Tuesday
Predawn
"I'm unraveling." She pictured the disappointment she knew must be on the face her department-ordered psychiatrist, Dr. Beverly Blanc.
"How so?"
Keri explained, letting it all spill out at once.
She was seeing Evie's face everywhere. She couldn't stop thinking about her. Maybe it was because the five-year mark was coming up next week. She didn't know. All she knew was that it was happening, more often than any time since the first six months after the abduction. She hadn't had any blank time in the last six months. But now she'd had multiple blank-out episodes in the last twelve hours. Worse, she'd gotten violent. She punched a high-school kid in the head. She'd swung a microphone into another guy's head. And she'd deliberately confronted both a drug dealer and a pimp.
She got a lead that Evie may have been taken by someone called the Collector. A local attorney, Jackson Cave, might know the man's real name and whereabouts but would never tell anyone voluntarily. Keri was entertaining thoughts of blackmailing him to force him to talk.
Also, she was working the Ashley Penn case.
"I know," Dr. Blanc said. "I saw you on TV."
She was on the case, then got kicked off it, then got back on it; right now, she didn't know what her status was.
Dr. Blanc said, "You have more coming in than you can process. You're like a balloon with too much air pumping into it. If it doesn't stop, you're going to explode. You need to either get off the Ashley Penn case or put Evie on hold. Stop thinking about her until this case is resolved."
Keri winced.
"I can't drop the case."
"Why not?"
"Because if I do, and something ends up happening, I couldn't live with myself."
Dr. Blanc exhaled.
"Then you have to let Evie go for now. You have to stop fixating on her. And you have to do the same with the Collector."
"That's impossible."
"Look," Dr. Blanc said, "here's the reality. If Evie's dead-"
"She's not!"
"Okay, but if she is, setting thoughts of her aside for a while is not going to affect her one way or the other. If she's not dead, then she's probably found a way to cope with her current life. The fear and desperation that you saw on her face the last time you saw her, it's not there right now."
"We don't know that," Keri said.
"Yes, we do," Dr. Blanc said. "Emotions like that are not sustainable. If she's alive, wherever she is, the overwhelming chances are that she's found a way to function day to day. She's in some kind of a routine. She's adjusted to it. Setting the Collector and this lawyer guy to the side for a week or two is not going to make a significant difference to Evie in the grand scheme of her life.
"In fact, if you rush into hunting down this Collector guy, you might even make mistakes that you wouldn't make later when you're thinking straight. You might tip him off that you're coming. He might slip away. So, clear him from your mind, the lawyer too, and work the Ashley Penn case if that's what you have to do, then go back at him when you're healthy and you can give him your full concentration. Does that make sense?"
Keri exhaled. "Yes."
"You need rest, too, Keri. Rest is extremely important. Go home and sleep at least eight hours. Consider that the doctor's orders."
"I can maybe try for three."
"I'll take it."
*
Keri went home.
These days, home was a deteriorating twenty-year-old houseboat slipped at Marina Bay in Marina del Rey. There was a fancy part of the marina further west, with expensive apartment buildings and yacht clubs. But Basin H, where Keri lived, was much more working class. Her place was housed among industrial fishing boats and the barely seaworthy vessels of old-timers. The prior owner had named it Sea Cups, and hand-painted a pink bra on the side. It wasn't exactly Keri's style but she'd never worked up the time or energy to scrape it off.
The good news was that it had electricity, water, a small galley, and a pump-out toilet, and it didn't tie her down. She could abandon it without a second thought and run off to Alaska if her life suddenly demanded it. The bad news was that it had no shower or laundry. Those tasks needed to be done down the road at the Marina's comfort station, or at work.
It also had almost no room to spare. Everything was in something else's way. If you wanted one thing, you had to move three. For people with houses, the thought of living in a houseboat might seem adventurous or exotic. For someone like Keri, who actually did it every day, the charm had long since worn off.
Keri went to the galley, poured herself a generous serving of scotch, and headed for the roof deck. As she got to the stairwell, she saw that a framed photo had tipped over. The houseboat didn't rock much but on occasion it moved enough to cause things to shift or fall over. She righted the photo, glancing at it without really processing what she was seeing.
