“I love the park at dusk. It makes your grave feel so…I don’t know, final. Like a real accomplishment. You shouldn’t have sent me away, Daddy. On the plus side, I found some new friends while I was gone. And a hobby.”
The screen flickered as though Norman had blinked. His hand came away from the tombstone and turned to reveal a watch. “Late again, are we, Mr. Scallion? I certainly hope you’ll bring my package. And a bit of that freakish chemical that makes my hobby so much more interesting…la la, la-la…la la, la-la, Elmo’s song.”
“Having happy thoughts, are we?” a voice said.
Norman’s fingers clamped together. Fear and confusion bounced from the screen. “Did you bring it, Mr. Scallion?”
The image panned slowly from Norman’s clenched fist, across the graveyard to a man wearing a skull and black armor. He laughed quietly and tossed a small baggie. It sailed across the screen and Norman reached out to catch it.
“My thanks,” Norman said. “Did you bring the child?”
Scallion stood motionless. “That would be reckless, wouldn’t it?”
“Don’t you trust me? I paid in advance.”
“It’s not a matter of trust. It’s a matter of process. That was step one.”
“Tell me about step two.”
“I acquire her.”
Norman’s frustration filled the room. “You don’t even have her? Do you understand my sense of urgency?”
“I understand it perfectly. I also understand your taste. You have very stringent requirements, do you not?”
“I do,” Norman agreed.
“And I don’t want to disappoint you. Meet me at the Shadow Passage. I’ll contact you. She’ll be gift wrapped.”
“That’s how I like them.” Norman’s eyelids came together and the screen went blank for a full second. When he opened them, he was alone with the tombstones. “But I’m not waiting.”
“Got it!” Andy froze the screen again.
“Andy, I don’t remember any of this. All I saw was a flash of a skull, not an entire conversation. Where did all that come from?”
“When the Memory Lash connected you to LaReau, your mind recorded everything. But the sight of the caged children traumatized you so much that you suppressed the rest of the memory. Fortunately, my equipment doesn’t feel trauma. It brings up everything. Girl, this is big! Do you have any idea what this means?”
I frowned. “Norman LaReau used costumes and a creeper van to stalk kids. When the police turned up the heat, he got nervous and paid Mason, disguised as Mr. Scallion, to do his dirty work. While Scallion was setting up the next victim, LaReau got impatient, and went after someone on his own. That must be what he was doing in the Elmo mask. And I let him get away!” My mind raced off in a thousand directions. If I had only controlled the Memory Lash, LaReau would be in jail. “Andy, this is awful. We might have two kidnappers. Now we don’t know whether Mason or LaReau took Christie Jasmine. Or whether another child is missing somewhere that we don’t know about. Andy, this is crazy, even for Mason.”
Andy looked at me blankly. “I was going to say I found the leotards, but let’s go with that.”
I smacked Andy. “You know something you aren’t telling me.”
“I know plenty of things that I don’t tell you. Most of them aren’t any of your business. But this particular thing may be. The hobby LaReau mentioned? Human trafficking. We never had any hard evidence against him. Just a gut feeling on the part of our glorious leader.”
“The Kilodan’s gut feelings are usually pretty accurate. What happened?”
“Trafficking just stopped one day. We got too close. LaReau’s sly. Looks like he’s back in action. Show me Munificent.”
I really didn’t want to. That memory frightened me. But a girl’s life was at stake, so I hugged myself and concentrated. The tombstones of Sinclair Park stared down at me from the screen like giant monoliths about to topple over. In a flash they were gone, and we were spying on Mr. Munificent through a hole in a frosted glass window. He seemed positively exhausted. The floor of the dimly lit room looked like a chessboard with its black and white linoleum tile. The wall was lined with file cabinets, all black but one. It was green and battered, with an open drawer. Mr. Munificent shoved an envelope in and closed it.
Andy froze the screen. “Color me intrigued.”
“What color is that?”
“The color of that off-color cabinet. Amos knows something he hasn’t told us. Let’s see what it is. And…ACTION!” Andy punched the unfreeze button or something, and Mr. Munificent started to move again.
“Unbelievable,” Munificent said, raking his fingers through his sweaty hair. “How could I let it happen again?”
A gauntleted hand appeared on the screen and pushed against the frosted glass, opening the office door. Mr. Munificent turned slowly as though he’d been expecting someone. A deep voice said, “You couldn’t stop it the first time. Why in the name of all that is fun and exciting would you try to stop it now?”