Expire
Page 5
As he looked up at the stained glass Jesus looming beyond the pulpit, the dark shadow of his father encircled him, and it was all he could do to make his way down the aisle for the chains constricting his chest.
8
Monday, 10:20 a.m. PST
Hal was on his way back to the office after interviewing a potential witness on a case when he received a relayed call through Dispatch. Dallas FBI had picked up Spencer MacDonald in the airport there on his way into town. They were holding him for questioning. With Hailey’s help, Hal had convinced Captain Marshall that someone from San Francisco PD should be involved in the search for Anna. She was their ME, after all. Marshall got special dispensation from the bureau to include one of SFPD’s inspectors on the case, and Marshall agreed that Hal could go for a few days. Hal never had to mention that he was going with or without permission. Having the blessing of his captain and the bureau was certainly preferable.
Twenty minutes later, Hal was at home, throwing clothes in a bag. Fifteen minutes after that, he’d booked a flight. A local agent would meet him at the airport. En route, he made arrangements for Anna’s neighbor to watch Buster and asked one of his friends who lived down the hall from his apartment to check in on his cat, Wiley. Hailey and O’Shea would cover for him at work.
After four cups of coffee, Hal made his way through the sea of faces toward security, groggy and out of sorts. The phone in his pocket beeped, a nudge from the hourly alarm he’d set to remind himself that another sixty minutes had passed since Anna had been taken.
This would be hour forty-seven. Forty-seven hours since that van had backed into the driveway and struck down an eighty-five-year-old woman. Forty-seven hours since Anna had come to Mrs. Goldstein’s assistance and been abducted.
He placed his shoes and belt in a bin with his wallet and phone and watched it float down the conveyer belt.
A hand touched him from behind. He wheeled around to find a woman in a skirt suit and stockinged feet. “You’re up.” She motioned him toward the X-ray machine. He stepped through, and the machine bleated.
“Are your pockets empty, sir?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I put it all . . .” But then he felt the hard lump in his front pocket. He removed Anna’s keys from his pocket and stared down at them. He’d been carrying the keys since finding them on the entryway table. In his downtime, he worried them between his fingers, like rosary beads. He’d driven her car a half dozen times before without noticing the small silver heart on her keychain, a Tiffany thing. He wondered where it had come from. Not the sort of thing she would buy herself.
“Sir,” the TSA agent said again, pointing back through the machine. “You have to go back through.”
The woman in the business suit pushed past him with an exasperated sigh as he returned and dropped the keys in a dish. He walked through the machine in silence and retrieved his things, returning Anna’s keys to his pocket before putting on his belt and shoes. He felt a strange vacancy at his waist where his gun should have been. He was not allowed to take the department-issued weapon. Or any weapon. As he made his way toward the gates, his phone rang in his pocket. His pulse batted against his chest and ricocheted in his neck. The phone trembled in his hand.
Every time it rang, it was her voice calling to him. He no longer checked the screen. Her phone was with Roger, being searched for evidence. No one was calling from her number. “Harris.”
“Hal, it’s Harper.”
Harper Leighton. Hal hadn’t spoken to the Charleston detective since MacDonald had been released from prison more than a year and a half earlier. He choked on the inhale, unable to speak for the cork in his throat. The Southern accent was more pronounced in Harper’s voice than in Anna’s. He stopped in the walkway.
“Hal?” Harper said, drawing his attention back.
“I’m here.”
“I heard about Anna.”
“MacDonald’s in Dallas,” Hal said. “I’m heading there now.”
“There was someone here, watching MacDonald, right?” Harper asked.
Hal thought about Colton Price and his inane excuses. “Yeah,” he said.
“So how—”
How did he get Anna? And where did he take her? “I don’t know.”
“Hal,” Harper said in a hush that felt like a blow to his gut. “What can I do?”
“I don’t know.”
She started to speak again, but he interrupted. “I’ve got to go now, Harper. I’ll keep you posted.”
