The car warmed as he dug up public information on Knight Products. The company’s name popped up in a simple Google search. Terry, who had also served in the military, was the CEO. The company, based in Seattle, sold protective supplies like tactical vests, ballistic helmets, and shields to law enforcement agencies and the military.
Three months earlier, the CFO, Wade Pierce, had been named as the prime suspect in the murder of his estranged wife in a custody dispute. Seth scrolled through the article and stopped on a photo of six-year-old Liam Pierce. The newspaper had chosen his first-grade school photo. Liam wore a white polo shirt with his school logo on the chest. In the photo, Liam’s hair was neatly cut and clean, but Seth recognized him immediately.
The boy in the basement.
Gabe leaned across the vehicle to read the article. “If Wade Pierce abducted his son, why was Liam being held in a basement in Hannon by Peter and Kandi?”
“I don’t know. We need to talk to the Seattle PD and FBI field office.” With new enthusiasm, Seth shifted the car into drive and steered the vehicle toward Terry Reece’s cabin. “Let’s get some background information on Wade Pierce.”
Gabe started by phoning the Seattle PD. A few minutes later, he ended his call. “The Seattle PD says the FBI took point on the case. Special Agent Vance.”
From a parking spot in front of Terry’s cabin, Seth called the FBI field office in Seattle and caught Agent Vance in his office.
Seth introduced himself. “We found a child who looks very much like Liam Pierce.”
“Holy shit,” the agent said. “Is he alive?” Agent Vance seemed to be holding his breath.
“Yes,” Seth answered. “Other than some minor bruises, physically he’s in pretty good shape.”
Agent Vance exhaled hard. “Thank God. I didn’t have much hope after the first week passed, but after three months . . .”
Most missing kids weren’t found alive after that length of time.
“Where is he?” Agent Vance asked.
“Solitude, Oregon.” Seth filled the agent in on the case so far: the double homicide, finding the boy in the basement, the holding of the Dodge brothers, and his conversation with Terry Reece and Shawn Collins. “We had no idea who this child was. We found out about the case through a routine background check on Knight Products.”
“Well, damn. It doesn’t surprise me that Knight Products is involved,” Agent Vance said. “Wade Pierce was the CFO until he lost his shit three months ago. He stole ten million dollars from the company before he took off with his kid.”
“But if he took his kid, then why was Liam being held by two other people?” Seth asked.
“Maybe they were holding on to him for Wade,” Agent Vance said.
“Did Wade like his son?” Seth asked.
“By all accounts, he’s crazy about his kid. We think he killed his wife in order to keep custody of the boy.”
“Then why would he allow two people to chain Liam in a basement?” Seth couldn’t believe any man who loved his child would allow him to be traumatized in that way.
“I don’t know,” Agent Vance said. “There are a lot of things about this case that don’t add up. Wade isn’t just former military; he was an Army Ranger. He came back from combat with post-traumatic stress and anger management issues. His marriage suffered. He and his wife fought. According to the wife’s brother, Wade became abusive, and that’s why his wife was divorcing him and suing for full custody of Liam. The wife’s brother went to his sister’s house one day to check on her. He found her shot dead, and Liam missing.”
“Do you have evidence to prove Wade was the one who killed her?” Seth asked.
“We have no witnesses and no murder weapon. Wade had lived in the house until the week before the murder, so his DNA and fingerprints were naturally all over it. She was killed with a 9mm. Wade owns a 9mm Glock. We assume he has it with him. We searched the motel room he’d been renting in Seattle and didn’t find it.”
“The two people who were killed here were shot with a 9mm,” Seth said. “But 9mm isn’t exactly a unique caliber.”
“No, it isn’t. Look, my partner and I are going to head down there tonight,” Agent Vance said. “We’ll bring the boy’s uncle Marcus with us. Flights are grounded, so we’ll be driving. I don’t know how long it’ll take us to get there in this weather, but we’ll get there as fast as we can. Please, be careful. I don’t know how Wade and Liam were separated, but Wade is highly trained and unstable. He’s a dangerous man. If he’s in your neck of the woods, he’ll be looking for his son.”
