The Silent Child Boxset: A Collection of Riveting Kidnapping Mysteries

by Roger Hayden

For a moment, there was no response, so Betsy stopped and looked toward the window. She was afraid to look out and afraid not to, but overcoming her fear, she crept closer, pulled away the curtain, and attempted to peek out. It was dark now and she hadn’t turned on the outside light. A loud knock resumed, sending her reeling back from the window and rattling the door within its frame. There was only one person who knocked like that. It had to be the police.

  “Sergeant Cruz?” she said loudly. “Corporal Powell, is that you?”

  She stepped forward and approached the door, peering through the center peephole. Whatever her expectations, there was nothing there, only an empty step and a doormat outside.

  “Impossible…” she said, realizing that she had been talking to herself out loud lately.

  Someone had knocked. It wasn’t a figment of her imagination. She wasn’t crazy. Not this time. She ran from the door, straight into the kitchen, and grabbed a butcher knife from the drawer, gripping it in her trembling hand. She looked at her broken phone on the floor, wishing she hadn’t thrown it against the wall

  She wished she had a gun—anything that could protect her. She backed against the counter just as a person ran past the kitchen window. A glimpse of their shadow beyond the curtains made the hairs on her neck stand on end. She felt as though she was being hunted. As she backed into the corner, her breathing intensified, and in the silence, she realized that the threat, whatever it was, had already found its way inside her house.

  The Morning After

  Homicide Detective Michael Dobson woke up to his cell phone vibrating on the nightstand with an incoming call. It was a little after 7 a.m. He hadn’t had much sleep, but unexpected calls day or night came with the territory. His head rose from his pillow in a daze as he looked around the darkened room. His wife Rachel wasn’t there. Her side of the bed was empty, with the covers tossed to his side. An aroma of eggs and bacon filled the air. She was cooking breakfast, and there was no better way to get him out of bed in the morning.

  He stretched and grabbed the phone to check the number. It was Jack Harris, another homicide detective and sometimes partner on the force.

  What now? he thought, frustrated with the call.

  Dobson had been with the Summerville Police Department for a total of fifteen years, eight of those years with his present Homicide unit. Although he was used to long hours and a never-ending backlog of cases, the job was beginning to wear on him. No matter what he did, it never seemed to be enough.

  He held his phone to his chest, thinking, and considered calling Harris back later. But an unexpected call two hours before he was scheduled to arrive at the station could only mean one thing: there had been a murder.

  “Dobson,” he said in a croaky voice with the phone pressed to his ear.

  “Hey, buddy. Got something for you,” Harris’s chipper voice said on the other end.

  Dobson cleared his throat and sat up as the sunlight behind the curtains glowed brighter by the moment.

  “What’s up?” he asked, grabbing for a T-shirt hanging over a nearby chair.

  “Dead body. That’s what,” Harris continued. “White female, early forties. Found in her home this morning. My shift ends in an hour, but I’ll wait for you here.”

  Dobson rubbed his eyes and squeezed the bridge of his nose. “What happened?”

  There was a slight pause on the other end before Harris answered. “From the looks of it, we have a homicide.”

  Dressed in only boxers, he scanned his tossed clutter of clothes scattered near the bed, looking for some pants. “I’m getting ready now. What’s the address?”

  “Nine thirteen Saxon Boulevard.”

  “Who’s there?” Dobson asked.

  “Just me and a few police,” Harris said. “Grab some coffee, and get over here as soon as you can.”

  Dobson stepped out of bed and stretched. “I’m moving…”

  “Oh, and Mike…”

  “Yeah?”

  “Fair warning. You might want to bring a strong stomach.”

  Harris hung up, leaving what awaited him up to Dobson’s imagination. It’d been a month since the department’s last homicide case. Any stretch of time without another case was a blessing. Now a woman had apparently been murdered in her home, not particularly far from where Dobson himself lived. The thought was chilling. Dobson placed his cell phone onto the nightstand and pulled a T-shirt over his head.

