Angie didn’t have the words to tell her. I’m your mother. I’m the teenager who didn’t want to raise you. I’m the woman who abandoned you.
“I’m a friend,” Angie said.
“Do you know what happened to the last friend who tried to help me? He ended up in the hospital. Probably won’t ever walk again.”
“Do you know what happened to the last woman who threatened Marcus Rippy?”
Jo looked away. If she didn’t know, she had a good idea. The despair was back, the helplessness. “Why would you risk your life to help a stranger?”
“I had a daughter who was in your situation.”
“Had,” Jo repeated. “She got killed?”
“Yes,” Angie said, because she knew that’s how most of these stories ended. “She was killed because I didn’t help her. I’m not going to let that happen again.”
“Jesus.” Jo saw through the lie. “You think you can get me on your side, make me trust you? I’ve seen you at 110. If you’re not working for Reuben, you’re working for Kip Kilpatrick.”
“You’re right. I work for Kip,” Angie admitted. “And I do a lot of bad shit for him, but I’m not going to do this.”
“Crisis of conscience?” Jo gave a hard laugh. She knew what fixers did. She’d been wrapped up in professional sports for her entire adult life. “Reuben keeps a knife by our bed. His gun is two inches from his hand when he takes a shower. He beats me.” She realized her voice was too loud. People were starting to stare. “He beats me,” she repeated, softer. “He rapes me. He makes me beg for him to keep doing it. I have to apologize afterward for making him lose control. He makes me thank him when I’m allowed to get a fucking cup of coffee or take my son on a playdate.”
“Then leave.”
“You don’t think I’ve tried?” She looked away, shaking her head. “The first time, I went back home. I stayed at my mama’s. Three days away from him. Three days of freedom. Do you know what he did?” She glared at Angie. “He dragged me out of my mother’s house by my hair. He near about beat the life out of me. He locked me in a box and he kept me in his garage and you know what the cops told my mama when she called, telling them that her daughter had been kidnapped by a madman? ‘Domestic problem.’ That’s all I am—a domestic problem.”
Angie wasn’t surprised. The small town cops who had arrested Jo with those prescriptions were probably the same cops who looked the other way on her abduction. If you were willing to take one payoff, then it was just a matter of time before you took another.
“There is a wall of money backstopping these men. They don’t lose things. They don’t lose their wives. They don’t lose their children.” She told Angie, “I tried in California. I tried in Chicago. Each time, Reuben came and dragged me back. He used my mama against me. He used Anthony.” Jo’s tone changed at her son’s name. “My birth mother abandoned me. I know how that feels. I’m not going to do that to my child.”
Angie felt her stomach clench. “Do you know anything about her?”
“Does it matter?” Jo asked. “I can’t run to her for help, if that’s what you’re asking. She’s probably dead by now. Even back then, she was a prostitute. A junkie. Exactly the kind of trash you’d expect to give up a baby.”
Angie took a deep breath.
“I’m not going to leave my boy. If Reuben was father of the year, I still wouldn’t leave Anthony. That kind of damage, it rots your soul.”
Angie had to get away from the subject. “What was your plan when you showed Marcus the video? What did you think you’d get out of him?”
“Money. Protection.” She slowly exhaled. “Without the video, I’ve got nothing.”
“It doesn’t matter. It’s what you’ve seen. It’s your ability to open your mouth.”
“Nobody cares what I have to say.”
“You know too much,” Angie told her. “As far as Kip and Marcus are concerned, your mouth is a loaded gun.”
Jo took a deep breath, just like Angie had. “So here I am again, trapped right back where I started.”
Angie couldn’t abide the resignation in her voice. “I’ve got a plan to buy you some time, get you away from your husband.”
“What are you going to do?” Jo’s mouth twisted into a scowl. “You think you can take on Reuben Figaroa? Shit. You’ll get a gun in your face. That man doesn’t back down and he does not give up control.” She counted down on her fingers, “I’m not on the bank accounts. I’m not on the investments. I’m not on the pensions. I’m not on the house. I don’t own my car. I signed a prenup before we got married.” She laughed, this time at herself. “I was in love, baby. I didn’t want money. I willingly signed myself into slavery.”
