“Yes.”
“According to Rosa, Jacob’s stupidity is what got him caught—he sent one too many messages and you nailed him. But, talking to you, that was the plan. You weren’t waiting for him to randomly e-mail. You were baiting him into further communications.”
“This kind of strategy . . . It’s hard on the family.” Kimberly sighed. “The investigative team might have been the general, sitting in a back room, strategizing away, but Rosa, Darwin, they were our foot soldiers. They had to sit down every day and beg for Flora’s life. They had to suffer through degrading postcards, audio recordings, and then that video . . . We advised both of them not to watch. But of course, they were so desperate for some sign, some connection to their loved one. The brother vomited. Twice. And Rosa . . . She went blank. We ended up calling for medical. I thought she’d broken, and we’d never get her back.
“I understand the family has a different perspective on things. Of course they do. At the end of the day, they were the best tool we had to get Flora back. We used them shamelessly. And it worked.”
“So how did you find him?”
“As we hoped, Jacob started communicating more. Especially via e-mail. Which allowed us to start tracking his progress across the southern states. By fourteen months in, we were sure he had to be a truck driver, delivery man, something of that nature. The bulk of the e-mails were from Internet cafés, some truck stops, all located near major interstates. So we shored up state police patrols of those areas, faxed Flora’s photo to all the major truck stops. We wanted to apply pressure, but not too much.”
“You didn’t want him to panic, dispose of her.”
“Exactly. But mostly we focused on the Internet cafés. Four hundred and seventy-one days later, he sent an e-mail we could trace back to a cybercafe at a truck stop he’d used once before. I personally drove out to the truck stop to interview the staff. All those postcards, e-mails, outreaches later, Jacob had revealed more of himself than he realized. Sure enough, the moment I started to describe the kind of man we were looking for, the manager ID’d him. Jacob was a regular. Stopped by at least once a month, if not more, on his route. The manager didn’t know Jacob’s last name, but he could describe his rig; we connected the remaining dots from there.
“Jacob Ness. A registered sex offender who’d already served time for molesting a fourteen-year-old girl. Suspected of several more sex assaults. Currently working as an independent contractor for several major delivery firms, driving a big rig.
“In a matter of hours, a state trooper discovered Jacob’s transport parked outside a motel just off the interstate. I mobilized SWAT and we got serious.”
D.D. didn’t need the FBI agent to say anything more. She could already picture it perfectly in her head. The adrenaline rush of such moments. At the cusp of breaking a major case. Do everything right, you get to save the girl, catch the bad guy. But one wrong move . . . girl winds up killed, bad guy escapes, and a life, a family, your career is over.
Yeah, she could picture it.
“What’d you do?” she asked.
“We confirmed with hotel management which room Jacob was in, and that he’d entered with a female companion. The room was an end unit with no rear door. That was the good news. Now, for the bad news: We had reason to believe Jacob was in possession of at least one firearm, if not more. Also, our profiler, McCarthy, believed that if cornered, Jacob would be most likely to shoot Flora, then himself, rather than surrender.”
“Suicide by cop?”
“Possible, but only after killing Flora. McCarthy felt at this stage of their relationship, Jacob felt a strong attachment to Flora. The nature of his taunts, his need to torment the family. She was his, and he wouldn’t give her up without a fight.”
“Relationship.” D.D. had to think about this. She was familiar with Stockholm syndrome, though more from movie plots than real-life experience. That syndrome, made famous by the Patty Hearst case, described how a victim bonded with her attacker over time, feeling empathy, even loyalty, for the very person who had caused her harm. But D.D. had never considered such a process in reverse. That by virtue of time and total dominance, a kidnapper might develop a certain affection for his captive. Jacob Ness had been a long-haul trucker. Meaning for years he’d been traveling alone, living in isolation, until the day he’d snatched Flora Dane and brought her along with him.
Four hundred and seventy-two days of companionship later . . . D.D. could see why he’d be loath to give her up.
