Noah sprang aside. The lead CERT team member brandished a man-sized plastic shield, used it to shove Drover backwards, and pressed him to the floor while Drover struggled, yelling obscenities. The other CERT members disarmed and handcuffed Drover, armed with pepper-ball delivery-system guns. It took them only a matter of minutes to haul Drover to his feet and out of the cell, still hollering.
Noah wiped the blood from his brow, shaken, and Deputy Warden McLaughlin entered with another CO, his expression grim behind his glasses.
‘CO Jimenez, uncuff Dr Alderman,’ he ordered, turning to Noah. ‘Dr Alderman, any injuries besides that cut on your forehead?’
‘Maybe a broken rib, but I could have been killed.’ Noah tried to collect his thoughts. ‘You see what happened? I assume you spoke with my lawyer. I’m in danger in Graterford. You have to transfer me out of here.’
‘We’ll do you one better.’ Deputy Warden McLaughlin smiled. ‘You’re going to be a free man, Dr Alderman.’
‘What?’ Noah asked, bewildered. ‘How?’
‘Your lawyer got a call from your wife. She’s up in Maine with the FBI. They have a man named Konstantine Rogolyi in custody, and he confessed to the murder of Patti Tenderly on May 10. I just got off the phone with the assistant U.S. attorney in Philly, who confirmed the information.’
‘Really?’ Noah felt stunned. He had no idea what was going on. May 10 was the date of Anna’s murder, but he had never heard of Patti Tenderly. He wiped the blood from his face again.
‘Let’s get to the infirmary, doc.’ Deputy Warden McLaughlin put his hand on Noah’s shoulder.
‘But who’s Patti Tenderly? And what’s my wife doing in Maine? With the FBI?’
‘I’ll explain on the way.’
Chapter Eighty-four
Maggie, After
Maggie gripped the plastic handle in the backseat as the police cruiser sped through the woods at night. Two uniformed officers in bulletproof vests sat in the front seat, silent except when they communicated on a radio. She was in the middle of a paramilitary operation of law-enforcement personnel, police cruisers, SWAT vehicles, and ambulances. Authorities were converging from all directions, flooding the roads to a secluded farmhouse in Tipton, near the highway exit and two truck stops.
Maggie kept her face to the window, trying to see through the driving snow and the darkness. Her heart hammered away. Every muscle in her body tensed. They passed through woods and finally reached open pasture. Every mile brought her closer to Anna. She sensed they were getting closer, racing down a curving country road. They accelerated behind the five other police cruisers, like the caboose on a runaway train.
The cruiser veered around a curve, following the others. The police in the front seat talked faster into the radio. Maggie caught sight of a farmhouse in the distance, a bright spot in the darkness. The cruiser zoomed ahead and so did the others in the line ahead, their red taillights burning through the blackness. The sirens remained silent, the light bars off.
The farmhouse got closer and closer. A light shone on the front porch and from every room, and the front of the farmhouse looked like the Tenderlys’, but in back were four mobile homes, also with the lights on.
Maggie swallowed hard. It made her sick to think that Anna and the other girls were being trafficked out of those trailers. She was horrified that Anna was inside, but she prayed Anna was alive. Where there was life, there was hope.
The police cruiser raced to the farmhouse behind the others. Suddenly all of the cruisers slowed to a stop at the same moment, then parked on an angle to the right, spraying snow. Maggie’s cruiser was at the end of the line, about a hundred yards from the farmhouse.
The police in the front seat grabbed their long guns, jumped out of the cruiser, and knelt behind its open door, training their barrels on the farmhouse in the blowing snow. Police in the other cars were doing the same thing, and SWAT teams poured from boxy black vehicles in the front of the line, closest to the farmhouse.
Maggie’s heart thundered. She couldn’t see the farmhouse well enough. It was too far away and too dark. Flurries clung to the cruiser window. She rolled it down. Snowflakes blew into her face.
