Her Silent Cry

Thirty-Three

Amy sat in her backyard on a chair she’d pulled over next to Lucy’s playhouse. In her arms she held a stuffed unicorn that Josie had previously seen in Lucy’s bed. Amy’s face was swollen, blotchy and tear-stained. As Josie approached, she said, “They told me about Wendy.”

“I’m sorry,” Josie said. “Truly sorry.”

“We weren’t even that close,” Amy said, her voice raspy.

“But you had lunch a couple of times a week, didn’t you?”

Amy nodded, squeezing the unicorn more tightly to her chest. “Wendy was a transplant like me. Divorced. She was well past the point of having children and had no desire to date or marry again. She was very insular. Like me, I guess.”

“She didn’t have many friends here?” Josie prompted.

“No. Not many.”

“What did you talk about at lunch?” Josie asked.

“Things we saw on the news, projects she was working on, books. I talked about Lucy a lot. Wendy didn’t seem to mind even though she didn’t have her own children. She was kind to me.”

Amy squeezed her eyes closed against the fresh wave of tears that came. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

“Where’s Colin?” Josie asked.

“I don’t know,” Amy said. “Upstairs, probably.”

“I need to talk to both of you.”

From the back door, Colin’s voice sounded. “I’m right here. Did you find something? What’s going on?”

As he stepped into the yard, Amy stood up from her chair, squeezing the unicorn more tightly against her chest. “What is it?”

“We believe that Lucy was with the kidnapper at Wendy’s house.”

“What?” Colin said. “You think—you think she saw what happened to Wendy?”

“Does this mean she’s alive?” Amy asked.

Josie held up a hand. “We don’t believe she witnessed Wendy’s murder although she likely heard it. We found a paper chrysalis under Wendy’s desk.”

The lines of Colin’s face deepened in confusion. “What? What are you talking about?”

Amy made a tsk sound at her husband. “You really don’t pay attention at all, do you? You really don’t know what a chrysalis is?”

He glowered at his wife. “Why the hell would I know what that is? What’s this got to do with our daughter?”

Amy’s voice rose to a shout. Her hands squeezed the unicorn’s head. “It’s a cocoon, Colin. You know, the kind that caterpillars make before they turn into butterflies. You remember that your daughter is obsessed with butterflies, don’t you? Or is that too much for you to hold in your head while you’re traipsing all over the globe overcharging sick people for cancer medication?”

Colin stepped back as though he’d been slapped. Even Josie was momentarily stunned. Amy’s comments were spiteful, and delivered with more force than Josie had ever seen from her previously.

Before Colin could snap back at his wife, Josie took out her phone and swiped to the photo one of Oaks’s crime scene techs had forwarded her. “It’s a cocoon. We believe that Lucy tore a piece of paper from a manuscript on Wendy’s desk and used it to make this.” She held the phone out and both parents moved closer to look at it.

Amy gasped. “She’s alive. Oh my God, our baby is alive.” She took one hand from the stuffed unicorn and clamped it over Colin’s forearm.

“How do you know Lucy made this?” Colin asked. “How do you even know what it is? What if Wendy tore a piece of paper, crumpled it up and tossed it onto the floor?”

“That is Lucy’s!” Amy said firmly.

Josie said, “I found the same thing in her desk at school. I believe that Lucy made this.”

“To let us know she’s still alive?” Amy asked hopefully.

“Maybe.”

“Jesus,” Colin said, beginning to pace. “This is a nightmare.”

Amy turned toward him. “How can you say that? Our daughter is alive. She’s alive! We have a chance to get her back safely.”

Colin stopped moving and gestured toward Josie’s phone. “How long ago did you find that? A few hours? He could have killed her by now.”

“No!” Amy shrieked. “Don’t say that.”

Colin’s eyes glistened with tears. “You need to prepare yourself, Ame. The person who has her—he’s a killer. He killed Jaclyn and Wendy like it was nothing to him. What’s to stop him from killing Lucy?”

“Us,” Josie interjected.

