Her Worst Nightmare - MoonSilverSprite (2024)

Chapter 1: The Magician, reversed

Chapter Text

The Magician in its reversed position: Deceit, con artist, liar, communication blocks, abuse of power, ill intentions, manipulation, being out of your depth.

The police ball was in full swing.

Maybe it was the fact that they hadn’t been able to celebrate anything for a long time, but everyone was just happy to be outside of their homes and with their friends. Either way, Olivia was glad to see her old friends without having to use a screen.

They had booked a restaurant, but very little food was on offer. Instead, the police officers and other members of staff from the precinct were simply having a few glasses of wine while nibbling on snacks. It wasn’t much, but it was certainly preferable to staying indoors.

Barba was smiling at her over by the drinks table. Munch was telling Rollins a humorous anecdote about something that had happened in Maryland. Huang was sitting down at a table, discussing an essay on human psychosis with Fin, who looked completely bored and sipped at his wine in an attempt to ignore him.

But Olivia just wanted to let her hair down and enjoy herself.

Seeing Carisi sip at a cola, she leaned in and asked, “Do you find it strange, how we became so adjusted to being inside that when we finally get to –“

“Spread our wings?” Carisi asked, putting his glass down, “Yeah. It’s weird. Munch said something about being reminded of stories from people in the Soviet Bloc after communism fell.”

Olivia gave a small snort. Then she peered at the woman standing behind Munch’s chair, who kept looking over her shoulder as she dug her nails into the wood.

“Who’s that?” she asked.

Carisi tilted his head. “I think it’s…I think it’s Claudia.”

“Claudia?” Olivia was slightly surprised. “I haven’t seen her in years. I guess they grow up fast.”

“That’s an understatement.” Carisi remarked as Munch turned around in his seat and tried to persuade his guest to stop eyeing everything with suspicion. Olivia couldn’t help but feel as if the pot was calling the kettle black.

“I just hope that she hasn’t brought a knife again,” Olivia sighed as she approached them, “Hi, John, Claudia, how are you?”

“OK,” Claudia snorted, her ponytail whipping about wildly as she looked about, “Are all the exits accounted for?”

Olivia blinked. Munch stood up.

“It’s fine, Claudia,” he tried to reassure her, “There’s nothing strange here.”

She gave a small chuckle and held one hand up as she looked down at the floor. “I know, I know, I –“ she sighed and looked between Olivia and Munch, “I think it’s a mixture of being cooped up with Amazon instincts and living with a conspiracy theorist.”

Munch smiled, or at least did his best attempt at a smile.

“Are you sure it’s a good idea to let her be at the same event as her dad?” Olivia raised an eyebrow at Munch. He shrugged.

“It’s been five years, Olivia. I don’t think she’s interested, anyhow.”

Claudia had started to drift over to the snacks table and Munch followed her to make sure that she didn’t steal any snickerdoodles like last time.

Rollins looked up at Olivia. “I guess it’s harder for people with a shorter lifespan.”

“I know,” Olivia sank down beside her, “How old is she now?”

Rollins held her head to one side. “I’d say early forties.”

Olivia exhaled. “She’ll have caught up with me soon. Anyway, how are the kids?”

Rollins replied, “Oh, they’re doing fine. Jessie lost a tooth last night and she asked me if the Tooth Fairy has to wear a mask and have her temperature taken when she enters the house. I told her ‘Of course she wears a mask; she’s a dentist’.” Rollins gave a heavy sigh. “I just worry about when they’ve grown up. Munch reckons that the reason that businessmen in the Fifties made everything bigger and grander and better is because they had grown up in poverty caused by the Wall Street Crash. I’m not a historian, I wouldn’t know. But he does have a point; what happens during childhood shapes their adulthood.”

Then she felt her phone ring in her pocket. “It’s the babysitter,” she explained, “Jessie’s just thrown up. She doesn’t think it’s anything bad, but it looks as if I’ll have to go.”

“Of course,” Olivia nodded, understandingly, “See you on Monday.”

As Olivia stood outside, she fumbled in her purse for her phone. She needed to tell Noah’s babysitter that she was coming home within the next half an hour. If she had to take a taxi, it might be longer; Olivia didn’t want to walk home in the semi-darkness.

“Hey,” she looked up and saw Tamin approaching, “Do you want a lift? Rollins and Carisi are coming with me. I booked a taxi.”

Olivia thought for a moment. “Will there be enough room?” she asked.

Tamin pursed her lips in thought. “No, sorry,” she shook her head, “I should have thought about that.”

“Well, it’s very kind of you to think about my safety,” Olivia managed a friendly smile, “But I can take care of myself.”

She started to dial the number of a taxi company. Tamin waved back at her as she walked away. “OK. Goodnight!”

He was watching the two of them, his van nestled in the shadows between two parked cars. He had made sure that he had parked far away from the security cameras. He’d already spent the best part of three days driving around New York, sitting outside of buildings that he knew held parties.

Waiting for a lone woman to leave. A lone woman for him to follow.

He saw the younger woman walk away to her friends waiting in a nearby car. He turned his focus again onto the other woman, now talking on her phone. She was a little on the older side, but she seemed to be rather attractive for her age.

He tapped his fingers on the tip of his steering wheel. A woman that age might have children, he told himself. Hopefully she didn’t have any big boys, potential threats that he knew that he wouldn’t be able to overpower. Maybe a lovely teenage girl. He had only taken a mother and daughter once before, but he had relished every moment.

If she didn’t have any children then he would simply look for someone else. Threatening mothers with their children’s lives was part of this man’s modus operandi. Of course, he would never harm a child. He simply used the empty threat to force women to leave with him.

It had been so long since he had taken another mother. Women with children having fun at fairs, carnivals, festivals or beaches had become slim pickings ever since the beginning of the pandemic. Of course, he could take homeless women or runaways, but he always preferred the risk.

He watched as the woman started walking down the street. Turning the keys in the ignition, he watched her carefully as she made her way home.

By the time Olivia Benson came home, she felt exhausted.

She didn’t have the money for a taxi, so she had chosen to walk home. It hadn’t been as dark as she had anticipated, so she had taken a chance. As a police officer, she chastised herself, but another part of her argued that there were still people on the streets and she had taken the same route back as she always did.

But no matter how cautious Olivia was, she knew what dangers lurked out there.

Noah’s babysitter had already made dinner for her. “I know that you’ve been out for ages and I didn’t know what sort of food they had there, so I just made a little something.”

The ‘little something’ turned out to be a plate of macaroni and cheese.

“Thank you,” Olivia politely smiled at the babysitter, “But I’ll see how I feel in a few hours.”

“OK,” the babysitter waved goodbye, “See you next time, Olivia.”

After the babysitter left, Olivia was about to shut the door when she heard her son running into the hallway.

“Hey, Noah,” she grinned as he ran up to hug her, “How are you?”

“I’m fine, Mom,” he shrugged, “Can I please stay up for another hour?”

“Forty-five minutes,” Olivia compromised, “No more.”

As she turned around to close the front door for a second time, she saw someone coming towards her apartment, looking out of breath. She didn’t recognize him and was about to shut the door when she saw that his hands and face were bleeding.

“Excuse me!” he called out, “I-It’s my girlfriend. She’s been stabbed i-in the lobby.”

Olivia looked over her shoulder and was about to tell Noah to stay here when she felt something in her ribs.

This man had a knife.

She tried desperately to shut the door but the man had burst his way in. She tried to grab the phone but he grabbed it from her and flung it across the room.

Olivia screamed, “Get off me!” She punched and clawed at the man, but he pushed her back against the breakfast bar.

She tore at his face, forcing him to let go of her. He would grab her again if she ran towards the door. Besides, she had to keep Noah safe. Heading towards the bedroom, knowing that if he followed her then he might miss Noah, Olivia ran towards the landline on her bedside table.

Lunging for it, she started to call 911, but as her fingers fumbled on the numbers, she was tugged by her legs off the mattress. Her duvet and sheets crashed down with her, obscuring her vision for a second.

But that was enough for the man to press himself on top of her back. Before Olivia could scream she felt a small prick in her neck. Even before the man pulled it out, she knew that it was a syringe.

Heart beating nineteen to the dozen, Olivia started to panic. Fears raced through her mind. If this man was simply a thief then he wouldn’t have used a syringe. Had he followed her home from the restaurant? Olivia hated herself for not being careful. She was a police officer! She certainly should have known better.

What did this man want? Her? Noah? Both of them? If she had stepped out before shutting the door, would that have kept Noah safe? She didn’t know.

Her vision had started to blur. She wondered if she would throw up, or if she would choke on her own vomit. She heard Noah’s pattering feet get louder as he came into the front room.

The last coherent sentence she heard was the man saying to her son, “Be good and I won’t hurt Mommy.”

No-one noticed the abduction. It was William Lewis all over again. If anyone had left their apartments that evening then they would have seen Olivia Benson with one arm around this man’s shoulder. They would have seen her in a dazed state, unable to even form words.

They would have seen Noah a few feet ahead of them, in his pajamas and desperately trying not to cry. They would have seen the man holding a gun, which he could easily slip under his shirt if anyone came too close.

They would have seen an experienced kidnapper forcing Noah to walk into the parking lot outside. The man dumping Olivia like a bag of garbage in the back. The man lifting Noah up into the passenger seat and taping his wrists and ankles.

They would have seen the man get into the driver’s seat, check his mirrors and turn the key, before setting off, threatening Noah again.

The whole incident took place in just four minutes and fifty-six seconds.

Chapter 2: The Empress and the Devil

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The Empress - Nurturing, mothering, love, beauty, a businesswoman, a problem-solver, social status.

The Devil - Enslavement, addiction (to sex, drugs, drink or money), fear and doubt, lies, violence, sexual deviancy, obsessions, feeling trapped and without options.

The next day Rollins came into work early.

She wondered if she should see how Captain Benson was. As Rollins approached the office, she saw that it was still locked and the lights were off.

“Where’s Benson?” she asked Fin, sitting behind his desk and trying his best to nurse his hangover.

“I’m not sure,” Fin groaned, “She didn’t come in yet.”

Rollins decided to let it go. She was early herself. Maybe Benson was still asleep. The schools weren’t open and her captain had no reason to take Noah anywhere. Maybe she also had a hangover.

Still, Rollins told herself, she hoped that her captain would come in soon. Just to see how she was. To see if she had gotten home safely.

Rollins scoffed at the idea. Of course Benson had gotten home safe. She was cautious. She would be fine.

Olivia slowly opened her eyes. Her head was spinning and there was a foul taste in her mouth. She wondered for a moment if she was going to be sick. She was surrounded by darkness and she was lying on something soft and furry.

Then she remembered the man in their apartment. Where was Noah? She tried to get up, but found that her wrists and ankles were held down by heavy chains and a large strip of duct tape had been wound repeatedly around her mouth and jaw. As she pulled on the chains she noticed that she was in a confined place. Then Olivia realized what the soft fabric lining was.

She was inside of a coffin.

Despite all of her training Olivia started to scream and kick, her mind in a whir and tears streaming down her face.

There was a loud banging noise just above her head and Olivia went still. He was still out there. Wherever this place was. She could hear him watching TV.

How could he have gotten her out of her apartment without anyone noticing? She barely remembered the blurred floors and somebody supporting her, her arm over their shoulder. It had been late. She would have looked like a drunk. What terrified Olivia was the sheer confidence of her abductor. He had been this before, perhaps numerous times.

What had happened to his other victims, if that was the case?

What would happen to her?

“Your kid’s fine,” she heard him say as he turned the TV off, “Hey, kid! Say hi to Mommy!”

She heard Noah’s faint whimpering. She tried calling his name despite the tape on her mouth. Her abductor chuckled.

“Now,” he spoke firmly and slowly, as if addressing a small child, “if you’ve calmed down, I can explain what it is that has happened and why you are here. I don’t have time to tell you everything myself, so I’ll just turn the tape recorder on.” Then he shouted across to Noah, “You want some breakfast, kid?”

“I want Mom,” she heard Noah sob, “Let her out.”

The man turned the tape recorder on and Olivia heard footsteps as he took Noah out of the room.

The cassette tape started up.

“Hello. No, don’t bother trying to get up. I can imagine that your head must be spinning at this very moment. Maybe I slipped something into your drink. Maybe I injected you with something. You’re already chained down and gagged. Probably blindfolded as well. You’re scared. Perfectly understandable, given the circ*mstances. Now, I don’t know anything about you, except perhaps the town I took you from or your kids’ names –“

At this point Olivia’s blood ran cold.

“But that’s only because I learnt their names so I could force you to leave the house. If that’s the case, then I must have told you that I would kill them if you didn’t come with me. Stupid b****; I don’t hurt children.”

Olivia guessed that this was why Noah wasn’t locked inside of a coffin like she was. She had no idea if this made things better or worse.

“This tape was made on June 14th 2008. If there are any changes made after this date, I shall upgrade the tape. You’re not the first female I’ve taken and you are very unlikely to be the last. I can imagine you now. Most likely white, although I’m not impartial to a black or Asian woman if I can get one. Between the ages of twenty-five and forty-five, I’d guess. That’s the age range I tend to hit. But if I see a runaway at a Sally Annie or under a bridge then I take a chance.

“My favorites are low-risk moms that I abduct from their homes. I can take prostitutes or drunks or homeless women, but the bigger the risk, the greater the rewards. Moms protect their children – it’s only natural, of course – but they tend not to protect themselves. Besides, if you pick on someone too young then it takes the fun out of everything. That’s why I stopped bullying other boys my age.

“You’re probably scared that you’re going to be raped and you can count on that happening while you’re here. At least three times a day, sometimes more if I feel up to it. You’re not going to like anything I do to you and I don’t give a rat’s ass about that. If there’s another prisoner here with you, you’ll get the brunt of my torture. I don’t care if I have to travel to get another woman, even if it means going into another state to get one. If I want to have two toys, I’ll get two toys.”

Olivia didn’t think that she heard anyone else in the room with her. She never knew, but she had the feeling that she was alone in here.

“Now, I don’t like to use protection. But I don’t like killing pregnant ladies. So how do I get around this? Well, it’s simple, really. Whenever a sultan was tired of a sex slave in his harem and he didn’t want to drown them like Ibrahim the Mad did to his 200 concubines, then he would give her off to a vizier or another trusted advisor. But first he would order a red-hot poker to be shoved up her bottom so that she would be unable to bear any children and threaten his own children’s legitimacy. I’ve always wanted a harem myself, full of adoring women kidnapped from all over the States and Canada, too, to do my every bidding. But I do not have the money for such a venture, so I must take my s**** one at a time.

“As a matter of fact, most belly-dancers in harems were white, mainly of Greek origin. The Ottomans also took Africans and Indians, but they always preferred white women. I don’t think that people in America know about this because they don’t care about anything that happened in Europe after the Renaissance, especially not Eastern Europe, which the Ottomans had power over.

“Anyway, back to business. You are currently held in one of my four houses. I only live in one house at a time, each in a different state. You are in one of my soundproof rooms and it is escape proof to boot. You’re going to be chained the whole time, even when you’re asleep.

“You might be married, have a husband, a job or a car. If I took you from your house then it’s very likely that you have children. You know what? I don’t care about any of that and I don’t want to hear about you. You will speak only when I give you permission. I don’t want to cut your tongue out like I did with Beach.

“Sit back, relax, wait for me to come back. Because when that happens then I will start to play. Someone might be looking for you, especially if you’re a soccer mom I snatched from her house. There may or may not be a missing persons report. But no-one will be looking for you here. I’m always very careful about that. No knight in shining armor will come and rescue you. Now, there is a sliver of hope. If you are very good then I will let you go. For the first few days I will keep my face covered and anyway, I’ll end up dumping you at least twenty-five miles from one of my homes.”

Olivia remembered that the man who had abducted her had let her see his face when he had run up to her front door. And surely Noah had seen his face as well.

As Olivia let herself weep, she heard the last lines of the tape.

“I will come back for you soon. My name is Sidney Barlow. I am your worst nightmare.”

