Ramona Richards - The Taking Of Carly Bradford

“Directions said—”

“This is faster.”

Fletcher followed Tyler’s instructions, letting a few seconds of silence pass. “You know, I can be distracted, but I don’t forget.”

“Take the next left. We need to focus on the case.”

In the silence that followed, Patty stuck her head between the front seats and Tyler scratched her chin. “OK. Go ahead and say it.”

Fletcher remained silent.

Tyler filled in the empty air. “This makes Dee’s claim a lot more credible.” He pointed at another street.

Fletcher turned the corner, still quiet.

“Do you have any idea when I’ll stop screwing up this case? I should have jumped on those shoes and got them to the lab last night.”

Fletcher glanced sideways again, then back to the road. “Don’t give yourself so much credit. You’re not screwing up anymore than the rest of us. This case is a jumbled mess and has been since Day One. You were right not to send the shoes last night. You know as well as I do how many false reports we’ve had about the shoes. It would be worse to jump the gun on these, especially given how fragile Nancy Bradford is right now. We need to find out if they are Carly’s before we stir anything else up.” Fletcher took a deep breath. “What I want to know is why pieces of Carly Bradford’s last known set of clothes are suddenly being scattered up and down the same stream of water.”

Tyler’s gut twisted. “She’s dead, and her killer is getting rid of evidence.”

“But if Dee is right, then the shoes were a mistake. They weren’t meant to be dropped. Her attacker was trying to get them back.”

A sliver of hope rose again in Tyler. “But…once they were found and turned over to us, we’d know Carly might still be in the area. We’d renew our search for her. This time maybe even more intensively.”

Fletcher turned the car into a subdivision and slowed, searching for the right street. “So the best way to keep us busy is to leave a trail leading in the wrong direction. A distraction.”

Tyler stared at his friend. “She’s going to be moved.”

Fletcher nodded. “Most likely. And if we’re not careful, it’ll happen while we’re peering into trash cans and following accident victims to the hospital.”

Tyler let out a long sigh as Fletcher parked the car behind Wayne’s cruiser. “Then we need to move on the shoes quickly. I’ll call Rick when we’re through here.”

“We’re definitely going to need his resources as well as any manpower he can spare.”

Tyler nodded and got out of the car. Rick Davis was the FBI special agent who had worked with them on the initial investigation. The FBI didn’t usually investigate local cases of missing children unless there was absolute proof of foul play or immediate danger to the child. There had been no Amber alert on Carly for the same reason. Children who disappear into the woods don’t usually have help doing so. They get lost; they have accidents. Tyler, however, put in a request for the FBI to help with the case as soon as he was convinced Carly hadn’t just wandered off. His officers, the FBI and the local press turned the town into a fortress. The square-foot-by-square-foot search of the town lasted ten days. As the time passed, hope drained from the town and the officers. Rick and his team had finally left when they found themselves sitting around the police station one day doing nothing but reviewing old files and going through the interview transcripts yet one more time. There wasn’t even enough evidence for a profile of a suspect. The case had simply come to an absolute dead end.

As if Carly had just vanished from the face of the earth. Until now.

Jenna Czock waited for them on the front stoop of her two-story Federal-style house. The boxlike home sat close to the road, but had a backyard comprising almost an acre of land. To the right of the house, a separate, more modern garage had a dark blue, mid-size sedan in front of it.

They pulled up behind it and got out, leaving the windows down for Patty. At Tyler’s strict “Stay!” the dog stretched out on the backseat. Jenna came down the steps to greet them, looking like someone who’d just gotten home from work, with her red oxford cloth shirt, charcoal-gray slacks, and the thick makeup some older women seemed to prefer. A fleeting smile creased a worried face, and she motioned for them to follow her around the side of the house. She used a flashlight to augment the flood lights that shone from beneath the eaves of the house.

“I hated to bother you, and I’m hoping this isn’t what I think…that it’s just trash. I usually check the can just to see if there’s room for another bag, and this was on top, just lying there. I’ve been following the case and listening to what the folks are saying around town. Everyone’s still talking about that precious little girl.”

They reached the back of the house, and Jenna pointed at a latticework cage set back from the house about forty feet. “The cans stay back there. I had that built for the garbage and the firewood. Cuts down on the raccoons in the garbage and the snow on the firewood.”

Raccoons, indeed, thought Tyler. This backyard must be a haven for them. Towering old trees dotted the richly green and well-tended lawn, many of them surrounded by flowerbeds ripe with new spring flowers. The cage, with its slanted roof, had vines of clematis and morning glories running up its sides, allowing it to blend into the landscape. The yard had a gentle but steady slope from the house to the stream at the back of the property. Yellow dots of fireflies danced among the bushes at the edge of the water.

“People walk their dogs along the stream almost every day.” Jenna pointed to a well-worn path that edged the water. “Even after dark like this. And there are two hiking trails on the other side that run close.” She shrugged and hugged herself as she followed them toward the cage, where Wayne had set up a bright spotlight on a tall mount. “It’s just not unusual to see people in my backyard, but I should have realized this one was up closer than most. I just didn’t dream someone would get into my garbage.”

“Man or woman?”

Jenna shrugged. “Not sure. It was already pretty dark. It looked as if they were wearing a cap, maybe sweats. Somewhere between my height and yours, I guess.”

“So about five-nine, five-ten.”

Jenna nodded. “I’m five-eight, so yes.”

They rounded the edge of the lattice, to find Wayne bent over next to the cage’s opening, peering at the ground illuminated by the white light of the quartz spot he had set up. He spoke without greeting. “Only one set of prints, but it’s been pretty dry the last couple of days. Doesn’t match either of the sets in the woods.”

Tyler cleared his throat, and Wayne looked up at Tyler, puzzled, then his gaze darted to Jenna and back to his boss.

Jenna perked up. “In the woods?” She grabbed Tyler’s elbow. “Does this have anything to do with Dee being attacked this morning?”

Fletcher let out a long sigh and squatted next to Wayne. “Small town.”

Before Tyler could respond, Jenna bolted on. “Phil, down at the convenience store, had the scanner on this morning, heard it and called his sister, she works at the hospital, saw Dee in the E.R. Is she OK?”

Tyler patted her hand. “She’ll be fine. Just a few scratches.”

“Is she back at the retreat?”

Tyler nodded. “But—”

“I should send her some flowers. Roses, do you think?”

“Maybe—”

“Or tulips. I think she said one time in the café that she likes tulips. You know, she talked about how she used to grow tulips and—”

Fletcher straightened and cut off Jenna’s rapid words. “Ms. Czock, would you mind if I got a glass of water?”