It was a Thursday when the questions started. I knew I’d never forget. It was the day Gabe and I both got to relive every horrible detail of the previous weeks.
We were sitting on the couch, staring into oblivion. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d watched television. We turned it on a couple of times shortly after I’d returned, but it played in the background while we sat, side by side, lost in thought. Somewhere along the way, we’d stopped even turning it on. Stopped pretending.
Gabe turned to me. His expression was a little more defeated than it had been the day before. That was a pattern I’d begun to notice. With every day that passed, every night that fell and every morning that dawned, my husband grew a little more despondent. I felt for him, I really did. Gabe had always taken his role as father, husband, head of household, and family protector very seriously. He believed that it was his responsibility to make sure Dalton and I had everything we needed, and were safe and happy at all times. I’d known from day one that was too much of a burden for any one person to carry. I’d come to understand early in life that we are all in charge of our own happiness. Dalton, not so much, simply because of his age, but one day he would have to take ownership of his own wellbeing, too. I just wasn’t sure Gabe would ever be able to let that happen. At least not completely. I knew he never would when it came to me. He loved with his whole heart. With his whole life. I knew he would lay down either for me or for our child without giving it a second thought.
I wondered if that was why the kidnapper chose me and not him. Gabe would’ve just fallen on his sword. Evidently, I wasn’t that strong.
His lackluster eyes stared over into mine. I imagined mine looked as empty to him as his did to me. Then he asked what I knew had been on his mind for weeks. “Tell me what happened.”
I was silent for a long time. Lost in thought. Lost in memories.
Lost in blame.
“I didn’t know at first, but he took me from my car. At the airport. Must’ve dosed me with something somehow. I wasn’t even aware of it. I just woke up in the dark.” I paused, allowing my mind to return to those first moments when I opened my eyes. I went back for just a few seconds. That was all I could bear. “That dark, it was… I’ve never known dark like that. I couldn’t see anything, not even my hand up in front of my face. And it was hot. So hot. And humid. Like floating in hot water. At first, I was confused, but little by little, it started to sink in. I realized I was naked. And alone. And chained.” I saw Gabe close his lids, but it didn’t really register in my brain that it hurt him to hear the details. My mind was elsewhere. I knew that some part of me would always remain there. In that place. In the dark. Part of me never left. “I came and went. Time was strange. I had no idea if it was day or night, or how many days passed. I slept and woke, and slept and woke, and nothing ever changed. I was always naked and alone and chained. Just me and my thirst. And my fear.”
Gabe’s words were slow and steely when he spoke. “That bastard didn’t even give you water?”
“He did eventually. I guess he knew I wouldn’t survive long without it otherwise.”
“Do you know where he held you? Did you ever see the room?”
“I explored it as much as I could in the dark. The walls were padded with mattresses and covered with chicken wire. There was a drain in the floor and a pipe in the ceiling. I didn’t find out about that until the first time he gave me water. It woke me up. I heard it dripping into a small puddle on the floor.” I laughed, but it had no mirth. It was as bitter as the aftertaste of the water I’d lapped up from the concrete. “It couldn’t have been more than a few ounces. I cupped my hands under it and caught what I could. I licked the rest up from…from where it fell.”
“From the floor?”
I nodded. “That dirty, disgusting, musty concrete floor.”
Gabe looked away at that, the muscle along his powerful jaw clenching and unclenching. “Jesus Christ, Shannon,” was all he said. But it was enough. I heard the pain in it, underscoring each syllable. The protector couldn’t protect me from everything. Especially the things that exist in a normal person’s worst nightmare. Those things aren’t supposed to happen in their real life.
“He fed me through that pipe, too. Just a couple of times.”
“What did he feed you?”
My cheeks filled with heat before I answered him. I was ashamed to admit what I’d done, but it was no time for half-truths. Our lives would never be the same again anyway. Might as well build what we could salvage on honesty. “Dog food. Some sort of dry kibble type stuff.”
Gabe leaned forward on the couch, dropping his head into his hands. I could see his muscles trembling with his efforts not to react. I let him sit in silence for as long as he needed. I knew it wouldn’t be easy to hear, just like I knew it wouldn’t be easy for me to hear the details of what happened while I was gone.
“Go on,” he finally said.
“Things went on like that for a while. I don’t really know how long. Long enough to turn me into…someone else. That kind of dark… It’s hard to describe what it does to your mind. I would’ve—” I took a deep breath. Gulped it down as fingers of panic tightened their grip around my rib cage. “I would’ve done anything to get out of there. Or at least I thought I would’ve.”
Gabe turned to look back at me. “Shannon, you can’t bl—”
“I’m not done yet. You asked if I got to see where I was. Well, I did. Twice. The first time the lights came on, I got to see…got to see…” I struggled to inhale. To fill my concrete lungs. I sucked air through my pursed lips in great hiccupping gasps. “I got to see Dalton. The lights were so bright in the room where I was, a garage bay I think, but darker where Dalton was. I could…I could see his silhouette. And I… I could hear him. He cried for me. He…he cried for me. Begged. And I couldn’t help him.”
