James PATTERSON - The Big Bad Wolf

Pedi asked, ‘Are we talking about past disappearances in the Atlanta metro area?’

I shook my head. ‘No, not to my knowledge. The other disappearances are in Texas, Massachusetts, Florida, Arkansas.’

‘Ransoms involved?’ Pedi followed up.

‘In one Texas case, yes. Otherwise no money has been asked for. None of the women has been found so far.’

‘Only white women?’ Detective Ciaccio asked as she took a few notes.

‘As far as we know, yes. And all of them fairly well-to-do. But no ransoms. And none of what I’m telling you gets to the press.’ I looked around the parking garage. ‘What do we have so far? Help me out a little.’

Ciaccio looked at Pedi. ‘Joshua?’ she asked.

Pedi shrugged. ‘All right, Irene.’

‘We do have something. There were a couple of kids in one of the parked cars when the abduction went down. Apparently, they didn’t witness the first part of the crime.’

‘They were otherwise occupied,’ said Joshua Pedi.

‘But they looked up when they heard a scream and saw Elizabeth Connelly. Two kidnappers, apparently pretty good at it. Man and a woman. They didn’t see our young lovers because they were in the back of a van.’

‘And they had their heads down?’ I asked. ‘Otherwise occupied?’

‘That too. But when they did come up for air, they saw the man and woman, described as being in their thirties, well dressed. They were already holding Mrs Connelly. Took her down very fast. Threw her into the back of her own station wagon. Then they drove off in her car.’

‘Why didn’t the kids get out of the van to help?’

Ciaccio shook her head. ‘Say that it happened very fast, and that they were scared. Seemed “unreal” to them. I think they were also nervous about having it known they were playing around in the back of a van during school hours. They both attend a local prep school in Buckhead. They were skipping classes.’

A team took her , I thought, and knew it was a big break for us. According to what I’d read on the ride down, no team had been spotted at any of the other abductions. A male and a female team? That was interesting. Strange and unexpected .

‘You want to answer a question for us now?’ Detective Pedi asked.

‘If I can. Shoot.’

He looked at his partner. I had a feeling that somewhere along the way Joshua and Irene might have spent some time in the backseat of a car, something about the way they looked at each other. ‘We’ve been hearing that this might have something to do with the Sandra Friedlander case? Is that right? That one’s gone unsolved, for what… two years in D.C.?’

I looked at the detective and shook my head. ‘Not to my knowledge,’ I said. ‘You’re the first to bring up Sandra Friedlander.’

Which wasn’t exactly the truth. Her name had been in confidential FBI reports I’d read on the ride down from D.C. Sandra Friedlander – and seven others .

My head was buzzing. In a bad way. I knew from my hurried reading of the case notes that there were more than 220 women currently listed as missing in the United States, and that at least seven of the disappearances had been linked by the Bureau to ‘white slave rings’. That was the nasty twist. White women in their twenties and thirties were in high demand in certain circles. The prices could get exorbitant – if the sales were to the Middle East, or to Japan.

Ironically, Atlanta had been the hub of another kind of sex-slave scandal just a few years back. It involved Asian and Mexican women smuggled into the US, then forced into prostitution in Georgia and the Carolinas. This case had another possible connection to Juanita, Mexico, where hundreds of women had disappeared in the past couple of years.

My mind was flashing through these unfortunate unpleasantries when I arrived at Judge Brendan Connelly’s home in the Tuxedo Park section of Buckhead, near the governor’s mansion. The Connelly place replicated an 1840s Up-Country Georgia Plantation Home and sat on about two acres. A Porsche Boxster was parked in a circular driveway. Everything looked perfect – in its place.

The front door was opened by a young girl who was still in her school clothes. The patch on her jumper told me she attended Pace Academy . She introduced herself as Brigid Connelly, and I could see braces on her teeth. I had read about Brigid in the Bureau’s notes on the family. The foyer of the house was elegant, and had an elaborate chandelier and highly polished ash hardwood floor.

I spotted two younger girls – just their heads – peeking out from a doorway off the main entryway, just past a couple of British water-colors. All three of the Connelly daughters were pretty. Brigid was twelve, Meredith was eleven, and Gwynne was six. According to my crib notes, the younger girls attended the Lovett School.

‘I’m Alex Cross with the FBI,’ I said to Brigid, who seemed tremendously self-assured for her age, especially during this crisis. ‘I think that your father is expecting me.’

‘My dad will be right down, sir,’ she told me. Then she turned to her younger sisters and scolded, ‘You heard Daddy. Behave. Both of you.’

‘I won’t bite anybody,’ I said to the girls, who were still peeking at me from down the hallway.

Meredith turned the brightest red. ‘Oh, we’re sorry. This isn’t about you.’

‘I understand,’ I said. Finally they smiled, and I saw that they had braces too. Very cute girls, sweet.

I heard a voice from above. ‘Agent Cross?’ Agent ? I wasn’t used to the sound of that yet.

I looked up the front staircase as Judge Brendan Connelly made his way down. He had on a striped blue dress shirt, dark blue slacks, black driving loafers. He looked trim and in-shape, but tired, as if he hadn’t slept in days. I knew from the FBI work-up sheets that he was forty-four, and had attended Georgia Tech and Vanderbilt Law School.

‘So which is it,’ he asked, then forced a smile, ‘do you bite, or not?’

I shook his hand. ‘I only bite people who deserve it,’ I said. ‘Alex Cross.’

Brendan Connelly nodded toward a large library-den that I could see was crammed from floor to ceiling with books. There was also room for a baby grand piano. I noticed sheet music for some Billy Joel songs. In the corner of the room was a daybed – unmade.

‘After Agent Cross and I are done, I’ll make dinner,’ he said to the girls. ‘I’ll try not to poison anybody tonight, but I’ll need your help, ladies.’

‘Yes, Daddy,’ they chorused. They seemed to adore their father. He pulled the sliding oak doors, and the two of us were sealed inside.

‘This is so damn bad . So hard,’ he sighed and let out a deep breath. ‘Trying to keep up a front for them. They’re the best girls in the world.’ Judge Connelly gestured around the book-lined room. ‘This is Lizzie’s favorite place in the house. She plays the piano very well. So do the girls. We’re both bookaholics, but she, especially, loved reading in this room.’

He sat in a club chair covered in rust tone leather. ‘I appreciate that you came to Atlanta. I’ve heard you’re very good at difficult cases. How can I help you?’ he asked.

I sat across from him on a matching rust tone leather couch. On the wall behind him were photographs of the Parthenon, Chartres, the Pyramids, and an honorary plaque from Chastain Horse Park. ‘There are a lot of people working to find Mrs Connelly and they’ll go down a lot of avenues. I’m not going to get into too many details about your family. The local detectives can go there.’

‘Thank you,’ the judge said. ‘Those questions are devastating to answer right now. To go over and over. You can’t imagine.’