“I can get you out,” Angie said. “I can keep you safe.” She had thought through some of this already. Dale’s trust fund for Delilah. Angie was authorized to pay for an apartment and living expenses. She could use the money for Jo instead. “I can get an alias for you. I’ll help you hide out. Once you’re safe, I’ll find a lawyer who can negotiate with Reuben.”
“How’re you gonna get me out?” Jo asked. “That’s the hard part. You might as well be saying to me that you’re gonna hide me out on Mars, and we’ll figure out how to fly me there later.”
She was right. Reuben would be waiting for Jo outside the jail. He wouldn’t let her out of his sight until she left for rehab. If he let her leave for rehab.
“You don’t get it, do you?” Jo seemed genuinely perplexed. “Reuben doesn’t care about basketball. He doesn’t care about Anthony. He doesn’t really care about me. He wants control.” She closed the space between her and Angie. “I’ll do whatever that man wants. Anything, you feel me? He just says the word. Snaps his fingers. And he still holds a knife to my face. He still wraps his hand around my throat. He can’t get off unless I’m terrified.”
Angie couldn’t think about all the ways her daughter had been shamed. “Tell me something, what’s it going to be like when Anthony gets older? How are you going to protect him?”
“Reuben wouldn’t hurt his son.”
Angie wondered if she could hear herself. “He’s going to see how his daddy treats you. He’s going to grow into that same kind of man.”
“No,” she insisted. “He’s sweet. He’s got nothing of his daddy in him.”
“Wasn’t Reuben sweet when you first met him?”
Jo pressed her lips together. She looked down at her hands. Angie thought that she was going to come up with another excuse, but she said, “What’s your plan?”
“You’ll bail out Saturday. I know Reuben will be waiting for you outside the jail. So will the photographers. I’ll make sure of that. You can go with me instead.”
“That’s your plan?” She looked more dejected than before. “Step two of that is Reuben either pulls out his gun and shoots me in the head, or I get a call from his lawyer saying I’m a junkie with a record and I’m never gonna see my son again.” She laughed. “And he still shoots me in the head.”
She was right, but Jo had spent years trying to think of a way out. Angie had spent two days. “What about when you go to the party on Sunday?”
Jo started to shake her head, but then she stopped. “Anthony will stay with my mother. She’s the only one Reuben allows to keep him.”
Angie asked, “Can you get away from Reuben at the party? Go to the bathroom or something?”
“He’ll be with the guys. With Marcus.” She explained, “That’s when they made the video. It was that girl, the one who charged Marcus with rape.”
“Keisha Miscavage?”
“Yes.” She wiped her eyes. She couldn’t wipe away the fear. “You should know what you’re up against. What they do to women who don’t matter. That girl was drugged. I know they put something in her drink. An hour later, she’s in that bedroom, arms flopping around, out of her mind, telling them no. And they just laughed while they took turns with her.”
Angie knew what a gang rape looked like. She was
n’t shocked by the details. “Sunday night, as soon as you’re on your own, slip out of the house. Go down the driveway. Take a left. There’s a turnoff for an alleyway that the gardeners use. I’ll be parked there waiting for you.”
Jo didn’t answer. This was happening too fast. “Why?”
“I told you about my daughter.”
Jo shook her head, but she was still desperate enough to listen to a complete stranger. “I meet you at this turnoff. Then what?”
Angie said, “I’ll go to your mother’s and pick up Anthony.” She talked over Jo’s protest. “That’s the first place they’ll look for you. I can handle them better than you can.”
“Why not get Anthony first, then meet me at the party?”
Angie could tell she needed something to push her over the line, to make her take that first step. “What happens if you don’t get away and I’ve got your kid in my car? How do I explain that? How do you explain it?”
Jo looked down at the floor. Her eyes tracked back and forth. She chewed her lip. Angie recognized the signs of negotiation. Jo’s escape from the party would set the plan in motion. That was the point at which there would be no turning back. If she didn’t slip away, if she changed her mind at the last minute, then Anthony would stay at her mother’s and Jo would take a beat down and everything would go back to normal.
