The Children are Missing
Chapter 12
Kahlan had removed her foot from Hotch's side about an hour into the ride. Hotch thought that it grown uncomfortable, but realized he was wrong as Rossi shifted in his seat to look at Hotch. With a glance in the mirror, Hotch noticed that Kahlan looked asleep. He smiled. She had known Rossi was going to turn even before Hotch did. He marveled at how aware she was even when she didn't seem to be. He almost beat himself up over it. He had always prided himself on his awareness and to realize that Kahlan was better at it than he was, kind of put a dent in his ego. She probably saw something from the back seat that I couldn't see, he told himself to sooth his male pride. Nah, she's just that good, he corrected himself. He was actually in awe of the woman, and Hotch was too much of a gentleman to be chauvinistic and think that because he was a man that he had to be better than her.
Rossi glanced back at Kahlan and then looked at Hotch. Hotch's glances to the mirror hadn't escaped Rossi's attention, nor had the fact that Hotch had been holding her foot. He would never say anything about it in front of both of them, but he would definitely give Hotch shit about it later. All kidding aside, though, he had the feeling his Unit Chief was falling for the mysterious woman. While he liked teasing Hotch about whether or not Hotch was attracted to her, he worried about it going any further than that. He wanted Hotch to be happy. He deserves to be happy! He just wasn't sure Kahlan was the one to make him happy. He knew Hotch would never be the type to have a casual fling; to just have sex. Hotch was too much of a gentleman to share that kind of intimacy with a woman he didn't love and have future plans with. Rossi was afraid, though, that Kahlan wasn't seeing Hotch in that way. He wasn't sure if Kahlan was capable of loving anyone with the state her life was in, not that he could blame her, but the outcome of this case would definitely impact her one way or the other. Maybe once the case was over and Kahlan had either her son or the answers she needed, she may be able to move on and love again. He just wanted to make sure she wasn't using Hotch as a distraction. I'll have to have a talk with her, and fast, he thought as he looked at her again. He liked Kahlan, and he didn't care about her past. What he saw now is what mattered in his mind, but he was not about to let her hurt the man he thought of as a son.
They arrived in Thermopolis close to two that afternoon. David Holt's residence, though, was still about forty miles away, forty miles out into the middle of nowhere. The local police station was in town, and Garcia had alerted them of the team's arrival. Thermopolis didn't have a big police force especially since they were responsible for such a big area. The team followed Hotch into the station and Sheriff Tim Cook greeted them with handshakes and a smile. Hotch introduced his team, but noticed Kahlan had grabbed a seat by the door. "So you guys are interested in David Holt, huh?"
"Yes. What can you tell us about him?" Hotch asked as the man led them to a little conference room that apparently doubled as a break room.
"Well, he's definitely a strange old bird," the detective started. "He lives on his family ranch, hardly ever comes to town, hell, I think that place is almost self-sufficient."
"Does he have any kids?" JJ asked him. Garcia had told them that there were no records of him and his wife, Charlene, having any kids.
"He's got a couple older boys and some grandkids now, I believe." The team shared glances.
"When you say 'older boys', what age are you talking about?" Reid asked.
"Twenties, I guess."
"So you have seen them," Hotch wanted to clarify.
"Maybe once or twice a year. They'd come into town with David heading to cattle sales. Never talked with 'em, though."
"And these 'grandkids', they belong to the older boys?" Blake asked him.
"Well I assumed. David is not some spring chicken, but I guess they could still be his."
"So you've never seen any woman that these older boys might be with?" It was Rossi's turn to ask.
The Detective's eyes moved up and to his left, indicating that he was trying to remember. "To tell you the truth, I don't think I've ever seen a woman with them. I've never even seen Holt's wife."
"Don't you find that a little strange?" Morgan asked him.
"Well, when I've only seen the men when they were hauling cattle, I didn't find it strange at the time. Now, that I think about it, though, I guess it is."
"Where do the boys go to school?" Blake asked.
"They don't. They stay on the ranch as far as I know."
"You realize that is not even legal, right?" Hotch asked him. Rossi could tell that Hotch was getting angry.
"A lot of folks around here home school their kids. The hours put in on the family farms and ranches don't let them attend school," he told Hotch defensively.
"Have you ever checked to see if any of them were actually enrolled?" Hotch was giving him his stare and Rossi noticed the detective swallowed hard.
"No."
"Do you even know how many children he has, old or young?"
