The Unearthed: Book One, The Eddie McCloskey Series (12 page)

“The McKennas aren’t going to let you anywhere near him.”

“There’s a kid missing. If Eamon can help, they should agree to that at least.”

On screen, Sean McKenna said, “Eamon, did anyone hurt you?”

Eamon took his time answering. “No.”

“Can I get you something? Are you hungry?”

“I’m not hungry.”

Sean kept a hand on the kid’s shoulder and they went silent again for a couple minutes.

Barnes knocked and came back in holding a stack of papers. He took his seat.

“Eamon, aside from your daddy, were there ever any other men in the house?”

“What do you mean?” Eamon asked.

“Hey—” Sean said.

Barnes ignored him. “No other men ever came over to the house?”

“Hey.” Sean gave Barnes a hard stare. “I’d like to talk to you in private.”

The officer hesitated. Then: “Eamon, if you could just wait outside for a minute?”

The door was barely closed before Sean laid into the cop. “All right, Barnes. This kid has been through fucking hell tonight.”

“Mr. McKenna,” Barnes said, as if he had all the time in the world. “This is a murder investigation. The longer we wait, the colder the trail gets. If there were someone else in that house, he is getting further away by the minute.”

“What are you basing this on?” Sean McKenna asked. “To ask a young boy if his mother—”

“Who happens to be your sister.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Let me state the obvious, Mr. McKenna. She’s your sister. You have a strong bond with her. If she were seeing another man, a man who treated her better than her husband, a man you consequently liked more than her husband—do I need to go on?”

“What proof do you have she was seeing anyone else?”

“Your reaction just told me she was, Mr. McKenna. And I’ve got plenty else to go on.”

Tim cut in. “Damnit, we’ve gotta find what he’s talking about.”

“If he’s not faking it,” Moira said.

On screen, Sean McKenna answered, “I don’t know anything about that.”

“You know something, Mr. McKenna. And you’d better rethink your position. If you’re keeping anything from me, you could be an accessory after the fact.”

Sean jabbed a finger at the cop. “I’d never safeguard a man I thought killed my sister.”

Barnes pondered this. “But you were her beneficiary.”

“What do you mean?” Sean looked confused.

“John had no living relatives. Nor did Siobhan, aside from you. After the kids, you were named beneficiary on their life insurance policy.”

“Look—wait a minute. Just wait … I didn’t know anything about that. And you can’t blame me for trying to keep this from Eamon.”

“Of course not,” Barnes said. “You’re just looking out for him. But he’s not in here right now. So tell me what you know.”

Sean looked like he’d been hit by a bus. “What’s the point in hiding it, I guess—”

“There is no point.”

Sean scratched his forehead and ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t know his name. Or where he lives.”

“You sure about that?”

Sean nodded. “She told me a year ago. She kept saying she was going to leave John.”

“What did she tell you about him?”

“Not much. I think he lives in town, or close by.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Siobhan was a housewife. So she never traveled for work, never went out with anybody except John. The only places she ever went alone were around town. She had to meet someone local.”

“What did she say about him?”

“She never gave me specifics.”

“Did you like your brother-in-law?”

“No.”

“Jesus.” Moira held up the cop’s notes and pointed to a line of thought that read: Sean—Motive.

Tim said, “I wonder if they ever made him a suspect.”

On screen, Barnes continued, “Did John beat her?”

“No, but she’d say things like, ‘He scares me sometimes.’”

“Did you ever confront him about it?”

“They were over our house one time, and he put her down in front of everyone. William was acting out about something. It wasn’t a big deal, but John told her she needed to be a better parent, since she spent all day home with him. And I told him I’d lay him out if he ever talked to my sister like that again.”

“Ever any violence between the two of you?”

Sean looked like he wished there had been. “It never came to that. As much as I wanted it to.”

Barnes sat back in his chair. “You said you were at work when you got the call tonight.”

“Yeah.” The mood shift in the room was palpable.

“Do you always work that late?”

“Sometimes.”

“And what do you do?”

“I’m a sales manager.”

“What do you sell?”

“Copiers.”

“What would keep you at work that late then, if you’re a sales rep?”