It had been an annoyingly busy day.

There had been mounds of paperwork to do that morning, after more information came in regarding a trial that had been dumped on 1PP at very short notice. Rollins hadn’t had the time to check on her captain. Now, after fourteen hours of signing documents, Rollins just wanted a hot bath.

But she decided to go back to Benson’s office to check on her.

Discovering that the door was still locked, she hastily made her way back to her desk. Noticing Carisi come through the main doors, Rollins needed up to him.

“Are you looking for Benson?” she asked him.

“Yeah,” he fumbled with the yellow file in his hands, “We need to talk about the upcoming Adkins trial.”

“Benson didn’t come in today.” Rollins’ heart was beating nineteen to the dozen as horrific, cruel memories of William Lewis entered the forefront of her mind.

“You sure?” Carisi asked.

“Please drive me to her apartment,” Rollins begged him, “Just to see.”

"Is she answering her phone?”

“I tried this morning,” Rollins answered, “I thought she was on her way here. I – I got called away –“

“OK,” Carisi interrupted, “I’ll take you.”

As they left, Rollins tried to push all of the horrifying possibilities out of her head. This couldn’t happen again.

Could it?

Carisi went up to the front door. As he raised his fist to knock, the door swung open. Grabbing her gun, Rollins raced inside as if the devil were on her heels. Carisi followed, calling Olivia and Noah’s names. He ran around, checking every room.

“Liv’s not here.”

Those words sent a chill down Amanda’s spine. She drastically tried to think. How long had it been? It had to have been at least twenty-four hours since she had spoken to Olivia.

“Are you sure?” she asked Carisi. She could hear him walking around the apartment.

“Yeah,” he replied, “Dinner’s on the table. It’s cold. I’d say that she and Noah left in a hurry.” He opened the door to Olivia’s bedroom.

“Amanda,” Carisi’s voice was hoarse and frightened, “The sheets are on the floor.”

There had clearly been a struggle, Carisi could see that. Someone had clearly come into Olivia’s apartment and abducted her and Noah.

Someone who had a day’s head start.

Rollins clapped a hand to her mouth. She wondered if she was going to be sick.

“Amanda?” Carisi’s voice snapped her out of her thoughts.

“I’m fine,” she croaked, waving her hand around, “We need to call Noah’s school, make sure if he arrived this morning.” She doubted it, if their dinner hadn’t been touched. But she had to check all avenues.

She was thinking like a cop, but the truth stared her right in the face.

Olivia had been taken again. This time Noah was gone, too.

Chapter 3: The High Priestess

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High Priestess - Mystery, intuition, inner-knowing, self-trust, emotional stability, divination, things yet to be revealed.

It had been thirty-eight hours since the squad had last seen Olivia.

The footage from her apartment building had been analyzed, but there wasn’t a clear enough picture of either the abductor or his vehicle. The plates had been covered with something while it was parked outside and anyway, the light had been too dim to even see what color the van was. As for inside the building, the man had worn a mask and a baseball cap. All they knew was that he was white, a few inches taller than Benson and was of average weight.

“We’ve put out an AMBER Alert for Noah,” Fin reassured Amanda, sanitizing his hands as he prepared to leave to question everyone from the restaurant that night, “But I don’t think it’ll do much good. This guy is a professional.”

“This is worse than William Lewis,” Carisi spoke his thoughts aloud, crossing his arms, “This guy took the risk of abducting a police officer and a child.”

“If it’s one guy and he didn’t have an accomplice in the van,” Amanda reminded him, shaking her head in disbelief, “This guy is desperate.”

“He might not have had the chance to take any victims recently,” Carisi suggested, “The coronavirus might be the closest that the United States will ever get to the Black Death, but the chances of being attacked by a random stranger while on a night out dropped significantly.”

“And the number of domestic violence incidents skyrocketed.” Amanda sighed.

Carisi nodded. “That is certainly true.”

Amanda chewed on her fingernail as she thought about the party. Would that night turn out to be the last time she saw Benson alive?

Thinking about the party planted an idea in her head. She knew how ridiculous it would sound coming from a police officer, but considering what she had seen, it could be possible.

“I need some air,” she told Carisi, walking towards the elevator.

As soon as she stepped inside, she searched through the contact list on her phone and waited. When she got through, she asked, “Hi, Munch? I need to speak with you and Claudia about something. Something – terrible has happened to Liv.”

She had no idea how long she had been held here. All she knew was that her stomach was rumbling louder than a bullet train.

Olivia wondered about Noah. Was he tied up like her, inside of another coffin? Or was he in another building? She had lost track of time and she felt dizzy and frantic and tired and worried all at once and all she wanted was her baby boy back.

She heard footsteps. Slow, heavy footsteps. Was the man – she refused to call him Sidney, especially since she wasn’t even sure if that was his real name – deliberately taking his time to frighten her, or was it the echo from a stone or concrete room? She had no clue.

The coffin lid opened.

Olivia glared up at the man. He was wearing a ski mask. She wondered why he had bothered to hide his face. But all she cared about was getting herself and Noah out of this.

“I see you’re a cop,” she heard him say, as he took her licence plate out of his pocket, “I’ve had barmaids, teachers, even a realtor. But never a cop.”

He looked down at the licence. “Fifty-three. I guess I won’t need the poker.”

Olivia considered that a small mercy.

“How old is your son?” He seemed curious. “Seven, eight, nine? You seem a bit old to have a kid that age. I didn’t see any photos of college students in your home. IVF? Adoption? I don’t see a ring. Pity, really. Rings fetch a lot of money.”

He jostled position and then pulled a pair of handcuffs out of his pocket. Grabbing her wrist in one hand, he looked into her eyes.

“Remember, your son’s somewhere in this house. He’s unharmed, for now. Be good, please, for him?”

Olivia frantically nodded. The man unlatched one manacle and, quick as a flash, locked one of the cuffs around her wrist. He did the same with her other wrist and yanked her up by her arm.

Olivia groaned as he did so, before he undid her ankles. Pulling her out of the coffin, she took the opportunity to look around the room.

She certainly did not like what she saw.

The room was barely twelve feet by twelve feet. The floor was made of concrete. There were shelves, all with horrific items that Olivia had seen in evidence photos but never in person. A chain was attached to the floor with a collar around it. The weirdest thing about the room, however, was the olive-green wallpaper with tacky pink hearts, making the room rather off-putting even for those who would consent to the sort of torture that Olivia guessed happened in this house.

The man pointed at a wooden plank with a large hole in the center. “For you,” he informed her, before turning around and forcing her towards a dark blue armchair.

Pushing her down onto the seat, he looked towards his camera mounted on a tripod. He turned it on and started to speak.

“Today is the twenty-first of June 2021,” he started to say, as if he were recording a fascinating experiment, “and our subject today is Cop. She has a little brat upstairs, whom I shall name ‘Kid Cop’. Oh don’t look at me like that; I’m not that evil. Now, I will begin with the usual, but first I shall make a bet. Cop, do you think that you will last more or less than two weeks here?”

Olivia simply scowled back at him.

“Gotcha,” he chuckled, “Less than two weeks. You’d be surprised how long the human body will cling to life.”

He picked up a Polaroid camera from a nearby shelf and came closer. Taking a picture, he then placed it on the shelf. “This room is my darkroom as well,” he informed Olivia, “I like to develop my pictures in here. I have an eye for pretty things. You’re – well, you’re what I like to call ‘Christmas cake’. The Japanese call any attractive single woman over the age of twenty-five ‘Christmas cake’. Of course, they later incorporated ‘New Year’s Noodles’ to refer to women aged thirty-one, but I’d still say that you’re quite attractive. After almost a year without a victim and I was desperate enough to take any woman that crossed my path.”

He then picked up a pair of scissors from the shelf and made his way up to her. She tried to remain calm and controlled, but her heart was beating nineteen to the dozen. He stood behind her and cut off a lock of her hair.

The man walked back around to the front and looked her in the eye, holding the lock. “Please retain your original receipts as proof of purchase.”

If he didn’t have the ski mask on then Olivia would probably have seen a great big smile.

He put the hair on the shelf beside the Polaroid and then crouched down in front of her. “Now,” he said to her, “I am a reasonable man. Whenever one of my ladies says ‘no’, then I will stop whatever I am doing. So, if I don’t hear a ‘no’, then I will not hurt you. So, do you want me to cut your clothes off?”

Olivia knew that she would sound ridiculous, but she tried to speak past the tape. The man put his hand to his ear and asked, “What’s that? I – Oh, I guess that’s a ‘yes’, then.”

As he cut her clothes, Olivia’s mind flashed back to the prison. Once again she was handcuffed, at a man’s mercy. But this time no-one would save her.

When Sidney had locked Olivia inside of the room, the chain around her neck, he made his way up the stairs.

Unlocking the room where he had placed Noah, Sidney looked inside and saw the boy curled up on the bed. The shutters had been glued together, but it didn’t matter anyway. There was almost no-one else around and most of his neighbors were old and doddery.

“You want some lunch, son?” He asked Noah.

“I want my mom,” the boy sobbed.

“I know, I know,” Sidney tried to soothe him, “But Mommy is very busy right now. Tell you what; I’ll get you some goldfish crackers and some cola. It’s all I have right now. I wasn’t expecting to have a little boy over. But tomorrow I can go shopping and we can get some pizza or something. Deal?”

Then he shut the door behind him, locking it again. Going down into the kitchen, the man opened a drawer next to the cutlery.

Turning Olivia’s licence in his fingers, he then dropped it alongside the twenty-five others and then shut the drawer.

Amanda took her mask off as she entered Munch’s apartment. It had been a long time since she had been here, long before the pandemic, but she could definitely see that it had changed.

Everything was fairly neat and tidy. The cushions had been plumped and the floor had been vacuumed. Munch was hardly a slob, but she had remembered newspapers being scattered about and giant pictures on his wall of Roswell and other conspiracy theories. So many, in fact, that she had had trouble remembering the color of the wallpaper. Now those pictures were all filed away in a cabinet labelled ‘Normal’. Another cabinet directly next to it read ‘Supernatural’.

She could also smell noodles being cooked in the kitchen. A few photographs of Coney Island, the Catskills and the underside of the Brooklyn Bridge were framed on the wall, alongside five pictures of Claudia, all taken exactly a year apart at the same willow tree. A few books lay on a table next to an armchair, but rather than the usual conspiracy theories or works by Ray Bradbury, they were about the supernatural. One of them was a book of fairy tales and had a Mickey Mouse bookmark sticking out. Pages had been ripped out from some of the books and pinned to a corkboard on the wall, with words highlighted or pictures circled.

If Rollins hadn’t known any better, she would have said that Munch was taking care of a very strange child.

“Hello,” Rollins pulled some hair behind her ear and turned to look at Munch sitting in the armchair, “Is Claudia in?”

“Here,” came a voice from the kitchen, as Claudia came out with a plate of stir-fried noodles, chewing on a piece of carrot, “I heard about your captain. It’s sad, but I’m not sure if it’s up our avenue.”

“I know,” Rollins sighed, sitting down on the couch as Claudia sat cross-legged on the floor, “But we’re at our wits’ end. I know that psychics pick up things in missing person’s cases; goodness knows we’ve had known of them poking around the precinct.”

“I’m not psychic,” Claudia stood up and pulled a knife from her belt as she faced the window, “I’m good at a bunch of other things –“

Rollins started to worry that Claudia might fling the knife out of the window, but to her relief the Amazon instead threw it at a nearby dartboard and hit the center.

“But I’m not psychic.”

“I know,” Rollins’ eyes were still on the knife, “But maybe you knew people who can genuinely see something –“

“I think there’s one on Orchard Street,” Munch looked over at Claudia, “Remember the Montclair case?”

The both of them gave an involuntary shudder. Rollins dread to think what that particular incident involved.

“She’s good,” Claudia agreed, crossing her arms as she looked at Rollins, “I’ve got my card somewhere. Give me a sec.”

To Rollins’ surprise, the Amazon started picking up the cushions on the armchair and unzipped them, emptying out what seemed to be several different business cards, parcels and something inside of a cash-box that had a label with ‘Hudson’ written on the front in red ink.

“Aha!” Claudia picked up a business card and handed it over to Rollins. “Just say we sent you. That way she’ll know that you’re serious.”

“OK,” Rollins stood up and did her best to smile at them, despite everything, “I think I’ll go now.”

“Oh, she doesn’t take money. Let me get you something.” Claudia left the room and Rollins found herself looking at the framed photographs.

“Claudia thinks that it’s a good idea to keep photographs of the two of us together despite the fact that she ages five times as quickly.” Munch told her.

Rollins was confused. “Why?”

“Well, nobody comes in to ask why there are photographs of a strange girl on the wall,” Munch remarked, “And she says that it’s handy if our case involves young women and we need to pretend that Claudia is a mother looking for her daughter.”

Rollins remembered a sex trafficking incident a few years ago. Her mind went back to Olivia. Heart in her mouth, she wondered if she was going to cry. Instead, she pointed at the other framed pictures on the wall. “What are those?”

“Successful cases,” Munch answered, “Where we saved all the victims.” He gave a sigh. “I hope you find Olivia. I truly do. I’ve known her for twenty years and she has helped so, so many people. She never gives up.”

“Well,” Rollins agreed, “we won’t, either.”

Claudia came back into the room with a pair of silver earrings. “The psychic likes shiny things.” She gave a shrug. “I don’t know why she only accepts these. I sometimes wonder if she’s part magpie.”

“Well, thanks for everything.” Rollins gave a heavy sigh and turned to leave.

“I hope you find your captain.” Claudia called out as Rollins shut the front door behind her.

The psychic was not some strange, old woman dressed in purple, wearing a dozen rings and waving her hands in front of a crystal ball.

She was a little older than Rollins (but considering that Claudia had provided the address, she didn’t know anymore) and wore a lilac t-shirt and dungarees. She was also chewing gum and her hair looked as if she had just gotten out of bed.

“Hello,” Rollins fumbled in her pocket for the business card, “Claudia –“

“She called ahead,” the psychic nodded, before blowing a bubble, “Come in.”

Again, Rollins’ expectations were broken when she saw that the inside of this woman’s living room seemed perfectly ordinary, if not for the Tarot cards sticking on top of a dark green cloth on top of the coffee table.

“She said something about a cop going missing?” the psychic asked. When Rollins pulled her phone out and showed the woman a picture of Olivia hugging Noah on her couch, the psychic pulled her gum out and left it in the middle of a rather clean glass ashtray.

“I see,” the woman sat down in front of the table, “Well, this definitely seems interesting. Can you provide any details?”

Rollins gave a quick summary of what had happened the previous night. As a precaution, she left out most of what she knew. She gave the basics; that Olivia had been walking home, that she and Carisi had found the apartment empty and that Olivia was not only an extremely careful woman but a caring mother.

“A low-risk victim,” the psychic raised an eyebrow, “Oh, don’t look at me like that; I read the news. I don’t provide readings unless someone comes to me, though. I mainly work with hunters, but I’ll let you have a reading.”

The woman closed her eyes and the hairs on the back of Rollins’ neck stood up. She wasn’t sure if it was getting cold in here or if it was just her overworked imagination, but whatever it was, it was working; she was scared stiff.

The psychic then opened her eyes and took out a card from the pack.

“Magician, reversed,” she prodded at it with her long fingernail, “Con artist. Your guy might be a kidnapper, but he’s a smooth-talker. He’s a liar, a professional.”

“Professional?” Rollins asked her.

The woman shrugged. “Cons and tricks? Abducting women? Maybe both. But he was confident when he took your friends. He’s done it before.”

She took out another card and then a third flew on top of it, obscuring it from view.

“Aha!” the woman cried out, separating the cards. “The Empress and the Devil. The Devil – I’d say that’s your kidnapper – is covering – hiding – the Empress. The Devil is – well, it’s pretty self-explanatory, really.”

Rollins glanced at the card featuring the Devil. A man and a woman were chained by the neck, naked, either side of the red, horned monster. It was a very uncomfortable suggestion.

