4

One of the callers on the list the policeman had handed me was from my office, so I had to phone and again explain what had happened. Saying it out loud reinforced the nightmare. Several times, I heard the buzz of call waiting. Twice, I switched to the incoming call in case it had something to do with Kate and Jason, but both times it was a journalist, and after that, I didn't pay attention to call waiting.

The moment I hung up, the phone rang again. We had caller ID, but most times I'd found it was useless, a lot of the calls listed as unknown caller or, in this case, blocked number. But I answered anyhow, and of course, it was another journalist; after that, I let the policeman answer the phone.

When the lab crew finally left, Webber, Pendleton, and everybody else going with them, the house had never felt so empty. My footsteps echoed off the hardwood floors as I went upstairs. Fingerprint powder smudged furniture, and clothes remained on the bedroom floors. I sat on Jason's bed, inhaling his boy smell. I went into the master bedroom, picked up one of Kate's blouses, and pressed it to my face.

I have no idea how long I remained there. The phone rang again. Ignoring it, I went into the bathroom, took off my borrowed clothes, and tried to take a bath without getting my bandaged hands and my stitched left forearm wet. Dirt and dried blood floated from me. Steam rose, but instead of the water's heat, what I felt was spreading pain as the effect of the pills the doctor had given me began to wear off. The extent of my bruises was appalling. I did my best to shave, then put on fresh clothes, but I begrudged their comfort, telling myself that I didn't deserve it, given the hell that Kate and Jason would be going through.

The doorbell rang. Limping, I needed extra time to get downstairs. Meanwhile, the bell rang again and then again. If this is a reporter…, I thought. When I opened the door, I saw a straight-backed man in a dark suit, with polished shoes and short, neat, slightly graying hair. His lean face was all business.

"Mr. Denning?"

Behind him, out on the street, a camera crew started forward.

"I'm not giving interviews." I stepped back to close the door.

"No, you don't understand. I'm FBI Special Agent John Gader." The man showed his ID. "I kept phoning, but no one answered, so I took a chance and drove over."

"I was… I didn't… Please, come in."

As the reporters neared the house, I shut the door and locked it.

Gader opened his briefcase and took out several small electronic devices. "These are voice-activated tape recorders." He linked one to the living room phone. "Is there a phone in the kitchen?"

He installed a recorder there also. "We'll deal with the rest of the house later. I've already obtained a court order to have your phone tapped and all calls traced, but it never hurts to have a backup system. If the man who took your wife and son phones to demand a ransom, we'll have a recording of it here, as well as through our intercept at the phone company."

"There won't be a ransom demand."

"You never know."

"I do know. My brother doesn't want money. He wants my wife and my son."

"Your brother?" Gader sounded as if he knew only the general parameters of the case.

So, yet again, I explained what had happened. Gader pulled out a pocket-size tape recorder and took notes as a backup. He assured me that the Bureau would give my case its full attention. After he left, it was as if he'd never been present.

Emptiness again enveloped me.

This can't have happened, I thought, straining to convince myself. I'm having a nightmare. I'll wake up soon. Kate and Jason will be back. Everything'll be perfect, the way it was.

But when I woke in the night, pain racking my body, I reached next to me and was confronted by the emptiness on Kate's side of the bed.

Nothing had changed.

As the days stretched on, the Butte police failed to catch Petey or find any sign of Kate and Jason. The Montana state troopers finally stopped watching the interstate.

5

"He isn't your brother."

"What?"

"The man who took your wife and son isn't Peter Denning," Gader said as he stood at my front door. "His name's Lester Dant."

I felt as if I'd been shoved. "You mean Petey used the name Lester Dant as an alias?"

"No. The other way around."

"For God's sake, what are you talking about?"

"The prints the crime-scene crew found in your house belong to a man named Lester Dant." Gader stepped inside. "Here's the file we have on him. Background. Social Security number. Criminal record."

Bewildered, I sat in the living room and stared at the photograph that came with the documents. Complete with chipped tooth and scarred chin, Petey's face confronted me from a mug shot that had been taken in Butte.

But the file identified the man as Lester Dant. He'd been born in Brockton, Indiana, a year before Petey was born. Over the years, he'd been arrested for, but never convicted of, auto theft, armed robbery, and manslaughter.

"Dant did time for extortion, drug dealing, and rape," Gader said. "It's a miracle he didn't kill you all in your sleep. See where the Butte police have a record on him? Lester Dant got in a bar fight and put a man in the emergency ward. He was released from jail a week before the CBS Sunday Morning broadcast you were on."

"But…" My sense of unreality intensified so much that the living room seemed to tilt. "How did he know so much about Petey?"

"They must have crossed paths," Gader said. "Maybe your brother saw the CBS Sunday Morning show and talked about it with some people he knew, including Dant. Later, in private, Dant got more specifics from him and decided to pay you a visit."

I raised my voice in dismay. "My brother hung around with people like Dant?"

"Maybe your brother had as rough a life as Dant claimed."

"But why in God's name didn't Petey come to see me himself?"

Gader stared at me, and I tensed with the realization that Dant might have killed Petey to prevent him from interfering.

"It doesn't make sense," I told Gader. "If Dant's this vicious, why would he have packed clothes for my son? Why would he have taken Jason along instead of…" The words caught in my throat.

"Killing him?" Gader looked uncomfortable. "I'm not sure that's a topic you want to get into."

"Let me decide that. Answer me."

Gader exhaled slowly. "It's probable that Dant took your son to put pressure on your wife. By threatening to hurt Jason, he could force your wife to submit to him."

I felt as if I'd been struck in the face. "No."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Denning. You asked me to be candid."

"Petey… Lester Dant…"

"Fingerprints don't lie."

"There's got to be a mistake. What Petey told me about when we were kids and how he was abducted-"

"What Dant told you. He probably kept buying your brother drinks to keep him talking, supplying details."

"But it all felt so real. I'm sure he was telling the truth."

"Listen, some of these con men are good-enough actors, they could have won Academy Awards if they'd gone straight."

"It's just that…"

"Everything was a lie. The name of the town in West Virginia where he told you he was held prisoner."

"Redemption."

"There's no such place."

"What?"

"Other parts of his story don't hold together, either. He told you he got the scar on his chin last summer when he fell off a ladder on a roofing project in Colorado Springs."

"That's right."

"Well, our agents showed Dant's photograph to all the roofing contractors in that area. Nobody recognized him. The same with the construction contractors. If somebody had gotten a two-inch gash on his face, they'd remember it, they say. It would have required stitches, but the hospitals in the area don't have any record of a construction worker coming in last summer with that kind of injury. However, the Colorado Springs police have a security-camera tape of a man who looks like Dant beating a clerk in a liquor store robbery. A police car chased his vehicle into the mountains. He may have gotten the injury to his face when his car skidded off a curve and tumbled into a draw. There was blood but no driver when officers climbed down to examine the wreckage."