Chapter 4 Mitch
MITCH
The park looked different in the morning light.
What had been shadowy and ominous last night when Ryan had searched for Tessa now appeared almost cheerful, with early joggers passing by and birds singing in the trees.
But Mitch couldn't shake the feeling that this peaceful scene was hiding something dark beneath its surface.
He and Lori stood near the big oak tree where Ryan had said he and Tessa had been before he left.
"I'll be about ten minutes," Glory Gains said as she approached them, Misty trotting happily at her side. The young forensic specialist looked far too energetic for someone who'd probably been up half the night processing evidence. "I just need to do a quick perimeter sweep with Misty first."
Mitch smiled despite the weight pressing on his chest. He couldn't help but be impressed watching Glory work with the German Shepherd. The dog responded to her slightest gesture, moving precisely where Glory indicated, her nose working the ground with professional efficiency.
"She's incredible," Mitch said. "Misty, I mean. I knew Carrie had trained her well, but this is something else."
Glory glanced back at him with a small smile. "I trained her, actually. For Carrie, as she wanted Misty to be both a family pet and potentially useful for work, I offered to help with the specialized training." She gave Misty's head an affectionate pat. "Misty here is one of my best students."
"I can see that," Lori said softly from beside Mitch.
"Give me a few minutes to work the area where Ryan found the evidence last night," Glory said, already moving with Misty toward the thicket of trees. "You two can start going over the sequence of events. Work through what you think happened."
Mitch watched Glory disappear into the brush with Misty, then turned to Lori. He pulled out his phone and scrolled to the photos Ryan had sent him last night. There were pictures of where he'd found Tessa's keys, her purse, and the chloroform cloth.
"Ryan said when he left Tessa, she'd stood up and was right here," Mitch said, moving to stand beside the bench. "Just next to the bench. That was the last time he saw her."
Lori stepped closer, studying the area with those sharp eyes of hers that missed nothing. Mitch had come to appreciate how observant she was, how her logical mind worked through problems methodically, looking for patterns and connections.
"So she was standing," Lori said slowly, her eyes moving from the bench to the trees, "and Ryan had already walked away toward town to get his truck from the repair shop."
"Right."
"Which means whoever took her was watching. Waiting for Ryan to leave." Lori turned in a slow circle, her gaze scanning the park. "They had to approach from..." She paused, and Mitch could see the moment understanding clicked into place. "From behind. While her attention was on Ryan walking away."
"Yes," Mitch said, impressed by how quickly she'd worked through it. "That's exactly what I think happened."
"Can we..." Lori hesitated, then seemed to steel herself. "Can we recreate it? I know that sounds strange, but I think I need to understand physically how it happened. The mechanics of it."
Mitch understood immediately. Sometimes you had to walk through a crime to truly comprehend it. "Are you sure? It might be uncomfortable."
"I'm sure," Lori said firmly. "Show me."
Mitch positioned Lori where Tessa would have been standing. Close to the bench, facing away toward where Ryan was walking to the exit of the park. Then Mitch moved around behind Lori, approaching quietly from the direction of the trees.
"If you don't mind..." he said, raising his hand.
"No, go ahead," Lori replied, her voice steady.
Mitch moved quickly, the way an attacker would have. His hand came up and closed gently over Lori's mouth. But not hard enough to hurt, just enough to demonstrate the motion.
The moment his hand made contact with her soft lips, lightning shot up his arm.
The sensation was so unexpected, so powerful, that it nearly made him lose his train of thought.
He could feel the warmth of her breath against his palm, could smell the faint scent of her shampoo, could feel how she fit against him as he pulled her back slightly against his chest to demonstrate how the attacker would have restrained her.
For a split second, the world narrowed to just the two of them. To the feeling of her in his arms, the perfect way she seemed to fit there, the rightness of it that made his heart pound for reasons that had nothing to do with the investigation.
Then reality crashed back, and Mitch forced himself to push the feeling away. This was not the time. This was not appropriate. They were recreating Tessa's kidnapping, for goodness sake. He cleared his throat, wincing at how his voice came out slightly hoarse.
"Now go limp," Mitch instructed. "Like you'd lost consciousness."
