his men (and two women). Especially considering there wasn’t money in the budget to replace the old tape system. But it didn’t matter. They had to find this “nice man.”
That is, of course, if he existed.
The sheriff had his suspicions. It didn’t take a lot to imagine being a seven-year-old boy, dehydrated, hungry, scared. Needing someone to hold you and convincing yourself that tree branches looked like arms.
But he had to be sure that there wasn’t a nice man.
Not to thank this Good Samaritan.
But to see if he took Christopher in the first place.
Dr. Karen Shelton: What did the nice man look like, Christopher?
Christopher: I don’t know. I never saw his face.
Dr. Karen Shelton: Do you remember anything about him?
Christopher: He had white hair. Like a cloud.
The sheriff had seen it enough in his old job. In the worst neighborhoods in the Hill District. He had seen bad things done to children. He saw them lie to protect the guilty out of fear. Or even worse…loyalty. But the doctor said that Christopher looked to be in good health. Nothing happened to the boy that left any physical marks.
But the sheriff had seen from experience that not all wounds leave marks.
Dr. Karen Shelton: Can you think of anything else?
Christopher: He walked with a limp. Like his leg was broken.
The sheriff stopped the tape and looked at the sketch artist’s rendition. Dr. Shelton tried every trick in the book, but Christopher could never remember seeing the nice man’s face. The rest of his description was consistent. Tall. Walked with a limp. And white hair.
Like a cloud.
The sheriff took a swallow from his old Dunkin’ Donuts cup and let the cold, bitter coffee slosh in his teeth. He studied the sketch for another minute. Something was wrong. He knew it in his guts.
The sheriff opened the door.
He got out.
And walked into the Mission Street Woods.
He didn’t know the woods very well. He wasn’t from around here. After that last case in the Hill District, he put in for a transfer. He chose Mill Grove for the quiet. And other than a small-time meth lab run by a couple of science fair judges, he got what he wanted. No crimes but underaged drinking and the occasional naked teenager in the back of Daddy’s leased sports car. No guns. No killing. No gangs.
It was heaven.
A heaven that barely lasted a year. That’s when he got the call that a boy named Christopher Reese had gone missing, and the mother wanted to speak to the sheriff right away. So, he got himself out of bed and threw stale coffee into the microwave. He added three pinches of salt to cut the bitterness and drank it all the way to the station. When he arrived, he was fully prepared to take the mother’s statement, mobilize his department, and offer her a trained, uniformed shoulder to cry on.
But there were no tears with Christopher’s mother.
She was fully prepared with a recent photo. A list of friends. Activities. And his normal daily routine. When the sheriff asked if there was anyone who would wish the mother or child harm, she mentioned one name. An ex-boyfriend named Jerry Davis back in Michigan.
The sheriff only needed one click of the mouse to see that Jerry was a potential suspect. It was a petty sheet. But there was enough violence. Bar fights. An ex-wife with some bruises. He hit Christopher’s mother after he got drunk. He passed out. She left him that night. The sheriff respected her for not waiting to verify his promise to “never do it again.” Most women he knew didn’t make that call until it was too late.
“Do you think Jerry could have taken Christopher, Mrs. Reese?”
“No. I covered our tracks. He’ll never find us.”
But the sheriff wanted to make sure. He used the landline with the blocked caller ID. He spoke to Jerry’s foreman, who told him Jerry had been at the plant all week. And if he didn’t believe him, there was security video to back it up. The foreman asked what this was all about, but the sheriff figured he better not give Jerry a trail to find Christopher or his mother. So, he lied and said he was calling from California. Then, he thanked the man and hung up.
After Jerry Davis was cleared, the sheriff did his due diligence. He questioned teachers and classmates while his deputies combed all of the security footage and traffic cameras in a ten-mile radius. But there was no