“I said I was a manager. I was preparing the quarterlies for our regional meeting next week.”

“Anyone else at the office with you that late?” Barnes asked.

Sean thought about it. “No. I was the last one there.”

“I see.” Barnes allowed an uncomfortable silence to grow.

Sean said, “Really?”

Barnes said nothing.

“You think I was involved in all of this?”

Barnes jotted some notes down. Then he stood. “Mr. McKenna, I think you’d better let me ask Eamon what I have to.”

Sean shook his head. “Fine. Just limit the damage to this kid. For his sake.”

“Of course.” Barnes nodded.

Moira sighed. “The more we look into this, the deeper it gets.”

“Good thing I’m here to help,” Michelle announced from the doorway.

“S
o
what about the phone?” Eddie asked Stan.

They were in the living room. Stan was pacing around, digital camera in hand. He had the viewer flipped open to check his angles. Eddie watched him work.

“No rings today,” Stan said.

“Too bad.”

“I researched caller IDs too. Didn’t find much.” Stan panned the camera around. “The lighting in here is good.”

“So what’s up?”

“It’s virtually impossible to fake Caller ID data. To do so, the person faking the call would need access to the called person’s line or exchange. Which would be next to impossible for most.

“There’s pretty much no way, practically speaking, to fake your number from your own line. You’d need a certain kind of connection to do it, and then the called party would need a certain kind of box with certain chips that can be tricked into receiving extra Caller ID tones during a call.

“All you can do is make the data unavailable by placing a call through an operator, using a certain kind of calling card, or using a mobile phone that’s analog,” Stan said.

“Greek to me,” Eddie said. “But it sounds like it’s impossible.”

“Based on all thirty minutes of research I did this morning online, yes.”

“We should tell Jackie.”

“We should wait until we’ve got everything before we tell Jackie.”

Eddie bit his tongue. Stan was being too cautious. He probably got it from Tim, who was putting a stranglehold on everything. Every time Eddie felt they’d taken a big step forward, Tim would always pull back and question the information that came to light. He was too hesitant, and from what Eddie could tell, Jackie was not happy with it. All clients wanted answers. They didn’t want to deal in probabilities. They wanted answers that led to a plan of action.

He decided to test the waters. “It won’t hurt to tell Jackie what we’ve found so far. As long as we say it’s not definitive.”

Stan considered it. “You’re probably right. I can’t dig much deeper.”

“So there you go. We’ve got as much information as we can about the phone.”

“You’re right.”

Suddenly the phone rang. Eddie and Stan froze. It rang twice then cut off.

Eddie and Stan hurried into the kitchen. Eddie checked the Caller ID. Withheld.

“Do you think we did that?”

“Maybe somebody’s trying to send us a message.”

“Yeah. But what’s the message?”

* * * *

Billy kept to the woods. He’d gone as fast as he could, deeper and deeper into the forest. He’d played back here plenty of times, so he knew where to hide. High schoolers would come out here late on weekends. He knew because he’d found empty beer cans.

He’d spent a long time in the woods behind the house. When he heard the crackle of feet on leaves and sticks, he’d hidden in a thicket and put a hand over his mouth to muffle his heavy breathing. The sound of the footsteps died eventually and he was alone again.

But not for long.

It had followed him out there somehow. The voice was faint, as if coming from far away.

Billy …

Feeling the anger bubble inside him, Billy said, “What should I do? So Dad believes me and understands?”

It had an idea.

“No way,” Billy said. But it actually sounded like a good idea, he was so pissed at Dad.

It will work, but you have to wait till it’s night.

Which meant Billy had to spend the rest of the day hiding.

“What if it doesn’t work?” Billy asked.

If he gets that angry again, you have to protect yourself.

“What do you mean?”

Your Dad has major issues. He’s going to come after you.

“He wouldn’t hurt me.”

Then why’d you run away?

“That’s different. I just wanted to get away for a little bit.”

Because you were scared he’d hurt you.

“No.”

Yes
.

“So what if I was? Don’t all Dads spank their kids at some point?”

You’re thirteen. He wasn’t going to spank you. He was going to hurt you.

“Fine. What do you think I should do?”

Like I said, you protect yourself. Just pick up a knife and keep him away.

