Even In Darkness--An American Murder Mystery Thriller (14 page)

But I am full of hope. I am not alone anymore.

And however good the Dark Man is with computers, he will be up against the FBI. On the drive over, Buckman gave me an overview of their Cyber Crimes Program, including the well funded Innocent Images National Initiative (IINI), an international, intelligence-driven, multi-agency operation that goes after online child pornography and child sexual exploitation.

The closest Cyber Action Team (CAT) is already inside the house. FBI agents, analysts, computer forensic experts and malicious code experts who travel worldwide at the drop of an e-mail.

Our team leader is Salvatore Pacino, no relation to actor Al Pacino. ‘Brilliant, but irritable,' Buckman told me on the drive over.

We ring the bell, then go inside. A short man, robust and white-haired, is walking toward us from the bathroom off the hall and I can hear the rush of water that means the toilet has just been flushed.

‘Please close that front door up,' he says. His shoulders are slumped. He looks like he's had a long day already.

Buckman waves me in. ‘Sal, this is Joy Miller.'

I shake his hand. I hear noises in the kitchen, and see a man in shirtsleeves move in and out of the dining room.

Pacino takes my hand. His eyes are bright and alert under heavy eyebrows that ought to be trimmed. ‘This is a terrible thing, the young mother and the child. They have put up the good fight, good for them. We will get him, this bastard.'

I don't have the courage to admit that it was Leo who knocked over the chairs and mangled the carpet chasing after Ruby when I brought her in.

He points a thick finger at his watch. ‘I show you what we got here set up.'

I lied to Agent Harris. I didn't touch the laptop, I left it where it was. It has been unpacked and set up on the dining room table. It is an Apple MacBook, slim and black, the screen thirteen inches square. It is wedged between three open cases that hold interesting electronics.

Three men and one woman are moving from the kitchen to the dining room. The CAT team in action around the coffee pot. No one introduces me.

Buckman shakes her head and starts pointing. ‘Sal, we've got to modify this set up. We don't want the kidnapper catching sight of all this stuff.'

Pacino's eyelids droop, lizard-like. ‘You think I don't check the line of sight?'

‘I want Joy alone when she's on camera. I don't want any chance she'll look at one of us, if something comes up.'

‘For this you give me a whole ten minutes' notice?'

Buckman taps his cheek with a long acrylic nail. ‘That's why I asked for you, Sal. I wanted someone who can deal.'

One of the CATs, the youngest male, makes a funny noise. Pacino glances my way and his frown eases.

‘Do not be looking so worried. This will be OK.' He looks across at the noisemaker and raises an eyebrow. ‘Get the move on, Atkins. Where is Bose? All of you, get on it. Everything to go into the kitchen – you have three minutes.'

The team is quick, their fingertips moving over the equipment like a confident caress. I back up to get out of the way.

‘New stuff?' Buckman says. There is something edgy in her tone.

The word
stuff
makes Pacino wince. ‘Not so new we don't shake out the bugs already.'

A man in his thirties with comb tracks in his hair, Bose, I think, looks at me over the top of an open briefcase. ‘Just confirming. You have no e-mail from this guy?'

I have withheld the e-mail. I shake my head. ‘No.'

‘No metadata, then.'

I don't answer because I don't know what metadata is. Would the Dark Man know if I gave them metadata?

‘Too bad for that,' Bose says. ‘It brought down the BTK killer.'

Pacino snorts as he moves a case into the kitchen. ‘This one is too smart for that, Bose. He gives us the laptop right out of the box.'

Agent Buckman is in the living room talking loudly on her cell phone, making something very clear to someone. The CAT agents buzz back and forth between the dining room and kitchen, moving and adjusting the equipment.

‘Mrs Miller, if you please.' Pacino waves me to the dining room and points to a tiny square lens at the top of the computer screen. ‘This laptop, now, she has a camera. You see them,
they see you
. You got to—'

Agent Buckman has come up behind him and puts a heavy hand on his shoulder. ‘Get on with it, Sal. She's been briefed.'

