A Son's Tale

“On Todd Williams,” the detective clarified. “Turns out he’s got a record, both juvenile and adult. He did time for burglary and theft.”

“That’s right.” Though she hadn’t known about the juvenile stuff until after he’d broken into her parents’ mansion and tried to steal what was “rightfully” his. His prison time had come after their divorce.

“We’ve got a call in to his parole officer. They’re going to be bringing Williams in for questioning.”

Again, Morgan nodded. They could question the devil for all she cared. She just wanted her son found.

“What kind of relationship does Williams have with your parents?”

“After he stole from them and they prosecuted him, you mean?”

“They were one of the counts in his conviction?”

She nodded.

“Before or after your divorce?”

“He stole from them before. The conviction came after.”

“What kind of relationship do your parents have with Sammie?”

“My mother sees him regularly. My father never comes to our home or takes Sammie anywhere.”

“Your parents are divorced?” The woman looked down at her paperwork. “I’m sorry, I thought…”

“They aren’t divorced,” Morgan clarified. “My father sees Sammie when my mother brings him to their place, but he and I have been in a standoff since before Sammie was born. After my marriage to Todd broke up, he offered to take me back into his fold, but only if I live at home with him and my mother and do exactly as I’m told. If I don’t live by his dictates, he has nothing to do with me. He won’t go to any of Sammie’s functions if I’m there. Though, to be fair, I believe that if I was incapable of providing for Sammie, my father wouldn’t let us starve. As it is, he’s content to let me penny-pinch, drive a used car and live in a smallish duplex. And I’m perfectly happy to do so if it means I can be my own person and live my life and raise my son in the way I feel is best.”

“Mmm.” The detective’s compassionate glance, her knowing tone, left Morgan feeling far too exposed. And ready to spill all at the same time.

She wanted her son found. No matter what embarrassing and humiliating shortcomings she had to confess.

“So your parents don’t help you out financially at all? Not even with Sammie?”

“No. My mother buys gifts for Sammie occasionally and my father doesn’t object, as long as I don’t benefit financially. It’s his way of teaching me a lesson. My father isn’t evil. He’s just cold. And certain that he’s always right.”

But he would not do anything, ever, to hurt his grandson. Or Morgan, either, in a physical sense.

“You have no siblings, right?”

“Right.”

Morgan jumped as a knock sounded on the door to the small room.

“Excuse me.” With papers in hand, Detective Martin left Morgan alone.

She was back in a couple of seconds.

“Todd Williams is here. We’re going to question him.”

“You really think he could have taken Sammie?”

Elaine Martin shrugged. “If his money pool is running low. I know you said his wife is rich but he could be into gambling. Or he could have taken your son if he wants to get back at your folks for rejecting him to begin with and then pressing the charges that sent him to prison. Either motive is solid. It’s our job to find out who has motive and to investigate every possibility as quickly as possible.”

Morgan felt like she might throw up. This couldn’t be happening. “But if he took him, he’d have to do something with him.” She swallowed the lump in her throat. “He couldn’t take him home… .”

Sammie? Oh, God. Her breath caught. Where are you, Sammie?

Does your father have enough of a parental instinct to at least keep you alive?

Thinking of the man she’d once thought she loved with all of her heart and soul, Morgan couldn’t be sure what he’d do. He’d been quite willing to turn his back on her, in spite of the adoration he’d professed to have for her, so how well could a child he’d never met fare with him?

“What about an Amber Alert? Did you issue one of those?”

“Not yet.” The detective looked down at the pages in front of her. “We have to be reasonably certain that there’s been an abduction before we can do that, which is why we’re questioning your ex-husband. As I told you already, there’s been no sign of foul play.”

Her ten-year-old son was missing! That was foul. Morgan resisted the temptation to jump up and run. To make up for what others weren’t doing. Not that she knew what that was.

Had Sammie really run away? Was he that unhappy with her?

As bad as that seemed, it was still better than thinking that her son had been taken against his will. That he was scared or…worse…

“But you’re still pursuing the possibility that he’s been kidnapped, aren’t you?”

“Of course. We have to consider the worst if we’re going to be assured of getting him back.”

“What about his backpack, his things? His baseball mitt? He took that to school with him this morning and he wouldn’t leave it behind.”

She’d just remembered. She’d told him he had to leave it at home, but when he’d said he wanted to show Jimmy how to catch during the picnic lunch and he’d promised to keep it in his locker the rest of the day, she’d given in. She’d told Detective Martin she’d forgotten about the mitt when she and Julie had discussed Sammie’s locker.

“There was no mitt in his locker,” the other woman said, frowning. “Or backpack, either. Who’s Jimmy Burns?”

“He’s a boy in his regular class at school and he’s in Sammie’s summer school art class. He just moved here last spring. He’s got Down syndrome, but he loves baseball and Sammie was going to teach him how to catch at lunch.”

“Does Sammie spend much time with Jimmy?”

“Yeah, a fair amount. His mom sometimes watches Sammie for me when I’m in class. Daddy only lets Mom see us a couple of times a week.”

Blind fear made her continue, to tell the detective everything. Her son’s life was in danger. She wasn’t going to spare herself. “According to my father, I’m a bad influence on my mother.”

“And on Sammie, too?”

“Only because I’m teaching him how to disrespect a parent and go against a parent’s wishes. If I’d conform to his way of thinking and move home and be pampered and protected, he’d think I’m a great mother.”

She didn’t want to stop talking now. If she kept talking she didn’t have to think. Could Sammie really be with his father? He’d never even met the man.

Already divorced by the time Sammie was born, she’d put “father unknown” on her son’s birth certificate to protect the boy from finding out who and what his father really was. And lost any chance for child support in the doing.

If Todd had her son, Sammie would be scared to death. And Todd? What would he do with him? How could he possibly keep the boy’s existence a secret? If Sammie didn’t turn up soon, his picture was going to be all over the evening news.