Sixteen
Caleb arrived early the following morning and immediately upon entering the room, after I hugged him, I explained that I needed a shower, complained about having a headache, and whined about needing food.
He was a very good sport about everything, and once I was out of the shower, he squinted at me.
“What?”
“I thought the shower would help, but really, you look like shit.”
“Yeah, well, I feel like shit.”
“C’mon, let’s check outta here before somebody figures out where you are and go eat.”
“I used cash,” I told him. “No one’s finding me. And what about you? I wonder if anyone tracked you when you landed?”
He shook his head. “It’s doubtful.”
“Okay, good. Let’s eat and I’ll catch you up.”
We had a huge breakfast of pancakes, bacon, eggs, and hash browns before driving to a motel and paying for a new room in cash. As I drove us back toward the house in Oak Lawn, I told him that I thought we should try to find out if Greg Fain had any relatives living in the city.
“Why?”
“Maybe they’d know who he hung out with.”
“Won’t the police be doing that?”
“I have no idea what they’re doing or not,” I told him, “but certainly if we see anyone in law enforcement, we’ll stay out of their way.”
“Okay, fine. So how do we go about finding any friends or relations of Fain?”
“I think we should start with his neighbors,” I said, driving past now-familiar sights on my way toward Oak Lawn. “They might know who his parents were or just who came around the house.”
“That makes sense.” He yawned, stretching his arms.
“You know, I really appreciate you coming all this way just to help me.”
“Of course. I wanna figure this out too. I hate looking over my shoulder all the time.”
“Me too.”
After a few miles in silence, he asked me how Sam was.
“Better. I called the nurses’ station this morning and got an update from Glynnis. She said he’s healing well and turning into a real grouch, so that’s great news.”
“Why?”
“The more growly he gets, the better he’s feeling.”
“If you say so.”
“You’re placating me.”
“Sorry, sorry,” he said, smiling. “Hey, how old are you now?”
“Twenty-six, why?”
He made a noise. “And how old is Sam?”
“He’s thirty-seven.”
“Do you worry about that age gap between you and Sam?”
“No. I figure I’m actually older than he is—I’m more mature.”
“Yeah, running around in dark houses in the middle of the night is really mature.”
“Bite me.”
He laughed, and I concentrated on the road.
“You know, Dane brought up my age just the other day as well. He made some snide remark about my frontal cortex not being developed yet.”
“Well, with all this, one does wonder.”
“We’re done speaking.”
He grunted. “We’ll see how long that lasts.”
I could only imagine what we looked like—me in my hoodie and peacoat, Caleb in his trench coat and scarf, both of us wearing sunglasses to block out the afternoon light.
Still, we must have come off as nonthreatening, because as we went door to door, people still talked to us.
Caleb said it was because I was so cute, and I countered with the fact that he looked like the boy next door, with his “aw-shucks, ma’am” smile and his Texas accent coming through.
I had never really looked at Caleb closely before, but the light brown hair and dark blue eyes were very appealing, and the cleft in his chin and the laugh lines made his face interesting.
Whatever the reason, people talked to us, and we found out that Greg’s mother’s name was Joyce, and she had moved, Mrs. Ogden thought, to Schaumburg.
Mrs. Ogden had lived on the corner for over thirty years and was almost positive that was what she had been told.
The snickerdoodles she gave us were very good, straight from the oven.
She went on to say that there had never been a Mr. Fain, only Joyce and her son.
Once Greg had been old enough to live alone, Joyce had left the house, and Greg had been there by himself ever since.
We drove to an Internet café and pulled up every Joyce Fain, J.
Fain, and plain old Fain in Chicago and Schaumburg.
There were more than I would have liked, but as I drove, Caleb made calls, and I realized how great it was to have a partner in crime.
Just one more person working on the same thing as me was a great big help.
“Oh-oh-oh,” Caleb said excitedly, and held out his phone after turning it from handset to loudspeaker for me. “Listen, listen.”
The answering machine was clear. The woman’s voice quavered just a little as she announced that the caller had reached Joyce with Our Sisters of Saint Andrew’s prayer line. We were to leave a prayer request or message and Sister Joyce would return our call.
“That’s gotta be her,” Caleb assured me. “Right?”
I didn’t remember seeing any crosses or religious items in the house, but it had been dark, so maybe I had missed them.
Or maybe when his mom moved out, Greg had sent all her religious pieces with her.
Maybe Mom was devout but not the son. “We might as well check it out, but keep calling the others too.”
He agreed and stayed on his cell as I drove.
