“Help me cut the cake, Gerry?” I wanted to distract him from whatever had caused his upset.
He nodded and placed his hand around mine and together we cut slices in the cake. I handed around the pieces on paper plates and the kids sat and ate. Gerry climbed onto my lap and we ate together.
“Do you know what I wished for?” he whispered, his blue eyes brimming with tears.
“If you tell me, it won’t come true. You know that don’t you?” I said.
“It won’t anyway,” he replied.
“Sometimes wishes do come true.”
“Not this one, it’s too big,” he said before wriggling off my lap and joining the boys on the floor to finish his cake.
Robert looked at me with a frown, I shrugged my shoulders. Maybe I should have let him tell me. Travis seemed to be having a great time playing a car racing game on the Playstation and for the first time in ages, we sat and watched him laugh. Robert and Ted headed off to the office to discuss the kids and I helped Evelyn clean up. Just before it was time for us to leave, I took Gerry to one side.
“You know the wish you made? Write it down, put it in your memory box or a safe place, that way you won’t forget what it was.”
He rushed to get paper and a pen and I covered my eyes with my hand while he wrote. He folded the paper and together we made our way to his bedroom. He had a little tin where he kept his private things. Inside was the photo of Kerry he had taken, a key ring with a small tattered teddy bear attached, some drawings and now his wish.
The children were encouraged, if they wanted to, to have a little box, something to keep their memories or personal items in. The other children were not allowed to look inside, it was one of the rules Robert had set. Most of the kids shared a bedroom so it was important that each had a private place for things personal to them and these little boxes were it.
I hugged all the boys before we left, Gerry the longest. I was trying my hardest not to single him out for special attention but at that moment he needed it. Had it been any of the other boys, I would have done the same. I turned in the car to look through the rear window as we drove away. Gerry was standing on the steps holding the small blanket in his hands.
“Where did Gerry get that blanket?” I asked.
“Ted said it was in Kerry’s room, guess it makes him feel close to her,” Robert answered.
“He’s such a sweet boy, I wonder why he hasn’t been adopted by now?” Evelyn asked.
I felt something odd, a wrench in my stomach at the thought of Gerry leaving. It wasn’t pleasant, I didn’t like the thought of him living elsewhere, as selfish as that was. The home wasn’t one where kids came and went. They stayed until they were sixteen, it was like a foster home but every now and again one left. More so the younger ones.
***
As the car pulled up at the house Robert took a call.
“For fuck’s sake,” he said to the caller. “Come over now, Mack, let’s get this sorted once and for all.”
“What’s up?” Travis asked.
“It was Irene, she threw the brick at the car and that prick, what’s his name, the reporter? He has it splashed all over some online magazine.”
“Guy Rogers,” Travis answered.
“That’s him. The fucker must have told her where we live.”
“Why today?” I asked.
“He thinks he has two days for the story to run, I bet. It’s Saturday, he probably thinks we can’t get lawyers involved until Monday so the story gets seen before being pulled. I’m going to fucking bury him this time,” Robert said.
“Don’t do anything rash, Robert, think it through first,” I said.
“Brooke, this prick has been writing shit about me for a couple of years now. I want to know why.”
We made our way into the house and waited for Mack. In the meantime I googled Robert Stone, printed out anything that could have come from Rogers, anything negative. I was amazed at the amount of information I found, many pictures of us together, some I had been aware of and some not. There was never anything concrete in the articles I read but a fair few alluded to his wealth being accumulated through crime. One article mentioned Joe and I kept that to one side. I wondered how much Robert had contributed to the Mayor’s campaign fund when I read a gushing interview. Apparently the Mayor thought Robert was a pillar of the community, a businessman to lead and someone to aspire to.
I found an online magazine, a trashy celebrity gossip type and centre page was a photo of Irene throwing the brick. There was no shot of the occupants of the car, just a black Range Rover with blacked out windows. Stupidly, he hadn’t thought to get the number plate in the shot either. There was no telling who this car belonged to but there was an interview with Irene. I printed it out as I heard Mack’s voice. I vacated the seat as Robert, Travis, Mack and Evelyn came into the office. Robert read aloud the article. It contained nothing that she hadn’t already said before. It said that Robert had visited her and offered to pay for Kerry. She claimed to have been outraged and terrified that Robert would come and kidnap her daughter. She said that she had fought the authorities but being a poor, single mother, she didn’t have the money to start a legal campaign. Many times she had tried to visit or at least have some contact with Kerry and was refused. She feared for her life but couldn’t stay silent anymore. Her daughter had been killed while in the care of Brooke Stone and she wanted the world to know how evil these people were.
“What a bitch,” I said when he finished reading.
“Here’s what I want to do,” Mack said.
He produced a document and handed it to Robert. It was an unsigned statement that he wanted to send to the magazine. Robert read it.
