THE LAST BOY Read Online Free Page A

finger deeply into her chest until it ached.
    “I’m gonna need a good description of the boy.” Pellegrino took out his pad and started jotting notes.“You got a picture on you?”
    Molly fumbled through her wallet. “This is old. He was only a baby here. I got a better one—”
    “This’ll do the for the moment.”
    “Look, we’re losing time just standing here.” Molly pleaded. “If someone kidnapped Danny, he could already be miles away.”
    “ Kidnapped? ” echoed Mrs. Oltz indignantly. “No one's kidnapped anyone!”
    “But I was watching—” Cheryl tried to chime in.
    “Whoa! Hold on everybody,” Pellegrino said.“Let's just do this one step at a time.” His radio squawked and he mumbled something into the mike clipped to his collar. “Give me a description.”
    Molly raced through it. Every last detail. From his curly blond hair to the sneakers he was wearing—those expensive Nikes that she had finally broken down and bought for Danny, the ones with the green whoosh on the side that he called “wings.”
    Pellegrino, scribbling, could hardly keep up with her.
    “ Please ,” Molly begged.“Do something. Fast! ”
    “Don’t worry. All the units picked up this call. Hang on,” he said, and turned back to his mike.“Blond four-year-old. ’Bout forty-fivepounds. Last seen wearing denim overalls. Red flannel shirt. White and green sneakers…”
    When he finished, he turned to Molly. “Look, I know you’re worried. My boys were little once, too, you know,” he said gently. “But kids have a way of getting into things. It usually isn’t as bad as it first looks. We’ll get everything ironed out. You’ll see.”
    Molly had never liked cops. As a kid growing up in Ithaca, she had been dragged in a couple of times. Once for shoplifting some lipstick up at the mall, and once for drinking beer at the falls near the high school. The kids she was hanging out with were always getting hassled, too. The cops in town had always struck her as cold and robot-like. They got their kicks out of busting you. This guy, with his soft blue eyes and silvery temples, however, actually seemed to care and she desperately wanted to trust him.
    “When was the last time anyone saw him and where?” he inquired as he pulled out his notepad.
    “I left at two o’clock, and he was right there,” said Mrs. Oltz pointing emphatically. “On the floor. By that toy box. Playing with two other kids. It was the Ruzicka boy and Patty Bruce. They built a fort out of blocks. And they had a fire truck. They were playing war, and they were getting wild. So I had to get them to pipe down.”
    Molly found herself wondering if Mrs. Oltz was in the habit of bullying the children as she had just done with Cheryl.
    “I remember them playing, too,” agreed Cheryl. Holding her breath, Molly turned to look at her.“And then, about an hour later,” she went on,“I had them clean up so we could have story time.”
    “We always try to get the kids to calm down before the parents start arriving,” added Mrs. Oltz.
    “Was he there—with the other kids?” asked Molly.
    “Yeah,” said Cheryl,“I remember him sitting there. He was joking with the Lifsey boy. Stevie. They kept poking each other and I had to ask them to be quiet so the other kids could hear.”
    “And then?” urged Molly.
    “And then the parents came. And, well…” Cheryl became agitated and her eyes started to well with tears again. “And then…then…he just wasn’t there!”
    Molly stared at her and felt empty.
    “Let me take a look around,” said Pellegrino, pulling a long, black flashlight from his leather belt and heading toward the kitchen. Molly followed. The thing in his hand looked more like a club than a light.“Sometimes a kid’ll just curl up and go to sleep somewhere. You find them and they’re perfectly okay.”
    “But I just searched the place. Everywhere. ” Molly was trying to keep up with him as he strode through the debris