The Kidnapping of Katie Rose: The Katie Rose Saga, #1

By McDonald Hanson

INTRODUCING KATIE ROSE:  The author, in the voice of 70ish widower, retired newspaperman and neighborhood grouch Jake Thomas, introduces us to Katie Rose Fowler, a bouncy little eight-year-old neighbor girl who intrudes into his otherwise quiet life one fateful day. At first she aggravated the grumpy old man, and eventually over a period of years she captured his heart. When she is abducted from a nearby house on his street while babysitting at the age of 15, Jake, in a race to rescue her, goes from a prime suspect to leading his own investigation. With help from a local newsman and some usual allies, Jake reignites the fire of an earlier incarnation as a veteran bulldog reporter to identify and find the kidnapper before Katie Rose comes to serious harm. The strong bond formed over those years pays off just when it appears that the mystery of her disappearance, her whereabouts and the identity of her abductor seems unsolvable. (The first book in a seven-part series.)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Janus Expressions
• Release date: Oct 6, 2013
• ISBN: 9781497701243

Book preview

THE KIDNAPPING

OF KATIE ROSE

(Book One of the Katie Rose Saga)

McDONALD HANSON

* * * * *

PUBLISHED BY:

McDonald Hanson Copyright © 2013

* * * * *

INTRODUCING KATIE ROSE:  The author, in the voice of 70ish widower, retired newspaperman and neighborhood grouch Jake Thomas, introduces us to Katie Rose Fowler, a bouncy little eight-year-old neighbor girl who intrudes into his otherwise quiet life one fateful day. At first she aggravated the grumpy old man, and eventually over a period of years she captured his heart. When she is abducted from a nearby house on his street while babysitting at the age of 15, Jake, in a race to rescue her, goes from a prime suspect to leading his own investigation. With help from a local newsman and some usual allies, Jake reignites the fire of an earlier incarnation as a veteran bulldog reporter to identify and find the kidnapper before Katie Rose comes to serious harm. The strong bond formed over those years pays off just when it appears that the mystery of her disappearance, her whereabouts and the identity of her abductor seems unsolvable. (The first book in a seven-part series.)

* * * * *

EXCERPTS:

NOW MAYBE YOU have gotten the idea that I might be the most unpopular guy in my neighborhood. My cat, Sam, is the only other pretender to that rather dubious honor.

I acquired Sam the old fashioned way. He showed upon on my front porch one day with his ribs sticking out and a forlorn look on his face. And I fed him. Big mistake. Snowy warned me. You feed him and you got a cat! Snowy didn’t really understand. I don’t like cats. Just feed him and send him on his way. Screw it. I don’t have time for a mangy animal. He certainly will sense I hate cats and off he goes, his tummy full and that would be that. Sam wasn’t exactly mangy – uncared for, yes, and a little ratty in the grooming department. Amazingly down the road he turned into a downright gorgeous cat when he took his full growth and regular nourishment brought back his rich and luxurious coat.

But he was a cat. Did I mention I don’t like cats? How was I to know that this would be the ultimate bond between Sam and me? He didn’t like cats either! I later found out Sam was a special breed of cat called a Ragdoll. And he was a neutered male who obviously had been cared for at one time. He was a seal-point mitted bi-color, in fact. It took a little online research to find that after I was told by a cat fancier he was well bred. This meant he had seal-point markings on his ears and tail, a fluffy white muff and white leggings with two colors of brown across his back for a saddle. He had striking rich blue eyes peering out of a dark brown raccoon-like mask and a flash of white in an inverted V on his nose. He had a quiet but authoritative demeanor. Clearly feline royalty.

I named him Fast-Talking, Slow-Walking, Good-Looking Mohair Sam, after the Charlie Rich song. Like all cats, Sam is an independent SOB, except when it’s time to eat or it’s too damn cold to be outside.  Then he gets real pushy and sometimes even friendly. You know the old rub up against the leg friendly.  Works like a charm. Now I am told Ragdolls have a particularly mild and easygoing nature, and go all limp in your arms, thus the name. Sam missed out on those traits. No lap cat he. But he showed his loyalty in Ragdoll fashion. While he was an outside cat, if I was in the yard or watering or tending to small chores, he would be one step behind me at all times. If I was on the porch admiring the sunset, he was sat right next to me and joined my reverie.

