MARY CLARK - Piece of My Heart

As she hung up, she registered a pang of guilt for feeling so grateful that her own son was safe. Her fear was increasing that Johnny was not.

Chapter 7

Seven-year-old Johnny Buckley felt like something was pressing down on him. No, more like someone . He imagined giant arms wrapped around him, but it wasn’t the way his mother or father would hold him. It wasn’t gentle or loving. This felt mean and scary. In his mind, Johnny imagined that the arms didn’t even belong to a person. They belonged to a monster.

The monster was holding him so tight that Johnny could feel the monster’s tummy rumble.

Johnny tried to sit up, but couldn’t move. He was certain his eyes were open, but he couldn’t see anything. He opened his mouth and tried to scream, but couldn’t hear his own voice.

But he could hear… something . A growl. The sound of the monster filled his head. He imagined the monster squeezing him even tighter, and Johnny wondered if he might simply disappear, never to be seen again.

I want Mommy and Daddy.

A loud honking sound broke through the monster’s snarls and pulled Johnny further out of his dreamlike state. The noise felt like it belonged to the world Johnny used to know. When he heard it again, his mind moved away from the monster. He pictured his mother behind the wheel of the minivan, saying, Where does he think I can go? Johnny, someday you’ll learn to drive. Honking your horn in traffic doesn’t do any good.

The sound was the beep-beep of a car horn.

Johnny’s eyes darted side to side as the fog he was in began lifting more quickly. He was finally awake.

He reached for what had been the monster’s arms in his dream and determined that he was wrapped in a fuzzy blanket. The rumble beneath him wasn’t a monster’s stomach, but the rumble of a car on the road.

Two tiny circles of light were visible from the holes for the taillights, but otherwise he was in pitch blackness. He was locked in the trunk of a car.

He had no idea how much time had passed since he’d heard the voice call out to him on the beach. Were his parents looking for him? He wondered where Chloe and Emily thought he went.

Exploring the area within his reach, he found two objects. The first felt soft, like a small pillow. He managed to hold it up against the slivers of light from the back of the car, squinting as his eyes adjusted to the darkness.

He was able to make out two big round eyes and a pair of moon-shaped ears. It was a stuffed animal. Why is this here? he thought. Why am I here? He set it aside, telling himself he didn’t need a baby’s toy right now.

The second item he found was made of a thin fabric. As he traced his fingers along the edges, trying to make out the shape, grains of sand fell onto his face. It was a hat—not like the baseball caps he liked to collect, but the kind with a rim that goes all the way around, like his Nana used to wear when she went on her and Pop Pop’s boat. In the darkness, there was no way for him to know that it was the same light blue cotton hat that a stranger had worn while he had watched their family earlier in the day.

This wasn’t a dream, but there was a monster, and he was taking Johnny away.

I want to go home.

He clutched the teddy bear to his chest as he started to cry.

Chapter 8

With ever-increasing terror, for the past two hours, Marcy had been in constant action mode—walking the beach, questioning other hotel guests, calling every business within walking distance. Now she was back in their suite, forcing herself to remain still and to focus on the information they had managed to gather so far.

She jumped at the sound of a knock on the door. Andrew opened it. It was Alex, and he was followed in by a woman about her age with long blond hair pulled back into a ponytail at the nape of her neck. “The police are here,” Alex announced.

“I’m Detective Langland,” the woman said. The business card she handed to Marcy gave her full name as Jennifer Langland. She was a detective with the East Hampton Police Department.

Marcy resisted the urge to say something about the police failure to respond until Laurie’s father had called in a favor, but the detective appeared to sense her resentment. “I can’t imagine how worried you must be right now. I’m so sorry that the dispatcher didn’t prioritize the call earlier. It’s no excuse, but we have a critical mass of units called out to a mess of an accident on Main Street.”

The detective’s tone was compassionate. She looked Marcy squarely in the eye when she apologized for the delay. Please be good at this , Marcy found herself pleading silently. Please be the woman who can bring back my son.

For the next ten minutes, Marcy listened. She willed herself to slow her thoughts as Detective Langland outlined the department’s current efforts to locate Johnny.

“I already met with the hotel’s general manager. He’s pulling all the available surveillance tape for us. Unfortunately, they don’t have much in the way of cameras on the beach itself, and only one camera in the beach shack, and it’s focused on the register.”

Marcy felt all hope fading away as the detective continued.

“But they’ll have footage from the hotel lobby, plus the entrances and exits. Unfortunately, the only cameras in the parking lot are close to the property, but we’re going to start with those. If your son left by car, hopefully we’ll get a plate number and move from there.”

“ Left by car? ” Andrew was clenching and unclenching his fists at his side. “We’ve been careful to warn Johnny. He never willingly would have gotten into—” Andrew cut himself off, considering the implication of what he was saying.

Langland nodded. “I know,” she said softly.

Marcy was grateful that the detective wasn’t minimizing the situation by lecturing her about the curiosity of seven-year-old boys who want to explore the beach on their own, but her heart dropped at the thought of her son in some stranger’s car. She also knew that a kidnapper had probably considered the possibility of cameras at a resort. She thought about all of the paths between the sand dunes farther down the beach, paths that led to public roads where someone could park anonymously and away from the reach of surveillance.

“What about an Amber Alert?” Andrew asked. Marcy had heard the blast of her cell phone a few times over the years when police used an area alert system to notify the public about a local child’s abduction.

“My supervisor is weighing the request. To restrict the notifications to the most urgent cases, the broadcast system won’t allow us to trigger an alert unless we are confident there has been an abduction. I know it’s frustrating, but the fact that we haven’t sent out an alarm yet is actually good news in the big scheme of things. It means we have other possibilities to explore.”

“I assume you’ll also be looking at the whereabouts of any natural suspects who might be on local law enforcement’s radar,” Alex said.

“Of course,” Langland said. “I’ve seen you on television, Judge. So I’m aware of your expertise in criminal law. I wasn’t sure how blunt to be with the rest of the family.”

Marcy’s brother-in-law Alex had been one of the country’s most well-regarded defense attorneys before he was confirmed to the federal bench three months earlier. His stint as the host of the first three episodes of the Under Suspicion series of specials had only increased his public profile.

“I assure you,” Marcy said, “that we want to know every piece of information you have.”

“In that case, you should know that we have officers from the Suffolk County Police Department’s Marine Bureau out on the water, looking for any signs that he might—”