“My childhood was good. I was raised by loving parents.”
Her head shook again. “I don’t understand. Was it...? All I can think is that they put you into witness protection because of Daniel without telling me.”
My eyes opened wide. “If that’s the case, I was never told.”
“How else could they, would they, take you from me?”
“Who is they?” I asked. “Who would have taken me and put me in witness protection?” My mind filled with scenes from my childhood. This scenario was not anything I’d ever considered.
“I would have assumed the FBI. I’ve been racking my brain since that night at the club. I’ve...” She looked down at the food. “...we’ve both been cheated out of twenty-six years.”
As Annabelle set her fork back down, her hands were visibly shaking. I reached out and laid mine on top of hers. “What may I call you?” I asked.
Her light brown eyes, the same as mine, peered upward away from the salad on the table in front of her. Her attention lingered on my hand and bracelet, before returning to my question. “I know what I’d like, but I can’t ask that of you.”
She’d turned her hand so we were now palm to palm, hers wrapped around mine and mine wrapped around hers.
I squeezed hers. “I had a good mom.” I took a deep breath. “A great mom. I won’t tarnish her memory. That doesn’t mean I don’t want to get to know my mother.”
“I’ll answer to whatever you choose to call me,” Annabelle said. “As you probably know, my name is Annabelle.” Her smile returned as our hands remained united. “My mother’s name—your grandmother—was Amelia. When I found your name, I’d been searching for something unique, strong, and resilient that also began with the letter A.”
“I didn’t know about my grandmother. Is she...?”
Annabelle shook her head. “No, she passed before you. I mean, before you were born.”
“I’d heard that story about why you named me Araneae from my mom.”
“How? How would she know?”
I exhaled. “I don’t know. She said you were friends from childhood and that my birth father had done something he thought was right, but doing it put me in danger, so you asked her to take me, to keep me safe.”
“I’m sorry, Araneae. I wasn’t that selfless. I wanted you. I vowed to protect you.”
There was a shift in energy, but before I could process, a deep rumbling tenor filled the room.
“Then we need your help.”
Though I’d felt Sterling’s presence, I hadn’t heard him enter, and by the look on her face, neither had my mother.
Annabelle and I turned to face Sterling.
Sterling
Interrupting this reunion wasn’t my goal. Saving Araneae by setting her free from the sights of McFadden was.
Araneae stood and came toward me.
“The clock is ticking,” I said as she placed her delicate hand on my arm and turned to Annabelle.
“I asked Sterling to give us some time alone.” Her head tilted. “I hope we can have more in the future.”
Annabelle nodded. “I’d like that as well.”
I walked Araneae back to her chair and assisted her in sitting before taking a seat across from Judge Landers. “I invited myself here today. You were honest with me when you came to my office. It’s my turn.”
“I hope for my daughter’s sake that we can always be honest with one another.”
“You told me,” I began, “that you didn’t believe the old wives’ tale of your husband passing on evidence to Araneae.” I looked to Araneae. “She has no idea about any of it. I’ve filled in as many blanks as I could. She knows what Daniel knew and who it involved.”
Judge Landers lifted her hand. “I don’t.”
“Judge Landers, can you really say that? Can you profess to that when your daughter’s life is on the line?”
She visibly paled. “Are you threatening Araneae, here in front of me?”
Araneae’s hand came back to my arm. “No, he’s not...” She sat taller. “...Mother.” The title seemed to come uneasily from her lips, yet her saying it had Judge Lander’s attention. “Sterling has been brutally honest with me. You yourself said that you named me to be strong and resilient. I am. I’ve been on my own since I was sixteen.”
Annabelle audibly gasped. “Why?”
“We don’t know,” I answered. “It all coincides with Daniel’s death.”
“Prior to that, as I’d said,” Araneae went on, “I was raised by great parents. I was raised as Renee Marsh.”
Annabelle’s eyes narrowed. “I was told you called yourself Kennedy Hawkins.”
“When I was sixteen, my mother...” She hesitated. “...my father, the one I knew, had died in an automobile accident. My mom took me to the airport and gave me a new identity. She told me that Chicago wasn’t safe, and I was never to come back.”
“At sixteen? You were abandoned at sixteen?” There were new tears in her eyes.
“Not abandoned,” Araneae said, “sent away, for my protection. It was what I was told.”
“We believe,” I said, “that Josey Marsh believed she was doing what was best for Araneae.”
“That was when she told me that you had named me Araneae, and you’d given me to her for safekeeping. She said there were bad people after me, and I needed to get away from Chicago and never come back.”
“Did she tell you who?” Annabelle asked.
I sat up straighter. “She warned her about the name Sparrow, my father and me.”
“What? And then you searched for her?”
“It should be obvious,” I said, “my intentions are to help Araneae. Yes, I found her to hurt Rubio, to get that evidence, but now...” I reached out and covered Araneae’s hand. “...I will do whatever is necessary to protect her. When I walked in here, you said that had been your intention in keeping her. You told me that someone took that opportunity away from you. Today you have the opportunity again. We need to find that evidence.”
“To hurt Rubio?” Annabelle asked.