I remembered thinking at the time it happened that the sound of my son pleading for me would break me. I thought I would never recover. But I realized, sitting there beside my husband, wondering every minute of every day where Dalton was and if he was okay, that what would break me still lay ahead. This wasn’t over. And it might not ever be.
I broke down into more sobs. Shed an ocean of tears. My husband held me. Cried with me. Sat numbly with me until I could talk again. And when I could, he listened. And he never let me go. He squeezed me tighter at times. His hands shook with fury at times. But never once did he let me go.
By the time I walked him through my struggle with killing an innocent person, then being shown that it was my best friend, I was exhausted. I could barely stand when he told me it was time for bed. That we would wait and talk more the next day.
Gabe carried me up the stairs. Laid me on our bed. Crawled in beside me. And we both pretended to sleep. All night long.
The next day, bright and early, over coffee, Gabe showed me the texts he’d received. They were on several threads. Some even from different numbers. My captor didn’t take any chances. He probably assumed he’d thought of everything. But nobody was that good.
At least I hoped not.
“I wonder how long he planned this,” I mused absently. My thumb scrolled through one of the texts. I’d read it a dozen times already.
“Probably for a while. He did a lot of recon on us, had everything in place and ready to go. Seems like he thought of everything.”
Something in his tone, the hint of resignation maybe, was like an electric shock to my heart. His words brought back to life something that was slowly dying in me. And I hadn’t even realized it.
“Nobody thinks of everything.”
“I can’t think of a beat he missed. Hell, the police can’t even figure out what happened to Lauren and she worked for a big law firm. He’s covered his tracks pretty damn well.”
“Okay, fine. Say he accounted for every detail. Every last one. There’s one thing he couldn’t have planned for.”
Gabe sat up a little straighter. Encouragement brightened his eyes. “What?”
“Us.”
“Us?”
“Us. You and me. Dalton’s parents. He didn’t plan for us. He couldn’t have.”
I saw my husband deflate a little. He was hoping for something more tangible. “No, I think he planned for us, too. Look at what he was able to accomplish without us having any idea.”
“He knew our routines, our habits, even our weaknesses, but he couldn’t have known us. Wanna know why?”
The more I talked, the more I listened to what I was saying. The more I listened, the more I heard. I heard the words. I heard what they meant. They spoke in a language far superior to English.
They spoke in hope.
And it was potent. Like a drug. Injected directly into my veins.
“Why?” It was clear he was only humoring me, but that was okay. I would convince him. I had to. For all our sakes.
“Because he doesn’t know us. He doesn’t know what we have, what our family is like. If he did, he’d have returned our son already. But he hasn’t. That means he can’t possibly know us. He can’t possibly know that keeping our child was the worst mistake of his life. If he knew us, he would’ve known that we would stop at nothing…nothing to get Dalton back.”
His brow furrowed. “I thought we weren’t going to risk his safety.”
“We won’t. I would never do that, but there is another way. There has to be. There has to be a way to find him, to catch him, without involving the police.” I turned to Gabe at that point, taking his hands in mine. I held them as if by doing so I could convince him of my seriousness. Convince him of the possibility. Even if both seemed as farfetched as me growing wings and taking flight. “We can do this, Gabe.”
“I don’t know, babe.”
“But I do. We will find a way, Gabe. We have to. I can’t… I can’t bear to think of any other option. So we will find a way. We will find a way. If it takes every minute of the rest of my life, I will find my son. I will find him. Do you hear me?”
My voice had risen. There was a thread of maniacal determination to it. I didn’t care. It was in that moment that I knew: I couldn’t live if I couldn’t find Dalton. He was the reason I’d taken my best friend’s life. He was the reason I kept going when I wanted to give up. He was the reason. Period. I couldn’t stop now. Not until he was home. Not until he was safe.
“We can’t be impulsive. We have to think this through.”
“We will. I promise. I would never risk his safety. I hope you know that.”
“I do. I know that. I just…you’ve been through so much, and we need to take this slow.”
“I know, I know.” I couldn’t keep the irritation out of my voice. “I won’t do anything stupid.”
“I didn’t say stupid. I just meant—”
I spun until I was sitting on the edge of the couch. “Did you search my car? When you brought it back, did you search it?”
“I went through it, yes, but I didn’t find anything.”
“That’s okay. But can we look again?” Gabe looked skeptical. Maybe a little insulted, too, so I added, “For my own peace of mind. I need to be doing something, and right now this is all I have.”
He understood that—the need to keep busy, the need to do something. Anything.
His features softened. He nodded. Leaned forward. Kissed my lips. Then he took my hand.
Together, we walked out to the garage. He turned on the bright overhead lights. I popped the trunk. I stared into the yawning abyss for several long minutes before I could bring myself to actually lean in and look inside. I hadn’t thought the trunk ride had traumatized me. I still wasn’t sure it had. Not the trunk, per se. No, it was much more the memory of that feeling—the feeling that I could be on my way to my death. I felt it as fresh as I had in those moments. It raised the hair on my arms. Prickled the hair on the back of my neck.
