Fair Chance

by Josh Lanyon

  After another moment or two, Tucker began to move again.

  At last they reached the top and the final monumental effort of hauling themselves over the edge of the entrance.

  Tucker landed facedown, back heaving, as Sheba sniffed them over stem to stern.

  “Hey.” Elliot hugged her briefly as she snuffled his face. “Good girl, Sheba. Smart dog.” Had it not been for Sheba—had he not come back here last Saturday and found Sheba—

  “When did we get a dog?” Tucker asked, interrupting these grim thoughts.

  “Long story.” Elliot pushed up to his knees and listened. Was that a rifle shot in the distance?

  “I think we should get moving,” he said.

  He helped Tucker to his feet, wrapping an arm around his waist. Yeah, Tucker had definitely lost weight. But he was still a big man. Elliot wouldn’t be able to carry him, not with his bum knee.

  He called to Sheba. She ignored him.

  “Shit. Hang on.” Elliot propped Tucker against a tree and went back for her, snapping the leash on. “Come on, Sheba.”

  She didn’t fight him, but he had to tow her along as well as support Tucker.

  It was another long and nerve-racking journey, but at least this time there was no fear of anyone plummeting to their death. Those slowly nearing rifle shots worried him though. He kept his mouth shut about his concern; Tucker was already doing everything he could to keep on his feet.

  Behind the sunglasses, his eyes were shut and he seemed to be almost sleepwalking as Elliot half guided, half dragged him down the trail.

  He was starting to feel his own aches and pains from the pummeling Tucker had delivered when he’d landed at the bottom of the pit cave. His eye was swollen and his face throbbed where Tucker had punched him.

  That was okay. He would happily absorb a few punches for the miracle of having Tucker back.

  Another two hours to reach the car, but at last they made it. Elliot dumped Tucker into the passenger seat, where he slumped back, his face ashen and sheened in perspiration. But he was conscious. His mouth moved in a flickery smile. “Did you save me any of that prime rib?”

  “Sorry. The dog ate it.”

  Elliot buckled him in and then moved around to secure Sheba. Finally, he started the engine and raced down the country lane back to civilization and safety.

  That was how it felt, anyway. In the end, proof of how genuinely uneasy he was, he opted for Seattle because of its proximity to the FBI field office. Not that he really thought anyone would try to snatch Tucker out of the hospital, but he was taking no chances.

  He phoned Montgomery and Pine and Yamiguchi and the hospital, but afterward could remember very little of any of those phone calls.

  They reached the emergency room and Tucker insisted on walking back to the assigned cubicle, where he crashed down on the bed and appeared to lose consciousness.

  “No, no. It’s okay,” one of the medical team reassured Elliot. “He seems to be sleeping.”

  Things moved fast from that point. In a matter of minutes Tucker was taped up to a bunch of machines and an IV was pumping fluids and antibiotics into him while Elliot filled out the paperwork and permissions.

  “What about you? You look like you could use some medical attention,” a sympathetic nurse asked, and Elliot was so focused on Tucker, it took a few seconds to realize she was talking to him.

  He shook his head. “I’m fine.”

  And he was—provided Tucker was.

  Within the hour Tucker’s cubicle was full of cops and FBI agents, most of whom who were ushered right back out again by the hospital staff.

  Detective Fallis, who had been in charge of Tucker’s kidnapping case, managed to slip back in again long enough to question Tucker about the morning he had been grabbed.

  “I bought coffee from a food truck,” Tucker said. He already seemed stronger and more alert, though his face was colorless and the shadows under his eyes looked like purple bruises. “I was walking back to my car and a van pulled up next to me. The passenger—female—asked if I knew where the Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium was. She wanted me to show her on a map.”

  “Did you recognize her? Can you describe her?”

  “I recognized her,” Tucker said. “She had a wig on, but I knew her.”

  “Who was it?”

  “The neighbor. Foster.”

  “Connie Foster?” Yamiguchi demanded.

