High-Risk Affair Page 2

  Her son was gone!

  4:45 a.m.

  "You sure you're up to this again so soon? I can find somebody else."

  FBI Special Agent Cale Davis turned off his electric razor and flipped up the lighted visor mirror of the agency SUV. "I'm good," he answered. "I'm glad you called me."

  His partner frowned at Cale's assured tone as he drove through the predawn darkness through a sparsely populated region of Utah.

  "I should have tried a little harder and found someone else." Gage McKinnon gave a heavy sigh. "Allie's going to skin me alive when she finds out I called you. You only had two weeks off and you need at least double that after what happened."

  "Leave it, McKinnon. I'm fine. Two weeks was more than enough."

  Gage looked as if he wanted to argue, but he didn't, much to Cale's relief. He would prefer talking about anything else but his last case and its horrible ending.

  "What else can you tell me about this missing kid?" he said to turn the subject.

  The SUV's headlights illuminated a carved and painted wooden sign for Moose Springs, population three hundred and eleven. Probably some overachiev-ing Boy Scout's Eagle project, he thought.

  The town was about an hour east of Salt Lake City, bordering the Uinta National Forest. He'd been here only once before in an official capacity, in a case involving a good friend, Mason Keller. Unofficially, he had been here many times. Mason and his wife Jane lived on a small ranch nearby and the town had always struck him as clean and friendly. Mayberry R.F.D. in a cowboy hat.

  He didn't want to think something dark and sinister might lurk Here. Yet when the FBI called out its Crimes Against Children unit, chances were good all was not as picture-perfect as he wanted to believe here in this quiet community.

  "Cameron Vance, nine years old," Gage answered him after a moment. "Father, Rick Vance, killed in action in Afghanistan. Mother Megan, thirty-two, works out of the home as an accountant. Mom puts the boy to bed at usual time. Goes in to check on him around two and finds him gone, a blanket rolled up to make the casual observer think he's sleeping away. There was no sign of forced entry and the alarm system was engaged and undisturbed, but there was also no obvious escape route either from the second-story window. No dangling bedsheets, no convenient awning. It's fifteen feet to the ground, heck of a leap for a nine-year-old kid."

  Not if the kid was a limber little monkey like Charlie Betran, Mason and Jane's adopted son, Cale thought.

  "What compelled the mother to check on him? Does he make a habit of wandering?"

  "According to initial reports from local authorities, Megan Vance said she had a nightmare around that time and checked both children out of habit."

  "Any idea what time he disappeared?"

  "We've got a four-hour window between ten when Mrs. Vance checked on him before going to bed and two when she awoke again."

  "She didn't hear any suspicious noises?"

  "Nothing, just the wind." McKinnon studied the GPS coordinates on the dashboard unit, then turned at the next street and headed out of town again before going on with his narrative. "After she finds him missing, the mother spends a little time looking around the house and yard, then calls local authorities around oh-three-hundrcd, who immediately issue an Amber Alert and call us."

  "What makes anybody think a crime has been committed here? Sounds like the kid just sneaked out. It seems a little early in the game for Amber Alerts and calling in the FBI."

  "You'd think," Gage said, "but this has the potential to be a high-profile case and I think the local authorities want to make sure all their bases are covered from the beginning. They're running it as a crime scene until they have evidence that it's not."

  Another high-profile case. Great Cale closed his eyes. The image of two pretty little girls with dark curls instantly burned behind his eyelids and he jerked them open again.

  He wasn't sure he had the stomach for this again.

  "I'm not seeing it from the information you've given me. What makes this case stand out?"

  "Besides the fact that his father was a national hero who died serving his country, the kid has epilepsy. There's an urgency here because the mother's terrified he's had a seizure somewhere."

  If anyone could find the boy, Gage was the man. His partner was known as The Bloodhound and he specialized in missing children cases. He had an uncanny knack for finding lost kids.

  Cale had often wondered if his partner's own history gave him some kind of sixth sense, some inner eye that guided his actions.

  On the other hand, he had his own grim history and his past usually seemed more of a hindrance than a help.

  "What do you see as our role here?"

  "Purely advisory at this point, providing assistance to the local investigators as needed."

  Judging by the bright flash of emergency vehicles against the night sky, they were approaching the boy's house. Gage climbed a slight grade and the whole chaotic scene stretched ahead of them.

  In the strobing glow from a dozen cop cars and search and rescue vehicles, Cale saw the house was a two-story log structure with a steeply pitched gable on one end and a wide porch along the front.

  A basketball standard hung from the detached garage, and two bikes were propped against the porch.

  Most of the vehicles were parked some distance from the house. He saw this as a good sign that local authorities had been careful to protect the scene as much as possible.

  Gage pulled in next to a van with the logo of one of the local TV stations emblazoned on the side. Then the two of them headed for the house.

  They showed their badges to the uniform cop at the door. Once inside, Cale's gaze was instinctively drawn to a woman on the couch. Though she was surrounded by a bevy of uniformed personnel, somehow she seemed alone in the room.

  The mother. It had to be. She was small and red-haired, with a wispy haircut and delicate features that just now looked ravaged.

