to be called.’
Detective Withers went white around the edges of his mouth. ‘I’ve got a female officer, she’s out back. Go ask Tellers to come in, why don’t you.’
‘Yes sir,’ Rodriguez said.
Withers settled on the edge of the chair across from Olivia, scooting it close. ‘Mrs James, do you think there is any chance your daughter just ran away from home?’
Olivia felt it suddenly. A weird ripple of . . . nothing. The numbness, as promised. ‘No,’ she said. ‘Teddy was strapped into her seatbelt, the dog was in the Jeep. I’d just seen her out of the window and waved. There would be no conceivable reason for her to run away.’
‘No trouble at school?’
‘None.’
‘But you did just move here?’
‘That’s right. But Teddy was happy in school, Detective Withers. My daughter did not run away.’
‘I find it odd that someone would abduct her and take the dog.’
‘So do I. On the other hand, it might be the only way she would go. If she was tricked somehow.’
‘You mean lured away?’ he said, nodding. ‘That’s the only thing that makes any sense. I
s she a naïve kind of child? Young for her age?’
‘No, she’s smart for her age, and she and I have been over all the stranger danger stuff. On the other hand, she is just a little girl.’
‘Maybe this was someone she knew.’
‘We don’t know many people, Detective, we haven’t been here long.’
The front door opened and a man in forensic overalls walked in, letting in a rush of air that ruffled Teddy’s school papers, scattered across the fireplace mantel where Teddy always left them instead of taking them upstairs, as instructed, to the little desk in her room. It bothered Olivia, the way some of the papers were hanging over the edge.
Withers put his hands on his knees. ‘At least that narrows the field. We’ve liaised with the LAPD, and they’ve already sent officers out to notify your ex husband, Hugh James, of the situation with your little girl. They confirmed just a few minutes ago that Mr James was at his office working. He asked us to notify you that he is on his way here. He’s catching the first plane out.’
‘Hugh had nothing to do with this.’ Olivia felt the compulsion to straighten up the papers. A ridiculous compulsion, she knew that, but she also knew that the very act of straightening them up would somehow make her feel better. The urge was ridiculously strong, but she had to fight it. Standing up, straightening those papers, that would seem like odd behavior, like a mother who did not care that her little girl was gone. She had to be careful. People would be watching her. Withers would watch her. She was on the tightrope now.
‘Evidently your ex says the same about you.’ Withers opened up a notebook. ‘Let’s go back over the timeline here. You say you saw Teddy, in the car, before you went down to the basement to get your clothes.’
‘Yes.’
One of the papers drifted down to the floor, math problems, marked over and erased with three problems circled in red.
The Piper Page 18