Little Girl Gone (3 page)

P
UNCHING
it as fast as she dared, Afton sped south on I-35 toward the Twin Cities. She was a fast, intuitive driver who'd honed her skills schlepping her two daughters and their myriad friends from school to T-ball to piano lessons to soccer practice. And she'd joined the ranks of single working parents yet again. She was recently divorced from her second husband, Mickey Craig, a man with a dazzling smile and a wandering eye, who owned Metro Cadillac and Jaguar out in the western suburb of Wayzata.

Afton had actually met Mickey when one of his Jaguars, driven by his secretary, Mona, had been carjacked right in the middle of rush-hour traffic in downtown Minneapolis. She'd been called in to help deal with the traumatized secretary, who couldn't stop blubbering and waving her arms in desperation.

When Mickey arrived at the scene, Afton had found him hunky, attractive, and sweetly charming. Traits she'd always thought impossible in someone who owned a car dealership. And in the end, it turned out her instincts had been right.

*   *   *

TRUE
to her word, Afton made the drive in an hour and a half, forgoing the ritual stop at Toby's for a take-home box of their famous sticky rolls. She
arrived at police headquarters in downtown Minneapolis by eleven o'clock, dumped the SUV at one of the curbside spots reserved for police officers, of which she was not technically one, and headed inside to meet her boss.

“About time,” Thacker said as Afton strode into his office still dressed in black leggings, boots, and a neon green fleece pullover. He sucked down the final dregs of his coffee, grimaced, and depressed the button on an old-fashioned intercom. “Angel,” he barked. “Is everyone ready for the briefing?”

“They're waiting for you,” came his secretary's muffled voice. Even she had been pulled in this Sunday morning.

“Good,” Thacker said, brushing past Afton. “Let's get to it.”

*   *   *

THE
Minneapolis Police Department was a perpetual hive of activity. Officers dressed in blue hurried between rows of desks and ducked in and out of cubicles. Detectives in weekend casual sucked cups of black coffee and pecked at computer terminals. Interview rooms, which lined the perimeter of the detectives' area, were used for interrogations and sometimes staff meetings during periods of high activity. Today, the high-profile Darden case dominated activity in the department.

Afton followed Thacker into a large, fluorescent-lit conference room, where the murmur of conversation throbbed like a beating heart. Two uniformed officers sat hunched at a table with four detectives. They were all shoving paper around, jotting notes, and looking generally stressed.

All heads jerked up when Thacker entered. Deputy Chief Gerald Thacker was dressed as if he were attending a shareholders meeting at a Fortune 500 company. Plaid Joseph Abboud sport coat, black slacks, and high-polished black oxfords. Once the detectives in their khakis and thermal pullovers had surveyed Thacker, their eyes turned to Afton. This wasn't unusual. She was used to their stares, and it was starting to get old. She just wished she could be looked upon as another member of the team, not as a little sister, chickie-poo, soccer mom, or forbidden fruit. Only Thacker and Max Montgomery, one of the veteran detectives, treated her as if she really belonged here, and for that she was grateful.

“Okay,” Thacker said loudly. “To catch everybody up, here's what we've
got so far.” He stood at the head of a battered wooden table covered with cigarette burns in a stuffy room that had probably been painted pea green sometime around the end of the Eisenhower Administration. Probably the only thing that had changed in the room in seven decades was that you weren't allowed to smoke there anymore.

“We got the call around midnight last night,” Thacker continued. “The Dardens had just come home from a charity event . . .” He snapped his fingers at Max Montgomery.

“Carrousel to Fight Cancer,” Max said.

“Hosted by the Edina Country Club,” Thacker said. “Anyway, they arrived home to find their babysitter hog-tied and hysterical, and their infant daughter missing. Two uniformed officers responded immediately and secured the scene. Then Montgomery and Dillon here”—he nodded toward Max Montgomery and Dick Dillon, who were sitting side by side across the table from Afton—“got the callout.”