‘Am I stepping on your toes that you need to show me the teeth?' Pacino waves a hand. ‘I am helping to catch this kidnapper. And, excuse me, please, but
what
is that scratching noise? It sound to me like mice in the ceiling.' He looks over at me. ‘You got mice in the ceiling? Big ones?'

‘It's the dogs. They want in.' I head for the kitchen door. Ruby is on the porch, head low, panting hard. Leo crowds her out of the doorway.

Buckman looks over my shoulder. ‘The older one. That's Ruby?'

I nod.

She leans across me to let Ruby in. She gives Leo a quick pat, then closes the door, leaving him outside on the steps. I get the feeling she knows who knocked over all the living room chairs.

I fill Ruby's water bowl and she laps loudly, slinging droplets on to my ankles. I should put a bowl out for Leo.

There is a shriek from Pacino. ‘I say to you that animals stay outside in the fence. Do you know what the dog hair can do to electronics?'

‘You're the computer expert, Sal, not the animal wrangler.' Buckman clucks her tongue at Ruby. ‘This old lady isn't going to bother you. I left the scary one outside.'

A tinny alarm sounds and Buckman taps a button on her watch. ‘It's time.'

I
t is the delicate and familiar prettiness of Andee's heart-shaped face that I focus upon. The darkness beneath her eyes, the pale and pasty tone of her skin.

‘It's really you,' Caroline says, and she sounds breathless, a little hoarse.

I am struck by how oddly elongated they look, Caroline and Andee, as if they are surreal, ghost portraits, caricatures of their true selves. It startles me, how ill they seem, though it may be due in part to the odd effects and camera angles of computer video.

‘Nina is crying,' Andee says. Then, as an aside, ‘I told you she would come.' Andee looks straight at the camera. She is perched on her mother's lap, the top of her head tucked under Caroline's chin, and the two of them give the impression of being glued together. ‘You're coming to get us, aren't you, Nina?'

Such faith. My throat tightens so that I cannot talk, and Andee puts her face right into the lens, so that her features balloon into a weird monstrosity, illuminating the pores of her skin.

‘Andee,' Caroline says gently, pulling her daughter away.

‘I'm coming,' I tell them. ‘I promise you, I'm coming.' And hearing the words come out of my mouth with such conviction, I believe it too. I will find them. I will bring them home.

I can't stop myself from touching the screen, and I see that Caro is doing the same.

‘We've got ten minutes,' she says. She has lost weight – I can see it in her face and her throat. Her hair looks slept on, her clothes crumpled, at least the shirt, which is all I can see.

‘Are you alone?'

She nods. ‘But he's probably monitoring, don't you think?'

‘Are you OK?'
OK
is a silly, inadequate word for all that I want to ask.

But Caro seems to understand. ‘We're OK for now.'

I take this to mean that she is as afraid as she ought to be.

‘Do you know
where
you are?' I ask her.

‘It's dark here. All the time,' Andee says. She is sucking two fingers, which I have not seen her do since she was three.

‘We drove a long way,' Caroline says, ‘after he took us. All night. Half a day. Then he brought us in blindfolded. Wherever we are, it's cold and quiet. Sort of muffled, if that makes any sense. They've put us in some kind of RV.'

‘It's got a baffroom,' Andee says.

‘Good thing,' I tell her. She almost smiles.

‘We have food and water.' Caro's chest heaves, and she is more breathless with every word. ‘Outside the windows, it's always dark. We can't see anything.'

‘What do you hear? Planes? People? Traffic?'

‘Nothing. It's always quiet. There are never any noises at all. I don't know what day it is. How long have we been gone?'

‘Three days, give or take. This is Thursday. He took you in the middle of the night on Monday.'

Caroline swallows. ‘It seems longer. Is anyone looking for us?'

‘Everyone is looking for you. And I'm going to find you. Do you believe me?'

Andee nods but Caro keeps swallowing. I can almost see the outline of the scream she keeps shoved in her chest.

‘Quickly, Caroline. Details. Anything. Do you know who took you?'

‘A man. Tall, and he's got dark, greasy hair and he's very … tall … I said that.' Caro frowns and shrugs. ‘We can't break the windows, they're boarded up. We don't see anything, we don't hear anything. No particular smells, other than a kind of basement feeling. Sort of damp and musty. It's like—' She shrugs suddenly, and wisely she does not speculate. I remember a terrible kidnapping that happened when I was a child, a woman who was put in a coffin and buried alive.

