The Missing Hours

by Julia Dahl

  EDIE

  They’d been scheduled to take off from JFK at ten a.m. but winds and then a mechanical problem and then a shift change meant the family spent seven hours in the airport trying to remain calm. Edie and Nathan took turns walking Lydia up and down the terminal, while Gabe and Michelle fell into their phones, getting sporadic updates from the Vineyard: An officer was at the house; Trevor was in custody; no sign of Claudia.

  Lt. Lucinda Braga and Dave Wilcox were waiting at the airport. Dave drove the family home with the lieutenant following and when they pulled up, the chief of police was standing in the driveway with two uniformed officers. What was he going to tell them? Edie began shaking. Please, God, she thought, looking down at Lydia. Please.

  Edie strapped the baby to her chest and followed her parents inside while Nathan and Dave unloaded the car. The bottle of wine and the plate and napkin and handful of utensils Trevor had used were still on the coffee table. Chief Frank Kittery, a tall, thick-necked man with a moustache and a military haircut, guided the family to the dining room table. Edie remained standing, swaying and lightly bouncing, trying to keep Lydia quiet. The chief explained that Trevor had been cooperative at first but that his story was inconsistent, that he had a juvenile record, and that he’d resisted an officer at the jail facility.

  “He says he doesn’t know where Claudia is,” said Lt. Braga.

  “Do you believe him?” asked Gabe.

  “I do, actually,” said Lt. Braga. “But I could be wrong. We’re not done with him. Especially now that he’s made an accusation against Ridley Drake.”

  The chief eyed Michelle. Apparently he read the Post, too.

  “What sort of accusation?” asked Edie.

  “He claims Mr. Drake’s son recorded a sexual encounter with Claudia,” said the chief. “He also claims that Mr. Drake stole his phone, which he says has a copy of the encounter on it.”

  “He called it an encounter?” asked Edie.

  “What’s important is—”

  “What’s important,” said Michelle, “is that Chad Drake filmed himself raping my daughter.”

  Without even a glance between them, Gabe took the iPhone from his pocket and handed it to Michelle, who handed it to the chief. Edie considered leaving the room but it occurred to her that she was probably going to have to deal with this video for a long time, and she’d better start getting used to it. She’d better start getting strong. Claudia had to endure it; the least she could do was bear to watch it. She put her hands over Lydia’s ears.

  Fifty-eight seconds felt like an hour.

  The chief spoke first. “I’m not sure what I’m looking at here.”

  Asshole, Edie thought. He probably got off on porn like that every night. He could take the video as evidence and get off on it at home. He could pass it to a friend. Or ten. That’s what Claudia was running from, Edie realized. And the truth was that she’d never be able to run far enough.

  “Ridley knows,” said Michelle “Ask him.”

  “Did you know that Mr. Drake was here the day before yesterday?” asked Lt. Braga.

  The chief glared at his subordinate. “Lieutenant,” he said.

  “Here? At this house?” asked Michelle.

  Lt. Braga nodded; the chief appeared annoyed.

  “I did not know. What was he doing?”

  “After we took the boy from Ohio into custody we asked your neighbors for any footage from security cameras. The people just across from you captured a white Tesla driving up and the driver getting out early yesterday. It was Mr. Drake.”

  “Lieutenant,” said the captain, “Mr. Drake explained that.”

  “Oh, really,” said Gabe. “How did he explain it?”

  The captain hesitated.

  “Our daughter is missing, Chief Kittery,” said Michelle. “How did Ridley Drake explain being at our home?”

  “He said he thought you were here,” said Lt. Braga. “But when no one answered, he left.”

  “He said he thought I was here?” asked Michelle.

  “Yes.”

  “That’s bullshit. He had zero reason to think that.”

  “Look,” said the chief. “I don’t really want to get into the middle of what is clearly a complicated situation…”

  “You need to ask Ridley Drake about my daughter,” said Michelle. “I realize that most of your so-called work here consists of golfing and cocktails but you are supposed to be a police officer. You have a witness in your custody who says that Ridley Drake stole his phone—a phone that had evidence of a crime on it. You now have a copy of that evidence—of Ridley’s son committing a crime against my daughter. My daughter who hasn’t been at school, hasn’t communicated with her friends or family, and hasn’t been on social media in almost two weeks. We believe she is in danger. She was seen with a ticket to Woods Hole last weekend and the boy you have in custody says she was planning to come to the island. Do your job and look for her.”