“The Empress is in front of a forest,” the psychic explained, “Could your friend be hidden in a forest?” She was speaking more to herself than to Rollins by now.

The next card was the High Priestess.

“Ah,” the psychic mumbled, “When the High Priestess is drawn it means that not all of the information will be available at the present time. Something I like to keep in mind when this card pops up is that there is a ‘B’ and a ‘J’ painted onto the two pillars on either side of the woman.”

“B for Benson?” Rollins asked.

“Maybe the abductor’s initials,” the psychic continued, pulling out three more cards, “King of Wands, reversed. Page of Pentacles, reversed. Three of Swords. Now, when it comes to predicting events, Pentacles mean years.”

“Years?” Rollins exclaimed.

“Or winter months. Or even just plain slowness. Wands, on the other hand, indicate days and quickness. Swords mean weeks and they also mean quickness, so I would say that you could receive answers in weeks, rather than years.”

“But Olivia might not have weeks.” Rollins argued.

The psychic looked up. “You’re the police, not me. I do my job, you do yours. I’m not a satellite.”

She explained in turn what each of the cards meant. Rollins seemed rather unhappy at the news.

“So,” Rollins took a deep breath, “Olivia is being held by – a smooth-talking con artist –“ she gestured to the Magician and the Kings of Wands, “While there is a child – it could be Noah, but it might mean someone else entirely – who closes themselves off from others, or will close themselves off, and could be an apprentice of some sort?” She jabbed at the Page of Pentacles.

The psychic once again shrugged. “It seems to be that way. The Page of Pentacles also covers the period between March 21st and June 20th.”

Rollins nodded, pursing his lips. Yesterday had been the twentieth.

“And the Three of Swords?” Rollins asked, “Grief, heartbreak, troubles ahead?”

“Well, the picture is a heart being stabbed by three swords, you tell me.” The psychic said as she pulled out three more cards.

“The Star, reversed. King of Swords, reversed. Justice.”

Rollins looked at the Star. A blonde woman was pouring water onto the ground while also pouring water into a lake. “Hopelessness,” she heard the psychic say, “Disappointments, missed opportunities. You might inadvertently let this guy get away. Or someone will.”

Rollins brushed the tips of her fingers over the figure’s blonde hair. She certainly felt hopeless now.

“The King of Swords is usually a man aged forty years or over, with a dark complexion,” the psychic went on, “Dictatorial, suspicious, untrustworthy, a spineless coward. But there is good news. The Justice card.”

“Justice?” Rollins looked up from the Star.

“When I drew these three cards, I asked if the NYPD will ever know his name. That is what this particular combination is telling you. There shall be despair, a missed chance to catch him early. He is a cruel and clever man. The Star is on the very left, looking to her left and downwards while the King of Swords and Justice both look directly ahead. These cards, incidentally enough, look quite similar. You will identify the man.”

But that did not console Rollins in the least.

“I will select three more cards, to see where she is,” the psychic told Rollins.

The next cards were the Seven of Wands and Temperance.

“Courage,” the psychic held up the Seven of Wands, “A calculated risk, challenges from many sources. Wands are connected to fire and I keep thinking of fire for some reason. I keep thinking of the number ‘seven’ as well. This card is all about control. The Temperance card also links to fire. It also symbolizes the number ‘fourteen’. A seven and fourteen, that’s interesting. The Temperance card implies harmony, balance and moderation, but in this case I believe it connects to self-help or self-acceptance.”

Then she held up the last card. As she did so, two more cards fell out from the deck.

Before the psychic could turn any of them over, Rollins’ phone rang.

“I’m sorry,” she apologized, “It’s my squad.”

The psychic nodded. “I understand.”

Rollins went into the hallway to answer the phone. “Yes?” she asked.

“Rollins?” It was Fin. “Huang said he’d take a look at – at the case.”

“OK,” Rollins pulled a strand of hair behind her ear, “What did he find?”

Finn sighed as he looked back over his shoulder at the board, which displayed a map of New England and several different pictures, all of missing women.

“I think you need to see this.”

Chapter 4: The Star, reversed

Chapter Text

The Star, reversed - Feeling hopeless, disappointments, missed opportunities, refusing to offer help, depression. When combined with Temperance, it can indicate healing and renewal.

Sidney sat back on the armchair in the living room, a grocery bag situated on the table next to him. Picking up a newspaper, he smiled to himself when he saw a picture of Cop and Kid Cop on the front page.

‘POLICE CAPTAIN AND SON, 7, ABDUCTED – DO YOU KNOW THIS MAN?’

Of course no-one would recognise him if the picture was of poor quality and he wore a mask. Sidney folded the newspaper and placed it on the table next to him.

So, Cop’s friends were looking for her. He had guessed that they would. The case would sell thousands of papers. Ten of thousands. And that would just be in New York. This sort of case would be talked about over dinner or between dog-walkers or in offices all over the world, whether in London, Mexico City, St. Petersburg or Mumbai.

It was normally the young, pretty women and girls that received attention, Sidney reminded himself, like Elizabeth Smart or JonBenet Ramsey. Or the housewives and soccer moms from small towns, like Laci Peterson or Tara Grant. If Cop hadn’t been a police officer (a low-risk profession if there was one) and hadn’t been kidnapped on camera along with her son, then chances are that no-one would have been interested in a fifty-three-year-old woman when there were younger choices to ogle.

There were exceptions, of course, but these exceptions were often very close to the rule. Michele Anne Harris had been a blonde mother from a middle-class background in Upstate New York in 2001. The problem was that she had vanished on the same day as the terrorist attack. The only reason that Sidney knew about Michele at all was because he had randomly decided to see how many people had disappeared on the same day.

There were also comparisons which were quite fascinating for Sidney. The body of a teenage girl had been found in the outskirts of London in 2002. At first it was believed that the girl had been Danielle Jones, a fifteen-year-old who had been reported missing the previous year, due to the fact that they were young, small and blonde. But rather than the missing middle-class girl from Essex, it had been a working-class teenager named Hannah Williams, who had been in foster care and had a history of running away.

The British newspapers at the time certainly enjoyed comparing Danielle and Hannah, as well as the case of Milly Dowler, who disappeared days after Hannah’s body was found. All three cases had been resolved, although Danielle’s body was still missing.

Another case from Britain Sidney remembered also involved class difference, but it had centered on younger children. In August 2002 two ten-year-old girls, Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells, had gone missing after a family barbecue in the rural village of Soham. While their bodies were found relatively quickly and the murderer caught, it was a completely different story to the case it was sometimes compared to.

That had been the disappearance of two young white boys in the city of Birmingham six years earlier, the day after Christmas. Patrick Warren and David Spencer had been ‘latchkey kids’ that had been out after midnight. The case had immediately been listed as a case of two runaways, although it was later believed that they had met with foul play. The boys’ bodies had not been found and although there was a prime suspect, he had not been charged with anything.

Sidney mused over these differences between America and Britain. America tended to be racist and occasionally classist, while Britain was classist and very rarely racist.

He was distracted from his thoughts when he heard Kid Cop crying upstairs. Yes, he meant to give him dinner. That was why he had been out shopping. Time really did fly when you were distracted.

As he opened up a tin of sausages and spaghetti hoops, he hoped that Kid Cop would like it. Sidney had eaten this when he was the boy’s age. He had forgotten to ask about any allergies. Pity.

Of course, when Sidney had been the boy’s age, he started to show all of the signs of being a psychopath. He had not started fires or hurt animals (if only because they tended to avoid him), but he wet the bed frequently.

His mother had slapped him around the ear whenever he wet the bed.

Sidney was glad when the old b**** had finally died.

He knocked on Noah’s door. “Kid, I’ve got dinner,” he called out, “I hope you’re hungry.”

When he opened the door and saw Noah sitting cross-legged on the bed, Sidney’s face fell. “Did you not like my magazines?” he asked, nodding towards a stack of movie and camera magazines on the desk.

“Not really,” Noah mumbled, “I want my Mom.”

Sidney sighed and placed the tray down on the desk, before sitting next to Noah, clasping his hands in front of him.

“Well, I’m afraid that you can’t see Mommy just yet. She’s still busy with me.”

Noah looked down, scratching at his dirty face.

“Don’t do that,” Sidney carefully pulled Noah’s hand away, “You’ll tear your skin.”

Noah carried on looking down at the floor. Sidney got up, left the room and locked the door.

Hopefully he would have more luck with the boy’s mother.

“The amount of work put into Olivia and Noah’s abduction indicates that this man has done this many times before.” Huang explained as he pinned the last photograph on the board. Rollins, Fin, Carisi and Tamin all watched him.

Carisi pointed at the pictures. “And these cases all involve a similar MO?”

Huang nodded. “There are many more cases involving the same type of MO,” he addressed the four of them, “I had a few contacts at the FBI take a double look. They usually deal with serial killers, getting into their minds and seeing how they work. They quickly found a list of names.”

“Names?” Fin asked the doc.

“Women who disappeared from their homes,” Huang sighed as he demonstrated, “Since Olivia was last seen after a night out, I asked their technical analyst to help me find cases of women who went missing after spending time in a public place. Then she narrowed down the criteria to mothers who were last seen in their homes.”

“Every single one of these women were abducted?” Rollins looked over at the pictures. All of them were of smiling, happy women from middle-class backgrounds. Blondes, brunettes, one was a redhead. Sitting at tables, hugging their children, attending weddings and book clubs. They were all significantly younger than Olivia – the eldest had been forty-four – but they were all low-risk victims. They were not the sort of women who would suddenly choose to leave their families and children in the middle of the night without a word.

Huang nodded. “It seems so. The incidents took place over a large enough geographical area not to cause any attention.”

Tamin felt a pang of guilt. She had been in the parking lot with Olivia. If she hadn’t gone home with Carisi and Rollins, the kidnapper could have taken her instead. As she scanned the names and pictures of the missing women, Tamin silently contemplated the fact that they seemed to be closer to her age than Olivia’s.

“They all came home from spending the day at public events,” Huang explained, “Fairs, fetes, carnivals, festivals, parades, a shopping trip, jogging. One woman had taken her daughter and some other girls skiing. All of these women were aged between twenty-one and forty-four years old. Something else of interest is that before the women are reported missing, money is removed from their bank accounts, all at ATMs. Sometimes money or other valuables had gone missing from the residences. Aside from the two youngest victims, all of them were mothers or currently lived with children.”

“You try to keep your eye on your children in a public place,” Fin pointed out, “You don’t about someone watching you.”

“Most of the victims had been to places centered around children and families,” Tamin argued, “Liv and I were at a restaurant.”

“They all went missing after nights out?” Fin asked.

“Most of them,” Huang answered, “But what is most interesting is that they are grouped in clusters.”

The first cluster was a triangle north of Schenectady. Fin read the dates out loud. “2002, 2005, 2019?” he asked incredulously. Then he pointed at the middle date. “This woman, Rosa Woodham, she’s black. She’s also the youngest here. Are you sure she’s linked?”

“Rosa went missing after spending the day at a fair with her nephews,” Huang explained, “It was the same with this woman, Lorena Allen,” he motioned towards the 2019 date, “She disappeared less than thirty miles away, also after attending a fair with young children.”

“But this one,” Carisi jabbed at the picture of the woman from the 2002 incident, “Heather Lowell,” he read out loud, “She was coming home from a hen night.”

“Some serial killers take time to develop their modus operandi,” Huang interjected, “Since this was the earliest date that my contact could find, this may have been his first murder. But she had young children living with her, which is paramount to the kidnapper’s needs.”

“Which puts our guy in his early forties.” Fin spoke his thoughts aloud.

The second cluster featured six names across Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Two were from 2006, two from 2007, one from 2009 and one from 2010. Two of the pictures had been circled.

“What do the circles mean?” Tamin asked.

Huang looked at the group with what seemed to be some hope. “These women survived.”

“Survived?” Rollins dared to believe that there was a chance.

“Rachael Barnes, 35, disappeared on the night of October 11th 2006,” Huang carried on, “She had spent the afternoon at a Halloween festival with her two children. Her husband was of course the prime suspect and he remained that way until Rachael was found here,” he pointed at a dot just over the Rhode Island border, “near Diamond Hill Reservoir, on November 9th. There is more information here.” He handed a tablet over to Rollins.

“That’s twenty-nine days,” Tamin exclaimed in horror, “She was alive the whole time?”

But Rollins asked the most important question. “Why wasn’t the case solved?”

“Technically it was,” Huang sighed, “It was believed that she had made up the abduction because she wanted to punish her husband for asking for a divorce.”

“Had she been raped?” Rollins asked, getting angrier by the second. It was clear from the evidence photos that there had been some kind of physical assault. Black eyes, cigarette burns, cuts, some of them healed.

“There was no evidence of any sexual activity in the three days prior to her discovery,” Huang crossed his arms, “It was agreed that she could have inflicted her wounds herself.”

There was silence for a few moments. “That’s disgusting,” Rollins put the tablet down on the desk, holding a hand to her forehead, “This woman was missing for a month and came back clearly beaten up.”

“What happened to Rachael?” Fin tried his best to divert attention back to the victim.

“She committed suicide in 2012,” Huang told them, “Her husband and children hated her. Frankly, I think it’s a miracle that she didn’t die in prison.”

“And the other woman?” Rollins asked, her voice still snippy.

“That was Rebecca Brittain,” Huang carried on, “It was eerily similar to Rachael’s abduction the previous year. Rebecca, then forty-one, had spent the day at a rodeo with her three children. She went missing during the night. Both Rachael and Rebecca were last seen in the Cape Cod area, in forested suburbs just four and a half miles apart. Rebecca was found wandering around a truck stop west of Providence two weeks after she was last seen, but her system was filled with drugs and there was evidence that she had ingested drugs over the last ten days. They even have the same initials.”

“It does seem too much of a coincidence.” Carisi agreed.

“The problem is,” Huang informed them, “that both Massachusetts and Rhode Island State Police did think that it was a coincidence. Remember, they thought that Rachael had deliberately run away. They wrote Rebecca’s case off as a copycat incident.”

“But didn’t Rebecca remember anything?” Rollins was determined. “There – there were other incidents! They must have believed her!”

“I’m not certain that they did.” Huang sighed. Before he could carry on, Rollins had started shouting.

“There were two – two – other disappearances at the same time! Women who – who had been out with their children. For goodness’ sake, the other abductions in 2006 and 2007 are seven miles apart! And the Massachusetts police had two women with exceedingly similar stories and they just think it’s a copycat! How dumb were these cops?”

“Amanda,” Carisi put his hands out, “Please, you need to calm down.”

“I – I don’t know if I can,” Rollins’ voice was hoarse. It was clear that she was about to cry. She put her hands up and moved away from the board, sitting down at a desk with her hand in her hands. Her colleagues weren’t sure if she was crying or silently screaming.

Huang cleared his throat and went on.

“The third cluster is up here,” he tapped on the paper map with his fingernail, “Five incidents, six women.”

“Six?” Carisi asked, “There was a double abduction?”

“A mother and her daughter,” Huang explained, “Both adults. They had spent the day shopping.”

Carisi examined the dates in the Vermont cluster. 2011, 2012, 2014, 2016 (the double abduction) and 2017.

“Could our guy move around?” he asked, “He keeps moving house?”

“It’s a possibility,” Huang was thinking the same, “It’s unlikely that he lives out of his van. No-one reported a strange van at any of the events or near the victims’ houses. Besides, it would be extremely difficult to keep a hostage in a van for a long period of time.”

“So this guy,” Carisi suggested, “could be using false names. If he has to keep moving and he wants to keep killing, he uses false names.”

Huang nodded. “My contacts couldn’t find any names that overlap. If he uses several false names then it’s highly likely that he is also a professional conman.”
“Why do from conning people to kidnapping and murdering women?” Tamin asked, “It seems a stretch.”

“Our kidnapper is a risk-taker,” Huang explained, “Confidence tricksters are all about risk.”