Jo asked, “What am I supposed to do while you’re kidnapping my son?”
“I’ll rent a car under an alias.” She’d have to get Delilah’s driver’s license, but that shouldn’t take more than a dime of heroin. “Sunday night, I’ll leave the car parked down the street from the Rippys. Once you leave the party, I’ll drive you to the car. You go to the OneTown motel and wait for me. I’ll go to your mother’s and pick up Anthony. Once I bring him to the motel, you jump on the interstate and drive the car west. I’ll stay here and make sure your tracks are covered.”
“And then what?”
“We find a lawyer to negotiate with Kip to get you out of this mess.” She stopped Jo before she could throw up obstacles. “Remember that you can testify that you saw Marcus in that video, too.”
“Testify?” She turned skitterish again. “I’m not going to—”
“It won’t come to that. All that matters is the threat.”
Jo pressed her lips together again. “Why should I trust you?”
“Who else are you going to trust?” Angie waited for an answer that she knew would never come. “What do I gain from tricking you?”
“I’m trying to figure that out.” Jo picked at the gold chain around her neck. “I thought Reuben sent you to fetch me. That’s what he usually does. But he doesn’t let the fetcher take care of me. He does that himself.”
“Who does he send to fetch you?”
“A man,” she said. “Always a man.”
Angie gave her time to think.
“Do you want money?” Jo asked. “That’s what you get out of this, a piece of whatever I get from Reuben?”
“Would it make you feel better if I asked for something?”
“I don’t know.” She was still thinking about it, trying to find the holes. “My mother can’t travel. She has a heart condition. She can’t be far from the hospital.”
“Look at me.” Angie waited until her eyes were locked with her daughter’s. The same brown irises. The same almond shape. The same skin tone. The same hair. The same voice, even.
She told the girl, “If I was your mother, I would tell you to take Anthony and leave and never look back.”
Jo swallowed. Her perfect neck. Her straight shoulders. Her anger. Her fear. “Okay,” she agreed. “I’ll do it.”
SATURDAY—4:39 AM
Angie yawned as she drove down Ponce de Leon Road. The dying moonlight made everything look chalky white. She was exhausted, but she couldn’t sleep. Jo’s arrest two days ago was still all over the news. The predicted press scrum had gathered around the jail, waiting for her release later today. Kip had warned Reuben to stay in line. Rehab had been arranged for Monday. Marcus had held a press conference last night where he talked about how Jo and Reuben’s marriage was strong, that they would get through this, that they just needed people to keep them in their thoughts and prayers. A blurred photo of Jo with her head down, sitting on the floor during one of Figaroa’s games, was the only image anyone could find of her.
She was safe for now. That’s what Angie kept telling herself. Jo just needed to be safe for another day and a half.
From the outside, it seemed like Jo had a good chance of escaping. The plan didn’t feel complicated. There were just a lot of moving pieces. Angie had spent the last two days doing her part. Stealing Delilah’s ID. Renting the car. Driving the escape routes back and forth. Buying a used iPad out of the back of a van. Smashing it with a hammer. Delivering the pieces to Dale. Acting like she was fine so that he didn’t get too close or too curious.
As always, money was the hard part. Angie had thirty thousand dollars in her checking account, but she couldn’t use it to help Jo. At least not if Dale was still alive. He could access her account. There could not be any recent, hefty withdrawals. Angie’s only option was to peel off some of the cash Dale kept in the trunk of his car and hope that he didn’t notice. He’d always kept payoff money under his spare tire, especially when his bookies were chasing him down. Angie would take the cash tomorrow, right before the party. She wouldn’t be greedy. Jo didn’t need to stay in five-star hotels while she made her escape. For a few grand, she could drive out west and find a dirtbag motel with HBO to keep the kid occupied.
Stealing Delilah’s identity had been comparatively easy. Angie had cased out a convenience store down from where Delilah was living. She knew the girl would show up eventually. Staying off H was hard, even with the Suboxone. It made you fidgety. It made you hungry. Angie had paid a kid to hang around the store. When Delilah had finally shown up, he’d picked her wallet out of her purse. He’d snatched her driver’s license, cloned one of her credit cards, and was gone before Delilah got to the cash register.
