"Ah-ha!" her friend called out. "The perfect year."
When she reappeared, she had two glasses of peach ice tea. She handed one to Sadie. "Drink up. Then I'll help you clean up this mess before Philip sees it."
Sadie's woeful gaze drifted around the living room. Paper plates were piled everywhere. They had somehow gone astray and hadn't made it into the garbage can that she had so thoughtfully provided next to the dining room table. Plastic cups, some half full of pop, were on every table and counter space. There were more cups than there had been kids.
"Ugh," Leah said behind her.
Sadie followed her friend's gaze.
A chocolate cake smear—so dark it almost looked like dried blood—stretched across the kitchen wall, three feet from the ground, a small handprint at the end.
"Your house is a disaster," Leah said unnecessarily.
Sadie sighed. "Well, at least it's quiet."
Sam had gone upstairs to his room, tired from all the excitement and junk food. The last time she had seen him, he was lying on his bed.
"He's probably asleep," Leah said, reading her thoughts.
Sadie gulped down her ice tea, then set to work on the kitchen, while Leah looked after the living room. After an hour had passed, all that was left to do was run the vacuum over the carpets and turn on the dishwasher.
"All done," Leah said, wiping a bead of sweat from her brow.
"Thanks. I can handle what's left."
As Sadie watched Leah climb into her car, a part of her wanted to holler, 'Come back!'
"You're being silly," she muttered.
Sadie closed the door and slid the deadbolt into place. Then she locked up the rest of the house, set the alarm for the night and went upstairs to check on Sam.
When she opened the door to his room, she smiled. Sam was stretched out across his bed. On top of the blankets. A soft snore issued from his half-opened mouth. He had passed out from exhaustion, his face covered with chocolate cake, white, black and blue icing, and an orange pop mustache.
"Happy birthday, little man," she whispered, tucking an extra blanket around him.
She closed the door and headed downstairs to wait for Philip.
Sadie was abruptly roused from a deep sleep. She jerked to a sitting position, inhaling deeply, and looked at the space beside her. It was unoccupied, the blanket still tucked under the pillow. She had waited for Philip downstairs for hours. Eventually, she had given up and gone to bed.
She peered at the bedroom clock. It was half past midnight. She'd only been asleep for about forty-five minutes. In the murky shadows of the room, she felt a foreign presence, a movement of air that was so subtle it could have been her own breath.
A draft?
She squinted at the window. It was closed.
Somewhere in the house a floorboard creaked.
Philip must be home.
Tossing the blankets aside, she slid from the bed and walked to the door. Remembering the brick thrown through Sam's window, she froze. Her stomach fluttered as she imagined a gang of teen hoodlums breaking into the house.
But the alarm would go off, silly.
Still, she pressed an ear to the door and strained to listen.
At first, there was silence. Then another creak.
"Philip," she mumbled.
She was about to open the door when she heard an unfamiliar ticking sound. Had Philip bought a clock for the hall?
She listened again.
Tick… tick, tick.
Whatever it was, it was coming closer.
Her heart began to pound a maniacal rhythm and her breath quickened. When a shadow passed underneath the door, she held her breath. Her heart thumped almost painfully in her chest.
Then the shadow was gone.
Cautiously, she opened the door. Just a crack.
The hall was empty.
And no ticking.
Maybe I dreamt it.
With a tremulous laugh, she flung open the door, a show of false bravado. Maybe Philip was working in his office. Maybe he'd gone to check on Sam.
"Philip?"
She walked down the hall and stopped in front of Sam's room. Her toes tingled as a draft teased her feet. She shivered, then opened the door.
The window that Philip had replaced gaped open—black and hungry—like a mouth waiting to be fed. The curtains flapped in the night wind, two tongues lashing out.
She frowned. Philip hadn't left the window open. He'd gone to work early, without a word to either of them. And Sam couldn't have opened it. He wasn't tall enough.
Did I leave it open?
