Грег Иган: The Nearest

She walked down the passageway in the darkness, treading as lightly as she could. As she entered the nursery, she felt her skin prickling with horror, and she had to cover her mouth with her hand to keep herself silent. She stared at the shape in the cot, afraid to raise the phone and illuminate it, but when she finally found the courage, the harsh light made the revelation unbearable. She staggered back, then fled.

She ran into the bedroom and switched on the light. “What have you done to him?” she roared. “What have you done to my son?”

The intruder shielded his face with his arm and then lowered it and peered at her groggily. “Kate? What’s happened?” He climbed off the bed and approached her; she flinched away from him, raising one hand with her fist clenched. She didn’t need a weapon; she’d beat the truth out of him with her bare hands.

“Kate? Talk to me!” He stood, rooted to the spot, feigning concern. “Has something happened to Michael? Should I call an ambulance?”

“Don’t play games with me!” she bellowed. “Where have you taken him?”

“Are you saying he’s not in his cot?” The intruder rushed past her, out into the passageway; she followed him halfway, but couldn’t bring herself to go back into the nursery. He switched on the light, then after a while she heard him whispering, “Shh, pesaram, it’s all right.” So this man spoke Persian—or was he just mocking her? Had he bugged the house and listened to all the things she and Reza said?

He came out from the nursery and walked up to her. “He looks fine to me. What got you so worried?”

Kate said, “You have ten seconds to tell me where my son is.”

“Now you’re frightening me.” The intruder reached down and scratched his hip beneath the waistband of his shorts, as unselfconsciously as if he spent every night wandering half-naked through a different stranger’s house. “Are you sick?” He reached up to put his hand on Kate’s forehead; she grabbed his arm and twisted it, bringing him to his knees.

“What’s wrong with you?” he gasped, wincing from the pain but keeping himself from shouting, as if his greatest fear was “waking” the mechanical doll he’d planted in the cot. Kate got him in a choke hold; he went limp in her arms, not even trying to fight her.

“I swear I’ll kill you,” she said. “If you don’t take me to my son, I’ll slit your fucking throat and hang you from a meat hook.”

The man started weeping, his whole body shuddering as he sobbed. Kate stared down at his blubbering face, desperately clinging to the hope that whatever he’d done to Reza and Michael that had left him so ashamed, they were still alive somewhere. “Take me to them now, and I’ll say you cooperated. The quicker you do this, the better things will go for you.”

“All right,” he replied. He sounded utterly defeated. For someone who’d been so brazen just minutes before, he hadn’t taken long to fold.

Kate released him and stepped away. “So where are they?”

He clambered to his feet. “I need to call someone. They’ll bring them here.”

“No, no, no!” Kate spread her arms so he couldn’t get past her down the hall. She wasn’t having him summoning accomplices. “You take me to them, alone. Are they in the house?”

He hesitated. “No. We’ll need to take a drive.”

Kate stood in silence, trying to think. She should call for backup, get the fucker cuffed and under control. But if he stopped cooperating, what redress would she have? As soon as she got anyone else involved, there’d be no point threatening to gut him like a pig; he could sit in his prison cell, laughing, while Reza and Michael starved to death, or worse.

“All right,” she said. “So you’d better put some clothes on.”

She walked into the bedroom ahead of him and scooped up Reza’s phone. She’d half expected him to try to flee, but he followed close behind her and proceeded to dress in Reza’s clothes. Kate stood watching him, dazed; not only did the clothes fit him—well enough—his resemblance to her husband was striking, right down to the pattern of freckles on his shoulders and the way his uncombed hair stuck up at the side. But did the kidnappers really think that she’d be fooled by such superficial details?

“Turn around and face the wall,” she said. He complied, and she dressed quickly.

“Okay, I’m done. Come on.”

“Can we take…?” He gestured toward the nursery.

Kate scowled at him, disbelieving; she thought he was about to start crying again. “Why would we take that thing with us? I’ll put it out with the garbage.”

The intruder stared at her. “When you get back, with Michael?”

“Yes! It’s not a priority. Now, come on!”

He followed her out of the house; she unlocked the car and got into the driver’s seat. He joined her, and she reversed quickly onto the street.

“Which way?” she asked.

“South.”

She drove down to the corner and turned toward Gympie Road. There was no other traffic in sight, no lights showing in any of the houses. She glanced at the man, sitting meekly beside her in his borrowed clothes. “So, what was the plan?”

“What do you mean?”

“Were you going to ask for money? Or was this about fixing some case? You wanted me to tamper with evidence, or make a file disappear?”

He didn’t reply.

Kate laughed humorlessly. “And the idea that you could just lie down in my bed and that would buy some time to get them further away… for fuck’s sake, how stupid can you be? You might look a bit like my husband, but do you think I couldn’t tell the difference?”

The man said, “What gave me away?”

Kate shook her head. “One touch, and my skin crawled. So where are we going?”

“Herston.”

“Where in Herston? I’ll put it in the GPS.”

“I don’t know the name of the street, but I can give you directions once we’re closer.”

Kate wasn’t happy, but at this hour the drive wouldn’t take long. If he was messing with her, she’d know soon enough, and he’d regret it.

“How many of you are there?” she asked.

“Just me and my friend. And he won’t hurt anyone, I promise. I’d never have got involved if it was going to be like that.”

“So why did you do it at all?”

“It was his idea,” the man insisted. “I just went along with it.”

Kate frowned skeptically, but this wasn’t the time to start browbeating the only person who could reunite her with her family. Whether he was a simpleton who’d been led astray or a criminal genius who’d thought it was a good idea to climb into bed with her would be up to the investigating officers to decide, then the prosecutors, then a jury. Once Reza and Michael were safe, she would need to step back and leave everything to other people.

“How did you get Reza out of the house so quietly?”

“My friend drugged him.”

“With what, exactly?”

“Some liquid he put on a cloth. I don’t know what it was.”

Kate suspected he was lying; it sounded like something he’d seen in a movie, and if they’d tried it with chloroform Reza would have been struggling for so long it would have woken her ten times over.

“And how did you clowns even get into the house?”

“The spare key under the flowerpot.”

She fell silent. That was her fault; she should never have put it anywhere so obvious.

They were close to the city now; she could see the lights in the Aurora Tower ahead.