They Disappeared

9

New York City

In the minutes after Jeff had left the Fourteenth Precinct, Detective Vic Cordelli resumed staring at the pictures of the Griffins.

Juanita Ortiz stopped reading her notes and shifted her gaze to him.

“What is it, Vic?”

Cordelli brooded as mistrust gnawed at him and he shook his head.

“I just don’t know about this one, Juanita.”

Ortiz tapped her pen against her notes, sighing to herself.

“You got a lot going on—” Ortiz picked up her landline “—but I need you to help me get to work and run this thing, okay?”

Ortiz called the Real Time Crime Center downtown at One Police Plaza. The RTCC operated a vast computer network, including hundreds of surveillance cameras and plate readers in all boroughs. She’d requested all footage covering the time and location of Sarah and Cole Griffin’s abduction.

While that was being processed Cordelli ran the Griffins through the National Crime Information Center, which held active records on millions of cases, ranging from thefts, to missing persons, fugitives and terrorists. The query rang no bells—no arrest, warrants, nothing.

As Ortiz checked with other local, state and regional databases, Cordelli got on the phone to Montana. He hooked up with Detective Blaine Thorsen of the Laurel Police Department, who was puzzled at why the NYPD was calling about Jeff and Sarah Griffin.

“No.” Thorsen’s keyboard clicked as he consulted local computer records for Cordelli. “There’s no complaint history here. No custody orders. It’s a damn shame that they lost their baby a while back.”

“What was the cause?”

“The coroner said it was SIDS. We investigated and had no reason to believe otherwise. They’re nice people. Why are you checking? What’s going on in New York?”

“They’re here on vacation,” Cordelli said. “Jeff’s reported that Sarah and Cole were abducted less than two hours ago near Times Square.”

“Abducted? Shit, really?”

“We’re looking into it.”

“Do you have any suspects?”

“A witness gave us a couple of men and a vague vehicle description. Nothing solid. Does this sound out of character for the Griffins?”

“Completely,” Thorsen said. “That family went through hell when they lost their daughter and now this. Lord Almighty. If you need anything from our end, anything at all, let us know.”

Cordelli hung up.

His perspective was shifting.

He reviewed the report from the uniforms, the witness statement taken by Roy Duggan. He knew Duggan, knew he was a hard-ass who didn’t trust many people. Duggan wouldn’t waste his time if he didn’t sense a case here. Cordelli would have to get down to the street and talk to Freddie.

For now, he returned to the family photos, the baby, Sarah, Jeff and Cole. Cordelli considered putting out an Amber Alert for Cole but they had nothing on a vehicle.

Juanita was still working her phone and the computer. These days an investigation entailed as much mouse clicking as shoe leather.

The more Cordelli looked at the Griffin family pictures, the deeper he’d looked into himself and how hollow his life had become.

Three nights back, in the case they’d just closed, a jacked-up addict had put a gun in his face but it jammed. Cordelli’s “this-is-it” moment made him realize that nobody would mourn him because, after five years, he’d determined marriage wasn’t for him. He’d told his wife that he couldn’t breathe, that he was on a leash.

She got a lawyer and cut him loose.

The papers came through yesterday.

Seeing the Griffins underscored what he would never have.

It’s what he saw with Juanita every day. He could never tell her how it ate him up. She had Lucy, her little girl, and Bert, her husband. He was a building contractor who often surprised her with picnics in Central Park or getaway weekends to Boston.

Cordelli figured these things were factors contributing to why he had been skeptical and a bit of a prick to Jeff Griffin. Yeah, maybe, he thought, downing the last of his coffee, maybe a little.

It was stupid.

He would correct it, starting now.

Going back over everything, one theory came to mind telling him that—

“Hey, you there? Vic? Hello? Did you hear me?”

Ortiz had yanked him from his thoughts.

“I said RTCC just came through. I think we’ve really got something here. Come around, you’ve got to see this.”

10

New York City

The fleeting video images of Sarah and Cole vanishing with strangers were seared in Jeff’s mind as he hurried through New York’s streets to the internet café.

Seeing what had happened to them made it real.