After a moment, she realized she was staring at what used to be her family. It was one of those posed beach photos they'd done as part of Evie's preschool fundraiser when she was four. They sat by a section of rocks with the ocean in the background. Evie was in front in a white sundress. Her blonde hair was kept out of her eyes by a green headband that matched her eyes.
Both parents sat behind her. Stephen had on khaki slacks and an untucked white dress shirt. Keri was dressed similarly in a flowing white blouse and a khaki skirt. Stephen had one hand on Evie's shoulder and the other wrapped around Keri's waist. That remnant of their casual intimacy flashed through her mind. It had been a long time since anyone had touched her in that comfortable, knowing way.
She remembered that it had been hard not to squint that day because the photo sitting was in the morning and the bright early fall sun was right in their eyes. Evie kept complaining about it but somehow managed to open her eyes wide for this one shot. Keri couldn't help but smile at the memory.
She left the picture behind as she walked up the stairs to the deck and settled into a cheap chaise lounge she'd ordered from Amazon on impulse. She closed her eyes and tried to feel the nearly imperceptible movement of the houseboat. The photo drifted through her mind again. The Keri Locke in that picture wouldn't recognize her now.
It had been taken almost four years before Evie was abducted. Looking back, that was about as close to perfect as Keri's life had ever been. She'd somehow survived a childhood she wouldn't wish on anyone to become a successful professor of criminology and psychology at LMU. She was a respected consultant for the LAPD. She was married to a prominent entertainment attorney who never let his work interfere with a preschool recital or Halloween parade.
And she had a daughter who made her see every day that growing up didn't have to be about trauma. It could be about wonder and joy. There were pumpkin patches to visit and chocolate chip cookies to bake together. There were furtive, hurried Sunday morning lovemaking sessions to enjoy before little feet could be heard galloping into their bedroom. Those were the salad days and she hadn't even realized it.
The Keri of the past would be aghast at the current one, gulping liquor like it was water, alone on a houseboat named after a bra size. She tried to reconstruct how it had all fallen apart. First came the drinking to oblivion, then the screaming matches with a husband who had become distant and cold. Keri knew now that it had been a form of self-protection, a way for Stephen to survive the living nightmare they shared, to keep it at arm's length. But at the time it had infuriated her, made her think he didn't care what had happened to their daughter.
After he finally left her a year later and moved out, their house felt somehow both empty and too full of memories, so she moved onto the houseboat. She also moved from guy to guy at the university. Sometimes it was grad students, sometimes undergrads-whoever was willing to make her feel good for a few moments and help her forget the anguish that consumed most of her waking hours.
That went on for about a year, until one particularly na?ve, love-struck nineteen-year-old dropped out of school because Keri had casually moved on. His parents threatened to sue. The historically Jesuit school had no choice but to settle quickly and quietly. Part of the agreement was that Keri be fired.
It was around that time that Stephen told her that he was marrying one of his clients, a young actress with sixth billing on a medical drama. They were having a baby, a little boy. Keri had gone on a week-long bender at that news. It was soon after that when a former colleague, a detective from Pacific Division named Ray Sands, had come by the boat with a proposal.
"I hear things haven't gone your way lately," he said, sitting on the same deck Keri was curled up on now. "Maybe you need a new start."
He told her about his own trip down the rabbit hole of despair and how he'd managed to crawl out by choosing to stop feeling sorry for himself and make a difference with what life he still had.
"Have you ever thought about applying to the Police Academy?" he'd asked.
The marina was quiet now, save for the sound of waves lapping up onto boat hulls and a distant foghorn calling mournfully into the darkness. Keri could feel herself drifting and chose not to fight it. She put down her glass, pulled a blanket over her, and closed her eyes.
*
Her reverie was interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone. She looked at the screen, blinking away the blurriness. It was 5:45. She'd been asleep for less than two hours. She squinted to see who was calling. It was Ray. She picked up.
"I was finally sleeping," she said irritably.
"They found the black van!"
