by J A Fielding
“Who is it?” she asked.
“Lucas Keen,” the assistant said and Victoria nodded.
“Show him in,” she said as she put the file she had been looking at aside.
She took a long deep breath as she clenched her fist. She might not have had the best news, but she did have a piece of not so good news to share with Lucas. She forced a smile as Lucas walked into the office.
“Hey,” she said as he walked towards her desk.
“Hey.”
“How’s the dog house?” she asked and he shrugged.
“Well, at least I am back in the house. On the couch though, but it is better than the hotel I had been staying at.”
Victoria sighed.
“Well, I’m happy that things are looking up for you.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s perfect.”
“So, what do you have to tell me about our case?” she asked.
“You are not going to love what I have to say about our case,” he started and Victoria shook her head.
“Why?” she asked. “What did you find out?”
“There was an open homicide case in Oklahoma. A thirty-year-old man was found at the bottom of his stairs dead. There was a lot of speculation about his death…some thought it was an accident, but the autopsy ruled out accidental death. It was a murder but the case went cold almost as soon as it started off because there was insufficient evidence and the person of interest just disappeared.”
Victoria bit her lip.
“Let me guess, the person of interest was Sonya?” she asked and Lucas nodded.
“Actually. The name she used then was Lily Glenfield. And she was a blond.”
Victoria raised an eyebrow over the other.
“A blond?”
Lucas nodded.
“How the fuck did she pull that off?” she asked and he shook his head.
“I don’t know. Dye? Wig maybe?” He reached into his pocket. “I actually snuck a picture when the cop was not looking.”
He scrolled his phone and handed it to Victoria.
“What the fuck?” she said under her breath. “This must be a really good wig.”
“I know, right?” he said as he took the phone back. “Even I didn’t recognize her.”
“This dead guy,” Victoria started. “What was his story?”
Lucas took a long deep breath and leaned back.
“Well, it was Darius Stratford,” he said and Victoria’s eyes grew wide.
“You mean the Darius Stratford, heir to Stratford Pharmaceuticals?” she asked and Lucas nodded.
“Oh, yeah. And that explains why she has been able to stay under the radar for so long. Before he died, they had eloped after what many thought was just another crazy weekend in Vegas and he had done everything wrong including getting joint bank accounts giving her all the access she needed to a personal account that had well over thirteen million dollars which she cleaned out before she ‘disappeared.’”
Victoria shook her head. It was obvious that they had downplayed just who Sonya was. Clearly, she was not only a nutcase but she was also clever enough to get away with scamming one of the biggest names in America’s corporate world. At that moment, she felt a sudden panic. If Sonya had access to that kind of money, then chances were high that she had already left the country. She could have been anywhere by that time. Probably in a country without any extradition to the U.S. She rubbed her temple and shook her head.
“This cannot be how it ends,” she thought. “She is wanted for murder. Two counts of murder actually.”
“You need to hire some kind of private security for your place. And I am not talking some shitty alarm system. I am talking armed guards…because that bitch is crazy,” she said as she looked at him. “She attacked a visibly pregnant woman. You know someone like that will go after your wife and kids without batting an eyelid, right?”
Lucas nodded.
“I’ve already taken the necessary measures…I would have wanted to move my family out of town for a few days. Maybe lie low until everything calms down, but my wife is a little stubborn…so I just tightened the security around the house.”
“Well, better be safe than sorry,” Victoria said.
“I know that Axel asked to be kept abreast with everything that happens, but I just don’t know if we should tell him of what has happened so far,” Lucas went on and she shook her head.
“I know that it might sound like the wrong thing to do, but the truth is that there is no other way. This case concerns him just as much as it concerns us.”
“But there is no way to put a lid on this…it’s not like there is any light at the end of the tunnel,” he argued and Victoria rolled her eyes.
“So, what?” she asked. “Ignorance is bliss? Is that your approach?”
“Well, I hate to add insult to injury but ignorance is bliss.”
“I’ve got every police department in the country and the FBI. I don’t know about you but I have faith in our justice system,” she said.
Lucas shook his head and sighed loudly.
“Well, I still don’t like this.”
Chapter 12
Axel looked at his phone and sighed. It was a little past midnight which meant that he had been up for almost thirteen hours. He had half a mind to make a call to Jean-Luc but considering the almost non-existent time difference, he knew that most if not everyone working on the resort in Suriname was probably out cold by then. Which is what he should have been doing. He got up from the couch and for the umpteenth time that evening, made sure that all the doors and windows were secure before he made his way upstairs.
Working from home was great. A little too great that he did not know if he was going to handle ever going back to the office. But working from home was not as easy especially when it came to the part where he had to do a lot of correspondence via email and Skype calls. He had been working with Jean-Luc for weeks checking out the photos he and the interior designer sent as he readied himself for the grand opening of the resort. But he had never done this before. So, obviously, he found himself wondering how different the situation would be if he was actually present on site.