Seth ended the call and relayed the details to Gabe. “We just have to sit tight and protect Liam Pierce until the FBI gets here.”
“That’s a seven-hour drive in good weather with no traffic,” Gabe said. “In the dark, with this storm . . . I wouldn’t expect them until late morning at the earliest. Where is Liam now?”
“On his way to the psychiatrist’s office in Solitude.” Seth drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, worry for his family eating at him. “I need to call Carly and give her the information on the boy’s identity. I want Bruce and Carly on alert.”
“I’m sure they already are.”
“Would you go to the psychiatrist’s office and escort them back to the farm? I don’t want to take any chances. We have to keep that boy safe for one night.”
“Why do I think that sounds easier said than done?” Gabe asked in a wry voice.
“Because we have multiple former soldiers running around Solitude, two murders, a kidnapping, and ten million missing dollars.” Seth wanted his family and Liam protected, but he had work to do.
“I’m on it.” Gabe reached for the passenger door handle. “Someone wanted that boy enough to kill two people to get him.”
Seth couldn’t let that number multiply.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“The road’s flooded.” Carly rolled past the turn off for James’s house, her stomach knotting. Frothy, brown water flowed in a swift current over the road.
“James’s neighborhood is cut off,” Bruce said from the passenger seat. “I’ll call him.”
“How am I going to get to Uncle James’s house?” Brianna asked.
“You’re not,” Patsy answered from her seat between the children.
Bruce lowered his phone. “James and Debra are fine. They have plenty of supplies.”
“Their house is on high ground.” Carly glanced in the rearview mirror. The two children were squished in the rear seat with her mother. “They’ll be safe.”
Carly wasn’t worried about James. People who lived in the country were accustomed to washed-out roads and power outages. They were always prepared to survive a few days of isolation. It was her daughter’s safety that concerned her. When she’d volunteered to take the boy home with her, she hadn’t planned on Brianna being in the house.
All she could hope was that whoever had tried to kidnap the boy was also pinned down by flooded roads and foul weather. Her grip tightened on the steering wheel. Tension constricted her lungs.
Her father’s voice rumbled in her ear. Worry about the things you can change.
A year and a half after his death, there were times when she could still hear his advice in the back of her mind, his voice as clear as if he were sitting in the car with her. For a few moments, she missed him as much as the day he’d died.
She took a deep breath and let the air out of her lungs slowly, then drove the rest of the way into town. Nothing could be done about the situation now. Carly and Bruce would keep Brianna and the boy safe.
The psychiatrist’s address was on a street just off Main. Carly pulled to the curb in front of a neat bungalow. A small sign marked OFFICE pointed toward a side entrance.
Bruce squinted through the windshield, then craned his neck to look out the rear window. “You sit tight. I’ll check the office and make sure it’s secure before we go in.”
“All right.” Carly glanced at the children in the backseat.
The boy was staring out the window, his face blank. Brianna looked bored.
Bruce exited the car. He circled the building before entering through the door marked OFFICE.
Bruce returned to the car and gestured that the coast was clear. Carly unlocked the vehicle and everyone climbed out. They hurried up the walkway. Inside the small lobby, her mother closed her umbrella and stood it in the corner. Then she collected dripping coats and hung them on pegs by the entrance. The boy had all four limbs wrapped around Bruce, his face pressed into her brother’s shoulder.
The waiting room was cheerful and clean. And empty because the receptionist had added them to the end of the doctor’s regular schedule. They were the last appointment.
On the bright white walls, a mural of a parade of animals holding brightly colored balloons circled the entire room. Carly checked in at the sliding glass window.
The receptionist took her name and information, then pointed to an open door. “The boy might be more comfortable waiting in the playroom.”