“It’s going to be okay.”
He ended the call without responding. Would it be okay? How? Could he survive if something happened to Anna? He refused to consider it.
What he knew was that Anna wouldn’t survive losing that baby.
He waded through the sea of people. Business travelers wheeled their luggage past him, trailing clouds of perfume and aftershave, followed by families with small children. He saw Anna’s face everywhere—in the woman who stood bouncing a mewling newborn, in the dark-haired gate agent calling for the premium cabin to board, in the woman riding by on the white cart, her leg in a cast. He watched the white cart until it was out of sight.
The white van. There had to be something memorable about it, but Eileen Goldstein couldn’t recall.
Hal knew that Spencer MacDonald was behind this. He couldn’t wait to look him in the eyes, the bastard. All this time, Hal had never stood face-to-face with the monster who had tortured Anna. He should have done it years ago. Should have made the trip to Greenville when MacDonald had gotten out of prison. Or when Anna had gone home to deal with her aunt’s murder.
Hal would face him now, that son of a bitch.
Anna had been so afraid of him. Hal recalled how she’d pushed him to teach her how to fire a weapon. They’d gone to the range together a few times, and he’d been relieved when her interest had dropped off. He wished now that he’d pressed her to take self-defense classes. How had someone gotten her into the back of that van? How hard had she fought? Had she almost gotten away?
If only he’d been there . . . The thought was a continuous loop in his brain.
Hal studied the monitor and confirmed his gate assignment. Twenty minutes until he boarded. In four hours, he’d be landing in Dallas. In five, he would be interviewing MacDonald. Hal would get the truth out of him. He might be the only one who could. MacDonald wanted Anna, and Hal knew her intimately. He would use everything he had to crack MacDonald.
Did MacDonald know that she and Hal had been intimate? That they were a couple? Had he been watching them?
They hadn’t told anyone. It had seemed premature.
Roger knew. Roger, who had come straight to Anna’s house after Hal called, who had gotten in touch with the Crime Scene Unit to process Anna’s house. Roger had been the one to find the positive pregnancy tests. His team had spent as long in Anna’s house as they did any active crime scenes. Hal had no doubt that Roger would give this case everything he had.
But there was nothing in Anna’s house to suggest what had happened to her.
Hal had known there wouldn’t be.
Anna had been entered into NamUs, the US Department of Justice’s National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, within two hours of the discovery that she had been abducted. The department had also put out a BOLO—a Be on the Lookout alert—and issued an EMA, an Endangered Missing Advisory. They’d used the photograph from her work badge on the flyer, and her expression was neutral, professional. No sign of the smile he loved. And why would there be?
Even with all the people participating, he still felt Anna slipping away from him. He took the keys from his pocket and worried them in his fingers. The gate agent called his group on the intercom. He straightened his shoulders and joined the line, feeling the seconds sliding by one by one. Patience, he reminded himself.
He’d get MacDonald. Find Anna and bring her home. Or he would die trying.
The plane had been stuck on the tarmac for an extra twenty minutes, and
Hal had spent the three-hour flight from SFO to Dallas in a middle seat between two women who’d shared life stories across his lap and a passenger in front of him who repeatedly had tried to recline his seat, banging painfully into Hal’s knees.
Hal arrived in Dallas ready to blow. He’d kept his phone on during the flight, taking surreptitious glances at the screen despite the lack of a signal. As the plane descended, he’d found himself praying for news.
But the only message on his phone was from the FBI agent meeting him at the curb. Telly Azar was his name. The only thing worse than his name was the fact that Telly was twelve years old. Or he looked it in his picture on the bureau’s website.
As Hal got into the unmarked Chevy Impala, he hoped the kid was just the ride to the department. But this was his agent, the one who was supposed to help him break Spencer MacDonald.
“Telly Azar,” the agent said, offering Hal a small hand with a surprisingly firm handshake.