Someone had taken them, pulled them from the street in a heartbeat.

Why? Who would do this? It’s insane!

His scalp prickling, he glanced at the directions to the café while rushing through a crosswalk against a red light. A Mercedes bumper came within inches of his knee—the horn blast startled him as the driver spewed obscenities. Jeff waved it off, took a deep breath and moved on.

What was he doing running around like this?

He should call Cordelli and Ortiz, alert them to the surveillance footage and the plate. He’d do that. But not yet, because when he considered the slip of paper bearing the license number, he knew he had more than hope in his hand.

This was his thread to Sarah and Cole.

Nothing was going to stop him from following it.

* * *

It was called Virtual Connections Online Coffeehouse.

Jazz music and the hissing gurgle of espresso machines filled the air of the packed café. At every table people had their noses in their BlackBerries, tablets, cell phones and laptops. All the rental computer terminals were in use. Jeff got his instructions and number from a girl in a white apron at the counter.

“Hit Enter, the rates come up. Swipe your credit card. Remember to log out. Three people are ahead of you but it won’t be long—we have twelve terminals.”

While waiting, Jeff went to the ATM next door for more cash. By the time he’d come back, a terminal in the corner had become available. The mouse was sticky and the keyboard was so worn off he had to strain to see what letters he was typing.

He took the half hour rate of seven dollars. He knew the detectives were monitoring his family credit card, so he used his company card for Clay Platt’s Auto Service. He’d explain the charges to Clay later. Once he was online he searched Google services that identified license plates. He submitted the plate number for New York State, then his credit card information.

A few seconds later the monitor displayed the data. The vehicle was a white 2010 GMC Terrain, the registered owner was Donald Dalfini and his address was 88 Steeldown Road, New York City. There was a vehicle identification number, title, registration date and other information.

Jeff printed it all off, then searched the address.

It was in the Bronx. The map put it near Neverpoint Park in the southeast section of the borough. The estimated travel time from midtown was about forty minutes.

Jeff collected his pages, folded them into his pocket and debated his next step.

Call Cordelli and Ortiz, tell them I saw the recording and now had a plate and address.

He took out Ortiz’s business card and pressed the number. The line rang, then went straight to her voice mail. He didn’t want to leave a message and he didn’t want to waste any time.

I’ll follow this on my own. I’ll take it as far as I can, then I’ll alert them once I have something.

Jeff worked his way through the crowd to the street and flagged down the first cab he saw.

11

New York City

“Run it again but slow it down.”

Cordelli rolled his chair beside Ortiz at her computer.

A few keystrokes and she replayed the video provided by the New York Police Department’s Real Time Crime Center. The images covered Forty-fourth and Forty-fifth Streets near Seventh Avenue—at the time of Sarah and Cole’s abduction.

It had taken time for the RTCC to gather the material but the number of angles, proximity and superior quality captured by its network exceeded anything from a single camera with a partial street view.

“Here we go.” Ortiz’s monitor offered an array of sharp perspectives as she zeroed in on what they needed.

Sarah Griffin emerges, taking a picture of Cole. Jeff joins them, his arm around her as Cole photographs his parents. Jeff approaches a tourist who takes a shot of the family, then looks at the camera. Jeff takes it, turns to the storefronts, talks with the panhandler in a wheelchair, then enters a store. Sarah and Cole move to a vendor’s cart, looking at souvenirs. A white SUV with tinted windows brakes at the curb. Two men exit on the curbside, leaving passenger doors open. They’re wearing ball caps, dark glasses, full beards, big, dark, front-button shirts loose enough to hide a weapon, dark jeans, dark boots, moving fast into Sarah and Cole’s space. One leans to Cole’s ear, telling him something, takes his arm, puts his other arm on Cole’s shoulder and swiftly thrusts him into the backseat. Sarah reacts with the second man, who is trying to push her back. They appear to only want the boy. But Sarah battles her way into the backseat after Cole. The men overpower her, shut the doors, abducting her, as well. The SUV pulls away…gone like it never happened…no reaction from people on the street. Jeff emerges from the store searching, asking people, calling on his cell phone. Nothing…

The images froze: Jeff Griffin alone, helpless in the street.

