by Merry Jones
At some point, my mind spinning, I opened the liquor cabinet and took out the Scotch. Get drunk, I told myself. Pour a tall glass, straight up. Quiet your brain. Go ahead. Molly’s safe in bed, and you don’t have to drive or do anything at all. If ever anyone had reasons to drink, you do. So, go for it. Chug-a-lug.
I took out a glass and opened the bottle. I was pouring a glass when the phone rang. Don’t answer, I told myself. Don’t talk to anyone. Just drink and numb your brain and get blotto so you don’t have to think anymore. But the phone kept ringing, so I set the bottle down and went looking for it. Damn cordless phones; they were like socks. Always disappearing. I found it on the kitchen counter, and as I answered, I thought, Damn; I bet it’s going to be a hang-up. And, sure enough, as I was saying hello, there was a click.
I cursed. For a moment, I considered calling star-sixty-nine to get the number and find out who’d hung up on me. But I didn’t want to bother. I didn’t want to do anything. I told myself it was just a telemarketer whose automatic dialer had run amok. Or maybe the FBI. Or a slave trafficker. But what did I care who was calling; there was a bottle of Scotch waiting for me. I was on my way back to it when the phone rang again. I hesitated, but answered.
“Did you hear?” Susan’s voice was shrill, upset. “They just found Agent Ellis. She’s dead.”
Oh, Lord. I hadn’t told her. I’d called 9-1-1, and I’d called Nick. But I hadn’t called Susan, hadn’t even thought of it. I’d been shaken, not thinking clearly. And if I admitted finding the body, Susan would be furious that I hadn’t called her instantly.
“Yes, I know.” I omitted the details of how I’d found out.
“This is bad,” she said. “If they’ll kill FBI, they’ll kill anyone.”
Great. “Anyone,” I assumed, included us. Agent Ellis had warned us; so had Sonia and the priest. “So, what are you saying?”
“What do you think I’m saying? Your house was broken into, I was carjacked, and the FBI agent who approached us was murdered. And that’s not even all of it. Get this: I called the Archdiocese. They do have people working on human trafficking, but not anyone called Father Joseph Xavier.”
“Of course not. That was an alias. They said they were undercover. In disguise—”
“I also called the Pennsylvania Immigration and Citizenship Coalition. Not only have they never heard of Sonia Vlosnick, they insist that they have no undercover agents. None. Same for the Nationalities Service Center. They gave me the names of the other organizations that help trafficking victims. I went down the list, calling them. Nobody, not one, had any idea what I was talking about. None of them have undercover workers. Not a single one.”
“Then who were Sonia and Father Joseph? Why would they pretend to be with those agencies? What would be the point?”
As soon as I asked the question, I knew the answer. Sonia had told us herself: “The cartel might send someone to question you.” She ought to know; she’d been the one they’d sent. In the guise of warning us, to find out what we knew, she’d even told us what the traffickers would do if they thought we knew too much. “They’d omit the risk. You know, dears. Snuff you out.”
Oh, Lord. Had grandmotherly Sonia and scholarly Father Joseph Xavier been actual hit men, working for the cartel? Had their knowledge of the slaves’ suffering come not from rescuing them, but from committing the maiming and torture—even photographing their deeds themselves? I shivered thinking about them. Realizing what would have happened if they’d decided we knew anything of substance.
But we didn’t. And obviously they must have known that, since they hadn’t killed us. So maybe we were out of trouble?
“Zoe, we’re in trouble.” Susan canceled my thought. “Big trouble.”
I groaned. “But you said they’d leave us alone!”
“And you took that as what? A guarantee? What the hell do I know? Nothing. Except that these are ruthless sons of bitches with no scruples—”
“Stop it, Susan. I know all about it.” I closed my eyes, saw the three logo lines carved in Agent Ellis’s face. “But maybe it’s not so bad. I mean, if they were going to kill us, they’d have done it right there, wouldn’t they?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. I don’t think they’re done with us. I think they want something. Look what’s happened in the last twenty-four hours. Break-in? Carjack? And if not for the horde of contractors here, I’m sure my house would have been ransacked, too. And now there’s a dead agent.” She was in high gear. Panicked.
