Once Taken (17 page)

But in more recent years? Not so much. Several years ago, she’d taken a few days off when April had been on summer break and Ryan had been too busy to go anywhere. So she and April had rented a condo at Virginia Beach. She’d done nothing like that since.

She knew that April had always dreamed of coming to New York. But she wondered if this trip really would feel to April like a dream come true. Her daughter had been through so much. The excitement of being here and shopping was sure to drain away soon.

When April came out of the bathroom, she sat down on the edge of one of the beds. She had that distant, troubled look again.

“Mom,” she said quietly, “I can’t look in the mirror.”

Riley sat down and put her arm around April.

“I know what that’s like,” she said.

She didn’t need to ask April why she felt this way. The poor girl’s face was still cut and bruised. Just looking at it was enough to bring back the horrible trauma she’d endured at Peterson’s hands.

April leaned her head against Riley’s shoulder.

“Tomorrow’s my birthday,” April said.

Riley’s heart sank. She’d forgotten, of course.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“No, I don’t want you to feel like that,” April said. “You’ve just bought me lots of things. That’s not why I’m telling you. The thing is, tomorrow’s my birthday, and …”

April heaved a single sob.

“And suddenly I don’t even care,” she said. “I don’t care about anything.”

“I know how you feel,” Riley said.

“I know you do.”

They sat there in silence for a few moments. How life had changed in just the last few days! One of Riley’s greatest frustrations as a parent had always been trying to get April to understand her job—why she was so obsessed with it, how important it was, and how dangerous.

Now April understood it all perfectly. And Riley wished with all her heart that she didn’t.

It was Riley’s turn to go to the bathroom. But she hesitated. She remembered something that Meredith had said …

“Have you looked at yourself in a mirror?”

Just like her daughter, Riley was apprehensive about looking into the mirror. She knew what she was likely to see there—the faces of countless victims and their tormentors. And in her own face, she’d see something that she really didn’t want to see.

She’d see the face of a woman who had no business, no right, to hope for a normal, happy life, who was a fool to imagine that she could raise a daughter in this terrible world. There were still too many monsters out there.

At the core of her being, Riley always felt it imperative to stop them, whoever they were, wherever they were. And despite all that Meredith had said, she couldn’t stop thinking about the monster who was still loose in Upstate New York.

The man was nodding, almost asleep, when the chains in the passenger seat began to grumble again. His van was parked in a shopping center parking lot in Albany. The chains weren’t actually rattling, but he could hear them grumbling even so. And he knew what they were complaining about. It was that FBI woman yesterday—the one he hadn’t taken.

“How many times do I have to tell you she wasn’t right?” he snapped. “If I’d taken her, you wouldn’t be happy. You’d ask why she wasn’t older, wasn’t wearing a uniform, hadn’t done what she was supposed to do. You’d only complain.”

The chains quieted a little, but didn’t stop their grumbling altogether. It didn’t surprise him that he and the chains were especially at odds right now. They’d been cooped up together in the van for most of twenty-four hours. Naturally, they were getting on each other’s nerves.

After the incident with the woman yesterday, he’d driven straight to Albany and made this parking lot his base. Sooner or later, he knew the right victim was sure to come by. But the rest of the day came and went without that happening. After the mall closed that night, he’d moved the van to a nearby side street and slept on its floor. He’d come back here first thing this morning.

Now it was getting dark, and he was wondering whether he was going to have to spend another night here. The chains would definitely get more and more irritable. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could take that.

He, too, was tired and irritable. But patience and vigilance were essential. He took a candy bar out of his glove compartment and began to eat it. It wasn’t much, but it would have to suffice for nutrition and energy. He couldn’t get out of the van and go buy something to eat. The chains wouldn’t allow it. And of course they were right. If he left his post even for a few moments, he might miss the perfect victim.

At this hour, more people were leaving the mall than entering it. They consisted mostly of young, childless couples and families with kids. He saw no one who came close to suiting what both he and the chains needed.

Even so, the candy bar lifted his spirits. He felt better about everything. Really, he had all that he needed in life. He was especially pleased with his van. It had brought him here years ago and served him well all this time. It was big enough that he could sleep in it when he needed to and also convenient for transporting the women. He had quickly realized that the women, too, could sleep here—the beginning of their final sleep.

And he had certainly never regretted leaving his former home. It had been the scene of too many childhood horrors. He’d been perfectly happy to drive away all alone until he’d finally decided on a new hometown and settled in.

He’d been eighteen then. He’d liked his new home from the start, and the people there were kind to him. For several years he’d lived quietly and hadn’t caused anybody any harm. That had changed five years ago when he took his first victim.

Nibbling the last of the candy bar, he wondered what had gone wrong. He never wanted to hurt or kill anybody. He still didn’t.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have stolen those straitjackets when he was released from the mental hospital. It’s just that he had an irresistible feeling that someday he was going to need them. And the chains that he accumulated little by little over the years insisted that he keep them.

But what was going to happen now? If he didn’t claim another woman, he knew that the chains would overpower him, bind him up, fasten his door so he couldn’t get out, render him as helpless as he’d been as a child. He needed to find a third victim, and quickly.

Suddenly, the chains murmured, telling him to look sharp. Sure enough, two women were coming out of the mall—both of them wearing nurse’s uniforms. One was slender and much too young. But the other was stout and middle-aged, exactly the woman he was looking for.

He watched as the two walked to a car in the next parking lane. The woman he needed was going to drive. He started the van and drove along after the car.

As he followed the car into a suburban neighborhood, he knew that something was wrong. Even if he could catch the stout woman, he still wouldn’t be able to take her. The problem was simple.

I didn’t choose the others. They chose me.

The first time, five years ago, that poor woman in Eubanks had provoked him when he’d picked up some change that she’d dropped in a store.

