The Missing (20 page)

Suddenly Darby had to sit down. There was no place to sit. She leaned back against a tree and filled her lungs deep, the ground shaky beneath her feet.

‘Two of our mobile forensic units will be here early tomorrow morning – one here, one at the blast site in Boston,’ Evan said. ‘We can run the investigation from there. I need to get going. I’ll call you later. Where can I reach you?’

She wrote down her mother’s home number on the back of a business card and handed it to him.

‘Your face is swelling up,’ Evan said. ‘You should put some ice on it.’

Darby stepped out of the woods and stared at the wounded and the dead. Four bodies – no, five – were under the blue tarps. An EMT was pulling another tarp over the body of another SWAT officer.

She turned away and looked in the direction of where the van had been. Now it was a smoldering black crater. The body of the man she had seen inside the van hadn’t been found. Pieces of him were scattered among the debris. They’d be lucky if they ever identified him.

A firefighter dropped his hose. He yelled something she couldn’t hear and then all four firefighters were running to the bloodied hand fighting its way out of the rubble.

That could have been me,
Darby thought.
If I had been standing any closer to the van, I might be trapped or dead.

Coop was heading back with another stretcher – this one holding a young woman. Her limp arms hung over the sides of the stretcher and bumped against the rubble as her lifeless eyes stared up at the dark gray sky, the rain washing away soot and blood from her face.

Chapter 46

By quarter to three, all the survivors had been found and moved. Firemen were still crawling around the blast site; two were standing by with hoses. ATF agents and members of the Boston Bomb Squad, dressed in coveralls and boots, sifted through the debris.

The man in charge of the blast site was Kyle Romano, a former Marine explosives expert and a fifteen-year veteran of the Boston Bomb Squad. He was a big, burly man with a dark red buzz cut and a face scarred by acne.

Romano had to shout over the steady rotor-thump of the news chopper hovering in the sky directly above them.

‘It’s definitely dynamite,’ Romano said. ‘You can tell by the way the metal’s pitted. We also found pieces of a timer and what appears to be a metal footlocker. Given what you and everyone else told me, once those van doors opened, I’d say it sent a signal to the timer. You know the rest. Now I got a question for you.’

Romano scratched his nose. His face was covered in soot and ashes. ‘I was talking to Banville, and he
told me this guy you’re after kidnaps young women.’

‘That’s right.’

‘This has the markings of a terrorist attack. You pull something like he did today, it’s guaranteed to draw attention. This guy you’re after, everything about him suggests he doesn’t want to be found.’

‘I think he’s feeling desperate,’ Darby said.

‘That’s the same thing the profiler told me – Manning was his name. Evan Manning.’

‘What else did he tell you?’

‘Not much. He was talking about the teenage girl that’s missing.’ Romano shook his head, sighing. ‘Poor girl’s as good as dead.’

‘He said that?’

‘Not in so many words.’ Romano took a long pull from his water bottle. That’s all I know right now.’

‘Can I help with something?’

‘Yes, you could point me to the piece of metal with the vehicle’s VIN number on it. It’s buried somewhere in this goddamn mess.’

‘I can help with the sifting,’ Darby said.

‘We’ve got ATF here to help. Bomb cases are different from the ones you work on – no offense. I’ve got to clamp down on the scene. Too many people walking around here. Thanks again for your help.’

The vehicle, its windows shattered from the blast, was part of the crime scene. Bomb techs were
searching it for scraps of evidence. Darby couldn’t drive it.

Darby couldn’t find Coop. She’d have to walk home.

The press was everywhere. She walked past them, numb, and headed down a street only to realize it was closed off to allow investigators to sift through the debris.

When she stopped walking, she was standing near East Dunstable Road. There was Porter Avenue. Down the road was St. Pius. Half a mile up the road was the Hill. Sitting high above it was Buzzy’s.

The pay phone she had used over two decades ago to make the call was still in the same spot, replaced by a new Verizon model with a bright yellow receiver. Darby wanted to call Leland to see what had happened at the lab. She checked her pockets. All she had was dollar bills. She went inside Buzzy’s to get change.

The store was empty except for the teenage girl standing behind the counter. She was watching a news report about the bombing at Mass General on a small color TV set up on top of a mini-refrigerator.

‘Could you turn that up?’ Darby asked.

‘Sure.’

