The Kindness of Strangers (9 page)

The question caused real fear to fill her mouth with the tang of metal. “
Why?
What does this girl have to do with you searching this house?” Was someone dead? Had they found the girl’s body here?

“Did you see anything unusual in Jordan’s room? Or in his bathroom? Any signs of illness or injury?”

Sarah sensed that they were all holding their breath, that they were finally to the point. “Is . . . is this about Jordan?”

Kramble leaned toward her. “What do you mean?”

“Jordan and his drug use?”

“Did you think he used drugs?”

“Well, no, not before yesterday I didn’t, but”—Sarah lowered her voice, not knowing if Jordan might be able to hear her—“looking back now, there were signs I guess we all missed. He’s always in a trance, it seems. Lost in his head. It makes him seem almost . . . slow.”

“He was considered gifted at school,” the woman officer snapped, as if Sarah had insulted the woman’s own child.

“Yes, I know,” Sarah said. “He’s gifted
academically,
but socially he has problems. He doesn’t get along with other kids. They say he’s stuck up. I think he’s just painfully shy, but it can come across as sullen or aloof. He’s always alone and never looks happy.” She wondered if he had somehow brought down this nightmare on his parents. “Is he in serious trouble? Was he selling drugs or something?”

Kramble coughed. Just then a red-haired woman officer escorted Courtney into the living room. She was dressed normally—in a pink cardigan over a yellow floral-print dress—but her face was red and splotchy with tears. She clasped her hands in front of her as if in prayer.

“Courtney?” Sarah stood.

Courtney turned to her, and a wave of relief rolled over Courtney’s face. She stepped toward Sarah as if to hug her, but the woman officer pulled Courtney back by the elbow. That’s when Sarah saw the handcuffs on Courtney’s wrists.

“Oh, my God. Courtney, what’s going on? What happened?”

“I . . . I’m under arrest,” Courtney said with a girlish inflection of disbelief.

“
What?
For what?”

The woman officer steered Courtney toward the kitchen.

“Wait! For God’s sake, you don’t have to cuff her! There must be some mistake. You have the wrong—”

“Please. Let me talk to her,” Courtney said to the officer. Courtney turned to Sarah, her face anguished. “They’re charging me with child endangerment and”—she paused, turning her wide eyes to Kramble as if trying to remember the words, get it right—“c-complicity with abuse?”

Sarah’s mouth fell open. All the other noise in the house went mute, as if someone had pressed a remote.

“There’s a warrant out for Mark’s arrest.” Courtney’s voice climbed higher with her tears. “For abuse and molestation of children and . . . and . . .” Courtney hiccupped a sob.

Abuse and molestation? Time seemed to slow, as Sarah struggled to translate the words she’d just heard into something she could grab on to or comprehend. They were so absurd her brain dismissed them—this was a case of mistaken identity, they had the wrong people. She felt a sensation of vertigo and feared she might have to sit down, right there on the floor, or she would fall. She took a deep breath and said the only words she knew, the words she believed with all her heart: “Oh, my God. That . . . that isn’t true. You’ve made some kind of mistake. These are nice people, good people.”

The officers stared back at Sarah, their faces expressionless.
Everyone says that,
she realized. They expected her to say that. But it was true; she had to convince them.

Chills prickled across Sarah’s flesh. “Is . . . is this what Jordan says? Is he accusing you?”

“No.” Courtney sobbed. She tried to put her hands up to her face, but they were cuffed together and awkward. “He hasn’t accused anyone of anything. But they won’t let me talk to him! I haven’t been able to see him since they called me from the ER.”

“You never got to see him?
At all?
” That poor boy was in the hospital and hadn’t even been able to see his mother? “Is Mark with him?”

“Come on, Dr. Kendrick.” The woman officer began guiding Courtney toward the kitchen again.

“Wait,” Sarah begged, grabbing Courtney’s other elbow. “But where
is
Jordan? The hospital said he was released. Is he okay?”