“But what are we supposed to do? We don’t know anything.”
“But Nick does. You can find out from him—”
“Nick’s not on the case, Susan. The FBI took over.”
“No, not entirely.”
What was she talking about?
“I talked to Ed.” Ed was one of Susan’s cop friends. Her link to the grapevine. “He told me something fascinating. Even with the feds in charge, the local police still have a hand in the investigation. And guess who’s the liaison?”
She didn’t have to tell me. My heart knew instantly; it smoldered, searing my ribs. Damn Nick. Why hadn’t he told me? Would he ever be open with me? Could I ever trust him? Suddenly I was exhausted. Wiped out. I took the phone into the living room, sank into the purple sofa.
“Hasn’t he told you anything?”
Not a damned word, except about the Humberton hat and the tattoos on the women’s shoulders. “You know Nick. He doesn’t discuss his cases.” I tried to make light of it. But I knew better. This case was different. I was involved in this one. Why hadn’t Nick told me he was working on it with the FBI?
“That’s absurd, Zoe. This case is huge. Nick has to talk to you about it. It’s not right for him to keep you in the dark; you’re in it whether he wants you to be or not. Especially now that Agent Ellis has been offed and we know for sure that Sonia and Father Joe are fake. This slavery thing—trafficking women? Ed says they sell over a million women each year, plus at least as many children. It’s a growing international multimillion-dollar business. Maybe multibillion. This case is as big as they get, and as nasty.”
My chest raw, I stared at the bottle of Scotch, at how warmly the amber liquid glowed in the lamplight. I was silent for a moment, thinking of nineteen hapless women, wishing them peace. And of Nick, wishing him a fat lip.
“But on the other hand”—Susan sounded more chipper—”if Nick can help crack this one, it’ll be a career maker.”
I didn’t say anything. It wasn’t enough that I might be in danger from the cartel; Nick was, too. I picked up a throw pillow and held it to my belly.
“I’m serious,” she rolled on. “He’s already got a high profile for somebody who’s only been in Philadelphia—what—not two years yet? Nick’s a rising star.”
“Susan, he’s making enemies in a multibillion-dollar international crime ring. How is that a good thing? Look what happened to Agent Ellis.”
“Are you kidding? He’s not out on the front lines; the feds are. But he’s the local guy in the arena, going after bad guys—Big ones. Playing hardball with the big leagues. It’s like a lawyer arguing before the Supreme Court. Or an actor doing Broadway, or a violinist playing in Carnegie—”
“But lawyers and actors and musicians don’t get killed.”
“Zoe, Nick’s a cop. You know the deal. He’s at risk no matter what case he’s on. Do you want him to rise to the top of his field? He could be commissioner someday—”
“Dammit, Susan. If it was Tim, you wouldn’t be so cavalier.”
“Tim’s in airplanes every other day. Do you think I don’t worry? I worry every time he leaves the house.”
There was no point arguing. Susan raved on, a volcano spewing words and energy, and not for the first time that week I suspected that she was more than a tiny bit bipolar.
“I gotta go,” I begged off. “I’m wiped. I’ll call you tomorrow.” And then, with a desperate determination, I made a beeline for the Scotch.
THIRTY-THREE
I TOOK IT TO THE KITCHEN, SHIVERING. MY HANDS TREMBLED AS I took out a juice glass decorated with panda bears. They trembled as I opened the bottle. And they trembled as I poured, threatening to spill precious Johnny Walker Black all over the counter.
“Bottoms up,” I toasted myself, and I finished off the entire glass in two gulps, as if it were medicine. Then steadying myself at the kitchen window, I poured another, letting the booze rush through my body. Absorbing it, and the news. Nick was the liaison on the slave-smuggling case. Nick hadn’t told me. I gazed out the window, unfocused, letting the streetlights blur into globs of hazy ghostlike white. Eventually I realized that I was staring at Victor’s house, and that Victor himself was silhouetted at his window. Oh my. A genuine Victor sighting. Was he watching me? Did he think I was watching him? Had I unwittingly entered a staring contest with my shut-in neighbor?
