Night Terror Read Free

she’d lost. Reminded her of
why
she was afraid of forgetting things. Tara had helped, once. But she couldn’t help after Zach was taken. Audrey couldn’t let her help the way she’d wanted to. She just couldn’t.
    “Then maybe we should call Doctor Burton.”
    “I don’t need a doctor. It was just a bad dream.”
    “It was a heck of a lot more than just a dream.”
    “Can we talk about something else?”
    “Like what? I’m on your side, Audrey. I just want to get you some help, that’s all.”
    “What about you?”
    “I’m okay.” He carried the griddle to the sink and stood with his back to her, head bowed.
    “I’m getting better,” she whispered. She hadn’t been weeping every day, standing in the front window staring out across the lawn. She hadn’t awakened in the middle of the night to go tuck Zach into bed in what, six months?
    She could see Richard taking a deep breath, working his way up to saying something, and she knew what it would be. She just didn’t know how he would phrase it this time.
    “I don’t want another baby,” she said.
    His neck reddened.
    “You can’t replace my son,” she said softly.
    Richard turned slowly to face her. “Audrey, having another child doesn’t mean we’re replacing Zach.”
    “Then what the hell does it mean?”
    “We can’t keep on like this, Aud. It’s killing us. It’s killing me. He’s gone. We both have to face that.”
    Audrey shoveled bits of egg around on her plate, staring at the swirling pattern in the yolk. The fork felt strange in her hand. Soft. Her entire body felt weird. What was happening, a panic attack? She willed her breathing to slow, concentrating on her pulse. Controlling it. Forcing herself to relax.
    Richard sat down in the chair next to her. His dark eyes and high cheekbones reminded her of Zach. There were times now when she hated looking at him because of the resemblance. Hated
herself
for it.
    “I loved Zach just as much as you did,” he whispered.
    She could tell by the startled look on his face that he realized his mistake immediately. Her voice was a heavy stone, poised to crush both of them. “I
still
love him.”
    “So do I, Audrey.”
    “Then why didn’t you say so?”
    “I only meant that we have to go on living.”
    “I’m living. You’re living.”
    “No, we’re not. We’re just frozen in time. Waiting. Audrey, we’ve done all we could do.”
    “He’s out there somewhere,” she whispered, barely able to breathe. “He needs me and I can’t find him. Someone took my son.”
    “Our son.”
    “I want him back.”
    “I want him back, too, but we have to face the fact that we may never get Zach back. There hasn’t been one call. No one saw him taken. He could be anywhere.”
    She dropped the fork onto her plate. The handle was bent. “Why didn’t they call? Why didn’t we get a ransom note?”
    “You know why, Aud. The police told you why. Zach wasn’t kidnapped for ransom.”
    “Don’t say that!”
    “Honey, calm down.”
    She stared out through the open back door. “The bastard stole my son right here. From our home.”
    That burned. The fact that Zach had been taken from a place where he should have been safer than anywhere else in the world. When both she and Richard were home. That inflamed her guilt and her rage, but it also angered her that Richard was right. They had done everything there was to be done.
    They had contacted the Ouachita County Sheriff’s Department immediately. The Warden’s Service coordinated the search. Rangers, deputies, even volunteer firemen searched the area with dogs for days. The woods surrounding the house were deep Maine forest, and farm-to-market roads spiderwebbed the mountains. She and Richard had run through the woods with the searchers, shouting Zach’s name, searching for him beneath every deadfall pine, in every dry gully. But there was no hope, really. The dogs never got a scent.
    The sheriff sent out a File 6 Missing Persons Report by