Emily shook her head at me with a smile.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you. How do you do it?” she said. “Great cop. Great dad. Head screwed on straight. How does that happen with ten kids? Oh, and a cat. Now that’s just showing off, don’t you think?”
I laughed as I gunned it north toward the Bronx.
“You see right through me,” I said. “I rent the cat for atmosphere.”
Chapter 23
THE SKINNERS’ HOUSE was on Independence Avenue about a half mile west of the Henry Hudson Parkway near Wave Hill. A stunning view of the Hudson River rolled silently behind the ivy-draped rambling Tudor.
There was a genteel country air about the landscaped neighborhood. Getting out of the car, I thought about how nice it would be to have a backyard. I imagined the peace and quiet as I sat on warm grass with a cold drink. More like fantasized. Within the confines of New York City, genteel country airs with river views usually go for about eight figures.
We met Schultz and Ramirez in the horseshoe-shaped gravel drive.
“Last night around ten, Chelsea snuck out of her house to party downtown with a couple of girlfriends,” Ramirez said, reading his notes. “They said they let her out of a cab here on the corner of West Two Hundred and Fifty-fourth at around two-thirty. They didn’t want to drop her right in front of the house because they didn’t want to wake up her parents. Her mom found Chelsea’s bag with her cell phone in it on the driveway just before six. He must have been waiting for her. Nobody saw any cars or people. Neighbors didn’t hear a thing.”
“Already checked out the Skinners,” Schultz said. “Parents are clean, but Chelsea got a desk-appearance ticket for drinking on the subway about a year ago. Chelsea, apparently, is a bit of a handful.”
I counted four luxury cars parked in the Skinners’ driveway as we walked toward the portico. A tall, upset-looking man in a pinstripe suit pulled open the door as we were about to ring the bell.
“Well, have you heard anything?” he said, staring at my shield. “Have you found Chelsea? I want answers.”
“Are you Harold Skinner?” I said.
“No, I’m not. Mr. Skinner is busy dying of grief that his daughter has been taken from him.”
A plump middle-aged woman appeared behind him.
“Mark,” she said to the man. “You’re my brother and I love you, but would you, please, just for one second, do me a favor and stop?
“I’m Rachael Skinner,” she said, shaking my hand. “Please come in.”
About a dozen of Chelsea’s extended family were sitting in the dead silent living room. They were red-eyed and shattered-looking, like mourners at a wake. Another tight-knit family was in agony this morning.
“Is Mr. Skinner around?” I said. “We’re going to have to speak to him as well.”
“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Skinner said. “He’s resting right now. Sedated, actually. The family physician left a few minutes before you arrived. Tell me something, if you would, Detective. I heard that the other boy who was taken was found with ashes on his forehead. That’s a Catholic thing, isn’t it, with the ashes? We’re Jewish. What do ashes signify?”
How did she know about that? I thought. We’d kept that out of the media coverage. Someone in the task force must have spilled it. My money was on Deputy Mayor Hottinger. So much for plugging all the leaks.
“It’s a sign of willingness for Catholics to repent for their sins,” I said. “In addition to abstaining from indulgences like smoking or drinking and eating meat on Friday, it’s a way to symbolically share Christ’s sacrifice during Lent.”
“I see. Then this person, the kidnapper, is Catholic?”
“We don’t know what he is,” I told the poor woman truthfully. “We don’t even know that Chelsea’s been kidnapped. Don’t assume the worst, ma’am. Let’s take things one at a time.”
Chapter 24
THERE WAS A family-photo wall in the hallway leading to the kitchen. Chelsea was a beautiful black-haired girl with striking light blue, almost gray, eyes. In the latest picture, she was wearing a hoodie with Lifeguard written across the front.
“Your daughter’s beautiful,” Emily said as Mrs. Skinner guided us to a large, bright kitchen table.
“Chelsea had a brain tumor when she was six, a medulloblastoma on her brain stem,” the kind woman said quietly as she poured us coffee. “She completely beat it. The operations. The chemo. She’s a fighter. This is nothing compared to that. She’ll get out of this. I know she will.”
I wished I could have shared Mrs. Skinner’s startling conviction.
Some PD TARU guys arrived and got up on the Skinners’ wall phones and cell phones. An FBI tech from the New York office showed up as well and installed some e-mail–tracing software,