Lori did as he asked, letting her full weight sag against him. It was surprisingly heavy for her slight frame. But then again, dead weight always was, and Mitch had to adjust his grip to keep her from sliding to the ground.
"Sorry about your trainers," he said, beginning to drag her backward toward the trees. "This might scuff them up."
To his surprise, Lori laughed, a slightly breathless sound given her position. "I think that's the least of our worries right now," she managed to say while remaining limp.
Mitch pulled her into the thicker brush, branches catching at their clothes. He was focused on the physical logistics of moving an unconscious person through difficult terrain when Glory's voice called out from somewhere through the thicket of bushes.
"Keep going another few meters, and you'll pop out on the other side!"
Mitch continued dragging Lori through the undergrowth, and then suddenly they were clear of the trees. He stopped, helping Lori back to her feet, and looked around in surprise.
His eyebrows rose. They were standing in a parking lot. Specifically, the parking lot behind Dr. Simons's medical practice.
"Well," Mitch said slowly, his mind immediately recalculating everything he thought he knew about the kidnappings' geography. "This is interesting."
Glory emerged from where she’d been walking up the road a moment later with Misty.
She pointed to a silver sedan parked near the back of the lot.
"That's Dr. Simons's car. Haley gave me her mother's keys.
She said she found them on the ground right there beside the driver's door.
" Glory walked over to the vehicle, with Mitch and Lori close behind.
"I've checked inside. There's nothing. I don't think Dr. Simons even managed to open the door before she was taken. "
Mitch moved closer to examine the car, careful not to touch anything. Through the window, he could see Dr. Simons's purse sitting on the passenger seat, her phone in the cup holder. Personal items were abandoned in the panic of abduction.
“She must’ve gotten in,” Lori pointed out. “Why else would her purse and phone already be on the front seat?”
“You’re right,” Glory said. “Sorry, I don’t use purses.” She pulled a face. “But you’re right. So then Dr. Simons must’ve been about to climb into the car.”
“Makes more sense,” Lori stated, turning to mimic sliding in. “As she went to sit, probably with her keys still in her hand, the kidnapper grabbed her. Then closed the door as he’d obviously not want to draw attention to a lone car standing with the door open.”
Mitch’s heart swelled as Glory smiled at Lori’s clever deduction.
“That makes a lot of sense,” Glory repeated with a nod.
"Where's the chloroform cloth?" he asked. "The one used on Dr. Simons?"
"I have it back at my lab," Glory told him. "I've been running tests, but so far there's nothing on it. No useful trace evidence, no fingerprints. Whoever handled it wore gloves and was careful."
Mitch's brows knitted together as a troubling thought occurred to him.
"There was no cloth for Ryan either," he said slowly.
His hand instinctively moved to touch the back of his own head, remembering the attack on the beach when he'd been knocked unconscious.
He winced. "I hope they didn't knock him out. Head injuries can be..."
He couldn't finish the sentence. Couldn't voice the fear that his son might have a serious brain injury, might be unconscious and untreated wherever they were holding him.
"Wouldn't there have been blood?" Lori asked gently, her hand coming to rest on his arm in a gesture of comfort. "At your house? If they'd hit him hard enough to knock him unconscious?"
"Maybe," Glory said, though her expression suggested she was trying to be diplomatic.
"Head wounds bleed a lot, but not always immediately.
And if they used something padded, or if the angle was just right.
.." She trailed off, clearly not wanting to elaborate on the various ways someone could render another person unconscious.
Glory handed Misty's leash to Lori, then held up a silk scarf.
"Misty followed Dr. Simons's scent from here—" She gestured to the car.
Then she held up a light jacket that Mitch recognized as belonging to Tessa.
"—and Tessa's scent from the park, both leading that way.
" She pointed toward the road that ran alongside the parking lot.
"A vehicle was parked on the side of the road there.
But there are no tire tracks, no oil marks, nothing useful like that. "
Mitch and Lori walked to where Glory had indicated.
"Look!" Lori suddenly said, pointing to a patch of sand on the pavement near where the vehicle would have been parked. "That shoe print..."
She crouched down, and Mitch and Glory quickly walked over to where she was. Lori studied the impression in the sand with the focused intensity of someone who'd found a crucial piece of evidence.