“Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you were someone else. Of course, of course, I am staying at the Marriot on 5th. What did Olivia do, is she in trouble with the law? It wouldn’t surprise me, you know, she was always defiant. I told John it was a waste of his time to find her, but he insisted that he see for himself. He was head over heels for her and she went and had an affair while they were on vacation, breaking his heart. He was never the same after that and went back to his parent’s farm in Kentucky, poor soul.”
With every word out of her mouth, a feeling of dread engulfs my body. Am I dealing with another crazy ex-boyfriend? I can’t blame them for being obsessed because that is what I have been since the moment I laid eyes on her. The difference is if she told me to leave her alone, I would, because I just want her to be happy.
“Estella, you said he never showed. Are you sure?”
“Yes, of course. I’m not stupid. She didn’t stay long enough to meet him, though. As soon as I told her he wanted to catch up on old times, she panicked and left. She didn’t even look my way as she drove off. I have never been so insulted in my life and by my only daughter no less.”
Thank God I put an information tracker on her car. It is an older Honda and I wanted to be able to check service alerts and mechanical problems. Lucky for me it acts as a GPS tracker as well. I start to log in to the service website the tracker provides to get the location of the car.
“Do you have a cell phone number for John that you can give me? Also, if he calls you, I want to be the first person you notify. Whether you had good intentions or not, Olivia is in danger and you put her there by bringing that man back into her life. If anything happens to her, I will make sure you are charged with conspiracy to commit a crime. The inside of a prison cell might not look too pretty on you if you do not cooperate with me on this. What is John’s last name and what is his birthday?”
“Casen, July 16th, 1988.” She tries to sputter out a response to the rest of my accusations but just ends up giving me the phone number and a promise to call me if he calls her. I hang up just as the information shows up on my computer, letting me know her car is traveling just on the outskirts of New York. I call Jax so he can do a search on John Casen.
“Sav, you are not going to like this, but it looks like mommy dearest bragged to her coworkers that her daughter’s ex-boyfriend paid her five thousand dollars plus expenses to fly to Boston to see her daughter.”
“Shit! Well, I need you to look up John Casen, DOB July 16th, 1988. I think he has her and the GPS attached to her car says they are traveling on I 95 near New York. Call Ren and and fill her in; she has Alex and I don’t know how long I’ll be. I am getting in my car now and heading in that direction. I am going to text you my login information for the car tracker so you can keep me posted on directions. As far as I can tell, he only has a four-hour head start and as long as he doesn’t dump her car, I can follow this bastard anywhere.”
“What is it with her and obsessed men? Not you, of course, just the crazy ones.”
“Shut up and look up the info, Jax. I don’t have time for your shit and neither does Livvy.”
I hang up and call my boss, the Director of the FBI and ask him to put her on an amber alert and ask for some time off. He grants me everything I ask for and even offers backup when needed. It seems like hours later when Jax calls but I know it has only been thirty to forty-five minutes.
“Hey Jax, what do you have for me?”
“Mate, you need to pull over before I give you this info. I don’t need you crashing before you can find her.”
“Don’t mess with me, Jax, just give me the goddamn info.”
“Sav, if you wreck, it is your own damn fault.”
He pauses and I know I should pull over but can’t stand the thought of having more distance between saving Olivia and myself.
“John Casen was born to Kathy and Theodore Casen in 1988 but was given up for adoption when their rights were terminated for neglect. He was adopted by Tom and Patricia Stanford at the age of two and lives in Kentucky near his adoptive parents. His brother is Jerry Stanford, first known psychopath to kidnap and abuse Olivia. At twenty-one, John reclaimed his birth name, Casen, but has remained close to his adoptive family to mooch off of the kind old people who took him in. I called Tom and Patricia and they said that John came back to Kentucky after a bad break up with a girl in Atlanta and became a shut-in. While I was on the phone with them, they went and checked out his apartment above the barn. They said his walls are covered in pictures of a blonde woman. I assume this would be Olivia and we just uncovered another stalker.”
He was right; I should have pulled over; at this point, I do not even see the road. The images flashing through my head are of Livvy buried in dirt and leaves in a desperate attempt to escape a mad man. The trauma of that situation caused her to suffer temporary blindness and I don’t think she will survive the