“But none of the children were abducted before,” Carisi pointed out, “Why take Noah?”

“He could be a witness,” Fin looked at his colleague.

“Or perhaps he has had to lie low due to the pandemic,” Huang suggested, “He would be desperate. But I do think that the children are an important part of his MO.”

“Do as I say and I won’t hurt your child.” Carisi sighed.

“Exactly,” Huang agreed, “That’s what gets his victims out of the residence. He also forces them to withdraw money from their bank accounts. He’s obsessed with money and family.”

“He doesn’t seem to want to hurt children,” Fin mused, “That could mean that he isn’t interested in Noah. He’s only using Noah as leverage.”

Fin looked at the two other photos on the board that had been circled. One was in New Hampshire, the other in Connecticut. “What are these?” he asked.

“Two more survivors,” Huang explained to him, “Fortunately one of them, Bernadette Chancellor, is still alive.”

“Explain.”

Huang recited from memory. “Shannon Wright, 32, went missing in Concord in 2008. Her case is different from the others because she was not a housewife or a soccer mom; she lived at a women’s shelter with her three children. But she did disappear during the night while her children were sleeping, which is why I included her.”

“She was abducted from a shelter?” Tamin asked in slight disbelief.

“No, she was taken as she went to a job interview. It was the only available time,” Huang went on, “Shannon was found ten days later in Maine, less than forty miles away. She had a variety of drugs in her system. While she claimed to have been abducted by a man who had threatened her children – even stating that he knew their names and ages – and held in a basem*nt for ten days, the police wrote her story off as the ramblings of a drug addict due to the illegal substances found in her system. To be honest, I can see why her story wasn’t believed.”

“It’s an interesting comparison to the Massachusetts kidnappings,” Carisi agreed, “One woman is thought to be a copycat and found with illegal drugs, the other is on the fringes of society and also found with drugs. Was there a rape kit?”

Huang shook his head. “From what I can tell, they didn’t even bother.”

Carisi swore under his breath. “And what happened to her?”

“She died of alcohol poisoning in 2016. Her children were taken back to their abusive father.”

Carisi swore again. “The final case?” he asked.

“As far as I am aware,” Huang looked at the last picture, “Bernadette Chancellor is doing well, all things considered. Bernadette was thirty-three when she went missing, also in 2008. There had been a parade that afternoon in their small town of Roxbury. She was living with her brother and his children while suffering from depression. When she disappeared, it was originally believed that she had committed suicide.”

“But she was found?” Carisi asked.

“Yes. Thirty-four miles away, just over the Massachusetts border, thirty-one days later. She was found by a milkman as she lay on the ground, completely drunk. She was comatose for a month. Her former husband had been suspected of kidnapping her. He was often on the road, selling electronics. He was not available for contact for most of that time period. When Bernadette woke up, it appears that therapists accidentally managed to convince her that her ex-husband was responsible.”

“The case is considered closed, then?” Fin asked.

“Yes,” Huang replied, “But Bernadette never believed that he was involved. She was susceptible when she finally woke from her coma, but by the time of the trial she said that her abductor was a different man. That he was built differently from her husband, had a different haircut and a different accent. But no-one believed her. Her husband is currently serving two life sentences for kidnapping, rape and attempted murder.”

It wasn’t just these women who had been victimized.

“This guy holds his victims for weeks,” Carisi said what everyone was thinking, “We might have time to save Liv.”

“But even if we do,” Tamin paled, “our kidnapper will have done goodness knows what to her for weeks.”

That night, Amanda sat with her feet up on the couch, a small glass of wine in her hand.

Forty-eight hours had passed since Olivia and Noah had been kidnapped. Usually it was expected that if a kidnap victim was not found by now, they would not come home alive. But if this man stuck to his modus operandi then Olivia and Noah were still alive and would remain alive for days or even weeks to come.

Taking Noah must have been unexpected, Amanda told herself, since none of the other children were taken. If the abductor had had any interest in the children, he would have taken them as well. What did this mean for Noah? Was he a bargaining chip? Or was he already dead?

Amanda didn't want to think of this possibility. No matter how long it would take, no matter how far she had to look, Amanda would bring the two of them home.

She was going to interview Bernadette Chancellor tomorrow, to see how much she knew. The woman would be overjoyed to learn that someone believed her after all this time. It was just a shame that the same couldn't be said for the other three survivors.

Standing up, she made her way over to the sink and poured herself a glass of water as she turned her wine glass over and let it trickle down into the washing-up water.

She felt truly helpless.

Nearly seventy miles away, in a house secluded by the trees and fields, Olivia felt exactly the same.

She had lost count of how many times he had come down here. How many times she had tried to scream 'no', but he carried on anyway. Or how many photographs he had taken.

He had mentioned something about a rack at one of his other houses and that he might drive over to fetch it. He claimed to have made it himself and seemed quite proud. Or maybe, he had told her, he might use the modified dentist's chair he had upstairs. He had several items that he wished to use. A set of light-bulbs that he had lying around, the toolkit he had stolen from the same dentist he had taken the chair from. He was certain that he had a pair of white stiletto heels that would fit her.

"But you love him, don't you?" he had whispered into her ear. "Be good for little Noah, won't you?"

Olivia lay in the dark coffin and let a tear run down her cheek.

She would escape.

She must escape.

Chapter 5: The Page of Pentacles, reversed, and the King of Wands, reversed

Chapter Text

Page of Pentacles, reversed - Delinquent, immaturity, inability to express themselves, closing themselves off from others. An apprentice or a student or undergraduate, a studious and methodical youth who enjoys learning, usually through practice.

King of Wands, reversed - Bossiness, self-righteousness, a smooth-talking con artist, shameless self-promotion, an entrepreneur or businessman, seemingly limitless mental energy, too charismatic for his own good.

It had been seven days since Olivia and Noah had been abducted.

Sidney smiled to himself as he lay back on the bed.

Things were going well. Once again the police had no idea where he was, or even suspected him. He had a mother in the basem*nt and her kid upstairs as a bonus.

Maybe now was the time to start molding Noah into what he wanted.

“Noah,” he sat up, cross-legged with his hands pressing into the duvet at either side, “Do you love your mommy?”

Noah nodded. “Yes.”

“The thing is,” Sidney held his cheek in his hand and strummed his fingers, “mommies and daddies will abandon their children if given the chance.”

“My mommy wouldn’t,” Noah shook his head, “She wouldn’t leave me like my last mommy.”

“So, you are adopted?” Sidney gave a small smirk. This was getting better and better. All the easier to manipulate the boy.

Noah nodded again. “My first mommy died when I was a baby. I – I don’t know about my real daddy. But my Grandma Sheila said that my mommy had to give me away and then she died.”

Sidney grasped Noah’s small hand in his clammy one. Looking into his eyes, the man asked, “Are you afraid that Mommy will die, too?”

Noah’s eyes widened. Sidney carried on, in an attempt to keep the child calm. “If she were to die, you would have no-one, would you?”

Noah shook his head. “I would have Aunty Amanda.”

“But,” Sidney ignored him, “you would have no-one left in the world. Let me tell you a story.” Sidney cleared his throat and pulled out a framed photograph from the drawer under the bed.

“My mommy was named Gillian. She was a very pretty woman, as you can see. I had four brothers and two sisters, so you can imagine that my parents never had enough time for me. I didn’t own this house then. I lived in Massachusetts. I still own that house. Anyway, when I was just a little older than you, when I was ten –“ He stopped for a moment. He placed the photograph back into the drawer.

“No, maybe I shouldn’t.”

“Go on.” Noah half-begged him, desperate for some human interaction, even if it was with the man who had kidnapped them.

“I was ten. Quite a bit older than you,” Sidney waved his hand around, as if this was of little importance, “This was back in 1990, over in Massachusetts. Dad had grounded me for breaking a dish, so I couldn’t go to the Christmas fair with my other brothers and sisters. It was just me and Mom in the house. Well, she told me that I had to stay inside and to make sure of that, she locked me in the cupboard under the stairs.”

“Why did she do that?” Noah asked. Sidney simply grinned.

“There are many words to describe my mother, but I won’t use them in front of you. She didn’t want another child, you see. She was forty-two when I was born and I was a complete surprise. She thought that she was on the menopause when I arrived. My oldest brother had almost grown up and two of my other siblings weren’t far behind. My parents didn’t want another eighteen years of child-rearing.”

“What were their names?” Noah asked.

Sidney stopped talking. “Sorry?”

“Your brothers and sisters. What were their names?” Noah asked innocently.

“Malcolm, Douglas, Lois, Jasper, Floyd and Zoe,” Sidney recited, “I don’t talk to them very much.

“Where was I? Ah, yes. My mother left the house to go and pick up Zoe after she broke her leg at the fair. I managed to break down the door – the wood had started to warp from age – and I was in the front garden when she returned. She sent my sister to bed and started to slap me silly. I fought back, but she was too strong. She called me all sorts of things. That I was useless and that I would never amount to anything. I ran outside into the back garden, but when she followed me she tripped over the steps and collided with the barbecue. It was one of those large stone ones that happened to be nailed down. When her neck snapped, it was the most horrific and wonderful sound I had ever heard.”

Noah felt a shiver go down his spine. This man’s mommy had been mean, but why had he been glad when she had died?

Sidney pulled Noah close to his side. “I went upstairs and hid in my bed. When Dad came home, he called an ambulance. I said that my mother had gone outside to chase a fox away from the bins. Zoe was asleep by then and hadn’t heard a thing. My life started to improve after my mother died. I learnt how to seem innocent so that people could pay me attention. Then I started to charm people so that they would give me money.

“I would pretend to cash checks for old women and trick them into handing over hundreds or thousands of dollars. Just enough to keep below the radar. My boyish looks, good manners and my extensive vocabulary ensured that people would trust me. Now, the thing is, Noah, that when your mommy has gone and there will be no-one to look after you, you might end up in a foster home with lots of other children and cruel parents and you will be just like me.”

He stroked Noah’s curls and the boy felt as if he was about to be sick.

“But, Noah, if you stay with me, then I will look after you. It doesn’t have to be this house; I have three others, including my parents’ home. I have enough money in various bank accounts to buy another house, or perhaps we could go anywhere in the world. Once the airports open, that is. I could even use you to get more money out of gullible people. A single father with a little boy would be quite appealing. I could teach you how to cry on cue. You haven't had a daddy, have you? I could be your daddy. What do you say, Noah,” he turned the boy around and uncurled his long, slender hand, “Shall we make a deal?”

Noah stared at Sidney’s hand and then looked up into the man’s beady eyes. “If –” Noah frowned, still determined to get out of here no matter what, “If Mommy leaves me.”

“Of course. I understand.”

Sidney got up from the bed and exited the room, making sure that the door was locked before he made his way downstairs.

Of course, he had left some pieces of information out from his story. About how he had sat beside his mother and watched as the life left her body, before going back inside to eat some potato chips. Or how he had spied on the women’s changing room at the swimming pool. Or how he had found his sister’s discarded Barbie dolls at the back of a closet and tore their clothes off before burying them in the garden covered in red nail polish, just feet from where his mother had died.

Or how, when he had invited his first girlfriend over, they had kissed on the steps and danced on top of the mutilated Barbies.

Sidney Barlow had many names. The deed for his house in Edinburg was Douglas Overton. The one for the house in Belmont read Jasper Leighton. The van that he had taken into Manhattan was brought by a Floyd Parrish of Burlington. The newspaper that he had brought from Poughkeepsie was registered to a Malcolm Mills.

But there was one name that everyone called him, from his father and his siblings to those he scammed to the women he took.

That name was monster.

Sidney tapped a spreader bar against the wall as he thought.

Olivia was currently sitting in the armchair. Her arms were bound behind her with tape, as were her ankles and knees. Tape was wound around her mouth and chin. All she could do was glare at Sidney.

“So,” he sat on the coffin, facing her, his hands balled into a fist underneath his chin, “your kid’s getting a wee bit moody. If you do exactly as I say today, you can see him.”

Olivia thought about everything she had suffered over the past week. Every horrible, disgusting moment of it. Living on crackers, cream cheese bagels, bottled water and strawberries, she had been forced to carry out every sexual act she could think of and had read about in files and had heard from victims and witnesses.

But Noah was at the forefront of her mind. The only reason why she even went through with everything he said. Death would have been a mercy. But she did this for Noah.

He pulled his camcorder down from the shelf and smirked horribly. Putting on his ski mask, he addressed Olivia.

“This footage is going to your lovely friends at the police station,” he told her, “I do hope that they will watch it again and again, trying to find the tinniest clue. They won’t, but let’s imagine them doing that anyway.”

Then he held up a finger. “Remember, Noah gets to see his mommy if you behave yourself.”

Fin had been allowed to work in Olivia’s office while she was absent.

He hadn’t wanted to, but he had been told that as he was the highest ranking officer after Benson and he needed to man the operation, her office was the best bet.

Tips had arrived by the cartload. Sighting came from California, Florida and Texas. There were even tips from abroad; Canada, Brazil, the Ukraine and New Zealand.

It was all speculation, of course. If Huang was right then the kidnapper operated and resided somewhere in New England. That was the mindset that they had been working with for five days.

There had been cruel taunts, of course. Some people had been yelling about ‘defunding the police’ and that Olivia was ‘a pig cop who got what she deserved’. Fin wanted to slap them. Whether or not Olivia was a police officer, she was still a low-risk woman who had clearly been taken against her will alongside her young son. That was what people should concentrate on, he had told the public.

The door opened and Fin looked up from his papers.

“Elliot?”

“I came as soon as I could,” Elliot looked pained and quite ill, “Did – Is there any news?”

“Not yet,” Fin stood up, “I – I can’t imagine what it must be like for you. You were her partner.”

“You know her just as well,” Elliot ran a hand over his chin, before he shook his head, close to tears, “I just lost Kathy. I can’t lose Liv as well.”

“I know,” Fin nodded empathically, “I know.”

Then Carisi came to the door. “Oh. I didn’t realize you had company,” he started to say when he saw Elliot, “I’ll come back later.”

“No, it’s fine,” Fin replied, “What is it?”

Carisi licked his lip anxiously. “A videotape was dropped off this morning. It’s – It’s addressed to the ‘Olivia Benson Investigation’.”

Elliot looked directly at Fin. “I need to see it.”

“No,” Fin had to put his foot down, “You are not a cop anymore.”

“You’re just as close to Liv and you’re watching the tape.” Elliot retorted.

“No,” Fin repeated himself, “I’m sorry, Elliot.”

“SHE WAS MY PARTNER!” Elliot shouted, almost directly in Fin’s face. After taking a few deep breaths, he looked Fin in the eye, his voice beginning to crack. “She – She’s the best thing to have happened to me, aside from Kathy and my children. Please, please, Fin.”

Fin looked downhearted. “Elliot, if this – if this happens to be the last thing you will ever see of her, do you really think that she would want that?”

Elliot sighed. He knew there was no use in arguing.

“I know.”

The video opened with a close-up of Olivia’s face.

Rollins felt herself gasping when she saw the state of her captain. Olivia had a black eye, there was dried blood beneath her nose and some of her hair had been pulled out in clumps.

Someone started to narrate the video. “Liv’s been living with me for about a week now,” he began, “She’s been very good. Well-behaved. I guess that’s what happens when you also hold their child.”

The camera panned out. Olivia was lying on what appeared to be a dentist’s chair that had been horribly modified. Her hands and ankles had been strapped down and there was a collar around her neck. Her legs were spread out as far as they could go. She was also stark naked. A newspaper with that day’s date lay between her legs.

For as long as they would live, her friends would never get this image out of heads.

The man came into view, wearing a ski mask. “Now, Liv’s been quiet for most of the time she’s been here. She hasn’t spat at me, or sworn at me or even tried to escape. She hasn’t begged or bargained. She’s the best-behaved sex slave I’ve ever had.

“Now,” he went on as if he were talking about a rather fascinating subject, “as you can see, Liv is sitting on a dentist’s chair. I brought this little beauty a few years ago. I modified it so that my ladies can have a good stretch.”

