Go Missing (Kate Valentine #8)

PROLOGUE

An object in possession seldom retains the same charm that it had in pursuit.

Pliny the Younger was, in William Schulz’s opinion, the wisest of Rome’s impressive bevy of philosophers.

That quote was, again, in Bill’s opinion, the shrewdest statement the esteemed magistrate ever produced.

Despite his well-known disdain—violent disdain—for Christians, Pliny well understood the allure of that most tantalizing of sins.

Or maybe it was because of his disdain that he understood theft so well.

Bill had said almost the exact same thing once when he was seventeen years old and was caught by the parents of a freshman schoolmate with said schoolmate’s lunchbox, an old, rusted military artifact from the Vietnam war that was worth maybe a buck-ninety-nine but carried a great deal of sentimental value, having belonged to the boy’s grandfather.

“It’s not about having it. It’s about taking it.”

Those parents didn't understand. No one ever did, not until Father Glover.

Bill finished pouring his wine—one glass of red per day, for his heart—and replaced the bottle in the countertop rack his second ex-wife gave him three years prior for his fiftieth birthday.

Samantha was the only one of his three former wives who was still on (reasonably) good terms with him, mostly because she didn’t have anything of sentimental value for him to steal and so had lost nothing that she eventually caught tucked away in his sock drawer or buried in his glovebox.

He lifted the wine to his face and inhaled. Deep plum and cherry, hints of pepper with just a touch of cocoa. He closed his eyes and sighed. If only life could be as varied and interesting as wine.

He opened his eyes and found them resting on a small ceramic figurine of a bird, a cardinal.

The hand-painted statuette sitting on the mantel over the fireplace was probably the most valuable thing Bill had ever stolen.

He’d seen one just like it selling for sixty dollars at a Renaissance fair in Columbus.

“Huh. Never did get around to returning that.”

No sooner had he spoken those words than he felt the familiar resistance. But it’s mine. I don’t have to give it back. I worked for it.

Apparently, possession counted for something after all.

He looked away from the bird, picked up his Syrah, and sipped.

He inhaled as he sipped—carefully, to keep from aspirating the liquid—and flicked his tongue back and forth, misting the wine and carrying it to his entire palate.

As he considered the transition from cocoa to fruit to smoke and finally the peppery finish, he carried the glass to his living room.

That was Father’s Glover’s advice. When you feel an urge, consume your senses with other things. It will drown out the desire for evil.

Another wise man, Father Glover. Bill really didn’t know what he’d do without him.

He lowered himself into his armchair and set the wineglass on the coaster. He felt a flush of pride that the coaster wasn’t stolen but instead purchased from . He chuckled at that. A fifty-three-year-old accountant proud that he could buy something. What a knee slapper that was.

He turned the television on. It opened to a news special, “The Commandment Killings and Religious Extremism among the Mentally Ill.”

He changed the channel. It was probably going to devolve into some political tirade that was going to make people who already felt good feel better and do nothing to help anyone who didn’t feel good.

Besides, religion applied correctly could cure mental illness. Bill knew that. He was almost better. He just had to get rid of that damned bird.

The television now played a rerun. Star Trek…

Well, he didn't know. One of the latter ones.

He left it on. The one woman—the blonde—was easy on the eyes, and considering Bill's track record with women, that was probably the closest he could come to having a relationship with one that didn't implode.

“Dear Mr. Fantasy, send me an alien bombshell with low self-esteem and a shaky moral code.”

He chuckled at his bad joke and sipped more of his wine.

Nine months ago, Bill had chosen to turn over a new leaf.

It was shortly after stealing a stuffed animal keychain hanging from the seat of a pink bike with white wheels and purple tassels sprouting from the edges of the handles.

Knowing that cars were passing by while he committed the theft added to the thrill.

At any moment, one of those drivers could have pulled over and asked what the hell he was doing. At any moment, he could be caught.

But he wasn’t, and that, dear philosophers, was the true thrill. Not just taking it. Taking it and not getting caught.

The feeling he had when he slipped the keychain into his pocket and walked on, his new toy safely in his possession, was better than any feeling he’d had since his third wedding night. It gave most of the other nights—with Darlene, Samantha, or Felice—a run for their money. Oh God, it was good.

Then it hit him with an almost audible click. He’d just stolen a keychain from a kid. A small kid. Judging by the size of that bike and the choice to clip a cartoon character keychain to the seat post, one under the age of ten.

He was a fifty-three-year-old man stealing stuffed keychains from kids.

So, Bill did something he’d never done before in his life. He gave something back.

Not the stuffed keychain. That ended up in a donation bin eight months later since Father Glover told him the kid who owned it had probably forgotten about it, and her parents had probably bought a new one for her anyway.

What he gave back was a stapler he’d lifted from Yadira, the woman who worked in the office next to his.

He’d returned it with a sheepish smile, claiming that his wasn’t working, and he’d just forgotten about it.

(A lie). Since taking it, he’d spent at least fifteen minutes a day admiring it where it sat in the bottom drawer of his desk.) Yadira had laughed and jokingly called him a thief before patting him on the arm and taking the stapler.

That was the only thing he gave back, and he had to resort to pinching himself to the point of drawing blood to keep from stealing it again. He wanted to change. He just couldn’t.

Until Father Glover. When Father Glover arrived at his doorstep, smiling, his voice full of compassion, and asked if he could offer a confession or spiritual counsel, Bill broke down. He told Father Glover everything.

And Father Glover listened. Without judgment. Without disdain. Without ridicule. He listened, and when he was finished listening, he gave Bill the only advice that had ever worked, the only strategy that attacked the problem at its source.

Bill stole because it felt good to steal.

So to stop stealing, he had to find other things that felt good, and he had to focus intensely on those things.

His nightly glass of wine, a comfortable chair, a walk through the park while the river coursed to his right, the occasional phone call with Samantha, who didn’t love him anymore but still liked him enough to care.

And he had to return the stolen belongings. He had to make amends.

He’d made amends. He’d given everything back. Everything but that damned bird.

He lifted his wineglass, and a knock on the door caused him to stiffen. The wine splashed from the glass. A quick movement saved his chair cushion and t-shirt. Bill said a brief prayer of thanks for his laminated hardwood floors and got to his feet.

He looked through the peephole, and his heart leaped when he saw the kind eyes of Father Glover, so crystal blue they looked like they belonged in Heaven.

He opened the door and smiled at the Father. “Father Glover! What a pleasant surprise. I thought you had moved on.”

Father Glover returned his smile, his blue eyes soft and piercing at the same time. “I was in town again, and I thought I’d stop by to see how you’ve been doing.”

“I see. Well, come on in!”

“Thank you, Bill,” Glover replied.

There was just the slightest touch of a southern accent in Glover’s resonant baritone voice. Bill found it charming. He imagined Glover’s past as a rough-and-tumble farm boy and wondered what had occurred to shift his path into the service of the Church.

As he led the father inside, his eyes fell once again to the ceramic cardinal. His cheeks flamed, and in a rather small voice, he said, “Still need to get around to returning that cardinal.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” Glover said.

There was a quality to his voice that Bill hadn’t heard before. If he’d had time to process that quality, he would have found it almost identical to the excitement he felt just before he took something that didn’t belong to him.

Unfortunately—or maybe fortunately—his cognitive function ceased less than a second after Glover slammed something blunt and cold and hard into the back of his skull, too quickly for him to register the imminence of its cessation.

His last coherent thought was that he was almost done, almost finished making amends.

He died one step away from the finish line.