Detective Dick Dillon, a short man with a florid complexion, cleared his throat messily and paged through his notes. He popped a pair of bifocals on his rotund face and picked up the story. “So Max and I showed up at the scene, immediately separated the parents, and commenced with interviews. Crime scene techs arrived and worked over the baby's room, her crib, the front door, and hallway.”

“Anything missing?” Thacker asked. “Besides the baby?”

“Pink blanket,” Dillon said. “Anyway, our guys also grabbed the Dardens' computers and are mining the data down in the geek cave.” He paused. “As far as the parents go, Mom is totally beside herself. Dad not so much. Guy seems guarded, but that could just be good old Nordic stoicism.”

Like a good partner, Max Montgomery recognized his cue and stepped in with his own assessment. “The babysitter, Ashley Copeland, wasn't a lot of help. She was pretty freaked out and was able to give only a rudimentary description of her assailant.”

“You don't think she knew him?” Thacker asked. “That she let him in?”

“Oh, she let him in, all right, but it's doubtful that she knew him. We talked to her in the hospital, but her nose was broken and she was on some
kind of IV drip, so we didn't get much out of her. The girl's mom assured us we could talk to her later so she can give a formal statement.”

Montgomery, who was silver-haired and handsome in a slightly grizzled sort of way, stood up and kicked back his chair. “But there are a couple of interesting things. One of the Dardens' neighbors was out walking his dog, a big slobbery brown malamute, around eight thirty last night. He said he saw a couple of people kind of bent over and hustling toward a junky-looking car. Said the only reason he remembered the incident at all was because the car had one of those yellow smiley face stickers pasted on the back bumper.” Max shrugged, strolled to the back of the room, and dimmed the lights. “And, of course, we got this. Footage from a nanny cam.”

“A lucky break,” Afton murmured. She knew this could be a real help.

Max flicked on a ceiling-mounted projector that was connected to a laptop computer sitting on the table. He punched a few keys and the projector hummed to life. “Those of us who have been up all night have already seen the baby cam footage. But you all need to see this, too.”

“It's not the best quality,” Dillon put in. “Dad cheaped out on the equipment.”

“Is there sound?” Thacker asked.

“Minimal,” Max said.

On the screen, a jumpy black-and-white image of a baby nursery burst into view.

Afton leaned forward and saw that the time code in the right-hand corner read,
20:17:45.569641.

“We moved the video forward to the part just before the kidnapper enters the baby's room,” Dillon explained.

The footage was grainy and dim, but Afton could see that the room was large by nursery room standards. The crib was frilly and elaborate and surrounded by stuffed animals. There was also a changing table, rocking chair, and of course, the sleeping baby.

The baby looked to be a few months old. A little girl. She was swaddled in a puffy quilt, her little cherub face looking peaceful and innocent in her slumber. The soft, easy breathing of the baby reminded Afton of the many
nights she had stood in her own children's rooms, gazing at them with a mixture of tenderness and awe.

There was the sound of a muffled scream and the child seemed to stir in her sleep.

“Babysitter just got jacked,” Dillon said. Then silence returned and the camera continued to roll as the baby slept on.

Two minutes later, a dark shadow fell across the crib. Afton and the others in the room held their breath. Then someone slipped directly in front of the camera. To Afton, it reminded her of a scene from that old movie
Nosferatu,
when the slithery, wispy figure of the vampire casts his shadow, then slowly oozes into the frame.

“Jesus,” one of the uniformed officers breathed. “That could be a woman.But it's hard to tell.”

“Nobody said that men had a lock on kidnapping,” Afton muttered under her breath.

“So a woman? We're looking for a woman?” the officer asked. He sounded shocked and more than a little dismayed.

“We think maybe a woman working with a male partner,” Dillon said. “That's what the babysitter seemed to indicate.” He consulted his notes again. “And there was a dusting of snow last night, so there was a pair of tracks on the sidewalk. One large set, one a little smaller, just where the dog walker guy said they'd be.”

“Are there any other leads?” Afton asked.

“I was just getting to that,” Thacker said. “There are a few . . . interesting aspects to this case. It seems that Susan Darden, the baby's mother, attended a doll show yesterday at the Skylark Mall. From what she's given us so far, the only person Mrs. Darden spoke to was a woman by the name of Molly who makes what is termed
reborn
dolls.”