Someone said, if you own a Ragdoll you will never be alone. They follow you anywhere and everywhere, unless there are bigger fish to fry. And job one was he had to establish that he was the top of the food chain. Being neutered you think he would be totally laid back. Nope. That was another missing gene that apparently went with his missing equipment. But territoriality survived the scalpel. And his territory apparently extends five miles in every direction of the compass. Medium-sized at full growth Ragdolls take their full growth late – about their third year, you would not expect him to be the neighborhood bruiser. He is.

Thanks to Sam, I am not only the grumpy old fart nobody ever talks to, but also the owner of that fucking cat! You see Sam has beaten up practically every other male cat on the street – just on general principles! Some actually had the nerve to walk onto his property. God knows how many other battles he has fought on other streets and yards I don’t know about. The other cat owners are not thrilled with Sam ...

(Katie) hiked her pink booted left foot under her, the way youngsters can do but would result in fractures or pulled muscles in an adult that wasn’t a trained yogi. She unleashed her first childish fidget and immediately changed subject. At the same time something amazing happened. My cat, Sam, jumped up and settled into her lap contentedly. This is shy stand-offish Sam who doesn’t cozy up to anybody...

I never saw her troubled ... again. She maintained that confident air. And her ever-engaging smile. Katie did know who she was. And so did I. I was captivated by this amazing child. She kind of reminded me of a certain cat.

One life lesson at a time. I have to pace myself at my age.

* * * * *

License Notes

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, you should return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

* * * * *

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1-5

Chapter 6-10

Chapter 11-15

Chapter 16-20

Chapter 21-25

Chapter 26-30

Chapter 31-35

Chapter 36-40

Chapter 41-45

Chapter 46-50

Chapter 51-55

Chapter 56-60

Chapter 61-65

Chapter 66-69

Acknowledgements

Other Katie Rose books:

* * * * * *

The Kidnapping

of Katie Rose

1

KATIE ROSE FOWLER may have been the first person that I talked with – I mean really talked with – since I had come to Montana Bahia now nearly eight years ago – just seven years before her abduction.

I am an old guy who likes my privacy, my solitude and taking the afternoon sun on my front porch, in my rocker, reading a bit, snoozing a bit – my retirement recreation – a time to think and even a time to dream.

After Snowy died, I had become a loner, half by design, and half by circumstances. So I wasn’t really prepared to have an eight-year-old bundle of restless energy come barging into my otherwise serene and contemplative life. I have my own grandkids and I know eight is a synonym for exhausting. And she was exhausting. I was told many years later her parents had never known Katie to take a nap after she was an infant.

But barge in she did, whether I liked it or not.

The real question was why me as the bargee, as it were. Let’s face it, I am kind of a grouchy old fart and a world class grump, if I do say so myself. Let’s say I am hardly the Pied Piper among town youngsters. I don’t look like Santa Claus or an avuncular charmer. I know I have a somewhat off-putting stern appearance, cultivated, I might add, in my aging years to fend off the Katie Roses of the world.

I had just moved into the neighborhood to the collective yawns of my neighbors who gave me scant notice, so when this blonde-haired gregarious whirlwind of a child bounced up onto my porch and plopped herself into one of the vintage rocking chairs that Snowy and I had bought for our retirement, she interrupted my reading and ran afoul of my moodiness. I was startled by her appearance and it left me momentarily speechless.

But despite my feelings at first, over time, these visits became a weekly ritual. I learned she usually dropped by on her way home from a nearby school. She was on her own, and en route to her own house three doors up the street from mine. Her mom and dad were apparently too often absent from her life, victims of the world of dual incomes, long working hours and a little time to be with the kid. After school there was just too much Katie wanted to talk about and I was a convenient ear.

At least Katie Rose saw it that way.

"Hi."

The voice was small but it startled me nonetheless. I turned quickly to find the source in time to catch a splash of golden blonde hair topping a small figure dressed in a denim cowgirl skirt and matching shocking pink shirt and boots! 

You’re my new neighbor, she said as she confronted me.

She skipped up the two-step riser and plopped down in the twin rocker across from me.  Ignoring the claim that somehow as a neighbor I belonged to her, I recovered with, And just who might you be with just the appropriate amount of get- lost-kid snark in my tone of voice. No such luck.

What’cha reading? She flat out ignored my question in favor of her own.

