Expose (Dr. Schwartzman Series Book 3)

by Danielle Girard

  And trying to stay apart became a losing battle as the pull between them grew. Without thinking, she touched his arm or shoulder when they worked together. On one occasion, after finding a piece of evidence that linked their killer to his victim, Hal had approached as though to kiss her. But he’d caught himself in time, and they both laughed awkwardly and moved apart, Roger watching them.

  A baby was not a “did they want to try” situation. A baby was a lifetime. A baby would change everything.

  The possibility was thrilling. A baby.

  On the heels of excitement was terror.

  Did Hal want kids? He was so good with his niece and nephews, but that was different than having his own child. Of course, he would be happy, wouldn’t he? He should be here when she took this test.

  But what if she wasn’t pregnant? Would she get his hopes up? Would he be disappointed? Relieved?

  No. She would take the tests on her own. Find out the answer, and give him the news tonight, either way. If she was pregnant, then she would tell him that she was having this baby. He could be as involved as he wanted. And if she wasn’t, she would tell him that, too, of course. He deserved to know.

  She took both tests and left them on the back of the toilet, returning to the kitchen to do dishes. Two plates and a bowl, her coffee cup. She loaded them into the dishwasher and stared at the clock, its slow hand barely moving. Two minutes was forever. Forcing herself to move, she looked around for something to do. She wanted to wipe down the kitchen counters, but the lemon cleaner made her sick, too. There was laundry, she thought, when the doorbell rang.

  Buster started barking as she made her way to the door. She glanced through the window. On her doorstep stood an older woman she recognized from down the block.

  She opened the door. Overhead, the morning clouds broke apart and scattered to reveal a blue sky. “Hello.”

  “Hello, dear.” The woman produced an envelope in a trembling hand. “I believe I got a piece of your mail yesterday.”

  Her neighbor held a generic white envelope with her name on the front. Junk mail, probably.

  “Thank you so much,” Schwartzman said, taking the envelope.

  “You’re very welcome.”

  “I’m Anna Schwartzman, by the way,” she added.

  “Eileen Goldstein,” she answered, motioning an arthritic hand down the block. “I live at 324.”

  “Very nice to meet you, Ms. Goldstein.”

  “Oh, Eileen, please. It’s nice to meet you, too.” She gave Buster a nervous glance and made her way out toward the street.

  Still in the doorway, Schwartzman opened the envelope. Buster settled onto the floor by her feet. An offer for health insurance. She ripped it in two and started to close the door when brakes screeched in the street. A horn blared.

  She dropped the ripped envelope and rushed out of the house. Eileen Goldstein lay in the driveway that ran between Schwartzman’s house and the neighbor’s. A white van reversed toward her.

  “Stop!” Schwartzman shouted, running. She stubbed her bare foot on the edge of her landscaping, and pain shot through her left toe as she hobbled to the driveway. She slapped the back of the van. “Stop!”

  Buster rushed to her side, and she held his collar to stop him.

  The reverse lights became brake lights.

  Schwartzman dropped to her knees by the older woman. “Eileen!” She touched the woman’s neck for her pulse.

  Buster pressed his nose to her face, and Schwartzman pushed him back. “Buster, no.”

  Her heartbeat was strong. They needed an ambulance.

  Ms. Goldstein moaned, and her eyes fluttered open.

  “Are you all right?” Schwartzman asked.

  Her eyes widened at the sight of Buster, and she tried to roll away.

  “Buster, lie down.”

  The dog backed up several paces and lay in the grass on the edge of her yard.

  “What happened?” Eileen asked.

  “You were hit.” Schwartzman looked back up at the van. “Hold on. We’ll get you some help.” She rose to her feet and rounded the side of the van. Damn driver. What the hell was he doing? She reached the door, but the van was empty.

  She swung back and struck something like concrete. She stumbled, dazed, her vision swimming. She didn’t get far. A hand gripped her arm, and she felt a hard pinch in her shoulder. She yelped at a stabbing pain. A needle. A shot.

