The four men’s gazes flashed to the man on the table. He appeared to be in his mid-twenties. Burke did a quick mental calculation, as did the others. Valerie Butler was forty-one years old. She could have given birth to him when she was in her teens.
“What’s his name and why was he sedated and flown in?” Burke asked.
“Brandon Ellison. His father is Mark Ellison, currently residing just outside of Minneapolis.”
“We’re listening. Explain,” Wilson prompted.
“Tell them everything, Valerie,” her husband said when she remained quiet.
“When I was fourteen, I was coerced into having sex with a family friend. I won’t call it rape, but it wasn’t consensual either. I wasn’t old enough to give consent, nor was I really given the chance to say no. Brandon was the result of it. I had to relinquish custody of him when he was born.”
“What exactly does that mean? Can we have it again with some more details?” Wilson asked.
“You appear to be intelligent. Figure it out,” Tom Butler said protectively.
Burke stared at Valerie. “This family friend, who I’m going to assume was much older than you, he had the approval of one of your family members. And you were told to have sex with him, weren’t you?”
She nodded. “Some fourteen-year-olds are sexually active, promiscuous even. I wasn’t. I wasn’t naïve either. I knew what sex was and that pregnancy could result from unprotected sex. I also had no one I could go to, no one I could trust when an innocent relationship turned into something that wasn’t appropriate, turned into something that was criminal. And it wasn’t a one-off. Pregnancy didn’t occur the first, second, third, or twentieth time Mark Ellison came into my bedroom with my father’s consent. Of course, the little baggie of coke he slipped my dad each time went a long way to ease any guilt my father may have felt about it, not that I ever saw any sign of guilt or remorse from him. Not even when I became pregnant. Not as my belly grew. Not even when I was in labor for twelve hours, or when I cried myself to sleep for months after I had to give up thatprecious little baby and not see him for over twenty years.” Her gaze went back to the man on the table.
“How’d he and Mark Ellison come back into your life?” Wilson asked.
“I registered with an adoption registry that helps to facilitate reunions between birth parents and the children they put up for adoption by using DNA samples. Brandon searched and found me a few years ago.” She pulled at her zip ties, uncomfortable. “Look, can you cut us loose? We’re not going to attack you or anything, and we need to administer another dose of flumazenil to help counter the klonopin. His vitals aren’t rebounding.”
“I can get that. I’m a medic,” Rogers said. “Where is it?”
She nodded at the cabinet. “In there. The vial is on the right with the syringe I used to draw the first dose I gave him. Just before you came in, I administered two milliliters.”
“Does he need Narcan?”
“No, that was administered at the morgue and on the plane. The doctor in Minneapolis determined it’s the klonopin that’s the problem,” Tom said.
Everyone watched as Rogers retrieved the vial and syringe from the cabinet. He drew two more milliliters and then injected the medication into the injection port in the cannula in his right hand.
“We’re not a threat to you,” Tom Butler said. “You can release us. We’re not going to do anything. You have my word.”
Wilson shook his head. “Sorry, not quite yet. Answer a few more questions first.”
“Is this Jessica Rosenthal real, or was that just a story to get us here?” Burke asked.
“Yes, she’s real and she filled out that online form and disappeared.”
“This is about more than getting a message to her, isn’t it?" Tessman asked.
“Yes,” Valerie said. “We need to find her so she can talk to Brandon and convince him to go with her. She was his stepmom, and wherever she is, is the only place he’ll be safe from his dad. I don’t know how you do it, get people new identities, but Brandon needs one too.”
All four of the team stared at her in stunned silence.
“Mark Ellison is dangerous,” Tom said. “Those weapons are his. Everything in those storerooms is his. This is a depot of his prepper supplies for his merry little band of paranoid weirdos who are getting ready for the civil war they’re sure is coming.”
“He’s blackmailed us into keeping his little stockpile,” Valerie added.
“That still doesn’t explain why this man is sedated,” Rogers said.
“It had to look like he died from a drug overdose, and to convince Mark, his respirations and heart rate had to be next to nothing. A doctor friend of mine in Minneapolis helped. A nurse was on that flight, administering Narcan and flumazenil to reverse both drugs, but as we said, he had an adverse reaction, and he didn’t rebound as he was expected to. The flight time was less than an hour, and we were confident we could get him revived once he was safely here and away from Minneapolis.”
“Isn’t Mark Ellison going to know something’s wrong when his son’s body is gone?”
“Administrative screw-up, sending the wrong body to the crematorium from the hospital morgue,” Tom said. “And by the time Mark Ellison realizes it, that wrong body would already have been cremated.”