He could hear the TV from the hallway and he shook his head. He had never understood how Trina could sleep through the noise. He was careful opening the bedroom door so as not to wake up Trina, but when he opened the door, he was surprised to see her sitting on the bed with a bag of chips while sipping on a glass of what looked like cranberry juice.
“What are you doing up?” he asked as he walked towards her.
“I am just catching up on TV shows.”
He smiled as he collapsed on bed.
“You’ve been catching up on a lot TV lately,” he said. “Should I be worried?”
She hit the pause button and took another sip of her juice.
“No, actually, if you were wise, you would be doing the same thing.”
“And why would I do that?” he asked.
“Well, babies cry a lot and their sleep patterns are terrible. You sleep when the baby sleeps so, that is like saying that you practically never get any sleep at all.”
He shrugged.
“Chips?” she asked, stretching the bag to him. “This new barbecue steak blend is amazing. It’s like they took the best thing about meat and put it in one of the world’s leading snacks.”
He took one and bit into it.
“What happened to the cheese and onion? I thought that was your favorite.”
She shrugged.
“It was. For a while. But lately I have been craving barbecue steak flavored potato chips…well, that and sweet potato fries with some strawberry milk.”
He frowned.
“I will remind you of this crazy eating habits in a few months and then you are going to hear how utterly ridiculous it sounds.”
She smiled and took another potato chip out of the bag.
“So, what are you watching today anyway?” he asked.
“This amazing sh
ow…based on actual events in history.”
He shook his head.
“Baby, you have been watching a lot of things based on actual historical events lately. First it was The Crown, then you binged three seasons of a CW teen show…” She put her finger up cutting him short mid-sentence.
“Reign is not just a teen show. It might have a lot of modern music and things like that, but it tells the story of Mary, queen of Scots. I read up on her story just to be sure they didn’t change anything.”
He raised an eyebrow over the other.
“And they didn’t?”
“They just wrote in some good storylines. That’s all.”
“Okay,” he said as he pulled himself up to sit. “What about the weird Chinese one?”
She grinned.
“Empresses in the Palace. That was one of my favorite. And I watched that one twice…that was how good it was,” she said.
“And now we are back to a clearly non-English show,” he said as he looked at the TV. There were English subtitles at the bottom of the screen and he could tell from the dressing that the show was not anything that would depict the current century.
“This one is one of the most amazing ones,” she explained excitedly.
“Well, tell me about it.”
“Okay. This guy…” She pointed to a man on the TV screen. “That is Suleiman. He is the Turkish king…was the Turkish king and one of the most awesome ones at that. He was actually called Suleiman the Magnificent…and that girl, Hurrem, was a slave from Polish Ruthenia. She was brought to the Ottoman lands to be a concubine to Suleiman but he fell in love with her.”
Axel grinned widely.
“You are really into this, aren’t you?” he asked and she nodded.
“This is one of the most amazing love stories I have ever heard.”
He shrugged as he took another chip from the bag.
“And why is that?” he asked.
“Well, the sultans in the Ottoman empire never used to take wives. They would have concubines…. a whole lot of concubines. And each concubine could only have one child sired by the king…not that they were allowed to lay with another man anyway.”
Axel laughed.
“Did you just say ‘lay with another man?’” he asked and she nodded. “I don’t know who you are right now, but I am loving this new side of you.”
She rolled her eyes.
“Will you just shut up and let me finish this story already?” she asked and he put a hand up in surrender. “Okay, so, the main reason the concubines could only have one child was to prevent competition between them. But something was different with this Ruthenian girl. She really captured the king’s heart and she had six children instead of just the one. A princess and five princes. And eventually, he married her marking the end of the weird concubine bullshit.”
He smiled at her.
“That is actually a pretty amazing story.”
She nodded.
“I know, right?”
She took another sip of her juice and was about to press play once again when she suddenly gasped.
Axel’s smile disappeared almost immediately as he looked at her.
“What is it? What’s going on?” he asked and she shook her head.
“I don’t know…I just felt a sharp pain…almost like a kick but a more intense one.”
“I know it’s still early. Two weeks to be precise, but I am calling Dr. Hahn and taking you to the hospital.”
“I just hit thirty-seven weeks. I am just fine. It’s probably Braxton Hicks.”
He looked at her as she gently ran her hand on her tummy.
“See? No reason to be…motherfucker!” she cried out again as she held her tummy.
“That’s it.” He bolted out of bed and grabbed his phone from the night stand. “I am calling Dr. Hahn.”
“I’m fine,” Trina said, but Axel was not hearing any of it. It was like he had just got a shot of adrenaline. He got the bag from the closet as he dialed Dr. Hahn. “Baby, seriously,” Trina said again, but he was already holding the phone to his ear and judging by the way she was frowning as she rubbed her tummy, he knew that something was either wrong or Trina was in active labor.
“Peter, hi. It’s Axel,” he said when Dr. Hahn picked up. “Trina is having some pain.”
