Last Seen

by Rick Mofina

“He never told us.”

  “Where did he get the money?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Was Gage Hudson the target?”

  “I don’t know. Abel just approached us to do it and said he would radio us when the time came and that we were to leave it off for half an hour.”

  “So he was watching for Gage? This was planned?”

  “All I know now is that he radioed me to switch it off at the time the boy and his family entered and that’s what I did. Before it all happened, all Abel said was that if we were ever questioned about it, we could use the lightning in Milwaukee as a cover for the system going down.”

  “Where’s Abel now?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know?” Malko’s chair scraped and crashed to the floor as he stood, looming over Alma. “You think hard. What else do you know?”

  She shut her eyes and cried.

  “Did you ever see Gage Hudson after he was reported missing?” Malko asked.

  “No.”

  “Who abducted him—was it Griner?”

  “No, Sid was outside at the chutes.”

  “Was it Wixom?”

  “Maybe, I don’t know. He was in and out of the Chambers at that time.”

  “Who else is involved?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Think!”

  “Abel said he was helping somebody, that they paid him, too, and that that was all we needed to know.”

  “Was it Roy Tate, Faith Hudson or Cal Hudson?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Who!” Malko shouted.

  “I don’t know anything more.”

  “You’ve just admitted that you’re an accomplice to a crime, a serious criminal act. That means you’ll face charges. If Gage Hudson is dead that makes you an accessory to murder.”

  Alma buried her face in her arms on the table and sobbed.

  “I swear, I didn’t know this was going to happen! God forgive me. I’m so sorry for that poor little boy!”

  “We’re going to place you under arrest, Alma. And we’re going to arrest Griner, too. You’re both going to prison for a long time. The only thing that might help you is if we find Gage Hudson alive.”

  She lifted her head, her hair curtained over her tearstained face.

  “I pray to God that you do. I’m so, so sorry.”

  65

  Lone Pine County, Montana

  Deputy Emmett Peak with the Lone Pine County Sheriff’s Office was driving west on Highway 200, a ribbon of pavement cutting across the vast, windswept plain of eastern Montana.

  Peak never tired of how the sky and earth became one in this part of the world; how you could go for miles without seeing another soul. He loved the land with its rolling hills laced with creeks, the pine-dotted coulees, the bluffs and badlands. Some two thousand people lived within the county’s 2,500 square miles, giving everyone lots of breathing room. With the exception of drunk drivers and a few domestics, there wasn’t a lot of crime here.

  Lone Pine was peaceful.

  Almost too peaceful. Maybe he should consider the Montana Highway Patrol again. Word was they were accepting trooper applications.

  Peak was just beyond the exit for Cottonwood, midway through his shift, thinking about getting a turkey sandwich with fries at Buck’s Diner, when a glint of chrome caught his eye.

  It flashed from the windbreak near the shoulder on the north side of the highway.

  What’s this?

  He pulled his patrol car over and got out to investigate. Tracks in the dried mud from last night’s rain led into a big stand of bull pine and blue spruce thick with creeping juniper and other shrubs.

  Tugging on gloves he followed the tire impressions into the thicket, using his baton to slap aside branches, soon determining that the chrome was part of a vehicle wedged at a forty-five-degree angle up against the trees, entwined in the brush. The sides were scraped and dented, the windshield shattered.

  Looks like someone lost control, or ditched a stolen vehicle, which is a good indicator of a link to another crime.

  Peak got the passenger door open and drew his weapon. No one was in the front.

  “Hello!” he called.

  He climbed inside. The interior was a mess of pots, pans, canned food, cereal and other items that had spilled from the kitchen. Empty take-out containers, wrappers and pizza boxes were starting to give off a bad smell. Clothes were strewn about.

  Nobody was inside.

  Peak climbed back outside and took notes. It was a camper van, a Phoenix Cruiser 2350, white on green with an Iowa license plate.

  Reaching for the shoulder microphone of his portable radio, he called in his position and the incident.