The room was equipped with a variety of toys: trains, a miniature plastic kitchen, books, and a child-size table loaded with paper and crayons.
“Do you want to go in there?” Bruce asked him.
The boy clung tighter around his neck.
Carly thought about the attack at the hospital. She should have called the doctor and asked him not to wear a lab coat.
“Come on. It’ll be fun. I’ll go with you.” Brianna walked into the playroom and sat on a child-size stool.
Bruce carried the boy in and sat down next to his niece. He picked up a red crayon and began to draw a barn. Brianna busied herself with a paper and crayons. Still wrapped around Bruce, the boy watched over his shoulder.
“He’s so attached to Bruce.” Patsy smoothed her loose sweater over her jeans.
Carly’s phone vibrated. Seth. “Excuse me. I have to take this call.”
She moved down the hall to a spot of relative privacy. “Seth?”
“Where are you?” he asked.
“The psychiatrist’s office. We just arrived.”
“The boy’s name is Liam Pierce.” Seth told her the story.
A sense of unease settled deep in Carly’s bones as she processed the horrific information. “Did he see his mother killed?”
“I don’t know,” Seth said. “All we know for certain is that his mother was murdered; Liam, Wade, and ten million dollars went missing; and Liam somehow ended up in that basement in Hannon.”
With two murdered people upstairs.
People around Liam died.
“But Wade doesn’t have Liam,” Carly said. Sweat broke out under her sweater.
We do.
She imagined ten different ways her Jeep could have been attacked on the drive, and how difficult it would have been for her and Bruce to protect her mother and two young children. Her heart began to pound harder, picking up speed like an eighteen-wheeler on the down side of a steep hill.
“I sent a deputy to escort you home. I’ll see you soon. Love you, babe.”
“Love you too.” Hands trembling, Carly lowered the phone. Her pulse skittered, and the hallway seemed to tilt. She couldn’t slow her heartbeat. Her breathing quickened. She put a hand on the wall to steady her balance.
What is happening?
A man stepped into her path. “I’m Dr. Mercer. Can I help you?”
Carly drew up. He was in his mid- to late fifties. He wore faded jeans and a red Mickey Mouse T-shirt on a tall, lean frame. Her worries about a lab coat had been unfounded. His only concession to being a doctor was an ID that hung from a Buzz Lightyear lanyard around his neck.
He offered her his hand to shake, then narrowed his eyes. “Are you all right?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Of course you’re not. Come in here.”
He took her by the elbow and steered her into an office, firmly guiding her into a chair. Little stars blinked in Carly’s vision.
Dr. Mercer opened a brown paper bag. “Breathe into this.”
Carly put it over her nose and mouth.
“It works better if you actually breathe,” he said, taking her wrist and putting two fingertips over her pulse point.
Light-headed, she let out the breath she’d been unconsciously holding.
“Take a nice deep breath through your nose.” He counted to five. “Now let it out just as slowly. Relax.”
Carly breathed in and out of the paper bag until her head cleared.
She lowered the bag. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened.”
“You had a panic attack.” He took her pulse again, and then he released her wrist, seemingly satisfied.
“I don’t have panic attacks.” Three seconds of silence ticked by before Carly clarified, “At least I’ve never had a panic attack before.” Now that it was over, the attack felt surreal.
“Are you under unusual stress?”
Understatement of the year.
But Carly didn’t have time to talk about her problems. She held up a hand.
“Really, I’m fine now. Thank you. Let’s try this again.” She set the paper bag down and pulled her ID from her purse. “I’m Carly Taylor, from CPS. We talked on the phone.”
“Call me Dean.” He offered his hand. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
Carly nodded. The dizziness had passed, and her hands had stopped shaking. “It’s just been a long day.”
Or month.
She didn’t need a psychiatrist to tell her that lack of sleep, nightmares, and the stress of her new case were taking their toll.
