The detective reaches for the volume knob and silences his car speakers, which up until now have been bleating copspeak in intermittent spurts.
The first three tries shoot me to voice mail, just as I knew they would. Finally, on the fourth attempt, Lucas’s deep and dusty voice creeps down the line. “What’s wrong? Is it Andrew?”
“No, it’s Ethan.” I say his name, and my voice cracks. “He’s missing.”
“What do you mean he’s missing?” It was pretty much my first question, too. There’s a reason why I called Lucas first. “Missing from where?”
“From the cabin where he was staying with his class. He was on that field trip to Dahlonega, remember? His teacher did a head count and he wasn’t there.” A fresh wave of terror surges, hitting me like an anvil right between the ribs. “He’s been gone for over three hours now, Lucas.”
There’s a rustling, a squeaking of mattress springs, and I picture him sitting on the edge of his bed on the south side of Knoxville, in a house only slightly bigger than mine but minus the leak spots on the ceilings and the mold climbing the walls of the cellar. Lucas works in construction, which, ever since the housing crash, means he’ll do whatever it takes to make a buck. He’s a welder, a bricklayer, a craftsman, a roofer, a painter, an electrician, a landscaper, a plumber, a handyman and a jack-of-all-trades.
He’s also an ex-marine trained in search and rescue. He can track any animal through any forest. If he leaves now, he can be there in just over three hours.
A sleepy female voice floats up from the background, and he shushes her. Lucas is a good-looking guy with a tool belt and a Harley. There’s always a woman in his bed, though it’s rarely the same one. More rustling, the click of a door. “Okay. Tell me what happened. Start at the beginning.”
“That’s all I know. He was there—now he’s not. The cops are looking for him now.”
“How many?”
“I don’t know.”
“Have they called in the dogs? The volunteers and helicopters?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know.” The panic is building inside me like a scream, a tightening noose.
“Shit. Okay, I’m on my way. Where are you?”
I look for a road sign, trying to get my bearings. By now we’ve merged onto the highway, citywide and busy, filled with big, lumbering trucks that cling to the right lanes. Up ahead, a green sign points us north to Cumming.
“We’re about to get on 400, so that’s what, another hour or so?” The detective dips his chin. “Yeah, he says another hour.”
“Who’s ‘he’?”
“The detective who came to my house. He’s driving me.” I know he showed me his badge, said his name and credentials through my front door window, but none of it stuck. The panic and shock of finding a strange man on my doorstep washed it all away. I pull the phone away from my ear. “I’m so sorry, but I’ve forgotten your name.”
He glances over. “Detective Brent Macintosh, Atlanta PD.”
I repeat the words to Lucas, who says, “I’m walking out now.”
Relief hits me square in the chest, followed by a spark of something sharper. “Do you think he just... I don’t know, went to the bathroom or something and lost his way back?” This is the version I keep telling myself, that Ethan’s disappearance is as simple as an accidental turn, a mistaken path. I want so badly to believe that it’s only a matter of time before someone finds him hunkered down behind a tree. The alternative is too awful to contemplate.
“He’s too smart for that,” Lucas says, and I wince, even though I know he’s right. “Look, wherever he is, he couldn’t have gotten far.”
On the other side of the windshield, the wipers slap out a frenetic beat, but they can’t clear the glass fast enough. I think about the dangers that could come from a downpour in the mountains—freezing pools of swirling water and leaves; saturated ground, boggy as quicksand; mudslides, fast and heavy, taking down everything in their path.
“It’s still dark out, Lucas.”
“I know.”
“And it’s pouring. He’ll be drenched.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“Okay.” I tell myself to breathe, trying to dampen down the panic. Lucas is a fixer, as evidenced by his choice of careers. He’ll fix this for me. He has to.
“Who else have you talked to?”
“Nobody. You’re the first.”
I know he’s really asking if I’ve called Andrew. The man who Lucas assumed was the reason for this call. Lucas has never been a fan.
