“No. He said Kevin would know where. He said it was dark down here, that’s it.”

“Have you talked to Kevin?”

“We made the decision to enter premises.” He paused. “Kevin was gone.”

Jennifer collapsed in her chair. “You let him walk?”

Claude sounded flustered. “His car’s still in the garage.”

She closed her eyes and took a calming breath. What now? “I want that tape here now. Set up a search in concentric circles. He’s on foot.”

She dropped her phone on the table and closed her fingers to still a bad tremble. Her nerves were shot. Four days and how much sleep? Twelve, fourteen hours? The case had just gone from terrible to hopeless. He was going to kill Balinda. Inevitable. Whowas going to kill Balinda? Slater? Kevin?

“Ma’am?”

She looked up to see one of Milton’s detectives in the door. “I have a call for you. He says he tried your personal line but couldn’t get through. Wouldn’t give his name.”

She nodded at the desk phone. “Put it through.”

The call transferred and she picked up. “Peters.”

“Jennifer?”

It was Kevin. Jennifer was too stunned to respond.

“Hello?”

“Where are you?”

“I’m sorry, Jennifer. I’m going after him. But I have to do this alone. If you come after me, he’ll kill her. You’re recording the house, right? Listen to the tape. I can’t talk now, because they’ll find me, but I wanted you to know.” He sounded desperate.

“Kevin, you don’t have to do this. Tell me where you are.”

“I dohave to do this. Listen to the tape. It’s not what you think.

Slater’s doing this to me. Don’t bother calling me; I’m throwing this phone away.” He abruptly clicked off.

“Kevin?”

Jennifer slammed the phone in its cradle. She ran her hands through her hair and picked up the phone again. She dialed Samantha’s number.

“Hello?”

“Kevin’s gone, Sam,” Jennifer said. “He just received a call from Slater threatening to kill Balinda in six hours. He baited Kevin to meet him, said he would know where and that it was dark. As far as I know, that’s it. The tape’s on the way down.”

“He’s on foot? How could they let him walk out?”

“I don’t know. The point is, we’re now on a very tight time line and we’ve lost contact.”

“Slater’s cell—”

“He said he was getting rid of it.”

“I’ll go back,” Sam said. “He can’t get far.”

“Assuming you’re right about Kevin, Slater’s drawing him to a place they must both know from their childhood. Any ideas?”

Sam hesitated. “The warehouse?”

“We’ll check it out, but it’s too obvious.”

“Let me think about it. If we’re lucky, we pick him up. Concentrate the search to the west—closer to Baker Street.”

“There’s another possibility, Sam. I know it may sound like a stretch, but what if Slater’s framing Kevin?”

The phone was quiet.

“Forensics will give us a better picture, but the cell could have been planted and the call log duplicated by relay. The objective fits: Kevin is branded a psychopath who terrorized himself, he’s ruined, and Slater skips free. Childhood grudge revenged.”

“What a tangled web we weave,” Sam said quietly. “Get the data on the recordings; hopefully it’ll tell us more.”

“I’m working on it.” Galager walked in and sat down, file in hand. Jennifer stood. “Call me if you think of anything.”

“One last thing,” Sam said. “I talked to Dr. John Francis and he mentioned that you’d spoken to him already, but you might want to consider breaking this down with him. He knows Kevin well and he’s in your field. Just a thought.”

“Thank you, I will.”

She set the phone down. Galager was back. “Well?”

“Like I said, not done. But I do have something. Ever hear of a seismic tuner?”

“A what?”

“Seismic tuner. A device that alters voice patterns.”

“Okay.”

“Well, I could record my voice and program this thing to match it to yours.”

“So? The sample we sent them of Kevin’s voice sounds nothing like Slater’s—what’s your point?”

“I talked to Carl Riggs at the lab. He says that even if they do determine that both Slater’s voice and Kevin’s voice have the same vocal patterns, someone who knew what they were doing could manufacture the effect with a seismic tuner.”

“I’m not following. Bottom line, Galager.” Her frustration was overflowing now.

“Bottom line is that Slater could have altered his voice to make it sound like a derivative of Kevin’s voice. He could have obtained a sample of Kevin’s voice, broken it down electronically, and then reproduced its vocal patterns at a different range and with different inflections. In other words, he could be speaking through a box that makes it sound like he’s Kevin, trying not to be Kevin. Follow?”

“Knowing that we would analyze the recording and conclude that both voices were Kevin’s.” She blinked.

“Correct. Even though they aren’t.”

“As in, if he wanted to frame Kevin.”

“A possibility. Riggs said there’s an open case in Florida where a guy’s wife was kidnapped for a ransom of a million dollars. The community came together in a fund drive and raised the money. But it turns out the kidnapper’s voice was a recording of the husband’s, manipulated by a seismic tuner. He evidently kidnapped his own wife. It’s going to trial next month.”

“I didn’t know there was such a thing as a seismic tuner.”

“There wasn’t until about a year ago.” Galager stood. “Either way, even if both voiceprints match Kevin’s, we won’t know if both really are his until we rule out the use of a seismic tuner. Riggs won’t have the voice report until tomorrow. They’re on it, but it takes time.”

“And the shoe prints?”

“Should have that this evening, but he doesn’t think it’ll help us either. Not distinctive enough.”

“So what you’re telling me is that none of this matters?”

“I’m telling you none of this may matter. In the end.”

He left and Jennifer sagged into her chair. Milton. She would have to depend on him now. She needed every available patrol car in the city to join the search for Kevin, and she needed the search conducted without risking a leak to the media.

Jennifer closed her eyes. Actually, none of that mattered. What mattered was the fact that Kevin was lost. The boy was lost.

She suddenly wanted to cry.

24

KEVIN KEPT TO THE SIDE STREETS, jogging as naturally as he could despite the pounding in his head.

When cars or pedestrians approached, he either changed directions or crossed the street. At the least lowered his head. If he had the luxury of a direct route, the crosstown jog would be half what it was with all of his side jaunts.

But Slater had said alone, which meant avoiding the authorities at all costs. Jennifer would have the cops out in force this time. She would be desperate to find him before he found Slater because she knew that Kevin didn’t stand a chance against Slater.

Kevin knew it too.

He ran with the dread knowledge that there was no way he could face Slater and survive. Balinda would die; he would die. But he had no choice. Although he thought he’d freed himself, he’d really been slumping around in that dungeon of the past for twenty years. No longer. He would face Slater head-on and live, or die in this last-ditch effort to reach freedom.

What about Jennifer? And Sam? He would lose them, wouldn’t he? The best things in his life—the only things that mattered now— would be ripped away by Slater. And if he found a way to escape Slater this time, the man would be back to hunt him down again. No, he had to end this once and for all. He had to kill or be killed.

Kevin swallowed hard and ran on through unsuspecting residential neighborhoods. Helicopters chopped through the sky. He couldn’t quickly differentiate the police from others, so he hid from them all, which slowed his progress even more. Eleven police cars crossed his path, each time forcing him to alter direction. He ran for one hour and still was only halfway there. He grunted and pushed on. The hour stretched into two. With every step, his determination increased until he could almost taste his bitterness toward Slater, the coppery taste of blood on his dry tongue.