The Night Stalker_ A Novel of Suspense - James Swain [86]
“Your son has a hiding place in the neighborhood, someplace where he goes when he wants to escape from the world,” I said. “He’s been going there for a long time, and you’ve always known about it, even if you haven’t talked about it. Am I right?”
She nodded stiffly.
“This secret place bothered you, so you watched him, and tried to figure out where he went. You wanted to know, and probably came up with some ideas, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” she said softly.
“Tell me your ideas,” I said.
She took a deep breath. “It was nearby. I knew because he never took his bike or the car. For a while I thought he was going to a mall where his friends hung out. Then I realized that wasn’t so.”
“How did you know that?”
“His clothes. Whenever he went to his secret place, he wore the worst clothes. He didn’t do that when he went to the mall.”
“Did he invite his friends there?”
“Yes, all the time. I used to hear him on the phone.”
“So other kids knew about it.”
“Yes, they knew.”
“Do you remember anything else?”
“Jed always took a shower after he came home. One day I confronted him in the hall. That’s when the smell hit me.”
“The smell?”
“It was rancid. He smelled like he’d been rolling around in something dead.”
“Do you think he’s hiding in a barn?”
“He didn’t smell like horses.”
“Then where?”
She fell silent and stared at the framed photo of Jed on the coffee table. “I just figured he’d dug a big hole in the ground somewhere. Where else could he be going?”
I went outside and called Jessie on my cell phone. A veil of storm clouds had descended over the neighborhood, and a harsh rain was falling.
“Hi, Daddy,” my daughter answered. “How did it go with Heather?”
“Not good,” I said. “Heather’s in trouble. I need to find Jed.”
“What can I do?”
“You grew up with Heather, and shared a lot of friends. I want you to call them, and ask them if they remember a secret hiding place that Jed had. Maybe there’s an old bomb shelter buried in someone’s backyard, or an abandoned garage. Jed’s got a hideout, and he’s had it for a while. Hopefully, one of Heather’s friends will know where it is.”
“I’ll call them right now,” my daughter said.
I folded my phone. Across the street, a small army of FBI agents wearing bulletproof vests and carrying rifles had gathered on the sidewalk. Whitley was with them, barking out orders, and I watched the agents break into groups, and begin a house-to-house search of the neighborhood. Seeing me, Whitley crossed the street.
“We just picked up a message on LeAnn Grimes’s voice mail,” the FBI agent said. “You can hear Jed beating up his wife. We’re going to find him before he kills her.”
I started to protest, then clamped my mouth shut. Whitley had made up his mind that Jed was guilty, and nothing I could say was going to change that belief. I watched him hurry away. Then Jessie called me back.
“I just got off the phone with Cinda Bowe, one of Jed’s old girlfriends,” my daughter said. “Cinda said that Jed’s neighborhood used to be on private well and septic, but got switched over to city water and sewer. Most of the houses kept their septic tanks, and Jed spent a summer cleaning several out, and connecting them with underground tunnels. Cinda said Jed even ran electricity down there.”
“Did Jed ever take Cinda there?” I asked. “Cinda went there once and smoked pot with Jed. She said it stank like a sewer, so she never went back.”
“Did she remember where it was?”
“Cinda said it happened when she was a kid. She forgot the exact location, but said it was a couple of blocks away from Jed’s mom’s house.”
Cinda Bowe wasn’t old enough to be forgetting things like that. My daughter’s friend wasn’t telling the whole truth, probably because she didn’t want her name coming up. We were running out of time, and I decided to press her.
“Give me Cinda’s number,” I said.
“But, Daddy—”
“Give it to me.”
“She’ll freak out if you call her.”
“Good. I always enjoy a freakout.”
“Let me call her. Please. I can make Cinda talk.”
I hesitated.