Sources close to Mr. and Mrs. Stone have said that they are appalled and disgusted by the lies being told about them. Kerry Cole was taken from her mother by the authorities after it was discovered that her mother, a drug addict, had offered her daughter to men in return for payment. The authorities then placed her into Stone House, a privately run children’s home. It is also known that Kerry Cole suffered a miscarriage as a young teen after falling pregnant to one of her many abusers. After being placed in the home, Kerry returned to school, was settled and showed no inclination to reconnect with her mother. At no time had her mother tried to contact Kerry. She had, however, demanded money from Mr. Stone, which he refused to give. Sadly, Kerry lost her life after being attacked by unknown assailants on a trip to New York. The police are still investigating her murder. She was in the care of Mrs. Stone at the time who was injured while trying to protect her.
“What we also do is get hold of the lawyers and have them issue a letter demanding a retraction of the story and a restraining order against Irene,” Mack said.
“Okay, leak that to the magazine but no one else, I don’t want to draw attention to the article. Trav, give Peters a ring. I want to meet today and tell him I don’t care if he’s on the golf course, remind him he’s paid a large enough retainer,” Robert said.
Travis made his call, Mack took over the computer and fired off a couple of emails. The one to the magazine would be routed through various accounts so it couldn’t be traced back.
“Now, what to do about Rogers?” Robert said as he strode to the window thinking.
“Meet him,” Travis answered.
Robert turned slowly, they looked at each other without speaking and Robert gave a nod. Travis left the office and Mack slowly smiled.
“What you do mean? Meet him.” I asked.
“Exactly that. I’m going to talk to him,” Robert answered.
“Look at you all, you’re like a pack on the hunt.”
He didn’t answer me but turned to Mack.
“Let me change then we’ll head into the office and wait for Peters.”
Robert made his way downstairs and I stepped in front of Mack.
“Mack, I can’t have Robert caught up in the middle of something, not again.”
“Brooke, nothing like
that will happen here. If we don’t do something this will get worse. You want to know what it’s like to have the lies and the press hound you? Go speak to the girls. We have to put a stop to this, we should have done it a while ago. Trust me?”
I did trust him, I didn’t trust Travis. In his frame of mind, who knew what would happen. I made my way downstairs and to the bedroom as Robert was sitting on the bed tying a shoelace.
“I don’t want you to do this,” I said. He stood and pulled me into his chest.
“I know you don’t and I would listen to your concerns all the time but, in this case, you have to let me deal with it my way.”
“You don’t have any construction going on right now, do you? You know, pouring concrete and all that.”
He looked at me with a frown.
“Bodies don’t make good foundations, so I hear,” I said.
He rolled his eyes, shook his head and laughed. “People should be more scared of you. You have a wicked imagination, but not a bad idea.”
“I was joking.”
He pulled my head towards his and gave me a brief kiss on the lips. “So was I, Brooke.”
“The problem with you is that you know too much and you think too much,” he said.
“Don’t shut me out, Robert.”
“I’m not going to. There are times when I have to deal with things the way I know works and you have to trust me.”
Trust. Trusting your average husband meant that he won’t cheat on you, he won’t lie to you. Trusting a man like Robert was much more complicated. I had to understand and accept he had a different lifestyle to many, dealt with problems in his own way and I trusted him, completely. I just worried something awful would happen to him.
I nodded and walked him to the door. I watched as the three of them climbed into the car and drove off. I sighed and climbed the stairs. Evelyn pushed a cup of tea towards me as I sat next to her at the breakfast bar.
“You know exactly when a cup of tea is needed,” I said, taking a sip.
She chuckled. “Years of experience, Brooke. You need to let him go and not worry about this.”
“I know but I can’t help it.”
After our tea Evelyn left, she had some errands to run before heading off to see her sister. I settled down for a chat with Sam. Scott had left that morning to join him and I wanted to catch up, we spent half an hour on the phone. Nothing had changed, his dad was still in the hospital and would remain there for a while before being transferred to a hospice nearer the end. Sam was debating whether to return to Washington, even if just for a week or so. He had spoken to Jonathan who had told him to take as much time as he wanted but he was concerned he had abandoned his job.
I headed back into the home office to pick up the papers I had printed off. I wanted to see if this journalist’s name came up more than the two times we knew about. I settled at Robert’s desk and started to read through. Most of the reports were about who Robert was supposed to be dating. There would be a photograph of him leaving an event with a woman beside him and I noticed Miranda a couple of times. Not once was he seen holding a hand, having any contact with them at all. I picked up one from years back, I had seen this article before. It was Robert shielding his face and was in the business section of a local newspaper. It talked about a deal Robert had done, he had bought a manufacturing plant, stripped it down and sold off the land. It was estimated that he had made a couple of million dollars in that one deal. I was about to put the page down when a word caught my eye, Rogers. I reread the line.
Daniel Rogers, an employee who now finds himself out of a job, is quoted as saying, “There are families with children who are going to suffer. How am I going to put food on the table, I’m in my fifties? Who is going to employ me, at my age?”
Could it be a coincidence? Could Daniel be a relative or the father of Guy Rogers? I picked up the phone to dial Robert, having to leave a message when he didn’t answer.
“Babe, call me urgently. I’m okay, just found something out you might need to know before you do anything.”
