Amanda Stevens - The Innocent

Sara Beth’s mama would cry, too. She’d cry and cry and cry, and the thought of that, more than anything else, made Sara Beth start to sob.

Thursday

Abby sat in the sheriff’s office the next day, waiting for him to arrive. She was bone-deep weary from a nearly sleepless seventy-two hours, and frustrated and heartsick over two investigations that appeared to be going nowhere. No trace of either child had turned up despite a full-scale search, and no evidence had been found at either crime scene. Dozens of leads were being pursued, but so far, nothing concrete had turned up.

Both cases were now being treated as abductions, and the local authorities had requested assistance from the FBI. An agent from the resident agency in Oxford had arrived late yesterday afternoon, just hours after Sara Beth Brodie had been reported missing, and another agent was due to arrive later today from the field office in Jackson.

A task force had been assembled, headed by the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department and supported by the FBI and the Mississippi Highway Patrol Crime Investigation Bureau.

Abby had been assigned to the Brodie case, although she’d asked to be put on the Campbell case. Naomi had been right yesterday when she’d said that Emily’s disappearance on the anniversary of Sadie’s abduction was the first break they’d had in ten years. Sadie’s case file had already been pulled and the information fed into the computer for analysis and comparisons.

But it was Abby’s own theory that had gotten her removed from the Campbell case. She didn’t believe, as almost everyone else seemed to, that they were dealing with only one suspect in the two recent abductions. Although ten years apart, the similarities between Sadie and Emily’s disappearances were striking, but Sara Beth Brodie’s abduction broke the pattern.

“You may be on to something,” Sheriff Mooney had told her. “I want you to pursue the Brodie case from that angle, but you’ll have to coordinate your investigation with the task force. And it goes without saying that all information will be shared.”

The glass door of the office opened, and Sheriff Mooney walked in. When he saw Abby, he nodded. “Good, you’re already here. That’ll save us some time.”

He was followed into the office by a man Abby had never seen before. The stranger was tall, dark, but far more dangerous-looking than handsome. In spite of the August heat, which could be brutal in Mississippi, he wore a navy suit, starched white shirt, and conservative tie. Abby immediately pegged him for the fed from Jackson they’d been expecting.

Even apart from his attire, he had the look of an FBI agent. His posture was ramrod straight, his demeanor tense, his senses on full alert. He was probably in his early forties, with dark hair and a deeply lined face that bespoke too many years of long hours, bad cases, and maybe just plain bad luck.

When he trained his gray eyes on Abby, a slight chill rippled through her. In her five years in law enforcement, she’d never encountered a colder gaze.

Sheriff Mooney lumbered around his desk and sat down heavily in a leather chair that squealed ominously beneath his bulk. “Abby, I’d like you to meet Special Agent Sam Burke. Abby—Sergeant Cross—is a detective in our Criminal Investigations Division.”

Abby rose and extended her hand. “Special Agent Burke.”

The man nodded in her direction, but barely took the time to shake her hand before turning back to the sheriff. But in that moment when their eyes met, in that second when his hand touched hers, the chill inside Abby deepened. There was something unsettling about the way he looked at her, about the way she reacted to the feel of his hand against hers.

Special Agent Sam Burke was a very dangerous man, Abby thought. In more ways than one.

“Have a seat.” Sheriff Mooney leaned back in his own chair to observe Burke with unveiled curiosity. “We weren’t expecting you until late this evening.”

“I caught an early flight,” the agent explained, waiting for Abby to sit before he lowered himself into the chair across from Sheriff Mooney’s desk. But even seated, he didn’t relax. Every muscle in his body appeared coiled and taut.

Sheriff Mooney frowned. “You flew up from Jackson?”

“I flew in to Memphis from Washington, then rented a car and drove down.”

“Washington?” Both Sheriff Mooney and Abby stared at Agent Burke in surprise. “We were expecting someone from the Jackson office. Didn’t realize FBI Headquarters paid that much attention to the goings-on down here in our fair state.”

“Didn’t you?” Sam Burke’s gaze never wavered from the sheriff’s face. “I seem to recall the Bureau was pretty active down here back in the sixties.”

A little dig, Abby thought, to put them in their place.

It was apparent from his attitude that Special Agent Burke considered them a bunch of incompetent hicks. Abby doubted that even her degrees in psychology and criminology from Ole Miss would convince him otherwise. Her dander was thoroughly ruffled by the man’s demeanor, but Sheriff Mooney seemed to take it all in stride. But then, he would. It wasn’t his style to worry about the opinion of some self-inflated federal agent.

If you only went by appearances, it would be easy to underestimate Fred Mooney. He was on the back side of fifty, seventy pounds overweight, and his uniform generally consisted of a faded golf shirt—he had them in every color—that stretched tightly over his gut and didn’t always quite meet the low-riding waistband of his trousers. His hair was always rumpled, as if he constantly ran his fingers through it, and his passion—aside from fishing—was his grandchildren, which he talked about incessantly. He had dozens of their pictures displayed on the wall behind his desk, along with an autographed photo of Elvis Presley and a recent snapshot taken with Senator Trent Lott.

The office, like the man who occupied it, was a bit of a mess, and Abby could only imagine the impression both made on Special Agent Burke. But Abby had never met a law-enforcement officer she respected or admired more than Fred Mooney. He knew how to handle the media, too, which had descended in droves since Sara Beth’s disappearance. Abby would match the sheriff’s savvy against anyone’s, including one arrogant FBI agent she could name.

“Wherever you’re from, we’re glad to have you.” Sheriff Mooney clasped his hands over his middle. “We can sure use the help. We’ve got two missing kids, and I don’t mind telling you, we don’t have any solid leads. One of the little girls has been gone for nearly seventy-two hours, the other almost twenty-four hours. Time is working against us here.”

He was right, Abby thought grimly. Time was the enemy in abductions.

“They’re both five years old, white, no distinguishing marks or disfigurements,” he continued. “They were in the same kindergarten class at Fairhaven Academy, a private school on the north side of town. We think the school is the connection.”

“It’s a natural assumption,” Agent Burke agreed with a curt nod. “But assumptions can be a dangerous thing. What about witnesses?”

“None so far, although we keep going back, interviewing anyone we can think of who might have been in the area at the time. We’re also running a background check on all school personnel, including the director, Lois Sheridan, and the girls’ teacher, Vickie Wilder. Lois Sheridan was the director ten years ago when the first abduction took place.”

“First abduction?”

Again Abby and Sheriff Mooney regarded the agent in surprise. “You don’t know about the first one? We sent a fairly lengthy fax to the Jackson office. They didn’t brief you?” the sheriff asked.