Rollins wanted to throw up. Carisi folded his arms and tried to hold himself together. Fin was fuming. All Tamin could imagine was that this could just as easily have been her, or even Rollins, if they hadn’t gotten into a taxi.

Olivia groaned as the man pulled a lever and her legs yanked apart. Then the man turned towards a box of light-bulbs, all of different sizes.

“Don’t worry,” he addressed the camera, giving a small shrug, “They’re not attached to anything.”

Elliot was sitting down on a chair in the waiting room when he saw the squad leave the conference room.

He stood up, seeing their horrified expressions. “What was it?” his voice trembled as he dared to ask.

Fin was the one who finally answered. “We have enough evidence to believe that she was alive this morning.”

“That’s all?” Elliot nearly shouted.

“El,” Fin tried his best to calm him down, but he knew more than anyone else here the rages that Elliot Stabler could fly into, “We’re going to hold another press conference and – I think you should be there.”

Elliot paused. “But I’m not a relative.”

“You’re the closest thing we have.” Rollins pointed out.

Elliot nodded. “I guess so. Fin,” he turned back to the man, “How did she look?” He knew that it was a terrible way of phrasing his question, but he had to hold onto something.

Fin sighed. “Like death warmed up. That’s the best way I can describe her.”

The two men walked back to Olivia’s office as Rollins took a seat, her hands clasped close to her chest. Tamin sat down beside her and although she knew that it was against protocol, she placed an arm around the older woman’s shoulders.

Two women then allowed themselves to howl.

Chapter 6: The King of Swords, reversed, and the Three of Swords

Chapter Text

King of Swords, reversed - Dictatorial, domineering, spineless, a liar, cynical, arrogant.

Three of Swords - Grief, heartbreak, emotional pain, troubles ahead, emotional disturbance. The 'three' links to expression, expansion of an idea and the first stages of completion.

It had now been eleven days since Olivia and Noah had been taken.

Sidney flipped through his scrapbook. This was one of the few photo albums in his house that did not feature horrifying images.

Instead, pictures of the Lagunas de Montebello and the Altun Ha were stuck down with Blu-Tack.

“Noah, come here,” he held the scrapbook out and brushed the pictures, “See anything you like?”

Then he turned the page. “How about the Colca Canyon, hmm? Or maybe the Viconga Waterfall? The Lauca National Park? I’ve been to these places. It’s wonderful what you can do when you steal enough money. I’ve got a box stuffed with jewelry in the garden.”

He leaned in close to the boy. “I made up my mind years ago that I would travel to every country in the world without an ‘a’ in their name. You’d be surprised how many there are. What is most interesting is that three of them are neighbors, or practically neighbors – Greece, Turkey and Egypt. I’ve visited all three of them.”

Sidney had looked around the Parthenon a few years ago, relishing in the fact that it had once been used by sultans as a harem, having dragged beautiful, begging Greek women up there. Then they had stored gunpowder in the beautiful building and let themselves be blown up rather than be killed by Greek resistance fighters.

And everyone ignored what the Greeks – particularly the women and children – had been through for five hundred years, all because they were white and the Turks were not. When people ignored victims, it made things all the better for Sidney. He had decided long ago that it was far too risky to let his victims go, even if they were homeless and the police wouldn't believe them. Because there was always the chance that someone might.

“I think Belize,” he spoke out loud to Noah, holding the child’s shoulder in a tight grip, “Or maybe Belgium. Belgium’s famous for chocolates.”

It was famous for a lot more, Sidney told himself. Ask any random person – especially an American – to name a famous Belgian and if they didn’t say Jean-Claude Van Damme, chances were that they would say pedophilic serial killer Marc Dutroux. Sidney hated pedophiles. He wanted nothing more than to place their naughty bits in a combine harvester.

“Or maybe I could try another route. I could take you to Switzerland or Austria. I could take you skiing. You’d like to go skiing, wouldn’t you, sport?”

“I want Mom.” Noah scowled up at Sidney.

Sidney looked a little surprised. “You saw her three days ago.”

“I heard her crying,” Noah answered, “I didn’t see her.”

Well, this boy certainly had a determined streak.

“Let me take you outside first,” Sidney offered, “Then I’ll take you downstairs. You want some fresh air, don’t you?”

Noah slowly nodded, before Sidney took him by the hand and, for the first time in ten days, took Noah out of the bedroom.

Once he was outside, Noah blinked in the bright light.

He took in his surroundings. There was a copse of trees at the end of the large garden, with fields in the distance. A large barbecue – a clay one, not made from iron like the ones in the store – sat beside a fenced-off pond. Noah wondered how many people lived out here. He couldn’t see any other houses.

Noah pointed at a row of flower beds. A different flower grew in each one of them. “What are those?” he asked.

Sidney looked up from the barbecue, which he had been setting up. “Oh, those are my special ladies,” he explained, “Their names are on the signs.”

Noah wandered over to take a look. Why did this man call his flowers ‘ladies’?

He read the names one by one.

Bluebird (Sarah Ingham, 18, 2008) and Lutheran (Elaine Snyder, 16, 2009)
Vodka (Kimberly Jamison, 34, 2009)
Fireworks (Stella Richard, 33, 2010)
Long Wharf (Jasmine Martell, 14, 2011) and Major Barmaid (Ursula Rigby, 48, 2011)
Depressed (Cara Evans, 14, 2013)
India (India Jenks, 19, 2017)
Broadway (Alexandra Hunt, 49, 2017)

“Seven plots for my nine beautiful women,” he smiled proudly, “I have a different flower for each of them. I had jasmine for Long Wharf because that’s her name.”

He had different methods of disposal at each of his houses. At his house in Edinburg, New York he let them bleed to death before throwing them into the lake. At his parents’ old house in Middleborough, Massachusetts he hung them before burning their bodies in a wood-burner and scattered their ashes in Cape Cod Bay. At his house in Belmont, New Hampshire he drowned them in the pool in the backyard before burying their bodies on the nearby mountain. Here he buried them alive in barrels and then grew flowers over their bodies.

“Those aren’t ladies,” Noah pointed at some of the signs, “They’re girls.”

Sidney crouched down beside Noah. “The thing is, little man, that when children get older they want to be treated like adults. They want to do grown-up things and think that the grown-up world is a carefree wonderland. They hate their parents and they run away from those who care about them. These girls want to be adults, so I treat them like adults.”

Noah looked at the last plot. “Did she come from Broadway?”

Sidney chuckled. “She did, sport. She disappeared only a few blocks away from where your mommy had a party. But no-one connected the dots because no-one cares about a suicidal woman suffering from bipolar disorder, even if she leaves three, beautiful children behind.”

Noah paused. “What if I start to act like a grown-up?” he asked.

Sidney sighed, still smiling. “You won’t. I’ll make sure that you stay just as childlike and wonderful as me.”

He thought for a moment. “Maybe I’ll show you a map of Europe through time. There are a score of them online. You’ll be able to see just how fast the Muslims were able to conquer south-east Europe. How were they so good, you ask? Well, the Moors – or the Golden Horde, or the Ottomans, as they later came to be known – had a heavy tax on all citizens of conquered lands who did not convert to their religion. Unfortunately, this led to many people becoming bankrupt due to high demands. There were just two choices – convert and live with the fear that you might go to Hell, or hand over your children. Little girls went to serve sultans. Little boys like you were forced to join the army and had their naughty bits cut off.”

Sidney leaned in close. “Any schoolyard bully will be able to tell you that there is no better soldier than a terrified boy yanked from a loving home.” He rubbed Noah’s arm as he looked around his flowerbeds. “You thought that the Hitler Youth was bad? Where do you think the idea came from?”

Sidney slotted the video cassette into the player.

“I recorded this a few days ago,” he told Olivia as she lay on the armchair, bound and gagged with tape, “I meant to give it to you, but I’ve been busy. Booking plane tickets, getting false passports, having some quality time with little Noah…”

All Olivia could do was shake her head in furious denial, hoping against hope that Sidney was lying.

“Anyway,” he sat down on the floor and crossed his long, skinny legs, “Let’s have a look and see what your friends have been up to.”

He pressed a button on his remote and the television turned on. As the image slowly came into view, Olivia’s heart skipped a beat when she saw Elliot standing at a podium, holding a picture of her.

“I have known Olivia Benson for more than twenty years,” Elliot addressed the crowd, “She was my partner for thirteen years. She – she is the strongest woman I know. I love her – almost as much as my own family. She has been with me through thick and thin and I –“

Elliot paused for a moment, resting his knuckle against his face before he carried on speaking.

“Olivia Benson has helped so, so many people. Sometimes I was by her side, sometimes not. Olivia has saved so many lives and it’s time that we return the favor.”

“Sweet, isn’t he?” Sidney looked over his shoulder at Olivia. He carried on gabbling. “I’ve recorded a lot of videos of press conferences. Hubbys, children, all pleading for their loved ones’ return. But you’re the first one who received a press conference while in this house.”

Olivia seemed a bit confused. Then he got up, smiling, before leaning on the arm of the chair only inches from her face. She recoiled.

“I have nine women in the back garden.”

Olivia turned her head to look away from him. If she threw up now, she would choke on her vomit. She had to regain control, even if it was the only thing she could control while she was held here.

“Nine pretty women. None of them have had a press conference with begging relatives. Five runaways, a barmaid from a dingy tavern, a suicidal mother from Broadway and two alcoholic mothers whose cases were written off of uncaring parents. You know, one of those b****** had collapsed outside of a tavern on New Year’s Eve in Poughkeepsie. When she first spoke to me, she told me that she had three children at home. Well, if she cared about them at all then she would have spent the night with them, wouldn’t she?”

Pictures of women appeared on the screen, all across a map of New England. They showed one state at a time; Upstate New York, Massachusetts and Vermont.

“But we’re in Connecticut,” Sidney answered Olivia’s unspoken question, “The thing is, I did take all of these women. I won’t deny what I did. But there are only thirteen pictures up there, fifteen if you include yourself and Noah. I’ve taken more victims than I have had years on this Earth.”

Olivia wasn’t quite sure how old Sidney was, but she guessed that he was somewhere in his early forties.

“There is one woman,” he sounded regretful, “that I held here who did survive. I called her ‘Mustard’. But her real name is Bernadette Chancellor.”

Then he asked, "You love him, don't you?"

When Olivia looked away, Sidney gave a small snigg*r. "You do, don't you? I'll bet that you wish that he was Noah's father. The three of you, a lovely happy family. It's such a pity that that will never happen."

Tamin stood outside of Bernadette’s tall, white house, built in the New England style.

Peering around, she thought about how easy it must have been for the kidnapper to break in. From the original police records, she had discovered that a spare key was hidden under a rock by the side door.

A woman in her early twenties, dressed in an apron, answered the door, leaving the screen closed. “Yes?” she asked.

Tamin held up her badge. “Hi, I’m Officer Tamin. Can I please talk to Bernadette Chancellor?”

“It’s Bernadette Blackbourne now,” a voice came from the kitchen, as an older woman, also wearing an apron, came out, “I divorced him after the trial. It’s fine, Sophie,” she told the woman in the apron.

Tamin nodded. “Can I please come in?”

The younger woman looked towards her aunt. Bernadette nodded and came up to open the screen.

“I heard about your friend on the news,” Bernadette told Tamin as she sat down in the living room, pouring a cup of tea, “I’m very sorry.”

Tamin nodded. She could hear whirring noises coming from the kitchen. Bernadette managed a small smile. “Blueberry soft-bakes for the Fourth of July celebrations.”

Tamin cleared her throat. She knew that this would be a difficult question to ask, but as Bernadette was the only survivor that she could talk to (as Rebecca Brittain suffered from paranoia and didn’t trust anyone), Tamin hoped to find something.

“Bernadette, do you think that you could tell us anything about the night of your abduction?”

Bernadette’s fingers gripped the china cup tightly. “Yes,” she said at last, “I can.”

Then she asked, “Should I leave anything out? I – I’ve bottled this up for so long.”

Tamin replied, “Even the smallest thing can mean something.” But she still dreaded what she might hear.

It was the twenty-fifth of May 2008, although I assume you already know that. Roxbury was holding a parade. I can’t recall what it was for. I think it was something to do with the county’s children.
My brother and I stood outside of the house with the kids. I didn’t see anything unusual. I knew most of the people there, but I didn’t stare at any strangers. People had come from neighboring villages, so I simply expected a few new faces.
At – At about 2pm this man came up to our fence to watch the parade. He was tall, dark-haired, late twenties, dressed in a dark blue suit. I thought he had just come from a business meeting or something. I remember he smiled at my nieces and nephew. I pulled my older niece – the one that opened the door – close to me and told the three of them to stand inside the fence.
The parade ended at 3pm. The man stood there the whole time. He kept looking around. I thought that he was waiting for someone. But it seemed to slip my mind. My children were behind the fence and close to me, so I ignored him.
It was just before eleven that night when I heard a noise. My brother was in Southbury and the children were asleep. I thought it must have been the dog. But then I heard him barking.
I went to see what it was. I admit that I should have gone upstairs to check on the children but I thought that I must have been overreacting. I opened the back door and looked both ways. I didn’t imagine that he was already inside the house.
I heard the sound of tape ripping and I turned my head. He ran out of the darkness and – he pushed the tape around my face, connecting it at the back of my head. I tried to scream but he wound it twice around my head. My arms scrambled behind my head, but he grabbed them at the elbows and pulled me into the main hall. He pulled some string out from somewhere and bound my wrists. He also taped my arms close to my back.
He held a gun at my head. He whispered, “Sophie, eleven. Ramona, eight. Harrison, six.” He didn’t hear my children’s names when I was at the parade and he certainly wouldn’t have known their ages. He must have been inside of the house for hours.
He dragged me upstairs. I was terrified. I thought that he was going to rape me or hurt the children. But he took me into my bedroom and started to rifle through the drawers. He took my purse and the money in my brother’s bedside cabinet. Then he forced me towards my nieces’ room.
The man jabbed the gun into my spine as he forced me to look in the darkness at my nieces. Then he took me to Harrison’s room and did the same. He didn’t say a word throughout.
When he pushed me back downstairs and out of the back door, I started to try and resist him. But he hit me in the jaw with the butt of the gun. My mouth filled with blood and I thought that I would die. In the coming days, I think that I would have preferred death.
He made me walk into a van parked in the driveway. When I was inside, he tied my ankles and attached – attached my neck to a collar that stuck out centimetres from the floor. We drove for what seemed like forever. I thought that I would never see my brother or his children again.
When – When we got to his house, he pushed me into the basem*nt. There was – a coffin sitting on the floor. He pushed me inside and left me there for several hours. When he finally came back I could see daylight from the door. He pressed play on a cassette tape and let it play.
That cassette – I will never get those words out of my head. He said that he had taken other women. He called me stupid for believing that he would hurt the children. He recorded these words on a cassette tape so that he wouldn’t have to repeat himself. This tape, he said at the start, had been recorded on October 4th 2004. He said that he created the tape when he was planning for his second victim.
I lost track of the days. Once he – he encased me in tape, so that only my nostrils were uncovered. He hung me upside down and used a baseball bat, just like a child with a piñata. I heard him take photos.
Another time, when he was – touching me, he was recording it on camera. He said that he would send this to my brother. He told me about other murders he had committed. He said that when he took a woman sleeping rough in Fall River, he left her tied up in a trunk and when – when he finally killed her, he used a hammer, hitting one bone at a time. She was just twenty years old. He also said that he had taken a woman from a beach and had cut her tongue out when she swore at him. He didn’t tell me her name. Just that he kidnapped her in 2005 and she was a prostitute.
He cut off my hair. He said that if a woman does not have long hair then she can never be beautiful. He called me ‘Mustard’ because of my mustard allergy. He recorded a press conference of my brother pleading for my return. This was back when everyone thought that I had voluntarily left.
He said that I would be the first body in his flowerbed. He showed me pictures of another dumpsite. It was a lake. He said that two women had been thrown in. He had pictures of their bodies. He called them ‘Sailor’ and ‘Prospect’.
I had given up all hope of being found alive when he piled me with drink and dumped me by the roadside. For a long time I wondered if he had been trying to kill me. But now, looking back, since he had hidden his face the whole time, I started to think that he knew that he couldn’t be linked back to me.