I sigh. “I’ll call him in the morning, if they still haven’t—”
“They’ll find him,” Lucas says, cutting off that depressing sentiment with a voice that’s sure and determined. “And if they don’t, I will.”
My breath comes out in a whoosh, a hot sigh fueled by relief. They’re the words I’ve been waiting to hear, the reason, if I’m being completely honest, why I called. Lucas is on his way. He won’t rest until he finds Ethan.
A not-so-tiny voice inside of me prays Lucas is not too late.
* * *
I knew Ethan was special three days after his ten-month birthday, when he handed me his bottle of milk and said, “No, I want juice.” Four little words and not very special ones at that, but a full sentence. Subject, verb, direct object. Unheard of for a baby his age.
Andrew insisted we have him tested as soon as the psychologist said it was possible, when Ethan was two. I’ll never forget Andrew’s face when that woman, a straitlaced type in a pencil skirt and pearls, told us that Ethan’s score fell in genius territory. All of a sudden, Andrew didn’t care that his toddler was obsessed with the mating rituals of penguins, or that the only way to quieten a terrible-two meltdown was to dial the radio to Bach. Ethan’s weird quirks had an explanation—one worth showing off to the world.
“My son is brilliant,” Andrew would say to our friends, his tennis teammates, the strangers behind him at the checkout counter, and in a voice meant to carry. He’s always been loud, but he likes to notch things up a few decibels when he’s bragging. “No, like, seriously brilliant. Equivalent to an IQ of 158, which is only two points lower than Einstein’s. The psychologist says it’s genetic.”
Of course Andrew meant him. His son’s intelligence had come from him.
“Ethan is a genius,” I say to Detective Macintosh now, cringing at how it makes me sound just like Andrew. “My son is not an outdoorsy type, but Lucas was right—he’s smart enough to figure out how to get to the bathroom and ba—the compass!”
The detective glances over. “What compass?”
“I gave him one, just this morning. Well, it’s an old surveyor’s compass, but it’s operational, and he knows how to use it.” Hope expands in my chest, soft and light like cotton candy. “If he’s lost, he can use it to find his way back.”
“Or find his way out.”
“Out of the woods?” I shake my head. “You don’t know my son, but he wouldn’t go deeper into the forest on purpose. He’s scared of the dark, and even if he had a flashlight, he’s too much of a rule follower. I just don’t see him doing it.”
“Make sure you tell the sheriff all these things when we get there. He’s going to want to get into Ethan’s head, to better understand what he’s thinking.”
By now it’s close to six, and the sky has gone from pitch-black to gunmetal gray, swollen clouds blocking out the first of the morning light. Most of the 18-wheelers and rush hour travelers are headed in the opposite direction—toward the city—leaving the northbound lanes largely clear. Mountains rise up like behemoths on either side of us, dark rolling ridges disappearing into a thick layer of haze.
Ethan will be okay, I tell myself, repeating the words over and over like a mantra. He’s just lost. Someone will find him soon.
But other word
s—heart-pounding, breath-stealing words—are louder, firmer, fiercer, tattooed like angry graffiti across my vision. Hungry animals. Bottomless ravines. Toppling trees. For an eight-year-old on his own, the mountains are a perilous place.
“How much longer?”
The detective checks the GPS. “Another forty minutes or so.”
In the dim light of the car, he looks young, almost boyish, but his face carries the weathered look of someone who’s seen it all. As a detective in a city like Atlanta, one that consistently ranks in the top twenty most dangerous places in America, I guess he would have.
A burst of noise erupts from the radio, then falls into silence. It’s been doing this since we left Atlanta, intermittent squawks and disembodied voices speaking in codes and numbers, a secret language of emergency that sends me spiraling into panicky shakes each time I hear them.
“What did they say?”
“Dogs haven’t caught his scent yet. Or at least not his most recent one.”
“What kind of dogs?”