“Did you worry about Stockholm syndrome?” she asked Kimberly now. “That Flora might not welcome your rescue efforts?”
On the other end of the phone, D.D. could hear the agent’s hesitation. “We were prepared for anything,” Kimberly said at last, which D.D. took to be a yes.
“So you have an armed subject holed up in a hotel room with a victim who’s suffered severe long-term trauma. What did you do?”
“Let SWAT lead the charge,” Kimberly said bluntly. “They fired in half a dozen canisters of tear gas through the room’s front window. Then they took down the door.”
The federal agent paused. “They found Jacob sprawled on the ground, clearly incapacitated by the gas. Next to him was a damp hand towel. Apparently, he’d noticed the officers mobilizing outside, had made some effort to prepare for their charge. But he hadn’t been fast enough.”
“And Flora?”
“She sat on the floor beside him. She had a wet towel tied around her mouth and nose. She also had a gun.”
D.D.’s eyes widened. Of all the things . . . “She had Jacob’s gun.”
“Yeah.”
“Did she point it at the SWAT team?”
“No. She had the gun on her lap. She was . . . stroking Jacob’s face. She was wiping the tears from his eyes.”
“Oh.” D.D. didn’t know why, but somehow that image was worse.
“Jacob was conscious when I entered the room. Whispering to Flora. The gas was already starting to dissipate, we needed to move quickly, but no one wanted to rush Flora as long as she had the gun. We were afraid if we spooked her . . .”
“She might open fire.”
“It was a strange sight. He was begging her. Jacob Ness was sprawled on the floor, begging Flora to kill him.”
D.D. didn’t have words for that.
“I tried to get her attention. I called her name, tried to get her to look at me. But she wouldn’t respond. Not to me, not to any of the officers. Her attention was solely for Jacob, stroking his hair, rubbing the tears from his cheeks. She seemed not just attentive to him but . . . tender.”
D.D. knew tear gas. It didn’t just inflame the eyes. It turned the subject’s nose, everything, to a giant, streaming mucusy mess. Jacob Ness would’ve been in a great deal of discomfort. Desperate for water to flush his eyes, tissue to blow his nose. But he hadn’t surrendered. Instead, the man who’d been taunting his victim’s family and investigators for more than a year had pulled himself together for one last move.
“What did he do?”
“He kept talking to Flora. Talking, talking, talking. And then, just when we thought we’d have to make our move one way or another, Flora suddenly leaned over and whispered something in his ear.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. Flora’s never said. But she told him something. And the expression on his face . . . Jacob Ness looked scared out of his mind. Then Flora grabbed the gun off her lap and pulled the trigger. Forty-five Magnum to the top of the skull. It got the job done.
“Flora dropped the gun. SWAT took her down. And that was that.”
D.D. couldn’t speak.
“You know about trauma bonding, right?” the agent asked abruptly. “Forget kidnapping victims, you see it all the time with battered women. They’re isolated, at the mercy of their dominating spouse, going through intense spells of abject terror foll
owed by even more emotionally draining periods of soul-wrenching apologies. The trauma itself creates a powerful bonding element. The things these two have gone through together, how could anyone else ever understand? It becomes one more thing that makes a woman stay, even after her husband has beat the crap out of her again.”
“I know trauma bonding.”
“I expected to see it with Flora Dane. How could you not? Four hundred and seventy-two days later, I couldn’t even get her to respond to her own name. Instead, she identified herself as Molly, the name Jacob had given to her.”
“Okay.”
“Trauma bonding is most likely to occur in situations where the victim is isolated and the perpetrator appears all-powerful. We found in the rear of Jacob’s cab a wooden coffin bearing a padlock. It bore traces of Flora’s hair as well as DNA.”
D.D. closed her eyes. “That’s isolating,” she agreed.
“Jacob put her in the box. But Jacob was also the one who took her out. Jacob starved her for long periods of time. But he was also the one who gave her food.”
“Which would make him all-powerful.”
