The Gentlemen's Hour

28

The case that Boone

still

works on is the Rain Sweeny case.

Rain was six years old and Boone was a cop when she disappeared from the front yard of her house.

The chief suspect was a short-eyes named Russ Rasmussen. Boone and his then partner, Steve Harrington, found Rasmussen. Harrington wanted to beat the answers out of the suspect, but Boone hadn’t let him do it. Boone left the force shortly after that but Harrington stayed and worked his way up to sergeant in the Homicide Division.

Rasmussen never told what he did with Rain Sweeny.

He walked and went off the radar.

Rain Sweeny was never found.

Boone became a pariah on the SDPD and pulled the pin shortly after.

That was five years ago, and Boone hasn’t stopped trying to find Rain Sweeny, even though he knows that she’s almost certainly dead.

Now he sits at his computer and checks a special e-mail file for any updates on the list of Jane Does that would match Rain’s age and description. He pays annually for computer constructions of what Rain would look like at her current age, and now he compares her eleven-year-old “photo” with pictures from morgues in Oregon and Indiana.

Neither of the poor girls is Rain.

Boone’s relieved. Every time a photo pops up, it stops his heart; every time it’s not Rain, Boone feels a bittersweet contradiction of emotions. Glad, of course, that the girl has not been confirmed dead; sad that he can’t give her parents closure.

Next he goes to another address and checks for messages about Russ Rasmussen.

Through Johnny Banzai and his own connections, Boone has reached out to the sex crimes units in most major cities and state police forces. Creeps like Rasmussen don’t strike just once, and sooner or later he’s going to get picked up strolling a park or a schoolyard.

When he does, Boone is going to be there soon after.

He keeps a .38 in a drawer just for the occasion.

Tonight, like all the other nights, there’s nothing.

Rasmussen has disappeared.

With Rain.

Gone.

Nevertheless, Boone writes to three more police forces, e-mailing photos of Rain and Rasmussen, the latter in case the skell has managed to change identities and is in custody under a different name.

Then Boone hits the sack and tries to sleep.

It doesn’t always come easily.