The Gatherers

Abduction
Snake-eyes

Chapter 1

Five-year-old Nick Gosch (Nicky, to his parents) is dreaming again, at least he thinks he is. He is sitting straight up in his backyard sandbox, eyes wide, staring at something a few feet in front of him. It is an auroral vision, murky and distorted, like looking through a grimy, rain-streaked window.
What he sees is a piece of jewelry, a charm for a charm bracelet, but this one is hanging from the fine, gold chain of a necklace suspended in mid air. The charm once belonged to his six-year-old sister, Lucy, given to her by her mother who in turn received it passed down from her mother.
The charm depicts the white, mountain-flower, edelweiss, set in a field of deep blue enamel. At the flower’s center are six, tiny pale-yellow florets. Lucy once told him that the flower-charm would protect her as long as she wore it.
It didn’t.

#

Nick, circling the drain toward retirement, is a precinct detective in New York City working out of Missing Persons. At 58, he’s more than just good at his job, he’s damned uncanny about solving cases. Due to their successes, the MP squad has a higher budget than most. Their investigations often required travel within New York, as well as to other states.
But, he never found Lucy. No sir. No one has ever found his sister. She would have been 59 this month. He sighs.
“Nick, you okay?” asked Gus.
Shaking his head to clear it, he turned to his partner.
“Fine, Gus,” Nick replied. “Just woolgathering.”
Gus Kaminski is a muscular behemoth at six four with an expansive pot straining the belt holding up his charcoal Haggars, an ever-present, unlit cigar protruding from his clenched jaws.
“Nicky, go take a break,” Gus said. “I got this.” Gus never used the diminutive form of Nick’s name unless he was worried.
“Told you, I’m good,” Nick replied, “but thanks,” he added, softening the unintended snap.
They are at the smallish apartment of a missing little girl, the parents frantic. Gus questions the mother while Nick has a look around the living room. Nick overhears the mother saying that her six-year-old Claire is ‘…so smart and beautiful. Who could ever do such a thing?’. Nick registers this, but doesn’t yet make the connection.
Later, he will.
Nick approaches a tow-headed boy, Claire’s little brother, and sits beside him on the couch. The boy is sobbing, a snot-bubble forming at one nostril.
“Hi, son, I’m Nick. What’s your name?”
“J-Johnny,” the boy said between sobs.
“Can I ask how old you are, Johnny?”
“Five.” Johnny held up five fingers for Nick.
“Wow, five huh? You’ll be starting first grade in another year.”
“I don’t want to go to school. Not without Claire. I was gonna ride the bus with Claire.” Johnny hung his head, light-blond hair falling over his eyes; his breathing held a leftover hitch from all the crying.
“We’ll find your sister, Johnny. We’ll do whatever it takes, and find her.”
“You promise?”
“I promise. On my honor,” Nick said. He knew better than to make promises like that. Not finding the girl would tear the boy apart. But he made a vow just now, not only to Johnny, but to his own lost sister. The boy had struck a chord, and he felt his throat tighten.
Johnny raised his sorrowful head and looked Nick in the eyes. “Are you a police mans?”
Nick returned the look. “Yes,” he said.
“Good,” said the boy, his lips set in a firm, thin line.

#

The two detectives crawled into the unmarked Crown Vic after first rolling the front windows down and turning on the air conditioner. Both removed their suit coats, throwing them onto the back seat.
“You believe this heat?” said Gus, wiping his brow with his shirtsleeve.
“Huh? Oh, yeah, must be global warming,” Nick said.
“Okay, what’s going on, partner?” as if I didn’t know. “Kid got to you, right? Whole case got to you, I bet.”
Being cop partners is a lot like being married, and has the same ups and downs, shared feelings and emotions, likes, dislikes, hates and compassions, along with a bit of intuition and ESP. Nick and Gus had been together almost from the beginning—the Academy—though Gus was about ten years younger. Nick, not in truth a ladder climber, nevertheless ascended the rungs a tad faster than Gus. But both were Lieutenants now, neither much interested in higher rank—or deskwork. They were street panthers, masters of their domain, and after all the grinding years, you would expect them to be top dogs.
Nick, behind the wheel, looked over at Gus. He wasn’t smiling now. Nick was born with the face of a Golden Retriever; it could light up completely when he was happy, show teeth when angry or cornered, and display the eyes of Jesus at Gethsemane when sad. Gus was seeing the latter face.
“Yeah,” said Nick.
“Yeah what?”
“All of the above. Think you know me pretty well, huh?”
“You asshole. Of course I know you,” Gus said. “You think I spent years riding in this stinking car looking at your ugly puss day after day and not know you? Christ. I can smell it on you: fear—and worry. Get it out of your system, or this car ain’t goin’ anywhere.”
Nick sighed, leaning far back in his seat, and closed his eyes.
“It’s not just the boy, though that’s part of it. He reminds me of me, way back …so long ago. I fear for my sist—his sister. I promised him we’d find her, and now I’m worried that we won’t. What a fucking mess. All these abductions. What’s happening, Gus? Are the psychos taking over, or are we just getting old?”
“Ha. You’re getting old. Me, I’m still the fine, young stud of a Polack that I always was.”
Nick chuckles.
“Seriously,” Gus continued, “I understand about the boy, and I understand about your sister and all the other kids that have been taken. But what can we do besides work hard and use our brains? As much as we’d like to, we can’t save them all.”
“Yeah, I know that. Listen, Gus, I was thinking…”
“Oh shit, here it comes.”
“…that there’s something hinky about the abductions. I’m starting to feel a pattern.”
“You’re crazy, Nick. The abductions are all over the map. Serials stay local, usually within a few hundred miles of where they call home. These snatchings are just the work of random pervs and other oozing sores.”
“I don’t know, Gus. I think this might be bigger—more organized— than that.”
“Bullshit.”
“Let me think about it. I need to mull this over.”
With that, Nick started the car.