Even with the window down, the farmhouse was too far away for Maggie to see anything. It was too dark. Snow swirled everywhere. The porch light barely illuminated anything. She prayed silently. Any minute now, Anna could be rescued, taken hostage, or killed.
Maggie watched riveted as the SWAT team hustled to the farmhouse, splitting into three moving teams. One team broke down the front door with a metal ram and charged inside. A second and third team flanked the farmhouse, raced to the windows, and shattered them with their long guns.
Suddenly a fusillade of gunfire went off inside the farmhouse. The shots echoed through the snowy night. Light flashed in the windows.
Maggie felt her heart lurch. Anna was inside the house. She could have been shot.
Maggie got out of the cruiser, ducking behind the police officer in the driving snow. More gunshots blasted in the farmhouse. Lights flashed again in the windows.
Maggie had to see what was going on. She took off running to the farmhouse. Her legs churned in the heavy snow. Icy flakes bit her cheeks. She ignored the police calling her back.
A group of SWAT team members hurried from the farmhouse with two handcuffed men, hustling them onto the porch. Uniformed police and FBI agents rushed the handcuffed men to waiting cruisers.
Maggie stumbled in the snow but kept running. Ice bit her cheeks. Her breath grew ragged. She heard women screaming in the farmhouse. The sound cut to her heart, bringing tears to her eyes. She had to get to Anna.
Maggie kept running, snow swirling around her. Another group of SWAT team members hustled two more handcuffed men from the house, their heads down. Police and FBI agents clustered around them and hustled them to cruisers.
Maggie reached the front yard, where police personnel hustled this way and that. They jostled her, calling instructions.
‘Miss, stop, get back, it’s not safe!’ one shouted, and a group of police blocked her path.
‘My daughter’s inside!’ Maggie shouted back, but the police linked arms, forming a barricade.
Maggie watched the porch from behind them. Another SWAT team emerged from the farmhouse with two girls in parkas.
Maggie’s heart leapt with hope. But neither girl was Anna. She told herself to get a grip. She remembered Chief Vogel’s saying there were seven victims. There were five to go.
SWAT team members hustled out with two more girls in coats. Maggie’s hopes soared again. She stood on tiptoe behind the police to see better. Neither girl was Anna. Only three girls were left.
Maggie began to panic. Anna had to be soon. Anna couldn’t have been shot. Anna had to be alive.
SWAT team members brought out another two girls. Maggie jumped up and down. She felt a bolt of recognition. She knew one of the girls. It was Samantha Silas.
‘Samantha!’ Maggie called out, but Samantha didn’t see her in the chaos and darkness before she was hustled off the porch.
Maggie started praying. Anna had to be next. She couldn’t be dead. She had to be alive.
SWAT team members emerged from the house with a young girl in a coat, whom Maggie’s heart recognized instantly, the way it was supposed to, even after all this time. A mother’s heart, in the end.
‘Anna! Anna!’ Maggie cried, tears brimming in her eyes. She pressed against the police, but they wouldn’t let her past. ‘That’s my daughter!’
Anna turned to the sound, finally spotting Maggie as the police hustled her off the porch. ‘That’s my mom!’
Maggie shoved the police aside to get to Anna, and Anna broke free of the SWAT team members to get to her. They made their way to each other, falling into each other’s arms, clinging to each other in the blowing snow.
Maggie held Anna tight, finally holding her beautiful baby girl.
And vowing never, ever to let her go.
Epilogue
Maggie and Noah, After
Five months later, the sun was rising in a clear sky, shedding dappled light on the backyard. The Eastern Redbud tree was blooming with tiny pinkish-purple flowers, the forsythia bush had exploded in yellow stars, and the snowbells bowed their pure white heads. The Zephirine Drouhin rosebushes along the fence had grown sturdy canes with floppy green leaves, sending thinner tendrils curling around the wooden pickets and making a natural border dotted with hot-pink rosebuds, which released a sweet fragrance.
