Harlan Coben (8 page)

“Don't drink any
more apple juice,” Cheryl told her two-year-old, Conner.

I stood on the sidelines with my arms folded. It was a bit nippy, the frosty, damp chill of late New Jersey autumn, so I pulled the hood of my sweatshirt over my Yankee cap. I also had on a pair of Ray-Bans. Sunglasses and hood. I looked very much like the police sketch of the Unabomber.

We were at a soccer game for eight-year-old boys. Lenny was the head coach. He needed an assistant and recruited me because, I assume, I am the only one who knows even less about soccer than he does. Still our team was winning. I think the score was about eighty-three to two, but I am not certain.

“Why can't I have more juice?” Conner asked.

“Because,” Cheryl answered with the patience of a mother, “apple juice gives you diarrhea.”

“It does?”

“Yes.”

To my right, Lenny drowned the kids in a steady stream of encouragement. “You're the best, Ricky.” “Way to go, Petey.” “Now
that's
what I call hustle, Davey.” He always added a
y
to the end of their names. And yes, it is annoying. Once, in a pitch of overexcitement, he called me Marky. Once.

“Uncle Marc?”

I feel a tug at my leg. I look down at Conner, who is twenty-six months old. “What's up, pal?”

“Apple juice gives me a diarrhea.”

“Good to know,” I said.

“Uncle Marc?”

“Yeah?”

Conner gave me his gravest look. “Diarrhea,” he said, “is not my friend.”

I glanced at Cheryl. She smothered a smile, but I saw the concern there too. I looked back at Conner. “Words to live by, kid.”

Conner nodded, pleased by my response. I love him. He breaks my heart and brings me joy in equal measure and at exactly the same time. Twenty-six months old. Two months older than Tara. I watch his development with awe and a longing that could heat a furnace.

He turned back to his mother. Littered about Cheryl was the product of her mommy-as-pack-mule harvest. There were Minute Maid juice boxes and Nutri-Grain bars. There were Pampers Baby-Dry diapers (as opposed to Baby-Wet?) and Huggies wipes containing aloe vera for the discriminating buttock. There were angled baby bottles from Evenflo. There were cinnamon Teddy Grahams and well-scrubbed baby carrots and sectioned oranges and cut-up grapes (sliced the long way so as to make them chokeproof) and cubes of what I hoped was cheese, all hermetically sealed in their own Ziploc bags.

Lenny, the head coach, was yelling out key, game-winning strategy to our players. When we are on offense, he tells them to “Score!” When we are on defense, he advises them to “Stop him!” And then sometimes, like right now, he offers keen insight into the subtleties of the game:

“Kick the ball!”

Lenny glanced at me after he'd shouted that for the fourth time in a row. I gave him a thumbs-up and way-to-go nod. He wanted to give me the finger, but there were too many underage witnesses. I refolded my arms and squinted at the field. The kids were geared up like the pros. They wore cleats. Their socks were pulled up over their shin guards. Most wore that black grease under their eyes, even though there was nary a hint of sunshine. Two even had those breathing strip-bandages across their noses. I watched Kevin, my godson, try, per his father's instructions, to kick the ball. And then it hit me like a body blow.

I staggered back.

That was how it always happened. I will be watching the game or I'll
be having dinner with friends or I'll be working on a patient or listening to a song on the radio. I'll be doing something normal, average, feeling pretty decent, and then, wham, I get blindsided.

My eyes welled up. That never used to happen to me before the murder and kidnapping. I am a doctor. I know how to play poised in both my professional and personal life. But now I wear sunglasses all the time like some self-important B movie star. Cheryl looked up at me and again I saw the concern. I straightened and forced a smile. Cheryl was becoming beautiful. That happened sometimes. Motherhood agreed with certain women. It gave their physical appearance a wonder and richness that borders on the celestial.

I don't want to give you the wrong impression. I don't spend every day crying. I still live my life. I am bereaved, sure, but not all the time. I am not paralyzed. I work, though I haven't yet had the courage to travel overseas. I keep thinking that I need to stay close by, in case there is a new development. That kind of thinking is, I know, not rational and perhaps even delusional. But I am still not ready.