The scene drove it home for Ortiz and Cordelli, briefly imagining the fear twisting in Jeff’s gut before they’d kicked things into high gear. Cordelli tapped his pen to the monitor on the SUV’s New York plate.

They wrote it down.

“Get the center to run the plate through everything,” he said.

“Already on it.” Ortiz had grabbed her phone.

“We want to get units rolling to the address of the registered owner ASAP. And,” Cordelli added, “get them to track the SUV through the surveillance network. Can they tell us where it went? Where it is now?”

As Ortiz dealt with her call, Cordelli used her keyboard to replay the footage. He eyed every aspect, absorbed every detail of the chilling act that had played out in broad daylight on one of the busiest streets on earth.

“What do you think?” Ortiz asked after finishing the call.

“Who the hell are these guys? Why would they kidnap a Montana schoolteacher and her nine-year-old son?”

“It’s hard to tell by her reaction if she knows them.”

“Go back to this angle, on this one.” Cordelli touched his pen to the monitor. “I can’t make out any features on the suspects. Counting the driver, is it four men?”

“The SUV’s got a little too much tint on the windows and that glare on the windshield doesn’t help.”

“We need to look into the family’s finances, see if they had gambling or drug debts,” Cordelli said.

“I thought the people in Montana said they were clean, upstanding.”

“We’ll check again and we’ll get the FBI in Billings to assist. We’ll request warrants on the family’s computers, check their records. Maybe it’s an online thing. Maybe she was having an affair that went bad.”

“Or maybe the kid was chatting with a predator, told them about the family’s vacation?” Ortiz said.

Cordelli went to his desk and made calls.

“I’ll get things rolling to put out an Amber Alert.”

He advised their supervisor, then started pulling together photos of Sarah and Cole, notes on the SUV—the plate, color—description of the suspects.

Ortiz’s cell phone rang.

Her eyes widened slightly as she listened, then jotted notes.

“This is happening now?” Her voice betrayed a measure of incredulity before she said, “Got it,” and hung up.

“Vic, you’re not going to believe this.” Ortiz stood, pulled on her jacket. “I’ll tell you on the way. We’ve got to leave right now.”

12

Neverpoint Park, the Bronx, New York City

The address for the SUV was in a corner of Neverpoint where faded Realtors’ signs listed small, tired-looking houses as Must Sell or with Price Reduced.

“My stepfather lived here,” Jeff’s cabdriver said. “There was a landfill over there, that whole section.”

It had taken about half an hour to travel from midtown to this part of the East Bronx, which was bound by Long Island Sound and the East River. After leaving the expressway, they’d driven through a mixture of warehouses, pawnshops, drugstores, hair salons and pizzerias.

They’d passed an assortment of low-income city apartment projects before coming to neighborhoods of shingle-roofed one- and two-story houses with small yards. On Steeldown Road, parked cars lined both sides of the street. A dog was in the middle of it, his head inside a fast-food take-out bag as he worked on the remains.

For the umpteenth time, Jeff glanced at the information on the printout, then back to the street.

Who was Donald Dalfini?

The Dalfini house at 88 Steeldown Road was a frame-and-stucco bungalow with a fenced yard. There was an older, dirty Honda with a dented rear quarter parked on the street out front, but the driveway was empty. The GMC Terrain registered to the address was a late model that would cost some thirty thousand dollars. Jeff didn’t see how it fit with the income level of the neighborhood.

He told the driver to keep going.

The knot in Jeff’s stomach was tightening, making it harder for him to concentrate.

Is this a mistake?

No, he had to do this. Too much was at stake.

“Pull over and let me out,” he said when they were midway into the next block. Jeff paid the fare, tipped the driver, then gave him another twenty.

“Kill your meter and wait. I may need to return to Manhattan fast.”

“Sure, pal. Out here to get some action, huh?” The driver winked at him in the rearview mirror and reached for his copy of the New York Post.

Walking to the house Jeff’s breathing quickened, the horror rising. He couldn’t believe the past few hours: Sarah and Cole abducted, the NYPD challenging his report, leaving him alone to track the people who took his wife and son to this street.

