Gregg Olsen - Fear Collector

Dear God, it is wrong for me to wish harm to anyone, but please answer me and spare my broken heart by making the Tricia’s murderer pay for his crimes with his own blood. Forgive me for wishing another human being to suffer, but I cannot be a stronger, better person here. I want him to die a slow, painful death. I want him to feel whatever she felt times a million. God, please hear my prayers. Please show some mercy on my broken heart and release me from the torment of a killer walking free to cause more harm.

Sissy O’Hare knew it was distasteful and probably even wicked to ask God for harm to another human being, no matter how vile the individual. She thought somehow that it was possible that God, in his infinite compassion for her suffering, would understand and do what he could to help ease her shattered heart. She didn’t tell Conner what she was praying for, because vengeance was not something he could truly comprehend. His devastation was his alone. He told Sissy over and over that he wanted whoever had taken and probably killed Tricia to be punished when he met his maker.

“Justice,” he said, “will be done. It may not occur in our lifetime, but one way or another whoever took our girl will pay for it.”

The year after Tricia’s vanishing was the blackest time of the O’Hares’ lives. It was a pendulum, however, that lurched back and forth from hope to despair. Any crumb of hope was devoured; each setback brought tears, drinking, arguments. They joined a victims’ families support group the spring after their daughter died. Neither would say that it was something that didn’t provide some solace, yet Sissy in particular found it a little too emotional.

“It’s like a church potluck, but with tears instead of fruit punch,” she told her husband after a few months of going to meetings in the basement of the Lutheran church on Pacific. The fifteen other members seemed focused on the tragedy of their circumstances, something none would have denied. Sissy saw a different purpose. She wanted to two things-justice for her daughter and another baby.

She was forty, not ancient, but hardly a young mother. When she told Conner she wanted to get pregnant, he was overjoyed by the prospect. No child could take their Tricia’s place, of course, but Conner felt that they still had a lot of love to give. When she became pregnant just before the Fourth of July the year after Tricia was murdered, Sissy made her next move. She quit the support group at the church and formed her own. Hers would focus on the catching of the killer responsible for Tricia’s murder.

A crew from a Seattle TV station made its way to Tacoma to cover a story that would likely lead the 11 PM broadcast. A missing girl was a ratings grabber-and despite the second-city reputation of T-Town, it had been a good locale for such stories. Ratings had been boosted by images of crying moms, empty parking lots, and the morose intonations of Kelli Corelli, a reporter with big hair and big teeth and the kind of sad, savvy delivery that always ensured at least a few viewers would tear up.

“… in a moment you’ll see the last images of the missing teenager as she left her job at the Lakewood Towne Center…”

The video, all grainy and practically useless, played for a second, and then another voice came on.

“If anyone has seen my daughter, please let us know.” It was Diana Rose, her voice cracking under the emotions that came with the discovery that Emma wasn’t where she was supposed to be.

The next shot showed Emma’s mother standing on her front porch.

“She’s all that we have.”

The cameraman panned to the mother’s hands. Inside one of her balled-up fists was a crumpled tissue.

“If anyone knows anything… I’m begging you… please, please help us find our daughter.”

The reporter got back on camera and somberly reminded viewers that the case was a top concern “not only of this family, but of the Tacoma Police Department, which has been investigating a series of missing girls’ cases.”

People connected to the case were watching that channel that night-Paul, Grace, the Roses. All were hopeful that someone would come forward with information. Emma didn’t just vanish like the fog off Commencement Bay. Someone out there had to know something about her whereabouts.

Someone watching did. A phone number was flashed on the screen.

Sienna Winters shut her phone and waited for a call back. She curled up on the sofa of her South Tacoma apartment. The neighbors were loud, as always, and it was hard to think, hard to figure out if she’d done the right thing. She was sick to her stomach about making the call, but there was nothing she could do. She felt that the Roses should have all the information they needed. They were nice people. An hour later, there was a knock at the door.

It was a pair of detectives from the Tacoma Police Department.

Grace spoke first. “Are you Sienna?”

“Yeah. You the police?”

“Yes, we are. I’m Detective Alexander and this is my partner, Detective Bateman. We got your message.”

“I thought you’d just call me. Kind of weird that you’re here.”

“Sorry, but your message was so…” Grace stumbled, uncharacteristically, for the words. “So disturbing.”

Sienna, a cranberry-headed girl with pale, pale skin, green eyes and twitchy nerves, didn’t blink. “Yeah. I guess it was.”

“Can we come in?”

“Yeah. Just don’t let the dog out,” she said, indicating a terrier mix behind her legs.

“No worries.”

Sienna and the dog led the detectives to the living room portion of the studio apartment. It was a dark space with a wall draped in icicle Christmas lights, a TV on mute, and a pile of dishes on the floor next to the sofa.

“Obviously, I wasn’t expecting company,” Sienna said.

“That’s all right.”

“Am I supposed to offer you something? All I got is sweet tea.”

“No, we’re not here to visit. We’re here about your message.”

“Yeah that. I kind of regretted it after I left it,” she said, settling into a molded plastic chair across from the detectives, who were now seated with the dog on the sofa.

“Sienna,” Paul said, “let’s go over what you told us.”

“You mean about her telling me she was going to run away? Hated her mom. I know that sounds ugly, but I just had to say it. I saw Diana crying on TV and it made me puke. Those two hated each other.”

“Really. And you know this how?”

“We used to work together. Before she went big-time and got the Starbucks job.”

“Where was that?”

“Food court. I was, still am, at Hot Dog on Stick. She was over at Mandarin Wok,” she said. Grace’s eyes landed on the ridiculous hat that was placed on top of the rest of Sienna’s work clothes.

“Don’t say how dumb the uniform is. I already know.”

Grace smiled. “No, I won’t. So you were friends with her?”

“Not BFFs, but pretty tight.”

“And she told her that she hated her mom?”

“Yeah. It was no big deal. I hate my mom, too.”

Grace nodded. She pretended to understand, when of course, she didn’t. She always loved her mother.

“Anyway, she started telling me about her mom being sick and demanding. How she didn’t get go to college because her mom was such a bitch about everything. A total control freak. One time she told me that she thought her mom was crazy enough to have faked her cancer just to keep her around.”

“That’s a pretty ugly thing to say,” Paul said.

Sienna shrugged it off. “So, ever heard of the ugly truth?”

“You said on the message that you thought she was a runaway. Why do you think that?”

“Because she told me she was going to.”