“Are he and Flora close? Would she have spoken to him about what she was up to?”
“Darwin is in London,” Rosa said.
D.D. shrugged. “Which is why there’s texting, e-mail, Skype?”
She kept her gaze on Rosa, who was clearly hesitating.
Interestingly enough, it was Keynes who spoke next, except not to D.D., but to Rosa. “Have you told him?”
“No.”
“Wait,” D.D. spoke up. “You mean you haven’t told Darwin his sister is missing?”
Keynes continued as if she hadn’t spoken. “Are you going to tell him?”
Again, that hesitation. “He’s just getting his life back. If you could’ve seen him, what this did to him the first time she disappeared. The helplessness, the hopelessness. He gave up college, halted his entire life. And then she came back. Our own happily-ever-after. Except . . . she wasn’t happy. The mood swings, the night terrors. The feeling that some imposter had taken her body. This wasn’t my daughter, his sister. This couldn’t be our Flora.”
Rosa looked up. “He’s just now getting himself together. How do I call and spring this on him? Again. So, what, he can drop everything? Again. Feel helpless and hopeless. Again. Even if he did come back, to do what? No postcards this time. At least not yet. In fact, best I can tell, you have no leads at all.”
“So are you going to tell him?” D.D. repeated Keynes’s question, because she thought it was a good one.
“He can’t help you,” Rosa said. “Darwin has been away for years. He’s doing his own thing, being his own person. Whatever Flora was up to, she wouldn’t have told him. She’s hurt him enough already, and she knows it. Now if you don’t mind, it’s getting late. I’m tired. I need a place to stay, and I’d like to use my daughter’s apartment, if that’s possible.”
“You’re not heading back to Maine?” Keynes asked.
“No.”
D.D. had to glance at her watch, get her bearings. Sunday, 7:00 P.M. Where had the day gone? Just this morning she was working a dead rapist case, and now . . . She had to think about it.
D.D. said, “Apartment is off-limits for tonight; we’re still processing. How long do you plan to stay?”
“How long will it take you to find my daughter?”
D.D. didn’t have an answer for that one.
“I’ll do my best to stay out of your way, Detective.” Rosa Dane gathered up her things. “But don’t expect me to remain on the sidelines. My daughter isn’t the only one who learned some hard lessons seven years ago. You have your job. And now, I’m going to do mine.”
Rosa swept out the door, Samuel Keynes following close behind.
“Hang on,” D.D. tried to say.
But neither one of them turned around.
Chapter 26
THE GIRL IS CRYING.
I can’t see her, only hear her in the pitch black. I should do something. Move, talk, assist. I can’t. I just . . . can’t. Somehow, I’ve retreated to the far wall, sitting on the mattress with as much distance from the girl as I can get, knees curled to my chest, bound arms looped around my knees. I’m too stunned to react. I know how to take care of myself. Are you in pain? Are you hungry? Are you thirsty? Are you uncomfortable? No? Then you’re all right.
I’m uncomfortable, I think wildly. I have training and preparation and experience. But I never saw this coming. I’m supposed to take care of myself, fight to save myself. Not . . . this.
Her cries are quiet. More whimpers than sobs. The kind of crying done when you’re exhausted and dehydrated. When you’ve already used up your supply of real tears and this is all you have left.
I recognize this kind of crying. I’ve done it myself.
Water. Somewhere along the way, I dropped the water bottle. I should crawl forward and find it. I should crawl forward and . . . help.
It’s not easy to do. In fact, it’s excruciatingly difficult. Why? I’m the one who collects images of lost people. I’m the one who assigned myself as personal savior of Stacey Summers. So now, faced with the opportunity to really, truly lend a hand . . .
I don’t want her to be her.
I don’t want her thinking I can actually save her.
I don’t want her, I don’t want anyone, depending on me.
She’s a resource. Is that a cold thought, a callous thought? But it comes to me. She’s a resource. Her clothing, items she might have in her pocket, clips from her hair. Who knows? And if she’s been allowed more freedom and privileges, say, a belt buckle—oh, the possibilities.
Now I must move forward. I have to engage. She’s a resource, and a victim must use all resources available to her.
I pitch forward onto my hands and knees. Using my inchworm crawl, weight on my elbows, I wiggle forward in the dark.
She’s fallen where I attacked her, sprawled in front of the suddenly appearing, disappearing door. Pulled shut, locked tight. I can’t make out any sign it was ever there. The wall has gone back to being just a wall, the crying girl the only evidence anything happened at all.
“Stacey?” I whisper as I crawl forward.
She doesn’t answer. Just whimpers.
My bound hands connect with the water bottle, knock it sideways. I pause, feel around more gently, until I can clasp it between my fingers. I wriggle forward, then bump against the girl’s body.
Leg. Clad in denim. Blue jeans. She’s in real clothes, versus my silly nightgown. The realization gives me hope. If she has pants, then maybe she also has a belt. With a metal buckle. That would be perfect. Oh, the locks you can pick, the things you can do, with the tongue of a belt buckle.
“Stacey,” I whisper again.
Still no response.
It doesn’t feel right to simply pat her down, as if she were a suspect at a crime scene. But she won’t talk to me either. I try to think of what I should do.
That last day, when the police found me, pouring through the hotel door and windows like a swarm of black armored ants, what had I been like, what had I wanted?
I’d been crying. I can remember that, but it feels far away and distant, something that happened to another person another lifetime ago. There was a female agent there. She kept saying “Florence Dane” over and over again. The name confused me. Tickled the back of my throat, as if I should know it.
“Flora,” she tried again.
I think I spoke then. I think I said, “My name is Molly.”
They exchanged looks, whispered responses. She placed her hand on my shoulder. “My name is Special Agent in Charge Kimberly Quincy. I’m with the FBI. You’re safe now. Okay? You’re safe.”
I flinched when she touched me. Then felt myself go incredibly still. I wasn’t shocked, I wasn’t elated, I wasn’t relieved.
I was suspicious. I was steeling myself for the blow to come.
She let go of my shoulder. She offered me water. Introduced me to a couple of EMTs who wanted to check me out.
“Would you like me to call your mom?” she asked.
But all I could think of was Jacob. Poor, poor Jacob.
And the blood all over my hands.
I couldn’t respond to the Kimberly agent. I never talked. Or screamed. Or cried. I simply held myself very still. That day, and the next, and the next.
A girl who’d been born and raised in a coffin-shaped box.
I’m not that girl, I remind myself now. If I’m not that girl, then I must be the FBI agent, the Kimberly person. So what did she do? Spoke briskly and moved with authority. She ushered me through a flurry of medical exams and necessary questions, while keeping up a steady flow of conversation, whether I chose to answer or not.
She was normal, I decide. Sounded normal, acted normal. That’s what she was trying to give me. After four hundred and seventy-two days, she offered normalcy.
I take a deep breath. Begin.
“My name is Flora.” Is it just me, or did my voice falter at the sound of my own name? I repeat myself, this time for my own sake. “My name is Flora.” Not Molly.
“I’m sorry I attacked you.” Am I? Maybe. I don’t know who she is yet, or her role in all this. Only a fool rushes to judgment.