Tamin was silent for a moment after Bernadette had finished speaking. She knew that this poor woman had just let out everything that she had had locked away for thirteen years, simply because no-one would believe her. If she had told anyone, they would have said that her brain had been damaged by the coma.

Maybe sometimes Bernadette had believed that she had imagined everything and her former husband was guilty.

The only words that Tamin could muster were, “Thank you very much, Bernadette; I cannot possibly imagine what you must have been through. When we catch this guy, I promise you that we will do our best to convict him.”

Bernadette nodded. “I know. There is one more thing, though.”

Tamin listened as Bernadette divulged this vital piece of information.

“When he dumped me, I heard him say, loud and clear, that ‘he’d gone within the radius’.”

“Sorry?” Tamin asked.

“On the tape,” Bernadette explained, “he said that if he would let any of – us – go, then he would dump us more than twenty miles from his home.”

Tamin repeated this to her colleagues on the phone, standing in Bernadette’s driveway.

“Are you sure?” Carisi asked her, “She was drunk and it was thirteen years ago.”

“I’m pretty sure,” Tamin confirmed, “The kidnapper must live within twenty miles of New Marlborough.”

Carisi brought a map up on the screen. “That still covers three different states.”

“I’m coming back,” Tamin responded as she made her way to the car, “I’m pretty sure that the house is isolated, somewhere in the country.”

“That’s a lot of ground to cover,” Carisi said, “Even if he owned the house in 2008, he might not live there now.”

“I think we should look at the information he provided regarding other victims.” Tamin suggested.

Carisi looked at the files. “What did he call them, again?”

“Sailor and Prospect. They would have been killed before 2008.”

Carisi looked at the notes. “Rosa Woodham was taken from Prospect Avenue.”

“And Sailor?”

He looked at the cases prior to 2008. “The hen night that Heather Lowell attended had a sailing theme. I think that Heather and Rosa are in the same body of water. Was she sure that it was a lake?”

“Yeah,” Tamin answered him, “Does that help?”

There was a few moments’ silence as Carisi scanned the map. “There are a few lakes Upstate, but the town that Heather disappeared from is situated by Great Sacandaga Lake. I’ll ask Huang. Thanks anyway, Tamin.”

Sidney stepped back, the scissors in his hand as he examined Noah. Noah’s curls lay all around him in a heap and his hair was now dark brown.

“I think that you look wonderful,” Sidney smiled to himself.

Noah didn’t think so.

“I want to see Mommy.” He turned around and looked up at Sidney.

The man frowned and loudly placed the scissors back into the drawer. “Sure. I’ll show you Mommy very soon.”

“It’s been days,” Noah argued, a tear running down his cheek, “Please.”

Sidney felt the gears inside of his brain turn as a wonderfully horrible idea planted itself inside. “OK, sport,” he took Noah’s hand, “I’ll take you down.”

When Sidney switched the light on, he made his way over to the coffin. Knocking on the lid, he called out, “Olivia, dear, there’s someone here to see you.”

Taking the lid off and letting it clatter to the ground, he gestured for Noah to come closer. “It’s OK, don’t be shy.”

What Noah saw next would surely haunt him for the rest of his life.

There were splatters in Olivia’s hair. Three of her nails had been torn out. It looked as if her eye was missing. Her face was swollen and there were bruises scattered all over her body.

Sidney curled his fingers around Noah’s shoulder and gripped it tightly. “You should have seen the other one,” he let out a small chortle, “Your mommy must be a very brave – or a very foolish – woman to put up with all of this, just for you. She hasn’t said ‘no’ once in eleven days.”

Eleven days. That was how long they had been here, Olivia realized. She wanted to rip Sidney’s arm away from her son and beat his face into the floor. But she couldn’t. She was stuck here, a prisoner of a madman.

Noah was stock still, his lip trembling, trying not to cry and failing miserably.

“You can see, Liv,” Sidney’s gaze went from Olivia to Noah and back, “I haven’t harmed a single hair on your little boy’s head. He’s perfectly alright. Now, I’m sure you can agree that he has seen enough. And I promise not to hurt him. After all, it can get so lonely, jumping from place to place with just my trophies to keep me company. I barely talk to my family and most of them hate me anyway. It’s interesting, Liv, to see how a young mind can be molded.”

He smirked and turned Noah on his heel before ushering him out of the room and into the linen cupboard opposite.

“Now,” Sidney came back into the basem*nt and shut the door, “you need to remember that when I make a promise, I keep it. I became the man I am today after I saw my mother die in front of me. I wonder if the same thing will happen to Noah.”

Olivia didn’t even have the strength to shake her head in fury. Sidney was a relentless animal. He abducted, raped, tortured and murdered women, threatening their children all the while. Even if Sidney was telling the truth and he would spare Noah, what did that mean for him? Or for her? Would Noah be able to recover from losing another mother? He had never known Ellie Porter, but he knew about how much Shelia had loved him and how she had betrayed them in the most awful of ways.

Would a combination of unfortunate and tragic circ*mstances, all before being ‘raised’ by a psychopathic serial killer and con artist change her son into the very person she had spent her life on the force putting behind bars?

Olivia imagined, in ten or twenty years’ time, Noah being arrested for swindling an old woman out of her savings, or for committing a murder with Sidney. She saw her son having his DNA taken, Rollins and Carisi and Fin and Elliot being informed of what happened to the little boy they had once known. Of her friends being character witnesses at Noah’s eventual trial, followed by his imprisonment in an institution if he was lucky.

Of her friends crying over her grave and holding a funeral that was many years late.

Olivia’s name and photograph being plastered next to those of many other women, all of whom would forever be linked to Sidney Barlow and Noah Porter-Benson. The vicious, woman-hating sociopath and his victim turned accomplice.

Olivia let herself cry again.

Chapter 7: The Justice and the Seven of Wands

Chapter Text

Justice - Justice, karma, truth, fairness, responsibility, judges, lawyers, the legal system.

Seven of Wands - Courage, standing up for yourself, obstacles that must be overcome, standing your ground, pushing through obstacles, challenges from many sources, not an easy task.

It had been twelve days since Olivia and Noah had been kidnapped. The video of the press conference had been seen by more than eight million people in the first four hours. By the end of the day, more than forty-six million people had watched it.

People were talking about Olivia Benson everywhere. On crime forums, on true crime blogs, on general interest sites, even on blogs run by supposed psychics, although Rollins privately decided that they might not be as accurate. It was a little creepy, though, that in two separate readings (both in the same afternoon) pulled out the Page of Pentacles, albeit in different positions.

She looked up from the screen as Barba made his way in. “Hello,” she pushed her chair out to get up, “I wondered when you would turn up.”

“Well, I was handed the Adkins case and I had to do everything myself,” Barba sighed, placing his hands in his pockets, “Any news?”

Rollins shook her head. “No. Sorry.” Then she tried to comfort him. “We’ll catch him, I know we will.”

Barba didn’t seem convinced. “It’s been twelve days, Rollins. The higher-ups are thinking about moving your squad onto another case.”

Rollins went pale. “They can’t do that!”

“They’re not closing the case,” Barba put his hands up in a bid to reassure her, “They want people who are not emotionally involved.”

“But we will identify this man,” Rollins pleaded, “I – I’m certain.” Rollins didn’t want to say that she’d found out through a contact given to her by Barba’s Amazon daughter. The less they reminded him of Psycho Buffy the better.

“We all hope,” Barba looked Rollins in the eye, trying to make her see things from his point of view, “But – It’s not like William Lewis. Back then we knew his name. We had enough breadcrumbs to search.”

“And we were almost too late,” Rollins argued, “Barba, did you know that Tamin and I were in the parking lot as well?”

She had been inside of a taxi, since she had exited the building with Carisi, but it was still the same.

“That’s the problem,” Barba sighed, “A lot of people – myself included – think that you’re too close to this case.”

“It’s not just Liv we’re fighting for,” Rollins strode up to the board, where she jabbed at the names in the Massachusetts cluster, “Eloise Harris, Rachael Barnes, Rebecca Brittain, Wendy Brent, Susan Clark, Claire Pierce. And these are just the victims we can name, from one state."

She pointed towards Vermont. "Roberta Leonard, Gwendoline Aitken, Maria Townsend, Isabel and Amber Landon, Flora Belanger - none of them have been found."

Rollins jabbed at the names in the New York State cluster and repeated their names. Maybe it was due to anxiety over being unable to help Olivia, or perhaps anger that it had almost been her name on that list, that it had almost been Jessie and Billie's names that the kidnapper had whispered into her ear, but she was desperate and tired and hungry and fed up.

"This guy’s operated in at least five states, maybe more. Rachael Barnes killed herself. Rebecca Brittain went mad. Barba, we think – we know – that he’s responsible for thirteen other murders. Twelve families who need to know what happened to their mothers, their wives, their daughters. Please, listen to me when I say that we will catch this guy.”

Barba paused as he thought. He pointed his index finger at Rollins. “You better be right.”

He turned around and Rollins sat down with a sigh. Maybe Barba was right; this case was getting to her.

She looked over Rebecca Brittain’s original statement from 2006. It mentioned something about her being found with a butterfly hair-bobble. None of her children could remember owning one.

However, twenty-four-year-old Wendy Brent’s two nieces (whom she had been living with when she disappeared a couple of weeks after Rebecca) did own butterfly hair-bobbles and that Wendy had had one in her purse when she went missing.

The thought sent an icy chill down Rollins’ spine. The kidnapper had held two women at once. Rebecca Brittain probably remembered Wendy’s face, if not her name. If the police had taken Rebecca seriously from the start, Wendy Brent could have been found in time.

Then the lives of countless women would have been spared.

Rollins wondered if she would still be able to work in sex crimes when they found this man. Not ‘if’. ‘When’.

Looking back at the Massachusetts map, she got a good look at the dots that represented women that were still missing.

Eloise Harris, 30, had gone missing from Middleborough in 2006. Wendy Brent had last been seen in Bridgewater in 2007. Susan Clark, 26, had been seen in Carver in 2009. Clare Pierce, 37, had been jogging by Elders Pond in Lakeville in 2010.

Three of the abductions made a triangle with Eloise near the center.

As Rachael and Rebecca had been taken from Cape Cod and found in Rhode Island, it only made sense that the abductor was based in or near the triangle.

“Hey,” Rollins stood up as Carisi walked by, “I think our guy might have owned property in this area.” She circled the triangle with her finger, before sharing her reasoning.

“You might be onto something, Amanda,” Carisi thanked her, “But we still need to look at Bernadette’s statement.”

“He could own several properties at once,” Rollins suggested, “He keeps going back to the general areas that he took victims from.”

She began to explain. “See? The cluster Upstate – which, as you said, covers Great Sacandaga Lake – took place several years apart. But he stayed in the same area. It’s the same in Vermont; they make another shape.”

“But Shannon Wright went missing in Concord.” Carisi argued.

Rollins’ eyes lit up as a thought occurred to her. “He might abduct women in Vermont and hold them in New Hampshire. He certainly wasn’t afraid to discard other victims across state lines. If Bernadette was right then it stands to reason that he also has a house somewhere in Connecticut.”

“Connecticut?” Carisi asked, perplexed.

“He has one house Upstate, but I don’t think that he would be prepared to drive more than a hundred and fifty miles to take a victim, no matter how desperate he was. Chances are that he has a house in each state. If Huang’s right and our guy is a con artist then owning houses in different states under different aliases would make it harder to catch him.”

Carisi mused this over in his head. “Huang told me that our guy would stick to a routine. Maybe we haven’t found a possible location for his house in Connecticut because he hasn’t taken any low-risk victims from that area.”

“The idea that he took victims that we haven’t been able to identify is just unsettling,” Rollins went over to her desk and looked at a scaled-down version of the map, “He’s probably within the Connecticut area of this map.”

“But even so,” Rollins shook her head, her ponytail flying, “This covers a lot of ground. This guy has been killing for almost twenty years and has been a con artist for goodness knows how long.”

“Let’s assume that he brought the house Upstate sometime before the end of 2002 – or at least tricked someone into handing him the deed,” Carisi began, “He had access to the house in Massachusetts at the very least in April 2006. The house in either Vermont or New Hampshire would have been brought before Roberta Leonard’s disappearance in 2011.”

“And Connecticut?” Rollins asked him.

Carisi scratched the back of his neck. “Before Bernadette’s abduction in 2008. So I think that we need to look for men aged about –“ he looked back at Bernadette’s statement. “ – thirty in 2008, who brought a house in the north-western corner of Connecticut before then.”

Rollins smiled for the first time in days and placed her hands on her hips. “How are we supposed to find that? I’m not a supercomputer.”

Carisi responded with, “Huang’s contacts at Quantico. I bet they could find the answer lickety-split.”

Sidney stood back as he pulled the lever again.

Olivia was hanging down from the ceiling by her arms, her hands cuffed above her and dangling from a hook. Her ankles were attached to a leg-spreader and there was an assortment of items in a cardboard box on the floor. A light-bulb, a rather large carrot, an axe handle and a football.

He asked, sitting on the armchair, “Which one first, do you think?”

“Please,” Olivia begged him, “Do whatever you want to me. But let Noah go.”

Sidney tutted, shaking his head. “And let him live in a foster home with no-one to comfort him when he gets sad? I think that I would rather live with wolves.”

Olivia wanted the see Sidney be ripped apart by wolves, but she kept her mouth shut.

“Be grateful that you’re not upside-down,” Sidney spoke to Olivia as if speaking to a disobedient child, “I’ve got a set of lovely photos I can show you from my slideshow.”

He held up a remote and turned around ninety degrees in his chair.

Olivia could see the pictures as they shone on the wall opposite. All of them showed women hanging from the very same hook that Olivia was now strung up on.

“This one I call ‘Major Barmaid and the Reverse Cowgirl’,” Sidney once again sounded as if he were narrating a documentary, “Here is ‘Vodka and the Train Tunnel’.”

‘Vodka’ was a woman with frizzy blonde hair hanging upside down, her mouth forced open with wire gag.

“Here is ‘Mustard the Piñata’. I liked that one.” Sidney looked back at Olivia. “I still have that baseball bat. Does Noah like baseball?”

“You leave my son out of it.”

“But that’s the thing,” Sidney held up one finger and pushed himself up up quickly out of the chair, “He’s not your son, is he? He’s not your biological child.”

Olivia’s mind went back to the conspiracy theorists who wanted to take Noah and Jessie away from her and Amanda, simply because a rumor had been published online that the NYPD were turning a blind eye to underage sex trafficking.

One comment had demanded that the children be forced to take a DNA test. Olivia’s fear was that one of those nutcases would actually succeed, even after the website had been shut down. If someone had taken Jessie and given her a DNA test from an independent clinic, then it would definitely have shown that she was Amanda’s child.

But if that same person had done the same with her and Noah, the test would have come back negative and people would have been screaming about how Noah wasn’t Olivia’s child and that his true mother was a sex slave whose pimp had bribed the NYPD. The ironic part was that they would have been partially right and no amount of paperwork from family courts and adoption agencies would have been able to change everyone’s minds.

“I raised him,” Olivia argued, daring to look Sidney in the eye, “He is my son.”

Sidney shrugged. “Whatever you say, Liv.” Then he picked up the box and sat back down on the armchair, asking, “So, which one first?”

It was just after three am when Sidney took Noah back down to see Olivia.

“Don’t you want to see Mommy, sport?” he asked as Noah tried to squirm away from his arms, “You’ve been asking for her. Don’t you love her?”

Noah didn’t want to see his mother beaten black and blue with scars developing over her body.

Olivia’s vision was distorted from the beatings and the blood, but she still make out where Noah was. As she lay in the coffin, hands and ankles manacled, she managed to look up at Sidney.

