The man identified himself as Jeff Griffin and Hodge started notes for a report.
“Okay, Jeff, tell us what happened and where,” Hodge asked.
The man walked them to the location, recounting the few details he had. Hodge took notes, asked short questions. Duggan said nothing. As their radios crackled with cross talk Duggan studied Jeff, listening, absorbing and watching through jaded brown eyes that seldom missed a thing. Nearly finished, Jeff turned to the wheelchair man, panhandling some fifteen yards up the street.
“…and that guy there in the wheelchair said he saw two men ‘help’ them into a van or an SUV before it drove away.”
“You got this from Freddie?” Duggan said.
“Is that his name, the soldier who lost his leg in Afghanistan? He said ‘it didn’t look right’ when he saw them being taken away.”
“Freddie sees a lot of things,” Duggan said.
Jeff nodded, clearly reassured he had a witness that police knew. But then Duggan elaborated.
“Sometimes Freddie sees things that aren’t there, depending on whether he’s on or off his meds. He didn’t lose his leg overseas—he slipped at a subway station platform. Train crushed it. Did you give him money?”
“Ten bucks.”
“He always tries to help people who give him money. He’s not a bad person,” Duggan said.
“What’re you saying?” In the tense silence, Jeff looked hard at Duggan, then Hodge, sensing doubt. His face showed an oncoming rush of helplessness. “What? You don’t believe me? Christ, what am I supposed to do here?”
“Maybe it’s like you said,” Hodge offered. “Maybe they went into a store and Freddie got mixed up. Maybe you should wait a bit?”
Suddenly remembering his one piece of evidence, Jeff reached into his pocket, then held up Cole’s key ring.
“I found this in the street, right where they were! We got this for Cole yesterday. He’d clipped it to his pants this morning! You’ve got to help me!”
Duggan’s face tightened as he blinked at Cole’s key ring. His instinct, forged from two decades of police work, was now telling him that the situation had changed.
“All right, here’s what we’re going to do,” Duggan said. “I’ll talk to Freddie. Jeff, give Officer Hodge any recent photos you have. We’ll start a canvass with other uniforms and I’ll call a car for you, Jeff.”
“Why?”
“This needs to go to the detective squad at Manhattan South.”
Duggan talked into his walkie-talkie as he started toward Freddie. Jeff cued up the photos on his camera and sent them to Hodge’s BlackBerry. He took more notes from Jeff, added more details.
Then Hodge hit Send.
“I’ve just shot the information and pictures to every cop patrolling this area,” Hodge said.
Duggan returned from taking Freddie’s information and was on his radio again searching the traffic.
“Jimmy, email your notes for the sixty-one to Sergeant McBain. I’ll call him. Jeff—” Duggan nodded to the street “—your ride’s here.”
A siren yelped and a marked NYPD radio car, lights flashing, pulled over. Duggan leaned into the empty passenger section, had a quick conversation with the officer behind the wheel. Duggan then opened the rear door for Jeff, who saw Hodge huddling with four other uniformed officers who’d arrived.
“Jeff, this is Officer Breedo. He’s going to drive you to the station house,” Duggan said. “He’ll take you in to Sergeant McBain, who’ll refer you to the detective squad. They’ll take over. Here’s my card with my cell and email—we have your information.”
“Thank you.”
“We’re going to circulate and look for Sarah and Cole here while you work with the detectives. The squad at the Fourteenth Precinct has more resources than we do. They’ll decide what steps to take next.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
* * *
Jeff got in the back.
The seat—vinyl patched with duct tape—was separated from the front by a plastic divider. There was little legroom. The back windows were up tight and would not open. The rear smelled of lemon-scented cleaner, barely masking the trace of vomit and despair. When Breedo slid the divider open, Jeff welcomed the relief as breezes from the open front windows carried Breedo’s cologne to the back of the car.
“It’s about ten blocks away. I’ll have you there in no time.”
The siren yelped again, then wailed nonstop as Breedo maneuvered the Crown Victoria through traffic. Jeff was no stranger to emergency vehicles. He took in the controls for the overhead lights, siren, public address, search lights, the small computer terminal. Breedo’s police radio issued a never-ending stream of coded transmissions.
Traffic ahead parted for them.
“See?” Breedo tapped his computer’s monitor. Jeff saw Sarah and Cole’s picture. “We’re getting information out there.”
Jeff’s gut writhed with relief and fear.
Then he noticed the visor above Breedo, where the faces of a woman and two girls around three or four years old smiled down from a color snapshot.
“That your family in the picture above you?”
“Those are my girls. Duggan says you’re a firefighter in Montana.”
“Volunteer. I’m a mechanic.”
“My brother was a firefighter. We lost him in the Towers.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
The siren wailed.
Jeff tried Sarah’s cell phone once more.
Again, it was futile. “Hi, this is Sarah. Please leave a message.” Keeping the phone pressed to his ear, he clung to her voice for a moment before another stab of concern hit him and he let go.
Breedo caught it and met him in the rearview mirror.
“Don’t worry, Jeff, we’re going to find your wife and son. Don’t worry.”
“Yeah, thanks.”
He saw Breedo’s profile as he drove. Then Jeff saw himself alone in the rearview mirror, stress lines carved in his face, worry bordering on fear clouding his eyes.
If this is a nightmare, then why can’t I wake up? Wake up!
Jeff got out Cole’s key ring, then the camera, and looked at the last picture taken of the three of them together.
He turned back to the window.
Manhattan blurred by and the siren rose to a near-scream.
7
New York City
The Fourteenth Precinct was situated on Thirty-fifth Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues in a three-story cream-and-coffee-colored building.
Breedo escorted Jeff to Sergeant McBain, a burly man on the north side of fifty. He was studying his computer at his desk and paused to gaze at them over his bifocals when Breedo introduced him.
“Sarge, this is Jeff Griffin, Duggan and Hodge’s sixty-one.”
McBain threw his attention to Jeff.
“Did the officers find my wife and son?” Jeff asked. “Did they call in?”
“No, I’m afraid nothing’s come in yet.” McBain