  She couldn’t make sense of it. What happened?

  And then her vision cleared. Her eyes locked to his. Her heart ricocheted in her chest.

  No.

  The van door opened with a long, low whine.

  She spun to escape, but he had her by the shoulders.

  The world spun as he pivoted her and threw her down on the bed of the van.

  She landed on her face on a hard metal surface. Her right wrist buckled beneath her, and she let out a cry. Scrambling to get up, she tried to bring her knees up, to rise. He landed on her back, the weight of him flattening her. Pain radiated down her arm like a burn. He wrenched the hand behind her, twisting it, and she screamed at the fresh wave of torture.

  Metal on her wrist pinched tight, and then he pulled her second hand behind her.

  Her brain swirled. She was dizzy, sick. Peanut butter and jelly rose in her throat, and she opened her mouth to scream.

  The snap of something tearing filled her ears, and then she couldn’t open her mouth. Rocking shoulder to shoulder, she screamed through the tape, kicking her feet against the metal floor.

  The van door slammed closed, and another door opened. The rev of an engine followed, and motion threw her backward as the van pulled forward.

  Tears choked her, making it hard to breathe. No. No. No.

  She tried to roll on her side. Her gaze caught his in the rearview mirror. The glint of a grin in his eyes.

  “Well, hello,” he said. “It’s been a long time.”

  And then the rev of the engine screamed beneath her, and a thick fog rolled over her . . .

  And she was sucked down as though under a wave, until she could no longer see or hear . . . or breathe.

  54

  Hal picked up a copy of the New York Times at the Starbucks next to the gym. Waiting for his coffee, he flipped open to the images of Aleena Laughlin—as a young woman in her niqab at her wedding with Jared, one of the family. He might’ve waited to go to Anna’s to read it, but he wanted his own copy.

  Anna. When had he stopped thinking of her as Schwartzman? After that night. It was too weird to call a woman he’d slept with by her last name.

  Slept with.

  It was so much more than that. This was not a casual thing. Not for him. He hoped not for her either.

  Though they hadn’t worked that out. Not yet.

  He would give her time. He had promised her that, and he was a man of his word. Even when it was killing him.

  By every indication, she wanted to be with him, but she wasn’t ready to tell the world. Her mother. Once her mother knew, Spencer would find out. The news could lure him out of hiding. But wouldn’t that be best? They would know when he was coming. They could be ready.

  Hal would be ready.

  He had imagined the scene so many times—how he would draw his gun and take aim. Shoot to kill. Self-defense. How different their lives would be if Spencer were dead.

  His phone buzzed in his pocket. A little jolt to his stomach said it might be Schwartzman, but the number had an 864 area code. The 220 prefix. Hal shouldn’t even know what those were, but he did know. Greenville, South Carolina. How six little numbers could make him so angry. He jabbed at the screen to accept the call. “Harris.”

  “Hal Harris?” a man’s voice asked.

  “Speaking. Who’s this?”

  “This is Colton Price. I was hired by—”

  “You’re the private investigator in Greenville.”

  “Right.”

  Hal stopped moving, his limbs frozen. “What’s happened?”


  “I was trying to reach Dr. Schwartzman.”

  “She’s—” Where was she? They had the day off. She’d said something about going to yoga and running errands. They’d planned an early dinner, a walk with Buster around the neighborhood . . . a movie on her couch. Hal started running. “You tried her house?”

  “The house and her cell.” Price’s voice was breathless.

  Hal picked up the pace. “You have news.”

  “Spencer MacDonald is gone.”

  Hal sprinted around the front of his car, unlocking the door with the fob. “Gone?” He ducked into the car and slammed the door, fumbling with his keys to get the right one into the ignition. “What do you mean he’s gone?”

  “He’s actually been gone. We discovered it this morning. He had someone staying at his place, making it look like he was there.”

  “You’re supposed to have eyes on him.”

  “We did,” Price said. “Only it wasn’t him. He’s got a double, a stand-in.”

  “What about work?”

