Page 188 of State of Alert

“Has your son ever been out of touch with you like this before?”

“No!” Lillian said. “Never. He’s a very good boy. He’d never do something like this to upset us under normal circumstances. It’s that girl. She’s got his head turned around so hard that he can’t see anything but her.”

“How would you feel about issuing a public appeal for him to contact you?” Sam asked.

“We’ve been able to keep this situation a private family matter,” Greg said. “His coach has been told he’s down with theflu, too sick to even go to the doctor. If it gets out that he’s on the run with a murder suspect… His whole life will be ruined.”

As a parent, Sam empathized with them. How could she not? But she also owed them the truth. “I’m sorry to be blunt, but I’m fairly certain that Zeke ruined his life when he chose to support Zoe in killing her mother and then running from the law.”

Lillian’s eyes filled with tears. “That can’t be true! Tell her, Greg. He’s an honor student and athlete with ascholarship. He made a mistake! That’s all this is.”

Greg put his hand on top of Lillian’s. “The lieutenant is right.”

“No! He’ll come back and straighten this out. I know my son. He couldn’t hurt anyone! Remember how he used to save the baby bunnies from the dogs? He wouldn’t kill someone or help anyone commit murder! That’s not who he is. Tell her, Greg.”

He put an arm around his distraught wife. “He’s always been a very good boy. Never gave us any trouble until he met Zoe. After she came on the scene, he was very different. He became almost unmanageable.”

“But he still did what we told him to,” Lillian added.

“When he wasn’t sneaking around with her. She had a hold on him. We tried to help him see that his relationship with her wasn’t healthy, but he wouldn’t listen.”

“I overheard her telling him how her mother abused her and her sister,” Lillian said. “That she locked them in their rooms and wouldn’t let them do anything.”

“Neither of the girls told us anything about being locked in their rooms,” Sam said.

“Do you think she told him that to make him sympathetic to her?” Lillian asked as Greg looked down at the table.

He was putting the pieces together faster than his wife, who was still in denial.

“Is there anywhere out west he would go to hide out?” Sam asked.

“No,” Greg said. “There’s nowhere… Wait. What was the name of the camp he attended in Colorado Springs that one summer? Remember how much he loved it?”

“Herron Creek?” Lillian asked.

“Yes, that’s the one. He talked about it for years afterward, but he could never go back because of baseball commitments in the summer.”

“This is helpful. I’ll pass that information along to the marshals.”

“What do we do in the meantime?” Lillian asked.

Sam pushed her notebook and pen across the table to them. “Give me your contact info, and I’ll keep you apprised of any developments.”

Greg wrote down the requested info. “I know you have no reason to believe us, Lieutenant, but our son is a good boy. If there was a plot to kill Zoe’s mother, it certainly wasn’t his idea, and in my wildest dreams, I can’t picture him harming anyone.”

“Thank you for sharing that with me. I’ll keep you posted, okay?”

“Should we go there?” Lillian asked. “To Colorado Springs?”

“Absolutely not. Go home and wait to hear from me. Please don’t make this worse by getting in the way of law enforcement.”

“We won’t,” Greg said. “Thank you for your time, Lieutenant.”

“No problem.”

She walked them out and then returned to the pit.

“What was that about?” Freddie asked.

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