She arrived and the feds pounced. We were ushered into the back of a black sedan, and with an impressive line of law enforcement vehicles in tow, we sped away.
OUR DESTINATION WAS the county sheriff’s department conference room, where we met a whole group of county, state and federal officers who needed to ask us some questions. Because our kidnappers were still out there, a blond FBI agent explained, and time was of the essence, and surely we wanted to help catch these terrible men, let alone recover our loved one’s body.
Justin’s body. I wondered if even now Z and Mick were tossing him into a ditch.
The sheriff’s detective was there, the one who’d first arrived at the prison and brought us blankets. I focused on him, because even though the crisp-talking blond FBI agent—Adams?—was the one who seemed to be running the show, Officer Wyatt had a steady demeanor I needed right now.
I noticed the investigator, Tessa Leoni, was beside him, both of their expressions carefully neutral. I thought she stood closer to him than strictly necessary. And I thought they both held themselves slightly apart from the rest of the room, as if they wanted it understood up front that they were only part of the circus, not the ones running the show.
Ashlyn wanted food. A deputy disappeared, returning shortly with a stack of take-out menus. She shook her head, asked if they had a vending machine. Two Snickers bars, two bags of potato chips and one can of Diet Coke later, my teenager was happy.
I went with coffee. And water. And a trip to the bathroom, where I washed my hands and rinsed my face over and over again.
When I stood up and confronted the face in the mirror, I had to pause, touch my own reflection with a trembling hand, because truly a woman who appeared that gaunt, that exhausted, that old couldn’t be me. The hollows beneath my cheeks. The bruises beneath my eyes. The sheer fatigue etched into each line of my face.
I had failed that woman. I had not taken care of her. And here I was, maybe exactly where I deserved to be.
When I opened the bathroom door, Tessa was standing in the hall, obviously waiting for me. She smiled faintly, as if she knew exactly what I’d just done, the thoughts that had gone through my head.
“It gets better,” she murmured. “Even if it doesn’t feel that way right now, eventually you will feel like something more than a shadow of your former self.”
“How do you know?”
“My husband was killed two years ago. I almost lost my daughter as well. Her name is Sophie, and she’s been very worried about your family. She told me to look for you in cold, dark places, and bring you hot chocolate and chocolate chip cookies.”
I smiled faintly. “I could use some hot chocolate.”
“Does Ashlyn have a boyfriend?”
I shook my head, no longer surprised by any question. “Not that Justin and I knew.”
“The pregnancy was a surprise?”
“We only figured it out when she miscarried in prison. My family…we haven’t been doing so well, even before this happened.”
She seemed to accept that. “The medic person helped her?”
“Yes.”
“You like him. You speak of him with respect.”
I shrugged, feeling, ironically, as if I was betraying Radar’s trust. “He took care of us when we needed him. I respect that.”
“Did you like the other two as well?”
Immediately I shuddered. Not when I thought of Z. Even with the cobra tattoo, there was something commanding about him, an admirable quality of extreme self-control. On the other hand: “Mick, the one with the checkerboard hair, I don’t think he’s sane. He promised to hurt me, but only after hurting Ashlyn first.”
“So if he was in the military,” Tessa said out loud, “maybe not honorably discharged?”
I nodded, understanding now where she was going with this.
“And Chris Lopez?” she asked abruptly.
Now I was surprised. “What about him?”
“He likes you.”
I shook my head, already dismissive. “He works for my husband. He’s one of the guys. I don’t… They’re like a gaggle of boys. I don’t even look at them individually. They’re just… Justin’s sidekicks. Very talented, each and every one of them, but not entirely sane.”
“Did you know Lopez is Kathryn Chapman’s uncle?”
“What?”
“And he’s the one who sent you those texts six months ago?”
I gaped at her, couldn’t help myself. In turn, the investigator nodded slightly, as if that had been half the point: to see my reaction and gauge it for herself.
Down the hall, the conference room door opened, a reminder of the rest of the task force, still awaiting our return.
Tessa produced a card. She handed it to me. “If you think of anything, of course, please call. But also…if you ever need to talk. Just talk. I can’t promise to understand everything, but I think given my own experience, my own family… I will understand enough.”
She offered me one last bolstering smile, then led me back to the conference room. I took a seat, and the blond FBI agent announced that, per protocol, they would be separating Ashlyn and me. Of course, if I wanted to call a lawyer, a family member for support…but again, time was of the essence and they really needed to get started.
I gazed at my daughter. She had chocolate smudging the corner of her mouth, and absurdly, that reminded me of when she was four years old and had smeared brownie batter all over her face, even on the tip of her nose, which she then tried to reach with her tongue again and again. I’d laughed till I cried, while Justin had grabbed the camera and we’d been happy then. I swear, we had been so, so happy…
I must’ve made a sound. Maybe distress. Because my daughter reached across the table and squeezed my hand.
“It’s okay, Mom. We’ve made it this far, right? I can do this.”
She got up and followed two agents out the door, while I fisted my hands on my lap in order to let my baby go.
The second the door closed behind her, Special Agent Adams got down to business.
