pair of cops walked past them. “Do you see any freckles?” She gestured with the blade of her hand at her eye-line, over her nose. “It’s not like they magically disappear, you know.”
“You never know, what with the miracle of makeup and all.” His voice dropped as well. “So you’re thinking foul play by the mother?”
The question was grim, reminding her that he had a job to do. That he was potentially the one who’d find this poor kid dead in a ditch somewhere or under a copse of trees. It made her realize that he’d been teasing her once againag.perhaps as a way of coping with that knowledge.
Great, Marissa. Some shrink you are.
Jackson leaned over and cut Sargent loose. He made a deep sound in his throat and Sargent took off into the woods.
“Keep working the mother,” he said before heading off after his dog.
She did exactly that. Subtly, slowly, waiting for the woman to do something to give herself away.
“I just don’t understand,” she said, dabbing a tissue under red-rimmed eyes. The tears had been genuine at least. Whether it was actual grief or due to fear, that part was hard to tell. It was past three a.m. and as far as she knew, Jackson had only taken two breaks, and both of those breaks she suspected were for Sargent’s benefit as opposed to his. The other dog teams from Albany were tied up and still hadn’t arrived. Apparently there was no shortage of missing people that night. Since the Saugerties dog handlers covered a great deal of the townships in the area, the next closest town with a team had been notified. It was spring so the ski teams had come off the mountains and were being called back to join the search. They were just now starting to arrive.
“Damn him, I’m going to nail his ass to the wall,” barked Avery Landon, the precinct captain. “He’s ignoring me on purpose!”
“Tommy was such a good boy,” the mother was saying. “He always, always listened to me. Never did a single thing wrong.”
“I’m going to go out there and get him myself.”
Uh-oh. Trouble. And she knew there was only one person “out there” who would pretend he didn’t hear his captain recalling him if he didn’t want to hear it. He would work himself until he dropped, the noble idiot. He’d let that dog rest, but he’d probably work himself into a—
Was.
Cold seized Marissa by the heart, freezing her breath in her lungs.
Was. Tommy was a good boy. Not is, but was.
And that was when she knew Tommy was most likely dead already. It could have been days ago … who really knew? The only other person to see him had been his teacher on Friday. Two whole days ago. And here he was, missing quite conveniently before he was due to show up in school the next day.
“Excuse me,” she said numbly, standing up and walking over to Landon. “Captain, I know where Jackson is.” She didn’t actually, but she suspected what she had to say would flush him out far quicker than his railing captain would. But she did have his cell number and as soon as she got into the woods and far enough out of earshot, she was going to tell him to come in.
Because as far as she knew, Sargent hadn’t been trained as a cadaver dog. It took a very special type of training for that.
“Where?” Landon demanded on a growl.
“Firstly, Captain, I can appreciate that it’s late and we are all very tired, but snorting like a bull isn’t going to help. Secondly, if you think I’m going to tell you so you can extract your pound of flesh you clearly don’t know me very well. Let me go. There’s as much chance of me talking sense into him than anyone else, I guess.”
“You get him and you bring him back A once againag.SAP, Doc,” Landon ordered. “I swear I’m writing him up this time. He’s gotten more and more insubordinate this last month …”
Marissa tuned out the rest of the tirade, hunching into her sweater, and moving toward the trees quickly before Landon changed his mind and sent someone with her. Actually, it was pretty thoughtless of him not to do so. She probably should have told Landon her suspicions, but a few minutes either way wasn’t going to make much difference. It had been hours, actually, since anyone had made anything resembling headway. Anyone but her.
Was.
It was a horrendous