CHAPTER 4

“I can’t believe I’m looking at you right now,” Kenna said. “You’re all grown up.” She laughed lightly. “I’ve only seen pictures of you as a little girl. Well, the artist we hired to do the rendering of you did a great job – I’ve seen that one, obviously – and you do look a lot like how he drew you.”

“That was the thing that pushed me over the edge,” Hollis replied. “Everything started to seem kind of crazy. I couldn’t be this little girl. At the same time, though, I knew I was her. It’s hard to explain. Memories have always been there in the background as if they wanted me to remember this life I had had before, but I’d never been able to make any sense out of them. Then, I saw that sketch, and it looked so much like me that it couldn’t not be me anymore.”

“Your mom never gave up, Hollis. And I’ve met a lot of grieving parents. I’ve met a lot of mothers who fight to find their daughters. Your mom is one of them. When she first got diagnosed, she could have given up then, but she never did. She worked just as hard, if not harder, to try to find you. She worried she’d…”

“Die before she found me,” Hollis finished for her.

“Yeah,” Kenna confirmed. “I don’t talk to her all that often these days; just a few check-ins every now and then. How is she doing? I know you’re here about the show, and it’s part of who I am to ask, but maybe I shouldn’t have.”

“She says she wants to do it. Thank you for meeting with me first. I just don’t know if I really want to. I mean, I will if she wants to. It’s important to her. My dad is just–” She looked down at her coffee cup with the lipstick on the lid. “He’s not a bad guy. I know he did something awful; I’m not excusing what he did. But–”

“He’s still your dad?” Kenna asked.

“Yeah…”

“I’ve talked to a few kids where it was a custodial kidnapping. It’s not easy to deal with that, I’d imagine. You love your dad, but he also did this thing that was very, very wrong.”

“I know. But he loves me. He never treated me badly.”

“I’m no expert in how to process those feelings, but I sent you that list. Were you able to check out the group or call Kathy? She’s been where you are. Her mom took her from her dad when she was seven. She was about your age when she figured out who she was and went in search of him. She said she’d be happy to talk to you whenever you’d like.”

“I haven’t called her, no. I don’t know if I’m there yet. I did try the group thing, though. I was late, so I missed most of it. I thought it started at eight, but they changed it to seven. I got there around seven-forty-five, so I only got in the last fifteen minutes or so.”

“How was it?” Kenna took a drink of her coffee.

“Awful.” Hollis laughed a little. “I mean, it was fine. It was also awful. I listened to this woman in her mid-twenties talk about how she’d been taken by some guy when she was eighteen, and they found her two weeks later. She didn’t get into all the specifics, but I heard enough, and it was hard to listen to.”

“It’s the only group in this area that deals with this, specifically, so you have a mix of people. Some are parents or family members of the missing or kidnapped. Others are like you; they’ve been kidnapped themselves.”

“How did you even get into this line of work? Your show?”

Kenna smiled and said, “I was a reporter who worked the regular beat. One day, I came across a possible story of an apparent child whisperer social worker in town. I thought there might be a story there, so I tracked her down.” She laughed. “Then, I married her.”

“How does that explain–”

“My wife wasn’t kidnapped, but she had something horrible happen to her when she was a child. Her story led me to want to help people. Since I’m not a child whisperer social worker and just a reporter, though, I thought this was the best way I could do that. It’s not all bad. Look at you. We told your story, and because of that, there was a book and an artist’s rendering, and now, you’re back with your mom, where you belong. I also get to tell those kinds of stories, and other people out there, who are dealing with something similar, can have some hope that maybe their child, sibling, or friend will be found one day as well. I guess the way I think of it is that the world is getting so much smaller.” Kenna leaned back in her chair before she added, “With the internet, social media, everyone with a camera on their phone, and this incessant need to post every piece of their lives online, the chances someone will catch a missing person somewhere in the background aren’t that minuscule. I’ve told two stories where we found people that way and one murderer of a young single mother. This is my way of getting those stories out to the people with their cameras, with the Facebook pages, scrolling on their phones. Maybe they’ll notice something or someone. Maybe that will help find someone else or solve someone’s murder. It’s not an easy job; I won’t lie to you. I go home to Ripley and our daughter sometimes, and it’s hard to get the stories out of my head. Then, I watch Rip with our daughter, and she’s teaching her something or just helping her with homework, and Aaliyah is either arguing with her about something or laughing, and I’m there with them again.” Kenna smiled at the thought of her family. “Rip deals with things at her job, too. That’s how we got Aaliyah, actually. She came from a bad home. Her mom couldn’t take care of her, and there was no father that anyone knew about. Ripley met her one day and bonded with her right away. We fostered her first, and I got attached to her, too, so now, she’s our daughter. We’re even thinking about adopting again, but we want to make sure Aaliyah is okay with it first. So, it’s not easy, what I do for a living, but I focus on my family. They’re the most important thing in the world to me. Then, I go to work and, hopefully, help other families.”

“Well, because you do what you do, I found my mom. So, thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” Kenna replied. “And I won’t pressure you guys about the show. I don’t want to put any additional stress on your mom or on you , either.”

“She said she can do it. But can we do it at her house, maybe? I don’t think she should come to the studio, given her condition. I don’t know. I’m trying to learn as much as I can about taking care of her. She’s been alone in this.”

“Of course,” Kenna agreed. “I’ll bring a skeleton crew and equipment to make it less invasive.”

“Thanks,” Hollis said.

