She was too kind. My mother always did have a way with words. But I was too interested in the details of this madman to lash out at her. “What kidnapper? What are you talking about?”
“The boy, Samantha, the one who was snatched off the street a few hours ago right here in our little town. It’s all over the news.”
In the living room I could see a press conference happening on the television, and I bypassed my mother’s reporting to get a more accurate take from the professionals. A line of reporters was firing off questions for the officer in charge.
Not wanting my information to come from anyone but her, my mother stepped in front of the TV and rushed out the details. “It happened right down the street at that business park off Jenkins. Thirteen years old. He was skateboarding with his brother, and some guy just snatched him up. I’m sure he’s dead by now.”
I fought the urge to blast my mother for her insensitivity when a picture flashed on the screen and I took a step back. The kidnapped boy… he looked like Keith, but he wasn’t. I blinked in horror.
“What… what’s his name?”
“Who?”
“The kidnapped boy! His name?” I raised my voice past acceptable levels and I braced for her fury, but my mother seemed too stunned by my outburst to retaliate on cue.
“Jake McKallister.”
The weight of a monster wave clobbered me and I stumbled backward, barely keeping myself from toppling over the coffee table. My phone rang again. Shannon. That was why she was calling. She already knew what had happened. Tears gathered in my lashes, preparing to splash down my face.Keith.
“Samantha!” My mother’s shrill voice burst into my thoughts. “What in the world is wrong with you? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Are you sure?” I whispered, black dots spinning through my vision and threatening to take me down. “The name. Are you sure about the name?”
“Yes. Like I said, it’s all over the news. What’s gotten into you?”
“I… I know him.”
“You know the kidnapped boy?” she asked, shocked by the turn of events. “How?”
“I mean, not him. I know his brother. From school.”
But in a way, I did know Jake because Keith talked about him all the time. I knew of his musical talents; Keith swore he’d be a rock star someday. I knew he was the brother Keith was closest to, and that he sometimes felt unworthy of his devotion. I knew these things because there were moments on those boards when we were bobbing on the ocean that we swapped truths. If what my mother was saying was true, Keith had just lost his Sullivan.
* * *
My first call was to Shannon to confirm what I hoped to hell wasn’t true. The second was to Keith. When it went unanswered, I steadied my shaking hands on the kitchen counter and bit back the fear – for Jake, and for Keith. This had happened several hours ago, but he hadn’t reached out to me. Not even once. We talked all day, every day, sometimes even late into the night. If Keith wasn’t contacting me over this, he either physically couldn’t, or worse, he’d already mentally checked out. I had to get to him.
Despite the fact that it was already past my curfew, I grabbed my car keys and sprinted to the door. Leaving my mother’s fervent protests behind, my only focus was getting to Keith before he did something he couldn’t take back. I prayed my fear was misplaced, but Keith had more pharmaceutical skeletons in his closet than others knew. Those weeks leading up to his decision to leave that whole life behind, Keith had not only been smoking weed but also popping pills and huffing. Had he not gotten out when he did, things could have gotten very far out of control.
But now, mere months after escaping that life, his sobriety was being tested in the worst way possible, and I wasn’t sure he had the discipline to keep from coming unhinged.
I was a block away from Keith’s house when it became apparent I wasn’t going to be able to get there by car. Two police cars were blocking the entrance to his street, which forced me to park and walk the final distance. What I saw when I arrived drew me up short. A line of dark, unmarked vehicles mixed with police cruisers. Reporters. Lights. And screaming – so much screaming.
I came to a halt several houses down, a rush of ice hardening my veins. A woman, who I could only assume was Keith’s mother, was wailing from somewhere inside his house. I was familiar with that sound. I’d sobbed the same chorus the night I’d learned about Sullivan. I remembered it like yesterday: that terribly personal moment when the truth seeped in with a sickening thud.
Had the sadness already gripped Keith’s heart? Would my sweet, goofy surfer boy ever be the same after suffering the dire consequences of tragedy? Keith was inside that house, and he needed me. I pushed forward through the crowd.
“Miss, I need to ask you to back up,” a young officer said, herding me away from the scene. No more than a few years older than me, he looked like he was playing dress-up in his father’s uniform. “No one is getting through unless you have proof of residence.”
“No. I don’t live here. I’m just… that’s my boyfriend’s brother who’s missing.”
I didn’t miss the flinch that skipped over him. Maybe with more years on the job he would develop his poker face, but for now, the officer looked as horrified as I felt.
Did he know something I didn’t? Was that what he was so unsubtly trying to hide? A gasp ripped from my throat. “Oh, god, Jake’s not dead, is he?”
The officer turned his attention to the house before twisting his head back toward me. “I don’t know, miss, but I figure he probably wishes he was.”
15