What gets me—what gives me that surprise wham—is the way grief seems to relish in catching you unawares. Grief, when spotted, can be, if not handled, somewhat manipulated, finessed, concealed. But grief likes to hide behind bushes. It enjoys leaping out of nowhere, startling you, mocking you, stripping away your pretense of normalcy. Grief lulls you to sleep, thus making that blindside hit all the more jarring.

“Uncle Marc?”

It was Conner again. He talked pretty well for a kid his age. I wondered what Tara's voice would have sounded like, and behind my sunglasses, my eyes closed. Sensing something, Cheryl reached out to pull him away. I shook her off. “What is it, pal?”

“What about poop?”

“What about it?”

He looked up and closed one eye in concentration. “Is poop my friend?”

Hell of a question. “I don't know, pal. What do you think?”

Conner considered his own query so hard it appeared as if he might explode. Finally he replied, “It's more my friend than diarrhea.”

I nodded sagely. Our team scored another goal. Lenny shot his fists into the air and shouted, “Yes!” He nearly cartwheeled out to congratulate Craig (or should I say Craigy), the goal scorer. The players followed
him. There was much high-fiving. I didn't join in. My job, I figured, was to be the quiet partner to Lenny's histrionics, the Tonto to his Lone Ranger, the Abbott to his Costello, the Rowan to his Martin, the Captain to his Tennille. Balance.

I watched the parents on the sidelines. The mothers became clusters. They talked about their kids, about their child's achievements and extracurricular activities, and no one listened much because other people's children are boring. The fathers offered more variety. Some videotaped. Some yelled encouragement. Some rode their kids in a way that borders on the unhealthy. Some gabbed on cell phones and constantly fiddled with handheld electronics of one kind or another, experiencing a bit of the bends after spending all week immersed in their work.

Why did I go to the police?

I have been told countless times since that terrible day that I am not to blame for what happened. On one level, I realize that my actions may have changed nothing. In all likelihood, they had never intended to let Tara come home. She might even have been dead before the first ransom call. Her death may have been accidental. Maybe they just panicked or were strung out. Who knows? I certainly don't.

And, ah, there's the rub.

I cannot, of course, be certain that I am not responsible. Basic science: For every action, there is a reaction.

I do not dream about Tara—or if I do, the gods are generous enough to not let me remember. That is probably giving them too much credit. Let me rephrase. I may not dream about Tara specifically, but I do dream about the white van with the mix-and-match license plate and the stolen magnetic sign. In the dreams I hear a noise, muffled, but I'm pretty sure it is the sound of a baby crying. Tara, I know now, was in the van, but in my dream, I don't go toward the sound. My legs are buried deep in that nightmare muck. I can't move. When I finally wake up, I cannot help but ponder the obvious. Was Tara that close to me? And more important: Had I been a little braver, could I have saved her then and there?

The referee, a lanky high-school boy with a good-natured grin, blew the whistle and waved his hands over his head. Game over. Lenny shouted, “Woo, yeah!” The eight-year-olds stared at one another, confused. One asked a teammate, “Who won?” and the teammate shrugged. They lined up, Stanley Cup hockey style, for the postgame handshakes.

Cheryl stood up and put a hand on my back. “Great win, Coach.”

“Yeah, I carry this team,” I said.

She smiled. The boys started rambling back toward us. I congratulated them with my stoic nod. Craig's mother had brought a fifty-pack of Dunkin' Donuts Munchkins in a box with a Halloween design. Dave's mom had boxes of something called Yoo-hoo, a perverse excuse for chocolate milk that tastes like chalk. I popped a Munchkin in my mouth and skipped the washdown. Cheryl asked, “What flavor was that?”

I shrugged. “They come in different flavors?” I watched the parents interact with their children and felt tremendously out of place. Lenny came toward me.

“Great win, wasn't it?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We're the balls.”

He gestured for us to step away. I complied. When we were out of earshot, Lenny said, “Monica's estate is almost wrapped up. It shouldn't be too much longer now.”

I said, “Uh-huh,” because I didn't really care.

“I also have your will drawn up. You need to sign it.”

Neither Monica nor I had made up a will. For years, Lenny had warned me about that. You need to put in writing who gets your money, he'd remind me, who is going to raise your daughter, who is going to care for your parents, yadda, yadda, yadda. But we didn't listen. We were going to live forever. Last wills and testaments were for, well, the dead.

