Харлан Кобен - The Boy from the Woods

Rola met him by the Maynards’ security gate in a golf cart.

“I’ll drive you up to Hester.”

He sat beside her as they started up the drive. The grounds were overmanicured. Many would find that beautiful. Wilde did not. Nature paints her canvas, then you come along and think you can improve it. No. Nature is supposed to be, pardon the wordage, wild. You tame it, you lose what makes it special.

After he filled her in, Rola asked, “So what do you need from me?”

“The ransom note.”

“What about it?”

“It asked specifically for the ‘oldest’ tapes.”

“Meaning?”

“The first time Dash Maynard met Rusty Eggers was in DC when they were Capitol Hill interns. See if you can find out anything about that time period.”

“Like what?”

“Like I have no idea. Did they room together? Hang out? It’s a long shot, I admit.”

“I’ll put some researchers on it.”

“Also, see if you can locate Saul Strauss. He has to be Suspect Number One here.”

“Okay. Anything else?”

Wilde thought about it and then figured better safe than sorry. “I need you to go to Naomi Pine’s house when it gets dark.”

Rola looked at him. “Weren’t you just there?”

“I need the place searched.”

“For?”

“Crash and Naomi.”

Rola nodded. “On it.”

Hester sat alone on a stone bench facing the Manhattan skyline. As Wilde approached, she turned toward him and shaded her eyes. With her other hand she patted the concrete. “Sit with me.”

He did. For a moment, neither of them spoke. They just stared at the skyline over the trees. The sun was at the height where everything — buildings, trees, formations — looked like it had angel halos.

“Nice,” Hester said.

“Yes.”

“And boring.” Hester turned to him. “You want to go first?”

“No.”

“Didn’t think so,” Hester said. Then: “I talked to Arnie Poplin.”

She filled him in.

“Killed someone,” Wilde said when she finished.

“That’s what he claims he heard.”

“I assume you weren’t the first person he told this to.”

“I would highly doubt it.”

“So why hasn’t anyone reported it?”

“Because Arnie Poplin is an attention-seeking, unreliable drug addict with an axe to grind.”

“Okay.”

“Journalists would be wary of him under any conditions, but Rusty Eggers rides the refs better than anyone.”

“Rides the refs?”

Hester squinted into the sun. “A good friend of mine was a star basketball player in college. A first-round draft pick out of Duke. You a basketball fan at all?”

“No.”

“Then you wouldn’t know him. Anyway, he’s taken me to a few games at Madison Square Garden. College mostly. You know what I always notice?”

Wilde shook his head.

“The way the coaches rant and scream at the referees. These little men in their suits and ties spend the entire game running up and down the sidelines, having nonstop tantrums like toddlers wanting candy. It’s embarrassing to watch. So I asked my friend, the basketball star, what was that all about, and he said it’s an intentional strategy. People by nature want to be liked. Not you, not me. But people in general. So if you scream at the refs every time they blow the whistle on you — legitimate or not — they are more likely to give you a call.”

Wilde nodded. “And that’s what Rusty does with the media.”

“Exactly. He constantly berates them and so they cringe and get scared, to keep within the metaphor, to blow the whistle. All politicians do it, of course. Rusty is just better at it.”

“We should still confront Dash with what Arnie Poplin told you.”

“Done already.”

“And?”

Hester shrugged. “What do you think? Dash denied it. He called it ‘rubbish.’ He actually used the word too. Rubbish.”

“Unfortunate. Your takeaway?”

“Same as yours.”

“They’re hiding something.”

“Right.” She patted his leg. “Okay, bubbalah , so what did you learn?”

Wilde started by telling her what Bernard Pine said about his ex-wife abusing Naomi. Hester just shook her head. “This world.”

“Something isn’t sitting right with that.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know,” Wilde said. “I still think we need to talk to Naomi’s mother. I told Rola to find her.”

“Good. What else?”

Wilde told her about the app communication between Crash and maybe Naomi as well as Ava’s conversations with Naomi about a budding relationship between the two teens.

“All signs point to Crash and Naomi being together,” Hester said.

Wilde said nothing.

“So let’s say that’s true for the moment,” she continued. “Let’s say these two teens secretly fell for each other and decided to run off.”

“Okay.”

Hester shrugged. “How does that turn into a ransom demand?”

Wilde didn’t reply. He checked the time. “Less than an hour to the kidnapper’s deadline. Should we head inside?”

“They said to meet at 3:45 p.m. in the library.”

“They, meaning Dash and Delia Maynard?”

“Yes.”

“Any idea what they plan on doing?”

“They don’t want to tell us until then.”

Wilde looked back at the view. “That’s not normal.”

“No, it’s not.”

They both faced the view now. Hester closed her eyes and let the rays warm her.

“How to put this delicately,” Hester said.

Wilde kept his eyes on the distant skyscrapers. “Delicately,” he repeated. “Not your forte, Hester.”

“True, so here goes: I was thinking about spending the night at Laila’s, but I don’t want to sleep over if you are.”

Wilde couldn’t help but smile. “I definitely won’t be.”

“Oh.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to stay though.”

“Oh,” Hester said. And then again: “ Oh . Really?”

Wilde said nothing.

“Can I be nosey?”

“I assume that’s a rhetorical question.”

“It’s been six years since we really communicated.”

“I’m sorry about that,” he said.

“Me too, and I hope it’s not because of David.”

David. Saying the name out loud stilled even the trees.

“I don’t blame you. I never have. You understand that, right?”

Wilde didn’t answer. “Is that what you want to be nosey about?”

“No,” Hester said. “I won’t say you’re like a son to me because that’s way over the top. I have three sons. They’re the only ones like a son to me. But I was there from the beginning — from the first day you came out of the woods. We were all there. Me. Ira. David, of course.”

“You were very good to me,” Wilde said.

“That’s not why I’m raising this either, so let me put it bluntly. Those online DNA genealogy tests have become super popular. I even took one a few years ago.”

“Any surprises?”

“Not a one. I’m so boring.”

“But you want to know if I took one,” he said.

“It’s been six years,” she said. “So yes, I want to know if you took one.”

“I did. Very recently, as a matter of fact.”

“Any surprises?”

“Not a one. I’m so boring too.”

“Seriously?”

“No parents or siblings. The closest thing was a second cousin.”

“That’s a start,” she said.

Wilde shook his head. “No, Hester, it’s not. If you’re looking for a missing kid — son, brother, whatever — you’d be on that DNA site. No one is looking for me, ergo no one cares. I don’t mean that in a pity-me way. But they left a small child alone in those woods for years—”

“You don’t know that,” Hester said, interrupting.