She crossed the room, barely looking at the mound in the bed. She reached for the window and tugged it shut. The lock clicked into place, the sharp sound shattering the stillness.
Then she glanced at the bed.
Sam hadn't even stirred. But then again, he never did. He was almost comatose when he slept and nothing could wake him early, short of a sonic boom.
She tiptoed to the bed and touched his hair. Then, closing her eyes, she leaned down, kissed his warm forehead and breathed in his sweet child scent. He smelled of chocolate and sunshine.
"Snug as a bug," she whispered.
She stepped back, her foot connecting with something soft and furry. Reaching down, she fumbled in the dark until she found the stuffed toy dog that Philip had given Sam the night before. She moved quietly toward the closet, inched the door open and tossed the toy inside. Then she stepped out into the hall, shutting the bedroom door behind her.
Her gaze flitted to the far end of the hallway, where shadows danced between silk trees that stood in the alcove. Beside the trees—two-thirds up the wall—was a small oval window, and through it, a full moon was visible. It hung in the cloudless sky, a pearlescent pendant on invisible string.
It was a beautiful night, one that was meant to be shared.
Loneliness filled her, but she shrugged it off and plodded down to the kitchen to get a glass of juice. Five minutes later, she went back upstairs, with every intention of crawling into bed and ignoring the fact that Philip hadn't even bothered to call on the night of their son's birthday party.
As she passed Sam's door, a flicker of light beneath it caught her eye. Then she heard a soft thud. Sam must have fallen out of bed again. He had done that on two other occasions. Usually he woke up screaming.
She opened the door and sucked in a breath as her gaze was captured by something that made no sense at all.
The window was open again.
She blinked. "What the—?"
Moonlight streamed through the window, illuminating the bed. It was empty.
"Sam?"
She reached for the light switch.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
At the sound of a stranger's hoarse whisper in her son's bedroom, she did the most natural thing.
She flicked on the light.
6
A black-hooded monster held her son in his arms.
Sam wasn't moving.
The oxygen was instantly sucked from the room, making it impossible for Sadie to breathe. The glass slipped through her fingers, orange juice pooling at her feet. Speechless, she took a trembling step forward. "Please—"
"Don't move!" the stranger growled from the depths of the sweatshirt hood. "You have ten seconds to make a decision. Let me walk out of here with the kid, or your son dies." He shifted Sam's limp body in his arms and a glint of metal flashed.
A gun. It was aimed at Sam's head.
She trembled uncontrollably. Oh Jesus…
"Let him go," she said in a shaky voice.
He snorted, as if he found her comment amusing. When he twisted his head to glance over his shoulder at the open window, she saw a ghostly face with a hooked nose that looked like it had been broken a few times. A red smear gleamed in the crease that ran from the side of his nose to his wide, thick lips. His cheek was pale alabaster and flecked with spidery imperfections.
Pockmarks, she
guessed.
The man turned, examining her just as closely. "Are you that fucking stupid? Turn off the goddamn light!"
Although her hand trembled noticeably, she obeyed.
Dressed in black, the man blended into the shadowed corner.
She hissed in a breath. "What did you do to my son?"
"Just gave him something to make him sleep." The man sighed, frustrated. "Why'd you have to go and mess things up? If you'd stayed asleep I'd be outta here already."
"I want my son," she said with a whimper. "Just let him go. Leave. I won't tell anyone. Please. Just give him to me and walk out the door."
"That ain't gonna happen."
The man did something unexpected. He moved into the moonlight, sat down on the bed and propped her son in his lap, like a ventriloquist's doll.
"Is it, Sam?" He gripped Sam's chin and turned his head from side to side. "No, Mommy," he said in an eerie, childlike voice. "I'm going with this man."
Sadie staggered against the wall. "No, he's not."
The man tossed Sam on the bed. "Shit, shit, shit!"
She shivered at the pure madness in his voice.
"I'll tell you how this is gonna play out," he muttered. "First, you're gonna promise not to leave this room for twenty minutes."