Dean didn’t look convinced. “You’re busy, and you probably think you don’t have time to take care of yourself.”
“Are you a psychiatrist or a mind reader?” Carly asked.
“A little of both.” He smiled. “But I’m serious. You need to take care of you, so you can take care of others. Panic attacks tend to get worse, not better, if you ignore them. This is really the first one you’ve ever had?”
“It’s been an unusually stressful month.” Carly shook off her nerves. She hadn’t come here to discuss her problems. “Let me tell you about the child. I’ve just learned his name is Liam Pierce, and he’s from Seattle.” Carly summarized the case, beginning with the double homicide, the boy being found chained in the basement, and the kidnapping attempt in the ER, and then progressing to Seth’s call.
Dean propped a hip on his desk. “No one knows how much of this violence Liam witnessed?”
“No.” She pushed to her feet.
Dean’s kind brown eyes and thick head of brown-and-gray hair brought George Clooney to Carly’s mind as he reached for her arm. “Take it slowly.”
But now that her heart was no longer trying to run right out of her chest, her legs felt steady. She turned toward the door. “I really want you to see him, though I’m not sure how he’s going to react when he learns that we know who he is.”
“Let me see him first.” Dean followed her back to the doorway of the playroom.
Carly peered in at the children before introducing her mother to Dean. “This is my mother, Patsy Taylor. She’s the child’s emergency foster parent.”
They shook hands.
“Follow me.” He led them into the next room, where they could see Bruce and the children in the playroom on a computer monitor. “We can talk in here.”
Closing the door, he turned his attention to the TV monitor. Dean rocked back on the heels of his bright-blue running shoes.
Carly told her mother what Seth had revealed in his phone call.
“Oh no,” Patsy said. “That poor child.”
On the monitor, the boy had slid off Bruce’s lap. He stood between Bruce’s knees, drawing with a blue crayon.
Dean frowned. “Has he spoken?”
“No,” Carly said. “He’s only said one word since he was found.”
“Which was?” Dean asked.
“He asked for pie,” Carly said.
The doctor smiled. “It’s a start.
”
“Yes.” Carly followed Dean’s gaze to the playroom, where Bruce handed the child a purple crayon.
The child took it and went back to his picture.
Brianna opened a small box and spread eight magic markers on the table. “Look, they have markers. You can use them if you want.” She slid the markers across the table so the boy could reach them. But the boy didn’t pick up a marker until Bruce nudged one closer to him.
“He responds to Bruce better than anyone else,” Carly said.
“Was Bruce there when he was found?” Dean asked.
“Yes. Bruce was the police officer who cut the chain from his ankle.”
“It’s not surprising he’s formed a bond with the man who freed him.”
“No, it isn’t, and my brother is exceptionally good with children.” Carly had always thought that Bruce and kids had much in common, namely immaturity. He was her daughter’s fun uncle. In the past, his antics had been juvenile, amusing, and occasionally irritating. But obviously Bruce’s recent maturation hadn’t affected his ability to empathize with children.
“You’re the social worker, your brother is a county deputy, and your husband is the detective investigating the case?” Dean’s thick, dark brows rose.
“Yes,” Carly said.
Dean’s gaze went to her mother for a second. “I had no idea how small a town could be until I moved here.”
“You’ll get used to it,” Patsy said. “And then you’ll wonder why you lived anywhere else.”
“I hope so.” Dean smiled.
“How should we tell him we’ve discovered his identity?” Carly asked.
“Usually, I recommend a simple and straightforward approach with kids.” Dean stared at the monitor for a few seconds; then he headed for the doorway. “But let’s see how he reacts to me first.”
Carly watched on the screen as Dean walked into the playroom.
The child turned away from the doctor to hide his face in Bruce’s shirt. Dean asked a few quick questions, then tried to interest the child in a green marker. After several more attempts to engage Liam, Dean gave up and rejoined Carly and her mother.
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