  He walked toward the bathroom, head hanging low, and flipped on the light switch. His tired face stared back at him in the mirror. The dark stubble on his cheeks indicated that he needed a good shave. No chance of skipping that. His light blue eyes were devoid of passion, and his short, dark hair was quickly accumulating gray on the sides. He’d be forty-five in a month. How fast the time had gone. Weighing just under two hundred pounds, he wasn’t in the best shape of his life. But he also didn’t know if it even mattered. He and Rachel were barely intimate anymore.

  “Enjoy it while you can,” the other detectives had said, referring to life after forty. “This is the best it’s going to get.”

  He ran warm water through his hands and onto his face, trying to wake up. There was a sense of fatigue running through him—always was, despite how much sleep he got. For the past few months, he had been in a funk at work and at home. Sometimes not even his own family could reach him. Things weren’t much better at work.

  His promotion to the rank of Level Three Police Detective just seemed to bring longer hours, with only a minuscule pay increase. And it never stopped. Some days he didn’t even know where to start. His growing detachment seemed unstoppable.

  He dried his face with a towel mockingly embroidered with his and Rachel’s initials and set about his journey back to the bedroom, wondering what to wear to work. Their bedroom was a mess of his dirty clothes strewn across the carpeted floor. His white, long-sleeved dress shirt sat crumpled on the floor with his black slacks and dress socks.

  Rachel had stopped doing his laundry some time ago. She seemed to be making a point, not about the laundry, but about their marriage. She was taking a stand, thinly veiled as it was. He hoped he had a clean suit to wear. It was only Wednesday, and the weekend had never felt so far away.

  He turned on a light and walked past the dresser where his wallet and badge rested next to his holstered Smith & Wesson 9mm pistol. He stopped at the closet and looked inside. A clean, long-sleeved, button-down shirt hung next to a coat and dress pants amid some of his wife’s dresses. Dobson took the hangers holding his shirt and pants and placed them on the unmade bed. The grumbling in his stomach increased by the minute. He was starving.

  Dobson left his room and walked down the carpeted hallway, passing his daughter’s closed door where he could hear both the television and the humming of her breathing machine. As a cystic fibrosis patient, her morning routine took over an hour each day, sometimes longer. Born with the disease, Penny knew little beyond the daily struggle of medicinal regimes, breathing exercises, nasal clearings, and several other time-consuming and expensive treatments just to make it through the day.

  She was their only child, and after Dobson and his wife learned that they were both carriers of the gene which caused cystic fibrosis, they had made the hard decision not to have any more children. They had been told that they had a one-in-four chance of passing down the gene again, in addition to the sobering realization that their daughter may not live past forty years old.

  Dobson entered the kitchen where Rachel stood at the stove with her back toward him, placing pancakes onto a plate with a spatula. She looked pretty in her red flannel, sleeves rolled up, and blonde hair tied in a ponytail. Like Dobson, Rachel had gained some weight over the years, but she still had a nice figure, evident in the same pair of blue jeans that she always liked to wear.

  Sunlight beamed in from the kitchen windows near the sink, and there was a slight haze in the air from the cooking. Dobson stood in the walkway and watched her for a moment, amused that she had no awa
reness of his presence.

  “Good morning,” he said.

  Rachel jumped and turned around, her freckled face surprised and annoyed. “Don’t scare me like that,” she said, clutching her chest.

  “Sorry, I couldn’t resist,” he said, smiling as he walked into the kitchen and grabbed a glass from the cupboard.

  “Your orange juice is on the table already. See?” she said, pointing.

  Dobson placed the glass back into the cupboard and went to the table, ready to dig in.

  “What’s the occasion?” he asked, sitting down.

  “I just felt like making breakfast,” Rachel said, turning from the stove and stopping him. “Now, go get Penny first and make sure that she’s all right.”

  Dobson glanced at the counter and saw a multitude of vitamins, antibiotics, and other multi-colored bottles filling the space. He had lost track of how many pills Penny had to take each morning. “Can’t stay for long. I have to leave soon.”