“What kind of pain?”
“I don’t know…it’s happening every few minutes.”
“Can you tell if they are contractions?” Dr. Hahn asked again and Axel ran his fingers through his hair.
“I don’t know…I just know that she is in pain!”
“It’s like period cramps,” Trina called out.
“She says it’s like period pain…so, what is that? Are they contractions?” he asked.
“Yes, if they feel like period pains then they probably are. Even though you guys are a couple of weeks early.”
“Isn’t that a red flag?” he asked.
“No, not really. A lot of women have their first children early. It is not uncommon especially in Trina’s case considering the surgery and everything.”
“We are on our way,” he said.
He hung up and pushed his phone in his pocket before he made his way to where Trina was.
“It can’t be the baby…I mean, it’s too early,” she said as he slipped an arm around her waist and helped her out of the bedroom.
“Dr. Hahn said that can happen. And I will sleep better knowing that you are fine from the doctor.”
*****
Over the last few months, Axel had done everything to prepare himself for the arrival of the baby and he really thought that he had everything in the bag. But on that particular day as he sat in the waiting room, he could not really figure out why he was in such a panic. Dr. Hahn had confirmed that Trina was indeed in active labor and that everything was all right with both her and the baby. But as much as he tried it, he could not push the thought that maybe something could go very wrong considering the highs and lows she’d had with her pregnancy. And as if that was not enough, Victoria had just called him telling him that there had been a break in the case and he just knew that she would not have called him that late if she did not have something concrete to go on.
He was feeling confused. He wanted to be in the room with her, to hold her hand and rub her back just as they had done in the birthing classes they had attended, but at the same time, he wanted to hear what break in the case the police had. He had reluctantly walked out of Trina’s room and into the waiting room where he was now pacing impatiently as he tried Victoria’s number.
It had only been ten minutes since she called, but by the time she finally arrived, it seemed like forever. But perhaps it was the fact that he could not reach her on her cell that made the wait seem even longer than it actually was.
“I keep on calling you and your phone goes straight to voicemail,” Axel said as he walked towards her.
“I’m sorry. My battery died,” Victoria said.
Axel looked at the two uniformed officers with her and the suit who looked like a fed.
“Everything okay?” he asked and Victoria nodded.
“Yeah. This is Ben and this Francene. They are from the police department and this is Agent Mejia. He is one of the agents who were handling the case for us,” she said. “This is Axel Anderson. He is Trina’s husband.”
“Trina, the pregnant woman she attacked?” Agent Mejia asked and Victoria nodded.
“Victoria told me that there has been a break in the case,” Axel started as he looked at the two officers and then the FBI agent. “What happened?”
“We got a call that a woman was caught shoplifting in a store in San Diego…” Agent Mejia started.
“San Diego?” Axel asked, confused. “Why would they call you? Why didn’t they just call San Diego Police?”
“We set up a tip line to make sure everything worked in our favor as far as catching Eva…that’s her real name. Eva Maria Jacobs. So, when we got a call from someone who
had claimed to see the woman, we mobilized the people we had down there to bring her in and we did.”
Axel exhaled loudly.
“You did?” he asked, his voice telling of all the relief he felt at that moment.
“Yes, we did. And Lucas Keen already confirmed her identity. She is en-route as we speak,” Agent Mejia said, smiling.
“So, it’s over now?” Axel asked as he looked at Victoria.
“Yeah, it really is,” she said, smiling.
“But why would she be in San Diego?” Axel asked. “I was told that she had access to a lot of money…she must have thought to leave the country or something.”
“She could not really do anything. We froze all her accounts. She could not really do much.”
“But San Diego?” Axel asked. “What’s up with that?”
“We think that she was trying to cross the border into Tijuana,” Francene explained. “And then from there, she would have bribed her way out of the country.”
“Yeah, we have had a real problem in the San Diego border. I was posted down there before I got transferred here. I can tell you that she would have slipped right past law enforcement in Mexico and no one would have batted an eyelid,” Ben explained.
“So, what is going to happen now?” Axel asked.
“As it turns out, she is not only wanted for two murders. There are also two open assault cases and a ton of fraud cases on her.”
“But last time you said that she might cut a deal…” Axel started before his voice trailed off.
“Not a chance. Altogether, we are looking at almost nine different charges,” Agent Mejia started. “Even if she cuts a deal, it will not be enough to let her walk. She is looking at twenty-five years…twenty at least.”
“Yeah, plus she got sloppy so the district attorney caught up with one of her accomplices who was like a broken record at the thought of walking free. So that reduces her chances of getting a lenient sentence,” Victoria said and Axel breathed a sigh of relief as he buried his face in his hands.
“We are, however, going to need your wife’s statement,” Francene said and Axel shook his head.
“I am afraid that is going to have to wait. She is having our baby…hopefully soon.”
“But isn’t it early?” Victoria asked raising an eyebrow over the other.