Just Let Me Die Here (A Serialized Novel) 19

Hours or possibly just minutes later, I hear people talking outside the door to my room. Ruth’s voice carries, even at a whisper, but the other two, men as far as I can tell, have low voices that blur in the chamber of the hallway.

“Never met him,” I hear Ruth say. “Always in the room. Sick I think.” I can’t catch anything else of the conversation. Just some low mumbling. I briefly wonder if any of the other guests are listening in on this moment of my tragedy.

My vision is clouded from my lengthy cry and so, at first, when the group enters the room, I just see a blob of navy blue. After blinking away the tears that have settled themselves on my lashes, I come to see that the blob is actually two policemen. Ruth is trailing close behind. It is at this moment that I realize this was not what I was expecting when she said the police were on their way.

My only idea of Canadian police was what I had seen in cartoons and movies and so I imagined a pair of red-suited Mounties arriving on horseback, wide-brimmed hats in hand. Cheerful and bouncy, ready with a friendly handshake and a “don’t cha know, eh?”. A terrible stereotype, I admit, but one that had been so ingrained in my psyche that the reality is quite jarring. These are regular cops. Exactly like the ones I would expect to find back home. The image strikes me as too familiar and I feel a wave of panic swirl inside me. And, contrary to my overly friendly imagined Mounties, neither of these men are even smiling. Which is understandable, given the circumstances, but their looks are also far from comforting. I adjust myself in the bed, trying to sit up a bit straighter, and my body quickly reminds me of my injuries with a sharp shot of pain in my side.

The two men do a quick sweep of the room, but there really isn’t much to see here. It’s the lack of evidence that is the evidence.

“Afternoon, Miss,” one says approaching the side of the bed. “Can you tell me your name?”

“Yes,” I say, sniffing back the last of my tears. “I’m August Logan.”

“Mrs. Logan, I am Officer Michaels and this is my partner, Officer Evans.” Officer Michaels is tall and quite gangly. He is probably in his forties, but his hairline has already retreated behind the crest of his head. Officer Evans, on the other hand, is the epitome of a rugged mountain man. He is young, probably in his mid-twenties, and his tailored uniform does well to show off the fit body it covers. The pair of them smell of cigarette smoke and musky cologne and I briefly try to decipher if one scent belongs to each officer or if this is just their general smell.

“What seems to be the problem, Mrs. Logan?” Officer Evans asks. I don’t really know how to put it into words yet. Ruth picks up on my hesitation.

“It’s like I told you, officer. Her husband has disappeared and he’s taken their baby girl with him.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Anderson,” Officer Michaels says. “But we need to hear this from Mrs. Logan. If you wouldn’t mind.” He nods towards the door as an invitation for her to leave the room. With a quick huff, Ruth’s face shifts to a frown.

“Okay,” she says after a moment. “But August, I will be right downstairs if you need anything. Just give a holler.”

“Thank you,” I am able to get out in a whisper. Once she leaves, both detectives look back to me.

“Now, Mrs. Logan,” Officer Evans continues. “Your husband has disappeared?”

“Yes,” I say.

“And your husband’s name?”

“Tucker Logan.” He scribbles this down in his notepad. I tell them how we had been skiing and how I was involved in an accident on the mountain. I explain that we were supposed to meet in the lodge but that, when I was finally able to get there, he wasn’t waiting for me.

“And when would you say he went missing?” Officer Evans asks.

“I’m not really sure. It could be about six hours now.”

“But possibly less?”

“Yes. Like I said, we were apart while I was skiing.”

“And you’re sure he hasn’t just stepped out for a bit?” Officer Michaels says, interrupting his partner’s line of questioning.

“No. He’s taken all the luggage.” They both look over at my open suitcase. Some of my underwear is hanging over the edge. I really don’t care if they see it. “That’s mine,” I say. “He left behind my one bag and my passport. But everything else is gone.”

“Do you have any reason to believe that someone else may be involved in his disappearance? Would someone want to do harm to your husband?”

“What? No. I mean, I don’t think so. We’re just here on vacation. We don’t even know anyone here.” I can’t believe this is happening. And it frightens me even more that I don’t exactly know what it is that is actually happening. Tucker taken? Someone else involved? My baby in trouble? Is that possible?

“We don’t typically consider someone missing until twenty-four hours have passed.” Officer Michaels says.

“But he’s not missing,” I say. “This isn’t a missing person issue. Tucker took my daughter. He abducted my baby.”

“And what’s your daughter’s name?” Officer Evans asks.

“Millie. Mildred. Mildred Logan.” Again, more scribbling.

“How old is the girl?”

“Ten months. Well, almost ten months.”

“And is she his child as well?”

“Well, yes.” The two officers look at each other. Tucker’s voice plays in my head. You definitely have a way of imagining things.