She and her mother had talked the day after her arrival about her life after Hollis’s disappearance. Her mother had never remarried. She’d hardly dated anyone in thirty years. She’d had a job that had given her a nice pension when she retired, but with her cancer and all the medical bills, things hadn’t been easy for her. All of Hollis’s grandparents had died. Her mother had had two sisters. One of them had passed when they were kids. The other had died a few years ago. Her father had been an only child. Whatever family he might still have, her mother either didn’t know of them or hadn’t kept up with them after Hollis was taken. That had left her mother all alone with her daughter’s kidnapping and now, her own illness.

“So, if you don’t mind me asking…” Kenna began. “And this isn’t for the story; it’s just for me – so, off the record. What are you planning on doing now? You live in Vancouver, right? I assume there’s a job waiting for you or a partner or a house. Are you going back?”

“There’s a job, but given the circumstances, they’ve given me a very generous and supportive leave of absence. There’s no partner, and I have an apartment I lease because I could never afford a house on my librarian salary in the city where I live.” Hollis chuckled a little. “And I guess I haven’t thought that far ahead. When the FBI agent told me that my mom was sick, I knew I couldn’t delay getting down here to see her, so I just packed a bag and got on a plane. I didn’t think about the future.”

“You’ve got time with her now. That’s the most important thing.”

“I think I’ll stay as long as…” She swallowed, unable to say it out loud.

“I get it,” Kenna said, understanding her meaning.

“I’ll stay at the house and take care of her, but it’s not like I have a lot of money saved up. And I still have to pay rent up there or break my lease, which I can’t afford. I’ll look into local libraries here to see if anyone is hiring, but I doubt it; jobs in this field don’t come easy. And they’d want a guarantee or close to it that I’d be sticking around here, and I don’t know if I will. It depends.”

“How are you with research?” Kenna asked.

“Research?”

“Yeah. Ever done any?”

“What kind are we talking about, exactly? Being a librarian is being a researcher – at least, in part. And I went to school for it, so I have my degree.”

“Well, my show needs a new researcher. We just lost a good one to CNN.”

“A job?”

“Why not?” Kenna shrugged. “I mean, you’d have to interview. I’m a producer and a host, but I don’t make the hiring decisions. I can get you an interview, though, if you’re interested. It also might not be the best job for you; I don’t know. You would be doing research on the stories we cover, and there’s a lot of tragedy and bad news there.”

“I don’t know if I could handle that right now.”

“I get it. And if you change your mind, they’re starting interviews next week with the first round of candidates. You’d have an in with me, and you’re local. We’ll be calling in candidates from all over.”

“But I have no experience in television,” Hollis shared .

“That’s a bonus. We just need someone who can dig and find the facts to support the story. We have two full-time researchers on staff. You’d be the third. They’d help you learn the ropes, if you got the job. It’s pretty much entry-level stuff, but it pays okay, I think.” Kenna thought about it then. “Actually, I have no idea how much it pays. I’d have to look it up. But you can think about it and let me know.”

“I’d have to update my resume,” Hollis said, thinking out loud.

Kenna smiled and replied, “You do that. Text me later, if you’re interested. I’ll be working on the episode for you and your mom, so we’ll just keep in contact. Like I said, no pressure. If it’s something you want, cool. And if not, no big deal.”

“Okay. Thank you, I appreciate it.”

“Sure. Now, Aaliyah has an indoor soccer game, and I’m on orange slice duty this time since Rip had a home visit this morning, so I’ve got to head home and get slicing so that I can get her there on time, or my kid and my wife will kill me.” Kenna laughed a little. “Never thought I’d be a soccer mom. I was a wrestling aunt first, and I liked that, but I love watching my own kid out there on the field, kicking ass and taking names.”

Hollis smiled and asked, “What position?”

“She’s a badass defender. You should see her make a slide tackle. Ripley hates it. I love it.” Kenna laughed again. “Anyway… I’m really glad we got a chance to meet in person.”

“So am I,” Hollis said, meaning it.

She liked Kenna. The woman seemed like a genuine person who cared about what she did, just like Olivia had said about her. Now, Hollis also knew that to be true, which made her feel better about doing the show.

When she left the coffee chain with her now-cold coffee in her hand, she drove the rental car she’d picked up the day before back to her mother’s house and sat in it for a while, thinking about how her life had changed .

No, changed was the wrong word. Uprooted , maybe? Twice now, her life had been uprooted by her father and his selfishness: once when he’d taken her, and now again, since she’d discovered it. So far, he’d only made excuses about why he’d done it.

Hollis knew that the story would have to deal with her dad being a bad guy and now being locked up. He’d already been extradited to the US and was, apparently, being held in the county jail not all that far from where she was right now. Kidnapping was federal jurisdiction, so Hollis had no idea what that would mean for him, but she hated the thought of her dad spending the rest of his life behind bars. He’d done his best with her. When she’d gotten her period for the first time, he’d told her that it was natural, that everything would be okay, and then he’d gone to the local store and spent nearly all his money on at least ten kinds of feminine hygiene products because he hadn’t known which she’d need. When she’d gotten picked on in school for being the new girl who didn’t talk much, he’d spoken to the principal and her teacher to get the bully to stop.

Now, he was sitting in his cell, and Hollis was sitting in a car outside her mother’s house. Her mother, who had been through so much and who still smiled. Hollis got out of the car and used the key Olivia had given her to let herself inside. She saw her mother on the sofa, with her eyes closed. Hollis’s heart raced, and she moved to her. This wasn’t okay. They’d only had a few days together. She couldn’t lose her now.

“Hey, sweetie,” her mother said with a scraggly voice as she opened her eyes. “I tired myself out and needed a nap. How was it, meeting with Kenna?”