Find Her (Detective D.D. Warren #8)(43)

He paused, waiting expectantly. And, finally, I got it. I was leaving the basement, really truly leaving. And for my punishment/reward, I would now spend all my time, 24/7, with this man. This mean, filthy, awful man in his castle of a big rig, where he got to rule the highway, personal sex slave chained to his side.

And in that instant, I understood something else as well. That he was doing this versus killing me.

Which he’d promised to do so many times before, right before explaining how he’d then roll my body into the nearest canal and let the gators ensure my mother never saw me again.

Everett wasn’t going to kill me. He was going to keep me instead.

I wondered, in the back of my mind, if that meant he’d grown to like me somehow.

And I wondered, in the back of my mind, if that meant I was supposed to like him too.

Everett planted the palm of his hand over my face and forced my head down into the box. I assumed the position, mind churning, as the lid came down. The padlock jangled. My moment of freedom ended. I became once again a girl in a coffin-size box.

Except now . . . Now I was a girl in motion.


*

HE LIKED TO TALK while he drove the big rig. Complain, really. About the price of gas, the asshole in the Honda Civic who just flipped him off. The pricks at the understaffed loading dock who just cost him two damn hours, and now he couldn’t even take a break for lunch.

In the good ol’ days, he’d grouse, the smart trucker could fudge his driver’s log and carry on. But no. Everything’s now federally mandated electronic this and federally mandated electronic that. Big Brother. Always watching.

Welcome to the life of a long-haul trucker, he’d tell me. Working for assholes while driving through an entire country of assholes.

In the beginning, every time the rig’s engine fired to life, I flinched. Every time the truck bounced down a rutted road, I went bug-eyed with nausea. After so much time alone in the basement, this—the smell of diesel, the roar of pistons, the violent hum of the beast—was almost too much to take.

And yet, much like my experience with the overwhelming boredom of the basement, I learned to adapt. I relaxed my shoulders into the jerk and sway. I absorbed the relentless growl and hum. And bit by bit, I started to discern the nuances of different road surfaces, the cruising speed of highway, the deep grind of slow climbs.

Life on the road. Where, according to fake Everett’s incessant grumblings, he was permitted to drive eleven out of fourteen hours, before taking a mandated ten-hour rest. Then, regardless of actual time on the clock—say, 11:00 P.M., or 2:00 A.M., or 4:00 A.M.—he’d start driving again.

And true to his word, away from loading docks, rest stops, and the hustle and bustle of civilization, he’d pull over and let me out. I got to pee squatted behind bushes versus trapped in my own filth. I got to eat Egg McMuffins for breakfast, Subway sandwiches for lunch, and fried chicken for dinner.

“Downside of the job,” Everett would say, handing over yet another bag of fast food while self-consciously patting the grotesque swell of his belly.

Dinner was inevitably followed by other demands. He’d driven all day. ’Course he needed to blow off some steam. And he had his love nest all ready to go.

Was it better being out of the basement? Was it worth it being out on the road? Where, from time to time, the blindfold came off, and I watched the world whiz by in a blur of greens and blues and grays.

So many other vehicles racing side by side. So many other drivers. An entire country filled with assholes, as Everett liked to say.

And yet not a single one who ever saw me.

Everett talked a lot. Complained mostly. And sometimes, once in a while, he even cried in his sleep.

Which is how I finally learned about Lindy.





Chapter 20


D.D. LIKED TO BE PREPARED. Hence, before she and Keynes met up with victim specialist Pam Mason at the FBI’s Boston field office, D.D. did the practical thing and Googled her. According to the woman’s professional bio, Pam Mason had a master’s in forensic psych from John Jay. She’d worked crisis management at a major women’s shelter in Detroit—talk about baptism by fire, D.D. thought—before joining the FBI. She’d moved around the bureau for the past fifteen years, including a stint in Miami specializing on human trafficking, then a position with the squad specializing in crimes against Americans overseas. The victim specialist was known for her work on a major kidnapping case in Mexico where the oil executive was returned alive, and for a situation in Guatemala where three young American missionaries weren’t.

In other words, the woman’s work history was as impressive as the number of frequent-flier miles she’d accumulated. D.D. wondered what she thought of life in Boston, let alone her current assignment with the Summers family.

Keynes had arranged for them to meet in his office at the FBI’s downtown Boston headquarters. The meeting place didn’t surprise D.D.; federal agents were big on home-court advantage. Though why anyone would consider the enormous concrete structure—one of Boston’s ugliest buildings, in D.D.’s humble opinion—an advantage, D.D. would never know. Then again, compared to the Hoover building in DC . . .

Never let it be said the federal government was known for good taste.

D.D. debated bringing Phil along. Sure, he had his own work to do with his own squad and his own codetective, Carol, but the FBI valued appearances. Given she was meeting with two federal employees, it felt logical, even balanced, for there to be two representatives from the BPD.