“Mrs. Laden,” Kramble said, “you really shouldn’t—”

“They transferred him to Children’s Medical Center last night,” Courtney said. “I’m not allowed to talk to him. He’s there all alone. Please go see him, Sarah. Make sure he’s okay. Tell him I’d be there if I could, but they won’t let me!”

“Of course. But what happened to him? They think you abused him? I don’t understand!”

“Oh, my God,” Courtney said. Her lips trembled. “The things that were done to him. Sarah, it’s—” And she burst into sobs again. Jordan flashed into Sarah’s brain, staring up at her from the gravel parking lot, the rain rinsing the vomit off his pale face and diluting the red pulse into a pink wash over his neck. He’d been hurt when Sarah picked him up? She tried to remember what he’d looked like when she first saw him in his driveway.

“Take her to the car,” Kramble said.

The woman officer tried to pull Courtney from Sarah’s grasp. Sarah hung on for a moment, engaging Courtney in a bizarre tug-of-war. Afraid of hurting her friend, Sarah let go. “Wait! Courtney, don’t worry! I’m coming with you!” Sarah followed after them.

But Courtney called over her shoulder as they moved through the kitchen, “No, Sarah, go to Children’s! Please! Check on Jordan!” The woman officer opened the side door.

“Where’s Mark?” Sarah asked. “Does he even know this is happening?”

“I don’t know!” Courtney wailed as she was led outside. She practically walked backward as she twisted around to talk to Sarah. “He left!”

“What do you mean he
left
?” Every word spoken worsened the scenario.

“He’s gone!” Courtney said. Courtney stopped, and the woman officer pulled on her. “Sarah—there’s pornography. Child pornography. Jordan
is in
some child pornography. I saw him. Mark was—” The woman officer managed to get Courtney to move in the right direction.

Sarah stared, struck mute and stupid by the sudden iciness that numbed her.

The officer opened the back door of an Oakhaven cruiser.

“His secretary says Mark took the call from the ER and he left! The bastard left! I haven’t seen him. He left because he’s fucking guilty.” The woman tried to maneuver Courtney into the car. “He knew he was caught. He knew I’d find—” The woman officer put her hand on Courtney’s head and ducked her into the backseat, then slammed the door, cutting off her voice.

What had Courtney just said?

The woman officer headed to the driver’s seat.

Sarah saw herself yesterday, speeding through the rain on the slick streets. The collision of rage and confusion nauseated her, and she quickly shut it off with,
It couldn’t be true, it couldn’t be true
.

She blinked at the blue sky, the glittering grass.

The woman got inside the cruiser and started the engine.

The enormity of what had happened expanded in Sarah’s chest. The pressure made her ribs ache.
They just took Courtney away in handcuffs,
she had to say to herself.
They won’t let her see her own son. Her son is in some child pornography. Her husband is missing.
Sarah stared at the cruiser as it drove around her van and disappeared up the driveway.

“Come inside,” Detective Kramble said behind her. She hadn’t realized he’d followed them. Kramble stepped to the side and gestured like a gentleman for her to reenter the kitchen first. Sarah did, on tingling legs.

“Child pornography?” she whispered. She had to reach out a hand to steady herself. For some reason she remembered how light Jordan had been in her arms.
It couldn’t be true.

“There is
no way
Courtney and Mark were involved in such a thing. I—” How could she make it clear to them? “These are nice people. They like kids, kids like them, they volunteer at school, they . . . they . . . This just isn’t possible.”

Kramble walked back to the living room. “Rodney? Are those stills back yet?”

Rodney came from down the hall and handed Kramble a manila envelope. Kramble took it and gestured for Sarah to sit back down on the plastic-covered couch. She did. Rodney paused in the door frame. He said to her, “I didn’t believe it either. But it’s true.” Kramble cleared his throat, and Rodney left.