Robert had always told me to not say too much over the phone, don’t give details. He’d had his phone hacked once and was always careful. I switched on the computer, I was sure Mack or Travis, the ultimate computer hacker, had already done this but I googled both Daniel and Guy. I found nothing on Daniel but plenty on Guy and printed out what I thought was useful. I logged onto his blog, it repeated the story about Irene and looking through past stories, I found another three on Robert. There was a kiss and tell, not that it told much. A Nikki Southern had had her heart broken after a relationship with Robert. She talked about how they were going to live together, get married before he cruelly left her, possibly for another woman. I rolled my eyes knowing that not to be true.
The latest Irene saga was there but it was the third article that grabbed my attention. I copied and printed it off. It was similar to an older post that we had discovered, the one detailing his relationship with Luca but this was more recent. It contained the unexplained death of Luca, added that Kerry had been killed at the building site linking the two. There was mention of Joe and some of his shady dealings many years ago and a photo I had seen before. The one of Travis and Robert standing by their car, the one I had stumbled across one evening, the one sent by Gabby. A chill went through me. This was bad, very bad. If Guy Rogers had that photo he had to have been dealing with Joey.
I called Robert again. I called Mack and finally I managed to get Travis.
“You need to see what I’ve found, now,” I said when he answered.
“Okay, Robert’s with Peters right now, I’ll come and get you.”
I gathered all the papers, keeping the relevant ones on the top and headed downstairs for shoes and my bag. It would take twenty minutes or so before Travis would arrive, assuming he left immediately. I tried to calm my nerves with a cup of tea but having seen that photo, having those memories brought to the front of my mind, made me very uneasy. I touched the scar running across my eyebrow, my reminder of that night. Flashes of images ran through my mind, a shiny knife being held at my throat. The sight of Joey, the blood, the pieces of skull as they slid down his face flashed before my eyes. My stomach turned and I rushed for the utility room. I was hunched over the toilet retching when I felt a hand on my back.
“Brooke, what the fuck? Are you okay?” I heard Travis say. I nodded my head.
“I’ll get you some water.”
I sat back on my heels and wiped my face with a cloth. Travis handed me the glass and I took a gulp, soothing my sore throat. “He knew Joey,” I said.
“Who did?”
“Rogers, he has one of the photos on his blog site, one that Gabby took.”
“Fuck, how did I miss that? Come on, we need to go.”
He held out his hand to help me up. As we passed it, I grabbed the papers and my bag from the breakfast bar. We rushed down the stairs and before I had my seat belt attached, Travis was roaring down the drive. He placed a call to Robert’s personal office number, I needed to remember to programme that into my phone. When he answered, he was on loud speaker.
“I’ve got Brooke, you need to read what she’s found. Are you alone?” Travis asked.
“No, I’ll call you back,” Robert disconnected the phone.
It rang thirty-seconds later.
“Brooke, what have you found?” Robert asked.
“Rogers, he’s connected to Joey somehow. He had that picture of you and Travis on his blog. There’s other stuff too.”
“Don’t say anymore, get here as quick as you can.”
His voice softened a little. “You okay baby?”
“Yeah, just, well, you know.”
“I know, I’ll see you in a bit.”
I stared out of the window, scrunching my eyes shut as if it would rid me of the images I saw in my mind.
“Brooke, look at me,” Travis said.
I caught his eye in the rear view mirror.
“Don
’t go there, okay. Don’t think about him. Talk to me, give me some shit for being an ass, anything but think of him.”
I smiled. “You are being an arse, Travis, you know that deep down. Call her, talk it through. If you don’t want a relationship or this baby, tell her. Give her a chance to make decisions instead of leaving her in limbo.”
I knew what he was doing of course. He had given me his problem to think about, to push the unwanted thoughts of Joey from my brain but it was an opportunity not to miss.
“You can have a relationship with her, you might find you love being a dad and you don’t have to leave Vassago or us. It can work, if you want it to but you’ll always be wondering if you do nothing.”
“How about we get this weekend out of the way and I call her Monday, deal?”
“Deal, and don’t make me beat you if you don’t keep up your end, okay?”
He chuckled as we pulled into the car park of the Vassago building. We rushed through security and found the lift doors being held open for us.
“Thanks, Stan,” I said, pushing the button for the eleventh floor.
As we exited, a group of men stood in Robert’s reception. He was shaking hands with them. Peters I recognised but not the others. As Robert had predicted, it looked like he had come straight from the golf course. He was sporting a rather glaring pair of chequered trousers and a polo shirt. I shook his hand before following Robert into his office.
“I found these on a blog run by Rogers, I might have found a reason. He also had a photo on his blog, one that Gabby took,” I said.
I pushed forward the page where I had highlighted the quote from Daniel Rogers. Mack stood one side and Travis the other as they read the article.
“You got his file?” Robert asked Travis when he had finished. Travis left to collect it.
“If Daniel is Guy’s father and he lost his job, it might have caused hardship at home. Maybe he resents you for that,” I said.
Travis came back in with the file. It contained Rogers’ home address, some personal details and a list of the papers he had worked for. There were a few copies of articles he had produced, all about some of the top businessmen of Washington. Robert read through them while I went to make coffee.
Fallen Angel, Part III Page 9