Angie had been in the store when it happened, hiding behind a Coke display. A risky move, but she couldn’t stop herself. She had always been fascinated by Delilah. At least as fascinated as you could be about someone you despised. What made her so special? It had to be more than blood. Dale had other family he barely gave a shit about. So what made him protect Delilah all those years, make it his dying wish that she was taken care of? It had to be more than pussy. Dale could buy that off anybody.
Angie had to admit that the girl wasn’t bad-looking—if you were into cheap and trashy. She’d managed to put on some weight. She no longer looked like a skeleton. She’d stopped coloring her hair. Apparently, she still wasn’t washing it. Even standing fifteen feet away, Angie could see that the brown was more of an oily black. The split ends tapped at her shoulders as she loaded her purchases onto the counter. A 40 of malt liquor. Two bags of Cheetos. A can of Pringles. Snickers bar. Skittles. She asked for two packs of Camels, because watching her father die from type 2 diabetes and kidney failure was not the cautionary tale you’d expect it to be.
Delilah never looked at consequences. She didn’t even look at next week. What mattered was today, right now, what she could get her hands on, who she could exploit, and how she was going to make money off of it.
Did she know about Dale’s trust fund? Angie wasn’t sure, but she knew that Dale would have a fail-safe. Someone else would know about the trust. Someone else would make sure that the girl knew Angie was holding.
There was only one other person Dale trusted, and Angie hoped like hell she never found herself face-to-face with that vicious motherfucker ever again.
Angie stopped for a red light. She yawned again. She rubbed her face. Her skin felt rubbery. Not enough Vicodin. She was trying to taper off for tomorrow night. The next few hours would be excruciating, but her mind had to be sharp. She went over the plan again, trying to see the holes, trying to anticipate the snags bef
ore they happened.
The iPad was the key. It was inside Angie’s private eye bag, locked in the trunk of her car. The thing felt radioactive. It was also an open question. Jo had said that Reuben’s laptop had been wiped clean. Jo’s iPhone had been remotely erased, too. Did that mean the iPad would be erased if Angie turned on the power? The technology eluded her. The value did not.
She hadn’t told Jo about the iPad because she didn’t trust Jo. She recognized the girl’s equivocation in the grocery store. Jo had only agreed to Angie’s plan because she saw that there would be a last-minute way to stop it: don’t leave Reuben at the party.
What would Jo decide?
Another open question. Angie wasn’t sure her daughter would leave. And even if she left, would she stay gone? Jo had left Reuben before. Five times before, that Kip Kilpatrick knew of. Angie felt the truth gnawing at her gut. Even if Jo left, she would go back to Reuben, as sure as Angie was sitting in her car. The only way to stop that from happening was to make certain there was no Reuben to go back to.
Will worked at the GBI. They had computer people. If there was a video on the iPad, he’d find a way to access it. He would throw Marcus and Reuben in jail, and Jo could work with a lawyer to break the prenup. Or not break it. Reuben’s career would be finished. His life would be over. Jo could disappear. She could take her monthly draw from Delilah’s account and go back to college. Meet a nice guy. Have another kid.
Angie laughed out loud. The sound echoed in her car. Who was she kidding? Jo didn’t like nice guys any more than Angie did. There was a reason Angie couldn’t live with her husband.
She wasn’t even sure she was going to live past tomorrow.
Dale Harding had blood on his hands. Laslo had killed before. Kip didn’t mind pulling the trigger from behind the safety of his big, glass desk. If any of them found out Angie had helped Jo, then there was no amount of running that would get her away.
Maybe that was why she wanted to see Will one last time. Or even if she couldn’t see him, see his things. Touch his clean, starched shirts hanging in the closet. Mix up his perfectly matched socks in the drawer. Put his toothpaste in the wrong hole in the porcelain holder. Carve an A in his soap so the next time he showered, he touched his body and he thought of her.
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