  “Shelley, will you run the tag and VIN through NCIC for me?”

  “Ten-four.”

  He read out the numbers and she repeated them.

  “Got it,” the dispatcher said.

  Waiting on his query, Peak probed the immediate area for any sign of an injured passenger or foot impressions. The terrain was too rugged. Maybe he’d request a K-9 team come up from Miles City.

  “Emmett, the plate comes back as stolen out of Sioux City, Iowa.”

  “Copy that. I figured. And the VIN?”

  “Stand by.”

  The radio crackled with static.

  “Oh, boy,” the dispatcher said. “Emmett, we have to alert the FBI.”

  “Want to tell me what you have there?”

  “There’s an Amber Alert on this. The vehicle and a white male subject—he’s got a whole list of aliases—are wanted in connection with the suspected abduction of Gage Hudson, age nine, from River Ridge, Illinois—that’s metro Chicago. That case has been on the news. There’s a lot more supplemental information.”

  “Read it to me.”

  The dispatcher read an overview of Abel Renard Wixom—alias Arthur Lee Wilemonte, Melvin Claude Marxe, Wardell Preston Bowles and Felix Steed Vassellef—who was a person of interest in connection to the abduction of Gage Hudson, last seen at the River Ridge Summer Carnival in the Chambers of Dread. Hudson was four feet seven inches tall, between sixty-five and seventy-five pounds, wearing a blue Cubs T-shirt with a mustard stain, light-colored camo shorts, SkySlyder blue sneakers, size five, with green neon laces in a zipper pattern.

  When she’d finished, Peak blinked several times, his heart beating faster before he headed back into the camper as if remembering a detail.

  “Emmett? You copy?”

  “Ten-four. Alert the sheriff, tell him what we got. Let him alert the FBI.” He resumed scanning the interior. “I’m going to stay with this vehicle. This could be a crime scene. Shelley, contact Miles City—we’re going to need a K-9 unit.”

  “Ten-four. Also, Emmett, I got another call for you. Just came in. Want me to raise Randy and send him, or can you take it?”

  “What is it?”

  “Stand by.”

  While waiting, Peak kept searching the disarray. He thought that when he first looked inside he’d glimpsed something.

  “Griff Johnson at the Sunset Dreams Motel—that’s only four miles from you. He says he’s got a bad feeling about a guest that showed up.”

  “What sort of bad feeling?”

  “Said a man showed up without a vehicle and his clothes were bloodied and his face was scraped pretty good.”

  Peak froze. “Did Griff say if the guest was traveling with a child?”

  “I don’t have that information.”

  “Did Griff say if the man was still there?”

  “Affirmative. And that call is only a few minutes old.”

  “Okay, Shelley, tell the sheriff we need assistance. We need Miles City SWAT ASAP to set up on the motel. Tell him we may have one of the
most wanted men in the country in that motel, possibly with a kidnapped boy from Chicago.”

  66

  Travis Prell, a sniper with the Miles City Police SWAT Team, lay flat on his stomach concealed by the wheatgrass in the field across the highway.

  The door and window of Unit 22 of the Sunset Dreams Motel filled his scope.

  Next to the motel, out of sight in the parking lot of the Rawhide gas station, Miles City SWAT Team leader, Doug Mott, had set up a command post. Using the hood of a Lone Pine patrol car he studied the motel property and floor plan, hastily sketched on the back of a diner placemat by the manager, Griff Johnson.

  Mott had guided the team, supported by deputies from Lone Pine, Garfield and Prairie counties, along with Montana Highway Patrol troopers, to set up inner and outer perimeters while he developed an entry and arrest strategy for Unit 22.

  Two plainclothes female officers, pushing cleaning carts, knocked on the doors of all occupied units. Other officers quickly and quietly escorted guests to a safe zone beyond the perimeter.

  While passing by Unit 22, one of the officers, quickly and surreptitiously, made a check at the door and window. She heard the TV and shower, confirming activity in the room.