The reporter, who was live at the scene, didn’t have much information but he had plenty of visual footage of the bomb that had exploded inside the delivery garage at Mass General. As he talked about
eyewitnesses who had described hearing a large, thunderous booming sound, the camera kept playing various footage of the destruction. Darby saw the streets lined with debris and overturned taxis and ambulances. The front half of Mass General, which was made entirely of glass, had been blown apart. When she saw the smoking crater, her first thought was a fertilizer bomb. A fertilizer bomb, if packaged correctly, could have caused the amount of destruction she was seeing on the TV.

Dozens of wounded people were being moved to Beth Israel Hospital. Mass General patients were in the process of being evacuated to other area hospitals. There was no information on how many people had been killed.

‘Were you there?’

Darby glanced away from the TV. The teenage girl was talking to her. She wore too much eyeliner and her face looked as though it had fallen inside a tackle box. Her nose was pierced, as were her bottom lip and tongue. Almost every available space on her ears was covered with pierced earrings.

‘Were you at the bomb site?’ the teenager asked. ‘Your clothes are, like, all dirty and ripped and stuff. And you’ve got blood on you.’

‘I was here in Belham.’

‘Oh my God, that must have been sooo freaky. Did you see any dead bodies?’

‘I need some change for the pay phone.’

Darby plunked her quarters down into the slot and dialed Leland’s cell phone. When his voice mail picked up, she tried his home number. His wife answered.

‘Sandy, this is Darby. Is Leland there?’

‘Just a moment.’

Darby swallowed. When Leland came on the line, she explained what had happened in Belham. Leland listened without interrupting.

‘Erin called me while I was stuck in traffic,’ Leland said after she finished talking. ‘She said a FedEx package came into the lab early this morning. They brought it downstairs to X-ray and found what looked like a body stuffed inside the box, so they rushed it upstairs. The return address was Carol Cranmore’s.’

‘Didn’t they test it for explosives?’

‘I don’t know. If I had to guess, I’d say they saw the body and decided to rush it upstairs. I’m in the process of pulling the security tapes from the garage and the lobby.

‘I was talking to Erin when the package blew up,’ Leland said. ‘I don’t think she made it. Pappy was out in a junkyard in Saugus collecting paint samples when the bomb went off. The blast took out the lab, the evidence lockers… it’s all gone.’

Darby wanted to ask about any other survivors but couldn’t get the words out.

‘I’m afraid I have more bad news,’ Leland said.
‘The hospital called looking for you a few minutes ago. Rachel Swanson went into cardiac arrest. They couldn’t revive her. They’re going to do her autopsy this afternoon.’

‘He killed her.’

‘Rachel Swanson was sick, Darby. The sepsis –’

‘Traveler needed to get to her. She was the key to finding him, and the only way he could do it was to create a diversion. What better diversion than bombing the hospital. The explosion creates a sense of panic – people start thinking it’s a terrorist attack and run for cover. Nobody’s paying any attention. Traveler moved in and killed her. Get someone over there and seal off the room – and pull the ICU security tapes.’

‘I already tried. ATF won’t allow access,’ Leland said. ‘I just got off the phone with Wendy Swanson, Rachel’s mother. Someone at the New Hampshire lab must have called her. She called us, wanting to know what hospital her daughter was in. I had to tell the woman her daughter was dead.’

‘Do you have her number? I want to talk to her about Rachel.’

‘That’s Banville’s job.’

‘Banville’s going to be tied up at the bomb site here in Belham. I want to talk to the mother to see if I can find out anything about Rachel, maybe figure out why she was selected. She might know something that can help us find Carol.’

Leland gave her the number. Darby wrote it down on her forearm.

A phone rang in the background. ‘I’ve got to take this call,’ Leland said. ‘Call me back if you find out anything.’

Darby called her mother. The phone kept ringing. She hung up, wondering if she was too late. A cold nausea gripped her as she ran home.

Chapter 47

The nurse shut the door to Sheila’s bedroom. Her mother was inside, fast asleep. Her lungs made a sick wheezing sound as she struggled to breathe.

‘I had to increase her morphine level,’ Tina said, ushering Darby away from the door. ‘She’s in a lot of pain.’

‘Did she see the news?’

The nurse nodded. ‘She tried calling you and couldn’t get through.’

‘My cell phone is broken. I called from a pay phone. Nobody picked up.’

‘The explosion knocked down some of the phone and power lines – at least that’s what they’re saying on the news. She knows you’re okay. A friend of yours stopped by and told he I forget his name. Are you going back out? I can stay a while longer. It’s not a problem.’