I looked away, embarrassed, but remembered that I’d never asked him about the break-in, whether he’d seen anyone hanging around that day. Was it too late to call? Of course it was. It was almost eleven. But, hell, I could see him; he was awake, sitting at the window. Still, Victor wouldn’t want to know I’d seen him. The very idea that he was visible to the outside world might send him into an agoraphobic spin. No, I shouldn’t call. But I could e-mail him. And I’d do it now, before I could get interrupted again.
It was good to have a purpose, something active to do. So, carrying Johnny and my glass, I went to my study and sat at the computer. As soon as I touched the keyboard the screen came alive. I blinked, startled. Why was the computer on? Then I remembered. Nick had been using it the night before. I’d interrupted him, and then we’d rolled around on the carpet like a pair of rutting hyenas. He’d apparently never logged off. I began to sign him off, then stopped, staring at the screen. The computer was still connected to his e-mail. If I wanted to see it, all I had to do was click.
Of course I had no business looking at Nick’s e-mail. That would be an invasion of his privacy. A breach of his trust. It wouldn’t be right. I should have felt bad even considering it, but I didn’t. I was too busy reading, and too immersed in what I saw.
THIRTY-FOUR
THERE WERE ABOUT TWENTY MESSAGES FROM SOMEONE NAMED Kiddo2. Randomly I opened one. “Look behind you, Nick. I’m here for you, finally. Can you find me?”
I read it again. And again. Someone was threatening Nick. What had Nick said? That the break-in might not have been the slave smugglers. That it might have been someone from his past. An old case. Someone with a grudge. I closed my eyes, saw the vandalized photographs, Nick’s face obliterated in each. Oh, God. I opened another message.
“You did what you did; now it’s my turn. Want to dance, Nicky? How about a two-step?”
A two-step? Was Kiddo2 a woman? Maybe she was someone from Nick’s past. Not an old police case, but an old romantic one. Someone he’d broken up with. I read on, looking for clues to the writer’s identity, finding nothing but anger. Veiled threats, one after another, indirect and chilling. And they’d been sent over a period of weeks. Which meant that Nick had known about them long before the break-in. And of course he’d said nothing. Not a word.
Sipping Johnny Walker, I read them all, one after another. A few rambled on for paragraphs of long run-on sentences, making no point, spewing spirals of rage. “Where am I, Nick? On the street corner, waiting for you to pass? In the doughnut shop? Outside your Chester County bungalow or your boat club? Inside your car? At your ladyfriend’s door? You have no clue, do you?
Okay, then. I’ll tell you where I am. I’m in your shadow, Nick. I’m right here. Behind you.”
Another read: “Ignoring me doesn’t help, Nick. You thought you could just walk away, but think again. See, now, because of you, I have nothing left to lose. Send me back to jail, lock me up again. I know the drill. I’ll be good and obedient and get out again. And if it takes ten years or twenty, or the rest of my life, I’ll be back. It isn’t over, I promise. She was my damn sister.” Her sister? Who was her damn sister? I kept reading, finding out nothing, until I read the final e-mail. “Nice house, Nick. Nice photos. Is the kid yours?”
The kid? Molly—oh, God. Ice washed through my body. The maniac who called herself Kiddo2 knew where Molly lived, what she looked like. That she was connected to Nick. Was she threatening Molly too? Was Kiddo2 the woman Molly had said was following her? Oh, Lord. She had to be.
Stop it, I told myself. Nick knew about this person, whoever she was. Nick was secretive, but that was because he was protective. He didn’t want me to be upset. But he wouldn’t let anything happen to Molly. He had the situation under control. Of course he did.
I scanned the list of e-mails, saw one dated a few weeks ago from someone named Bosscop. “Heads up, buddy,” it said. “You no doubt know that Heather’s parole came through. She’s out. And I’ll bet my pension she’s still got it in for you. Family reunion time, pal. Watch your back.”
Family reunion? Was Kiddo2 related to Nick? In one of her e-mails, she’d written Nick about her sister. Facts swirled around my mind, falling into jumbled heaps. And then, with a jolt, I finally began to understand. “Family reunion time” meshed with “She was my damn sister.” Was Kiddo2 Nick’s sister-in-law? Nick’s wife might have had a sister. Was her name Heather? Was she Kiddo2?