  At the command post, Griff Johnson looked hard at the images Lieutenant Mott was showing him on his phone. The FBI had distributed photos of the subject known as Abel Renard Wixom.

  “You’re certain this is the man, sir?” Mott asked again.

  “That’s definitely him.” Johnson scratched his sideburns. “His clothes were bloody. His face was scratched. He had a backpack and a duffel bag with him, but I can’t say for sure if a child, like that boy, or anyone else, is in the room with him.”

  Mott nodded, then made a round of whispered radio checks.

  SWAT members wearing helmets, armor, headset radios, and equipped with rifles and handguns, were ready. Sharpshooters had taken up key points while other team members lined up on the unit. The squad pressed against the motel’s walls as they inched toward the room from either side.

  “All right, if we’re good to go, let’s call into the room so we can end this peacefully.” Mott nodded to the negotiator, Louise Reddick.

  Reddick dialed the room number but the phone rang unanswered. She waited, then tried again. After four efforts, she moved closer and, using an unmarked police vehicle as a shield, spoke through a bullhorn.

  “Mr. Abel Wixom.” Reddick’s voice crackled across the motel courtyard. “Mr. Abel Wixom in Unit 22, this is the Miles City police, supported by Lone Pine County. We want to talk to you. For your own safety, would you exit now with your hands raised and your palms forward.”

  Several long, silent moments passed.

  Reddick tried calling in again, then repeated the police order through the bullhorn.

  No response.

  Several more moments passed. Reddick turned to Mott. It was now his call.

  They couldn’t wait a second longer, he thought. There was always a chance Wixom could have spotted them setting up. It was a safe bet he was monitoring news; he had to know he was on the FBI’s Most Wanted list, so there’s no telling what he might do if he had the boy with him.

  Mott made a decision and spoke into his headset. “Go! Go! Go!”

  Five seconds later the battering ram smashed the door, accompanied by the deafening crack-crack and blinding flashes of stun grenades fired through the window. The team stormed the small room, flashlight beams piercing the fog as the heavily armed officers swept it in choreographed tactical movements to detect and neutralize any threat.

  They tossed the mattress, checked under the bed, checked the sofa bed and checked the closet. No sign of anyone. The room was empty.

  The TV was on, tuned to an all-news network. The bathroom door was closed. The shower could be heard.

  “Police! Exit the room with your hands raised now!” the squad leader shouted.

  Nothing happened.

  The order was repeated, and still nothing happened.

  The team popped the door and entered, filling the room.

  “What the hell?”

  A man’s body hung from the center of the ceiling, a belt around his neck affixed to the overhead sprinkler nozzle.

  The first SWAT member immediately hugged the man’s legs and raised his weight while the second slashed the belt with a knife.

  Upon lowering the man to the floor one of the members touched his fingers to the man’s neck.

  67

  Somewhere over Nebraska

  Seventy-five minutes from Denver, a flight attendant summoned Malko from his aisle seat to the front of the plane. The first officer had stepped from the cockpit to relay an urgent message.

  While Malko was gone Marsh checked her phone again.

  The airline provided in-flight Wi-Fi service but the connection was down. The FBI had arranged to send them encrypted secure updates via the crew. Marsh resumed studying files for several minutes before Malko returned and slid back into his seat.

  “Abel Wixom is alive.” Malko kept his voice low. “Tried to hang himself but they cut him down in time.”

  “And the boy—did they find Gage Hudson?”

  He shook his head.

  “This is what we just got from our people on the ground.” He paged through his notes. “They’ve launched a major search operation.”

  “What about Wixom’s vehicle and motel room?”

  “Our ERT people from Great Falls are on-site along with a team flown in from Salt Lake. They’re processing the camper and motel room.”

  “Did Wixom say anything useful?”

  “No. They airlifted him to Billings unconscious and critical. It’s uncertain he’ll survive.” Malko glanced at his watch. “We’ll land in Denver soon, get our connection to Billings. We should be at the hospital in a couple of hours to question him.”

