Voices Carry (24 page)

“Maybe she’s at a neighbor’s. . . have you called—”

“I’ve called everyone. You don’t understand. She isn’t anywhere. . .”

The officer clicked off the tape.

“And he was right. She wasn’t anywhere. Of course, in a case like this, with no sign of a break-in, no evidence of foul play, the first person you look to is the husband. But he’d been in his classroom since at least seven-thirty that morning—he’s a high-school history teacher—and had been seen by almost every one of his colleagues and a goodly portion of the student body. Every minute of his day was well documented. And it was clear that the baby had been tended to. The diaper wasn’t overly soiled. The baby appeared well fed, though he was red-faced and wailing when his father arrived home just around four. Mr. Akins had spoken with his wife around one-fifteen. She’d been having a normal day. A little laundry in the morning. A leisurely chat with her sister while she ate her lunch and fed the baby a bottle before putting him down for his afternoon nap. The sister says she called back a little before two and left a message on the answering machine when Terrie Lee didn’t pick up. It appears that she never did hear that last message. So something happened in the middle of that routine day that turned the blissful life of this young family into a nightmare.”

While he paused to take a sip of water from the tumbler in front of him, Genna studied his eyes and found them weary. It was obvious to her that this case weighed heavily on his mind, that even a seasoned officer such as this one, gray-haired and round-shouldered and wise from years on the street, was frustrated by his inability to capture that one thread that could lead to a resolution. His point was
well made. There were no apparent threads to be caught.

“The best we’ve been able to determine is that sometime after one-thirty in the afternoon, Mrs. Akins walked out her front door, down the path that led to the road to pick up the mail from the mailbox. The mailman says that he’d placed the mail in the box at approximately twelve forty-five. But she was on the phone with her sister at that time, then later, with her husband. So the only time she’d had to walk down for the mail was after she’d put the baby down for his nap. She would have most likely waited a few minutes before leaving the house—just to make sure he had in fact fallen asleep. Outside the front door, on the top step, were a pair of gardening gloves and clippers. She’d told her sister that she was going to clip some roses for the dining room table, that this was their first year in their new house and she was amazed at the variety of flowers she’d found there. How she’d kept the house filled with fresh flowers all summer and how it had delighted her.” West cleared his throat, then added, “Apparently she decided to bring the mail up first. She never did get around to cutting that bouquet.”

He walked to the far end of the room and turned on the wide-screen TV, then slipped a tape into the VCR. Unconsciously, the entire group that had been gathered—law enforcement officers from twelve states and a handful of FBI agents—leaned forward in anticipation. The camera focused on the front of a white clapboard farmhouse that boasted a large grapevine wreath on the front door and a profusion of cheery yellow roses that climbed over both the doorway and one of the front windows in sweeping arches.
The person holding the camera then climbed the steps and stood in front of the door, the lens facing out toward the road. Behind him, wind chimes tinkled softly, a delicate soundtrack for a bitter soliloquy. He began to walk along the path, narrating his journey in a voice engraved with hoarseness from years of too many cigarettes and too little sleep.

“. . . from the front of the house, down the path here toward the road, which is approximately one hundred feet from the front door.” His words popped out between shallow breaths.

He walked slowly, panning the camera from one side of the worn dirt path to the other, until he reached the mailbox. It, too, was cheery, covered with dogwood blossoms that Ed Akins said Terrie Lee had painted herself.

“The shoulder of the road cuts in here, giving more than enough space for a car or small truck to pull in and park. The mailman says he put a packet of mail—several letter-sized envelopes, a few catalogs, a couple of magazines, and a large brown envelope—in the mailbox.”

The camera was again focused on the ground, where white envelopes littered the ground and the pages of a catalog rustled in the breeze.

“The roadway is paved as is the shoulder,” he noted.

The detective stopped the VCR, freezing the last frame on the screen.

“So she was taken when she went to get the mail. . .” someone in the room commented aloud, unnecessarily, since everyone was thinking the same thing.

