Harlan Coben - Caught

"But?"

Noel Wheeler stayed silent. He did not look at his wife.

"But better safe than sorry, is that it?"

Jenna said, "Dan felt it was best not to come around. So the neighbors wouldn't gossip."

Noel kept his eyes on the carpet.

"And," she continued, "I would still like to know what this has to do with anything."

"We would like to talk with your daughter Amanda," Frank said.

That got their attention. Jenna jumped first, but something made her stop. She looked toward Noel. Tremont wondered why. Step-mother syndrome, he figured. Noel Wheeler was, after all, the real parent here.

Noel said, "Detective… Tremont, is it?"

Frank nodded, not bothering to correct the terminology-it was investigator, not detective, but half the time, hell, he mixed them up.

"We've been willing to cooperate," Noel went on. "I will answer any and every question you have. But now you're involving my daughter. Do you have a child, Detective?"

With his peripheral vision, Frank Tremont could see Mickey Walker shifting his feet uneasily. Walker knew, though Tremont had never told him. Tremont never talked about Kasey.

"No, I don't."

"If you want to talk to Amanda, I really need to know what's going on."

"Fair enough." Tremont took his time, let the silence make them squirm a bit. When he thought the timing was right, he said, "Do you know who Haley McWaid is?"

"Yes, of course," Jenna said.

"We think your ex-husband did something to her."

Silence.

Jenna said, "When you say 'did something-' "

"Kidnapped, molested, abducted, murdered," Frank snapped. "Is that specific enough for you, Mrs. Wheeler?"

"I just want to know-"

"And I don't care what you want to know. I also don't give a rat's ass about Dan Mercer or his reputation or even who killed him. I only care about him insomuch as he relates to Haley McWaid."

"Dan wouldn't hurt anyone."

Frank felt the vein in his forehead throb. "Oh, why didn't you say so? I might as well just take your word for it and go home then, right? Forget the mountain of evidence that he snatched your daughter, Mr. and Mrs. McWaid-his ex-wife says he wouldn't hurt anyone."

"There's no reason to get snippy," Noel said, in that doctor voice he probably used on patients.

"Actually, Dr. Wheeler, there is every reason to get snippy. As you pointed out so clearly earlier, you're a father, aren't you?"

"Yes, of course."

"Well, imagine that your Amanda had been missing for three months-and the McWaids were jerking me around like this. How would you react?"

Jenna said, "We're just trying to understand-"

But again her husband silenced her with a hand on her knee. Noel shook his head at her and shouted, "Amanda!"

Jenna Wheeler sat back as a sullen teen voice from upstairs called back, "Coming!"

They waited. Jenna looked at Noel. Noel looked at the carpet.

"Question for both of you," Frank Tremont said. "To your knowledge, did Dan know or ever encounter Haley McWaid?"

Jenna said, "No."

"Dr. Wheeler?"

He shook his head with the unruly hair as his daughter appeared. Amanda was tall, skinny; her body and head seemed elongated, as though giant hands had squeezed the clay on either side. It may be a cruel word to bandy about, but the one that came to mind here was "gawky." She stood with her big hands in front of her, as though she were naked and being inspected and wanted to cover up. Her eyes were everywhere other than on someone else's eyes.

Her father rose and crossed the room. He put a protective arm around her and led her to the couch. He placed his daughter between Jenna and himself. Jenna too put her arm around her stepdaughter. Frank waited a few moments, letting them coo words of comfort.

"Amanda, I'm Investigator Tremont. This is Sheriff Walker. We need to ask you a few questions. You're not in any trouble, so please relax. We just need you to answer the questions as honestly and directly as you can, okay?"

Amanda did a quick nod. Her eyes darted about like two scared birds seeking a safe perch. Her parents huddled in closer, leaned a little forward, wanting to take the hit for her.

"Do you know Haley McWaid?" Frank asked.

The teen seemed to shrink right before his eyes. "Yeah."

"How?"

"School."

"Would you say that you two are friends?"

Amanda gave him the teenage shrug. "We were lab partners in AP chemistry."

"Was that this year?"

"Yeah."

"How did that come about?"

Amanda seemed confused by the question.

"Did you two choose each other?"

"No. Mrs. Walsh assigns it."

"I see. Did you two get along?"

"Yeah, sure. Haley's real nice."

"Has she ever been to your house?"

Amanda hesitated here. "Yeah."

"Lots of times?"

"No, just once."

Frank Tremont sat back, gave it a second. "Could you tell me when?"

The girl looked to her father. He nodded. "It's okay."

Amanda turned back to Tremont. "Thanksgiving."

Frank watched Jenna Wheeler. She gave away nothing, but he could see it was an effort. "Why was Haley here?"

Another teenage shrug. "Just hanging out," Amanda said.

"But on Thanksgiving? She wasn't with her family?"

Jenna Wheeler explained. "It was after. The girls all had Thanksgiving dinner with their families and came over here late. There was no school the next day."

Jenna's voice seemed to come from far away now. Flat, lifeless. Frank kept his eyes on Amanda. "What time would that have been?"

Amanda thought about it. "I don't know. She got here about ten."

"How many girls were there?"

"Four. Bree and Jody were here too. We hung out in the basement."

"After Thanksgiving?"

"Yeah."

Frank waited. When no one volunteered, he asked the obvious question: "Was Uncle Dan here for Thanksgiving?"

Amanda didn't answer. Jenna sat very still.

"Was he here?" Tremont asked again.

Noel Wheeler leaned forward, lowered his hands into his face. "Yes," he said. "Dan was here on Thanksgiving."

POPS GROUSED THE entire way home. "I had that shawty in the palm of my hand."

"Sorry." Then: "Shawty?"

"I like to keep up on modern terms for chicks."

"Good to keep up."

"You should only know."

"Please don't elaborate."

"Oh, I won't," Pops said. "So this is important?"

"Yup. Sorry you lost your shawty."

"Fish, sea." Pop shrugged. "You know the deal."

"I do."

Wendy hurried into the house. Charlie was flipping channels with two of his buds, Clark and James. They were sprawled on the den furniture as only teenage boys can, as though they'd removed their skeletons, hung them in a nearby closet, and slid to a collapse against whatever upholstery was nearby.

"Hey," Charlie said without moving anything but his lips. "You're home early."

"Right, don't get up."

He smirked. Clark and James muttered, "Hey, Mrs. Tynes." They didn't move their bodies, but they at least rolled their necks to get a glance. Charlie stopped on her suddenly former station. The NTC News was on. Michele Feisler, the annoying, new, and very young anchor they should have fired instead of Wendy, was reporting a follow-up to a story from a couple of days ago about a man named Arthur Lemaine who had been shot in both knees while leaving the South Mountain Arena in West Orange.

"Ouch," Clark said.

"Like one knee wouldn't be enough."

Arthur Lemaine, Michele recapped in that pseudo-serious news-woman inflection Wendy hoped that she didn't have, had been shot following a late-night practice. The camera now panned over the South Mountain Arena, even showing the sign that said the New Jersey Devils practiced here-like that added something important to the story.

The camera came back to a properly grim Michele Feisler at the anchor desk.