by Hart, Stella
“What’s wrong?
She didn’t reply for a long time, but I could still hear her sniffling and breathing shakily. “He’s gone,” she finally muttered.
“What?”
“Jamie just called to tell me. They found him in the river this morning.”
“Who? Your dad?”
“Yes,” she said, voice quaking. “He’s dead.”
16
Logan
I sped all the way back to Wonderland, making it there in half the usual time. It still felt like it took forever.
When I finally strode into our suite on the top floor, I saw Willow sitting alone on the bed, arms rigid by her side. There was dried mascara on her cheeks, but she wasn’t crying anymore. She was staring at the wall instead, eyes glassy and expressionless. She looked like she was in a trance.
I hurried over to her and gathered her into my arms. “Tell me what happened,” I said, stroking the nape of her neck.
She muttered something unintelligible. I drew back, tucked her hair behind her ears, and tilted her chin up so that she was forced to look at me. “Willow,” I said in a commanding tone. “Tell me what happened. From the very start.”
That seemed to be enough to snap her out of her dazed reverie. She took in a deep, shaky breath and lowered her gaze to the bed. “Jamie called about an hour ago,” she mumbled.
“How?” I asked. Her phone was only able to receive calls from specific numbers I’d programmed into it.
“He called downstairs and asked to be connected to our room. Said it was an emergency,” she said, listlessly waving her hand toward the landline phone on the other side of the room that we used to order food or call housekeeping.
“What did he tell you?”
She chewed on the inside of her cheek for a moment. “A jogger saw a body floating in the river at six o’clock this morning. She called the cops and they pulled the body out. They transported him to the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office, but they had no idea who he was, because he’d been in the water so long that he was totally unrecognizable. When they examined him, they found an ID card with my father’s name. They also found a note zipped into a waterproof pocket on his jacket. It said ‘Sorry’.” She sniffed and looked away again. “He couldn’t swim.”
I rubbed my jaw. “Fuck.”
“They said judging by the state of his body, he’d probably been in the water for a few days. So he probably jumped in not long after the parade.”
I frowned. “How do they know he jumped?”
“Apparently medical examiners can tell stuff like that,” she said softly, fidgeting with her hands. “No injuries inflicted before he went in the water. Nothing to suggest he was forced in any way. Water in the lungs, meaning he definitely drowned and wasn’t already dead before he went in. In cases like that, they determine the person either jumped in on purpose or accidentally fell. When they found the note in his pocket and identified him from the card, they decided it had to be a suicide. Guess they figured he couldn’t handle being a Rhoades with all the scandal at the moment. Too much pressure, or something like that.”
I squeezed her hand. “I’m sorry,” I said.
She muttered something incomprehensible again and looked toward the window, shoulders slumping.
“Did you speak to your mom?” I asked, trying to keep her talking.
“Yes. Jamie put her on the phone after he told me everything. I talked to her for a while.”
“You should probably be with her right now. I’ll take you to the White House,” I said, straightening my shoulders.
“No.” She bit her trembling bottom lip. “She doesn’t really want me around at the moment. She has to make all the funeral arrangements and figure out a way to tell the whole world that her husband is dead. I’d probably just get in her way.”
“Then I’ll take you down to Alexandria to see Jared,” I said. I stood and held out a hand, but Willow shook her head and stayed on the bed.
“We can’t do that.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“Mom hasn’t told him yet. She said she doesn’t want to do it this close to Christmas.”
My brows furrowed. “Are you serious?”
“Yes. She said she’s worried it’ll ruin every Christmas for the rest of his life if we tell him right now. She wants to wait a while.”
I shook my head slowly. “How can she keep something like this from him? Once the media picks up the story, it’ll be everywhere.”
“She’s making my aunt keep him away from live TV, internet, and newspapers.”
“That’s fucked up. He deserves to know his father is dead, as horrible as it is.”
Willow let out a morose sigh. “I know, but he’s her child. So it’s her choice in the end.”
“I guess. That’s seriously coldblooded, though.” I sat down again, frown deepening.
Willow started picking at a thread on the charcoal gray blanket in front of her, eyes shimmering. “Can you tell me something?”
“Of course.”
She swallowed audibly. “I know I was angry at Dad. Beyond angry. I hated him for what he did. But I….” She paused to sniff back the tears. “I wish I could’ve talked to him one last time before this happened. Talked to him properly, I mean. Is that totally insane?”
I put my hand on her shoulder. “No. It’s not insane at all,” I said, squeezing her arm. “Do you want me to take you down there?”
Her forehead creased. “Where?”
“To the morgue. I know it’ll be horrible to see him like that, but it’s still him. It might help if you say goodbye to him in person.”
She sniffed again. “I can’t do that.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to?”
She sucked in a deep breath. “I mean I literally can’t. They cremated his body already.”
My brows shot up. “What?”
“They said he looked too bad for family members to see. All bloated and blue from the river. They did the autopsy, took some samples to test against us at some point just to make sure it’s definitely him, and then they cremated him.”
