Six days after Maddie was grabbed, Meghan drove their SUV to New York City hospital.
Beth called Chang while they were driving and briefed him on their visit.
‘Yeah, we’ll let you know if we find anything.’
‘He says we might get lucky,’ she told her sister when the call ended.
‘Fat chance,’ Meghan laughed without humor.
Gramma, Liz, and Peaches were in Amy Kittrell’s room when they entered it.
Peaches launched herself with a squeal into Beth’s arms, a question in her eyes.
Beth smiled at her reassuringly, detached her, and greeted Amy Kittrell.
She didn’t reply and an awkward silence fell in the room.
Beth made eye contact with Gramma who got the message and led her wards out of the room.
‘Ma’am, we need your help,’ Beth pleaded with the mother. ‘Your husband died five years back. Who was the man living with you?’
Amy Kittrell kept silent. Her face was pale; her body thin, beneath the hospital gown.
She wasn’t twisting her hands, yet the one hand that was visible, twitched.
‘They suspect me of arranging her kidnapping.’ Her voice was whispery when Beth kept looking at her.
They, the cops.
‘Who was that man, ma’am? Why does he look like your dead husband?’
‘My daughter is my life. Why would I have her kidnapped?’
Beth went closer. ‘Ma’am, who was that man who lived with you?’
Amy Kittrell turned her head away from them and didn’t reply.
She didn’t speak to them again even though they spent an hour in the room.
Beth looked at her one last time as they were leaving.
Amy Kittrell was still turned away, her eyes unseeing.
No. She’s looking at something
Beth stood on tiptoes and spotted the small picture frame that had been obstructed by Amy Kittrell’s shoulder.
It had Maddie’s smiling face in it.
‘Nothing. She isn’t talking to us,’ she told Chang.
She listened for a few minutes. ‘I am not surprised,’ she replied. ‘When Meghan and I moved from Boston, we too didn’t have any friends. It took us a long time to make some.’
‘They interviewed other parents. All of them knew the man as Josh Kittrell.’ She answered Meghan’s raised eyebrow when she had finished with Chang.
An idea struck her. She called Chang again and this time turned on the speaker.
‘Careful, Beth. My wife will think we’re having an affair,’ Chang’s dry voice came on.
‘What happened to the money, Chang?’ She ignored his humor.
‘What money?’
‘The benefit payment. It was a sizeable amount wasn’t it?’
Keys clicked.
‘It’s still there. A large chunk of it. There are small cash withdrawals. Ten, twenty dollars, those kinds of amounts. Some grocery purchases. But most if it is still there.’
‘When was the most recent transaction?’
‘Last week. At Trader Joe’s, near her office.’
‘How did they fund their home? That must have cost a few million.’
More keys clicked.
‘You know the first home she sold was a ten million dollar one. The second one went for eight mil. Both in her first year of their move to New York.’
‘Her commissions funded the down payment? Her salary, the mortgage?’ Beth asked him.
‘That’s right. We looked at the finances. Nothing there.’
‘No bank account for him?’
‘None,’ Chang confirmed. ‘He doesn’t exist.’
Beth finger combed her hair when they entered their office.
‘We can always go to every hotel and every motel in the city. Ask them if they saw Maddie and this dude.’
Her sister looked at her dubiously. ‘Are you serious?’
‘What else have we got?’
The man was no longer in the motel.
He had booked a bedroom on the Amtrak service for that afternoon and had checked out early in the day.
He dressed her in a voluminous jacket, hid her blonde hair under a cap, and hurried her to Penn Station.
‘It’s an adventure. Mommy will be waiting for us at the end of it.’
That cheered the girl up and she hopped and skipped, as she kept pace with him.
He entered the busy station and waited next to a photo booth while he looked over the concourse.
There were cops. There were a couple of K-9s. None of them seemed to be searching for anything or anyone in particular.
He took a deep breath, grabbed the girl’s hand and hurried to their platform without looking left or right.
Two passengers hurrying to catch their train.
No one gave them a second glance.
He greeted the train attendant, helped the girl board the coach, and guided her to their bedroom.
He shut the door once they were safely inside and released his breath.
The girl was excited. She hopped and bounced on her seat. She explored the bedroom in delight and made to open the door and check the outside.
He stopped her.
‘There’s enough time for that. Let the train start.’
The train started and something loosened inside him.
The next part is the riskiest.
They reached their destination early the next morning. He woke the girl up, bundled their luggage and helped her down the portable steps onto the platform.
It was deserted; they were the only two passengers in the station.
The girl looked up and down, yawned, and asked. ‘Where’s Mommy?’
‘She’ll be here soon.’
He waited for the train to leave and then got the girl to do his bidding.
Seven days from Maddie’s disappearance, the message blinked on the twins’ phones, waiting to be seen.
The twins were on their early morning run in Central Park and neither of them carried their phones.
Meghan got the first inkling that something was wrong when her sister pounded her door and yelled loudly at seven a.m.
‘For chrissakes,’ she flung open the door, ‘you’ll wake the neighborhood.’
Beth brushed past her, entering her apartment, and hunted for Meghan’s phone.
She spied it in her charging cradle. She grabbed it and tossed it to Meghan.
Meghan caught it, ‘What…?’
She sat heavily on a couch and stared at her cell phone.
Madison Kittrell smiled back at her.