Expire

by Danielle Girard

  The little girl—Madison—whispered again, and Valerie set her down. “Go on,” she said. “I’ll be there in a minute.” Madison ran toward the back of the house, and Valerie took hold of the dog’s collar. Her gaze remained on her child, and when she looked back, her expression had softened. “I’ve got to go help her.”

  “Of course,” Georgia said, straightening her back. “Thank you. I appreciate your time.”

  Valerie reached out her hand and touched Georgia’s arm. “I hope you find your daughter.”

  Georgia blinked hard and nodded. “Thank you.” She turned toward the street and heard the door click closed behind her, the words echoing in her head. I hope you find your daughter.

  Was Bella really missing? That was what the police had told her, and now Georgia believed it. The only question that remained was Spencer.

  Jennifer Fontaine had seen something in his office that she could never unsee. She had left Spencer’s employment that same day. Whatever she saw wasn’t illegal, her daughter had said.

  But somehow that knowledge did nothing to reassure Georgia Schwartzman. To the contrary, it left her with more questions than ever.

  29

  Thursday, 11:47 a.m. MST

  For Schwartzman, the goal of every waking hour was threefold. One, collect any new snow and melt it. Two, find a way to cut off the collar. Three, distract herself from the lack of food and water. With the last of the untainted water in a glass on the table, she turned her attention to the continued hunt for a cutting tool. She trolled through memories of her own cases, searching for ones in which a strange implement had been used. There would be no knives, no scissors in the cabin. She would have to invent something.

  In one such case, a woman had killed her husband with the rack from an industrial oven. After months of fighting over the rising costs of the product for their small business, she’d heaved the fifteen-pound rack and swung it into the back of his head.

  Pulling out as much cord as she could, Schwartzman tucked the slack under her arm. In the event that the cord started to retract again, at least she’d have a little notice. Then, on her knees, she opened the narrow oven, pulled the flimsy rack free, and checked for sharp edges. There were none. Setting the rack aside, she leaned into the oven, tugging on plates and levers, trying to free something she might use as a tool. Her fingers measured the thickness of the rubber collar. With the rack free, she yanked out the slim drawer at the base of the oven and searched its edges for one sharp enough to saw through rubber. Examining the underside of the oven yielded her nothing.

  The refrigerator and freezer were the same. This was her third—or maybe her fourth—round of searching, and she’d found nothing rough-edged enough to act as a cutting tool. A useless waste of time, all of it. She sank into a chair and slowly released the extra slack in the cord, relieving the burn on the skin of her arm where it had been rubbing. On the table was the last of the snow water. She stared down at the liquid, guessed it was maybe 350 milliliters’ worth.

  She thought of the shooting victim she’d autopsied on the Friday before her abduction. There had been two bullet wounds. One had perforated the right fourth intercostal space and the middle and upper lobes of the right lung, leaving a hemorrhagic, pulpy wound track. She’d measured the liquid and clotted blood in the right pleural cavity. Fifteen hundred milliliters, about fifty ounces. She had a quarter of that now.

  She drank the water slowly, letting it wash across her tongue and chill her teeth before swallowing it. She made the liquid last for five sips. Outside, snow was beginning to fall again, lightly. She closed her eyes, unsure what to do next.

  As she rose from the table, a square of light appeared on the kitchen wall. She grabbed the table and stared at it, blinking to clear her vision, but it wasn’t a hallucination. She took a step toward the wall as a fuzzy image covered the space.

  Blinking, she thought at first it was a trick of her eyes. But it was still there—some sort of projection.

  She stood three feet from the wall, her own shadow blocking the bottom of the image, and waited. A video began to play. A street. Cars passing. She looked around the room, searching for the source. A pinhole in the ceiling. A projector. Turning back to the projection, she clasped on to the cord from her collar. The camera panned the street in a jerky, mechanical movement, the world smeared across the lens.

  And then it stopped. The film showed a wide view of the street, pedestrians walking. Holding her breath, she searched for something familiar.