“And you are sure he didn’t tell you where he was going? Maybe he’s just taken a trip somewhere and he brought his child along.”

“No. No trip. This was the trip. We are here on vacation. And he didn’t tell me anything. While I was skiing, he took our daughter out of the resort’s daycare, came back here, collected all their things, and left. I don’t even know how he got back here. I have our rental car.” They both just look at me, as if expecting something more. “He has stolen my daughter!” I shout this last bit. Why aren’t they seeing the urgency in this?

They know you don’t really love her.

They see you’re not a fit mother.

This is your fault.

“Well, ma’am. If it is an abduction case, that does make it a bit more urgent. And this kind of thing isn’t unheard of.” Officer Evans makes a few more notes in his notepad. “For now, we can put out an alert and see if we get anything back. Do you have a recent photo of your husband and daughter? Something we can use to help identify them?”

“Yes, of course.” I grab my phone and open up my photos. But something is wrong. All my recent photos are gone. I have never been the biggest picture taker, but there should be more than this. There are a few from our wedding. But that was years ago. Our trip to Hawaii. Also a long time ago. And a couple from my pregnancy. But nothing after that. Only the photo I took from the top of the mountain earlier today. That even feels like years ago now. I swipe down on the screen, quickly searching for a photo of Millie. Nothing. I know I have taken plenty. Where are they? A couple blurry ones of her room back home, but where is she? “I have a couple of my husband, I’m just trying to find…” My hand starts to shake. The accident. Something during my fall must have damaged the phone. Was that possible?

“That’s okay, Mrs. Logan,” Evans says, cutting off my thoughts. “For now, we can just get a description and worry about the photo later.” I tell them everything I can think of about Tucker and Millie’s appearances while Officer Evans writes it all in his notebook. Everything. Right down to the scar on Tucker’s shoulder and the small mole just to the right of Millie’s nose.

“Anything else we should know?” Officer Michaels asks when I finish.

“No. I think that’s it.”

“Here’s our contact information,” he says, handing me a card. “Take your time, and send those photos to us when you can.”

“Okay,” I say. “I will.”

“I recommend you stay here and let us know if your husband and daughter return.” They leave me to wait, surrounded by the emptiness of the room and memories of my family.

Moments after I hear the door close downstairs, Ruth returns to my room.

“I am so sorry, August,” she says, standing in the doorway. “Is there anything I can do?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “I’m trying to figure out what I can do at the moment.”

“Well don’t even think about going anywhere. You just stay right here until you’re feeling better. I’ll bring you something for dinner.”

Once she leaves, I lie down on the bed and begin searching through my phone again. There are plenty of pictures of Tucker to choose from. There are pictures of me pregnant. Nine months. Eight months. Seven months. I jump all the way to the start of the album. Our wedding. I scan through images of my dress, the flowers, the dry, tasteless cake. And then, there he is.

The one thing I knew when I was planning our wedding, as rushed as the planning was, was that I wanted two photographers. Because there was one moment I wanted captured more than any other and it had to be from two different angles. The moment the doors opened in the church and I started walking down the aisle. I wanted a picture of me and I wanted a picture of Tucker seeing me. And here is the one of him seeing me. But now, looking at it again after so much time has passed, it catches me off guard. At first, you might just think he’s smiling. But looking at it harder, as I am now, I’m not sure that it is a smile of happiness. There is something dark behind his eyes. A warning I wish I had noticed sooner. I select the photo and send it off to the detectives. But where are my photos of Millie? I put the phone down, and, staring at the blankness of the ceiling above me, I feel the edges of my world pulling at me, collapsing into nothingness.

And so, I spend the night alone. I hear the other guests downstairs, but I can’t bring myself to get up and join them. I nibble on a piece of bread that is part of the meal Ruth brought me, but I can’t stomach much more. I lie awake until the sun rises over the mountains before being dragged into an awful sleep.

I wake in the middle of the night to see a glow coming from under my bedroom door. I walk to it and open the door, only realizing once it’s open that the handle had been hot against my hand. A fire roars in the hallway of our home and smoke billows into the now open space of my room. Amongst the cracking of the flames, I hear Millie’s cries. They snap like embers in the fire. Her door is closed but flames lick at it, tasting the innocence in the room beyond.

Tucker grabs me and pulls me back into our room, towards the open window.

“Millie! I have to get Millie!” I scream.

“You can’t do it,” he says, hollering against the approaching fire. “It’s too late. She is gone. You have to let her go.” He pulls me back into our bedroom and slams the door. In two steps, he picks me up and carries me across the room, his arms sharp against my body, cutting into me. Before I can say anything, he throws me out the window to a pool waiting below. My body hits the water. The instant cold stabs me and I am awake.

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