She started with the basics. How we’d been taken, where we’d been taken. How much did our captors know about us, what had we managed to learn about them?
I relayed Radar’s medical expertise, several of his comments that led me to believe he was former military. Justin’s initial belief that they didn’t mean us harm, as they carried Tasers, not guns. Also when Mick attacked me, Z had Tased his own man to get him to back down.
Except then they’d pulled Justin from the cell and beaten him to a pulp without any explanation.
The investigators exchanged several glances at this.
“You mean,” the blonde, Special Agent Adams, reiterated, “the kidnappers did not start by talking of ransom?”
“No. That was our idea. After the beating, it occurred to Justin that he could evoke the imminent-death clause of his life insurance policy, making us worth nine million dollars. And that kind of money might be what it would take for them to let us live.”
“In the days leading up to the kidnapping, did you feel any threat? Such as someone watching you? Notice people loitering around your neighborhood, perhaps contractors across the street? Feel any sense of danger?”
I shook my head.
“Did they know about Justin’s affair?”
I recoiled, wondering how this would be relevant, but then again… “Actually, Z seemed to know about Justin’s…extracurriculars.” I wanted to keep the bitterness out of my voice. I didn’t.
“How would you describe the state of your marriage?”
I shrugged tiredly. “Strained. Awkward. But we were trying. Date night. This whole thing… Date night.” The taste of oranges mixing with champagne upon my lips.
“Did you ever contact a divorce lawyer after discovering that Justin was cheating on you?”
I shook my head.
“Why not?”
The question confused me. “We have a daughter. We have a life. Maybe som
e people throw that away after…one mistake, but I wasn’t going to.”
“Are you aware of the terms of your prenup?” the second FBI agent asked me. Special Agent Hawkes.
I nodded uncomfortably, still not understanding this line of questioning. “Yes. I renounced all claim to Justin’s company, in return for fifty percent of our personal assets. The company was from Justin’s father and predated me. The concession seemed fair enough.”
The blond agent studied me. “Are you aware that you have no personal assets? That, in fact, Justin ran your entire life, your homes, your cars, your furniture, everything, through the company?”
I shook my head, feeling dazed. The interview wasn’t going the way I’d thought it would. I’d hoped it would be about the men who’d just murdered my husband and assaulted my family. Not about…me. “Justin paid the bills. I never thought to question… But it wouldn’t have mattered. I hadn’t asked for a divorce. Not to mention, in prison, Justin offered to rip up the prenup, give me anything I asked for. He was sorry.”
“So you were going to divorce him.” The second FBI agent again.
“I didn’t say that. Justin also said he’d miss me. He’d miss our family.”
“Well, it’s all a moot point now.” Special Agent Adams, not sounding harsh, just matter-of-fact.
“He swore he would keep us safe,” I whispered. “Justin knew he wasn’t the perfect husband, the perfect father. He worked too much, was absent too often, let alone the whole matter of faithfulness. But he swore he would keep us safe. We were his family and he would not fail us. And he didn’t.”
I stared them in the eye. Dared these investigators to besmirch my dead husband. Dared them to question a marriage and life that had already cost me so much.
They didn’t.
Instead, another investigator, with wire-rim glasses, spoke up for the first time. “So, what can you tell us about the missing eleven million dollars?”
I stared at him blankly, and felt the ground open up beneath my feet yet again.
BY THE TIME ASHLYN RETURNED TO THE ROOM, I was done. I couldn’t answer one more question, I couldn’t absorb one more “truth” about me, my husband or the family business. Someone had embezzled money from the firm. A lot of it. For a long time. And apparently, in the past few weeks Justin had stumbled across the theft and taken some countermeasures.
Except he’d never related anything to me. Maybe because for the past few weeks, he’d still been sleeping downstairs in the basement, a husband kicked out of his own marital bed.
The firm’s financial future was rocky. Not insurmountable, I was told, but rocky. Which, given that the firm owned my homes, my car and my furniture, was probably something I should care about, if not for my own sake, then at least for Ashlyn’s. Except I wasn’t sure I could absorb one more shock.
My husband was dead. Someone close to us had been stealing from us for over a decade. And most likely, that same person had hired Z and his team, probably not because of ransom at all, but to remove Justin from the picture before he uncovered the full extent of the embezzlement scheme.
Which must have had Z and his team laughing on the inside. Here they were, already paid to kidnap and torment us, probably with instructions to buy time, maybe even to kill Justin but have it look like part of a separate crime. Then we’d gone and offered them an additional nine million. Win Z over? Manipulate him into doing our bidding? Please. Talk about double-dipping. First, he got paid by some shadowy client, then, got even more money from his own victims.
The man was an evil genius, and I almost wished I could return to our incarceration just so I could poison him this time. While starting a kitchen fire and burning the whole damn place down around their ears.
I hated him. Every time he’d looked at me with respect. The background report hadn’t indicated you’d be a problem…
He’d lied to me.
My husband had lied to me.
Except my husband had also died for me.
My thoughts were such a tumultuous mess. My head hurt and I was tired. So unbelievably tired.