“Air scenters, trackers, trailers. Probably all three, I’d imagine. I don’t know where these ones came from, but a well-trained search-and-rescue dog can find somebody a heck of a lot faster than a human can, and they don’t need daylight to do it.”
“But Ethan disappeared almost four hours ago. What’s taking them so long?”
The detective glances over. “Scent contamination would be the biggest hurdle they’ll have to face. The dogs are trained to discriminate, which means they’ll be able to pick your son’s out of all the other kids’ scents, but it’ll take them a minute to find the right trail, and the most recent one.” He gestures over the dash, to the wipers sloshing rain across the windshield and beyond. “Rain’s not helping, either.”
And it’s the kind of rain that goes on for hours and hours. No sun. No strips of blue sky. Just dark clouds dumping water in blinding, never-ending sheets.
“Because it makes things harder to see?”
“No, because it makes things harder to smell. Search-and-rescue dogs are highly effective, but they can’t scent something that’s washed away, which is what happens after about three inches of rainfall. Wind isn’t good news, either, and neither is cooler air, which creates an updraft when it hits the wet ground. The dog trainers’ll know how to combat weather, and they’ll take all this into account when positioning the dogs, but honestly, these conditions don’t make their job any easier.”
My eyes sting, struck by his less-than-optimistic update. As hard as it is to hear, I appreciate his honesty all the same.
The car radio crackles to life, and I hold my breath and lean in, electric with equal parts hope and dread. I strain to make out the words over the noise of the wipers and rain, but the message emerges slushy with interference. I look to the detective’s expression for guidance. His eyes crinkle into a squint and he rolls his neck before he looks over.
“They’re requesting a description of Ethan’s backpack.”
My heart freezes, and I grip the seat on either side of my legs. “Why, did they find it?”
“Sounds like they’re trying to locate it and need confirmation of the description. As many identifying details as you can give would be helpful.”
“It’s light blue and black, with an Angry Bird on the front. His first and last name is written in Sharpie on the inside flap.”
He relays my answer to the person on the other end of the radio, along with what I just told him about the compass. The voice sputters something back, and he presses the device to his thigh. “Is there anything else that might be used to track him? A cell phone, an iPod touch, gaming electronics, things like that?”
“No. He doesn’t own a cell phone, and I don’t like him playing video games. He’s allowed to use my old iPad, but it’s at home.”
Because I was worried about him losing it. Because I was worried about the cost. A stupid hunk of metal and glass, irrelevant and immaterial until now, when it might have been used to find him.
He repeats my answer into the radio, and there’s a long, static-filled pause. “Copy that,” the voice says, and then is gone.
Macintosh hangs the headset on the hook. “We’re going to want access to your home in order to get to that iPad, see if he’s made any contact with anyone online. They’ll want to take a good look at his bedroom, too.”
“What for?”
“Same reason they’ll have a long list of questions for you—to get in your son’s head. To see if there was anything going on in his life that might be relevant to his disappearance. And before your mind starts going to dark places, the fact he took his backpack is a good thing. It means he was prepared.”
I shake my head, certain of exactly the opposite. “I just don’t see Ethan wandering off in the middle of the night. He wouldn’t have left that cabin, not without explicit permission from his teacher. What about Miss Emma and the chaperones? What about the kids? Somebody must have seen something.”
“If I were standing in your shoes, those are pretty much the first questions I’d ask of the Lumpkin County police. How Ethan disappeared when he was surrounded by all those people.”
And right here, my mind goes to all those dark places the detective told me to avoid. Why didn’t Ethan scream, alert the chaperones? Did he go kicking and screaming or willingly, at the barrel of a gun? How did none of the other kids hear? How come no one saw it happen?
By now Detective Macintosh has veered off the main drag and is following 19’s fat, looping curves that lead into Dahlonega. The lanes are narrower here, the asphalt pitted and half-buried in places, deep, dark puddles that catch the tires and send us fishtailing toward the guardrails. I hold tight to the door handle as we lean into another curve, which he handles with the skill of a NASCAR driver.
