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I end the call and hit the speed dial for Tomasetti.

  He greets me with, “You’re working late tonight.”

  I tell him about the missing boys. “Tomasetti, I’ve got blood. A backpack that was left behind along with a cell phone. A bunch of footprints that tells me they weren’t the only ones out here.”

  He sighs. “Blood is ominous.”

  “I’m officially worried.”

  “Let me get on the horn,” he tells me. “I’ll get some resources out there. Meet you there as soon as I can.”

  I thank him, but he’s already gone.

  * * *

  Three sets of tracks take us due north along Painters Creek. Another quarter mile in, the path narrows to little more than a deer trail, the fallen leaves so thick we can no longer see the prints. To make matters worse, the wind has shifted out of the north. Drizzle floats down from a black sky, and the temperature has begun a precipitous drop.

  “Why the hell don’t kids ever get lost when it’s seventy degrees and sunny?” Skid mutters as we run our beams along the trail.

  “That would ruin all the fun for us,” I tell him.

  We’ve seen no sign of the boys for some time. No prints. No broken branches or threads of clothing. Even so, there’s no indication they’ve left the trail or doubled back, so we press on.

  By the time we reach the bridge where Hogpath Road spans Painters Creek, the wind is cranking. As I tromp through the ditch and onto the road, the first snowflakes are hurtling downward at a nearly horizontal angle.

  I cross the road, shining my light into the greenbelt which continues. My cell phone vibrates.

  “Hey, Chief,” says Mona. “I’ve been working on the RSO list and I’ve got a name for you.”

  “Lay it on me.”

  “Kenneth O’Neil. Fifty-two years old. Get this: He was convicted of possessing child pornography in 2007. A year after his release, he tried to lure a ten-year-old boy into his truck. Did twelve years in Mansfield. Released eight months ago. Currently on parole.” She rattles off an address that’s just a few miles away.

  I’ve talked to O’Neil several times since I’ve been chief. He’s an unpleasant individual with a fondness for whiskey, disdain for his fellow man, and a stone-cold hatred for cops. I think about the shoe imprints and wonder: Is it possible he accosted the boys in these woods? Or befriended them to lure them in?

  “I’ll go talk to him,” I tell her. “Anything else?”

  “Sheriff Rasmussen has two deputies on the way to the covered bridge now. He’s working on getting tracking dogs out there. It’s already snowing up in Millersburg, Chief. They’re expecting the bridges and overpasses to ice in the coming hours.”

  “Thanks, Mona. Keep me posted.” I end the call.

  I look up to see Skid approach from the woods. “Looks like we’ve lost the trail, Chief. The trail ends as they travel deeper into the woods. No tracks. No broken branches. Not even a damn deer trail.”

  None of this bodes well for finding the boys.

  I look around, spot the pullover on the other side of the road, and another quiver of worry goes through me. “Someone in a vehicle could have picked them up here on the road,” I say.

  “Damn, I hope that’s not the case.”

  I tell him about Kenneth O’Neil. “I’ve got to talk to him.”

  “I’d rather get hit by a bus than talk to Kenny.” The words are flippant, but his smile is forced, as if we’ve both just realized the situation could become exponentially more serious.

  “Check that pullover for tire tracks, and get Glock out here. I want you guys to continue north along the creek.” I sigh. “Keep your eyes on the water, too. I’ll catch up with you when I’m finished with O’Neil.”

  I hit the speed dial for Tomasetti.

  * * *

  This morning when Kevin left the house, the idea of running away with his best friend had seemed like a grand adventure. Now, cold, hungry, and scared out of his wits, he figured it was the worst mistake of his life. The good news was they’d lost whoever had been chasing them. The bad news was he’d dropped his backpack—and his phone. How could he have been so stupid?

  “How much farther?” he called out to Aaron.

  “Seems like we should have been there by now.” Aaron didn’t slow down. “Stop worrying. We’ll get there.”

  But Kevin was worried. They’d left the trail a ways back. Everything looked different in these woods after dark. He couldn’t stop thinking about his mom. The house was probably nice and warm and smelled of whatever she’d fixed for supper. Dang, his dad was going to be pissed. He’d likely get grounded for the rest of his life. What had he been thinking?