Both parents froze and turned their heads toward her. Josie went on, “The most recent information we have indicates that Lucy is still alive. We are operating as though she is and we’re going to do everything we can to find her as quickly as possible. The best thing that you two can do for Lucy is stay calm and answer any questions we have for you.”

Colin rolled his eyes, drawing a glare from his wife. “Questions and more questions. What now?”

Ignoring his barbs, Josie asked, “Do either of you know a man named Bryce Graham?”

“No,” Colin said. “Never heard of him.”

“Who is he?” Amy asked.

“A local psychologist. He was at the search the other day at the park. He offered his services to many of the volunteers. Free of charge. We were just wondering if you knew him personally.”

“No,” Amy and Colin said in unison. Then Amy asked, “You think he took Lucy?”

“No, not even close,” Josie said. “He just stood out to us when we were reviewing all the search footage because he was wearing a suit.”

“There has to be more to it than that,” Colin said. “Or you wouldn’t be asking us about him.”

“Evidently he has no alibi for the time Lucy was taken.”

Amy gasped. “But… a psychologist? What would he want with Lucy?”

Josie held up a hand. “I didn’t say he’s a suspect. I just said he has no alibi. We have no reason to believe he had any involvement in Lucy’s abduction. In fact, we’re looking at someone else right now.” She took out her phone again and pulled up the photos of the man who had impersonated John Bausch at Lucy’s school. She handed her phone to Amy, who held it while Colin looked over her shoulder. “There are three more photos,” Josie told them. “Swipe to the left. Tell me if you recognize the man in the photos.”

Amy and Colin looked at each photo carefully. Colin’s face remained blank. Horizontal lines creased Amy’s forehead. “I don’t know him. Who is he?” she asked.

“You’ve never seen him?”

Amy handed the phone back. “No. I don’t think so. I mean I can’t see his face, only his profile, but he doesn’t look familiar.” She turned to her husband. “Do you recognize him?”

Colin shook his head. “I’ve never seen the guy before.”

“Who is he?” Amy asked. “Do you think he’s the person who took Lucy?”

“The man in the photos visited Lucy’s school,” Josie explained. “He gave a presentation on bugs.”

“Oh,” Amy said. “The bug expert. I remember Lucy talking about him. He brought a butterfly, of course, and a bunch of other insects. She loved the stick bug.”

Colin said, “I do remember her talking about that. Do you think he had something to do with her disappearance?”

“We’re looking into it,” Josie said. “The school had booked a man named John Bausch. The real John Bausch is a man in his sixties, but someone contacted his office and canceled the presentation. Then this guy showed up at Lucy’s school and gave a presentation.”

“What are you saying?” Colin said, tension drawing his shoulders upward.

“I’m saying that this man impersonated the real John Bausch, which in itself is a red flag. He would have met Lucy. She would have shown great interest in his presentation, I’m sure.”

“She did,” Amy croaked. “She said he was the best visitor they ever had.”

“And neither of you remember seeing him after that? Lucy never pointed him out to you anywhere? You never ran into him?”

“No,” Amy said. “She didn’t. I’m sure she would have if she’d seen him.”

Colin added, “I only remember her telling me about the school visit. She never mentioned him after that.”

Josie put her phone away. “We’re dealing with a two-month period here. Is it possible that Lucy could have seen him or been around him without either of you knowing it?”

Colin remained silent. Josie guessed it was because he wasn’t home often enough or long enough to have taken Lucy places on his own.

Amy took a long moment to think about it. “Well, I guess when she was out with Jaclyn. I’m sure I would remember if she’d been talking to a strange man while we were out somewhere.”

“Where did you take Lucy in the last two months?”

Colin stared at his wife expectantly.

Amy said, “I already told you this. School, the park—that’s it. We had a routine. We don’t live terribly exciting lives.”

“Did you take her grocery shopping with you?”

“Well, sure, sometimes.”

“Ever go to the mall?”

“Yes, a couple of times. They have that new arcade place—you can eat there and play in the arcade. One of her friends had a birthday party there several months ago and then I took her there again more recently—just the two of us. But Lucy is only seven. I don’t let her out of my sight when we go out.”

