Harlan Coben - Home

Dad left. Myron and Mickey stood and looked at the floor. Ema sighed and said, “Grow up. Both of you.”

The three of them grabbed cold drinks and took their seats around the kitchen table.

“So,” Myron asked, “what’s your impression of Patrick? I mean, if it is Patrick.”

“He’s a normal kid,” Mickey said.

“Too normal,” Ema added.

“What do you mean?”

Ema put her hands on the table. Besides dressing in black and wearing black makeup, Ema had numerous tattoos up and down her arms. She had silver jewelry including two skull rings on her hand. “He knew recent movies,” she said.

“He was up-to-date on the latest video games,” Mickey said.

“He knew about the newest apps.”

“Same with social media sites.”

Myron considered that. “I don’t think he’s been kept in a cage all this time. Especially in recent, I don’t know, years. I mean, he was out on the streets. He lived under an arcade. The guy who was holding him in London is a major gamer. Couldn’t that explain all that?”

“It could,” Mickey said.

“But you don’t buy it?”

Mickey shrugged.

“What?”

“I don’t think he’s who he says he is,” Mickey said.

Myron looked at Ema. Ema nodded.

“His hands,” she said.

“What about them?”

“They’re soft.”

“It wasn’t like he was doing hard labor,” Myron said.

“I know,” Ema said, “but they don’t look like the hands of someone who’s been out on the streets either. And more than that, his teeth. They’re straight; they’re white. He may have incredible genes, but a safer bet would be that he’s had proper dental care and braces.”

“It’s hard to put a finger on it,” Mickey added, “but Patrick doesn’t look or sound, well, street. He doesn’t look abused, except, you know, for the recent stuff. I mean, ugh, he might have been ‘kept’ or taken care of by some… whatever… but…”

“Did you talk about the kidnapping at all?” Myron asked.

“We tried,” Ema said. “But we always got shot down.”

“Francesca was running interference,” Mickey said.

“Interference how?”

“She was protecting him,” Ema said. “Which is understandable, I guess.”

“So whenever we raised what happened-”

“Or even mentioned Rhys’s name.”

“She would interrupt and get all emotional, crying and hugging him,” Mickey said. “I mean, Patrick seemed kind of normal, but the sister was off.”

“I’m not sure I’d use the word ‘off,’” Ema said. “Her brother comes home after ten years. I think it would be weird if Francesca wasn’t all emotional.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Mickey said. But he didn’t say it with much enthusiasm.

“We tried to raise the kidnapping again after she left with Clark.”

“Wait,” Myron said. “Clark Baldwin? Rhys’s brother?”

“Yes.”

“He was there?”

“He came in to pick up Francesca,” Mickey said.

“They go to Columbia together,” Ema said. “He was giving her a ride back to campus.”

Myron said nothing.

“Is that a big deal?” Ema asked.

“I don’t know.” Myron thought about it some more. “It’s odd; that’s all. Maybe, I don’t know, do you think they’re romantically involved?”

Mickey rolled his eyes as only a teenager could. “No.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“Old dudes,” Ema said to Mickey with a shake of the head. “No gaydar.”

“Clark is gay?”

“Yes. And what difference would it make if they were romantically involved? Weren’t they, like, ten, when this all went down?”

Something was niggling at the back of Myron’s brain, but he couldn’t figure out what yet. He moved back to the topic at hand.

“So after Francesca left, you tried to broach the subject of the kidnapping again?”

“Yes, but Patrick got real quiet.”

“Completely clammed up.”

“We left not long after that.”

Myron sat back for a moment. “How did he sound?”

“Sound?”

“We found him in London,” Myron said. “We have no idea how long he’s been there. Did you detect anything in his accent?”

“That’s a good question,” Ema said. “His accent was American overall, but…” She turned to Mickey. He nodded.

“It did have something else in it,” Mickey said. “I can’t put my finger on it exactly. He didn’t sound like he’d grown up here. But he didn’t sound like he’d grown up in England either.”

Myron tried to process that but came up with nothing. He tried something else. “So what did you do the whole time?”

“We ate pizza,” Ema said.

“We watched a movie,” Mickey added.

“We played video games.”

“We talked.”

“Oh, Patrick said he had a girlfriend,” Ema said. “But not from around here.”

“A girlfriend?” Myron said.

“Yeah, but he backed right off. He said it, I don’t know, like a kid bragging a little.”

“You know,” Mickey said. “Like when the new kid comes to town and says he has a girlfriend in Canada or something.”

“Don’t get us wrong,” Ema said. “He was nice enough. All kids talk about those kinds of things. It was just… I don’t know. It felt so normal.”

Mickey nodded.

“Thanks, guys. This was really helpful.”

“Oh, we’re not done,” Ema said.

Myron looked at them.

“I put a keylogger on his computer,” Mickey said.

“As in…?”

“As in we can see whatever he types on it. Emails, social media, whatever.”

“Whoa,” Myron said. “Who’s monitoring him?”

“Spoon.”

Spoon was Mickey’s other close friend-if you still counted Ema as only a “friend”-and what they used to call (or heck, maybe still do) a lovable nerd or geek or dork. Spoon was also ridiculously brave.

“How is he doing?”

Mickey smiled. “He’s walking again.”

“And annoying everyone again,” Ema added. “Anyway, he’ll let us know if anything important comes up.”

Myron wasn’t sure what to say here. He didn’t like these teenagers crossing this particular ethical line, but he wasn’t in the mood to lecture them about privacy or, more important, give up a chance of possibly finding out the truth. It was a close call. Patrick might not be Patrick. Patrick might hold the key to finding another missing boy. Then again, was spying on a teenager justified? Was it even legal?

If you were the type of person who knew for sure what to do here, if you could make the call to spy or not spy without qualms or caveats, you’d be the kind of person Myron would find somewhat suspect.

Life ain’t that black-and-white.

“There’s one more thing,” Ema said.

“What?”

Ema glanced uneasily at Mickey.

“What?” Myron said again.

Mickey gestured for Ema to go ahead. Ema sighed and reached into her purse. She pulled out a small clear plastic bag, the kind you used to get your toiletries past TSA. “Here.”

Ema handed the bag to Myron. He held it up in the air. There was a toothbrush and strands of long hair. He put it down and waited a moment. “Are these…?”

Ema nodded. “I got the toothbrush from Patrick’s bathroom,” she said. “Then I sneaked down the hall and grabbed the hair from Francesca’s hairbrush.”

Myron said nothing. He just stared at the contents in the plastic bag.

Mickey stood. Ema followed suit.

“We figured maybe you could run a DNA test on them or something,” Mickey said.

We are inside the farmhouse now.

It is just the two of us, Fat Gandhi and moi. Zorra now stands guard by the front door. Fat Gandhi’s traveling companions-two of the men Myron had described as the “gamers” from his visit and one male who could possibly be underage-are in the front yard with him.