Free Abandoned: A Thriller by Cody McFadyen Page A

much of a head start as we can get. Because I said so!”
    He stops there; his good humor is gone. There are times to challenge your boss, and there are times to let it go. “I’ll let you know, sir.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

    I ride the elevator back down to my office and find James, Alan, and Callie there. Callie is out of her wedding dress, but both James and Alan are still wearing their tuxedos.
    “Where have you been, honey-love?” Callie asks.
    “AD Jones’s office.”
    I guess I look preoccupied. “Heavy stuff?” Alan asks.
    “The heaviest. Where do we stand on our Jane Doe?” I’m not ready to open this can of worms with them yet. I need a few minutes to recover from my own shock before passing it along.
    “I got her printed,” Callie says. “I’m going to go down to the lab, where I’ll take digital photographs of the prints and feed them into the system. I’ll have a search going in the next hour and then I’m going to head home, assuming that’s okay.”
    “That’s fine. Alan?”
    “Jane Doe woke up and had to be sedated again. She shows signs of vitamin D deficiency and calcium loss, probably attributable to a long-term lack of sunlight and milk. The doctor says she has scabs on her arms, legs, and skull from picking and scratching at herself. It’s a behavior you see in meth addicts or the mentally ill.” He lifts the ends ofhis lips in a bare nod to a smile. “Same difference. She’s missing some teeth, and most of the rest are looser than they should be.”
    “Why?”
    “He’s only guessing, since he’s no dentist, but he figures bone loss. Apparently vitamin D is needed for proper calcium absorption by the body.”
    “Jesus,” I say, processing the ramifications.
    “Yeah.” He consults his notepad. “We already know about the whipping. Doc also confirmed the evidence of electrical scarring. The perp shocked her, probably with a car battery or something like it.
Workmanlike
was the word he used.”
    James frowns. “What does that mean?”
    “He went for areas of concentrated nerve endings or areas that would cause psychological trauma. Nowhere else, and nothing too severe.”
    “Punishment,” I murmur. James glances at me, absorbing this.
    “Go on,” I tell Alan.
    “No drugs found in her system. No other identifying marks, no tattoos. He estimates her age at early to mid-forties. No broken bones, though she does have some old calcification on her left wrist and a couple of left ribs. He says she probably broke them when she was a child.”
    “That will help with an ID,” Callie observes.
    “We hope.” He closes the notepad. “One strange thing. She has good muscle tone.”
    “Which means?” I ask.
    “Her captor probably made her exercise.”
    “This is starting to sound like purposeful imprisonment,” I say. “No evidence of sexual abuse—though we’ll have to hear from her to be certain about that. Torture, but not excessive. He fed her, made her exercise. He kept her alive.”
    “Which begs the question,” Alan says. “Why let her go now? And why us?”
    We’re all silent. No one has an answer.
    “First goal is to identify her,” I say. “He took her for a reason, however he treated her. Knowing who she is might be the key to figuring out what that was.” I take a breath. Prepare myself. “Now. Let me tell you about my meeting with AD Jones and Director Rathbun.”
    I give them a detailed account, explaining everything. They’re quiet, taking it in. When I finish, only Callie has any immediate comment.
    “What a curveball day it’s been. I don’t think I’ll have trouble remembering my anniversary date.”
    Alan sighs. “So let me get this straight. The powers that be, in all their wisdom, have decided we spend too much money and personnel on catching criminals instead of terrorists?”
    “Essentially.”
    “So they’re tossing around the idea of centralizing everything? Doing away with the NCAVC coordinator postings in all the field