  The buildings were none she’d seen before, so they were not in San Francisco, not in Seattle, not in Charleston or Greenville. The scene zoomed in, and there was Hal. A strangled noise escaped her throat as he came into focus. She took note of Hal’s light button-down and blazer. Khaki slacks, the casual suede oxfords he wore when they weren’t working. A size thirteen—his clown feet, she would tease him. She blinked and swiped the tears from her face, not wanting to miss a moment of him.

  The building behind him was a slate monolith. He carried a windbreaker in one hand but no jacket. January. No signs of snow. That eliminated the Northeast and the Midwest. The women on the street were fashionably dressed, slacks or dresses and light coats. Expensive handbags. A business city.

  Nowhere near here, she thought.

  Fear corked her throat.

  He’s looking for you.

  Hal stared down at his phone, a frown on his face.

  Only then did she notice the man who stood beside him. Small compared to Hal, he was probably five seven or eight and in his midtwenties. His features were Middle Eastern, and his navy suit made her think he was government. He talked to Hal as though to convince him of something. What were they talking about?

  Hal’s eyes lifted, and for a moment, it was as though he were looking directly at her. Those eyes. Her heart danced in her chest.

  But then the eyes narrowed. The brow sank, and his mouth set in an angry line. He started into the street without looking.

  She cried out at the car that drove straight toward him.

  It halted only feet from Hal, who smacked the hood of the car as the driver waved through the windshield. Hal ignored him, his eyes still glued on her. Not her. The camera. Who was there?

  It had to be Spencer.

  The driver cracked his door and stood from the car, waving his arms in big, angry gestures and yelling. The phone in his hand was aimed at Hal.

  Hal didn’t look back.

  The smaller man in the suit produced a badge and pointed it at the driver, waving him back into his car.

  She froze, memorizing every detail, taking it all in. What did it mean? What was Spencer trying to tell her?

  Hal continued in his path, straight toward her. She leaned forward in the chair as he grew close, her pulse thumping wildly in her throat. He was only feet away. She could smell the hint of clove and sandalwood in his cologne, feel the smoothness of the skin on the back of his neck, the rough texture of his unshaven beard.

  He reached out, and she let out a gasp.

  The film ended, Hal’s face remained in the center of the screen. A sob broke free, and Schwartzman lunged forward, reaching for his image. Her fingers couldn’t reach the wall. She stretched as far as she could. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay,” she said aloud.

  She clung to the relief she’d felt at seeing his face. Whatever doubts she’d had about her abduction vanished. This was Spencer’s work. Even if it was Roy Butler who held her here, Spencer was behind it. The projection was his doing.

  This was Spencer’s master plan. And there was Hal. Which meant when Spencer came for her, Hal would be there. He would come for her.

  All she had to do was figure out how to avoid the drugs, stay sharp and focused.

  And wait.

  That was exactly what she would do.

  She made a last stretch to touch the image of Hal’s face. Her fingers grazed the wall when a reeling sound whirred from above. The cord yanked her back, and she let out
a choking cough, gripping her neck.

  The collar around her neck tightened, the cord shortening as it dragged her upward. She struggled to get hold of the cord and keep her feet on the floor. Scrambled for a chair and felt it slip out from under her feet.

  Then she was off the ground. Hal’s image stayed frozen on the wall. Black took over the corners of her vision. Her fingers gripped the cord, trying to pull it down, to create some slack. Her pulse throbbed in her eyes.

  Her chest felt ready to explode.

  From somewhere close by came the sound of a man’s laugh.

  She focused on Hal’s face, tried to memorize his eyes, until everything went black.

  30

  Thursday, 6:07 p.m. PST

  Hal pulled up to the police department behind the patrol car that carried Billy Vandt. A twitchy homeless man who had been to the station more than a few times, Vandt was a victim of his own addiction. Unlike many of the homeless, he was not mentally ill, but the combination of an abusive father and bad luck had put Billy on the streets when he was only eleven. Aside from a few mostly harmless run-ins with the police, Vandt had remained out of trouble for the past three decades.