  They trudged through the dusting of snow that whispered across the ground, catching on dead leaves and brush. Kevin was trying to figure out a way to tell his friend he wanted to turn around and go home—and still save face—when Aaron called out. “There it is!”

  Aaron’s flashlight went black.

  “Dude!” Kevin cried.

  “Shhh! He’ll hear us!”

  Kevin came up beside Aaron. Sure enough, the trees opened to a clearing. A small cabin sat in the darkness, smoke puffing from the chimney. No lights in the windows, but a porch light glowed yellow.

  “Old man Henderson’s place,” Aaron whispered.

  As his eyes adjusted to the near total darkness, Kevin took in the scene. The cabin was off to the right, a hulking form nestled in the trees. Farther out, Henderson’s pickup truck was parked in the gravel lane. Junk littered the area. Old farm implements surrounded by high grass. A rusty stock trailer sat at a cockeyed angle. A tractor tire lying on its side. A fifty-gallon drum.

  “Lookit.” Aaron pointed. “There’s the pen.”

  Kevin looked past the barn and saw the silhouette of the chain-link pen. It was too dark to make out any details; he couldn’t tell if the buck was inside.

  “Come on,” Aaron whispered. “This way.”

  The Amish boy ducked left. Sticking to the shadows of the trees, they skirted the cabin and barn. Not for the first time, Kevin wished to God he’d never gotten himself into this. If Henderson came out and saw them, they were dead meat.

  “What if he’s got dogs?” Kevin squeaked.

  Aaron was so intent on their quest, he didn’t even look at him. “I think we’d have known by now.”

  The crunch of leaves beneath their feet seemed inordinately loud in the silence. Kevin followed Aaron, pushing through thick brush, ducking the occasional branch. All the while, he kept his eyes on the cabin, expecting at any moment for a light to go on and a dozen junkyard dogs to come rushing out and tear them to pieces.

  He nearly ran into Aaron when he stopped.

  “There he is.” Awe echoed in the Amish boy’s voice.

  Kevin looked past him. The sight of the buck was otherworldly in the falling snow, like something right out of one of his graphic novels. A massive buck with a rack of antlers like he’d never seen stood in the center of the pen, head high, tail raised, staring at them. Snow flew sideways between the boys and the deer, and Kevin thought he’d never seen anything so cool in his life.

  “Whoa,” he murmured.

  “Never seen a deer like that,” Aaron said quietly.

  For the span of a full minute, the boys simply stared. The deer stared back, snorting, breaths puffing from its nostrils.

  After a moment, Aaron set his knapsack on the ground, opened it, and pulled out the wire cutters. Two pair. He turned to Kevin, his expression solemn and determined as he handed the wire cutters to his friend.

  “You know what to do, right?” Aaron asked.

  Kevin reached for the wire cutters, hoping the darkness covered the fact that his hand was shaking. “Yeah.”

  Aaron studied the pen a moment. “Too dark to tell for sure, but it looks like there’s a gate. If there is, we open it. If it’s chained or locked, we go to the back and cut the fence. Four feet wide. As high as we can reach. Hopefully, that buck is sm
art enough to find his way out.”

  Aaron looked at him. “You ready?”

  Kevin tried to speak, but couldn’t find his voice, so he nodded.

  Aaron started toward the pen. “Keep an eye on the house.”

  Kevin’s heart pounded a hard rhythm as he followed. The snow was coming down harder now. He hoped it would help conceal them if the old man woke up and looked out the window.

  As they neared the pen, the buck began to pace, snorting an alarm, its tail high. The closer they got, the more frantic the animal’s pacing, until it was running back and forth along the deep trench its hooves had dug over the months of its captivity.

  The boys reached the pen. The buck trotted to the far corner, eyeing them warily. Aaron sidled to the gate. Sure enough, there was a padlock and chain.

  “Let’s cut it,” he whispered.

  The pen was about ten feet high, with chain link strewn across the top to keep the buck from jumping out. The support posts were a combination of two-by-fours and steel pipe. Taking a final look at the house, Kevin followed his friend. He was so scared he almost couldn’t breathe.