  “If he regains consciousness,” Marsh said.

  Malko nodded.

  “Has this find gone out to the press yet?” Marsh asked.

  “Not yet. We’ve got a head start but it’ll break wide open soon enough.”

  As their jetliner encountered a pocket of rough air, Marsh considered the circumstances of the case so far and turned to Malko.

  “This should tie everything to Wixom.”

  Malko removed his glasses, tapped them to his chin and said, “Not entirely. He didn’t act alone.”

  “Agreed. We have Alma McCain’s admission of her and Griner receiving five thousand dollars to help him, but it’s shaping up to be all Wixom.”

  “No, beyond that, there’s still Cal and Faith.”

  “What about them?”

  “Remember, they each had separate bank accounts and moved enough cash to cover the amount Wixom paid McCain and Griner. We can run the serial numbers of any of the remaining paid-out cash against banks the Hudsons used.”

  “You’re still hanging on to the idea one of them conspired with Wixom?”

  “We’ve got a lot of unanswered questions.”

  “True, but with everything now pointing to Wixom, why bring the parents back into this?”

  “There are factors we can’t ignore,” Malko said. “They lied to us. Their marriage is fractured. There’s the Tate connection. There’s Cal’s plan to take Gage to Kuwait. The shoe in the Dumpster behind the strip mall where they’d stopped and Faith was crying in the car. There’s the T-shirt so close to the Hudson home and the timing.”

  “Timing?”

  “Given that Adria Zoliski checks her garden each day, the timing of the discovery of Gage’s T-shirt makes it impossible for Wixom to have placed it there when he was driving across the country.”

  Marsh weighed Malko’s theories.

  “I know you’re trying to avoid tunnel vision,” she said, “but isn’t it possible y
ou’re overthinking this?”

  “This isn’t over, so nothing can be ruled out.”

  He glanced up to see the first officer coming down the aisle toward them. When he arrived at their seats, he leaned in, keeping his voice low.

  “Agent Malko, the captain has confirmed our connection’s been restored. You can use your phones in-flight to receive and transmit messages now.”

  The agents’ phones began pinging with a stream of messages. Malko went to the most recent. It was from Keith Coogan, with the Evidence Response Team processing Wixom’s camper.

  Agents Malko and Marsh, we’re alerting you to this item recovered in the subject’s vehicle.

  Malko read the description and looked at the attached color photo of a blue SkySlyder sneaker, size five, with green neon laces in a zipper pattern. The sole had a diamond and sawtooth traction design.

  “Tibor,” Marsh said. “It’s the right shoe. It has to be Gage’s missing shoe.”

  “I know.” Malko glanced down at the patchwork-quilted landscape flowing under them before going back to his phone and the photo of Gage Hudson smiling back at him.

  Are we on the right track?

  Time was running out and the odds were mounting against them.

  Malko pleaded with fate to give him a break.

  He pleaded for the plane to go faster and for Wixom to recover so he could question him.

  Above all, he prayed for Gage Hudson to be alive because in the pit of his gut Malko knew that he couldn’t bear to stare at another little corpse.

  68

  Billings, Montana

  “Duration of suspension is a critical element for near-hanging victims.”

  Dr. Violet Knight explained Wixom’s condition to Malko and Marsh as they stood in a waiting area of the hospital’s intensive care unit. The large windows presented a sweeping view of Billings.

  “While early resuscitation was administered, we can’t pinpoint the duration of suspension. Permanent cerebral damage is inevitable if oxygen to the brain is cut off for more than five, even three, minutes.”

  “What are the odds he’ll recover?” Malko asked.

  Knight slid her hands deep into the pockets of her white coat, then answered. “He’s been intubated and he’s on a ventilator. Given he’s suffered head trauma, consistent with an auto accident, and given his vital signs, I would rate chances at full recovery with no neurological problems at ten percent and regaining consciousness at fifteen percent. The next few hours will be crucial.”