  When he wasn’t high or drunk, Billy had a keen eye and kept watch over his friends. Under different life circumstances, Vandt would have made a good cop. He was a reliable source of information when he wanted to be, and Hal suspected Billy knew more about the latest shooting than he was saying. Hal also suspected that a cup of coffee and the promise of a warm meal and a little cash would get him to disclose what he knew.

  As he parked the car, Hal’s stomach growled. He hadn’t eaten all day. Locking the car, he headed across to the burrito place to pick up a couple of burritos and a Coke for himself and Vandt before their interview. Vandt needed a little time to sober up, and the patrol officers were going to try to get some coffee in him. Hal would give it a half hour or so before he headed upstairs.

  He had managed to keep his head on the case for most of the day. Anna never far from his thoughts, he’d channeled his focus on solving this case so that he could get back to finding her. To that end, he had spoken to no fewer than twenty-five of the homeless population who lived on and around Union Square. Most of them had still been in their makeshift cardboard beds when he’d arrived, but a few had already moved. He’d traveled to three different areas of the city, all of which had become makeshift tent communities, before he’d tracked them all down. Normally, the inefficiency would have frustrated him. Right now he was just grateful for the motion.

  Telly had yet to return his phone calls from the day before, but Hal had spoken to Harper briefly, and she was working to find some reliable PI help in Greenville to help him dig into Spencer MacDonald’s friends and associates.

  Hal ordered four burritos—two for Vandt, one for himself, and one extra before heading back to the station. Hailey was getting her daughters dinner and planned to meet him at the station. He was about to call her when a text from Telly filled the screen. Denver freezing. Confirmed SM using burners.

  Hal read the words again, untangling the two sentences. Telly had sent an update on the weather first, then the information on MacDonald? Somehow the FBI had confirmed that Spencer MacDonald was buying burner phones, so MacDonald was talking to someone. Hal felt sure MacDonald would be contacting whoever held Anna.

  The three dots ran across Hal’s screen. Hal stopped on the sidewalk, eyes fixed on the dots. The breath he was holding burned in his lungs. Had the FBI been able to retrieve one of the phones? If MacDonald discarded it somewhere, they could take it. They couldn’t remove it from him—not without a warrant, at least not legally, although Hal would have happily taken MacDonald’s phone in the Dallas restaurant if he’d discovered an extra one during their encounter.

  But if MacDonald threw one away . . .

  The dots vanished. No message appeared. Hal resisted the urge to shake the phone as though it were a stuck vending machine. Nothing. Hal released the air from his lungs. “Come on, Telly.”

  The dots returned, cycled for several seconds, and disappeared again.

  “Screw it,” Hal whispered, dialing the agent.

  “Azar,” Telly answered.

  “It’s Hal.”

  “Yeah. I was just texting you.”

  “You were taking your time with it,” Hal snapped. “Did you get his burner?”

  “No,” Telly said. “One of the Denver field agents followed MacDonald into a convenience store. MacDonald purchased a burner phone there. Removed it from its package and tossed his trash in the parking lot.”

  “The agent checked the trash.”

  “The contents of the trash can were brought in to evidence, searched thoroughly.”

  Hal exhaled.

  “No phone,” Telly said. “But it’s—”

  “Don’t say it,” Hal said at the same moment Telly said, “Progress.”

  Hal was ready to hang up when Telly called his name. “There’s more,” the agent said.

  “What?”

  “We’re looking into the death of MacDonald’s mother, Peggy MacDonald. She died right after—”

  “Thanksgiving,” Hal interrupted. “From heart disease. I remember.”

  “That was the coroner’s findings, but we received a call from a friend of Mrs. MacDonald’s, a man who had seen her the morning before she died. Name is Bryce Scala. Scala was adamant that Mrs. MacDonald was not ill when he saw her.”

  Hal crossed his arms. Peggy MacDonald was in her midseventies, not exactly a spring chicken. Why would Telly pay the Scala guy any attention?