“Such a sweet boy!”
she’d said.

Those words and that tone—so condescending, as if he were retarded. It stung him unbearably, reminding him of his mother and the nuns.

It was the same with the woman in Reedsport.

“What a good boy!”
she’d said when he helped her with her groceries.

Both women had sealed their fates with those well-intentioned words. But this woman had said nothing to him at all. Without such an impetus, such a provocation, he was helpless to act.

And if he didn’t act, he’d be at the mercy of the chains.

The car he was following stopped in front of a house. The younger woman got out, waved goodnight to the driver, and went into the house. The other woman started driving again, and he kept on following her. He still had no idea what to do next.

But now the chains were chattering to him, explaining everything. Somehow, he was going to have to provoke
her
into provoking
him.
And the chains had their own ideas about how to do that. It was going to require perfect timing, and the chains weren’t at all sure that he was up to the task. He decided to prove them wrong.

Now he was following the woman on a road that wound through a park. He saw nobody anywhere. It seemed like the perfect place to act.

“Here?” he asked the chains.

The chains chattered in agreement.

Up ahead, at the edge of the park, was a traffic light. The light was green, but the chains assured him that it was just ready to change. He carefully passed the woman’s car and drove directly in front of her. The light turned yellow, and he sped up a little, as if he were meant to make it through the intersection before it turned red.

Then he hit the brakes good and hard. Sure enough, the woman’s car struck the rear end of the van with a sharp bump. The collision wasn’t hard enough to cause much damage, but it served his purposes.

He shifted into park, put on the parking brake, and got out of the car. The woman backed her own car away from the van a few feet, then got out, looking very concerned. He walked to the back of the van and surveyed the minor damage to both cars. As the woman approached, he tried to explain to her what had happened—and to apologize.

“I—I—I—” he stuttered.

The woman’s face was suddenly full of sympathy.

“Oh, you poor thing!” she said. “It was my fault, of course. I’ll go get my insurance information.”

She got back in the car and opened her glove compartment.

He felt exactly the surge of aggression and anger he needed.

“Oh, you poor thing!”
she’d said.

What did she think he was, a baby?

He opened the back of his van and took out a heavy bundle of chains. Then he stood there waiting, holding the chains behind his back with one hand. When the woman came out again, he pointed again to his back bumper, as if trying to draw her attention to some further damage.

“What is it?” she asked.

When she bent over a little for a closer look, he brought the chains crashing against the back of her head. She collapsed perfectly, falling head first into the bed of the van, completely unconscious. All he had to do was lift her legs into the van and shut the back doors.

As he drove away, the chains were silent. He understood why. They were slightly awestruck. They hadn’t expected him to accomplish this so boldly and deftly. They had underestimated him. He had proven himself their master—at least for now.

*

He arrived at his house about an hour later. He pulled the van beside the house and backed it around to the basement door. Then he got out, walked to the back of the van, and opened the doors.

There she was, lying completely still, a pool of blood around her head. He bent over to make sure she was still breathing. Fortunately, she was. The chains wanted her to be alive, at least for now.

He’d stopped along the road outside of Albany put her into the straitjacket. Sooner or later, she’d regain consciousness, and the chains had thought it best to put her in the straitjacket right away.

Now came the difficult task of getting her into the basement. The woman was slightly heavier than the others had been, and he was none too strong. He tugged and pulled until she fell out of the van, then tugged and pulled some more until he got her to the basement door. He opened the door and pushed her on inside.

As he rolled her across the concrete floor, she emitted a loud groan, then fell silent again. He had the cot ready. Clumsily, he pulled the woman’s upper body up on it, then wrestled her legs onto it as well.

From that point on, things were much easier. He began to wrap the chains around and around her, binding her tightly to the cot. The chains laughed with delight. They were well-pleased with his work.

When he finished wrapping, he heard her speak.

“Where am I?” she said, just starting to regain consciousness. “Oh, God, where am I? What’s going on?”

He shushed her loudly. If he could only talk, he’d explain to her that she mustn’t say a word. In this place, only the chains were allowed to speak.

But his shushing didn’t do any good.

“Where am I?” she said in a slurred voice, her terror rising. “Somebody help me.”

He stuffed a rag into the woman’s mouth, then gagged her by wrapping a chain all the way around her head. She continued to writhe and groan. Her wide-eyed gaze was fixed across the room. He followed the gaze and saw that she was staring at the little altar he had made.

A bulletin board rested atop a table pushed against the wall. On the table he had respectfully placed shoes, a prison guard’s badge, a nurse’s uniform and nametag, a few buttons, and other items belonging to the other two women. On the bulletin board were pinned obituaries, funeral handouts, and pictures he had taken of the flowers he had left at the gravesites.

He was glad she was looking there. It ought to give her some comfort. Surely she understood that she, too, would be memorialized there when the time came. A tear came to his eye and he thought about how he had mourned those two women—and how he would mourn this one.

But the woman groaned sharply against the gag. She didn’t understand. It was infuriating. This whole thing was going to play out the same way it had before. He’d loosen the chains and remove the rag to give her a drink of water, and she’d scream uncontrollably.

Maybe he could make this one understand. He took his straight-edged razor out of his pocket, opened it, and held it close to the woman’s throat, shushing again. Surely she’d understand that he didn’t want to slit her throat, and that the choice was hers. All she had to do was keep quiet.

Her groaning quieted a little. Even so, he still saw a trace of defiance in her eyes. It was no good. Sooner or later, this one, too, was going to scream, and he’d have no choice but to kill her.

And like last time, he would hang her up for all to see. The warning was absolutely necessary. The world had to know. The world had to understand. The world must be told to leave him alone. He didn’t yet know how and where he would display her. The chains would tell him what to do.