“That’s the way it looks.”

“She took the mail out of the box and was probably focused on looking through it.” Genna heard herself say. “Was the brown envelope found?”

“No. Only the mail you see here scattered on the grass.”

“Any idea of what was in the brown envelope?” Someone asked.

“A short-sleeved sweater—light blue, with dragonflies embroidered on the front,” he recalled without consulting his notes, “that she’d ordered from a catalog the week before.”

“So she probably opened the mailbox, saw the big envelope and pulled it out. She was pleased that it had come so soon, and was thinking about trying it on.” Genna sat with her hands in her lap, trying to see it all as it might have happened. “She wouldn’t have heard the car pull up behind her. Might not have even noticed that someone had gotten out until it was too late. She might have just been thinking about the sweater. . .”

Twenty-two pairs of eyes shifted curiously in Genna’s direction from every side of the table. John merely leaned back in his chair and listened. He had seen her do this before, pick up the small pieces and weave them into a scene from a story that more often than not turned out to be accurate. John had never questioned her ability, believing that her insights came from somewhere deep inside, and were part intuition, part empathy. He’d long since come to respect her talent to seemingly slide into the victim’s shoes.

“We’re certain he knew what time she’d be there, timed his drive-by perfectly. We figure he came up behind her on the road, swung over quickly, hopped
out and grabbed her, hopped back in just as quickly.” The detective who stood with the remote control continued. “From talking to the other officers whose communities had similar abductions, it appears that this was pretty much his MO. He watches his victims carefully, knows their schedules, knows when their most vulnerable time will coincide with his most opportune.”

Genna sat staring into space. She could almost see it, as if in a dream, the woman moving in slow motion, turning from the mailbox with her arms filled with white envelopes and colorful catalogs, stashing them under her arm while she sought to rip open the brown mailing packet. She did not hear the van approach, did not hear the cautious footsteps behind her. Was aware of nothing until the hand closed over her mouth and she felt herself being lifted off her feet. . .

“Did someone say that near the suspected scene of one of the abductions a dark blue van had been spotted?” Genna asked.

“Yes. That was ours. In Omaha,” replied a dapper looking man in his fifties who sat across the table from Genna.

“When our victim disappeared,” commented a voice from the end of the table, “there had been mention that there may have been a dark van sighted. But the witness couldn’t remember what the make was, though she thought it looked new. Never saw the license plate. And since we don’t know for sure just where she had been abducted from, it’s tough to tell whether or not the van had any significance at all.”

“It’s dammed hard to investigate a crime scene
that you can’t find.” The voice of the detective from the small Kentucky town was heavy with frustration.

“Has the FBI’s ERT been there?” A young woman—the lead investigator from Kansas City—asked, pointing to the television screen.

“Yes. They were there when this film was made.” The detective switched off the VCR. “When we realized that there could be a tie to the cases that were discussed at the press conference, we called the closest FBI office and asked if they could send in their Evidence Response Team. We knew that this investigation could be crucial. If anything at all was left behind that could lead to tracking this guy, we didn’t want to be the ones to blow the evidence.”

“They wanted us to blow the evidence,” Adam Stark quipped to break the tension.

“However, by the time we realized there could be a connection,” Detective West chose to ignore the agent’s weak attempt at humor, slipping the video tape back into his briefcase, and snapping the lock briskly, “it had already rained. There was nothing there. No footprints. No tire tracks. Nothing.”

The others seated around the table packed their notes up as well, silently reflecting on the unfortunate circumstances but refusing to judge—even to themselves—the actions of the local police. There but for the grace of God. . .

Finally, Rex Egan stood and thanked the members of the various law enforcement agencies for agreeing to meet as they had for the past two days.

“Keep in touch, ladies and gentlemen. We’ll certainly let you know how things are going on our end,” he promised them as they filed out through the open door. Pausing for a brief moment to lean down and
whisper something into John’s ear, Egan followed the others into the hallway, leaving only John’s chosen few seated at the table.