“So here’s the issue: Flora absolutely, positively shows signs of trauma bonding. Which, we know from other cases, makes victims stay even when they could run.”
“Flora had opportunities to escape but didn’t take them.”
“We learned that, by the end, Flora accompanied Jacob everywhere of her own free will. He could leave her sitting alone in restaurants or waiting for him in hotel rooms. She stayed, which to outsiders makes her appear complacent, a willing victim. Anyone who has experienced trauma bonding, however, will tell you that in those moments, she was just as physically restrained as if he’d wrapped her in chains. Such is the power of the bond.”
“Okay.” D.D. was familiar with trauma bonding, though it was hard for her to associate the Flora she had met forty-eight hours ago, the woman who’d burned Devon Goulding alive, with that level of submission.
“Trauma bonding can also lead to someone committing acts they wouldn’t normally have done otherwise.”
“Patty Hearst, wielding the M1 carbine.”
“Exactly. There are many well-documented cases of victims that, over time and torture, have become accomplices to their own attackers. In this case . . . we found more than Flora’s DNA in that pine box. In fact, we found DNA from several different unidentified girls.”
“Oh.” D.D. didn’t know what else to say. The FBI agent was right: Especially in cases where the victim was held for a long period of time, many reached a point where they assisted in ambushing others. It was tempting to lay blame, though psychologists would frown upon such things. Kimberly had been right: The trauma bond coerced the victim into compliance as powerfully as physical force. “You think Jacob Ness might have grabbed additional girls.”
“I think I would’ve liked to ask him that question. In fact, the more we dug into his life, the more suspicions we had. Unfortunately, we’ll never know exactly what he did. How many women he might have raped and even murdered.”
“What does Flora say?”
“She doesn’t. She’s never talked about what happened to her. In the beginning, we gave her time and space, based, frankly, on the advice of Dr. Keynes. But later . . . We know that box held girls other than Flora. We can’t, however, say when the evidence got there. For example, maybe the DNA from other victims occurred before he kidnapped Flora versus during the same time period. Given that, we don’t have grounds to subpoena her. If she doesn’t want to talk, she doesn’t have to.”
“You think she’s covering for herself? For what she might have done, under duress or not?”
“I think there are questions I’d like to ask that Flora’s gone out of her way not to answer. Not to mention . . .” Kimberly paused again. “Between agent and investigator? Because in this day and age, when we’re never supposed to blame the victim . . .”
“By all means.”
“As I was leading Flora out of the hotel room, she paused for one moment, looked back at Jacob’s body. She’d lost the towel by then. I could see her face. And just for a second, her eyes sparked. It was like watching a machine come to life. She appeared . . . triumphant.”
“Having just shot her own kidnapper?” D.D. guessed.
“Or, maybe, having just killed the only other person who knew exactly what she’d been up to over the past year. I can tell you one thing: Dozens, if not hundreds, of law enforcement officers were involved in the search for Flora Dane. And yet, for all of us, four hundred and seventy-two days of that woman’s life remain a complete mystery.”
Chapter 29
I’M NOT OKAY.
I want to be. I want to be strong, in control, resolved. Not hungry, not thirsty, not hot, not cold, not in pain, not terrified. I am the new and improved Flora Dane, the kind of woman who will never be a victim again.
I’m shaking uncontrollably.
The name. Why does this girl call herself Molly? She’s not Molly. I know she’s not Molly because I knew a Molly once. I was a Molly once. That can’t be a coincidence, right? And the pine coffins. The endless procession of cheap pine coffins . . .
What the hell is going on here?
He’s dead. Jacob’s dead. I have to tell myself this. I’m huddled in a corner, bound arms looped tight around my knees. Jacob’s dead and I know Jacob’s dead because I pulled the trigger. I felt his blood, bits of his skull, blow back into my face. I left that room, finally free after four hundred and seventy-two days, with Jacob’s brain matter stuck in my hair.
He’s dead. He’s dead. He’s dead.
I have tears streaming down my cheeks. I hate myself for the weakness.
