Page 30 of 2nd Strike
I leave the folders on the table, knowing Charlie will lose it when she sees the disarray. Too bad. I hop out of my seat, ducking into my office to grab a jacket and my messenger bag. Fred sits on his stand, patiently waiting for me to apply clay strips along his mandible.
“I’ll be back soon,” I tell him.
Until then, he’ll have to wait. At this moment, he is simply a skull with eyeballs secured by stems of clay and I feel the punch of guilt for ignoring him. “I’m sorry, Fred.”
This is what my life has come to. Chatting with skulls.
I leave Fred behind and head to the back door. “Haley,” I holler over my shoulder. “I’m going with Matt. Call my cell if you need me.”
“Okay!” She shouts back.
I hustle out and find Matt already in his car, the purr of the vintage Mustang’s engine idling. I climb in the passenger side, buckle up and take the envelope from him. A sheaf of papers inside contains Matt’s handwritten notes on Ramona Caldren, a probate attorney at a D.C. law firm.
“No way,” I mutter.
“The attorney thing?”
“Yes. I mean, what if Carl and Lily’s son is—”
I stop talking. All along I’ve imagined the kidnappers living in a rotting, nearly condemned
home. The realization strikes that anyone, rich or poor, sane or not, could be a criminal.
“I know, Meg. We can’t get ahead of ourselves. There are millions of boys his age in Virginia. Let’s just check it out.”
More curious than ever if a probate attorney has been raising a kidnapped boy, I shuffle through the stack in search of the photo Matt obtained. Four pages deep, I find what looks like a screenshot from a school database. Ryan Caldren.
Ryan.
Nice name.
Ryan’s photo sits at the very top. It’s a black and white copy so I can’t tell the exact color of the hair though Matt’s notes say it’s light brown. That’s okay. For now, I’m interested in his bone structure.
Matt heads for the expressway while I form a mental picture of Carl and Lily. Hmmm. Now I know why Matt was non-committal. Ryan Caldren, even to my artist’s eye, is a completely average teenager. Acne and all. Do I see Carl and Lily in him? Possibly. His jaw, like Carl’s, is square and his smile dips—sort of—on one side. Lily flaunted a similar one while building a television career.
But that’s all I see. Is it enough?
Who knows?
It could be a bad picture. Or not.
“What do you think?” Matt’s voice is casual, but I suspect that’s an act.
He loves the hunt and he’s hoping as much as I am this is a solid lead.
Still, I can’t give him what he wants. “I’m not sure.” I shove the papers back in the envelope. “I’d have to see him in person. The photo isn’t giving me anything.”
Outside my window, trees blur my vision as we speed by. The full weight of this thing hits me like a branch from one of those sturdy oaks.
In the next hour, we might be shattering the life of Ramona and Ryan Caldren.
I shake my head and let out a sigh. “Lord, what a mess.”
“Yep.”
We spend the next twenty minutes in silence until Matt turns onto a tree-lined street with elegant brick brownstones and neatly manicured patches of lawn. It screams upscale in a completely understated way and I kinda love it. I could see Charlie living in one of these homes. Me? Not so much. I’m more the simple cottage type.
“Nice,” Matt says as we cruise the block looking for number ten-forty-one. Cars dot both sides but given the time, most residents are likely at work leaving plenty of on-street parking.
