“I can’t say,” I whisper breathlessly. Telling her that is not part of our agreement, and she knows it. “I need the rest of the story. I don’t have a lot of time.”
“You had legions of paparazzi up in this nothing town up on the Minnesota Iron Range. A gorgeous, mysterious wild boy…the way things were headed, his image would’ve been on every computer screen, every supermarket rag, every news show…his own reality show. Teen idol shit. It was human interest but also scientific interest. Some of the experts had this idea he’d become some kind of superalpha, kind of like domesticating wild wolves, because you’re not out there surviving those winters without wolves. There were a few kids in Siberia who survived like that. Everybody wanted a piece of the supposedly beautiful wild boy. Well, you can imagine.”
“Whoa.”
“It’s a miracle no decent photos got out. But the director of the medical center was ex-military, and he ran security like a World War II general. One staffer lured Savage Adonis out a side entrance while he was coming out of anesthetic from some procedure, and we got one shit picture out of that. It was a feeding frenzy for the poor kid, and a few people went to jail off it—I’m forwarding you a shot that never got out. A while later, just when Savage Adonis mania was at its peak, it all got shut down.”
“Shut down?”
“East Webster authorities came out and did a press conference and said it was a hoax. The identities of the people involved in the hoax were under wraps because the person or persons were underage. Something else broke that week, and paparazzi cleared out, and that was that. We dropped it then, too. Better for us that it turned out to be a hoax, in terms of border security image.”
“But you’re not convinced.”
“It always smelled funny. We all thought it. We heard rumors he’d broken out. He had hair down past his shoulders, a beard. Did somebody decide to clean him up and get him out of there for his own sanity? Did he run back to the wilderness? Why wouldn’t anybody talk? Was there money involved? There were a lot of questions.”
“Christ.” I drop to my knees and peer under the door. I’m completely paranoid Donny is out there, waiting to do a push in.
“Here’s what’s interesting. The fingerprints turn up a second time. A year ago, right around Halloween. Rhone County, Minnesota. But the case number is behind a wall. Classified. I wouldn’t have seen it if I hadn’t run it for the gaps and seen the number skip. It’s a glitch. Unfortunately, you need clearance to crack in.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about with the gaps and the number skip, but I hear the word “classified” loud and clear. “Tell me you cracked in.”
“It’s classified, Ann. Classified information,” she says. “National security.”
“What does the wild boy have to do with national security?”
“You know what a…broad umbrella that is. Broad.” There’s a pause, as if she’s choosing her words carefully. “Things get classified for a lot of reasons. It’s possible things get classified just because somebody is playing keepaway. Still. I can’t give you that number or any details.”
“I see,” I whisper, head spinning. Her message between the lines is that I’m not paying her enough for that level of risk.
My blood races. What the hell did 34 do to be deep-sixed like he is? “Thank you.”
“So you’re not going to tell me where you lifted the prints from? I wouldn’t mind knowing. Be grateful to get the end of that saga.”
An investigator to the last. Her message is loud and clear—she wants to know, and she’d owe me one if I told her. But I have to think about 34. “Let me sleep on it,” I say. “I appreciate this.”
“Wish I could help you more.”
“I understand,” I say. “Thank you for trying.”
I take a quick look at my email for the image, and there it is. It’s a blurry shot taken from the shoulders up, and it’s definitely Patient 34. He glares at the camera, beautiful and feral and even a little otherworldly with long beautiful curls half in his face. Scruffy beard. He’s like an angry mystic, pulled down off the mountaintop. So alone. So beautifully, intensely alive.
And actually, she helped me a whole lot, giving everything she could between the lines. She gave me a place—Rhone County. A date—around Halloween a year ago. The fact that she thinks somebody paid to get it classified, which means it’s likely not about national security. Pay-to-classify is a something agents hate almost as much as journalists.
Rhone fucking County. A place where parking-lot fender-benders make headlines. I don’t need a case number, and she knows it.
My beautiful, feral boy. What did he do?
I hold the phone to my chest, staring at the crack of shiny tile outside the door. My gut says Donny’s out there. Fourth floor. What was I thinking coming up here in the afternoon? There’s nothing scheduled up here until dinner. I grab a plunger and press it into the toilet and flush once. Again. Then I call maintenance and report an actively overflowing toilet. I shove a toilet paper roll into there.
And wait, hoping they’ll hurry. I’m missing rounds.
Ten minutes later, Jerry the janitor is at the door. I let him in and speed the other way. Donny’s nowhere, but he was there. I know it in my bones. When you’re a journalist, you learn to trust your instincts.
I get on my rounds and start making up time, but my mind is on 34. I do a quick search of theRhone River Tribuneon my phone while I’m between tasks. I’m unhappy to see there was nothing written about it. Or maybe there was, and it got deleted.
The rest of my shift seems to take forever. I get out of there with a group, make it home by five, and go right online.
There’s plenty about the Savage Adonis, and all of it is based on speculation and interviews with the campers who found him, mostly descriptions of his injury and his incredible beauty, his huge muscles, his bare feet like shoe leather.