Chapter 12 - The Man in the Hospital Bed
Gregory Vance looked smaller without the careful disguise of respectability.
No orange volunteer vest.
No polished shoes.
No patient smile.
He lay handcuffed to a hospital bed under armed guard, his face swollen badly enough that I barely recognized him.
A breathing tube had been removed less than an hour earlier.
Morales and I stood outside the secured room while a federal agent named Daniel Reeves reviewed the rules.
“You get five minutes,” Reeves said. “No promises. No deals. No physical contact.”
“I’m not here to negotiate.”
Reeves gave me a skeptical look.
“You may not be. He might.”
Morales crossed her arms.
“Who attacked him?”
“Another inmate.”
“Random?”
“No.”
That one word settled heavily between us.
Reeves continued.
“Someone deposited money into the inmate’s commissary account yesterday. Fifteen thousand dollars went to his sister this morning.”
I looked through the narrow window at Gregory.
“Someone wanted him dead.”
“Looks that way.”
“Why now?”
Reeves glanced at Morales.
“Because someone believes he might talk.”
Inside the room, Gregory’s eyes opened when I approached.
He tried to smile.
It came out as a grimace.
“Officer Dunham.”
“Who sent the picture of Liam?”
His eyes narrowed.
“You received it.”
“You already knew.”
“I knew they’d warn you.”
“Who are they?”
Gregory turned his head toward the ceiling.
“The people you should’ve left alone.”
I stepped closer.
“You kidnapped a baby and stole six years of his life. Don’t pretend you’re protecting anyone.”
His jaw tightened.
“You think I was the beginning?”
“I think you were a coward who hid behind children.”
Something flashed in his eyes.
Anger.
Then fear.
“Cedar Street wasn’t mine.”
“What?”
“The house. The paperwork. The school schedules. I didn’t build the system.”
“Who did?”
He wet his cracked lips.
“There were always safe houses. Different cities. Different names. Children nobody expected to be found quickly.”
Morales stepped forward.
“How many children?”
Gregory looked at her.
“I don’t know.”
“How many?”
“Dozens.”
The word hit harder than I expected.
I remembered the blue folders from the basement.
Names.
Routes.
Families.
I had assumed Gregory was planning.
Maybe he had been maintaining inventory.
“You worked for someone,” I said.
Gregory gave a faint nod.
“Who?”
He stared at me for several seconds.
Then whispered, “Katherine Vale.”
KV.
17/4/12.
My pulse hammered.
“Who is Katherine Vale?”
“You’ve met her.”
I froze.
“No, I haven’t.”
Gregory laughed once, then winced.
“Yes, you have.”
“Where?”
“At Evergreen.”
Morales pulled out her phone, already messaging detectives.
“What does she look like?”
Gregory shook his head.
“Names changed. Hair changed. Jobs changed.”
“You said Katherine Vale.”
“That was the name she used when I knew her.”
“What job did she have?”
Gregory looked straight at me.
“Ask who approved the volunteers.”
Everything inside me stopped.
Evergreen Elementary had a volunteer coordinator.
A woman named Karen Voss.
KV.
She had personally introduced Gregory to teachers.
Personally signed the district forms.
Personally assured parents that every volunteer had been cleared.
I took one step backward.
Karen Voss was sixty-two years old, soft-spoken, gray-haired, and known for bringing homemade muffins to school board meetings.
She had attended the ceremony three months earlier when Liam gave me the Junior Deputy plaque.
She had hugged Clara.
She had placed both hands on Liam’s shoulders.
And smiled for photographs.
My stomach twisted.
“Where is she now?” I demanded.
Morales was already calling Portland dispatch.
Gregory closed his eyes.
“You’re too late.”
“Where is she?”
“She never stays after a network breaks.”
“Network?”
His eyelids lifted.
“You arrested me in March.”
“Yes.”
“She disappeared the next morning.”
I remembered.
Karen had supposedly taken emergency leave to care for an ill sister in Arizona.
Nobody questioned it.
“Why would she photograph Liam now?”
Gregory studied me.
“She wouldn’t.”
The room went silent.
“What?”
“She wouldn’t send a threat. Not her style.”
I leaned closer.
“Then who did?”
Gregory’s breathing became shallow.
“Someone trying to make you find her.”
Morales stared at him.
“Why?”
“Because Katherine knows where the records are.”
“What records?”
Gregory looked toward the armed guard.
For the first time, his voice carried something close to genuine terror.
“The names of every child they moved.”
A monitor beside the bed began beeping faster.
“And whoever sent your photograph,” he continued, “isn’t trying to scare you away.”
May you like
He locked eyes with me.
“They’re asking you to finish what Liam started.”