  He could fill a chapel with the faces of all the grieving mothers he'd had to face in his career, but somehow each one managed to score his heart anyway.

  He forced himself to turn away from her raw devastation, focusing instead on a dark-haired, muscular man who stood in the center of the action, towering above everyone else.

  The Moose Springs sheriff was no stranger to him, and it looked as if Daniel Galvez had the situation well in hand.

  Galvez made eye contact with him briefly, then broke off his conversation with the officer and headed in their direction, his big hand outstretched.

  "Davis! Sorry I had to drag you boys from the FBI down here already, but we don't want to miss anything on this one."

  "No problem," Cale said. "This is my partner, Gage McKinnon."

  The two men shook hands. "I know you don't have time to babysit us," Gage began, "but can you just spare a minute to bring us up to speed on the search so far?"

  Galvez shook his head. "We're baffled. The kid seems to have vanished. At this point, we haven't turned up any signs that anyone else was involved but we just don't know."

  "What about friends? Could he have snuck out to meet up with someone?"

  "He doesn't have many. His cousins, mostly. Megan and the kids only moved to town a few months ago."

  "What about search dogs?"

  "They're on their way. They've been in Wyoming looking for a lost hiker but should be here by the time the sun comes up, when we can mount a full-scale search of the surrounding mountains."

  "What about closer to home?" Cale said with a meaningful look at the mother.

  Galvez suddenly looked tired. "I just don't know. My gut's saying no. Like I said, the family has only been here a few months, but as far as I can tell there's nothing in their background to point any fingers to the mother. From all accounts, Megan Vance is a devoted mother who's had a rough road."

  She certainly looked devastated by her son's disappearance, Cale thought with another glance at the woman on the couch. But he knew outward appearances could some
times hide rotten insides.

  "You said they've only been here a few months," he said. "Where were they before they moved?"

  "San Diego."

  "Why the move?"

  "Mrs. Vance's sister lives about a half mile down the road with her husband and four children," he answered. "Molly and Scott Randall. I gather Mrs. Vance wanted to be closer to family. It would be tough raising two kids by yourself."

  Sometimes the strain of twenty-four-hour single parenting could make even the most seemingly devoted parent crack. Cale had seen it before and he wasn't willing to rule anything out yet.

  "I'm assuming you want to talk to Megan Vance," Galvez said.

  No. He wanted to stay as far as possible from that traumatized-looking woman on the couch. But he knew his job.

  "Definitely."

  His partner gave him a, careful look. His shoulder ached. Cale wondered how long it would be before everybody stopped looking at him as if he were a big bundle of unstable plastic explosives just waiting for an ignition source.

  He returned Gage's scrutiny with cool regard, and after a moment the other agent nodded.

  "You run the mother. I'll go talk to the crime scene unit and see if they've come up with anything," McKinnon said.

  He headed up the stairs and Cale turned toward the mother. Up close, Megan Vance looked even more fragile. Breakable, like an antique pitcher teetering on the edge of a shelf.

  She clasped her hands tightly together on her lap, but he could see even that couldn't still their trembling. Her whole body shook, he saw as he approached. Not constantly, but every few seconds, a shiver would rack her slight frame.

  "Mrs. Vance, I'm Special Agent Caleb Davis with the Salt Lake office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I wonder if 1 could have a minute of your time."

  The woman next to her bristled. She was older and rounder than Megan Vance but shared the same brilliant green eyes. The sister, he guessed. "She's told you all what happened a million times already. How many times do you people have to put her through this?"

  "Molly, it's all right," Megan said, her voice quiet but determined. "Will you grab another cup of coffee for me? Agent Davis?"

  He shook his head. The sister looked reluctant, but she rose and left them alone.

  Megan Vance faced him, her hands tight together and her remarkable eyes filled with raw emotion. For one insane moment, he was stunned and appalled by his urge to gather her close and promise everything would be all right. He shoved it away.

  "I'm very sorry about your son, but I can assure you many excellent people will be helping in the search."

  She drew in a slow breath and when she met his gaze, he could see a layer of steel underneath the pain.

  "I don't need platitudes, Agent Davis. I need action. Why is everyone standing around and not out there looking for my son?"

  He had to respect her grit. "It's very important in cases like this not to go racing off in a hundred different directions and run the risk of trampling over your son's trail. When the sun comes up in an hour or so, you'll see everybody here jump into action."

  "I can't stand that he's out there in the dark somewhere. I need to be out looking for him."

  Despite his best efforts to remain impartial, the emotion in her voice seemed to slither through his defenses.

  "I know it's tough but the best thing you can do for Cameron right now is to help us narrow the direction of our search. Would you mind going over the timeline with me?"

  After a moment, she nodded. "I put him to bed as usual at about 9:00 p.m. He was sleeping soundly at ten when I checked on him—I tucked the blanket up so I know for sure he was in bed at that time. I woke at two and went to check on him and he was gone."

  "What woke you?"

  She paused slightly. "I had a nightmare."

  "Is that unusual for you?"

  "Not really."

  "And do you usually check your children when you wake from a bad dream in the middle of the night?"