  Aaron knelt and began to snip. It wasn’t easy cutting through chain link. He tossed a look at Kevin. “Over there.” He motioned to a place about four feet away. “Hurry.”

  Kevin dropped to his knees and pulled the wire cutters from his pocket. His hands were so cold he almost couldn’t get his fingers around the wire cutters. It took every bit of strength he possessed to cut, but he did. Starting at the ground level, he worked his way up. Snip. Snip. Snip. Aaron finished first and came around to help him, starting at the top, working his way down.

  “You see the rack on that buck?” Aaron whispered as he worked.

  “Never seen anything like it,” Kevin replied.

  For the span of a full minute, they didn’t speak. Kevin’s fingers ached from the exertion and cold, but he kept going. Finally, their cuts met and the chain link sprang loose and curled.

  “Got it.” Taking the fence in both hands, Aaron pulled it outward, opening the pen.

  “Holy cow, we did it,” Kevin said.

  In tandem, the boys walked to the other side of the pen. “Go on, boy,” Kevin whispered.

  Aaron raised his hands and clucked as if to a horse. “Go!”

  The buck held its ground, frozen. Kevin looked into the animal’s eyes. The buck stared back, and he thought he’d never seen anything so magical. After a moment, the deer lunged across the pen, soared through the opening, and bounded into the woods.

  Kevin stood there, awed by what they’d just witnessed. He was proud of what they’d done. At that moment, he felt more powerful than he’d ever felt in his life.

  “That was awesome,” he whispered.

  He was so caught up, he didn’t notice when the light flicked on at the back of the cabin. He didn’t even look over until he heard the door slam.

  “What the hell are you punks doing out there!” roared a deep male voice.

  “Holy shit!” Kevin squeaked. “Old man Henderson!”

  “Run!” Aaron whispered, and they sprinted into the woods in the same direction the buck had gone.

  * * *

  I find John Tomasetti’s Tahoe parked on the gravel pullover when I emerge from the woods. We meet next to the Explorer. I can tell he’s tempted to greet me with a kiss, but a Holmes County deputy is parked on the other side of the road, so we settle for a quick handshake.

  “Hell of a night for two boys to go missing,” he says, huddling more deeply into his coat.

  I update him on our search and tell him about Kenneth O’Neil. It’s premature for me to be overly concerned that O’Neil is involved, but RSOs are always high on my list of suspects and at this point I’m bound to do my due diligence first.

  “O’Neil did twelve years in Mansfield for trying to lure a ten-year-old boy into his vehicle,” I tell him. “Currently on probation. He lives just a few miles from where the boys went missing.”

  Tomasetti gives me a dark look. “In that case, let’s go ruin his day.”

  A few minutes later we’re in the Explorer, heading south on the township road. Snow patters the windshield, my wipers barely keeping up. Next to me, Tomasetti has the GPS pulled up on his phone.

  “Gotta be it right there.” He motions toward a narrow lane that cuts into a skeletal jungle of trees.

  “No number on the mailbox,” I murmur.

  “Convenient.”

  I make the turn. The Explorer bumps over uneven road, mounds of earth, and ruts deep enough to swallow a tire. My headlights slice through a wall of darkness and snow and I try not to think about two kids out in the cold without shelter. We pass a large Quonset hut made of galvanized steel that’s gone to rust. An overhead garage-type door demarks the front. A window the size of a shoebox. I wonder what the hell O’Neil does with all that dark interior space.

  I continue on and a mobile home looms into view, the windows glowing. The exterior is robin’s-egg blue striped with rust. A porch lamp throws a dome of light over a wood deck covered with Astroturf. The yard is unkempt and littered with junk. An old swing-set frame with a rickety slide sits in the side yard.

  I park next to a beat-up Toyota pickup truck and we get out. It’s quiet back here; I can’t hear the highway. The trees offer a thousand hiding places. An owl hoots from somewhere at the back of the trailer.

  “Creepy place,” Tomasetti says.

  “Creepy guy.”

  He looks at me. “Eyes open.”