"Wait!" she cried, tears flowing down her face. "Take me instead. You don't need him. I'll come with you, do whatever you want."
"I don't need you." He stroked the gun against Sam's hair. "I have what I came for. Five seconds."
She hitched in a breath, her heart aching, burning…dying.
"You sick…pervert," she said between gritted teeth.
"I'm no perv."
"Then what do you want with my son?"
"For fuck's sake, shut up! You've already screwed things up enough. No one's ever seen me. No one!"
That's when it hit her.
The Fog.
She shrank back against the wall. "I won't let you take my son."
The Fog laughed mockingly. "You won't let me?"
She stood slowly, quivering from head to toe. "No. I won't."
In a flash, she lunged for the gun. The man backhanded her across the face. Pain exploded in her left temple. Enraged, she roared and hurled herself at him again. This time she managed to dislodge the gun from his hand.
She dove for it.
He kicked her in the ribs. "Stupid bitch."
Forcing her away from the gun, he kicked her again. And again. Then he reached down, hauled her up by her hair and flung her across the room. A sharp twinge pierced her side as she landed with a sickening thud against the dresser. She let out a pained gasp. When she looked up, Sam was lying helpless in the man's arms.
"I'm walking out of here," The Fog said. "With the kid. And you're not gonna stop me. You know why?"
She shook her head, unable to move or speak.
"Because if you try to stop me…" He pressed the gun to Sam's head and pretended to pull the trigger. "Bam!"
"I can give you money," she cried out. "I've got twenty-five thousand in my checking account."
He sneered. "Is that all he's worth to you?"
"I'm begging you…a hundred thousand! Whatever you want, I'll get it. Please! Just tell me how much you want."
The Fog tossed Sam over his shoulder with the ease of someone hefting a sack of potatoes. Then he strode toward her and leaned down, his shadowed face bare inches from hers.
"What I want is to see nothing in the papers," he said, his breath a simmering stew of cigarettes, onions and beer. "No description, no nothing. I want you to go back to bed and pretend you never seen me."
"I can't do that."
"Yes, you can. And you will."
"But the police—"
"Fuck the police! You want your kid to live?"
Sadie shuddered. "Yes, I want Sam to live."
"Don't leave this room for twenty minutes."
She stretched out a trembling hand. "Don't take my baby."
The Fog straightened. Then he yanked the door open and the light from the hall illuminated him for a brief moment.
"Please," she wept.
"Please," he mimicked scornfully. "You're pathetic."
She closed her eyes in agreement. Then, in a last ditch effort, she clawed her way across the floor, writhing in agony as a hot wave threatened to pull her under.
The Fog watched her, his thin lips twisting into a sinister smile. "I see one description—you even say you saw me—and I'll send the kid back to you all right. In little bloody pieces. You got that?"
She couldn't answer.
"Two seconds!" he snapped, raising the gun to Sam's head.
"Okay! Take him! Just please…don't hurt him."
Then Sadie did the only thing she could do. She let a madman take her son.
Alone, she cried in the dark, scared to move, scared not to.
"God help me," she sobbed. "Help Sam!"
But God wasn't listening.
Philip stumbled into the house at one fifteen. And stumbled was an understatement. Upstairs in Sam's room, Sadie heard the sound of glass hitting the floor. It was followed by a belligerent curse.
She stared at the bat signal clock on Sam's wall.
The twenty minutes were up. Five minutes ago. They had passed slowly, like a never-ending funeral dirge for the Pope. She had mentally shut down and collapsed on Sam's bed in a haze of overwhelming pain, grief and guilt.
She pulled herself to her feet, ignoring the throbbing spasms in her ribs. Her legs shook, her heart raced and her head pounded.
What do I do? What do I tell Philip?
She moaned. "Oh God. Sam…"
She stepped out into the hall, one hand on the doorframe for support. Her throat burned as heavy footsteps lumbered up the stairs.
