The Innocent

Apparently he shared the same image with Marcus Pratt. The kid gave a low whistle. “Not bad,” he muttered, staring at Abby in a way no kid should be allowed to.

Leering should be reserved for dirty old men, Sam decided. Like himself.

“I’m Sergeant Cross,” Abby said coolly, flashing her ID in Marcus’s face. Her shield was clipped to the waistband of her jeans, and she made sure the kid saw it. “I’m a detective with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department. We’re investigating the disappearances of two little girls.”

“So? What do you expect us to do about it? Pin a medal on you or something?” He glanced at his grinning brother.

“The girls’ names are Emily Campbell and Sara Beth Brodie. Maybe you heard about the disappearances on the news?” When he merely stared at her sullenly, Abby’s mouth tightened. “We have reason to believe you two boys were in the vicinity at the time Sara Beth Brodie went missing.”

Marcus flicked back a long strand of hair from his face. “What do we look like, kidnappers?”

“We’re not accusing you of anything. But we’ve got a witness who can place you on Mimosa Street near Holyoke Cemetery at around 3:30 yesterday afternoon.”

“You ain’t got squat,” the kid said with practiced aplomb. “We were home all afternoon. Right, Mitch?”

The younger boy swallowed and nodded, his gaze darting first to Sam and then back to his brother. “Uh, yeah.”

“That’s not exactly what your mother told us,” Sam said.

Marcus’s face turned beet red. “You already talked to our old lady about this? Hell, man. What’d you have to go and do that for?”

At last, a chink in the kid’s armor, Sam thought.

“Let’s try this again,” Abby said, pushing her dark hair behind her ears. “Were you and your brother on Mimosa Street yesterday or not?”

Another glance passed between the two boys. “What if we were?”

“Were you almost hit by a car?”

His gaze narrowed. “How’d you know—” He clammed up, realizing he’d given himself away.

“About that car,” Abby said firmly. “Do you remember what color it was?”

“Maybe white. Maybe not.”

“Was it white or wasn’t it?” Sam demanded.

Marcus slanted him a surly glance, almost daring Sam to get violent with him. “I wasn’t talking to you.”

Sam took the kid’s arm, not applying enough pressure to hurt him, but making sure the boy knew he meant business. “Now you listen to me, kid. Two little girls are missing. Their lives are at stake. I don’t have the time or the patience for your attitude. You’re a bad ass. Okay. We got it. Now answer Sergeant Cross’s questions.” He didn’t say “or else.” He didn’t have to.

Something that might have been respect glimmered in the boy’s eyes before he replaced it with a scowl. He rubbed his arm. “The car was white.”

“Did you recognize the make or model?” Abby asked, flashing Sam a look he couldn’t quite fathom.

Marcus shrugged. “How should I know? I didn’t hang around long enough to find out.” But he eased away from Sam as he said it.

“It was a Chevy,” Mitchell said, speaking up for the first time. “Maybe a ’91 or ’92 Caprice. Something like that.”

Sam gazed down at the boy. “You sure about that, son?”

“Don’t call him son,” Marcus snapped. “You’re not his old man.”

“I know cars,” Mitchell said shyly. “My dad’s got a ’67 Camaro we aim to fix up.”

“Yeah, right. When hell freezes over,” Marcus muttered.

“Mitchell.” Sam walked over and put his hand on the boy’s shoulder. It was thin and bony, making him seem younger than his age and vulnerable somehow.

For a moment, Sam’s heart seemed to stop. It had been a long time since he’d been around kids. After their son had died, he and Norah had cut themselves off from friends and acquaintances with children. Eventually, they’d cut themselves off from each other. Norah had found solace in her own way, and Sam had immersed himself in work, in cases so sordid and gruesome he had no time to think of his own misery. To wonder what might have been.

But as he gazed down at Mitchell Pratt, he suddenly saw another boy’s eyes staring up at him. He suddenly wondered if he would have been the kind of father a son would be proud of. The kind of father a boy could count on.

He wondered if he would have been a better father than he had been a husband.

Not that it mattered. He’d lost Jonathan to cancer, Norah to neglect, and Sam didn’t plan to ever remarry. And now he was too old to start a family, even if he wanted to, which he didn’t. Jonathan could never be replaced, and besides, if he’d learned anything in his twenty-year journey into darkness, it was that too damned much of this world was not a nice place for children.

Even a town called Eden.

He glanced at Abby and found that she was gazing back at him. Her expression was puzzled, as if she’d glimpsed something in him that she hadn’t expected to see. That he might not want her to see.

His grasp on Mitchell’s shoulder tightened almost imperceptibly. “You’re certain about everything you told us?” he asked again.

Mitchell nodded solemnly.

“He knows a lot about cars,” Marcus said grudgingly. “He hangs around garages every chance he gets. If Mitchell says it was a Caprice, then that’s what it was.”

“What about a license-plate number?” Sam asked hopefully.

They both shook their heads.

“Either of you get a look at the driver?”

Marcus shrugged. “Other than the fact that the guy was a lousy driver, I didn’t pay much attention to him.”

“Was anyone else in the car?” Abby asked.

“Didn’t see anyone else.”

“Not even in the back seat? A child maybe?”

“Look, I said I didn’t see anyone else, okay?”

“What about you, Mitchell?” Sam asked softly. “You see anyone else in the car?”

“Naw.” The boy shook his head. “But I didn’t really look.”

“Then how can you be certain the driver was male?”