As the door closed, John rose without ceremony and began to pass out large manila envelopes to each of the other three agents who had remained seated.

“Each one of these envelopes contains a complete copy of the entire investigative file on each of the disappearances. Eight victims, including Mrs. Akins. Four of us. Two files apiece. Read them through. However many times it takes until questions begin to form.”

“Questions?” Adam asked.

“The ones that weren’t asked the first time. I think it’s clear, after all we’ve heard over the past forty-eight hours, that no one has a clue about this guy, so there’s no point, in my mind, to spend any time discussing anything that we’ve heard. While I think the meeting was a good forum for the locals to share their information with each other, nothing that I’ve heard here has given me any clearer picture of who or what or why than I had when I arrived. It was a good PR move, but as far as I’m concerned, it’s a waste of time to rehash it, so we won’t, unless one of you caught something that I missed and wants to throw it onto the table.” He paused and looked at the three agents sitting before him. No one seemed to have anything to say, so John continued.

“When you’ve completely reviewed your files and made notes, we’ll get back together and then we’ll compare notes. We’re looking for that common thread. Something that strikes a familiar chord. Maybe it’s in a witness statement or in the comments made by a family member.” John sat down in his chair
and opened the file in front of him. “Then, when we’re done, we’ll be calling on the family members, the witnesses and potential witnesses until we find out
why
these women were taken. And hopefully, that knowledge will help us to figure out where they’ve been taken.” John paused, then added, “And if any of them are still alive.”

“And if, after we’ve all gone through the files, there’s still nothing?”

“Then I’d have to admit that everything I feel about this case—everything my instincts tell me—is wrong. But I don’t see it happening. I don’t think it’s random. We just haven’t stumbled on that one thing that will lead us to the truth.”

“We will,” Adam Stark said softly. “Sooner or later, we’ll get lucky.”

“Hopefully, before our chameleon strikes again. . .” Genna murmured.

“Well, I for one am not going to give up until I personally lay eyes on. . .” Dale leaned over his files to read the names off the fronts, “Lani Gilbert and Joanne Landers.”

“I used to know someone named Lani,” Genna said. “Her given name was Atalanta. Isn’t that some name for a kid?”

“That’s a mouthful, all right.” Adam nodded as he opened the file and began to sort through the papers within.

John looked across the table as Genna opened the first of her files. Their eyes met briefly as she slid the contents out, and she gave him a half-smile. John fully expected their break to come through her. Sooner or later, the more she focused on the victims, the greater the likelihood that they’d get lucky. While
he understood that whatever force controlled those little windows in Genna’s psyche didn’t always open them, he knew from past experience that once Genna’s instincts kicked in, they often pointed her in the right direction. John opened the first of his files and began to read.

It was two hours later before Adam Stark, the tall, dark-haired former NFL linebacker, broke the silence by asking, “Is there a reason why I can’t take this material back to my hotel room?”

“None at all,” John told him. “You’re certainly free to work wherever you feel most comfortable.”

“Good.” Adam stood and stretched. “I think I need a change of venue. We’ve been in this conference room on and off for too long. I’ve got cabin fever.”

“Let’s plan on meeting back here at eight tomorrow morning,” John suggested. “Of course, it goes without saying that you’ll call if any bells go off.”

“That’s more than enough time to read through and make notes.” Dale nodded. “I think I’ll head back to my room, too.”

John watched as half his team bunched their files under their arms and left the conference room.

“Genna?” John asked.

“What?”

“Do you want to go back to your hotel room to work?”

“I’m fine here.” She looked up from her reading. “How ’bout you?”

“I’m fine here, too.” He nodded.

“Good.” She turned her attention back to the documents before her.

“Want to take a break?”

“No. I don’t want to lose my momentum.”

“I think I’ll see if I can scout up some coffee.” He stood and stretched, much as the others had done. “Want some?”

“Sure,” Genna murmured, and he could tell she was totally immersed in the story that was unfolding in front of her.