Philip turned the corner and lurched to a stop when he saw her. "Sadie?" he slurred. "Whatcha doing? Waiting up for me?"
"Philip, I n-need—"
"I need you to blow me." He grinned lecherously and tried to grab her.
She batted his arm away. "Philip, stop it!"
"So I'm a little drunk," he said, pouting. "We can still—"
"Sam's gone," she whispered. "He took Sam."
"What?"
"The Fog…took…him, Philip." Her voice caught in the back of her throat as deep, wracking sobs hiccupped to the surface.
Philip stared at her. "What the hell are you talking about?" He pushed her aside and staggered into Sam's room. "Sam's sleeping in his—"
He stopped, confused. Then he strode to the closet and flung the door open. "Where is he, Sadie?" He whipped around, almost colliding into her. "What've you done with my son?"
She was stunned. "I haven't done anything, Philip. I told you, Sam's been kidnapped."
"Kidnapped?" His glazed eyes went immediately sober and his face blanched. "Oh shit." He looked as though someone had sucker punched him in the gut.
She moved slowly toward their bedroom.
"What are you doing?" he demanded, following her.
"Calling the police."
"You haven't called them yet?"
She reached for the cordless phone. "I just…found him gone."
Philip sank down on the bed and watched her dial.
When the 911 operator answered, Sadie's composure crumbled. "My son's been kidnapped," she wept into the phone.
The man took her information, then instructed her not to hang up. "The police will be there soon."
Phone in hand, she stood by the window and stared at the street below. There were no signs of life. No cars, no lights.
No Sam.
Then she heard the siren wailing in the distance.
"Did you see anyone?" Philip rasped.
She hesitated and swallowed hard, remembering The Fog's parting words. 'If you even say you saw me, I'll send the kid back to you all right. In little bloody pieces.'
She believed him. If she said anything, Sam was as good as dead. And how would she live with that on her
conscience? But she realized something else. Once she started lying, there was no turning back.
She choked back a muffled sob. "I heard something. I thought he fell out of bed. But when I went to check on him…" She stared at the phone. "Sam was gone."
The lies had begun.
7
Two police detectives showed up on her doorstep. The younger of the two, a tall man with closely cropped sandy hair, looked as if he were fresh out of college, while the other was balding and probably nearing retirement. They were followed by three crime scene unit investigators carrying metal cases.
Philip greeted them with a slurred, "C'mon in, officers."
"Mr. and Mrs. O'Connell, we're terribly sorry," the older detective said, offering Sadie his hand.
"Actually, my last name is Tymchuk," Philip cut in. "My wife kept her maiden name. For her writing."
The detective's wrinkled eyes arched. "Ms. O'Connell, then. Detective Lucas, and this is my partner, Detective Patterson." He reached into his shirt pocket and handed Sadie a plain white business card.
Detective Jason Lucas, Robbery Unit.
"Robbery?" she asked, confused.
"We handle abductions too."
She led them upstairs and paused in front of Sam's door.
"Is this your son's room?" Patterson asked.
When she nodded, the young detective disappeared into the room with the crime scene investigators. She leaned against the wall, afraid to breathe or move, afraid that she was in the way, yet afraid that if she went downstairs they would miss something.
"I need a drink," Philip muttered, veering unsteadily toward the stairs. "Want one?"
She scowled. "I think you've had enough."
"I meant coffee." He headed downstairs, shoulders slumped.
Detective Lucas cleared his throat. "Ms. O'Connell, I have to ask you some questions. Can we go downstairs?"
She shook her head. "I need to stay up here. Close to Sam's room."
The man gave her a sympathetic look. "Is there someplace we can sit?"
She nodded and led him to the bedroom. "Sorry for the mess," she said, wincing as she picked a nightgown and a mauve robe—a Christmas gift from Leah—off the floor.
"Don't worry about it." He looked at her closely. "Ms. O'Connell, you have blood above your left eye."
Children of the Fog Page 5