Cody McFadyen - Abandoned

I sit down on the edge of the tub. I want to call for Alan, but I seem to have lost my voice. All I can do is stare.

It’s Dana Hollister; I recognize her from the black-and-white photograph. She’s nude. Her eyes are empty and they stare into nothing, and her open mouth yaws, hungering at the level of instinct only, the plastic tube falling out and away.

“Dana?” I whisper.

No reply. She continues to stare without seeing. Drool runs freely from her mouth, and everything about her is a slackness and a void. Something terrible moves through me, a mix of grief and rage and misery. I kneel down next to her and open the bag farther. I don’t care about the smell. I just want to touch her, so she knows she’s not alone, if there’s anything in her that is still aware. I reach into the bag and grab her hand. I cradle it in one of mine, and I reach out and stroke her forehead. There is no reaction. Her mouth opens and closes once, that smacking sound.

I notice a hole above her eye but within the socket, and a single full-body shiver rocks me.

Is that what I think it is? It’s something I’ve seen before.

When the other boy—the one I hadn’t checked yet because Dana had surprised me—cries out softly, I almost fall backward off the tub in sheer terror. I recover, and I crawl over to him and feel for a pulse. I find it, weak and thready but there. He coughs twice, and his eyes flutter.

“Alan!” I yell. “Get up here, please! Right now!”

I wait until I hear the heavy thuds of his shoes on the stairs, and then I let myself weep a little. Grief, anxiety, fear. I cradle the boy in my arms and thank God for his moans. They mean he is alive. Dana Hollister grunts once. The other child stares into the carpet with sightless eyes.

What we do is primordial.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Dana and Dylan Hollister have been taken away in an ambulance. I’ve arranged for them to go to the same hospital Heather is in. Avery Hollister has been confirmed dead.

My grief has fled, brushed aside by a hot wind of rage. I want to go and rip the arms and legs off Douglas Hollister, to put his eyes out, to tear out his tongue.

I feel a large hand on my shoulder. “Now is the time to interview Hollister,” Alan says. “He’s been read his rights; he’s not asking for a lawyer. If we’re going to get it out of him, we should strike while the iron’s hot.”

If I close my eyes and listen hard, I can still hear the ambulance sirens howling in the distance. “Do you want to transport him first?”

“No. The more time we give him to think, the greater the chance he lawyers up. I’ve already asked him. He’s agreed to be interviewed here. He even provided us with a video camera and a fresh tape.”

“Why is he being so cooperative?”

“He’s scared. He’s not the one who did that to Dana.”

I turn the ramifications of this over in my mind. “Let me make a call, and then, yes, let’s do the interview here.”

Callie is silent, processing what I’ve just told her about Dana and the Hollister boys.

“My, my,” she manages. “What do you want us to do?” She’s all business, flippancy put aside for now.

“Have James continue distilling the information from the case files. I want you to do a ViCAP search. We’re looking for similar crimes to Dana Hollister’s.”

“You think he’s done it before?”

“I don’t know, but what I do think is that it’s relatively unique. I think if he has done it before, it will definitely be in ViCAP and it will definitely be him.”

The Violent Criminal Apprehension Program was established by the FBI in 1985. It was a stroke of genius and has lived up to its name. It’s a cooperative endeavor. We provide participating law enforcement around the country with a form that can be filled out. I am always struck by the clinical contrast it provides to the reality of the horrors it records. It’s filled with if yes then go to item … directions, like some twisted tax return.

Were there elements of unusual or additional assault/trauma/torture to victim? Yes/No/Unknown. Assuming yes is checked, then question 88b follows, a laundry list of possible additional abuses: If yes, indicate what elements occurred (check all that apply and describe). Some possibles among many are: Beat sexual areas with hands/fists, with objects; body cavities or wounds explored/probed; cannibalism; douche/enema given to victim; skinned , and, my personal favorite at the end of this impossibly long list of awfuls, Other.

The first time I read the form, I wondered about the people who’d come up with it. What would you have had to see to make that list? What would you have to know to ensure it was complete? I wondered then, but I know better now: I could rattle off most of the list from memory, based on the things I’ve seen myself.

Once filled out, the form is sent to ViCAP in Quantico. The information is entered into the database and then compared against the existing database to try to identify similar cases.

“Give me the pertinent information,” Callie says.

I force myself to be as clinical as the form she’ll be filling out. It won’t be complete. That’s not necessary right now. I explain what I want her to search for, the thing unconfirmed by a doctor but that I believe, in the gut of me, to be true.

She’s silent for a moment. “Are you certain about this?”

“Not certain, but I’d bet my home on it.”

“I’ll get in touch with them right away.”

If anything, Douglas Hollister seems calmer now than when we first knocked on his door. I’m not really surprised. This is something you see a lot with a confession. Hiding what they’ve done is stressful. One offender described it to me as a “huge building pressure with nowhere to go.” Many are relieved when they no longer have to hold it in. One of the most common requests after a confession, from my own experience, is to sleep. They’re finally able to relax.

He’s seated on the couch. Alan has positioned the coffee table so that the camcorder can face him directly. Alan is seated nearest, with Burns to one side, as before. I decide to remain standing. I’m afraid to get too close to Hollister, afraid of what I’ll do.

The sliding-glass door that leads into the backyard lets in the light. I think that it does not belong here, but the sun shines on everyone equally, I guess.

“Can I have a cigarette?” Hollister asks. “Do you mind? Dana didn’t like me smoking, but I guess it doesn’t matter now.”

“It’s your home, sir,” Alan says.

His voice is all business without being cold. It’s a part of the deal: cooperate and get treated with respect. Why? Because pragmatism rules in what we do. We want suspects talking, not silent. So even if we’d personally like to set them on fire, as long as they’ll continue to hang themselves for the camera, we’ll bring them sodas and light their cigarettes.

“They’re in the kitchen,” Hollister says. “Can I get them?”

“Where are they, sir?” Burns asks. He, too, is polite. I’m sure he wants to destroy Douglas with his bare hands, but he knows the tune.

“In the drawer to the left of the stove.”

Burns gets up and returns in a moment with a pack of Marlboro Reds and a green lighter. I feel twin pangs of hunger and irony shoot through me. I quit smoking almost four years ago, but stress can still bring out the craving. Marlboro Reds were my brand too. I watch him light up with an envy made greater by my hatred of him. He inhales deeply, eyes closing in a moment of brief bliss. Alan pushes record on the video camera.