  Tucker nodded dreamily. “While I was talking to her, the driver got out and came up behind me. I punched him, but she jabbed me with something. It knocked me out.”

  Montgomery said to Pine, “The Foster woman—”

  Pine was already on his way out of the room. “On it,” he threw over his shoulder.

  “What about the man?” Fallis asked. “Did you get a good look at him?”

  “White, midtwenties, brown eyes. He was wearing a hoodie.” Tucker’s gaze moved to Elliot. “When I came to, I was in that pit. They’d taken my wallet, piece, phone.” He closed his eyes.

  Yamiguchi and Montgomery were looking at Elliot. Elliot nodded. He thought that description sounded a lot like Torin Barro.

  “Did either of them say anything?” Fallis asked. “Did they tell you why they were holding you prisoner?”

  “It was part of a plan.”

  “What plan?”

  “I’m not sure they knew...”

  “What does that mean?” Montgomery asked.

  Tucker’s eyelids drifted shut and then fluttered open.

  “He needs to rest,” the doctor said.

  “I want to get this over with,” Tucker said to the obvious relief of the agents and police crowded into the cubicle.

  “Just a few questions more. What was the plan?” Montgomery pressed.

  “Don’t know...”

  Elliot listened stoically. Tried, anyway. The more details Tucker could give them, the better the chances of picking Foster up fast. If it was anyone else, Elliot would have said it was tough, but had to be faced. The fact that this was Tucker...well, he couldn’t allow himself to dwell on what Tucker had endured. The horror of waking up in complete darkness, the discovery of Todd Rice’s body, the slow realization of where he was and what had happened. Elliot couldn’t think about it without going a little crazy, and that was not helpful to anyone, least of all Tucker.

  He leaned against the wall of Tucker’s cubicle, out of the way of hovering medical personnel and the law enforcement members who had been allowed to stay, never taking his gaze from Tucker’s weary, bruised face.

  “They wanted me alive...for a while anyway. There was a bucket of water and a loaf of sourdough bread... My hands were tied, but I finally got free yesterday. Couldn’t see anything though...”

  The questioning went on for some time although there was really not much more that Tucker could tell them.

  After an hour of it, Elliot slipped out and went to the parking lot to walk Sheba. He met Pine coming back into the hospital.

  “Did you get her?” Elliot asked.

  Pine’s expression was grim. “Nope,” he said. “It looks like Foster’s cleared out.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  “All right?”

  Tucker’s quiet voice jerked Elliot back to awareness. Elliot smiled. “Hey,” he said, and reached out to warmly clasp the hand Tucker offered.

  It was late Saturday afternoon. He had returned from dropping Sheba off at Nobb’s Organic Farm to find Tucker alone and sleeping peacefully in his hospital room. He had settled himself in a chair by the window and was trying to figure how Connie Foster fit in to all that had happened over the past week.

  Even taking Corian’s hypnotic effect on women into account, Connie Foster did not fit the profile. Corian liked them young and pret
ty and pliable. That was not Foster. She didn’t fit any profile, as far as Elliot could tell. But she was clearly part of it.

  Whatever it was, it seemed likely Todd Rice had stumbled into the middle of it and paid the price. No wonder Foster had tried to kill Sheba. The dog was running around a crime scene with a tag carrying the victim’s phone number—direct links didn’t get more direct than that.

  “You don’t have to worry about me,” Tucker said.

  “What, me worry?”

  Tucker offered a tired grin and squeezed Elliot’s hand back.

  According to the doctors there was, thankfully, not much wrong with Tucker that rest, fluids and nourishment wouldn’t put right within a few days. They had insisted on keeping Tucker overnight despite his strenuous objections. Having lost that battle, Tucker had fallen into a deep, deep sleep. He seemed more like himself now. There was color in his face and his eyes had lost that glazed look.

  “I just want to go home,” he said. “I feel like I’ve been gone for years.”