The man shifted in his seat. "I guess not. Two older, maybe two younger, I'm not sure."
"Have you ever been to his house?" Rossi jumped in.
"No. Never had a reason to. Exactly what is it you all think he has done?"
Hotch stood up. He couldn't take the incompetence of the man sitting in front of him. As Hotch approached him, Cook stood up. Hotch towered over the man by eight inches. "What hospital did they have the kids in? Or do you think they did that at home, too?" Hotch asked.
"I. . . I don't know. What difference does that make?"
"Because there are no records of Holt having any kids!" Hotch inched closer to the man's face with every statement. "Because there are over fifteen boys in the last twenty years who have disappeared. Because two of those boys were found dead right across the state line in Idaho!" By the time Hotch was finished, Cook's head was leaning against the wall. Rossi got up and put his hand on Hotch's shoulder.
Cook looked at the agents with a shocked look. "I didn't know."
Hotch stormed out of the room. Rossi let him go.
Kahlan immediately looked up when she heard a door slam. She saw Hotch at the back of the station. She could tell he was furious as she watched him paced back and forth trying to get control of his emotions. She could think of only one thing that would make him that angry. They've found them. She quickly walked over to him. "Aaron?"
He stopped his pacing, but she noticed his teeth were clenched and his nostrils were flaring. He also wouldn't look at her. "Tell me," she told him softly. He inhaled deeply and finally looked at her. He grabbed her elbow, led her out of the station, stopped on the sidewalk, and turned to face her. She noticed his anger had been replaced with concern.
"He may be our unsub," he admitted.
"The local police didn't know." It wasn't a question. "How bad is it?"
"I don't know yet. Apparently the sheriff has seen some older boys and some younger boys," he told her and he waited for a reaction.
She didn't give him one. "I see," she told him calmly. She turned and took a couple steps away from him. Her mind was racing. They needed more information. She turned back to him. "When will you make the raid?"
"I don't know yet. I. . . left the meeting."
"May I join in?"
Hotch thought it over. There was no way he should let one of the mothers in on a meeting where they were discussing the unsub, but Kahlan wasn't just a mother. He didn't know what she was for sure, but he knew she could probably help.
She searched his face, and she could see the conflict within him. She raised her brows as if to ask the question again.
"Alright." He nodded and she followed him back into the station's conference room. He noticed a few worried glances from the team, but no one verbally objected to her joining them. They had arranged all of the boys' pictures on the wall in order of disappearance. The sheriff and his three deputies were studying the photos.
"I know this is Chase," one of the deputies said as he pointed to the picture of the boy abducted in 1998. "This is an old picture, but there's no mistaking that curly hair," he told them with a smile.
"Have you actually met him?" Reid asked him.
"Not really, but he comes in with the old man. I heard the old man yell his name once."
"When was the last time you saw him?" Blake asked.
"Last spring, I think."
"How about any of the others?" Hotch asked them.
The sheriff looked warily at Hotch but stepped up to the picture of Christopher Jackson. "I've seen him a few times. He was with them last spring."
Hotch glanced at Kahlan. She was studying the sheriff. "How many different boys have you seen?" She asked him.
"I have seen two older boys for sure because I have seen them at the same time. I've also seen two younger boys at the same time, but I think I have seen at least four different ones."
"What do you mean 'think'?" Kahlan continued her interrogation.
"I've only seen them in the truck. They all look so much alike that I can't be sure."
A deputy stepped up and studied the face of Devin Crockett. "I think I've seen this one, but it's been a few years."
"Well this definitely gives us enough for a warrant. That will take a few hours, though." Reid pointed out.
"You guys are going to go out there and serve a warrant?" one of the deputies asked, clearly shocked.
"Of course. Why?" Reid asked.
"I had to go out there once. I had to escort the census taker, and the old man met us on the road about two miles away from the house. He wouldn't let us past. He filled out the form real quick and made us leave."
"That old man is a bastard," one of the other deputies injected.
"How would he know you were coming?" Kahlan asked.
"The house is on a ridge, they can see anyone coming down the drive for about five miles," the deputy explained.
For a millisecond, Hotch thought he saw a look of dread cross Kahlan's face, but it was replaced with her normal calm exterior. He could tell she was thinking, considering the information she was compiling.
"So, none of you have actually been to the house? None of you know what's actually out there?" Kahlan asked them.
"I know there are several out buildings on the way to and around the house, but that's it," the deputy who had been with the census taker told them.