To this house.

This was beyond his control.

Suddenly, he was besieged with questions.

What are you doing? What are you getting into? You’re not a cop. You should let Cordelli and Ortiz handle this, he thought as he came to the bungalow. But what if Sarah and Cole are being held here, right now? What it they’re being tortured, or worse?

He couldn’t live with himself if it turned out that he was this close but did nothing to save them. He’d already faced an unbearable loss. Standing in the street, in front of the house, Jeff had no choice.

My wife and son could be in there and I’m going in after them.

He wrote down the Honda’s New York plate and scanned the interior. It had an overflowing ashtray. The passenger seat was covered with flyers and junk-food wrappers. Other than this car out front there was no sign of any vehicles at the house.

The curtains were drawn.

All quiet, except for the jets flying in and out of LaGuardia.

How was he going to do this? Call the phone number he obtained on the search record printout? Or ring the doorbell? A dog’s distant bark underscored that he was losing time. There was a diffusion of light near a window. A shadow passed by a curtain.

Someone’s in there.

Jeff stepped onto the property, walked to the side of the house, bent down and cupped his face to a basement window. His eyes adjusted to a double laundry sink, a washer and dryer, clothes heaped on the floor.

He flinched.

A child’s earsplitting scream shattered the quiet.

Cole?

Something inside the house vibrated, someone moving around. Jeff started for the backyard but was stopped by a wooden fence and a gate that reached to his shoulders. He tried the handle; the gate was locked. He tried reaching over it for a latch but got nothing.

Gripping the top of the fence, he hefted himself over it, landing on a garden hose that snaked to the back. Jeff followed it past a back door to patio steps, a small deck with lawn chairs and picnic table. It was a typical family backyard.

He stopped at the sight of two children standing in the grass, some fifteen feet away: a boy about Cole’s age and a girl who looked to be four or five, both wearing swimsuits.

The hose meandered to the girl. She used both hands to hold the dripping nozzle, which she pointed at the boy, who was drenched. For a moment, water plunking from the boy to the deck was the only sound.

Then the boy, his blond water-slicked hair darkened, turned to Jeff at the same time as the girl.

The boy was not Cole.

The children’s eyes widened slightly as they stared at Jeff, speechless until the girl said, “Hello.”

At a loss, Jeff scanned the small yard when he noticed the children’s attention shift a fraction to his left.

“I have a gun,” a woman’s voice said from behind him.

Jeff turned.

The woman’s arms were extended; her hands were wrapped around the pistol aimed at him.

“Get on your knees and put your hands behind your head!”

Before Jeff could explain she shouted.

“Do it now, asshole! Or I swear to God I’ll shoot you dead.”

13

Neverpoint Park, the Bronx, New York City

Jeff raised his hands and lowered himself to the lawn.

The woman holding the gun ordered her children into the house.

Jeff got on his knees, his mind racing.

Are Sarah and Cole here? Where’s the SUV?

The woman kept her gun on him and kept her distance.

A shrub of frizzy red hair haloed her face. She had to be in her late twenties but the lines carved deep around her mouth suggested an embittered life. She had an overbite. She wore jeans and a T-shirt showing a pit bull guarding a motorcycle. Tattoos swirled along her arms.

“Get out your wallet.”

Slowly Jeff pulled it from his pocket and tossed it to her feet. Keeping her gun on him she retrieved it, examined his driver’s license and fire department photo identification.

“Montana? Why the hell are you here, trespassing, threatening my kids?”

His pulse galloping, Jeff thought it odd she hadn’t called the police. Or maybe she has and I’ll hear sirens? Her voice was throaty, she may have been drinking. She looks like someone who has been arrested before. If she’s involved in the abduction she wouldn’t want police coming to this place.

“Answer me, asshole!”

He tried to think.

“My wife and son were abducted a few hours ago near Times Square in an SUV registered to this address.”

“That’s a crock of shit!”

“It’s the truth. Do you know Donald Dalfini? Where is the SUV? Are you his wife?” The woman didn’t answer. As she considered his questions, Jeff kept talking. “Let me show you something?”