I remembered Nick’s spotty account of his wife’s death, how difficult it had been for me to find out what happened. At first he’d let me think that she’d shot herself when she’d found out he was leaving her. Later I’d learned on my own that there had been an investigation, that he’d been suspected, briefly, of shooting her. Apparently, Kiddo2 still believed that he had.
Well, one thing was clear. Nick had been right about the break-in; it had not been by the cartel, but by someone from his past. From “an old case.” But he’d known all along that it was his sister-in-law. And he had deliberately hidden that fact from me, even though it affected not just his life, but my child’s and my own.
I swallowed what was left in the panda glass, poured another. There was no point anymore in e-mailing Victor. I knew who’d been in my house. Who’d damaged my photos. Probably, who’d been following Molly, too. Everything began to make sense, merging together in a hazy but somewhat coherent blur. Wandering away from the computer, I listened to the quiet of the house, and observing that the Johnny Walker bottle was much emptier than when I’d opened it, drank more, bolstered with the confidence that even if it couldn’t fix life, it could blur it for a while.
THIRTY-FIVE
SOMETIME IN THE DARK, A MAN’S VOICE DRIFTED THROUGH THE haze, insisting that I open my eyes and go with him. The voice was soft and gravelly, and I liked its persistent urging, its presence, but I didn’t like what it was saying. My eyes were happy being closed, and I was comfortable. I was fine. But the voice continued, and I realized that I wasn’t actually all that comfortable after all. The mattress had become hard, and I had no pillow. And now someone was touching me, pushing a hand under my back, lifting me up.
“Come on,” the voice urged. “Let’s get you to bed.”
To bed? If I wasn’t in bed, where was I? I managed to open an eye, and it managed to look around. Oh. The light was dim, only the stained-glass lamps were lit, but I was in my living room. Definitely the living room.
The man kept talking, asking questions. “How much did you have? Since when do you drink?” His lips brushed my forehead. “Come on, Zoe. You can do it. Lean on me, just like that.”
I had no choice, actually. I had to lean on him; the room was rotating, and so was my stomach. I needed to steady myself when I lifted my head; my temples throbbed and my pulse was a base drum.
“You know,” he snickered, “you’re going to have a hell of a headache tomorrow.”
A headache? Oh, damn. Reality washed over me. And so did nausea. I forced myself up and dashed to the bathroom. When I took my head out of the toilet, Nick was waiting, eyebrows furrowed, with a cool damp washcloth.
Gently, he wiped my face, my eyelids, my throat. “Feel better?” he asked.
I nodded yes, but knew otherwise. Shards of memory began to float through my mind, teasing, staying close enough to bother me, but too far away to grab.
He sat beside me on the powder room floor and rubbed his eyes, tired. “Well? Want to talk?”
I shook my head no, but knew I had to. “Okay,” I said. “Sure.” The toilet seat seemed almost as good as a pillow, offered itself to me as a place to rest my head, but I leaned against the wall, drifting.
“Okay.” Nick smiled with half his face, the other half immobile, paralyzed and scarred. He knelt beside me and touched my cheek, a tender gesture. I studied his crooked features, imagining how handsome he must have been before he’d been shot, and I reached up and touched his scar. Lord, I loved this man. Or, wait. No. Did I? Did I even know this man?
“Okay,” I agreed, not remembering anymore what I was agreeing to.
“Okay. So, tell me. What’s driven you to drink, my sweet? What?” He waited, his pale eyes patient but tired. And something else.
Good question. What had made me drink so damned much? Even the thought, the memory of drinking made my stomach churn. I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to talk at all.
“Zoe, let’s just put you to bed.” Nick put an arm around my back, starting to get up.
But when he reached for me, I recoiled, remembering the e-mails, the threats. Nick’s secrets. I pushed him away.
“What?” He looked wounded. “What’s wrong?”
Go on, I told myself. Tell him. Don’t play games. “It’s everything.” Why had I said that? It was not everything. It was one thing. It was him.