  “He called in sick Thursday and Friday. That’s what got our attention. But there was someone in the house. We saw him through the window. It looked like him, and we had no reason to believe he wasn’t there.”

  Hal cranked the key in the ignition, looked over his shoulder, and pulled into traffic without fastening his seat belt. Oh, God. “So he hasn’t been seen since Thursday?”

  A pause on the phone.

  “Price!” Hal shouted.

  “Right,” the investigator confirmed. “The house hasn’t sold, so he’s probably coming back.”

  Probably. The word rang like a siren in his head.

  Today was the third day. Spencer might have been in San Francisco for two days. But why wait until now? She’ll be okay. But he wasn’t taking any chances. “I’ll call you back.” Without waiting for Price’s response, Hal ended the call.

  Hal jammed the seat belt until it clicked. The clock on the dash said 10:50 a.m. He dialed Schwartzman’s cell, let it ring twice, and then ended the call so he could dial her home number. Again, two rings. Then the cell again. Home. Cell. Just rings. No answers.

  He set the phone in his lap, drew two deep breaths, and willed the thing to ring. Come on, Anna. Call me back.

  Nothing.

  He turned on his siren and flashed his headlights, honking and cursing at cars too slow to move out of his way.

  She always called him right back. She would see the calls and know something was wrong.

  Something was wrong.

  He swerved into an intersection to pass a slow-moving UPS truck and ignored the blaring horns. He lifted the phone and called her again—her cell phone, then her home.

  “Damn it!” he shouted and dialed the main number at the station.

  “Dispatch.”

  “Inspector Harris here. I need any available car to 625 Elizabeth Street. I’ve got a possible 11-99.” Officer in danger. Not exactly, but he didn’t give a shit about semantics. This was Schwartzman. This was Anna.

  He called Roger next. When he didn’t pick up, Hal sent a voice text. Anna’s missing. I’m heading to her house. He added her address. Roger would come. If he got the message. If he could, Roger would come.

  He imagined getting to her house, finding in her in the bathtub with her headphones on, listening to music. But she didn’t use headphones. She didn’t like being unaware of her surroundings. It made her uneasy. It scared her.

  He tried to think of other possibilities. She might be outside. Or she might have left her phone and gone on an errand. But he didn’t believe it. His gut said this was real.

  He raced through the streets, laying hard on the horn and shouting through the glass.

  Please, God. Not Anna.

  Driving like a madman, he called Price back. “You need to find out where Spencer went, where he is.”

  “We’re following up on it,” Price said. “So far, we’ve found eight itineraries in his name. Eight different destinations, eight different times.”

  “For when? Thursday?”

  “A couple for Thursday. Four for yesterday. A couple this morning.” Price talked quickly but not fast enough.

  Hal wanted to shout at him to spit it out—everything he knew. “Where? Where was he going?”

  “All over. New York, Philly, Toronto, Dallas—”

  “Here? Was he booked to anywhere close to us?”

  “LA.”

  “That’s Southern California. It’s not close.”

  “That’s the closest one. Everything else is farther—Vegas, Denver, and Tucson were the others.”

  Hal sped into his turn at Twenty-Third and Elizabeth and barely slowed at the stop sign at the end of the block. Why would Spencer book eight itineraries? He was trying to distract them. Or lose them. He knew he was being followed. Hal slammed his palm on the wheel. “He must’ve caught another flight—a connection to one of the local airports. You’ve got to trace him from those other places. Do it now!”

  Price started to answer, but Hal cut him off. “Find out where he is.”

  “We’re looking.”

  “Look faster,” Hal barked as he reached her house and double-parked at the curb. Her car was also on the curb. The sight of it made him sick.

  He jumped from the car and ran to the house. A car honked at the door he’d left wide open in the street, but he didn’t stop. He’d barely reached the walkway when he heard Buster behind inside. He pounded on the door and rang the bell, but he didn’t wait for an answer. Instead, he gripped the knob.

  The door opened, and a sob caught in his throat. “Anna!”