Josie thought of the man Ingrid Saylor had seen at that party, helping Lucy at the skee-ball machine while Amy got change. “Not even for a few minutes?”

“No, I mean, not really.”

“Can you get me approximate dates? When you went to the mall? Since that birthday party?”

“I guess so. I can try. If I look at my bank statements—or you can. We gave the FBI access to all of our accounts. I have a debit card that draws right from the bank account Colin set up for me. I usually take out a certain amount of cash each week, but I do sometimes use it as a credit card instead of taking out cash, so the arcade would probably be on there.”

“What about the grocery store? Do you use the card there or cash?”

Amy shrugged. “It depends. Why? What are you thinking?”

“It’s a long shot,” Josie said. “Most places don’t keep their CCTV footage very long, but I might have my team ask for footage from the arcade and the grocery store for the dates you were there with Lucy to see if this guy was following you.”

Colin said, “I’ll go get the bank statements. I can make a list of places where Amy used the card in the last two months.”

“Thank you,” Josie said.

Once he was back inside, Amy plopped back into her chair. “Do you think this man was stalking us? All this time? Watching Lucy?”

Josie touched her stomach as a wave of nausea rushed over her. Heat stung her face. She hoped she wouldn’t throw up in front of Amy. “I don’t know,” she said, willing the feeling to pass. “But I do think it’s extremely likely. This kidnapping was well-planned and executed without a single mistake. If the kidnapper had made one, we would have found something by now, but we haven’t.”

Amy hugged the stuffed unicorn to her chest. “It’s so creepy. So disturbing. I can’t believe this. This—this monster was stalking my baby all this time and I didn’t even know it. What kind of mother doesn’t notice someone stalking her seven-year-old?”

Josie sucked in several deep breaths and the nausea began to recede. Again, questions of whether or not a baby—her very own baby—was growing inside her crowded her mind, but she pushed them aside. She had to focus on the case. She thought of what Oaks had said to her at the station.

“Amy,” Josie said. “I need you to listen to me very carefully. This man who has Lucy is targeting people close to you in order to make contact with you.”

“He’s killing them to get to me?” Amy said.

“He’s using their phones so that we can’t trace him so long as he leaves the scene before we get there, and he’s killing them so they can’t identify him—but also, I think, because it will hurt you. This whole time we’ve been looking more closely at Colin, but Colin had less contact with Jaclyn than you, and I’m guessing he barely knew Wendy.”

“He only met her once or twice,” Amy agreed.

“What we need to know is, who will he target next?”

Amy stared up at her as though waiting for her to answer her own question.

Josie said, “Amy, do you understand what I’m asking? I need to know who is next.”

“I don’t—I can’t—there isn’t anyone.”

“You saw Jaclyn almost daily. You had lunch with Wendy a couple of times a week. Who else is there in your life whom you have regular contact with?”

“No one,” Amy said. “Not in a meaningful way. I see the same cashier at the grocery store most times I’m there. We have the same mailman.”

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

“Detective Quinn—”

“Josie, please.”

“Josie, I don’t have many friends. None really. Not anymore. Wendy was my friend. That was it. Jaclyn helped me with Lucy. I’m a mother. That’s what I do.”

“Who would you call if you had a problem? Needed to vent?” Josie asked.

“My husband.”

Josie sighed. “I’m pretty sure Colin will stay out of harm’s way. He’ll be here with us until this is over. But Amy, I really need you to think carefully about this because this guy is not going to stop. He’s made a demand now—a million dollars—but he didn’t tell you where to bring it to him or when which means he needs to get in touch with you again. He’s going to use someone to do that. Who?”

“I don’t know,” Amy insisted. “I’m telling you, there’s no one else.”

“What about old friends? Someone from New York City or from your childhood?”

“No,” Amy said. “I didn’t keep in touch with anyone. I’m telling you, there is no one else. I only ever had my mother and she died years ago. I’ve never been good at making friends. People are—they intimidate me, make me nervous. I have my husband and my daughter. That’s all I’ve got left.”