"What about guns? Is Holt the type to use them?" Morgan asked
"You're in Wyoming. Everybody has a gun," the sheriff told him dryly.
Morgan looked at Hotch, they were thinking the same thing and knew that it could get dangerous really quickly.
"If these boys were taken way back in the nineties, wouldn't they have escaped once they were big enough?" Cook asked.
"I could be Stockholm Syndrome. It could be that since they were taken at such a young age, they could have been there long enough that they don't even remember life before it." Reid suggested.
"Either way, if those boys are actually with Holt, it changes our approach," Morgan pointed out.
"Is there only one road out there?" Rossi asked.
A deputy nodded.
Hotch suddenly realized Kahlan wasn't in the room. He panicked for a second and went in search of her. He found her outside on her phone. She hung up as he walked up, so he didn't get a chance to figure out who she was talking to.
"I need an hour," she told him before he could ask any questions.
"What?"
"I need an hour," she told him with a smile that revealed nothing. "And the keys."
"Why?"
"Can you just trust me?"
Hotch studied her. When he realized she was gone he had feared she had gone after Holt on her own, but he wasn't getting that from her now, or at least he didn't think he was.
"My God." She smiled as she shook her head. "An hour wouldn't give me enough time to go all the way out there and back," she told him as if she had read his mind.
"Why can't you tell me what you are going to do?"
"You can't plan a raid safely if you go in there blind," she told him matter-of-factly.
That was true, but he noticed she didn't answer his question. Has she ever?
"One hour," he told her and held up the keys to the SUV.
She smiled, grabbed the keys, and leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "Maybe even faster."
He watched her quickly walk to SUV, get in, and take off. He sighed heavily and turned and walked back into the station.
Rossi met Hotch at the door. He was wondering where they had gone. Rossi gave Hotch a puzzled look when he realized Kahlan wasn't with him. "What's going on?"
"Kahlan had something she needed to do," Hotch told him as he walked back to the conference room.
Morgan overheard them and got extremely worried. Rossi was mirroring his emotions, too. Apparently they were both thinking what Hotch had originally thought.
"She's only going to be gone an hour," Hotch explained.
"Hotch!" Morgan yelled. "You let her leave not knowing what she doing? But. . . but you know what she. . ." he couldn't finish the statement because they didn't know what she was.
"She will be back," Hotch said simply, and he believed it.
Morgan wasn't so sure.
Rossi smiled, though, he realized that Hotch trusted her, so, of course, he trusted her, too.
"She wouldn't do anything foolish," Reid reassured them.
They continued to discuss Holt and his property, and within forty minutes Kahlan was back. She walked into the conference room and put several photos down on the table between Rossi and Hotch. Hotch looked at the photos and then looked at her and smiled. Rossi spread the photos out and looked at her with raised brows, clearly surprised.
"How the hell did you get these?" Morgan asked as he picked up the photos.
"Does that really matter?" Kahlan asked innocently. Hotch chuckled; he knew she wouldn't tell them anyway.
Reid looked over Morgan's shoulder. "Wow! Satellite imaging of Holt's property. The clarity is awesome!"
Kahlan winked at him and sat down next to Rossi. "You can't execute a raid without knowing exactly what you are raiding."
JJ and Blake came into the room. "We were able to get witness statements that confirmed sightings of Christopher Jackson and Chase Sanders," JJ told the room.
"The witnesses also confirmed seeing two other young boys, but they weren't able to identify them," Blake explained with a glance at Kahlan.
Maybe one of them is Wyatt, Kahlan thought with a glimmer of hope, but she made sure her face stayed passive.
"Well, even with these photos, you guys aren't doing anything tonight are you?" Cook asked them.
Hotch looked at his watch, 5:47. "No, we have to plan everything out thoroughly, but we will be going out first thing in the morning."
"Well, I don't know about you all, but I think skipping lunch sucked. I vote we all take a break and go get something to eat," Rossi suggested as he stood up and patted his stomach.
JJ smiled at the incorrigible man. "I agree."
Hotch looked at the rest of his team and with their nods of agreement he stood up, grabbed the satellite photos, and turned to the sheriff. "We'll meet you back here at seven in the morning."
"We'll be here," he told him.
"Where's a good place to eat?" Rossi asked him.
"The Doorknob over on highway 20 is great, and I know the name is stupid, but the food is good."
"Alright, we'll see you in the morning," Rossi told him and they left the little station.