“Please,” she pleaded with him, “Don’t – Don’t take me away from Noah.”

Sidney did not answer. Instead, he pulled Noah in front of his chest and clutched his shoulders.

“Your mommy doesn’t love you, Noah,” he leaned down and whispered into his ear, “If she did, she wouldn’t let you see her like this.”

He tilted his head and looked down at Olivia.

“Nighty-night.”

Sometime after seven am on the fourteenth day, Sidney decided to drive into town.

This time, however, he had Noah in the passenger seat with him. He’d cleaned him up, wiped his tears and changed his clothes.

“Remember what I said, Noah,” Sidney told him as they parked at the very edge of the street, away from the security cameras, “Be good or else.”

Or else Sidney might abandon him by the side of the road and let Noah spend his days in the foster system. Or else he would make sure that Olivia would never be found. Or else he might go to another country alone and kidnap a little boy from another loving family in a place where the authorities didn’t care about their poor.

“America doesn’t care about its poor, either, no matter what color they are,” Sidney had scoffed, “Neither does Britain, or Germany, or any country in the so-called Western world.”

Once they entered the store, Sidney called out towards the shopkeeper, waving merrily.

“Hi, Dan!” he grinned eagerly, “How’s things?”

“Oh, they’re fine and dandy, Sidney.” the cheerful man exclaimed, as Sidney made his way over, clutching Noah’s wrist tightly. Then he held up a finger, remembering something. “How’s your wife?”

“Well, she’s clearly better otherwise I wouldn’t have been allowed to open the store,” the man shrugged.

Sidney nodded. “I completely understand. I haven’t been able to see my dad, either.”

Of course, Sidney didn’t care about his father. When he was finally old enough to own property, he had managed to convince his elderly, widowed father into handing the deed over, before shutting him away in a nursing home in Boston. His brothers and sisters argued that since they were older they should get the house. Sidney had told them that their father had given him the property and they certainly weren’t allowed back there.

Partly because he needed somewhere to hold sex slaves.

“Tell her that I wish her all the best,” Sidney comforted the man, “Your sons, too.”

“I’m very proud of the both of them.” The shopkeeper placed his arms on the counter and leaned on them.

“Say hello.” Sidney dug his nails into Noah’s palm. Noah glanced over at the man behind the counter. While he was too scared to say anything in case Sidney kept his word, he did manage to give a short wave.

“And who’s this young chap?” the shopkeeper smiled down at Noah.

Sidney gripped Noah’s hand tighter. “My nephew.”

The shopkeeper didn’t feel the need to ask. He already knew about Sidney’s huge family. They’d come by a few years ago, on the rare occasion that they chose to visit Sidney, before they bought half of the goods for a Fourth of July barbecue and left muddy bootprints all over the floor.

“The usual, then?” The shopkeeper nodded towards some ice cream.

“Oh, I’m not sure,” Sidney sucked air through his teeth, “What do you want, sport?”

Noah didn’t say anything. He only looked at the ground.

“Is he OK?”

“Oh, he’s fine,” Sidney playfully chuckled, “He’s just staying with me while his parents are fixing their marriage.”

“I see,” the man nodded, “Sad, isn’t it? Over the holidays as well.”

Sidney knew that he shouldn’t be too co*cky. The quicker he got Noah out of here, the better.

“Just a tuna-and-mayo sandwich, please,” he pointed at the shelves, “And I guess I’ll get this little guy a hot dog.”

“Coming right up.” The shopkeeper turned his back.

Sidney smirked up at the camera, fully aware of what he was doing. Although he was holding Noah’s hand, the little boy instead looked away.

Sidney’s one mistake in this whole fiasco had been underestimating Noah. Sidney had simply believed that Noah was a frightened, nervous little boy who wanted to go home. He hadn’t taken into account that when he had shoved Noah into the laundry room, the child had found Olivia’s police badge, kept as a trophy in a cardboard box behind the towels.

Around eight hours after Sidney paid for his goods and led Noah away, the shopkeeper started to rearrange the potato chips. His eyes bulged when he saw a police badge wedged underneath the chocolate bars.

He couldn’t remember any police coming into the store. Hang on a minute; wasn’t there a cop missing from New York?

Picking the badge up with a pair of tongs, the shopkeeper made his way into the back room and started to call the local station.

“They might have found something,” Fin came up to Tamin’s desk, “Litchfield, Connecticut. Someone found Liv’s badge.”

As Fin explained what had happened, Tamin glanced at the map, still up on the wall. “The town of Litchfield is just inside of the radius. How does he think it ended up in his store?”

“The cops up there are taking a look of the security footage,” he told them, “They’re sending a copy over for us to look. He doesn’t remember any suspicious people; just regulars looking for holiday merchandise. People he trusts.”

“That’s the problem,” Tamin got up and started to follow Fin, “We never suspect the people we know.”

Rollins and Tamin sat down in front of the computer in the forensics lab, their eyes peeled and their hearts pounding.

“I can’t see Liv anywhere,” Tamin said to herself, “But I really don’t think that he would let her outside.”

“He might let Noah outside,” Rollins argued, before she pointed frantically at the screen, “I think that’s him!”

She was sure that it was Noah. His hair had been cut and dyed and he wore clothes that were far too big for him. But it was him. The man who had come into the store with Noah was gripping his wrist tightly. That wasn’t the way that a loving parent would hold a child’s hand.

But Rollins knew for sure when she saw Noah place the badge underneath the chocolate.

“It’s him,” Rollins could hear her heart in her ears, “That’s Noah.”

In the house on Orchard Street the psychic looked back at her cards. It was a pity that the cop hadn’t returned for the rest of her reading. She still had the results written down in her notebook.

Glancing back at her notes, she reread what she had found.

Three specific cards had fallen out. The Five of Pentacles, reversed. The Five of Cups. The Chariot.

Maybe she should do another reading, just in case circ*mstances had changed in the two weeks since the policewoman had gone missing.

Unbeknownst to her, the NYPD were already racing up to Connecticut. Within an hour they would have the name and address of the man who had been in the store with Noah; Sidney Barlow, forty-one, who lived alone not far from Route 63.

But what would they find when they got there?

Which one of these three cards spelt out Benson’s fate?

Chapter 8: Temperance

Chapter Text

Temperance - Harmony, balance, blending and blending opposites, self-help and self-acceptance.

GOOD ENDING
Five of Pentacles, reversed - Coming out of a dark period, a turn for the better, finding sanctuary, finding hope, temporary setbacks at home or work.

As soon as Carisi reached the basem*nt door, he called out, “NYPD! Open up!”

He listened with his ear against the door, but all he could hear was a small whimper. Nodding towards the SWAT team, Carisi moved back up the stairs.

The door was battered down within a few seconds. Carisi heard a small squeak from inside. Running down, he shone his flashlight around the room.

Ignoring the terrifying items for the time being, he looked towards the armchair. Running over to it, he shone the light down.

Sidney Barlow let go of Noah and raised his hands.

“Noah?” Carisi asked him, trying to be as gentle as he could, “Amanda’s outside. These guys will take you to her.”

Noah darted out and made his way over to the SWAT team before he headed up the stairs.

Carisi tried his very best to stop his hands from shaking as he held the gun directly between Barlow’s eyes.

“Where’s Olivia Benson?”

There was a faint knocking sound from behind Carisi. Two members of the SWAT team made their way over and gingerly removed the lid.

As soon as he heard the lid clatter to the floor, Sidney’s eyes turned downwards and he licked his lip. Carisi called out, eyes still on Barlow, “Is she OK?”

Olivia was lying down in the coffin, almost unconscious. Her eyelids fluttered and she groaned softly.

“She’s alive,” one of the team replied, “We need a medic!”

As soon as Noah made his way out of the front door, a member of the SWAT team helping him on his way, Amanda’s heart skipped a beat. Racing towards him, she knelt down and asked, “Noah, are you OK?”

Noah whimpered, his fist close to his mouth.

“Noah, where’s Mommy? Is she OK?”

“I don’t know.” Noah answered, quietly.

“I-Is she alive? Noah, was she breathing?”

“I don’t know.” Noah’s eyes were starting to well up.

Before Amanda could do anything else, she saw one of the SWAT team nearby speak into his radio. She could only make out the word ‘ambulance’.

If they were calling for an ambulance, surely this meant that Olivia was still alive?

Amanda dared to hope.

A few minutes passed. Then, just as the ambulance arrived, she saw Olivia being carried out on a stretcher.

Olivia was alive. It had taken fourteen days, but they had managed to find her in time.

At least, Rollins hoped that they had found her in time. Even from over here, she could see that her captain appeared to be in bad shape.

Then Carisi dragged Sidney out of the main entrance, towards the car. Amanda glared at him. This was the man who had abducted, raped and tortured her captain. Her friend. The man who had sent the squad a videotape of Olivia being raped.

They had caught him.

She knew that they would.

Barlow smirked at Carisi and Rollins as he sat in the back of the car.

“How many?” Carisi asked him, digging his fingers into the steering wheel in an attempt to restrain himself.

“How many women?” Barlow asked, pretending to be confused.

Rollins decided to take over. Turning around in her seat, she asked him, “How many women did you kill? We know that you took Bernadette Chancellor. We’re also pretty certain that you took Rebecca Brittain and Rachael Barnes and twelve other women. But how many did you take in all?”

Barlow shifted about, trying to make himself comfortable. “If you include Officer Benson and her boy, then…forty-five.”

“Forty-five?” Carisi asked in surprise.

Barlow nodded at him, smiling. “Forty-five. The ones that you didn’t notice were prostitutes, runaways, single mothers from homeless shelters, alcoholic mothers. I took a Hispanic cleaner once. The runaways I offered food, the prostitutes…well, you can imagine.”

“And the mothers? Did you threaten their children as well?” Rollins asked.

Barlow grinned, showing off his teeth. “You seem to know much about me, ma’am. I have a list somewhere in one of my houses.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Rollins eyed him carefully, “We’re checking them.”

Then she thought about Olivia. Would her friend ever return to the force? She wasn’t entirely sure. Higher-ups would offer retirement and a pension, given the circ*mstances. Even if Olivia wanted to return to work, she might chose to work in a different department, away from victims of sexual abuse.

Their lives would never be the same and Rollins knew that all too well.

“You do realize that we’ll drench Great Sacandaga Lake.” She told him, looking at the road ahead of her. It had been years, but maybe they might find something.

Sidney lay back and smirked at her. He seemed to thoroughly enjoy talking about his victims to a woman. Maybe he recognized her from the restaurant parking lot, maybe not.

“We’ll find them,” Carisi butted him, though he doubted that Sidney would answer him, “Heather, Rosa, Lorena. We’ll find them in the lake.”

“Seven,” Sidney answered, as if telling Carisi how many people he had beat at tennis, “There are seven bodies in the lake.”

But it had been so long and the lake was so large that the families might never receive their loved ones’ bodies.

Sidney gave the two officers his victims’ nicknames. “Sailor, Sally Annie, Caramel Sandals, Prospect, Westchester, Amtrak and Pikachu. Pikachu got her name because of the toy I saw on the counter when I broke into her house.”

He paused. “You won’t find any of them. I took Sally Annie and Caramel Sandals from the same block in Schenectady, three months apart.”

“Even if you know their names, you won’t tell us, I bet.” Carisi snarled.

Sidney lay back in his seat. “That’s right, Officer.”

“How many bodies were recovered from the Litchfield house?” Barba asked Rollins. She and Fin were in his office. Barba was going to hand the case over to another lawyer, one who was not attached to the NYPD, but he still wanted all of the details anyway.

“Nine,” Rollins answered, “He dug seven graves.”

Barba swore, running a hand over his face as he lay back in his seat.

The New Hampshire State Police were excavating Highland Mountain. They were looking for the ten victims that Barlow claimed were buried there.

Some of the nicknames had been linked to known victims. To be specific, the excavation was an attempt to find the remains of schoolteacher Roberta Leonard, 36 (School); Gwendoline Aitken, 44 (Skiing), who had gone missing after taking her daughter and her friends out for the afternoon; Maria Townsend, 29, abducted after spending the day with her children at a carnival (Halloween); Isabel Landon, 42, and Amber Landon, 22, last seen at their home in Jericho (Jericho Mom and Jericho Girl); and Flora Belanger, 32, taken just over two weeks before Christmas 2017 (Christmas Cake).

But Barlow had provided nicknames. He did not reveal their real names, if he knew them. The police had had no choice but to call the unidentified women Hogg (Rollins was sure that the second ‘g’ was significant), Lucky, Otter Creek, Maple and Cowgirl.

It was a similar case in Massachusetts. Four of Barlow’s victims from Massachusetts had been named (six if you included Rachael and Rebecca), but he said that he had murdered twelve women in his childhood home.

He provided nicknames for these victims, too. Beach, Ugly Betty (Eloise Harris), Nazarene Street Mission, Sushi Club, Mexican, Sandwich (Rachael Barnes), Lanky (Wendy Brent), Corkscrew Curls (Rebecca Brittain), Carver Receptionist (Susan Clark), Elders Pond (Claire Pierce), Pixie, Worcester, Quincy, Border Bunny and Parrot.

But what saddened Rollins about that while list that Barlow provided could help to identify his victims, at the same time it dehumanized them. It reduced them to words on a piece of paper.

This women and girls had been real people, with real hopes and dreams. Almost every one of them had had families or children.

Barlow had taken that away from them.

Rollins wriggled in her seat. “Should we make a statement?” she asked, “We need people to identify the victims.”

There was a moment of silence as Barba let the situation sink in. “Those – photos – are far too p*rnographic to show to the public eye. If anyone – believes – that Barlow took their loved one, then they should go to the FBI. But, for now, we need to concentrate on Olivia and Noah. Do you think that Olivia will be ready to make a statement any time soon?”

Carisi sighed. “I’m not sure, Rafe. I really don’t.”

Even if his friend hadn’t been involved, Carisi knew that this would have been a difficult case.

He ran a hand down his face and then looked across at Rollins. “She’ll be fine. Liv’s a fighter. We can get through this.”

It was two days before she dared to visit Olivia in the hospital. Noah was staying with her until Olivia could be released, but Amanda was not quite sure how long that would be.

Amanda felt terrible about having to take Noah to the police station in Torrington, to listen to his statement about what Sidney had done to them over the course of fourteen days. She felt dreadful about taking him to have a rape kit done, despite the fact that the results showed no evidence of abuse.

Olivia had been in intensive care. The doctors said that her pelvis had suffered extensive damage. She was partially blind in one eye. Her fingernails had been ripped out and her arms and legs were mutilated.

But the worst part was that there was such a large tear in her vagin* – a tear that had become infected – that if she hadn’t been brought in then she would have likely died within the next twelve hours.

Amanda braced herself for what she would see. But she was still unprepared for what Olivia looked like.

“Amanda?” the older woman managed to croak, “Where’s Noah?”

Amanda sat down in the chair next to the bed. “I didn’t want him to see you.”

“He has seen me like this.” Olivia squeezed her eyes shut.

Amanda took a deep breath as she informed her friend of what was going to happen now, although Olivia certainly suspected it.

“The higher-ups don’t want you to come back any time soon.”

Olivia responded, “I understand.” She still sounded miserable. “But I don’t want to be a victim.”

“Almost no-one does,” Amanda shook her head, “They’re willing for you to come back at some point – if that’s what you want – but we’re not sure about field work.”

“Amanda –“ Olivia began.

“Liv, you’re almost blind!” Amanda argued. “Not to mention any possible PTSD you might encounter if you work with Special Victims.”

“I do not have PTSD.” Even close to death, Olivia still stood her ground.

“Liv, please,” Amanda pleaded with her friend to see reason, “They want what’s best for you.”

Olivia sighed, looking back up towards the ceiling. “I guess so.”

Amanda squeezed her friend’s hand, daring herself to smile.

They would get through this.

BAD ENDING

Chariot - Drive, ambition, victory, a journey, transportation, success with little or no support.