“You’re fucking crazy.”

I didn’t say to hurt him. Just to defend yourself. There’s a difference, just like your Mom told you the other night.

“I don’t want to talk to you anymore.”

Trust me, dude. I’m only looking out for you. Your Dad’s a scary guy.

Billy ran further away, till he could hear It no more.

He figured Mom would be looking for him. He felt bad because he knew she’d be worried, but he wasn’t about to go home because Dad still needed to cool off. He did have a bad temper, the more Billy thought about it. How many times had Dad yelled at him in the last few months, let alone the last few weeks? And Dad had been rough with him in the basement when they were sparring.

Maybe It was right about all of this. Maybe he had to be prepared to defend himself for next time.

And maybe Its name was Billy after all.

* * * *

Tim was talking to Stan on his cellphone. “Anything yet?”

“Nope. It’ll be dark in a few hours.”

Tim stood just outside the interrogation room, where Michelle and Moira were still going through the files. They’d taken a break from the videotape.

“I know,” Tim said. When he’d first spoken to Jackie, he’d figured two days would be more than enough time to prepare. But the more they looked into things, the more mystery they discovered. And Billy’s flight only raised the stakes that much higher. Tim didn’t feel like he was investigating the paranormal so much as he was trying to locate a missing child now. He’d never been vested with that much responsibility for anything in his life. It was overwhelming.

“Another thing …” Stan lowered his voice. “The phone calls, the ringing—it looks like gold.”

“Gold?”

“You’re supposed to be happy we found something.”

Tim thought about that. Stan was right. Normally, he’d be thrilled to validate a claim, this one verified before they even went dark. But instead, it unnerved him to think there was that much evidence of a haunting, and they’d only scratched the surface. Tim knew he was risk-adverse by nature, but still he believed things were starting to get out of control.

“Guess I’m a little more worried about getting Billy home than validating anything.”

“Go for that,” Stan said.

“All right. Hold tight, pal.”

“You bet.”

Tim hung up and went back into the interrogation room.

Michelle was leafing through a manila folder, while Moira was reviewing some of her notes. Michelle looked up at him and smiled. “Any good news?”

“I wouldn’t call it good, but I think we’ve validated the phone.”

“Really?” Michelle perked up.

“That’s great,” Moira said.

“Let’s go back to the tape.”

He took the same seat, Michelle sat where Eamon had sat, and Moira sat to her right. Moira hit PLAY.

Barnes resumed his questioning of Eamon. It went on for awhile, but nothing of substance came out. Barnes was busy establishing Eamon’s whereabouts during the day.

Then Barnes asked, “Why didn’t you leave the house when they started fighting?”

Everybody perked up.

Eamon tilted his head. “I don’t know.”

“You’ve run away before,” Barnes started. “Haven’t you?”

Eamon nodded.

“And didn’t you run away before because your parents were fighting?”

“No, not really. Sort of.”

“Were they fighting the time we picked you up at Beeler?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you ever run away because your brother Billy was bothering you?”

“I ran away from him a lot. And his name’s William.”

“I’m sorry, I forgot.” Barnes smiled at Eamon. “So why didn’t you run away this time when your parents started yelling?”

Eamon kept his eyes downcast.

“Where did you go when you ran away from home?” Barnes asked.

“Different places.”

“Like where?”

“I don’t know. The playground, Mrs. Dilworth’s. One time I made it pretty far, all the way to the other side of town.”

Tim dialed Charlie Waite’s number. He stepped out of the room so Michelle and Moira could continue watching.

“Got something for me?” It sounded like Charlie was in the car, riding with the windows down.

“Eamon talked about running away. He used to go to Beeler, Mrs. Dilworth’s and the playground. I assume he means the one about a mile from his house.”

“Check, check and check. We got nothin’.”

Tim exhaled sharply.

“This is starting to look bad,” Charlie said.

“Hang on.” Tim lowered the phone and stuck his head back into the room.

Moira saw him and paused the tape. She raised her eyebrows, and Michelle turned to look at him.

“Where do the McKennas live again?” Tim asked her.

“Taberville.”

Tim brought the phone up. “Charlie, do you have any contacts in Taberville?”