There was a cacophony of grunts and mumbles around the table.

“What're those?” asked Andy Farmer, one of the detectives. “Retread dolls.”

“Re
born,
” Thacker said, making a disparaging face. “They're dolls that have been painted and reworked so they resemble real live babies.”

More murmurs ensued. “Sounds like real fruitcake stuff,” Max muttered.

“Is this doll lady a suspect?” Afton asked.

“We're not ruling anything out at this point,” Thacker said. “Especially since Mrs. Darden gave this woman her phone number. The other thing is, reborn dolls are apparently some kind of cult thing. Apparently, hundreds of these dolls are sold over the Internet for big bucks.” He pulled a sheaf of papers from a manila folder and passed them around the table. “Here. I had Angel make printouts from some of the more popular websites.”

“Plastic dolls,” Afton muttered, studying the splash page of a website called Anita's Babykins. “Painted and molded and dressed so they resemble newborns.” It was the first she'd ever heard of this kind of thing. An interesting concept, she decided, but with a slight creep factor.

“A lot of these reborn doll makers are very proprietary about their creations,” Thacker said. “In fact, they're big on having buyers sign actual adoption papers. So that's another wacky, off-kilter aspect to this case.”

“You said a mouthful,” Max said.

“Are there security tapes from the mall?” Afton asked.

“We're working on that,” Dillon said.

“Obviously, this doll lady is the first angle we have to work,” Thacker said. “But there are a few other wrinkles, too. The husband, Richard Darden, recently resigned his post as VP of Marketing at Novamed. Now he's over at Synthotech with a big-shot job in their new products division. But the powers that be at Novamed have accused him of breaking his confidentiality agreement and taking trade secrets, certain proprietary information, out the door with him.”

“Has Novamed filed suit against him?” Farmer asked.

Thacker sorted through his hastily gathered file. “Ah . . . yes, they have,” he responded.

“You think this kidnapping could be some sort of retaliation?” Afton asked. The idea sounded off the charts to her, but she had to ask.

“I don't know what to think,” Thacker said. He reached a hand up and scrubbed distractedly at his mop of curly gray hair. “It doesn't feel like it.
Corporate execs don't usually get their hands dirty by hiring someone to nick a baby out of its bassinette. But . . . we gotta look at them anyway.”

“This could be a straight-out kidnapping for ransom,” Max said.

“Maybe the Dardens will get a phone call demanding money,” Afton said.

“Maybe they already got the phone call,” Max said. He moved around the table and took his same seat across from Afton.

“No, no, we've already pulled their phone records,” Thacker said. “There's nothing unusual. And we're currently monitoring all their lines. No calls like that have come in.”

“Did you put out an APB to area hospitals?” Afton asked.

This time Max answered. “That's the first thing we did. Alerted area clinics, hospitals, and doctors' offices. Advised them to be on the alert for any newborns that are brought in under what might be suspicious circumstances. And we strongly advised them to ask for positive ID from any new parents whose children aren't current patients.”

“Has an Amber Alert been sent out?” Afton asked. “Is the FBI involved?”

Max rolled his eyes. “Yes, and we've met with our local federal agents once already.”

“I just hope those techno-turds have the decency to stay out of our way,” Dillon said.

“Listen up,” Thacker said. “Even if you feel their hot doggy breath on the backs of your necks, I don't want to see any territorial shit. Job one is to retrieve that poor little baby and put her back in her crib or jolly jumper or whatever the hell. Okay? Is that understood?”

“Sure,” Dillon said, looking unhappy.

Andy Farmer tapped the end of his pencil against the table. “If there's a nanny cam,” he asked, “is there also a nanny?”

“There was,” Max said. “A woman by the name of Jilly Hudson. She worked for the Dardens for about two months, starting the week before the baby arrived. Now Hudson is currently studying for her master's degree in early childhood development at the University of Minnesota.” He pressed
his hands together and steepled his fingers. “Hudson says she was staying at her parents' home last night and her story checks out.”