  “The airport has no record of her flying in,” offered Lt. Braga. “We have officers looking at footage from the ferry. If she was here, we’ll find out.”

  “But until then,” said the chief, “I’m sure you understand that I can’t just force citizens to answer questions based on speculation.”

  “Nobody’s asking you to force anyone,” said Nathan. “They’re asking you to try. If you actually wanted to find Claudia you’d try. Unless you’re afraid, for some reason.”

  “Afraid?”

  Nathan shrugged his shoulders. “Ridley Drake is a big shit, right? ‘Prominent lawyer.’”

  “He’s got something on everybody,” said Edie. It was something he’d told her that summer: Information is just as valuable as money. More, sometimes. You want to know which judge has a secret kid; which one is a pothead; which ADA has a daughter with a shoplifting issue. Which one is having an affair with a hot teenager. He’d laughed. And she’d laughed, too. She’d been flattered. An affair. “What’s he got on you?”

  “I think we’re done here,” said the chief. “I understand you’re concerned…”

  “You’re a piece of shit,” spat Michelle.

  The chief spoke through his teeth. “If I could be sure that this video isn’t doctored in some way, or if I had reason to think that it wasn’t simply depicting what most college students do on a Friday night, or if I could prove it was filmed in my jurisdiction, maybe I would have probable cause to bring Chad in. Not his father. It doesn’t work like that.”

  “We’re not asking you to bring him in,” said Gabe. “We’re asking you to have a conversation with him.”

  “I’m sorry,” said the chief, “I recognize that you’re not used to being told no. But I won’t be pressured. Not by anyone.”

  The chief signaled to the uniformed officers. “Lt. Braga,” he said. She stood up but lingered a moment after he’d gone.

  “We’ll get back to you if we find anything on the ferry cameras.”

  “Thank you,” said Edie.

  Lt. Braga looked at Michelle. “Drake’s still on the island as far as I know,” she said, handing Edie’s mother a business card. “Reach out if you need anything.”

  When the lieutenant left, Edie realized they hadn’t gotten half the information they needed. What was happening to Trevor? What else did he have to say? Could they talk to him? She looked to her mother to say they should call Lt. Braga back but Michelle already had the phone to her ear.

  “You’re on the Vineyard?” she asked. She was talking to Ridley. “Yes … Where is Claudia?… When was the last time you saw him?… I’m coming over.” She ended the call and looked at her family. “We’re going to Ridley’s.”

  * * *

  Ridley Drake’s house was about a mile outside Edgartown proper, on the road to Katama Beach. Matching stacked stone pillars marked the driveway, and a long slope of grass, acres of grass, sloped toward the water and the house, sprawling along the shore. Edie could see a few rooms illuminated inside and a motion light clicked on a
s they approached, revealing glass walls and tiers of bluestone patios, decks, an infinity pool. The driveway was paved in a herringbone pattern; three garage doors, all closed. Nathan was going to stay outside with Lydia. She’d sleep in the car seat or he’d walk her until they came out.

  “Just start screaming if you need me,” he told her.

  Edie kissed her husband and her daughter, and as she followed her mom and dad up the stairs to Ridley’s front door, she pulled out her phone and pressed the red button on the voice record app. Whatever he said would be used against him.

  When he opened the door and saw them all standing there, Edie thought she saw Ridley flinch. Had he just expected Michelle?

  “I told you I don’t know where she is,” said Ridley.

  Michelle walked in past him. How many times had her mom been inside this house? It was being renovated the summer he and Edie had been together and once they had sex in a room with no walls or roof. Just the wooden framing and the drop cloths and the stars above. It was the only time he’d brought her here; in the dark.

  “I wish I knew,” he said. “Believe me. I’ve been doing everything I can to contain this.

  “Contain this?” said Michelle, glowing with rage. “You mean keep Claudia from filing rape charges against your son?”

  Ridley was sweating. He was angry, too, but he didn’t take the bait. Gabe shut the door.