“If I said yes,” I asked, my tone deepening, “would you choose him over Araneae?”
Annabelle moved her gaze from me to Araneae and back. “No. I’d choose my daughter. I’d make the choice I was never allowed to make twenty-six years ago. However, if it comes to that, I may require your help, Sparrow’s help.”
Araneae’s big light-brown eyes turned my way.
“If you need it,” I said, “you have it. Right now, we need to find the evidence for him.” I leaned back. “He said he had a copy and so did my father. He also said he saw it and knows it exists. Daniel told him...” I wasn’t going to tell Annabelle Landers that Rubio McFadden killed her husband. “...near the end of his life that he’d made another copy. He told Rubio that Araneae is the key.”
Annabelle’s head shook back and forth. “Are you saying that Daniel knew our daughter was alive? And Rubio has known for ten years?”
I let out a long breath. “I can’t answer about Daniel with one hundred percent assurance. My father knew. He showed me her picture...” Technically, I found her picture. “...when I was thirteen. In that picture, Araneae was seven years old. Each year I was shown an updated photo. My father told me that she was mine.”
“I-I don’t understand. Your father was watching her? He planned for the two of you...why?”
“All I know for sure was that he was getting at least yearly updates,” I clarified. “They ended when Renee Marsh became Kennedy Hawkins. I was at the University of Michigan at the time, but I had help. We found her again. Up until I lured her back to Chicago, Araneae, without her knowledge, has been under Sparrow protection. Mine, not my father’s.”
Annabelle leaned back in the chair. The table was littered with most of the lunch Araneae had arranged. Outside the windows, life was occurring, the way it did. Sparrow Enterprises was making money. Sparrows were around the city doing what they did. Yet within this small office, it was ti
me to come clean and learn what we could.
“What do you want from me?” Annabelle asked. “I never saw evidence.”
“Then why would he say I was the key?” Araneae asked.
The judge’s head shook. “I never understood why Daniel did anything that he did.” She looked back to Araneae, her gaze going to her wrist. “He gave me the bracelet you’re wearing right before you were born.”
Araneae lifted her wrist. “This came from my...other mother. She gave it to me before she sent me away on the plane.”
“It’s the same bracelet. I couldn’t believe it when I saw it at the club. I don’t know how any of this happened.” She tilted her head toward the bracelet. “Have you changed the picture in the locket?”
As Araneae struggled with the locket, I reached over and pried it open. “It’s faded,” I said. “I can’t see what it is.”
“It was a picture of the church where we were married.”
“How did my mom get it?” Araneae asked.
“Daniel gave it to me just a day or two before you were born. We were up in Wisconsin...” She sighed. “...I blamed him for what happened to you. I wasn’t supposed to leave Chicago. One morning, while I was supposed to be on bed rest, he drove me up there. The snow started falling.” Her eyes closed as if she were seeing the scene from the past. “I was terrified I’d go into labor. The roads were nearly impassable. We had stopped at this little out-of-the-way motel. I didn’t understand why he’d do that. He started to tell me what he’d done and why we were in danger. I refused to listen. I was a judge. I couldn’t be made to testify against my husband, but if I knew...” Her sentence trailed away.
Araneae and I both nodded.
“He left me there.”
“Alone in a snowstorm?” Araneae asked.
“He wasn’t acting like himself. But when he came back, he was calmer. That’s when he gave me the bracelet. However, back then, it only had two charms.” She touched the charms. Where did you get the scissors and the diploma?”
“From someone very special. The diploma was when I graduated high school. The scissors were to commemorate the ribbon cutting of Sinful Threads.”
“I’m so proud of all you’ve done.”
Araneae glowed with Annabelle’s praise.
“Back then,” the judge went on, “when you were born, it only had the locket and key.”
Araneae and I both looked toward one another as I reached for her wrist and lifted the charm, the one that looked like an old key. It was smaller than a standard skeleton key for a door. My mother’s house still had interior doors that took skeleton keys. The one on the bracelet was less than half the size, some of the gold had chipped away, exposing the metal beneath.
Turning to me, Araneae asked, “Did he say that I’m the key or I had the key?”
“Fuck. It can’t be. Where would it lead? What could it possibly open?”
We both turned to Annabelle.
“The minister who married us,” she said, “gave Daniel the bracelet for our daughter. That’s what Daniel told me. It had belonged to the minister’s wife. He wanted it passed on and they had no children. We were married at a small church in Cambridge, Wisconsin. We were never very religious, yet I remember when Daniel returned from visiting the minister and talking to him, I thought that he had a new sense of calm. He agreed to go back to Chicago.
“Is that minister still living?” I asked.
Annabelle shook her head. “I don’t know. I doubt it.”
Araneae reached out to the judge. “It may be a long shot, but is there anything, a lockbox, a...” Her head shook. “...jewelry box, anything that you can think of that my father could have used to hide the CDs that Rubio thinks I have?”
“I can’t think of anything. I moved after he died. The house was too big and lonely. Everything was cleaned out. A lot was donated.”
“Did Rubio...? Was he around when you moved?” I asked.
