The Lonely Mile(48)
“Convince me Carli’s still alive, Agent Canfield.”
She was silent for a moment. “She’s alive,” the agent answered, placing her hand on Bill’s arm as he grasped his cup on the table. He felt an electric charge run through his body at her touch and wondered whether she felt it too. “I’m going to tell you something in addition to what I said at your apartment, but if I do, you have to understand it’s just a theory.”
“Of course. I promise. You can trust me, Angela,” he said, referring to more than just the case.
“The media has been trumpeting this whole ‘I-90 Killer’ thing for years, but we believe he might be into something else.”
“Like what?”
“What do you know about human trafficking, Bill?”
“Sexual slavery. I’ve had my suspicions about that since reading the I-90 Killer’s letter.”
“That’s right,” Canfield agreed. “It can be an extremely lucrative undertaking, especially where young, pretty, American teenage girls are concerned.”
“He’s kidnapping girls and—what? Shipping them out of the country? To whom? Where do they go?”
“Our theory,” Canfield said, “is that he is just one link in what is probably a very extensive chain of conspirators. We believe he started out as a kidnapper, and, in the beginning, he did sexually assault and murder his first couple of victims. We found their remains, so we know that to be true.” Bill winced and she said, “Sorry. Would you rather I not go on?”
He shook his head. “I need to hear this.”
“That’s what I thought. Somewhere along the line, this disturbed man who was kidnapping and murdering teenage girls was co-opted by players much bigger and more frightening than he. How this connection was made and how extensive the ring is, we don’t know. But now we think he satisfies his compulsion, taking the girls and probably getting some sort of time limit within which he can enjoy them in his own way as long as he doesn’t damage them irreparably, then he passes them along to a contact, who smuggles them out of the country, probably to buyers in Russia or the Middle East.”
“Oh my God, that makes me sick.” Bill’s hand shook and coffee slurped over the side of the ceramic cup, overflowing the saucer and pooling on the scarred and chipped table.
“I know it’s hard to hear,” Canfield said gently, “but the thing you should focus on, and the reason I told you, is that we believe Carli is still alive, and just as importantly, is still in this general area. If we catch a break or two, like we seem to have done with your memory about the truck, we just might be able to nail this twisted bastard before Carli is shipped out of the country. If we don’t find her before that happens…” Her voice trailed off. There was no need for her to continue.
Bill hung his head, thinking hard as he tried to digest the implications of this information. Carli was alive. He held onto that nugget of hope like a drowning man clinging to a life raft. She was alive, and if she was alive, she could be saved. That was what he needed to focus on, not the horrifying scenario Angela Canfield had just laid out.
The FBI agent finished her coffee, setting the cup down on the table with a jarring clatter that sounded much too loud, echoing off the bare walls, vinyl flooring, and ceramic dinnerware in the empty restaurant. “I’ve got to get this information out to everyone in the field. Thanks for calling, Bill. It goes without saying that this is a huge break. If you think of anything else, let me know immediately. I would prefer if you only called me. It makes things easier to have just the one point of contact. Thanks for the coffee.”
Agent Canfield rose from the table and glided out the door without a look back. Bill watched her through the big, plate glass window as she got into a plain Chevy Caprice sedan and drove away.
He sipped the last of his coffee. He wanted to scream, to hit somebody or something. He didn’t feel the information he had just given Agent Canfield was huge unless it led directly to the capture of the I-90 Killer. Bill knew in his heart that the kidnapper of his child was no longer driving around the east coast in that ratty old box truck; he couldn’t possibly be stupid enough to continue using it after Bill had seen him in it. The guy had successfully kidnapped thirteen girls before making his first and, so far, only mistake. He was much too smart to keep using the vehicle a witness had seen him driving.
And as far as using the available evidence to convict the I-90 Killer after his capture, Bill couldn’t care less about that. Fingerprints, DNA evidence, the lettering on the bastard’s truck, none of it mattered to Bill, at least not in terms of using it to attain a conviction in a court of law. Bill didn’t care about a winning a trial or incarcerating the lunatic or anything else.
Beyond finding Carli alive and rescuing her, what he wanted more than anything else in the world was the I-90 Killer, dead and buried. It was a visceral need, almost like the intense thirst of a man lost in the desert. He had missed his chance to put the man in the ground once; he wouldn’t make that mistake again if he ever got another crack at him. He drained his cup, threw down some money, and stalked out of the coffee shop.
CHAPTER 43
CARLI’S HEAD POUNDED RELENTLESSLY. It felt like the USC Marching Band had taken up residence inside her skull and was practicing for their next halftime show. She had suffered on and off from migraines ever since young childhood, so Carli Ferguson knew headaches, and this one was off the charts.