  “What happened?” Rachel asked, putting some bacon strips onto each plate.

  “There was a woman found dead in her home this morning,” he answered, taking a sip of orange juice. “A few blocks over, actually.”

  “Wow,” Rachel said, distracted with the plates in her hands.

  “Jack says she was murdered,” Dobson continued.

  “Well…” she began as she set the plates onto the table. “I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”

  Rachel rarely asked him about work anymore. Years before, she used to ask him about every detail, despite his reluctance to discuss ongoing cases. Nonetheless, she was fascinated by his work. Lately, however, nothing seemed to phase her after twenty-three years of marriage.

  Dobson left the table and walked down the hallway toward Penny’s room. The sound of her machine was still going, a low, steady hum.

  “Hey, Penny,” he said, knocking on her door. “You up? Breakfast is ready.” He listened for a moment. He knocked again to hear her shout, “Come in,” and then opened the door.

  Penny sat on the floor against her bed with her back slightly to him, watching TV. She wore a vibrating purple vest hooked up to a machine as she breathed vapor through a plastic ventilator—her morning routine.

  “Morning, Dad,” she said, with the tube still in her mouth.

  “Morning, honey,” he said, taking over the machine. “Your mom has breakfast out when you’re ready.”

  “Okay,” she said, her voice shaking from the vibrating vest. “I should be just another ten minutes.”

  “No problem,” Dobson said. “I’ve got to head to work soon.”

  She nodded and turned back to the television.

  Dobson waved and closed her door, hoping that they’d have some time to eat together, though he had his doubts. The longer it took for him to get there, the more people there would be at the crime scene.

  “She’ll be out in a few minutes,” Dobson said, taking a seat at the table, a fresh plate of pancakes on a plate below him.

  Rachel sat across from him and sipped from her coffee mug. “Did you see if she needed help?”

  “She said she was fine,” Dobson said, talking a bite.

  Rachel looked up and noticed. “How are they?”

  Dobson swallowed, then gulped down half of his orange juice. “Great. Thank you.” He shoveled the rest in and looked at his watch. “I’ve got to get going,” he said, wiping his face.

  “I don’t think it would hurt to wait for Penny,” she said. “We barely see you.”

  “I know, and I’m sorry,” he said, getting up. “Thanks again, babe.”

  He gave her a quick kiss on the forehead and brought his plate to the sink, feeling her stare along the way.

  “I was thinking,” he began as he turned on the faucet. “Maybe we can all go out this weekend for a nice dinner and some mini-golf.”

  “Penny has physical therapy Saturday and Sunday,” she said.

  He shut off the faucet and turned around. Rachel’s eyes were back on her paper. She looked up slightly, noticing his curious glance in her direction. She tried to smile and the tension that Dobson knew to exist between them appeared again, seemingly out of nowhere.

  “We’ll try to plan something,” she said, sounding more agreeable to the idea. “I’ll talk to Penny and see what she’d like to do.”

  “Sounds good,” Dobson said with a forced smile of his own. “Gotta jump in the shower.”

  He walked past her and out of the kitchen, toward their bedroom. Once inside, he pulled his T-shirt off and walked into the bathroom. He turned on the shower faucet and jumped inside just as the water began to warm. He thought of what Harris had told him—the warning he gave about bringing a strong stomach. They’d seen many murders together. How bad could this one possibly be?

  Dobson drove straight to the crime scene in his gray four-door Chevy Impala. He’d check in at the station later. The Summerville Police Department covered several incorporated and unincorporated jurisdictions outside of Charleston, South Carolina. Dobson had lived in the town of Leesburg for almost twenty-five years.

  He had moved from Dearborn, Michigan right after high school to join the Summerville Police Department in search of a fresh start in a safer, quieter town. It was where he met Rachel, a former human resources administrator with the same department. They met at a company picnic. She had grown up in Leesburg with a small-town charm that had instantly attracted him to her.

