Red Rain

Franks raised both hands in a halt signal. “Hold up. We’ve got to deal with these parents first. Make sure they’re out of the way-in case there’s trouble.”

Trouble? Pavano wondered what the captain was expecting.

Franks rubbed the scar on his chin. “If this is a mass kidnapping or a hostage situation, we might face weapon fire. There could be explosives-”

The rest of his words were drowned out by the shouts of the parents. Ignoring the outnumbered state cops, they surged forward, stampeding to the bottom of the wide concrete steps.

“We want our kids.”

“How are you going to get them out of there?”

“Who locked them in? Who brought them here?”

“What are you doing? You’re just going to pound on the door?”

The parents glared up at the officers, their faces frantic, voices shrill. In their utter confusion and helplessness, they all shouted at once, anger rising over their fear.

Pavano saw one of the state cops hand Franks an electric megaphone and Franks began to plead for quiet. “I need you to step back. Quiet, everyone! Quiet! Everyone, please be quiet and step back.”

His requests were unheeded. The shouts grew angrier and more desperate. Pavano saw more SUVs pull up and more frantic parents running to the steps. A young couple tossed their bikes to the grass and came jogging to join the others.

As Franks continued to plead, his voice washed back at him as if by a powerful wave. Two officers flanked him. They assumed a defensive position, their faces hard, and unholstered their revolvers.

That’s what it took to quiet the crowd. Pavano let out a long whoosh of air. He hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath.

“What now? Their guns are drawn? They’re going to fucking shoot the parents?” Pinto murmured, close to his ear.

Pavano shook his head. “Can’t blame the parents for being in a panic. If it was your kid in there. .”

Pinto spit in the grass. They stood just behind Franks. Pinto crossed his arms in front of him. Pavano stood stiffly, hands clenched into tight fists.

“We have no information at this time,” Franks declared, his voice magnified like the voice of God, booming over the nearly silent crowd.

The exact wrong thing to say, Pavano thought. What a fucking jerk.

And yes, it ignited the parents again. Cries of alarm and a barrage of frantic questions.

When the cops finally restored quiet, Franks took a different tack. “We are going to get your children out of there. And we will get them out safe and sound.”

Some muttering, but the reassurance seemed to calm them a little. Gazing down at the crowd from the steps, squinting into the spreading glow of sunlight, Pavano recognized Lea Sutter. She stood near the back of the crowd, dark hair down around her face, arms crossed, wearing a pale blue sweater.

Next to her, he spotted Sutter’s sister. Roz. She stood with her hands on the shoulders of her squirming little boy, leaning over him, trying to get him to stand still. Lea Sutter stared straight up at the school building, frozen like a statue.

She has four kids in there. What must she be feeling? What horror is she going through? Four kids. .

Pavano had read the report taken by a state cop late Saturday night. The Sutter kids were reportedly in the guesthouse out back with some friends. And all vanished, kids and guests, leaving no trace. He pictured the twin boys she and her husband had adopted from that hurricane-devastated island. What a tough introduction to American life those poor boys were getting.

He swallowed. Especially if their new father is a murderer.

And then he couldn’t stop the gruesome images from playing through his mind. The young girl with her stomach burned open, lying facedown in a pile of her own intestines. If only he hadn’t seen that. And the boy with his head completely burned off. And. . and. . the man in the car. .

If only he hadn’t seen the three victims. Then he wouldn’t see them in his dreams. Or when he closed his eyes for a moment. Or when he woke up. Every day. He saw them every day.

I’ll probably see them forever.

And if Mark Sutter was the murderer. . Pavano wondered if Mark Sutter was haunted by the murders, too. He claimed he thought about the first murder night and day. Really? Did he think about the victims and think about how he had burned them. . burned them open like some kind of monster from hell?

But Pavano knew Franks was wrong. He knew Mark Sutter wasn’t the murderer. Sutter didn’t have it in him. Pavano could read him. He didn’t have the anger. He didn’t have the insanity. He didn’t have the balls.

And there stood Lea Sutter, on the edge of the crowd of frantic, shouting parents. Silent and still. Standing so stiffly beside her sister-in-law. No kids and no husband.

Your husband isn’t a murderer. I know it.

So why did he decide to run?

Pavano knew the cops were no closer to finding the murderer of those three people than they were to knowing how a hundred or more kids disappeared from their homes and, presumably, were locked in this school building.

And thinking this, with Franks fading into the background of his mind, yammering on through his megaphone, Pavano suddenly felt the full weight of all his regret. It came so suddenly and as such a surprise, he felt his knees start to give as the heaviness swept down over him.

All the wrong choices he had made in his life suddenly confronted him, just as the crowd of parents confronted Franks. Such bad timing, but he couldn’t shake it off. If only you could command your mind to think what it should be thinking.

But instead he thought of Sari and then back to Susannah, how he messed up his marriage. It could have worked if he had tried harder, if he hadn’t been such a fucking jerk. And Sari. . Again Sari. What the fuck? What made him think he could step into the past and just claim her as if he hadn’t walked out on her before? Didn’t he move to the Hamptons to step into his future? Well, she fucking showed him you can’t go home again.

All the wrong choices. All wrong. Every decision of his life.

And now what?

What was happening? A young blond woman with a red polka-dot bandanna around her neck had stepped forward and was talking to Franks. Their conversation quieted the crowd as the parents strained to hear.

“You’re a teacher here?” Franks said, lowering the megaphone.

“Yes. I’m Rhea Seltzer. I teach eighth-grade science. I arrived the usual time. A little before eight. With everyone else.” She gestured to some other teachers, who stood apart from the parents. “The door was locked. We tried shouting for the custodians. We thought it was a mistake.”

“Then what did you do?” Franks asked, brushing a fly from the broad shoulder of his jacket.

“We. . didn’t know what to do. We looked for Mrs. Maloney. The principal. She usually arrives about the same time we do.”

“But you couldn’t find her? Is she here?” Franks shouted into the megaphone. “Mrs. Maloney, are you here?”

“We saw her car. It’s a white Camry. It’s in the teachers’ parking lot. But we couldn’t find her.” Seltzer pointed to a short man with a mane of curly black hair. “Mr. Munroe had her cell number. We tried it several times, but we only got her voice mail.”

One of the cops leaned forward and said something in Franks’s ear. “Are the teachers always the first to arrive?” Franks asked.

“No,” the woman answered. “The cafeteria workers get here first. They have to make breakfast for the meal-plan kids. They arrive before seven-thirty.”

“Where are the cafeteria workers?” Franks demanded, shouting as if at a rally. He raised the megaphone. “Are you here? Please step forward.”