“And the second question?” I say, once we’re back on solid ground.
He keeps his gaze superglued to the road, his words slow and careful. “The second is to start asking yourself who might want more time with Ethan. Because the longer your son is gone, the longer nobody can find him, the higher the odds climb that he’s not lost.”
STEF
3 hours, 33 minutes missing
I blink into the darkness of our Atlanta bedroom, and I don’t have to flip on a light to know that I’m in bed alone. No sounds of Sam, brushing his teeth or banging around in his closet for his running gear, which can only mean he’s already downstairs. My husband is a good man and a terrific mayor, but in his own house he lives on Planet Sam, where morning rituals are not performed with regards to those of us still sleeping. If he was still in here, I’d for sure hear him.
I roll toward my nightstand and check the time—six-oh-three. Twelve minutes before my alarm would normally send me shuffling down the hall to Sammy’s room to get him ready for school. Unlike his father, Sammy sleeps like the dead. Rousing him from underneath his blankets often feels like trying to tug an elephant through a bottle neck: impossible.
But this morning, Sammy’s bed is empty, and Sam and I are taking a rare day off. No endless, snaking car pool lines for me. No donor meetings or campaign rallies or schmoozing city council members for him. And best of all, no Josh, Sam’s ever-available chief of staff, to call or text or interrupt at the worst possible moment like he tends to do. Nothing but me and Sam and a long stretch of empty hours.
Heaven.
I swipe a hand over Sam’s side of the mattress, running my fingers along sheets that have long gone cool. Once upon a time, Sam and I stayed tangled in the sheets until noon. Granted, that time was pre-Sammy, pre–Sam throwing his hat in the ring for mayor, which he won in a surprise landslide, but still. I sure do miss those days.
I’m about to hit the switch for the blackout shades when the bedroom door opens and Sam steps in. He’s cradling something in a hand, his former-football-player silhouette lit up from behind with the hal
lway’s golden glow. He sneaks into the room in pajama pants and bare feet, the distinct sound of porcelain clunking in a hand. Sam curses under his breath.
“It’s fine. I’m awake.”
I flip on a lamp, and the shadows in the bedroom take shape. The sandalwood dresser on the far wall. The tufted chaise by the floor-to-ceiling window. Sam, approaching the bed with two steaming mugs of coffee in one hand. The scent hits me and so does his smile—warm, wholehearted, seductive.
He shifts one of the mugs to his free hand and hands it to me. “Extra strong, with the tiniest splash of coconut milk.”
As perfect an example as any of why Sam was elected mayor—his ability to give you exactly what you want before you even know you want it. The first sip provides a welcome and instant zing, like a tuning fork to the bloodstream.
“I’ll admit to being annoyed when I woke up alone, but you are officially forgiven. This is perfect, thank you.”
“So I’ve been thinking...” he says, sinking on the bed by my feet. He drapes a palm over my foot. “Why don’t we rent some bikes and ride the BeltLine? We could grab lunch at Ponce City Market and cupcakes at Saint-Germain, then spend the rest of the afternoon doing a pub crawl. It’s supposed to be a gorgeous day, not too hot. What do you say?”
“I thought today was supposed to be just you and me.”
It’s the only thing I asked for. A day without obligations. Without appointments and voter polls and mile-long to-do lists. After four years of craziness—and with the next four looming—I don’t think it’s too much to ask for. All I want is a day—a whole, glorious day—just us two.
“You, me, sunshine and cocktails,” Sam says. “What’s not to love?”
“The thousands of constituents who will recognize you, all of whom will want to slap you on the back and take a selfie to post to their social media, alerting everybody in the entire state of Georgia where to find us. That’s what’s not to love. And I know you. You’d never tell anyone to take a hike, not when it might cost you a vote. Our day won’t belong to us at all.”
Three Days Missing Page 3