“Why do you think Joyce left her son?”
“Jory, I know the Fains as well as you do,” he said with a chuckle. “The inner workings of the family life of one of the men who kidnapped us are a mystery to me.”
“Sure. I was just thinking out loud.”
“Why don’t you ask his mother when you meet her?”
“I don’t wanna pry.”
For whatever reason, he found that very funny.
It was a long drive up to Schaumburg, but Caleb kept busy on his phone while I used mine. Dane wanted to know what was on my kamikaze mission for the day.
“I had this idea—” I began.
“You know, of course, that I will find you. And when I do, you will never ever get out of my condo without my permission. I hired Aja a bodyguard until this is over, and I’m going to do the same for you.”
“Yeah, okay.” I sighed, realizing that my headache just did not want to go away. It hurt up the back of my neck and over the top of my head. I felt the tension deep in my shoulders.
“Is Caleb with you?”
“Caleb? No.”
“Put him on the phone.”
I shoved my phone at him, and after a minute he took a breath and squinted as he said hello. He groaned deeply ten minutes later when he hung up.
“Jesus, that man is mad.”
“Yeah, well—”
“He’s mad at you, at me—he’s just pissed off all the way around.”
“Not a lot to be done about that.”
“He’s going to murder us both.”
“Well, that line forms behind the guy who kidnapped us, am I right?”
It was quiet, and after a moment I turned to him.
“What?”
“That was kind of morbid.”
I shrugged.
“A little tired, are you?”
“Just a bit.”
He laughed at me and told me where to get off the expressway.
Ms. Fain’s house was at the end of a narrow street with enormous potholes and trees that lined both sides. The sidewalks were cracked due to overgrown roots, and the houses were all run-down. Standing in front of the chain-link fence with Caleb, I shivered hard.
“What?”
“I dunno, feels weird.”
“Why?”
I shrugged.
“C’mon.” He smacked my shoulder before lifting the latch to step into the yard.
I followed him up the path with weeds growing through the cement to the front door. He rang the doorbell and knocked on the door. The porch was tiny, the wrought-iron railing framing what was basically a stoop.
“I’ll go around the back,” he said, taking the four steps back down.
“I’ll go with you,” I rushed out, not wanting us to get separated.
The yard was an overgrown mess with grass that hit my knees.
There was a fenced-off garden, now dormant in fall, and a barren oak tree.
It didn’t look like Greg had made it to Schaumburg to help his mother with the upkeep of her place.
I thought about Sam and his brother cleaning out their mom’s rain gutters, mowing the lawn, painting, raking leaves—it was so different.
I wondered what Joyce Fain had done not to receive the same treatment that Regina Kage did.
“God, could it be more grim back here?” Caleb shook his head.
I followed him up the four stairs to the back door, and when he turned the knob, the door opened.
“Oh shit,” I groaned, stopping Caleb from going inside.
“What?”
“We can’t just go in there. She could be taking a shower or something. She’d totally freak if we just showed up in her living room and, you know, breaking and entering is illegal.”
“No one’s home, J,” he assured me. “I just called, remember?”
“Again, this goes with my shower hypothesis.”
“Fine,” he sighed. “I’ll call again, and if she doesn’t answer, we’ll go in, all right?”
“What about the breaking and entering?”
“You broke into Greg’s home last night.”
“Yeah, but he’s dead.”
“I don’t know if that makes it less illegal or not. Call Sam and ask.”
“You’re hilarious,” I told him.
He just shrugged and then scrolled to recently dialed numbers and hit send. I stood beside him as he put the phone on speaker, and it rang. We heard it ring inside the house from where we were outside, as well as the message click on before he hung up his phone.
“Now can we go in?”
The second I agreed, he opened one screen door and then another that led into what looked like an enclosed back porch.
It was all glass on four sides, but I hadn’t noticed from the outside because the blinds were drawn.
The reason became instantly clear, as we found a woman lying face down in a pool of blood in the middle of the floor. I felt my stomach heave.
“Oh shit,” Caleb moaned, taking a step back.
There was no question that she was dead. It was a lot of blood, and there was a smell. I squatted down and leaned back against the door. “Jesus.”
“Look at this.”
When I lifted my head, I saw him holding a bloody kitchen knife. “I think this might be the murder weapon.”
“Why is that in your hand?” I moaned.
“Oh.” His eyes got huge as he stared at me. “Shit.”
Unlike me, who religiously watched CSI, the man had never even seen one episode. Forensics 101: never touch stuff without plastic gloves on.