Elsie pulled her car into the narrow driveway of a small rock house in an old neighborhood of Barton, braking before she entered a battered carport fashioned from corrugated metal.
Putting the car in Park, she examined the woman in the passenger seat. Kim Wickham’s head was bowed, her chest heaving; but the open-mouthed sobbing had subsided.
“Can I walk you in? Make you some coffee?” When Kim didn’t answer, Elsie fidgeted, uncomfortable. She broke the silence with the first thing that popped into her head.
“Or Diet Coke? Want me to get you a Diet Coke?”
The woman shook her head, but remained in her seat. Elsie hoped she’d make a move to open the car door, but Kim sat, her hands limp in her lap.
Elsie peered at the nearby houses, praying that a neighbor might come to her rescue, but the sidewalks were deserted. She tried again.
“Is there someone I can call? A friend at work? Or a neighbor?”
Kim shut her eyes and shook her head. Finally, she spoke. “How will I get my car back? It’s at the courthouse. I need my car.”
Elsie took a moment to reflect. She had thought it imprudent to let Kim Wickham drive, in her emotional state of extreme distress. That had motivated Elsie to insist on ferrying her home. But the gesture left Kim without transportation.
“I’ll talk to Detective Ashlock. When you feel up to it, he can send a patrol car over. They’ll give you a lift to the courthouse.”
She hoped she wasn’t making a promise she couldn’t keep. Ashlock hadn’t been in touch since she left his office that morning.
Elsie cleared her throat. “Ashlock gave you a card, right? With his number. I can give you one of mine, too. You can call me if you remember any additional details. Or if you want to talk.”
Her purse was in the backseat. She had to twist around and fumble inside for long moments before she found a business card. It was wrinkled and slightly grimy, but her office phone was legible.
When she offered the card to Kim, the woman didn’t reach out to take it. She fixed her eyes upon Elsie with a fierce red-rimmed glare.
“I want to talk to the FBI.”
Gently, Elsie dropped the card onto Kim’s denim-covered left leg. “I’m sure you do. Ashlock is going to be in touch with them. I bet they’ll call. Real soon.”
“I want to talk to them now.”
“Kim, I don’t have a personal contact in the FBI. I don’t know anyone who works there.”
“I got to talk to them.”
Her voice grated with need. Elsie couldn’t brush it off; even though she was chagrined to admit she didn’t have any confidence that a federal agent would take her call. She twisted back to reach into her purse again; fortunately, locating her cell phone was an easier task than unearthing the business card.
She tapped in her code, then did a Google search: FBI Missouri. Scanning the results, she found a contact number. “Let’s call them right now,” she said with a brave smile.
The search gave two options: St. Louis or Kansas City. She chose KC; McCown County was in the Western District of Missouri, so she assumed the KC branch had jurisdiction.
Elsie punched the number into her phone. As it rang, she reached for Kim’s hand, and gasped when Kim clenched it in a bruising grip. She pulled free, ashamed to withdraw support; but Breeon had crushed the bones of the same hand earlier that day.
When the call picked up on the other end, Elsie shot her an encouraging look. The recorded voice on the line in Kansas City shouldn’t have come as a surprise; it wasn’t a pokey little office like the McCown County Sheriff’s Department of the Barton PD, where human beings still answered the phone.
Elsie drummed her fingers on the console as the polite female voice talked in her ear.
“You have reached the office of the FBI. If this is a life-threatening emergency, please hang up and dial 911.”
Elsie hung on. As the options rolled by, Kim Wickham tapped her shoulder. Ignoring the silent inquiry, Elsie squeezed her eyes shut, waiting.
“For employment information, press four.”
“Jesus,” she whispered.
“What is it? What are they saying?”
Elsie shook her head, and Kim fell silent. Finally, she was told to press a number for “all other matters” and an operator would answer.
Elsie pressed the digit. When a woman answered, Elsie breathed out in relief.
“Hi. This is Elsie Arnold, assistant prosecutor in McCown County. I’m with a mother of a fifteen-year-old girl. We believe the girl has been abducted.”
The voice on the line was calm. “Have you dialed 911?”
Elsie’s heart rate amped up. “Yes, she contacted local law enforcement. And they are investigating. But she’d like to talk to someone in the FBI. She’s right here. I can hand off the phone.”
Kim Wickham tore the phone from Elsie’s hand. “I want the FBI. This is Kim Wickham, Desiree’s mama.”
Elsie could hear the voice say, “Okay. One moment. I’ll connect you.”
Kim shot Elsie a look of triumph, and Elsie responded with an encouraging nod. But another recording buzzed through the phone, saying: “I’m away from my desk, please leave a message.”
Kim’s face crumpled. She handed the phone back to Elsie, saying, “There’s no one there.”
Elsie slipped the phone into her pocket. “Let me get you inside. It’s cold out here.”
Without speaking, they walked up the drive, under the carport. As she unlocked the side entrance to the rock house, Kim gave Elsie a pleading look.
“Will you come in, just for a minute? I got some Diet Shasta in the fridge.”
Elsie longed to fly back to her car, rev it up, and race back to the courthouse. But she followed the woman inside and accepted the cold can of soda.
In a distracted voice, Kim said, “I can get you a glass, but I don’t have ice. Ice maker isn’t working too good.”
Elsie popped the top of the Shasta and took a swig. “I like it from a can.”
She followed, watching as Kim wound through the kitchen and into the living room. The woman moved in slow motion, as though it took all her strength to put one foot in front of the other. When they reached the sofa facing the rock fireplace, Kim froze so suddenly that Elsie stepped on her heel.
“Beg pardon,” Elsie said; but Kim wasn’t listening. Her face focused at the display on and around the fireplace mantel.
Elsie’s eyes squinted in disbelief as she studied the childhood trophies. Some of them were huge, two and three feet tall. They sat on the floor framing a gas log in the fireplace. Colored sashes hung from the mantel like stockings on Christmas Eve. The sashes varied in color and length; but they were clearly child-size. The display gave off a distinct JonBenet Ramsey vibe that chilled her.
She stared at a large photo over the mantel: Desiree, obviously as a tot; with one hand resting on her hip and the other holding on to a tiara, poised on a riot of curly blond hair. Struck with a sick fascination, Elsie took a step toward the fireplace; but halted when Kim stumbled ahead of her, with her arms uplifted.
With reverent hands, the woman took down a glittering rhinestone crown, fashioned to sit high upon a small head. Sinking onto the floor, Kim cradled the crown in her arms and began to weep again.
“My baby,” she said, repeating it like a refrain. “My baby, my baby.”
Elsie’s stomach clenched, and she looked away from the raw display.