Her Silent Cry (Detective Josie Quinn Book 6)(92)

Josie said, “Was it you or Natalie? Or both of you?”

“Was it me or Natalie what?” he asked.

“You were her children,” Josie murmured.

Downstairs, the front door creaked open and next came the sounds of a half dozen pairs of boots storming the house. Shouts of “FBI” floated up the steps. The man’s eyes widened. He looked down at where Colin had curled into a fetal position on the tiles. He raised the knife in one hand and reached for Colin with the other. Josie fired a shot. It grazed his upper arm, but it was enough for him to lose his grip on the knife. It clattered to the floor, and Josie rushed at him, gun pointed at his chest, screaming for him to get his hands up and get on his knees. She kicked the knife away and under the clawfoot tub. She was aware of the FBI agents thundering up the stairs, their large shadows now behind her in the bathroom doorway. With a look of defeat, Lucy’s kidnapper dropped to his knees and put his hands behind his head.





Sixty-Six





I waited until I heard his truck roar to life. When I heard its wheels screech away, I went to the bedroom door and started working on the lock. He let me out into the other rooms when he was home as long as I was quiet and still. He didn’t let me play the way she used to—and we never had cookies. More often than not, I stayed in my own room. The smallest infraction and he’d hit me or think up something worse. Something that left scars. Sometimes I would bite him or hit or kick him, trying to leave marks on him the way he left them on me. It felt good. When I saw his blood, something inside me came alive, like a light turning on. I dreamed of getting a knife and using it on his leathery skin. But making him hurt only made the beatings worse for me. The last few days I’d stayed calmly in the living room so I could study the lock he’d put on my door. It was a simple thing. A small hook. I figured out that I could unlock it from the inside using something slim. A knife would do it. I managed to steal one from the kitchen before he locked me back up without him even noticing. I thought of keeping it for the next time he let me out. I could hide it in my shirt and slice him with it when he was distracted by the television.

But I had to stick with my plan. I had to get out, just like she had.

It didn’t take long to pop the hook out of place. Excitement made my skin tingle. I didn’t bother gathering anything like she had. There was nothing I wanted from this place except to get out. Even though I knew he was gone, I tried to move as stealthily as I could. I might never break that habit. In seconds, I was out the front door. The first rays of the morning sun inched along the horizon. I hadn’t run for so long that my legs grew weak after less than a block. My lungs burned.

Those telltale double lights appeared in the distance. Just like the night she tried to take me home. My body wouldn’t do what I told it to do. Run, my mind screamed. Get away! Instead it sank to the ground, as if my bones were dissolving. The lights stopped close to me, blinding me. A door opened and closed. Then hands lifted me off the cold pavement. Their touch was gentle, the way she used to touch me. I didn’t want to cry, but hot tears streaked my face.

A face I didn’t recognize blotted out the lights. A woman. Not her and not the silver woman. Someone else. “My God,” she said. “Son, are you okay? What happened to you?”

A thick lump formed in my throat. I could hardly speak over it, so I shook my head. I was not okay.

Her hands cupped my cheeks. “I’m going to call the police. Just hold on. You know what? You’ll come with me in my car and we’ll go to the hospital. They can call the police from there. Come on. Let’s go.”

I let her pour me into the back of her car. As she pulled away, she asked me, “What’s your name, son? Can you tell me your name?”

I remembered what my mother used to call me. “Gideon,” I said. “My name is Gideon.”





Sixty-Seven





“Who the hell is this kid?” Chitwood asked no one in particular.

Josie, Noah, Mettner, Gretchen, Oaks and Chitwood all crowded into one the Denton PD viewing rooms, watching the man they’d apprehended at the Ross home on CCTV while he sat alone in an interrogation room down the hallway. They’d left him cuffed and he sat slumped in one of the metal chairs, his bound wrists in his lap. He hadn’t said a word to any of them since they’d brought him in.

“He’s Amy Ross and Martin Lendhardt’s son,” Josie said. “I’m sure of it.”

Gretchen said, “You think she gave him all those scars?”

“I never liked her all that much,” Noah admitted. “But I’m not sure I could see her torturing a little boy.”

“No,” Josie said. “It wasn’t her. Martin was the one convicted of child endangerment. It had to be him.”

“Child endangerment wouldn’t account for the kind of abuse this kid endured, based on those scars,” Noah said. “Child endangerment is when you neglect your kid or put them in a dangerous situation. This kid was abused.”

“Well,” Josie said. “I’m not sure what happened, but he blames Amy for whatever happened to him.”

“Well, what the hell is his name?” Chitwood asked.

Oaks’s phone chirped. He answered it with a brusque hello, listened for a few minutes and said, “Thank you.” He turned to Josie and said, “That was one of my agents in Buffalo. They got in touch with the district attorney’s office there. They were able to view Martin Lendhardt’s file. He had a son—not a daughter. His name was Gideon. Gideon Lendhardt.”