  Counting the years until retirement, Dobson wondered if they’d ever live anywhere else given Penny’s condition. He’d always wanted to find a place in the mountains of Tennessee and get away from it all. Someday, he was sure that they would.

  The hand-held radio resting near his waist buzzed with police chatter. The woman’s name was Betsy Wade. Her name sounded familiar. He recalled hearing it around the station. She had made several complaints over the years, everything from faulty smoke alarms in her house to noisy neighbors.

  Her house was a quick drive from Dobson’s neighborhood. Paved roads and old-fashioned colorful houses lined the road. It was late January, and most of the tree branches were barren of their leaves and skeletal looking. He continued down the road as a faint glimmer of sunlight showed from behind the gray morning clouds. He’d never investigated a homicide so close to home.

  According to the police radio, there were few details about the crime scene beyond what Harris had told him. With every moment crucial, Dobson prioritized in his mind what needed to happen to bring them closer to finding a suspect.

  The house would need to be thoroughly searched for points of entry, footprints, and fingerprints. He would order the police to cordon the property and keep a controlled environment. They would need to question every resident on the victim’s street, gather alibis, and make determinations; investigate the victim’s background, family, and relationships.

  Someone had killed Betsy Wade for a reason. The circumstances could involve everything from a robbery to sexual assault. The murder could have been premeditated as well. Somewhere, someone had something to gain from her death. Was she married? If not, was she dating? Did she have a stalker? Did she have enemies? There was no doubt that she had a contentious relationship with her neighbors, but was that enough to get her killed?

  Dobson pondered these questions as he turned onto Saxon Boulevard, a quiet two-lane residential street where he could see two police cars at the very end of the road, parked in the driveway of a small home.

  He picked up the radio, announcing his pending arrival.

  “This is Dobson. I’m right down the street.”

  “That’s a copy, Mike. We’ll be waiting.”

  As he drove past quaint homes on both sides, Dobson saw residents peering out their windows and some walking to the edges of their driveways, observing the police cars in the distance. He caught a quick glimpse of some of their faces, making note of the expressions.

  Did any of them look worried? Regretful perhaps? Or maybe he would see a look of satisfa
ction. He sped down the road, weaving past two empty garbage cans just past the edge of someone’s driveway, one blown over from the wind.

  He slowed as the victim’s mailbox came into view, with the numbers five thirteen listed on the side. The blue, one-story ranch house looked like the ideal residence for a single occupant. He could see Harris’s beat-up Ford Taurus parked directly in the grass of her small lawn. Garden gnomes lined the front of her house in the mulch just below the windows, separated from the grass by garden stones. Her front door was open, though the blinds on both side windows were drawn.

  Dobson pulled into the sliver of room left at the end of the driveway and parked behind the two police cars. He felt relieved to have arrived before the crime scene turned hectic, which he believed it soon would. He knew it was important to take charge as soon as he could, but there was also a possible downside to that.

  He glanced into the rearview mirror and ran a hand along his smooth cheeks. He then adjusted his tie and grabbed his coat, stepping out of the car with his ID hanging around his neck from a lanyard and his pistol holstered to his belt on the right side. With half of his car sticking out into the road, he walked up the driveway, past the police cars, and up the cement path leading to the front door toward a gruesome crime scene that awaited him in the confines of Betsy Wade’s home.

  Neighborhood Shock

  The house looked virtually untouched with no signs of forced entry. The windows were closed and the doors locked, all but the front. In the living room sat a television and computer station. To the left of the room was a dining area with a china cabinet and the kitchen just past it. A slew of junk mail lay across a small table along with cluttered papers and books. Her house had the look of a long-occupied dwelling.

  Betsy Ward had done her best to remain secluded from the outside world, but ironically, someone from that world had lashed out at her in the end. Dobson observed the living room, surprised that a body was not in sight. He stopped in the kitchen where three uniformed police officers stood, one of them rattled and pacing back-and-forth across the vinyl floor.