  Buster barked, pushing himself against Hal.

  “Anna!” he shouted again, his voice hoarse with fear.

  There was no answer. He ran through the house. Down the hall and into her bedroom, into the master bath, and beyond to the back door. He ran onto the porch. “Anna!”

  He prayed that he might find her on the ground somewhere. Maybe she’d hit her head . . . or fainted. But she was nowhere. Not in either of the bedrooms, not in the kitchen or the laundry room, or the den or the yard.

  Her car was there.

  Buster was there.

  But she was not.

  Hal made another loop of the house and stopped in the entryway. He doubled over, pressing his hands into his knees as he fought to breathe. On the floor lay an envelope and letter, torn in half. He lifted it and opened the page. An offer for insurance.

  She tore her junk mail in half. He’d seen her do it, something he’d thought cute and quirky. She’d been standing right there when something had happened. Something had drawn her out.

  She was gone.

  Anna was gone.

  It had to come down to this. He should have known it would. Eventually, that bastard was going to come here. Spencer MacDonald wasn’t going to accept defeat.

  He tried to calm himself, to draw breath. Buster circled him, the barking fading into a whine. Had the dog seen Spencer?

  Hal forced himself upright.

  Anna had a gun. She knew how to use it. They’d been practicing.

  He looked at the gray sky through the open front door. She would not be expecting Spencer in the middle of the day. If the doorbell rang, she’d probably just open the door. Without looking. She wouldn’t be going for her gun.

  No. She wasn’t stupid. She would be on guard. She would be careful.

  Hal pivoted back toward her bedroom and crossed to the small table. On it lay a book called A Little Life, a notebook, and the latest journal from the American College of Pathologists, folded open to the article she’d been reading.

  He opened the drawer and saw it—her gun. He sank onto the bed. The blood in his veins had stopped moving. His lungs no longer wanted to draw oxygen. His fingers trailed across the gray silk quilt, pulled neatly across the bed, her pillows plumped and squared across the top of the bed.

  The bed he should have been sharing with her for the past two months. The bed he
had waited for her to invite him into. She would have, wouldn’t she?

  He stood upright. She still would. They would be together. He would find her. She would be okay.

  Someone pounded on the front door. Hal hoped it would be Anna.

  Instead, it was the backup car. Hal gave the officers a picture of her and had them start by canvasing the neighborhood.

  He called his captain. He called Hailey. Then he called her cell phone again, heard it ringing in the kitchen. He gripped her phone in his hands and fell into one of the chairs.

  Roger arrived a few minutes later.

  The sound of the door brought him to his feet, and for that brief moment, he prayed it would be her. The crushing blow when it wasn’t.

  “I came as soon as I got your message,” Roger said.

  “There has to be something.” Hal’s voice cracked. He gripped his hands in fists and then smoothed them on his head, desperate to have something for them to do. “We have to find something that will tell us where she is. Where he took her.”

  “Naomi and Chase are en route. We’ll go through everything. Top to bottom. Have you called the FBI?”

  “Captain Marshall is calling. He’s got a contact.” Hal started pacing again. “I should have been with her. I should have done something.”

  “We’re going to find her.” Roger nodded to the back of the house. “I’m going to start.”

  Hal stepped through the front door into the air. He couldn’t breathe. He pulled out his phone and stared at the screen. No word.

  Where was she? What was that bastard doing to her?

  He jumped at a woman’s voice. It was Anna’s next-door neighbor, Helen. “I saw the police cars. Is everything okay?”

  “We’re looking for Dr. Schwartzman,” Hal said.

  “I haven’t seen her this morning. I just took Mrs. Goldstein to the hospital.”

  Hal shook his head. “Who?”

  “Mrs. Goldstein,” Helen said. “She lives at the end of the block. She was hit by a van in our driveway.” She motioned to the driveway that ran between Anna’s house and hers.

  The hairs on the back of Hal’s neck stood on end. “Hit by a van.”

  “My daughter and I got home from the store, and she was lying in our driveway. She said she was hit.”