She nodded. “Yes, he had people to help.”
I looked to Araneae and shook my head. “Then it wasn’t there. He’d know.”
Her soft brown eyes swirled with ideas. She turned to Annabelle. “He went to the church and afterward he was calmer?”
“Yes, well, he said he talked to the minister. I assumed that was at the church.”
“Mom, can you tell us the minister’s name and the church?”
“I love hearing you call me that.” She sat straighter in her seat. “The minister’s name was Watkins, Kenneth Watkins. The church was...” She reached for Araneae. “...it’s where you’re buried.”
Josey
Eleven years ago~
Wrapping my jacket around me, fending off the chill of the springtime air, I stared down at the track as members of the girls’ track team gathered. The sky was blue, yet the early April sun held little warmth. At least it wasn’t snowing, I thought, as I took in the greening grass. Trees were beginning to sprout blossoms and leaves.
Often Byron would arrange his schedule to attend Renee’s track meets. Today wasn’t one of those times. I smiled as parents I recognized waved and nodded, some carrying blankets. Through the years there had been reassurance in that many of the children who’d first met in kindergarten were still together. Though their interests varied, they’d remained friends. As Renee got older, I’d become a Girl Scout leader and active in the PTO. Byron worried that I was bringing too much attention to us, but in my mind, it was my way to stay involved and protect Renee from within.
Those girls, including Renee, who were scheduled next to run, were unzipping their sweats and pulling sweatshirts over their heads. Like many of her teammates, Renee’s hair was pulled back to a high ponytail. Throwing her sweatshirt to the side of the track, she reached up and tightened her ponytail tie. I knew from experience that when she ran, her hair would swish back and forth.
My back stiffened as a vaguely familiar man took the seat near me on the bleachers. My mind tried to place him as a parent of one of Renee’s classmates. I was coming up empty. Then again, the parents from all the participating schools were seated together. Maybe he was the father of one of the opponents.
My skin prickled with an uneasy feeling as he scooted closer.
I wished I could lose the sense of dread that accompanied me night and day over the last fifteen years. I longed to enjoy the life we’d created and not fear that at any moment it could be ripped out from under us.
What would it be like to not wake multiple times a night in a cold sweat with images of Allister Sparrow in my head?
After all of this time, I couldn’t imagine.
It wasn’t that Mr. Sparrow personally visited us through the years, but he’d sent subtle messages, enough to let us know he was watching. We’d continued to do as he instructed, sending Renee’s school picture each year to the post office box. The address was the same as when she’d first been given to us, as was ours. We lived in the same house.
The man sitting beside me nodded toward the track as the girls readied themselves in the starting blocks. Renee was in the lane closest to the field, farther back than her teammates and opponents. It was an optical illusion—the way the different lanes appeared. Each lane farther from the field was just that much longer than its neighbor.
“One of those yours?” he asked.
I flinched as at the same moment he spoke, the starting gun sounded, echoing through the cool air, and the girls began to run.
“Excuse me?” I replied, my mind on Renee as she pushed herself, her bare legs below her running shorts straining and arms pumping with a baton in her grasp.
This was Chicago in the spring. It seemed like track uniforms could be warmer.
“She’s grown up nice,” the man said, his eyes too on the track.
I turned his way. “I’m sorry, do we know one another.” I couldn’t place him.
I stood and clapped as Renee came around the track and passed the baton to a teammate. Breathing heavily, she looked up to the stands and s
miled. Her soft brown eyes glowed with pride. The baton hand-off was the hardest part of a relay for her, and she’d done it perfectly. Her teammate was significantly ahead of the pack.
The last runner in a relay was usually the fastest. As the first, Renee’s job was to keep them in the running. No pun intended.
As I sat down, the man turned to me. “What was that cat’s name?”
My stomach twisted as a cold chill ran through me. “Sir, I’m certain you’re mistaken.”
“Kitty,” he said with a nod. “Big gray one.”
The next hand-off had happened, but my eyes were no longer on the track. I turned to the man, my blood boiling. “If you have something to say or a message to deliver, do it and leave.”
“Just checking up. She’s gotten real pretty, that one. There are always opportunities for her, you know, if things don’t work out.”
Another perfect hand-off, yet I wasn’t seeing the relay as my stomach was revolting at his suggestion.
My neck straightened as my mind was besieged by memories of Neal’s childhood stories. It didn’t take a genius to know that his mother had talked up his abilities in math and other attributes to keep him out of what could happen to children in the Sparrow outfit. I wasn’t talking about the children of people in the outfit. I meant children they acquired. Selling a prostitute’s boy wasn’t beneath them and she knew it.
The race ended, Renee’s foursome the victors.
After standing and clapping, I sat again and turned this man’s direction. With my jaw clenched I stared at this man—my gaze unblinking. As I did, I now recognized him. He was the census taker when Renee had been young. “Things are working out just fine,” I said. “Leave us alone.”
“Just doing my job, ma’am.” He pulled a toothpick from his pocket and placed it between his teeth. “Watching her daddy too. There are lots of moving parts. Sometimes they crash.”
“Byron is doing everything he was told.”
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