And I hate even more that small, miserable, pathetic part of me that still misses him.
I am not okay.
The girl is on the mattress. I think. She crawled there on her own. She’s sleeping now. Or has fallen unconscious. Or is dying. Probably, I should check on her. But she said her name is Molly, and now I can’t stand her.
That FBI agent, staring straight at me: “Flora, Flora, Flora.” Myself, no idea who she’s talking about: “My name is Molly.”
Victims and captors form a bond. You don’t have to like it. You don’t have to understand it. That’s just the way it is. Dr. Keynes explained this to me many times. I couldn’t help forming a relationship with Jacob any more than I couldn’t help being hungry, thirsty, and tired. Human beings are social creatures. We aren’t meant to live in a vacuum. Or, more specifically, locked away in a coffin-size box.
Jacob might have been evil, but he was also very smart. He knew what he was doing every time he stuck me in that box and denied me light, food, water, companionship. And he knew exactly what he was doing each time he took me back out. Becoming my hero. Becoming the all-powerful father figure I never had. Of course, I listened and obeyed. You don’t piss off the all-powerful father figure. And you don’t leave him either, not even when you might suddenly, unexpectedly have the chance. Because he is all-powerful. And if he says he knows where your mother lives, and your brother, and your den of favorite foxes, and he can track them down and kill them anytime he wants, you believe him.
When he says you’re his favorite, and he never meant to keep you alive this long, but somehow you’ve grown on him. You’re special. Worthy. Maybe even the one woman who could finally make him happy . . .
You believe that too.
And this girl? Huddled away across the room from me in the dark. Has she also been shut up in a box? Has she also endured hours, if not days, on end of her own pathetic company? Until she too would’ve sold her very soul just to get out.
I can’t trust her. That’s the problem with girls who were once trapped in coffin-size boxes.
Just ask Jacob. You can’t trust any of us.
I scrub at my face with my bound hands. I ca
n’t keep doing this, I think, rocking back and forth. I was stupid for trying to find Stacey Summers, for arrogantly thinking I could take on the big bads of the world. I was misguided. I was . . . I don’t know. Everything my mom and Samuel accused me of. And now, I see the light. I repent. I just want out of this godforsaken pitch-black room. I just want to return to my apartment and resume normal life again.
Except, of course, I’ve never figured out how to do normal. How to settle for everyday routine.
I’m not okay. I’m not okay, I’m not okay, I’m not okay.
“Why?”
The girl speaks. The sound of her voice, so unexpected in the dark, shocks me into paying attention. I wait, ears attuned.
“Why?” she whispers again. “Why, why, why?”
I wonder if what she means to ask is, why me?
I unloop my arms from my knees. One last scrub of my cheeks. One last sniff.
I pull myself together.
I have a headache. That’s real enough. My head feels fuzzy and my body lethargic. I wonder once again about drugs. Misted into the air, injected into the water bottle? I can’t smell or taste anything, but I definitely don’t feel like myself. Of course, trauma can do that to you.
But I’m functional. I can sit, I can stand, I can move. Time to do something.
“We need to get out of here,” I say out loud. I sound hoarse. Raw. And determined. Almost like a woman who knows what she’s doing.
The girl doesn’t reply.
I rise to my feet, shuffle forward to the wall where I know the door is. This time, feeling around with my fingertips, I can easily determine its edges. The door opens out—that’s my memory. The door opening out, the silhouetted form stepping in, then myself lunging forward with my wooden dagger.
I push against it now and feel it give slightly.
I stop, stunned by this development. Surely my mind is playing tricks on me. And yet, another experimental push. The door jiggles. It’s closed, I realize, but maybe not locked tight. Ordinarily, you’d simply turn the handle, retracting the latch from the hole in the strike plate, and voilà, open sesame. Except in this case . . . I blink my eyes several times, contemplating options. On this side of the door, there’s no knob to turn. But if I could find a way to suppress the latch, say, shimmy in a sliver of wood? I might get lucky.