Huckleberry Finn, I said. I was snared. I could have said none of your damn business.  But cranky old dudes like me have some lingering sense of decorum when addressing children, some of the habits my mother drubbed into me at an early age. I think she called it courtesy. I have gotten so I am not very good at it anymore as the years pass. I’ll have to work on that, I thought.

No, you’re not. That’s a kid’s book.

Now I have a policy with children. Talk to them like adults. No sweet fairy tales about Jesus and the angels. No Buffy the old spaniel went out to the farm to roam free when we actually whacked the little sucker for biting the mailman.

No, I said, it’s a book for everybody even if it’s about a kid.

She looked at me skeptically. Haven’t you ever read Huckleberry Finn before?

Now I was on the defensive. Of course I have.

Then why are you reading it again? Now I have to explain myself to what looks like a seven or eight-year-old?

It was about then that she fixed her electric blue eyes on me. No flinching, no aversion, a just- you- and-me- kid," steady eyeball to eyeball talk. How old is this kid? Twenty-five? I thought.

Well, I hesitated slightly, good books are always worth reading again and again. I buckled.

Why? she asked. Now that age-old awful kid question, Why? And she is still skewering me with that look.

I tried to recover the advantage that, looking back on it, I never really had. Well, I said, because good books are not only rich in text, but rich in ideas and insights into human nature. I gave her my best adult-speak voice, stilted, slightly stuffy and authoritarian, and, frankly, ludicrous. Actually, I really wanted to say, cuz – but I knew I couldn’t get away with it.

Unimpressed with my scholarship, she furrowed her forehead ever so slightly, pondering my answer. I guess you may be right, but I won’t know ‘til I get older, I suppose.

I attempted to lighten the moment. You know a very funny man called Groucho Marx used to say, ‘Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside a dog, it’s too dark to read.’

That got a smile though it might be over her head but I just like to quote Groucho Marx.

She hiked her pink booted left foot under her, the way youngsters can do but would result in fractures or pulled muscles in an adult that wasn’t a trained yogi. She unleashed her first childish fidget and immediately changed subject. At the same time something amazing happened. My cat, Sam, jumped up and settled into her lap contentedly. This is shy stand-offish Sam who doesn’t cozy up to anybody.

What’s your name?

John Charles Thomas, I replied. A little formal, I admit, but we have to observe the proprieties. After all who’s the adult here?

Suddenly, comes a paroxysm of girlish giggles, then more fidgeting. Did I say something funny? I said in mock horror.

You have three first names, she said. That’s funny. I’m not a little girl, never have been, so how was I to know that was funny?

Do they call you John?

I nodded and added, "Some call me John. Some call me Johnny. Some call me Jack. But just don’t call me late for dinner. Bad joke. Old joke, but maybe new to her.

She laughed. Surprise! But now she is getting more animated, rocking back and forth in the chair and petting Sam at the same time. I began to worry that she will topple over and I will be stuck with a lawsuit.

You’re funny, she said.

Folks call me a lot of things, I thought, but funny was way down the list and it still didn’t mean humorous.

She didn’t miss a beat, I have as friend named Johnny and one named Chuck, she said, so I can’t call you either of those." Apparently in her world there is one name to a customer. She talked in that childish stream of consciousness manner where her words poured from her as though she couldn’t get them out fast enough.

What else did they call you? Nosy little twerp, I thought.

Jake, I said, but now most people still call me John. Some even call me Mr. Thomas. Maybe this will appease her and restore proper adult-child separateness.

She passed right over that without reaction.

I do like the name Jake. You look like a Jake. So that is what I will call you. What does a Jake look like? I thought.

Don’t I have a say in my own name? Another giggle from her told me, no way! This issue was settled in her mind.

She smiled broadly and just bit too mischievously, getting more animated. She arched her back and slid out of the chair as Sam jumped off her lap like that quiet confinement had lasted many minutes too long for the energy in her body. It was just way too much for her.

She sprang from the seat and did a quick pirouette on the porch. "Yes, you will be my new friend, Jake, so I will call you Jake and you will be the only one of my friends named Jake. You are my Jake."

There that possessive thing again, I’m her new friend with the name she gives me. What cruel fate foisted this child off on me, I thought. Couldn’t she go annoy someone else on the neighborhood?

And almost like my wish was being granted as I spoke, she skipped down the steps and after a few more skips down the pathway turned around and said. I have to go now, Jake, but I’ll be back to see you soon, and we can talk more. You know, I am really going to like having you for my new friend.