‘I’m in for the night.’

Darby folded her arms and leaned back against the wall. She was afraid to move away from her mother’s door. Walking away now, Darby felt she was saying good-bye.

‘I don’t think it will happen tonight,’ Tina said.

It took Darby a moment to gather the courage to ask the question. ‘When, do you think?’

Tina pursed her lips. ‘Any day now.’

After the nurse left, Darby wrote a note to her mother saying she was home and taped it to the night-stand where she kept her glasses and pills. She kissed her mother on the forehead. Sheila didn’t stir.

Darby headed into the shower. Standing under the hot water, she reviewed the things Rachel had said under the porch and at the hospital. Rachel had used the word
fighting
several times.
I can’t fight him anymore,
Rachel had said. What had she said about Carol?
Is she a fighter? Is she tough?

Fighter. Fighting. Was that the key? How would Traveler know they would fight back?

Did he pick them up from battered women’s shelters? No. Those women predominantly
didn’t
fight back. What then? Some place, they all had to connect at some place.
Please, God, let me find a common thread.

When the water grew cold, Darby toweled off, threw on a pair of sweats and a sweatshirt and headed downstairs to the kitchen. She checked the phone. It was working. She put on her jacket and took the cordless and her pack of cigarettes out to the back deck. The rain was coming down harder now, drumming against the roof.

She went through two cigarettes before dialing the number for Rachel’s mother. A man answered the phone.

‘Mr Swanson?’

‘No, this is Gerry.’ His voice was terribly quiet. Darby was sure she heard someone crying in the background.

‘Can I speak with Wendy Swanson? I’m calling from the Boston Crime Lab.’

‘Hold on.’

A thin, trembling voice came on the line: ‘This is Wendy.’

‘My name is Darby McCormick. I wanted to call and tell you how sorry –’

‘Are you the one who found my daughter underneath the porch?’

‘I am.’

‘Did you talk to Rachel?’

‘Yes, ma’am, I did. I’m sorry for your loss.’

‘What did Rachel say? Where was she all this time? Did she tell you?’

Darby didn’t want to lie to the woman, but she didn’t want to upset her even more. Darby needed Wendy Swanson to answer some questions.

‘Rachel didn’t say much. She was very sick.’

‘I saw the news story, the video footage, and I didn’t once think it was Rachel. The woman you found looked nothing like my daughter. I didn’t even recognize her. And I’m her mother.’ Wendy Swanson cleared her voice several times. ‘This person who took Rachel, what did he do to her?’

Darby didn’t answer.

‘Tell me,’ Rachel’s mother said. ‘Please. I have to know.’

‘I don’t know what happened to her. Mrs Swanson, I know this is a difficult time for you. And I wouldn’t be calling you if this wasn’t important. I need to ask you some questions about your daughter. The questions may sound odd, so please try and bear with me.’

‘Ask anything you want.’

‘Was Rachel ever in an abusive relationship?’

‘No.’

‘Would she have told you if she was?’

‘My daughter and I were very close. I knew all about Chad’s background, but he never hit her – he never even raised his voice. Rachel wouldn’t have put up with any of that. She had nothing but positive things to say about Chad. I think his ex-wife was a bit of a nut.’

‘Was Rachel ever assaulted by anyone?’

‘No.’

‘Did she ever tell you about being stalked? Was someone following her?’

‘No. If something like that ever happened, she would have told me. Rachel and Chad had a great relationship. They were going to get married. Rachel was… She was so smart, so hardworking. She paid her own way through college. She was taking out loans to go to law school. She never asked for anything, never got into any trouble. She was just a solid, well-grounded person.’

Wendy Swanson broke down. She spoke through her tears. ‘The police told me that when someone goes missing, if they’re not found in the first forty-eight hours that usually means they’re dead. After the first year, I started to accept the fact that Rachel wasn’t coming home, and that I may never find out what had happened to her. And then early this morning I get a phone call from a friend who works at the state lab and she says that Rachel was found in Massachusetts – was found alive.
Alive.
After five
years.
I got down on my knees and thanked God. And then I call to find out what hospital Rachel is in only to be told she’s dead. Rachel was alive all this time and I find out and now she’s dead and I didn’t… I didn’t get to talk to her. I didn’t even get a chance to hold my baby’s hand and tell much I love her and how sorry I am for giving up on her. I didn’t even get to say good-bye.’