Telly. Anna’s life might depend on a guy named Telly. No fucking way.
The agent tried to make small talk on the way to the bureau, but Hal remained silent, buying his time until he could let loose on whoever had assigned Anna’s case to a child. The agent seemed to pick up on Hal’s cues, and they spent the majority of the ride in silence.
When they arrived at the bureau’s Dallas office, Hal excused himself and called San Francisco’s supervisory senior resident agent, a man he’d gotten to know in a few shared cases over the years.
“You’re putting Anna’s fate in the hands of a sixth grader?” Hal growled.
“He’s the best in his class.”
“Best in his class?” Hal repeated. “What? Last year’s class?”
The SSRA didn’t respond.
“This is Anna,” Hal whispered, his voice breaking. “Dr. Schwartzman,” he corrected, clearing his throat.
“He’s your contact, Hal. He’s got the full support of the bureau behind him. Don’t underestimate him because he’s young. You were young once.”
And an idiot, he thought. Hal blew out his breath. “What’s with the name Telly?”
“You should ask him.”
Hal fell silent. He wasn’t going to make small talk with that kid. They weren’t going to be friends. The kid could go to the playground with someone else. “Forget it.”
“His full name is Telluride.”
“Telluride,” Hal repeated.
“Like the ski resort in Colorado.”
“Christ. There has to be someone—”
“Listen, Hal, give him a chance. I’m told he’s very good.”
Hal ended the call and pressed his face against the cold tile wall. Named after a fucking ski resort. Jesus H. Christ.
When he emerged from the restroom, Telly Azar had them set up in a conference room. “There’s coffee there if you want it,” Telly said. “MacDonald is here for our interview when you’re ready.”
Hal ignored the coffee and remained standing. “I’m ready. I know exactly how I’m going to handle him.”
Telly’s finger hovered over a button on the phone. He pulled it away slowly, shaking his head. “I can’t let you do that.”
“Do what?”
“I appreciate how hard this is for you,” the agent said.
Hal stared at Telly, a kid with his unlined face and his sharply pressed suit. “You do? You appreciate it?”
“We’re on the same side,” Telly said softly.
“I know this guy. I know how he works.”
“And that will be helpful. Later.”
“Later.” Hal shoved his hands deep into his pockets so he didn’t wrap them around the agent’s neck.
“We have to do this by the book. That means I conduct the interview.”
Hal drew a deep, slow breath, battling to keep his voice even, calm. “He wants Anna, and I know her. I can use that to—”
“No, that’s not how I’m running this. Emotions make things go sideways. I don’t want this going sideways. Do I need to do the interview alone?”
“No,” Hal said quickly, feeling a rush of heat. He would not miss the opportunity to see MacDonald in person. Even if it meant taking a backseat in the interview.
Telly watched him. The two men didn’t know each other. The agent had no reason to believe him.
“I need to be in on this,” Hal said. He had to hold himself still, to fight against the desire to beg. “Please.”
Something in Hal’s expression—desperation maybe—must have convinced Telly to agree. The agent nodded, and Hal released the breath from his lungs, the air hot and dry as it passed his lips. He’d given up control of the interview. You had no choice. But what if MacDonald played the agent? He played everyone else.
The thought of sitting by while MacDonald evaded the questions . . .
“You ready?” Telly asked.
“Absolutely,” Hal lied.
However it went down in there, Hal was coming out with some damn answers.
9
Monday, 12:27 p.m. MST
The panic that came from searching the cabin drained Schwartzman, forcing her to retreat to the bedroom. It was a few hours before she rose and willed herself to return to the hunt. Don’t think. Just take it all in. Something would come to her. Some idea. It had to.
Back in the kitchen, she studied the ancient appliances. The small refrigerator reminded her of Hal, the way he had to stoop to get into her refrigerator, the image of him leaning down to reach a bottle of Guinness from the lowest shelf.