  “What were you doing at our house?” asked Michelle. “Was she there?”

  “If she was she didn’t answer the door.”

  “What were you going to do if she did?”

  “I was going to talk some sense into her, Michelle!” The volume of his voice startled Edie. The words seemed to detonate inside the room, the blasting syllables knocked around the walls and bounced off the windows. No one responded. Ridley took a deep breath through his teeth, disdain souring his face.

  “I was going to make sure she understood her choices,” he said, now studiously somber. “I was going to encourage her to talk to you. And to get some help.”

  “And what would you say her choices are?” asked Michelle.

  “I wanted her to know how it works in the real world. I wanted her to know what happens after she shows that video to the police. It’s not going to be, oh, poor you, sweet victim, those bad boys go to jail. Not by a long shot. All that video does is open her up to questions. How did you get so drunk that night, Claudia? Why so many shots? Where did you get that fake ID? Why did you go up to his room? Why did you post that selfie? And what about this post from last month, the one with all the cleavage? And what about that TV show? You know, Claudia, it seems like maybe you have a pattern of getting drunk and doing things you don’t remember. Would you call yourself an alcoholic?”

  Edie watched Ridley’s performance and bile started to rise in her throat. He was the worst of everything and she’d let him strangle her spirit for almost two years. He was always going to be there, his dismissal, the degradation, the fetus she’d had to have removed from her body because of him. But as she watched him lecture them all, she realized that she didn’t have to hate the eighteen-year-old who let him into her life anymore. Ridley was like the wind: If he wanted in, he was getting in, whether the door was open or not.

  “I wanted to tell your sister,” he continued, now looking directly at Edie, “that even if she answers all these questions to their satisfaction, the DA is never going to take her case to trial because she will be under indictment for felony assault of my son. She will be the definition of an unreliable witness.”

  “What are you talking about?” asked Gabe.

  “Your daughter has serious problems, Michelle. No wonder she disappeared.”

  “She disappeared because of what Chad did to her!” screamed Edie. “He’s just like you. He thinks he can do anything. But he can’t. You can’t scare us. We’ve got the video and we’re going to the police. You think Claudia can’t stand up to some questions? Claudia is a fucking hero.”

  She had everyone’s attention now. Her body felt better than it had in weeks. The strength she needed finally kicking in.

  “Did you steal that kid’s phone?” Edie asked him.

  “Eden,” said Ridley. He stepped forward and put his hand on her arm, a light, intimate touch. “You need to calm down, honey.”

  Michelle grabbed Edie’s hand and pulled her close.

  “Back up, motherfucker.” Michelle’s eyes were wide, nostrils flaring: her face ugly with the horror of what she suddenly suspected. This is what Ridley did, Edie thought. He made the people around him ugly.

  “Trevor told the cops you stole his phone,” Edie said again. “Did you?”

  “I offered him a lot of money and he wouldn’t take it. That kid is in way over his head, okay? He’s lucky we didn’t press charges on him after he attacked Chad, in broad daylight.”

  “I wonder why?” said Gabe.

  Ridley turned to Edie’s dad. “He speaks.”

  He’d barely gotten the words out when Gabe whacked him across the face with a coffee table book.

  “What the fuck!” shouted Ridley, stumbling sideways. His leg caught the corner of a side table and he crashed to the ground, knocking over a vase full of wildflowers that shattered when it hit. An explosion of glass and water.

  “Do you know where Claudia is?” Gabe asked, now standing over him, struggling to keep his voice steady. Edie had seen her father this angry only once before, a decade ago, when he kicked in a door the night he learned his dad had died in a car accident.

  Ridley tried to get to his feet but Gabe kicked him in the stomach.

  “No!” shouted Ridley. “I don’t know where she is! All I know is she sliced my son with a box cutter in a motel room last weekend. If I were her I’d go to Mexico. Or jump off a fucking bridge.”

  Silence dropped over the room. Edie looked at Ridley’s bleeding, aggrieved face and thought: we will destroy you.

  “We’d better not find out you’re lying,” said Michelle.

  Edie took her mom’s hand and tugged her toward the door. Gabe followed. They were done here.