  “Scala was convincing enough that I sent a couple of local agents to Leisure Palms—that’s the nursing home. Found out Mrs. MacDonald was visited by a man the day of her death.”

  The outside air felt suddenly stuffy.

  “The man was older-looking,” Telly continued. “But one of the nurses commented that there was something about him. His hair didn’t look real, she said. And he seemed to be hiding his face behind the flowers he was holding.”

  Hal felt a pressure on the back of his neck, swiped at it uncomfortably. “What kind of flowers?”

  “Just a bouquet.”

  “What kind of bouquet, Telly? Do you know?”

  “Hang on,” Telly said. “I’m reading the notes.”

  Hal pressed the fingers of his free hand into the hollow above his eyes. Even if the bouquet was what he thought, it might still be a coincidence. What kind of man would kill his own mother?

  “The front desk staff and one of the nurses both described it as a big bouquet of mixed flowers—all yellow.”

  “Yellow,” Hal repeated.

  “Right,” Telly said. “I read about the bouquet Anna Schwartzman got from MacDonald.”

  “It doesn’t mean anything,” Hal said, but the words echoed empty in the quiet car.

  “We’re working to get a better description of the man,” Telly said. “We’re also running a search on the flight manifests in and out of every airport within two hundred miles of Greenville or Tampa, Florida.”

  “And?”

  “So far, no Spencer MacDonald.”

  Hal sat up in the car. If MacDonald planned to hold Anna, he would need a new identity. Did he have one? Had he used it on a trip to Florida? To kill his own mother? “He might have a new ID, too.”

  “Yes. We’re working on the possibility that he was using another name. I’ve got a team compiling footage from the airports.”

  “Send me a link to the footage,” Hal said. “I can help look.”

  “I’ve got eight people working it—dedicated tech people. And good facial recognition software. If he was on a plane, we’ll find him . . .”

  “Call me the minute you do.”

  “Promise.”

  “I’d like to talk to Bryce Scala,” Hal said. “If he’d be willing to talk to me.”

  “Sure,” Telly said. “I’ll find out.”

  Hal ended the call and made his way to the
station. As he crossed the street, a man handed him a flyer. Hal took it, too tired to argue. At the front of the station, he stopped to call Hailey. His eyes drifted to the flyer, which announced a meeting at a local church.

  IS CHRIST GUIDING YOUR LIFE? WON’T YOU LET HIM? WE CAN SHOW YOU HOW.

  The next words read, TONIGHT. JANUARY 18, 7:00 P.M.

  He dropped the flyer, watched as the page floated in the air toward the street. He couldn’t take his eyes off it. A man’s voice snapped at him. “Watch it.” The man veered around Hal to get into the building, but Hal didn’t even glance up. Instead, he turned and strode down the street, drawing a trembling breath through parted lips.

  January 18.

  Today was Anna’s birthday.

  31

  Thursday, 9:45 p.m. MST

  “Roy!” a woman’s voice hissed.

  Schwartzman squeezed her eyes closed against the drilling pain in her head. Fog pressed down on her. She struggled to break through its icy crust and emerge.

  “Shh,” a voice said. “Shh!” it came again, more emphatic. Moisture sprayed her face. He was close. She flinched, raising her hands to her face. Her eyes flew open.

  She gasped.

  The man above her jerked back, his hands bent at the wrists and tucked to his chest almost under his chin.

  Schwartzman didn’t move. Slowly, he edged close again.

  Behind thick, smudged glasses, his eyes were a bright blue. The eyes were small, the lids above folded heavily over them. Small lines circled beneath them as well. He turned to look sideways. A blue elastic band, the kind she often saw on small children, attached his glasses to his head.

  His mouth hung open, his tongue out over his bottom lip. He smelled of peanut butter. Bits of it had collected at the corners of his lips.

  “Roy!” came the woman’s voice. “Where you at?”

  He covered his mouth with a child-like hand and giggled softly before pressing his finger to his lips again. His nose was small and rounded, his face full.