“Mrs. Laden, Dr. Kendrick just gave you more information than I would have myself. But since she did, perhaps you can help us further.” He took an eight-by-ten photo out of the envelope and laid it on the glass table. The wrestler and the pouting woman drew close. “Can you identify this man?” Kramble asked.

Sarah looked at the close-up of Mark’s face. His mouth twisted in a strange grimace, as if he were working out.

“That’s Mark Kendrick,” she said.

Kramble watched an angelfish in an aquarium for a moment, then said, “This man is positively identified in
many
of the pornographic movies. Most of them, actually.”

Sarah’s nails bit into her palms. How could he say these outrageous things with such a calm, serene face? He could have said, “Mark wore black shoes,” for the tone of voice he used. This could not be happening. This could not be true. Mark Kendrick who’d coached soccer? Who’d bought the teachers boxes of candy for Valentine’s Day? Who’d “adopted” Danny for the father-son cookout and basketball game, taking him along with Jordan?
Oh, dear God.
“He . . . he couldn’t.” She could not bear for this to be true. It would destroy her.

“There are five adults who appear consistently in the tapes.” Kramble lined up four more eight-by-tens. Sarah buried her face in her hands. She wanted to beg him to stop speaking. She needed time to let this horrifying information absorb. It was too much.

She didn’t want to look at the other photos. She didn’t want to know.

But she did. All close-ups of faces. Two women and two men. All with those strange, exhilarated expressions. All with hard, cold eyes. Sarah understood that these were stills taken from the videos. That these were the faces of people involved in sex acts. Sex acts with children. Sex acts that had been cut away so she could see only their faces. Sarah shook her head. “I don’t know any of these people. I’ve never seen them.”

The pouting woman and the wrestler sighed.

“Why did you arrest Courtney?” Sarah asked. “She’s not in these pictures.”

Kramble said nothing, but Sarah followed his gaze to the video camera on the floor.

She pictured Courtney at the soccer games with her video camera but quickly forced that image away.
It couldn’t be true.

“She would never do this. She didn’t know this was going on. If she knew, she would have called you herself. I
know
this woman.” Sarah had thought she’d known Mark, too, but didn’t say this aloud. “I mean, Mark’s disappearance speaks for itself. Courtney’s here, she gave you permission to search. She couldn’t have known.” They had to believe her.

“What can you tell me about Dr. Kendrick’s family?” Kramble asked her. “What do you know about her parents, her background?”

Sarah wanted desperately to help her friend, to convince these people that Courtney could not possibly be connected to something as obscene as they described. “They’ve only lived here four years. Her parents are dead. Her mother got really sick right around the time they moved here. She died that first year they were here, I think. She had . . . c-cancer.” Sarah stumbled over the word.

The stocky wrestler scribbled and turned a page in his notebook with a crisp
snap.

“And her father?” Kramble asked.

“He died a long time ago, when she was a teenager, I think.”

“Any brothers or sisters?”

“No.” Courtney was an only child, just like Sarah. Just like Jordan. Oh, God. Poor Jordan. Where had he been going when Sarah picked him up?

“Do you know where they lived before they moved here?”

“Yes. In Indianapolis. Her mother lived in Bloomington.”

Snap
—the wrestler flipped another page.
They are going to investigate her childhood,
Sarah realized. This was going to be on the news and in the papers. Parents would have to explain to their children. People would talk. And ask questions. And judge.

Sarah heard her own voice repeating, “Courtney didn’t know this was happening.” But even as she said it, a bright ringing sound made her turn to the doorway. Rodney stood there with a girl’s purple ten-speed bike. “Oh, my God. That . . . that’s Hadley Winter’s bike.”

Kramble stood and approached the bike with her. “Hadley Winter?”

“Yes.” Sarah blinked at the bike, its presence here confounding her. “It got stolen.” That was the last time she’d dealt with the police about something regarding the Kendricks. She wanted this to be that simple, that solvable. Something not so foul and horrifying.