I held up a palm. “So no one actually saw his body apart from the so-called cops and medical examiner?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You’re telling me that your mother, the fucking president of the United States, wasn’t able to see her husband’s body before they permanently disposed of it?”
“Yes,” she said softly, looking down again.
I glanced at the clock on the wall. “It’s half past five now, and you said his body was found at six this morning. So the authorities cremated him in under twelve hours without letting a single family member come in to identify him. Don’t you think that’s the most suspicious fucking shit you’ve ever heard?”
“He wasn’t identifiable,” Willow mumbled. “Like I said, they took DNA samples, and they’re going to test them against a sample from me later to confirm the ID. But that’s just a formality. They know it’s him.”
I narrowed my eyes. Willow was obviously in a deep state of shock, still trying to process everything that had happened, so she hadn’t yet registered how messed up the explanation for the premature cremation was. I’d never heard anything so fucking shady in my life.
Quinn Rhoades had to be in terrible shock as well. That would explain why she hadn’t questioned the decision for her husband’s body to be destroyed almost immediately. Either that or something deeply sinister was happening and she knew all about it.
Tears splashed down Willow’s cheeks again, and her face crumpled. “It’s all my fault. I should’ve known,” she said, lifting one hand to wipe under her eyes.
“Should’ve known what?”
“That my dad was going to do this,” she said. “When I was standing next to him on the parade float the other day, he said some stuff.”
I tilted my head to one side. “Like what?”
She bit her bottom lip. “You know how he’s been trying to get me to talk t
o him so he can tell me how sorry he is?”
“Yeah.”
“He said the same stuff at the parade, but this time there was more. He said he was going to make things right. Fix everything. I had no idea he meant he was going to….” She trailed off and rubbed her red-rimmed eyes again. “I had no idea he was going to kill himself. But that must be what he meant. That was his idea of fixing everything. I should’ve known, but I didn’t. I basically told him to fuck off, and that was one of the last things I ever said to him.”
A penny rolled in from the back of my mind, ready to drop. I narrowed my eyes. “I don’t think that’s what he meant.”
She looked up at me. “What?”
“You know how I met with Q today?”
“Yes,” she murmured, lower lip still quivering. “Was it your dad?”
“I still don’t know. I’m about ninety percent sure it is, though. Same height, same speech patterns,” I replied. “Anyway, he said a bunch of shit about your father. That’s what I was going to tell you on the phone earlier.”
“What was it?”
I leaned closer, lowering my voice. “Q said he found out that your dad was feeling guilty over the whole contract thing, and he was planning on going to the media because he wanted to expose the whole Order,” I said. “He also said he dropped the body and the note as a warning to him.”
Willow’s eyes widened. “Oh my god.”
“So when your dad said he was going to fix everything at the parade, that’s probably what he meant. He was telling you about his plan to destroy the Order and get you home.”
She shook her head slowly. “So… he wasn’t hinting that he wanted to kill himself?”
“No, I don’t think so.” I pressed my lips into a grim line. “Q said the note was just a warning and that he has no idea where your dad went after the parade, but I’m not so sure about that. I didn’t believe half the shit that came out of his mouth today. He’s the slimiest motherfucker I’ve ever met.”
“You think he’s the one who made Dad disappear after the parade?”
I nodded. “Yeah. I mean, it could’ve been suicide like they’re claiming, but I think there’s an equal chance he was murdered. There’s just so much shit here that doesn’t add up.”
Willow stared at the wall again. “Even if someone else killed him, it’s still my fault,” she murmured, tears leaking down her cheeks.
“How the hell is it your fault?”
“If I hadn’t been so awful to him, he wouldn’t have tried to cross the Order to make things right, would he?” she said, chin trembling. “He was only doing it because of me. Because I refused to speak to him or forgive him.”
I frowned and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Willow, you can’t think like that. It’s not your fault at all. You had every right to be furious at your father for what he did. Every fucking right. I can’t imagine a single person in your shoes who’d choose to forgive him.”
“I guess,” she mumbled as I let her go. She drew her arms and legs close to her body, a defeated expression crossing her face. “I just… I don’t know what to do now. I don’t even know what to think. I feel like a zombie. Like nothing is even real.”
“You’re in shock. It’s normal.”
Willow’s eyes shuttered, and she let out a shaky sigh. Her mouth kept opening and closing, like she wanted to say something but had temporarily lost the ability to do so.
“We need to find out what really happened, okay?” I said, leaning in to stroke her hair. “I can’t just let you sit here not knowing the truth.”
“How can we find out anything?” she asked, eyes fluttering open. “If you’re right and Q actually did this, it’ll be covered up. Just like everything else.”
“I can still try. I have ways, remember?”
She didn’t respond.
“Are you okay to sit here for a few minutes by yourself?” I asked, brows knitting with concern.
She nodded silently.
“I need to make a call. I’ll be right in there,” I said, pointing to the walk-in robe.
“Okay,” she said, so softly that I barely heard it.
I patted her arm and got up before quietly slipping into the smaller room. Then I fished my phone out of my pocket and dialed Connor Chang’s number.