  Yes, it felt like a lifetime. Elliot said, “The doctor said probably tomorrow. They’re playing it safe. That’s a good thing.”

  “Being home would be a better thing.” Tucker’s eyes closed. He said, “I keep thinking I’m dreaming this part.”

  Elliot’s throat closed up. He hung on to his self-control, though it wasn’t easy.

  He thought Tucker was sleeping again, but then Tucker said, “What is it that no one wants to tell me?”

  “Nothing that can’t wait.”

  Tucker opened his eyes. “It doesn’t have to wait. Tell me. I want to know.”

  And Elliot wanted to tell him, but he was not taking any chances with Tucker. Instead, he asked, “Why did you lie about coming back Sunday evening?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You told me you would be back Sunday. You told Montgomery you wouldn’t be back at work until Tuesday.”

  Tucker gave a quiet groan, but his expression was sheepish rather than pained.

  “What?” Elliot didn’t want to press Tucker, but this discrepancy had been one of the things that had gnawed at him.

  “I’ve never lied to you. I was coming back Sunday. I was looking forward to that dinner. Believe me, I dreamed about that dinner for days.”

  “But then why’d you lie to Montgomery?”

  “It wasn’t—” Tucker stopped. Drew a deep breath. “We’ve had so little time together. You don’t have to go in until late on Mondays, so I thought it would be a nice surprise if I took the extra day off and we could spend most of it together.”

  Elliot closed his eyes, gave a disbelieving laugh. For Christ’s sake. The agony that half-truth had caused.

  Tucker said, “What did you think was going on? Why would you think—Did you really believe I was lying to you?”

  “No.” Elliot said, “I admit at first I didn’t know what to think. I was shocked. I was...”

  “Worried?” Tucker was smiling faintly. He looked a little sympathetic and a lot smug. “Heartbroken?”

  “Something like that.” Elliot shrugged. “You’ve kept things from me before. I thought maybe it was something like that.”

  Tucker stopped smiling. He was silent. He said finally, “But we talked about that and I agreed that I wouldn’t keep things from you, even if I thought they might hurt you.”

  “We did, yeah.”

  “But you still thought—”

  “Tucker, I can’t explain to you what I felt or thought. It wasn’t a logical process. It felt like I was in a daze. It was like—it was like the bottom fell out of the fucking world.”

  “Hey.” Tucker’s voice was soft. “Don’t do that.”

  Elliot shook his head. Wiped impatiently at his eyes with his free hand.

  Tucker sat up, disconnecting a few electrodes, and tried to pull Elliot onto the hospital bed, which was pretty awkward, and a concerned nurse popped in to check what the heck was going on. Tucker waved her off and then kissed Elliot.

  It was an energetic kiss for a man who had been through what Tucker had. His lips were warm and his arms were reassuringly tight. He whispered something soft and mostly inarticulate against Elliot’s ear, and Elliot told himself he would never take this for granted again.

  Anyway, it was stupid getting emotional because everything was fine now. He was just a little short on sleep. A lot short on sleep. They both were. The last thing he wanted to do was—to borrow from Roland—lay a guilt trip on Tucker, especially since none of this had been Tucker’s fault.

  They were quiet for a time.

  Tucker said finally, reflectively, “You’re a very good arguer, Elliot. So sometimes I like to get my own thoughts, my own argument in order before I try to take you on. That’s all. I’m not going to keep anything from you. I’m not going to lie to you. I’m not going to change my travel arrangements. I’m not going to plan a surprise birthday party—”

  That got a laugh out of Elliot and he raised his head to find Tucker’s mouth again.

  * * *

  Tucker was having his mostly liquid dinner when Elliot told him he was going to run a few errands.

  Tucker stopped scowling over his lime Jell-O long enough to glance up. “You’re coming back though, right?”

  “Yep. I’ll be back in a couple of hours.”

  “I’ll save you some Jell-O.”

  “Really not necessary.”