Where was Hal now? She wrapped her arms around herself. Had he gone to her house? Had he seen the pregnancy tests she’d left in the bathroom, the ones she’d never looked at?
Again she had to force the thoughts away. The panic came so quickly, like a tap just below the surface. She drew a slow breath. “Don’t waste your energy.” The sound of her voice was soothing. Longing wasn’t going to solve her problem. Nor were thoughts of Hal.
Survive and escape.
Hunger made her belly ache. She opened the refrigerator and found milk and juice, some fruit, and lunch meats. Food. Schwartzman almost buckled in relief, remembering the heavy padlocks on the refrigerator and cupboards in Zhanna Doe’s kitchen, her weakened and emaciated frame.
Zhanna’s captor had locked away the food, leaving her collared and hungry, like a dog.
Using Zhanna’s nails and hair as a measure of her malnutrition, combined with bone density, Schwartzman had estimated that she’d likely been starved for most of her captivity. She’d found evidence of extensive sexual abuse, and it appeared that she’d suffered at least one abortion—likely performed in the apartment. In the end, Zhanna had looped the cord around the bedroom doorframe and hung herself.
Dying had become the easier option.
You will not die here, Schwartzman told herself, turning her attention back to the room.
She opened the refrigerator again and pulled out the carton of milk. It was good protein and would fill her belly. She checked the carton. It had not been opened. Turning it upside down, she confirmed it was still sealed. She squeezed gently. A drop slid down the side of the carton and hit the floor, then another. She traced the drops to the underside of the fold at the top of the carton. Turning it sideways and viewing it under the light, she saw the puncture mark.
The right size for a needle.
The milk was drugged. She grabbed the orange juice and turned it upside down, squeezing harder now as the frustration built. A slow drip came from a puncture mark in the same place. Drugged. She noticed the small puddle of water beneath the liter bottle of water on the bottom shelf. Drugged.
She stared at the kitchen sink. Surely if they’d taken the time to drug the liquids in the refrigerator, then they’d drugged the tap water, too. Dragging the cord along the track, she crossed the kitchen to the sink. On her tiptoes, she studied the scene out of the fogged window. Behind the glass, a set of heavy wrought-iron bars, like a prison, lay stark against the whiteness beyond.
Snow.
Everything outside was buried in snow. She tried to imagine where they might be but couldn’t. North was all that came to mind. Maybe somewhere in the Sierra Mountains; maybe out of California entirely. How long had they traveled?
Shivering involuntarily, Schwartzman pressed her fingertips against the cloudy windowpane above the kitchen sink, surprised to find the surface wasn’t cold. She studied the ground again. That was definitely snow on the ground. She wiped the surface of the window, expecting to clear the fog on the glass, but the window looked the same. Checking the slack in the cord above her head, she climbed up onto the countertop and pressed the whole of her hand to the window.
Like the mirror and the water cup, the window was made of a thick plastic.
Unbreakable.
Even if she could pull the window out and get past the bars, she would freeze to death. She had no shoes, no coat.
The dull buzz of a baseboard heater kicked on in the other room, and she jumped. Drawing a breath, she tried to calm herself. Work. Think. Focus. One thing at a time.
Using a chair from the table, she climbed up to the sink to get a look outside. On the counter, she balanced one knee on either side of the metal sink. Her face pressed against the thick plastic as she studied the frozen ground outside. How was the water drugged? Fighting the stubborn casement, she slid the window open and leaned out until her cheek was pressed to the cold iron bars. From there, she spotted a small plastic bottle similar to the ones that hung from the side of a rodent’s cage. The bottle hung from a fence stake. A thin plastic tube ran from it and wrapped around a curved pipe that led toward the house.
Shivering, she closed the window against the frigid air and climbed back down off the chair. Pulling the cord slack, she lowered herself again. One hand on the cord, she opened the cupboard beneath the sink to study the pipe that rose from the subflooring.