Chapter 18 #2
Gunderson blinked. “What has he done?” There was no question about what they thought he might have done or what he was accused of. He knew his son and had no issue believing that he had done something wrong.
Grant sidestepped the question. “Has Bryant wanted a family of his own?”
Gunderson groaned and looked down at the table.
“His mother and I did the best we could for him, but we were never good enough. He always wanted more. When he was a child, he’d watch television shows and wonder why his family wasn’t like the people on TV.
Why all of us couldn’t be like them, with perfect relationships, no arguments, and the kids somehow always got exactly what they wanted.
That was what Bryant always thought he should have.
He once told me that I was a bad father because I didn’t get him a new bike.
Same thing when he turned sixteen and he didn’t get a new car.
He always thought that his brother got more than he did.
” A tear ran down his cheek. “I don’t know what more we could have done for him.
” He wiped his eyes. “What has Bryant done?”
“We believe that he has taken three boys so far. All three of them have been found, and they are now safe. But we know that he’s been watching the schools, and we’re assuming that he’s looking to take another boy.”
“Oh god,” Gunderson whispered.
“Yes. He seems to take the boys until something happens and when he realizes they aren’t perfect, he hides them somewhere.
Luckily we have been able to find them in time…
at least, so far. But I need to know where Bryant might be.
If you know, you need to tell us, because if he takes another little boy…
.” Grant had no trouble putting additional pressure on this man.
Grant opened the folder he’d brought in with him and slid pictures across the table.
“These are the places where he dumped his victims once he was through with them. A cistern, this one behind a wall in a basement, and finally closed up in an old water tank. It seems that if they disappoint him, then he wants to hurt them deeply.” He pushed back the bile that threatened to rise.
The thought of Cameron behind that wall made him angry.
“He’s hurting six- and seven-year-old kids, scarring them for life.
So where do you think he might have gone? ”
“I don’t know,” Gunderson said, holding his head. “He doesn’t hang around his brother’s old friends, because they might figure out what he did. He found some new friends, but I don’t know who they are.”
“Okay. But he lives somewhere. Do you have a way to contact him?”
Gunderson wiped his eyes and sat a little straighter. “He calls me sometimes, and he’ll come to the house if he has mail and stuff. But….” He paused. “There was a house on East Louther that he spent a lot of time at. I used to see his car parked out in front of it.”
“Do you know the address?” Grant asked.
Gunderson shook his head. “No. But it was right in the middle of the block, and last I remember, it was painted a light yellow. I don’t think it will be hard to find. All the others are white or light gray. It kind of stood out.”
“Okay.” Grant purposely lightened his tone. “Thank you for your help.” He left the room, and the captain met him in the hallway. “What did you think?”
“This is a man still grieving for the son he lost,” Captain Robards opined. “I think in some way, going along with his younger son’s scheme was a way for him to still have his older son… in a way.”
“I get that, and this whole thing is really messed up. But we need to find this guy.”
“Get the father’s permission to search his son’s room at the house. Maybe there’s something there. We could get a warrant, but having his permission would be quicker. Then we need to keep an eye on this house on Louther, see if Bryant Gunderson shows up there. The guy is living somewhere.”
Grant nodded in understanding. He knew that Gunderson had to be going out of his mind.
His obsession with talking these kids and trying to find his ideal family had to be pushing on his mind constantly.
School had ended, so the kids were less clustered in certain predictable locations.
Still, the longer that no reports came on, the more worried he was that the next kidnapping was going to happen at any time. “I’m on it.”
“Good. I’m going to assign Kip Rogers to watch the house on Louther. You stay on the father and his place.” The captain continued down the hall, and Grant went back in the interview room.
THE FIRST thing Grant did was make a cursory inspection of the house.
The furniture was old and worn, but it was clean and unfussy.
Pictures hung on the wall of both boys and their mother.
As he went up the stairs, an image of the four of them, all smiles, caught Grant’s eye.
The happy family. “Come on, Dexter, let’s see what we can find,” he said after a minute and continued up to the bedrooms. He went to the one that Hansen Senior said had been Bryant’s.
It was spare, with occasional remnants of childhood.
He let Dexter loose to poke around while Grant set about looking for anything that might help him in the search.
He found a few old girlie magazines under the mattress and a box of electric trains under the bed, which was not helpful.
The closet was filled with old clothes, some of which couldn’t have been worn in a few years.
He found boxes on the shelf and lifted them down.
Dexter sat in the middle of the rug in the room, looking at him expectantly.
“What did you find?” he asked and approached him.
The floor creaked as he got closer. “Oh, you’re a good boy.
” He called Dexter away and rolled up the rug.
Part of the flooring was loose, and he pried it up.
The small space had money and a few pictures that Grant glanced at and felt his stomach roil.
He had found Bryant’s souvenirs, pictures of each of the boys looking up at him.
The fear in their eyes was palpable. He took pictures of the hiding place before pulling out evidence bags, put on gloves, and carefully placed the images inside.
He also bagged the money and the rest of the contents, but there was no indication of where Bryant was.
He hoped to find a piece of mail with an address, a matchbook…
something. He kept thinking there had to be a clue here somewhere.
Once the stash location had been emptied, he put the floor back in place and rolled the carpet back.
He paused and stood in the center of the room, looking at everything, trying to get a sense of the person who had stayed here, like some grand impression would form in his mind.
Nothing came, and he went back to searching.
The boxes contained enough old toys and dust to flare his allergies.
He stifled a sneeze and turned to put the boxes back in the closet.
That’s when he saw it, on the closet floor under a pair of sneakers.
At first he thought they were old, but when he lifted them, the foot odor nearly knocked him over.
These had been worn recently, and the bottoms were caked with dirt.
He bagged them and carefully lifted the envelope beneath them.
The postmark was from just before Cameron had been taken, and the return address was an apartment building on Highland Avenue.
Grant bagged the envelope and finished his search before leaving the room.
He did a cursory search of the other rooms, but found nothing, so he and Dexter headed out into the backyard.
“HE’S OBVIOUSLY been using that room as a stash,” Grant told the captain.
“I doubt his father even knows he’s been there.
There’s a large tree in the backyard, and I suspect he uses it to come and go.
The bedroom window was unlocked, so he could easily get inside.
The tree also had places where the bark had been compressed and scuffed.
I took photos of everything.” He showed Captain Robards the envelope.
“I think this is where he’s living. I found it in the closet under the shoes. ”
“There hasn’t been any activity at the home on Louther so far.
” Captain Robards picked up the phone as he was still talking.
“Check in with Kip and have him stay there. I’m requesting a search warrant for this location.
” He told whoever answered what he needed and hung up.
“Take a couple of units and head over there. Don’t approach the apartment building until we have the warrant. But then get this bastard.”
Grant left the office and got Dexter, who had curled up in his bed near the desk.
“Hey, Atlas, you and Evie want to join us?” he asked as they came into the station.
He filled him in quickly. The other units joined him, and they all headed to the south side of town.
“Park around the corner until we get confirmation of the warrant,” Grant instructed.
The street curved just before entering the apartment complex.
He parked out of sight with a unit behind him.
Atlas and a third unit entered through the park behind the buildings and were watching in case Bryant made a break through the back.
Grant’s printer ran, producing a copy of the warrant.
He took it and let everyone know that they were going in.