Jeffery Deaver - Speaking In Tongues

Wasn’t that reasonable? Of course it was. But it hadn’t been then, not to the Tate Collier of five years ago. Not to Tate Collier the whiz-kid commonwealth’s attorney, the man who spoke in tongues, the Judge’s grandson.

Why?

Because the thought of a killer depriving parents of their child was unbearable to him. That was the answer. That was all he thought. Someone stole away a girl just like Megan. And he had to die. To hell with justice.

Tate had never seen Peter’s father, Aaron Matthews, at the trial or hadn’t paid any attention to him if he’d been there. The man was a therapist, Tate remembered from reading the boy’s history and evaluations. Lived alone. His wife-a therapist as well, and reportedly more successful than her husband-had committed suicide some years before.

Aaron Matthews…

Well, he could give the police a name and address now. They’d find him. He only prayed Megan was still alive.

Now, in Konnie’s office, he dialed Bett’s home phone. Her voice mail gave her cell phone number and he dialed that. She didn’t answer. He left a message about what he’d learned and told her that he was at the county police station.

He started down the hall, striding the way he’d walked when he’d been a commonwealth’s attorney and cut up these offices as if he owned them, playing inquisitor to the young officers as he grilled them about their cases and the evidence they’d collected.

He pushed through the door to the Homicide Division and was surprised to see three startled detectives stop in the tracks of their conversations. He smiled ruefully, remembering only then that he was a trespasser.

One detective looked at another, an astonished gaze on his face.

“I’m sorry to barge in,” Tate began. “I’m Tate Collier. It’s about my daughter. I don’t know if you heard but she’s disappeared and-”

In less than twenty seconds he was facedown on a convenient desk, the handcuffs ratcheting onto his wrists with metallic efficiency, his Miranda rights floating down upon him from a gruff voice several feet above his head.

“What the hell’s going on?” he barked.

“You’re under arrest, Mr. Collier. Do you understand these rights as I’ve read them to you?”

“For what? What’re you arresting me for?”

“Do you understand your rights?”

“Yes, I understand my fucking rights. What for?”

“For murder, Mr. Collier, The murder of Amy Walker. If you’ll come this way, please.”

She cradled him, sobbing.

Megan had eased Joshua LeFevre into the pale light from the outside lamp. He was even more badly injured than she’d thought at first-terribly battered-riddled with slashes and bite marks, the wounds crusted with dirt and dried blood. One eye was swollen completely closed, Most of his dreads had been torn off his scalp, which was covered with mud and scabs.

He could speak only in a ghostly, snapping wail. No, it hadn’t been Peter Matthews’s leering voice she’d heard; it was Josh’s. His throat was split open and his vocal cords had apparently been cut. When he breathed, air hissed in through both his mouth and the slash. The bleeding seemed to have stopped but she bound the denim rope around his throat anyway. She could think of nothing else to do.

“Thought it was you,” he gasped. “I couldn’t see. My eyes, my eyes. I thought it was you. But you didn’t answer.”

Megan lowered her head to his chest. “I thought you were his son. I thought you were going to kill me. Oh, Josh, what happened? Was it the dogs? Outside?” He nodded, shivered-from the pain, she guessed, as much as the cold.

“That… man?” he struggled to ask. “He kidn-”

She nodded. “Did you call the police?”

“No,” he gasped. “I didn’t know what was going on. I stopped him but he tricked me He coughed for a moment. “Thought you… thought you were going with him.”

“What happened?” she asked tearfully.

The stuttering explanation: he’d followed her and Matthews here then the doctor had attacked him and left him for the dogs. But before they could finish him off a young deer had trotted past and they left Josh to pull her down.

His beautiful voice, Megan thought, crying. It’s gone. She had to look away from his face.

He’d found a metal rod to use as a cane, he continued, and made his way into the hospital to find a phone. But there weren’t any. Then he learned that the doors didn’t open outward, that the place was a prison.

She gently touched a terrible wound on his face. Even if they managed to get him to a doctor soon would he survive? He’d lost so much blood.

“Were you… you weren’t his lover, were you?”

“What?” she blurted.

“He said you were. He said… He said you wanted to get rid of me.”

“Oh, Josh, no. It was… whatever he said, it was a lie.”

“Who is he?” LeFevre rasped.

“We don’t have time now. Can you walk?”

“No.” He breathed heavily and winced. “Can’t do anything. I’ve about had it.”

She pulled him farther into the alcove, hid him from view. “Wait here.”

“Where… you going?”

“Lie still, Josh. Be quiet. I’ll get something to use for bandages,” she said, rising.

“But he might be there.”

She showed him the glass knife. “I hope he is.”

“I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. But for God’s sake send somebody after my daughter.”

“Once more from the top, please, sir.”

Tate was still stunned from the news that Amy had been found naked and stabbed to death on Tate’s farm.

“There’s a man named Aaron Matthews. He drives a gray Mercedes. He lives on Sully Field, off Route twenty-nine near Manassas. He’s been following my daughter for the past couple weeks. Or months. I don’t know. And-”

“We’ve got our own agenda here, Collier,” the young homicide detective-a dead ringer for the security guard at Megan’s high school- said gruffly, his patience gone. “You don’t mind, we got a lotta ground to cover.”

“Is Ted Beauridge around?”

“No. One more time, sir. From the top.”

He was in an interrogation cubicle and he was perched on an uncomfortable metal chair. At least the cuffs were off.

“Matthews killed Amy. Megan had told her about being followed. He thought she might have some information-maybe he just killed her to get me out of the picture.”

And I gave him her name, Tate thought. He was sure the man who called from the FBI-special agent McComb-was Aaron Matthews, probing to get information to stop their search for the girl. He forced or tricked Megan into writing those notes and when they kept looking for her anyway, he turned on them.

“How’d you find out about the body?” Tate asked. “An anonymous call, right?”

The detectives looked at each other. They were slim and in perfect shape. Shoes polished, guns tucked neatly away. Law enforcement machines.

“It was Matthews who called. Don’t you get it?”

“Her mother said you’d been stalking Amy. That Child Protective Services has been investigating you.”

“What? That’s bullshit. Call them.”

“On Saturday night, sir? We’ll call on Monday.”

“We don’t have until Monday.”

The cop continued lethargically, “Mrs. Walker also said you tried to break into her house today.”

“Amy was going to give us Megan’s book bag. I knocked on the door and tried to open it when no one answered.”

“Uh-huh.”

“There is no Child Protective Services investigation. It’s him! It’s Matthews. He’s trying to stop me from finding Megan. Can’t you see?”

“Not exactly, sir. No.”