James Patterson - The 6th Target

The frog voice was back.

"Tell her parents they made a big mistake calling the police. Call off the dogs," said the caller, "or we'll hurt Madison. Permanently. If you back off, she'll stay alive and well, but either way, the Tylers will never see their daughter again."

And then the phone went dead.

"Hello? Hello ?"

I jiggled the hook until I got a dial tone, then I slammed the phone down.

"Brenda, get the Call Center."

"What was that? 'They made a big mistake calling the police ?" Conklin shouted. "Lindsay, did that little girl sound like Madison?"

"Jesus Christ, I couldn't tell. I don't know ."

"What the hell ?" Conklin said, hurling a phone book against the wall.

I felt dizzy, physically sick.

Was Madison really fine?

What did it mean that her parents shouldn't have called the police? Had there been a ransom demand or a phone call that we didn't know about?

Everyone in the squad room was looking at me, and Jacobi was standing behind me, literally breathing down my neck, when the radio room called back with the result of the phone trace.

The caller had used a no-name cell phone, and the location couldn't be traced.

"The voice was altered," I told Jacobi. "I'll send the tape to the lab."

"Before you do that, get the parents to listen to it. Maybe we can get a positive ID on the child's voice."

"Could still be a sicko getting his rocks off," Conklin said as Jacobi walked away.

"I hope that's what it is. Because we're not 'calling off the dogs.' Not even close."

I couldn't say what I was thinking.

That we'd just heard Madison Tyler's last words.

BRENDA FREGOSI HAD BEEN the homicide squad assistant for some years and, at only twenty-five years old, was a natural mother hen.

She was clucking sympathetically as I spoke to Henry Tyler on the phone, and when I hung up, she handed me a message slip.

I read her spiky handwriting: " Claire wants you to come to the hospital at six this evening ."

It was almost six now.

"How did she sound?" I asked.

"Fine, I think."

"Is this all she said?"

"This is what she said exactly: 'Brenda, please tell Lindsay to come to the hospital at six. Thanks a lot.' "

I'd just seen Claire yesterday. What was wrong ?

I drove toward San Francisco General, my mind swirling with terrible, sinking thoughts. Claire once told me this thing about brain chemistry, the nub of it being that when you're feeling good, you can't ever imagine feeling bad again. And when you're feeling bad, it's impossible to imagine a time when you won't be circling the drain.

As I sucked on an Altoids, a little girl's voice was crying, "Mommy," in my head, and it was mixed up with the bad knee-jerk reaction I had to hospitals ever since my mother died in one almost fifteen years ago.

I parked in the hospital lot on Pine, thinking about how good it had been having Joe to talk to when I felt this low, frustrated from three days of staggering blindly into dead ends.

My thoughts turned back to Claire as I stepped into the hospital elevator. I stared at my fried reflection in the stainless steel doors. I fluffed my bangs uselessly as the car climbed upward, then when the doors slid open, I stepped out into the antiseptic stink and cold white light of the post-op unit.

I wasn't the first to arrive at Claire's room. Yuki and Cindy had already moved chairs up to her bed, and Claire was sitting up, wearing a flowered nightgown and a Mona Lisa smile on her face.

The Women's Murder Club was assembled – but why?

"Hey, everyone," I said, walking around the bed, kissing cheeks. "You look gorgeous," I said to Claire, my relief that this wasn't a life-support emergency bringing me almost to the point of giddiness. "What's the occasion?"

"She wouldn't tell until you got here," Yuki said.

"Okay, okay!" Claire said. "I do have an announcement to make."

"You're pregnant ," said Cindy.

Claire burst out laughing, and we all looked at Cindy.

"You're crazy, girl reporter," I said. A baby was the last thing Claire needed at age forty-three, with two near-grown-up sons.

"Give us a clue," Yuki blurted out. "Give us a category."

"You guys! Stomping on my surprise with your cleats on," said Claire, still laughing.

Cindy, Yuki, and I swiveled our heads toward her.

"I had some blood work done," said Claire. "And Miss Cindy, as usual, is right ."

"Ha!" Cindy cried out.

Claire said, "If I hadn't been in this hospital, I probably wouldn't have even known I was pregnant until I started having contractions."

We were all yelling now. "What did you say?" "You're not putting us on?" "How far along are you?"

"The sonogram shows that my little one is fine," said Claire, serene as a Buddha. " My wonder child !"

I HAD TO PULL MYSELF AWAY from the celebration, overdue as I was for Tracchio's meeting back at the Hall. As I entered his office, the chief was offering leather-upholstered armchairs to the Tylers, while Jacobi, Conklin, and Macklin dragged up side chairs, circling the wagons around the chief's large desk.

The Tylers looked as if they'd been sleeping standing up for the last eighty-four hours. Their faces were gray, their shoulders slumped. I knew they were painfully suspended between hope and despair as they waited to hear the audiotape.

A tape recorder was set up on Tracchio's desk. I leaned over and pressed the play button, and a terrifying, evil voice alternating with mine filled the room.

A little girl's voice cried out, " Mommy? Mommy ?"

I pressed the recorder's stop key. Elizabeth Tyler reached out toward the tape recorder, then turned, grabbed her husband's arm, buried her face into his coat, and sobbed.

"Is that Madison's voice?" Tracchio asked.

Both parents nodded – yes.

Jacobi said, "The rest of this tape is going to be even more difficult for you to hear. But we're feeling optimistic. When this call came in, your daughter was alive."

I pressed the play button again, watched the Tylers' faces as they heard the kidnapper say that Madison was fine but that she would never be seen again.

"Mr. and Mrs. Tyler, do you have any idea why the kidnapper said you 'made a big mistake calling the police'?" I asked.

"No idea at all," Henry Tyler snapped. "Why would they feel threatened? You've turned up nothing . You don't even have a suspect . Where is the FBI? Why aren't they trying to find Madison?"

Macklin said, "We are working with the FBI. We're using their sources and their databases, but the FBI won't actively work this case unless we have some reason to believe that Madison was taken out of state."

"So tell them that she was!"

Jacobi said, "Mr. Tyler, what we're asking is, did you receive a communication from the kidnapper telling you not to call the police? Anything like that happen?"

"Nothing," said Elizabeth Tyler. "Henry? Did you hear from them at the office?"

"Not a word. I swear."

I was thinking about Paola Ricci as I looked at the Tylers. I said, "You told us that Paola Ricci was highly recommended. Who recommended her?"

Elizabeth Tyler leaned forward. "Paola came to us directly through her service."

"What kind of service is that?" Macklin asked, stress showing in the grinding of his jaw.

"It's an employment agency," said Elizabeth Tyler. "They screen, sponsor, and train well-bred girls from overseas. They get their work papers and find them jobs. Paola had tremendous references from the agency and from back home in Italy. She was a very proper young woman. We loved her."