Lenny changed subjects on the fly. “You want to come back to the house for a game of foosball?”

Foosball, for those of you who lack a basic education, is that tabletop bar game with the soccer-type men skewered on sticks. “I'm already champion of the world,” I reminded him.

“That was yesterday.”

“Can't a man revel in his title for little while? I'm not yet ready to let go of the feeling.”

“Understood.” Lenny headed back to his family. I watched his daughter, Marianne, corner him. She was gesturing like mad. Lenny slumped his shoulders, took out his wallet, peeled out a bill. Marianne took it, kissed him on the cheek, ran off. Lenny watched her disappear, shaking his head. There was a smile on his face. I turned away.

The worst part—or should I say the best part—was that I have hope.

Here was what we found that night at Grandpa's cabin: my sister's corpse, hairs belonging to Tara in the Pack 'N Play (DNA confirmed), and a pink one-piece with black penguins that matched Tara's.

Here was what we did not find and, in fact, still have not found: the ransom money, the identity, if any, of Stacy's accomplices—and Tara.

That's right. We never found my daughter.

The forest is big and sprawling, I know. The grave would be small and easily hidden. There could be rocks over it. An animal might have found it and dragged the contents deeper into the thicket. The contents could be miles from my grandfather's cabin. They could be somewhere else entirely.

Or—though I keep this thought to myself—maybe there is no grave at all.

So you see, the hope is there. Like grief, hope hides and pounces and taunts and never leaves. I am not sure which of the two is the crueler mistress.

The police and FBI theorize that my sister acted in conjunction with some very bad people. While no one is quite sure if their original intention was kidnapping or robbery, most everyone agrees that someone panicked. Maybe they thought that Monica and I would not be home. Maybe they thought that they would just have to contend with a baby-sitter. Whatever, they saw us, and acting in some drugged or crazed state, someone fired a shot. Then someone else fired a shot, ergo the ballistic tests showing Monica and I were shot by different .38's. They then kidnapped the baby. Eventually they double-crossed Stacy and killed her with an overdose of heroin.

I keep saying “they” because the authorities also believe that Stacy had at least two accomplices. One would be the professional, the cool head who knew how to work the drop and weld the license plates and disappear without a trace. The other accomplice would be the “panicker,” if you will, the one who shot us and probably caused the death of Tara.

Some, of course, don't buy that theory. Some believe that there was only one accomplice—the cool professional—and that the one who panicked was Stacy. She, this theory goes, was the one who fired the first bullet, probably at me since I don't remember any shots, and then the professional killed Monica to cover the mistake. This theory is
backed up by one of the few leads we had following that night in the cabin: a drug dealer who, in some bizarre plea bargain on another charge, told authorities that Stacy had purchased a gun from him, a .38, a week before the murder-kidnapping. This theory is further backed up by the fact that the only unexplained hairs and fingerprints found at the murder scene were Stacy's. While the cool pro would know to wear gloves and be careful, a drugged-out accomplice would probably not.

Still others do not embrace that theory either, which is why certain members of the police department and FBI cling to and support a more obvious third scenario:

I was the mastermind.

The theory goes something like this: first caveat, the husband is always suspect number one. Second, my Smith & Wesson .38 is still missing. They press me on this question all the time. I wish I had an answer. Third, I never wanted a child. Tara's birth forced me into a loveless marriage. They believe that they have evidence that I was considering divorce (something that yes, I did indeed contemplate) and so I planned the whole thing, top to bottom. I invited my sister over to my house and perhaps enlisted her help so that she would take the fall. I have the ransom money hidden away. I killed and buried my own daughter.

Awful, yes, but I am past anger. I am past exhaustion. I am not sure where I am anymore.

The main problem with their hypothesis is, of course, that it is hard to finesse my being left for dead. Did I kill Stacy? Did she shoot me? Or—drum roll here—is there a third possibility out there, a blending of the two different theories into one? Some believe that yes, I was behind it, but I had another accomplice besides Stacy. That accomplice killed Stacy, perhaps against my wishes, perhaps as part of my grand scheme to deflect my guilt and avenge my own shooting. Or something like that.