I doubted anyone could understand what a disconcerting, terrifying, confusing feeling that was—to possibly be about to die, and not be convinced that you really even wanted to live. Especially not if it meant living under the torture of my captor.
Gabe shuffled closer. Put his broad palm on my back. He rubbed big ovals, a silent show of support for whatever I was going through. Gabe was wonderful like that. It had been that way since day one of our relationship. He’d always seemed to know just what I needed, right when I needed it. And at that moment, no words, no advice, no reasoning could’ve helped me. I didn’t think I even wanted to be held. But what I did need was his presence. His strength. His stability. And he gave it. Wholeheartedly and without reservation. Just as he gave his love.
I took a deep breath. Stepped closer to the car. I could feel the cool metal of the rear fender through my pants. It chilled a band of skin across my thighs. I focused on that for a few seconds. Breathed a handful of times. Bent down. Then I leaned into the trunk.
I looked around. Studied the brightly lit interior—the dark blue carpeting, the emptiness of it. So different from the one I’d been transported in. I even inhaled. Examined the scent. It smelled vaguely of my favorite perfume with a hint of something else. I could understand the perfume. I transported my luggage and bags and clothing in the trunk often, so that made sense. But the other aroma…I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
I scanned the open space four times. Went over every square inch. First with my eyes. Then with my fingertips. As Gabe said, there was nothing there.
I swallowed my disappointment. Moved to the front of the car. I opened both doors on that side. Rounded to open both doors on the passenger side. Gabe was standing near the driver’s door. I looked at him over the pale gray roof of the car. We nodded at each other. At the same time, we ducked into our respective sides.
With him on one side and me on the other, we went through the front seats. Methodically. We opened every compartment. Searched every nook. Checked every cranny. Even the little place under the steering wheel where the fuses were. We felt every crevice, but neither of us turned up anything useful. In fact, the only things we found were three petrified French fries, a straw wrapper, and an orange Tic Tac. My car was cleaner than I’d expected it to be. And clearly I needed to stop eating fast food while I drove.
Wordlessly, we got out. Slammed the doors. Repeated the process in the back seats.
Again, we found nothing.
I let my head fall back against the headrest. “Dammit.”
“I wish I’d missed something, but…”
“I can’t say I’m surprised. I mean, he got me when I was getting my luggage out. There wouldn’t have been any reason for him to be inside it at all.”
“Except to lock up.”
“Right. Except for that.”
I sat there. Stared at the navy material stretched tight across the ceiling. Tried to tamp down my frustration to reign in my hopelessness. Eventually, I had to move. I couldn’t sit in the car, in the garage all day.
I got out. Shut the door. Walked slowly back to the trunk. When I reached up to close the lid, something light blue, the color of an autumn sky, caught my eye. It was stuck in the latch, as if the trunk had been closed on material. Using my fingernails like tweezers, I pulled out the swatch. Frowned down at it. It didn’t look familiar to me. Not the color, not the texture, not the quality. “What is this?”
Gabe leaned in close to examine the ragged triangle. “It looks like a piece of a shop towel.”
“A shop towel? What’s that?”
“You know those thick paper towel-like things I keep for wiping up oil or grease or whatever in the garage? They’re on cardboard rolls.”
“Oh, yeah. I know the ones. The ones I use to clean the windshield in the car?”
“Right. Those. I think this looks like it could be one of them.”
“Would you have had one near my trunk for any reason?”
“Not that I can think of.”
“So this could be…” I nodded meaningfully at Gabe. He nodded back.
“Could be.”
Curious, I brought the piece of towel to my nose and sniffed. It wasn’t strong, but it had an odor of some sort. Maybe a chemical. Maybe even what I was detecting in the trunk. Maybe even what had been used to sedate me during my capture. “Here, smell this.”
I shoved it under Gabe’s nose and he obliged by inhaling. “Smells like, I don’t know, sort of sweet, but still kind of chemical-ly.”
“What do you think it is? Have you ever smelled it before?”
“I think it smells a little like the laughing gas they used on me when I had my wisdom teeth removed.”
“So maybe something that could knock someone out?”
“Maybe.”
Gabe stared down into my eyes. Neither of us moved or spoke for a few breaths. That didn’t mean we weren’t communicating, though. Excitement was rising between us. Around us. Within us.
“Could this be a clue?”
“It could be. I don’t know how effective it may be in leading us to the asshole that did this, but at least it’s something. Maybe a start.”
“So what do we do with it?”
“Let me get a baggy for it. I can take it to Garrett, see if he can get anything from it.”
Gabe’s brother, Garrett, was a brilliant forensic scientist. He’d worked in the lab at the Chicago Police Department since he graduated college. If anyone could figure out what they were dealing with, it would be Garrett.
I felt like we were onto something. Maybe something small, but it was something. And I knew we could both use a little something.
And something was certainly better than nothing.