She took a moment, then nodded once. Jeff fished out Sarah’s digital camera and Cole’s key ring. He cued up the photos and held the camera to her with the ring.

“Look at these, please. Pictures we took today. I’m telling the truth.”

Hesitating, she inched forward, keeping the gun on Jeff. She took the items with her free hand, then backed away. As she looked them over Jeff told her everything—about Lee Ann, the trip, everything. He explained all the events that brought them here, to this moment.

“Tell me where my wife and son are. I’m begging you.”

Jeff saw that her eyes were blue, a bit glassy, as he searched them for her reaction. With each passing second her hardness started to fracture. As she blinked back tears her mouth began moving and she spoke, in a whisper, to herself. Jeff struggled to hear, certain she’d said, “I told Donnie it’s freakin’ wrong, stupid.”

“Please,” Jeff said. “I’m begging you. Are they okay? Are my wife and son hurt? Please.”

On the verge of tears, she dragged the back of her hand across her mouth.

“Shut up! Your shit’s got nothing to do with us!”

“It’s your SUV. It’s registered to this address.”

“It was stolen three weeks ago when I went to the Neverpoint Mall. I’ve been scared the fuckers who took it would come here.”

“Then we’re on the same side. We both need to know what happened.”

“Sheri, you need my help?”

A woman’s voice came from just inside the sliding doors to the deck. A large woman in her fifties with long white hair stood in the dim light. She was wearing an oversize Mets T-shirt and tapped the tip of a baseball bat into the palm of her left hand.

“Did you call Donnie?” Sheri asked the older woman.

“I left him a message. Did you find out who this asshole is? Want me to help you with him?”

“No, I’ve got this.”

But Sheri’s voice quavered; her hands were shaking, signaling that she was losing her internal struggle to regard Jeff as a threat. He needed to search the house, then he’d alert Cordelli and Ortiz.

“Sheri, I told you the truth,” he said. “If what you told me is true, let me look through your house for my family, then I’ll go.”

“I told you we got nothing to do with that.”

“I need to look. Put yourself in my shoes.”

As she weighed Jeff’s argument, he pressed his case further.

“Sheri, listen to me—I need to find my family. Let me look and I’ll go. No matter what you do, your SUV is linked to my family’s disappearance and police will be coming here. I can let them know you helped, or I can let them know you hid something. I think you have a good heart. I don’t believe you want to kill me because I’m telling you the truth. I need to find my wife and son.”

After studying his face she swallowed, then lowered her gun.

“All right. Belva! Bring the kids out back. This won’t take long.”

“Are you nuts, girl?”

“It’s my damn house. Do as I say!”

It was a small bungalow; the reek of cigarettes and stale beer hung in the air. The kitchen table was cluttered with plates, butter knives, an open bag of cookies, a loaf of white bread and jars of jelly and peanut butter. When Jeff entered the living room it became evident why Sheri might not call the police. The coffee table was lined with empty liquor bottles, beer cans and small clear plastic bags containing something organic.

There were newspapers open to want ads with jobs circled.

“Since Donnie got laid off at the plant, it’s been hard,” Sheri was almost apologizing to Jeff. “The mortgage, car and credit card payments are piling up. We’re looking for jobs but it’s hard, and then with the SUV stolen, that took the cake.”

Holding her gun at her side, Sheri kept her distance as she escorted Jeff in his room-by-room search on the main floor bedrooms. He recognized the intrusive aspect of a stranger in her bedroom and those of her children but it was eclipsed by the outrage forced upon him. He looked in closets, under beds, in the basement and he tapped on walls until he was satisfied that Sarah and Cole were not here. When they’d returned to the living room Jeff’s cell phone rang.

The display showed a blocked number.

His heart rate soared when he answered.

“Jeff, this is Detective Cordelli. We’ve located the SUV.”

“What about Sarah and Cole?”

Sirens and the rush of the road indicated Cordelli was in a car.

“No confirmation. We’re en route to the scene now.”

“What’s the location? I’m coming.”

“You sit tight at your hotel—we’ll keep you posted.”

“Tell me the location, Cordelli!”