  “Or you could bring me back a couple of burgers.”

  Elliot’s grin was commiserating. “Probably not. Not until your doctor gives you the thumbs-up.”

  “It’s not like I was starving. I did have a loaf of dried bread to eat.”

  “Now you’re milking it.”

  “Mmm. Milk,” Tucker murmured. He winked.

  Elliot was smiling to himself as he stepped into the elevator.

  * * *

  Ellen Haysbert still lived in the house where Andrew Corian had grown up. That either showed guts or a lack of healthy self-preservation.

  The house was an ordinary, nondescript suburban home painted a rather drab mint green. The yard was mostly dead. Sun-bleached sunflower chimes hung from the front porch. The front room lights shone behind beige draperies.

  Elliot knocked on the front door screen.

  A dog began to bark in a high, yappy voice. After a few seconds, he heard the door being unlocked.

  It went on for a while—there seemed to be several locks to unfasten. Now, here was someone who probably lived in fear of a family reunion.

  At last the door swung open and Haysbert stood framed in the doorway. She was dressed in a pink housecoat and pink slippers. Her shoulder-length hair was thin and wispy and white. She wore ugly thick, round glasses.

  “Yes?” She peered nervously through the screen door.

  “Mrs. Haysbert, I’m Elliot Mills. We spoke on the phone the other night.” He honestly couldn’t remember which night it had been. It seemed long ago, given the events of that day.

  She sucked in a sharp breath, but then said nothing—did nothing. She simply stood there, peeping out at him. The dog, one of those off-white walking dusters, sniffed energetically at the bottom of the screen.

  “May I come in?” Elliot asked.

  After a moment, she unlocked the screen and stepped back.

  Elliot pushed the screen open and stepped inside. The dog transferred the sniffing to his ankles, trotting close behind as Elliot followed Haysbert into the living room. The house smelled of air freshener and disinfectant.

  The TV was on, tuned to Chopped.

  “I don’t know what you want,” Haysbert said. She looked around the room as though the surroundings were unfamiliar, as though she wasn’t sure how she had arrived there. “I told you everything.”

/>   “Well, no,” Elliot said. “You actually didn’t tell me anything.”

  “There isn’t anything to tell!”

  He wasn’t buying it. She had let him inside the house. He hadn’t broken down the door. He said gently, “There must be something you want to say. From what I can tell, you and your husband were treated pretty unfairly by the media.”

  That seemed to hit a chord.

  Her face worked and she cried, “That’s true! It wasn’t fair what they said. Everyone wanted to believe that we did something to Andrew that turned him into a monster. That it was somehow our fault. But we didn’t. We never harmed those boys. Never.” She stopped.

  Elliot pretended he hadn’t caught that telltale boys. Plural. He said, “People don’t like to believe that someone could be born like that.”

  Haysbert said harshly, “No, they’d rather believe my husband molested children and that I turned a blind eye.”

  “I’m sorry,” Elliot said. “I know the situation grew ugly after your connection to Corian was revealed. I’ve seen some of the news footage.”

  “It killed Odell. The things people said to us. People who had known us for years. Harm Andrew? Do you want to know the truth? We were afraid of him. We were all afraid of him. Even when he was a small boy, he was...not kind. Not...reasonable. And we did try. We kept him. The other families didn’t. Wouldn’t. But we did. We tried.”

  “Corian was placed with other foster families before he came to you?”

  “Yes. He was with three families before he came to us. Three. They couldn’t take it. None of them could take it.”

  “Why did you keep him?”

  “Because it was the right thing to do!” she burst out. “Because he had been abandoned so many times. Starting with his own mother. No, starting with his own father. We believed that with love and patience we could make a difference. We truly believed that.” She put a hand to her forehead as though the memories hurt. “We were so wrong. When he ran away, it was a relief. It was the best thing that ever happened to us. The only thing we worried about was that he might come back.”

  She stared at Elliot. The round glasses made her look like a small, bewildered owl.