The house was empty. The curtains had all been drawn, the doors had all been locked, the van was missing.

They were too late.

“Amanda,” Carisi ran up to her from the car, “Forensics are going to try and open the basem*nt door.”

“OK,” Amanda nodded, trying her best not to cry but letting the tears flow in any case.

Carisi didn’t cry, but he sounded as if he might. “Amanda,” he could barely muster the words, “They found Barlow’s van in Canada.”

“Canada?” Amanda croaked. “H-He might still be close –“

Carisi took her hands in his. “Amanda, it was found a block away from the Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu airport.”

The nearest airport across the border.

“When?” she asked.

“It was left in a parking lot just after one this afternoon. The security tapes showed Barlow and Noah walking away together.”

Sidney had set off for Canada as soon as he had left the convenience store. By the time the shopkeeper had found the badge Sidney and Noah had already passed through customs and were about to board the plane.

“Do they know which flight they took?” Amanda was barely clutching at straws.

“We don’t even know if they arrived at the airport.” Carisi argued.

“OF COURSE THEY DID!” Amanda found herself shouting at him. She stopped, took a deep breath and wiped away tears from her cheek.

“Of course they did.”

Carisi knew it was against protocol, but he let Amanda cry into his shirt.

As they did so, the SWAT team made a horrifying discovery in the garden. After glancing at the flowerbeds, trying to find a freshly dug grave, one of them found himself looking towards the barbecue. Walking close, he saw remnants of a bra and a pair of knickers. There was also evidence that the barbecue had been used recently, to burn something large.

Then he saw the skull at the back.

According to the autopsy (thankfully not performed by Melinda Warner) Olivia had died between twelve and eighteen hours before the SWAT team had arrived. Barlow must have killed her and disposed of her body before packing up to leave. He had chosen the Fourth of July as it meant that everyone would be distracted.

Even the fact that broken thyroid bones revealed that Olivia had died quickly provided little comfort.

It had been a month since Sidney Barlow had murdered Olivia and fled to Canada with Noah.

The squad had wanted to put off the funeral until Noah came home, but they couldn’t wait any longer.

Everyone that she knew was in attendance. Fin, Rollins, Carisi and Tamin were there, of course, as was Elliot and his children. Munch and Claudia sat together in the back row beside Fin, the older man trying to reassure his former partner. Cragen, Warner, Novak, Barba, Amaro, Stone and Garland all attended. Lake gave his condolences from prison.

Amanda held Jessie’s hand as they walked behind Olivia’s coffin.

The woman had never believed that she would end up attending Olivia Benson’s funeral. Even if she did, she would have expected Olivia to be killed in the line of duty. Not gutted like a fish in front of her son.

They had scoured all flights leaving the airport that day. The closest they had gotten was that a man matching Sidney Barlow’s description had hopped on a plane to San Pedro Sula, but the flight had already landed by the time the FBI had managed to confirm that it was him.

Barlow and Noah could still be in Honduras or – as Rollins suspected – had hired a car under another name and sneaked across the border into Guatemala or Belize. Or even taken another flight from another airport and left the Americas entirely.

“What happened to Aunty Olivia?” Jessie asked Amanda during the ceremony.

Amanda felt her eyes well with tears. Jessie was far too young to understand any of this. She just stroked her daughter’s hair and told her that ‘a bad man’ had killed Olivia.

A bad man that she was determined to catch.

“We will get him,” she had told everyone when the funeral was over and she made her way over to the car, “We will get Barlow.”

Noah looked out at the waves in front of him. He had never seen water this blue before. He curled his toes in the white sand and looked back at Sidney.

Sidney was sitting on the edge of the pavement, his shirt open and wearing flip-flops. He wore sunglasses atop his newly-dyed hair and had coated his body in suncream. “You enjoying yourself, sport?” he asked, sipping at a beer can.

Noah didn’t say anything. He instead looked back at the sea. Due to the fact that it was almost winter tourists would soon crowd the place. He and Sidney would simply be two more Americans enjoying themselves after eighteen months of being introverts.

This would make it easier for them to slip away unnoticed.

At that moment Sidney got up from the pavement and came back behind him. “We’re going to have fun, Malcolm,” he took Noah’s hand and began to lead him back to the car, “When foreigners are on holiday they get co*cky. Even when it isn’t tourist season, there are a lot of retirees that can be swindled. And the best part about living in a Third World country such as Belize is that there are many, many women whose disappearances won’t be noticed. When we’re done here and we have the money we can go anywhere. Spain, Aruba, Italy – a country with hot sands and enough rich foreigners to trick. Or I could go to Germany or Switzerland. I could take you skiing. You want to go skiing, sport?”

He saw how downhearted Noah looked. Crouching in front of him, Sidney did his best to reassure him.

“I know you’re sad about your mom, son. But in time you’ll begin to realize that you have no-one left in this world besides me. So, what do you say? I can show you the world. I can do amazing things with you, see wonderful places with you. You won’t even have to go to school. Although I could buy you a few old textbooks from when I was young. What do you say?”

Noah still scowled. This man had killed Mom. He had taken Noah away from everything he knew. But Noah knew how dangerous Sidney could be. If he angered Sidney then the man might break his promise to Mom and kill Noah. And he would certainly make sure that his body would never be found.

Noah nodded silently. Sidney grinned and patted him on the shoulder.

“I knew you’d say that. Come on, let’s get going.”

The two of them walked back to the car, holding hands as they went.

BITTERSWEET ENDING

Five of Cups - Sadness, feeling disappointed, feeling let down or betrayed, despondency, some losses, negative thinking, depression, mourning.

Fin tried to open the bedroom door but found it locked. “NYPD! Open up!” he shouted.

Turning to the SWAT team, he nodded at the door and stepped out of the way. They broke it down and stepped through, swinging their guns about.

Fin made his way over to the bed. There was a lot of junk underneath it, but could that possibly mean that there was a large enough space for someone to hide?

Pulling away a large plastic container, then another one, Fin knelt down and shone his flashlight.

The first thing he saw were Sidney’s beady eyes, furious and perhaps a little scared. Sidney had one arm wrapped around Noah’s chest and the other clamped tightly over his mouth.

“Let the boy go.” Fin spoke slowly but firmly.

Sidney loosened his grip and Noah crawled out from under the bed. Sidney followed him, showing his hands at all times. As soon as he was out, Fin demanded, “Where’s Olivia?”

All Sidney did was chuckle loudly.

“Get him out of here!” Fin shoved Sidney towards the SWAT team, before he bent down in front of Noah.

“Noah,” Fin knew that this would be the hardest question he would ever be able to ask, “Where’s Mom?”

Noah looked towards the window, then back at Fin.

“Sidney killed her,” Noah answered, letting himself cry at last, “He killed her two days ago.”

Two Days Earlier…

“I’m sure you can agree,” Sidney sat down on the armchair, “that you would want a quick death. Some of my murders have been quick; strangulations, smothering, even poison. I have even buried a few victims alive. But I have made sure that none of them are found.”

Olivia looked him in the eye, terrified and exhausted. “Please,” she begged, “don’t kill me. N-Noah needs me.”

Sidney sighed, leaning forward in his seat. “Don’t worry, Olivia,” he put on an air of false reassurance, “I won’t kill him. I don’t like to hurt children. How many times do I have to tell you? I’ve booked plane tickets. Under false names, of course. I’m going to show Noah the world. He will have all his little heart desires. You, on the other hand, are going to stay in my garden. It’s your choice if you want to rot or have your ashes scattered.”

He got up and left the room. Olivia faced the camera that she had seen so many times over these past days and felt her heart sink.

She would never see anyone that she loved again. Fin, Rollins, Carisi, Barba, Munch…Elliot…

They would never see her again. Sidney might not even be caught. Olivia and Noah would be yet another unsolved cold case, languishing on dusty shelves and occasionally touched upon on true crime shows.

Please, she begged, Even if I die, let Noah go free.

There were heavy footsteps outside. Sidney had brought Noah downstairs. She didn’t want him to see her yet again in this horrible state. She closed her eyes so that he wouldn’t have to see her cry.

Sidney sat Noah down on the armchair. The boy looked rather sleepy. Olivia wondered if Sidney had drugged him. Sidney knelt down in front of Olivia and held the knife in his hands.

“See, Noah,” Sidney faced him, “Your mommy wasn’t able to fight back. She is weak. If she wasn’t weak, then she would have been able to stop me from breaking into your home. She wouldn’t have made herself so vulnerable. She would have been able to save you from me.”

Olivia felt the pain almost instantly. Her eyes bulged open and she couldn’t stop herself from screaming. She found herself looking directly at Noah, despite her decision not to. Olivia chose to look at Noah instead of Sidney, even though the man dug his nails into her cheek and tried to make her turn her head.

As Olivia Benson slipped away, the white light and white mist surrounding her, she stared at Noah, refusing to look at anything else other than her wonderful son.

Sidney cut up Olivia’s body in the basem*nt.

He forced Noah to help him carry the pieces outside to the barbecue. As soon as the flame roared into life, Noah stopped in his tracks.

Sidney turned around to see why the child was taking so long, before grumbling to himself and lifted one of the heavy garbage bags inside.

“It’s a good thing we have a lot of time,” he had told Noah, “If we were leaving for Canada today then I would only have had the chance to burn one part.”

There was a lake nearby, but even though Sidney had deviated from routine, he didn’t want to drive up there. No, he was going to burn this woman and force her son to watch.

When the sun finally rose the lasts embers of the barbecue died down. Sidney picked up the ashes that were left over and chucked them over the garden.

Olivia Benson would never leave his property.

Rollins and Fin held their flashlights out as they entered the basem*nt. It was already unnerving to think that Olivia had spent her last twelve days in this room and had very likely died in here, but they were unprepared for what they saw.

As Rollins looked at each of the items on the shelves one by one, she felt her stomach churn as she imagined Sidney using them. Using them on her captain.

“Rollins,” Fin called as he picked up a camera from the shelf next to him, “There’s a photo of Liv here.”

She came over to look at it. It featured Olivia sitting on the armchair, her mouth gagged with tape and her arms tied behind her. She was still in the dress that she had worn at the police ball and there were no bruises or marks on her skin yet, so it must have been taken not long after she was kidnapped. The word ‘Cop’ was written in the space below.

Fin opened a drawer. The pile of drivers’ licences inside told Fin that Barlow had kidnapped far more than fourteen victims. He placed his gloved hand inside, gentling pushing the licences aside. There was a photo album at the back of the drawer.

Taking it out, he showed it to Rollins. The two of them held it aloft as Rollins flipped to the back, expecting to see Olivia. Instead, however, she saw someone else; a young woman with messy blonde hair hanging by her wrists from a rafter. The word ‘Angel’ was written underneath. She didn’t appear to be more than sixteen.

Rollins took the album upstairs into the light and placed it on top of the kitchen table, oblivious to the forensic investigators walking around her.

Sidney had given his victims nicknames. He also listed where he had found them, which Rollins supposed might be useful in identifying them. But all she could think about was how Sidney had tortured them.

How he had tortured Olivia.

The names leapt out at Rollins as she counted each of them. Sailor, School, Fifties, Naughty, Mexican, Parrot, Cowgirl, Cupcake, Halloween, Jogger, Cat Lady, India, Skiing, Border Bunny, Sally Annie, Pixie, Lucky…the names went on. In all, Rollins counted forty-three separate women.

She could see why some of the nicknames had been chosen. ‘Pixie’ had a pixie cut. ‘Border Bunny’ was a young Mexican or Hispanic girl. ‘Naughty’ had various tattoos over her arms and chest. ‘Parrot’ was wearing a pair of parrot earrings.

Maybe Barlow could explain why he assigned them these names.

It turned out, as Rollins found to her disgust, that he was very eager to discuss his crimes.

“Some of them were names,” he explained as they drove back to the police station, “India was her name. Lucky’s real name was Kylie.”

“And Sally Annie?” Rollins asked him. They had found out that Barlow tended to answer questions if a female officer spoke to him.

“Salvation Army,” Barlow shrugged, “I sold any jewelry or clothes that they had on them that I didn’t want. No use wasting them, especially if they were worth a lot of money.”

Rollins didn’t want to ask this, but she knew that she had to. “How many women were killed in that particular house?”

Barlow paused for a moment, deep in thought. “Eight. Nine, if you include your dear friend Olivia Benson.”

Carisi felt the bile rising up his throat.

“Eight?” Rollins asked. Barlow nodded slowly, smiling as he remembered them.

“Bluebird, Lutheran, Vodka, Fireworks, Long Wharf, Depressed, India, Mustard.” He said these words loudly and clearly, enunciating each one as he went.

Carisi supposed that ‘Mustard’ was Bernadette Chancellor as she had a mustard allergy and claimed that her abductor had forced her to consume some on numerous occasions. “We’ll identify them,” he argued, “We will get their names back.”

Barlow simply shrugged. “If you insist,” he snorted, “I’ll give you a couple of clues, just because you’ve been such good sports. Lutheran was taken outside of a church. Vodka was a single mother from Danbury. I don’t think she was on your radar because she was a drunken cow and was fighting for custody. Fireworks was kidnapped on New Year’s Eve 2010. That’s all I’m going to give you, for now at least.”

He lay back in his seat as they drew up to the station. “I’ll provide a bit more each time I want something. Better living conditions, perhaps. Or parole.”

Carisi lost it. Parking the car, he turned around in his seat and glared at Barlow.

“Now, listen here, you disgusting excuse for a human being. You murdered our friend. If I wasn’t a cop, trust me when I say that I would have blown your brains out the second you got in the car. You’re never going to get parole; I’ll make sure of that.”

Sidney only shrugged.

“Say what you want, detective. I might not be able to hurt any more s****, but the world will know my name. Everyone will know what I did.”

“They’ll remember Olivia’s name, too,” Carisi argued, getting angrier by the second, “I’ll make sure of that.”

In the days after Noah’s rescue, it seemed as if Sidney was right. His picture was in every newspaper and on every news site that the NYPD could find. Pictures of his houses were present in newspapers from every country in the Western world, as well as a good chunk of the Eastern world. For a few days the coronavirus was pushed to the second pages.

There were also rumors. Rumors that said that Sidney dressed up in his victims’ clothes.

(“How did they get that stupid idea?” Carisi asked.)

As the transcript of the cassette tape had been released, with mentions of Ottoman harems, there was speculation that Sidney was secretly a Muslim.

(“That’s all we need,” Fin had groaned, “Get the Westboro Baptist Church screaming on our streets. Besides, his family are all Protestant. But I doubt any religion would accept someone like Barlow.”)

The worst rumour, in Rollins’ opinion, was that he had abused Noah.

(“The rape kit came back negative,” she had argued, “Noah’s a complete mess, but he wasn’t physically assaulted.”)

For the time being Noah was staying with Amanda and her children. Maybe, she told herself, she could eventually adopt him. It would be horrible to pull Noah away from the people he knew. If he was then he would have been molded the way that Sidney had wanted.

It meant that Sidney would have won.

Amanda sat in her apartment that night, staring at the television in front of her, she gave a deep sigh. Getting up to go to the kitchen area, she poured herself a glass of water.

“Aunty Amanda?” Noah stood at the door.

“Oh, hello, Noah,” she forced herself to smile, “Can’t you get to sleep?”

Noah shook his head. Amanda poured another glass of water and asked him, “Do you want to talk about it?”

Noah nodded. “Can we do it in my room?” he asked.

Amanda answered, “Of course.”

Carrying the two glasses, she made her way into his bedroom.

She told herself that Olivia would want him here, somewhere safe. Noah had a lot of healing to do. Olivia wouldn’t want Noah to suffer. There was going to be a long battle ahead, not just in the courts but inside of Noah’s mind.

Amanda told herself that she would do whatever it took to make sure that Noah did not turn out the way that Sidney had intended.

Noah had been through something terrible. Olivia hadn’t managed to survive, but Amanda was determined that she would do her utmost to make her friend proud.

Because wherever Olivia was, she was looking down on them.

They needed to be brave.

They would be brave.