The feds wanted to put us in a hotel, safe house, something of that nature. Our kidnappers were still on the loose. No sign of the white cargo van, just a hole in the perimeter fencing where they’d made their getaway. Until they had more information, Special Agent Adams felt it was best to keep us safe.
But I saw the expression on my daughter’s face. Felt its match on my own.
After all we’d been through, the days, the nights. The look on Justin’s face, the knife, the knife, the knife, the knife, sinking into his chest…
We wanted to go home. Safe or sorry, we needed to be home again.
More consultation. A phone call with the Boston PD, further discussions.
Finally, it was agreed. The agents would graciously permit us to return to our own residence. But given that Z and his team also knew where we lived and might have incentive to finish what they’d started, basic precautions needed to be taken. I would immediately change our security passwords the second I stepped foot into my house. In addition, the Boston PD would assign a uniformed officer to keep watch from the street, as well as beef up patrols in the area.
Special Agent Adams also suggested that I not immediately invite over any family or friends. In fact, if there were people we wanted to see, she recommended that we meet them in full daylight, at public places.
You know, because someone we trusted had clearly betrayed us. And that person hadn’t escaped with eleven million dollars just yet.
It was okay, I said. We didn’t just want to go home; we wanted to be alone. No more eyes watching. No more audience judging.
It was time to just be. Once a family of three, now a family of two, battered, shaky, grief-stricken, but still hanging in there.
Shortly after ten, the cops finally let us go. The feds provided the escort, a black sedan heading three hours south to Boston. Ashlyn fell asleep in the back. I think I dozed off a time or two.
Then, we were there. Our home, which would never completely feel like our home again. The crime-scene tape, subtle but present on the doorway. Evidence placards, still marking random places in the foyer.
My wedding ring, buried in a pile on the kitchen island. I took it out. I slipped it on, and felt the first wave of grief hit me like a wall.
But I would not succumb. Not yet, not now.
Off to the security system’s control panel. Running through the instructions Justin had given me time and time again. I needed a code, a string of numbers no one would know but I could easily remember. I went with a date: the day I’d moved out of the tenement housing. The first step toward building a better life. If only I’d known then what I knew now…
I told the agents we were all set. I let them graciously out the front door, then promptly activated our security system, listening to various dead bolts fire home.
Ashlyn was still standing in the foyer, looking at the spot where I had vomited. Just three days, but already a lifetime ago.
“Can I sleep in your room?” my fifteen-year-old daughter asked.
“Yes.”
“I want a gun.”
“Me, too.”
“I want it loaded, underneath my pillow.”
“Everything we learned not to do in firearms safety,” I observed.
“Exactly.”
“Loaded clip next to the unloaded firearm, in the top drawer of the bedside table,” I countered.
“Okay.”
“Ashlyn… I’m proud of you.”
My daughter didn’t look at me, but stared at the vomit stain. She said, “I’ve been sleeping with Chris Lopez. He likes you, he’s always liked you. But he can’t have you, so he settled for me instead. And I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t care. You and Dad…you just seemed so far away, and I wanted someone to make me feel special again.”
I opened my mouth. I closed my mouth. “Oh, honey.”
“I just want it to go away now, okay? Don’
t tell anyone. Don’t do anything. Just…make it all go away.”
“Did you tell the police?”
“Of course not! I just want it to be over. Please, can’t it all be over? I can’t stop seeing his face, Mom. Dad and the blood, and that knife! He died for us. He died because of me!”
Ashlyn collapsed. Hunched over on the bottom step, her arms over her head, as if that would block the terrible images. And I understood what she meant, because I had the same visions stuck in my own head. As well as way too many unwanted revelations. Chris Lopez, Justin’s most trusted second in command, sleeping with our teenage daughter. Is this why Tessa Leoni had asked about him specifically? Because she already suspected him in my family’s kidnapping? After all, he’d meddled in my marriage, then seduced my fifteen-year-old daughter.
Why, if Justin were still alive…
Then, all of a sudden, so many things finally made sense. Including why my husband, my modern-day caveman, had to die.
I went to my daughter. “It’s okay, Ashlyn. We’ve come this far. We’re going to get through this.” I was unconsciously repeating her words from the sheriff’s office. I gave her a bolstering hug. Then, I got on the phone and dialed Tessa Leoni.
Chapter 41
CHRIS LOPEZ WOKE UP to the barrel of a gun, dug into his right temple.
“If I were you, I wouldn’t move,” Tessa said. She sat beside him, on the edge of his mattress. She hadn’t bothered with any lights, using the glow of a penlight to jimmy his rear window, then creep through his house, up the main stairs. She’d found the elderly Lab, Zeus, sleeping in the hallway. He’d lifted his head once, seen it was her, then gone back to sleep with a sigh.
All in all, she was feeling very comfortable with her nighttime adventure. Which was good, as she was extremely pissed off.
Now she offered up conversationally: “When did Ashlyn first tell you she was pregnant?”
“What?”
Lopez tried to sit up. She used her left fist to whomp him hard in the middle of his sternum.
Lopez collapsed back down against the mattress, gasping for air.
“Fifteen-year-old girl? The daughter of your boss? A child you swore you thought of like your own daughter? You fucking pervert!”