‘I'm sure it seems that way because they've boarded up the windows,' I say.

‘Yeah.' Caro moves a hand to her throat and even on the distorted visual of the computer camera I can see the crookedness of her wrist, how it cants slightly off center, the joint thick and heavy. I remember how delicate and slim her wrist was, before my son broke it in three different places.

‘Did you go to the police?' Caro's voice is trembly, and I sense a warning.

‘No,' I lie. ‘No law enforcement. I'm doing everything just like he said.'

‘
You
can't call them,' Caro tells me, though I think she wants me to do exactly that. Is it my imagination, the plea in her eyes?

Caro jumps, and Andee hides her head in her mother's shoulder. ‘Footsteps. He's coming.'

I hear a whisper from the kitchen and look up to see Ruby being pushed in my direction. I forgot about the dog. I call Ruby over, and she comes immediately, shoving her nose into my lap.

‘Andee, Andee, look who's here.' Ruby snuffles and squirms and I pull her higher to make sure she's in front of the lens. ‘Speak, Ruby. Speak.'

‘Mommy, look, it's Ruby. Oh, Ruby Ruby
hello
.'

Tears stream down Caro's face. ‘
Ruby.
'

‘Caro, listen to me. I'm going to make sure everything turns out OK.'

‘I know. I know you will.' Caro's voice is so tight it is unrecognizable.

‘Trust me, Caroline.
Be ready.
'

Caro looks over her shoulder, then glances back at me. I see her nod, mouth the word
OK
.

A shadow looms behind Caro and Andee. The view is hazy, but I get the impression of a man, very tall. He bends over Caro, and I see the ski mask. The screen goes dark.

My stomach is tight and painful, and my throat is so constricted I can no longer speak.

In spite of the mask, I've seen just enough to recognize the man that I know and remember. He is keeping his face covered, so they will not be able to identify him. Does this mean if I do what he says he will let them go?

It is eerily seductive – believing when they tell you what you want to hear.

I
am alone in Caroline's backyard, sitting on her porch swing crying gustily. My cell phone rings, and I see Agent Russell Woods' number on the caller ID.

I swallow hard, and answer. ‘Anything?' I ask. The dogs mill nervously around my feet.

‘Not yet, I'm afraid. But I'll let you know the minute we get something.'

‘You've got something now, you're just not telling me.'

‘I wish that were true.' The defeat in his voice seems genuine.

All that equipment, all the hope. I trusted the FBI and I betrayed the Dark Man and now they're gone and I'm second guessing. Buckman and the FBI CATs have taken the laptop and all of the equipment.

‘Look, I just got off the phone with Agent Buckman. She said you were really great.'

Buckman gave me a pep talk before she left about results very soon. But Pacino headed out with a worried look that I can't get out of my head.

‘She promised you would call me and let me know what was going on.'

‘That's what I'm doing, Mrs Miller. You're going to have to hold on for a while. Give us a little time. We'll get your girls home safe. They've survived the first seventy-two hours. According to our statistics, that's a very good thing.'

‘Did you make that up?'

‘Look it up on the Internet, if you don't believe me. It's probably out there somewhere, everything else seems to be. Now listen. We need to know where you are every minute, and we need to know if he gets back in touch. You understand what I'm saying?'

‘I understand. What about Buckman? Can she still work on the case?'

‘She's back on her regular detail. Harris will handle the Arkansas end and I'll take it from here. When are you heading back this way?'

‘First thing tomorrow morning.'

‘Give me a call when you get to town.'

‘OK. And
you'll
call
me
if—'

‘I will.'

He won't. I'm not stupid. That's not how these things ever work.

That night, I dream of my son. I have not seen him, even in my dreams, for such a long time. And though I am sound asleep on the living room couch, in my dream I sit on the porch swing, Leo and Ruby at my feet.

It begins with footsteps. The gate to the backyard opens, and I can see the figure of a man. It is not until he is through the gate and around the tree that I see it is my son.