  I hit my lapel mike and hail Dispatch. “I need a ten-twenty-eight,” I say, using the ten code for vehicle registration information. I recite the license plate of the Toyota.

  “Stand by,” Mona tells me.

  A moment later she confirms what I already know. The truck belongs to O’Neil.

  Tomasetti and I cross to the deck and ascend the steps. The blare of a TV sounds from inside. I see the curtains twitch at the window to my left.

  “He knows we’re here,” I say quietly.

  “I saw it,” Tomasetti replies.

  Standing slightly to one side, I knock. “Painters Mill Police Department!” I call out. “Kenneth O’Neil. Can you come out here and talk please?”

  The door swings open and I find myself facing O’Neil. The first thought that strikes my brain is that he looks far older than fifty-two. Rheumy blue eyes shot with capillaries, something crusty in the corners. His hair is grizzled and unkempt, his beard yellowed. His complexion is the color of a ripe tomato. I can smell the alcohol on his breath from two feet away.

  “Mr. O’Neil?” I have my badge at the ready and show it to him.

  He squints at it; then his eyes sweep past me to Tomasetti and back to me. “What’d I do now?”

  “We’d like to ask you a few questions,” I say. “May we come inside?”

  An instant of hesitation. His eyes flit left. In the back of my mind I wonder what he’s doing in there besides drinking.

  “We won’t take up too much of your time,” I add, keeping my voice conversational.

  “I got all night.” He moves to the door, obstructing my view, blocking our entry. “I think I’ll just come out there.”

  He passes through the doorway and steps onto the porch. I move back, keeping a prudent distance between us in case he does something stupid. I’m glad I’ve got Tomasetti with me.

  O’Neil is holding a beer bottle in his left hand, a smoldering cigarette in his right. Both are annoying me, so I say, “Would you mind setting that beer down and putting out that cigarette?”

  He cocks his head, thinking about arguing, but wisely opts not to. “Whatever you say.” Bending, he sets the bottle on the grill behind him, flicks the cigarette into the weeds off the deck.

  “Are you alone tonight, Mr. O’Neil?” I ask.

  “Just like last night and the night before that. That okay with you?”

  “Would you mind telling us where you were today?”

  His brows furrow, as if
he has to think about it. “I was here.”

  I pull out my notebook and jot down something meaningless, watching his hands, the windows. “Is there anyone who can substantiate that?”

  “Nope. Just me and my lonesome.”

  “Did you leave the house at any time today?”

  “Went down to the farm store for a case of oil.”

  “What time was that?”

  “Noon or so.”

  “You got a receipt?”

  “Probably.”

  He turns to close the door behind him. I catch a whiff of dirty hair and bad breath, and take another step back, a combination of caution and distaste. Tomasetti holds his ground.

  “What’s this all about, anyway?” He glances at the bottle of beer on the grill, but makes no move to retrieve it.

  “Have you seen or been around any kids lately?” I ask.

  His eyes go flat. “You here to hassle me or what?”

  Tomasetti gives him a hard look. “Just answer the question.”

  “Two boys went missing this afternoon,” I tell him.

  O’Neil looks away. “I ain’t seen no one.”

  “Do you mind if we take a quick look inside?” I ask.

  “You got a warrant?”

  I pat my cell phone. “Your parole officer doesn’t need one.” I don’t know the terms of his parole, but it’s an effective bluff, because he turns to the door, opens it. I glance at Tomasetti, who looks back at me and shrugs.

  O’Neil goes through the door. I follow, Tomasetti right behind me. The living room is a cramped space that smells of cigarette smoke and dirty clothes. A window-unit air conditioner sits in the window. A lamp with a crooked shade throws dim light onto a ragtag sofa and recliner. A decent-size TV tuned to a football game sits atop what looks like a garage-sale night table.

  To my right, a cluttered kitchen sports faux-wood cabinets. Formica counters. A harvest-gold sink full of dishes that have been washed and left to dry.

  I catch Tomasetti’s eye, motion toward the bedrooms in the back. I stroll into the kitchen, aware that O’Neil is following me. “Where are you working these days, Mr. O’Neil?” I ask, hoping to keep him occupied while Tomasetti snoops.