  He hadn't meant to make his questions sound like an interrogation, but her mouth tightened.

  "Look, Agent Davis, I know the drill here. I've watched enough television to know you have to consider me a suspect. I have no problem with that. None whatsoever. Take my DNA, my fingerprints, whatever. I'll take a lie detector test or anything else you want. But please hurry, so you can quickly rule me out and focus on finding my son."

  Chapter 2

  6:32 a.m.

  He was in serious trouble.

  Cameron hit the glow on his watch and groaned at the time. His mom was going to have a total cow. Most mornings she got up early to work in her office before he and Hailey woke up. If she checked on him like she usually did, by now she had probably found the stupid wadded blankets he thought had been such a great idea.

  It seemed like such a baby thing to do now, something even Hailey could come up with.

  If she had checked on him like usual, she must have figured out he was gone. He felt sick to his stomach just thinking about how worried she must be. She totally freaked out if he even walked an aisle away from her at the grocery store.

  Had she called the police? Gosh, he hoped so. He thought of that terrible scream and the thud of a body falling and shivered in the cool, damp air, wishing he had the new jacket he'd taken off inside the entrance.

  He had been lost in the maze of tunnels for more than four hours, and he had to admit that he was starting to get a little nervous about finding his way out again.

  Like an idiot, he had gone way too far into the mine after that gunshot. He had just wanted to escape that ugly scene. By now, he was so turned around he didn't know which way he'd come.

  None of this seemed familiar. These tunnels were more narrow, barely wide enough for him to get through in spots.

  He had tried to backtrack but was now more confused than ever.

  His night vision goggles were worthless in here with no light to draw on, so he had abandoned them a ways back and pulled his flashlight out of his bag.

  He wasn't completely unprepared. He might have made mistakes, but at least he hadn't been that stupid. After he first found the mine entrance a few weeks earlier, he had checked out a book on spelunking from the library, slipping it between a book on soccer and a middle reader mystery so his mom wouldn't see it and suspect anything.

  The book said to always wear a helmet for head protection when exploring underground places. A caver could bump his head on a low ceiling if he wasn't careful.

  All he had was his bike helmet so he had used that. He was grateful for it now since he'd already bonked his head twice in the low tunnels.

  The book also said to take along three sources of illumination. Besides the now-worthless night vision goggles, he had two flashlights with two extra sets of batteries for each.

  They weren't going to last long, he knew. Since he was taking a short break, he turned off the flashlight for now to conserve energy, grateful it hung on a lanyard around his neck so he couldn't lose it. That was a trick his dad taught him when they used to go fishing and stuff, always to keep his light handy.

  His dad would have been really mad at him for worrying his mom like this.

  He sighed, taking a sip from one of two water bottles he'd stowed in his backpack earlier that evening. He also had a couple of granola bars, some hard candy and a banana.

  Without his mom seeing, he had also managed to sneak a few other survival items out of his dad's stuff stored in the garage, like a first aid kit, one of those shiny survival blankets and a lighter.

  He didn't dare use the lighter inside the mine, though. He knew enough from reading that spelunking book to know there could be bad air inside these places and he didn't want to risk it.

  He looked at his watch again: six forty-five. How long would it take the police to start looking for him? And how would they ever figure out he was inside here, trapped in miles of tunnels with a dead guy?

  He shivered again, wishing with all his heart he was bac
k in his bed complaining at his mom for coming in to wake him up so soon.

  8:15 a.m.

  The community had turned out in force.

  Megan stood on her porch and looked out at the crowds of volunteer searchers waiting for assignments to begin combing the foothills above her house.

  The sun had barely crested the mountains to the east, but already an empty field at the edge of her five acres had been turned into a staging area for the search.

  A Moose Springs Search and Rescue trailer served as the mobile command center, and she could see horses and all-terrain vehicles being unloaded and dozens of strangers with water bqjtles and fanny packs milling around as the various agencies involved worked out all the necessary search details.

  How could this all have happened so suddenly? The FBI agent had been right. Once the sun rose, the search effort had ramped up significantly. Now everything looked organized and efficient. For the first time since she found that horribly empty bed, hope began to flutter through her.

  "Looks like word travels fast."

  She turned to find the FBI agent who had grilled her for more than an hour. Caleb Davis stood on the edge of the porch. She didn't know if he watched her or the volunteer searchers, since dark sunglasses shielded his eyes.

  Megan had to fight down her instinctive defensive-ness, her deep sense of invasion at the questions he had asked. She knew he had only been doing his job, and she knew later she would probably appreciate his thoroughness. But the hour spent under his microscope had been grueling and intrusive.

  Can you go over what woke you again ? What led you to go into Cameron's room? Do you often check on him in the night?

  He had asked the questions a dozen different ways. His voice had been cool, controlled, but all the time he questioned her, Agent Davis had studied her out of polar-blue eyes that looked as if they could pierce titanium.

  She had answered his questions over and over, never wavering in her story. She still couldn't tell whether or not he believed her story from any reaction on his lean, harshly handsome features. At this point, she didn't give a damn. She just wanted her son home—and she could only pray the people gathering in that meadow down there could facilitate that.