Mother May I(47)

“There are parallels between the cases that point to the same perpetrator,” Marshall said.

“How old is your son? Like preschool age? Is he blond?” she asked, still focusing on me.

“The boys are similar, yes.” Marshall spoke fast and loud, in case I thought of answering. “The method of abduction was the same as well.”

She finally turned to him. “I’m shocked you found us. You must be good at your job. Are you from here? The national news didn’t pick up our story, which our lawyer says is lucky. Lucky! Even he thinks that I did something to my son. And now the trail is cold, our PI says, and then he bills us again. I guess Adam can goddamn well afford it.” She waved an angry hand at the house, as if showing us all the things Adam could afford. “Adam is the one who said he thinks the guy is milking us. What do you think? I have these nightmares where our investigator knows where Geoff is but he won’t tell us because then we wouldn’t pay him anymore. Do you think if you find her boy, you might find Geoff?”

That question would have killed Bree Cabbat. But I wasn’t her. I was a woman with a black Visa that said “Elizabeth” on it. I could feel it, heavy in my purse, ready to charge more hours to keep my PI looking.

“I’m not sure,” Marshall said, so gentle. “I know you have a lot of questions, but I want to get back on the trail. Can you answer a few of mine first?”

She nodded but still turned back to me to ask one more. “Have they contacted you?”

“Not so far,” Marshall said, again coming in fast.

Kelly sucked in a breath, still facing me. “If our PI was any good, he would have found you, though, right? Your related-seeming case? Instead you came here. Adam must be right about our guy milking us. Except I don’t really think that came from Adam. I think his wife, his ex, put it in his head. She wants to keep his money for her own kids.”

I could feel Marshall willing me to silence, but she was talking to me, not him. Really me, not some character. I clutched my purse so hard, trying to feel a credit card that wasn’t there through the thick leather.

My face twitched itself into a truer shape, and words got out, asking about the mother. “So you didn’t get a call?” Marshall coughed, sharp, and I belatedly added, “Either?”

She shook her head. “No. No contact. In fact, no one calls us anymore. Not after six weeks. At first, we got a lot of visitors, a lot of food, but now it’s like no one can stand to look at us.” She whirled back to Marshall, desperate. “I think whoever took Geoff must have sold him. Maybe to someone who can’t have babies? Someone nice, and they love him, and they don’t know he’s stolen. Do you think that’s what happened?”

I understood her need to picture Geoff with some wealthy, childless couple, warm and fed and loved. She’d scraped my character off my skin; I was almost only me. She deserved to know her son was gone. This not-knowing—it was the only hell that looked worse than the one I was facing. But Marshall’s eyes held a clear warning. If I wanted Robert back, I had to be quiet now.

It was hard to keep on looking at her; she had that right. I looked around the room instead, then wished I hadn’t. My mother’s eye picked out half a dozen pale rectangles on the walls where framed photos had once protected the paint from fading. Family photos, or perhaps prints from Where the Wild Things Are or Pete the Cat. In the carpet’s indents, I could see the missing furniture: a toy chest, a low table with a toddler-size chair, a bookshelf that would have been stuffed with picture books and art supplies.

“I don’t want to say too much about the other case until I get some information,” Marshall said. “I don’t want to influence your answers.”

I could feel her trembling through the sofa. “Okay. That makes sense. Ask me anything. Clearly, I’ll tell you. No filter. I already told you about Adam and his wife. His ex, and how she’s trying to protect his money. But he’s the one who wants to fire the PI, and wouldn’t any decent person pay for a chance to get their only son back? My only son, I mean. Adam has three kids with her. Two boys. So not his only son. My only son. I’m babbling. I’m sorry. I will answer your questions, but . . .” She craned her neck over her shoulder, looking to me. “Can you bring the gin here?”

“Let me get you a glass of water,” I said.

“Yes, okay. And an Ativan? They’re on the counter.” She was already turning to Marshall, asking again, “But it’s possible that if you find this other boy, you’ll find Geoffrey?”

“First I need to establish that these cases are connected,” Marshall said, so very gentle.

“Yes,” she said. Marshall reached for his phone to show her pictures of Spencer and my husband, but she got up and walked after me, into the kitchen, talking. “He was an accident. Geoff. I was only nineteen. Adam was my professor. Such a stupid cliché, except I really did fall in love with him, and then I was pregnant. His wife kicked him out. That means he didn’t pick me. I didn’t think about it that way at the time. But she kicked him out, so I got him. Like, by default. Just like I got Geoff.” I was washing out one of her filthy glasses. She picked a pill bottle and dumped a couple of small white tablets, as innocuous as aspirin, into her hand. The glass I had was full of suds, so she tossed the pills into her mouth and dry-swallowed. She kept on talking, her volume rising with every fast, slurred word. “My whole life here is pretty much an accident. I got this house, and her husband, and dresses like yours if I shop off-season, but sometimes I wished I’d never had a baby. That’s true. I’m not allowed to say that, because it makes me sound awful. But it’s true. There were days I wished I was single again or in school and not a mom.” She set the pill bottle down and pressed her hands hard into her head, Marshall’s waiting questions forgotten, her words slurring and her shoulders shaking. “Not most of the time. Most of the time, I loved him so, so much. But on bad days, when he was crabby or tired, or I was, I might wish him away, so I must be being punished. It’s my fault. I wished it, and now he’s gone.”