He picked up on the second ring this time. “Logan! Twice in one day,” he said. “What’s up?”
“I need another favor.”
“Sure. What is it?”
I scratched my head. “You’re a really good hacker, right?”
Connor snorted. “Of course I am. Why do you think the NSA hired me? They were afraid I was gonna hack them.”
“Do you think you could get into the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner’s system?”
“Uh… you mean the city morgue?”
“Yes.”
“I could probably swing it. Why?”
“I have to tell you something before I answer that, but you can’t tell anyone else. Got it?”
“You’re freaking me out, but okay,” he said slowly. “Shoot.”
I lowered my voice. “The president’s husband is dead.”
“Shit. What happened?”
“He was found in the river this morning. They’re saying he drowned himself.”
“Jesus. Really?”
“Yeah. It’ll be all over the news soon,” I replied. “Anyway, it doesn’t add up to me. They wouldn’t let the family see the body, and they’ve already cremated it.”
Connor was silent for a few beats. “I know that sounds weird, but it’s not actually that weird,” he said. “Have you ever seen a body that’s been in the water for ages?”
“No.”
“Trust me on this: don’t Google it. It’s fucked. They change color and get all bloated, and they’re basically unrecognizable if they’ve been in for long enough. Sometimes the flesh even sloughs right off. That shit can be traumatic for family members to see. Not to mention how hard it is for them to even identify the person by sight at that point,” he said. “I know this sounds morbid, but at that point, it’s no longer the man, woman or child they knew and loved. It barely even looks like a person at all.”
“I get that, but what if someone didn’t want the body to be recognized because it’s not actually Stephen Rhoades?”
“Huh? You mean you think he’s still alive and they switched him out or something?”
“No. I have pretty good reason to presume that he’s genuinely stone cold dead at this point. But I think he might’ve been murdered, and this drowning thing is just a cover-up.”
“Uh… what? Why?”
“Long story.” I clenched my jaw. “Anyway, I think they could’ve taken him to the morgue to cremate him so they could hide the evidence of what was really done to him, and they made sure there was another body for the official autopsy report and photos. A body that would be conveniently unrecognizable in case the family ever asks to see it. A drowned man, for instance.”
“That sounds pretty far-fetched, Logan,” Connor said. His voice had taken on a slow, reluctant tone.
“I know, but I have reason to believe it’s true. I’m not just making shit up.”
“Right. What exactly do you want me to do?”
“For now, I just want to know what the official autopsy report says.”
He clicked his tongue. “I suppose I can try. But it’ll take a while to get into their system, if it’s even possible.”
“If anyone can get in, it’s you.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere,” he said with a soft chuckle.
He fell silent, and for the next few minutes, all I could hear on the other end of the line was the clatter of his keyboard. While I waited for him, I stepped out of the walk-in robe to check on Willow. She was still sitting on the bed, staring blankly at the wall.
I walked over and rubbed her back. She glanced up at me, eyes puffy and pink. “What are you doing?” she asked timidly, eyes darting to my cell phone.
>
“I’ll tell you soon,” I said. “Just sit tight for now, okay?”
She nodded and went back to staring into space. On the other end of the line, Connor was still typing furiously.
“I’m a fucking genius,” he said a moment later. “I’m in. That’s a record time for me.”
I stepped back into the wardrobe. “Can you find the autopsy report and read it to me?”
“Yup. Hold on.” His mouse clicked a few times, and then he spoke up again. “Let’s see. Stephen Rhoades… aged fifty-one… probable suicide by drowning.” He paused to clear his throat. “Obviously it says a lot more than that, but it’s just medical jargon and numbers. No point reading it all out.”
“Okay. Are there photos?”
“Not on this page, but—” He stopped abruptly and swore under his breath. “Fuck. I just found some on the next one.”
“Bad?”
“Worse than I imagined,” he said in a strained voice. “He’s all bloated and mottled. Barely even looks human.”
“Give me a second.” I went back into the main room and got Willow’s attention again. “Did your dad have any distinct freckles or moles on him?” I asked, covering the phone with one hand. “Or a tattoo? Anything like that?”
Her forehead crinkled. “Um… he had a dark brown mole here,” she said, raising one hand to her left ear. “Right on this spot. I used to tease him about it when I was a kid because I thought it looked like he had a stud piercing.”
I nodded and returned to the wardrobe. “Can you see a close-up of the ears in any of the photos?” I asked Connor.
“I dunno. There’s a ton of them. Let me check.” A few more minutes went by in silence before he spoke up again. “Okay, yeah. I found a few clear close-ups of the head.”
“Any freckles or moles on the ears? Specifically the left one.”
“Nope.”
“You sure?”
“Positive. Both ears are bone white. No marks of any kind.”
“Stephen Rhoades had a dark mole on his left earlobe.”
Connor lapsed into silence again. “If that’s true, then this isn’t Stephen Rhoades,” he finally said.
I swallowed thickly. “I knew it,” I muttered.