  No one spoke on the way home. Back in the house, Nathan walked Lydia upstairs and Edie’s parents asked her to stay down on the first floor.

  “Your father shared what you told him,” whispered Michelle. “Can I…” Her mother stepped forward, her face red and wet and crumpled, crying openly, and wrapped her arms around Edie. “I’m so sorry, baby. I…”

  “It’s okay, Mom,” said Edie, closing her eyes and allowing herself to fall into the comfort, the closure, of the embrace. “I’m okay. Let’s just find Claudia.”

  CLAUDIA

  The guy who attacked her at TGI Fridays heard the bartender say her ticket was for Woods Hole, so she couldn’t go to the Vineyard. As Claudia rushed through the Port Authority to the escalator at the corner of Forty-First Street, her teeth were chattering. Her body screamed, Go! She had no more fight in her, only flight. She had to get off the island.

  The last train to Poughkeepsie left in an hour. She was pretty sure Edie and Nathan kept a key under the mat. She bought a quarter bottle of wine and a bag of popcorn at a bodega around the corner from Grand Central and got a seat by the window on the 11:59 leaving from Track 71.

  As the train pulled above ground in Harlem, the hot buzz of adrenaline that had been roaring through her body since she put the blade to Chad’s face began its work on her brain. Were they all in on it? Ridley had to have sent the guy at the bar. Did Trevor tell him where she’d be? For all she knew Ridley and Chad had given Trevor money to bump into her at the dorm. Ridley could have even told her mom about the video. Maybe that’s why Edie had been so cold. Maybe they were disgusted. Maybe they really were worried about her germs.

  Claudia looked at her reflection in the scratched plastic window. She watched herself drink wine from the bottle. She reached into her bag and found the PReP pills she was supposed to take. Look at Claudia Castro, she thought. Chasing her HIV meds with wine. Cl
audia Castro is a drama queen. Claudia Castro is a slut. Did Claudia Castro know the guy at the pool party had a girlfriend? Did she care? Is Claudia Castro crazy?

  There were two cabs idling in the roundabout outside the Poughkeepsie station. She gave the driver her sister’s address, and when he started the car her bag fell forward, spilling the contents onto the floor of the back seat. The bottle of wine, the box cutter in the plastic bag,

  “Big night in the city?” asked the driver. She could see him looking at her from the rearview mirror, a tired smile on his face. Would he believe her if she told the truth? Would anyone?

  The house that her sister and Nathan had been living in since they graduated was near the end of a residential street in a hilly neighborhood just off Vassar’s campus. It had a screened-in front porch and an old door knocker shaped like a fish and chipping blue-painted shutters. Claudia paid the cabbie and shouldered her bag, watching as he drove off. There was a light on two houses away but every other window on the street was dark. Above, clouds drifted by, swiping lazily across the sky.

  The key was where she thought it would be, and inside the only sound was the tick tick of a waving Chinese good luck cat on the windowsill. The last time she’d been here she and Edie had gotten in an argument. Edie was just starting to show and Claudia asked if she was having second thoughts.

  “About what?” asked her sister, though she knew exactly what Claudia meant.

  “About turning your life into a Bruce Springsteen song.”

  Claudia had laughed at what she thought was a mostly harmless dig but the words hit Edie in the heart. Of course Edie was having second thoughts. Who wouldn’t? Nobody pretended the pregnancy was planned. It was a make-the-best-of-a-bad-situation situation. Edie told her she was being mean and Claudia protested and then Edie said fine, not mean, just thoughtless. Edie was right. She had been thoughtless. Just like she’d been when she got too drunk with Chad Drake. What did she expect?

  There was a glass overturned in the drying rack. Claudia filled it with water and took her bag into the living room. Mismatched picture frames on the mantel above a fireplace that didn’t work; a pile of board games in the corner; a record player on the bar cart. Her sister was happy here. It was the kind of home where a “normal” family might live: a family where Mom and Dad go to work and then come home for dinner and stay. Not many people Claudia and Edie grew up with had families like that. Families where parents at least pretended that home and kids were as interesting as the world outside. Claudia’s childhood home had been a way station for the four of them; a shared space but never a shared spirit. This house had Edie and Nathan braided together inside. It almost seemed like magic: her sister had created a happy family.