‘What do you think of those roses?’ Maggie asked, leaning back in the cushioned lounger.
‘I think they’re gorgeous,’ Anna answered, lying on the lounger beside her, with Wreck-It Ralph curled into a purring ball at her feet.
‘I think they’re incredibly gorgeous.’
Anna smiled. ‘This is usually when you tell me that Zephirine Drouhin is one of the few varieties that are both thornless and fragrant.’
‘I was just about to, because I like to hear you pronounce Zephirine Drouhin.’
‘With my French accent?’
‘Yes. Say it for me.’ Maggie was only half-kidding. She was so happy that she’d gotten Anna back, and that her daughter was recovering from her horrific ordeal with intensive therapy, support, and love. Anna had good days and bad, but this was one of the good ones, an Easter Sunday morning. Anna had taken the year off from school, and Maggie had stayed home to support her in her recovery. Fortunately, Anna had been spared a trial because the other co-conspirators had also taken plea deals. Jamie Covington, Samantha Silas, and the other four victims had been restored to their families.
‘Zephirine Drouhin,’ Anna said, in French.
‘Sublime.’ Maggie smiled, then heard Noah laughing by the bushes. She looked over to see him gesturing to Caleb, who was rifling behind the forsythia for the plastic eggs they had hidden, filled with M&Ms, Reese’s Pieces, and other caffeinated treasures.
‘Caleb, keep going!’ Noah called out, laughing.
‘Here? Or here?’ Caleb raced back and forth with his bag.
‘There!’ Noah pointed beside the bushes. ‘Look there! There’s more in that direction.’
‘Am I getting warmer or colder?’ Caleb ran back and forth.
‘Warmer!’
‘Warmer here?’ Caleb scooted to the right. ‘Or here?’
Maggie looked over at Anna. ‘How much longer is this going to take?’
Anna chuckled. ‘Noah hid the eggs too well. I told him he should have made it easier.’
‘When has Noah ever made anything easy?’
Anna looked over, her blue eyes shining. ‘He made everything easy for me. He’s been wonderful to me, and I love him for it.’
‘Aw, he loves you, too. We both do.’ Maggie patted her daughter’s forearm. She was so lucky that Noah and Anna were close, and that Noah had been completely exonerated. Maggie felt she’d redeemed herself for the past and had even adopted Caleb, so they had become a family. And Anna had fixed her trust so that it paid out later, and as part of the healing process, she’d established The Anna Fund, a charitable foundation to provide victims of sex trafficking with counseling, a safe house, and college tuition.
‘Dad, you said here, not there!’ Caleb giggled.
‘No, I said there, not here!’ Noah laughed.
‘Noah?’ Maggie called out, with a smile. ‘Will you guys be done by Christmas?’
‘Doubtful!’ Noah turned to Maggie, flashing a grin. The man still made Dockers look sexy, and she was more in love with him than ever. He had mellowed, and their marriage was stronger than before. Plus, when they fought, she always won. Because she’d saved his life.
‘I found one!’ Caleb jumped up and down, holding a yellow plastic egg.
‘Great!’ Noah ruffled his hair.
‘Good job, Caleb!’ Anna called to him.
‘Only three hundred more to go!’ Maggie shouted.
‘Maggie, tell me where they are!’ Caleb shouted back, with a smile.
‘You really want to know?’ Maggie shifted up in the chair.
‘No!’ Caleb took off running around the bush, resuming his egg search.
Maggie eased back in the chair. She wasn’t truly in a hurry. She’d learned not to be so damn busy. She closed her eyes, delighted to feel the warm sun on her face, sitting with her family and surrounded by nature’s beauty.
Maggie realized that life wouldn’t be as much fun if we knew where its treasures were hidden. Sometimes you had to search for them. Sometimes you had to fight for them. And sometimes, they were at your feet.
Either way, they were waiting.
For you.
After Anna Page 35