Oh, joy! I thought.

She began to skip towards the sidewalk when I called out to her.What’s your name? You never told me, I said.

Katie, she answered over her shoulder. Katie Rose Fowler.

Then the little blonde-headed cowgirl disappeared in a burst of pink, gold and denim rounding the hedge and I was alone again.

And that was how ‘the Jake and Katie thing" began seven years before that same Katie Fowler was kidnapped from a nearby house where she was babysitting.

It was a traumatic event for this little seaside town. Everything quaint and quiet about this village seemed was to be history after that. Deadbolts slammed on every house, gun sales doubled, the pound had a run on big-ass dogs just for their size and meanness.

That wasn’t the worst of it. While our 10-man keystone cop shop initially stumbled around trying to solve Katie’s disappearance, the local population sharpened their finely honed suspicions about friend and neighbor alike as possible culprits. Squinty-eyed fear hung in the air like the smoke from the Monday morning garbage dump burn-off that poisoned the air and stunk like burning tires.

It would get worse. Much worse.

2

IF MY RECENTLY adopted hometown was described in the first sentence of a novel, it would be described a sleepy little spot on the California Central Coast – which like in every other use of that time-worn description it is largely oversimplified.

I’ve only lived in this town since Snowy died. But as much of a newcomer as I was to Montana Bahia, I can probably retell all the current town gossip just by keeping my ears open at stores and restaurants where the natives gather. I even knew who is pulling the strings down at city hall, and why the garbage truck is always late on Thursdays – when driver Butch Meltzer takes a break at the widow Cassidy’s condo out on the Point Road.

And I didn’t even care. But you hear things even when you try to keep to yourself and offer up spare and reluctant greetings to neighbors, store cashiers and the Salvation Army bell ringers.

On bright sunny fall days, the coast is lit up like a jewel and, after the gloomy mornings of summer, Montana Bahia looks like one of those idyllic beachfront towns you see in 1950s movies – the sun sparkling off the harbor waters. You expect to see a young Elvis singing to a pony-tailed chick in a one-piece swimsuit perched on a mahogany sailboat deck. It looks like that kind of place.

Who named the town is lost in antiquity, but certainly someone with a rudimentary knowledge of pidgin Spanish. Oh, there is a bay all right, but any mountain is way off to the east in the coast range. There are mountain ranges all up and down the Left Coast, but none in sight of my new hometown.

Oh, there may be a modest hill or two in the way, but not so connected that you could come up with Mountain Bay for a town moniker, even if it sounds pretty to the tourists – in Spanish, of course.

The town was served at the time – and not well – by a dinky little weekly tabloid newspaper, The Bahia Breeze, that wraps the supermarket ads and comes out on Thursdays.

It looked like it was edited by the high school English teacher who wouldn’t know an AP stylebook from a rhinoceros. City council stories, were apparently written by some J-school dropout, burying the news leads in the 15th paragraph, where the city is doubling the parking fees and using the money to tear up the street in front of your house. The lead was something like a council resolution commending the pigeon racing club. Seriously. Seriously sad.

I exaggerate only slightly.

I should probably tell you at that time I was an embittered retiree from a career as a print journalist.

Snowy and I had been coming here since the ‘60s, back when we were courting as they used to say, shacking up as they might say now and we were enjoying the adventure of a les liaisons dangereuse, not to mention a bracing sea breeze and delicious fresh seafood.

A few times we spent weekends in driving rainstorms, but our favorite motel on the high street had third floor rooms with views and fireplaces. We managed to find things to do to amuse ourselves as we were young and very into each other and we would occasionally catch the view – and a meal or two. We were energetically and athletically in love in those early days.

That is why we chose this town for our retirement. It is filled with good and carefree memories of days that we had savored in our years together. In case you haven’t guessed, Snowy is my spouse, my true love, my soul mate and my sweetie, and was then recently gone.

I met Snowy after she had come to California as a farm-born and small-town reared girl who escaped the farm and the plains small town life as soon as she could. She had to stay with family in the Midwest for a while and met her first husband and married. She was tiny is some ways. Well under 100 pounds, but not at all fragile. She scarcely eclipsed five feet in height, though she swore she was five feet two. She wore fashionably short skirts that showed her off well. She had a great pair of legs, not at all unnoticed by all the guys who came in contact with her. We are talking ‘60s miniskirts here. But that was only a first impression. As good as the package was that she