“Go ahead.”
“I think her name might be Marita Gonzales. She has been missing for a week now.”
“How do you know this woman?”
“We’ve been cleaning houses together. There was an ad, in the paper, for a cleaning lady. She answered it. It was a full weekend job. She was supposed to do it last week. She did not come to our work last Monday and I have been very worried. She is a responsible woman.”
“Where does she live? Family, friends?”
A pause. “She lives with a few families in a house off Nolensville Road.”
The dime dropped for Holly. “Ah. Is she here illegally? It’s okay, I have no interest in jacking up her or her family. All I’m concerned with is identifying the victim we found and finding who might have hurt her.”
“The ad was in the paper,” he repeated. “Marita Gonzales.” And he hung up.
She called Jim as she pulled back onto the road, told him the story. “Can you find this ad, and call Forensic Medical and tell them we have a possible ID to work with?”
“I can. Also...” Silence for a moment, then the booming voice of Moreno.
“Graham. You’re turning into quite the detective. Update me.”
She did, and he said, “We’ll track down the name and the ad. Good work. I have information for you, too. The FBI caught the accomplice. They sweated him, finally offered him a deal. According to him, Brookes put him up to it all. We got a new address, too, think it might be where she’s staged this whole mess from. Jim matched it to the phantom IP. I’m sending people there now. Good thinking there, Graham.”
“Thanks. She’s slippery. We’re going to need all the help we can get to take her down.”
“Call in from Montclair’s, let us know if he’s okay. I’m sending a couple people to meet you there. No going it alone, not with a crazy woman on the loose.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll call in. Thank you for watching my back.”
“When a case breaks, it breaks wide open. Good job, Graham. Good job.”
LEAN ON ME
Then
His name was Henry Tomkins. In school, his friends called him Hank.
Hank led an ordinary life in an ordinary town in the middle of nowhere, Ohio. He was, in turns, an unremarkable student, a slightly better athlete, and a champion drinker. He also liked acting. His parents, sensing the wild streak in their son and hoping it might be the trick to keeping their only child out of jail, encouraged this interest. They attended all the plays, from first grade’s Thanksgiving festivus to the pinnacle, Hamlet, Hank’s senior year.
That’s where it all went off the rails. Hank lost the lead role to a quiet African American kid named Barent Goodson. For years after the indignity, the Tomkinses would say the school simply wanted to lay claim to having a black Hamlet, their bitterness disregarding the fact that Barent Goodson was one hell of an actor, who went on to appear alongside Denzel Washington in a cop movie, and subsequently became a star in his own right.
When Hank was shunted aside for his more talented classmate, (even though he took the role of Claudius, and played it well), the situation hit him hard. He’d worked his whole short acting career to be Hamlet, knew all the soliloquies by heart. He identified with the young prince of Denmark, probably more than anyone around him knew. And where a disappointment of this magnitude would normally send a young man of relative means to the next step regardless, like moving to New York and waiting tables and trying for an off-Broadway play, or maybe even a trip to California to take some acting classes and try writing a screenplay or two, Hank Tomkins was made of lesser grit, and was destroyed. Flattened.
This damage was irreversible.
The drinking, a pastime moderated by the acting, grew to epic proportions. DUIs followed, and a stint in jail. Drugs were next, and another stint in jail, this time for dealing marijuana.
The downfall was fast and complete. Disappointed Hank catapulted himself to the dark side, and didn’t look back.
It was a deficit in his character, absolutely, that made him so unable to handle even the simplest of bad situations, but a person’s true character is rarely revealed until they are staring into the face of adversity. Hank’s test came early, when he wasn’t emotionally mature enough to handle it after being coddled by parents and friends his whole existence, but it would have shown up sooner or later.
He was handsome, Hank, and a partier, and always had a little cash on hand, which meant he attracted women who thought to enjoy his attentions. He took great advantage of said attentions, but then he met a girl who started to straighten him out, and things began to look up. Neighbors whispered Hank Tomkins had outgrown his childhood disappointment and was going to be a responsible young adult. But then the idiot cheated with Alicia Barstow, his high school crush. And of course, Alicia got pregnant and told his girlfriend, and the whole world collapsed down around him again. Wash, rinse, repeat—only he was caught dealing meth this time.
A sympathetic judge took pity on Hank and threw him into rehab. Which turned into a life-changing experience for our young man.
Sober for the first time in years, he acquired the tools and learned the trades a man needs to succeed in life. Like how to commit fraud, check kiting, identity theft, and where to find the shadow men who did all sorts of things behind the scenes for criminals who had needs, desires, and money.
This wasn’t the education the judge wanted him to receive, but Hank happened to be there at the same time as a kid named Jake, who was one of the most successful con artists Ohio had seen in recent years. So good he’d conned a judge into sending him to rehab instead of jail after his last infraction.
Jake and Hank were inseparable. Jake taught Hank all he knew. Turned out Hank, with all his intelligence, had an aptitude for the long con. He was a very good actor, after all. Brilliant with accents, mimicry. He kept them all in stitches doing impressions during group therapy.
And then there was Ivy.
She arrived on a Wednesday at two in the afternoon. Ivy was hot in the damaged way of all lost young women. Doe eyes, scraggly blond hair with dark roots, waif thin. She wouldn’t talk to anyone, or meet anyone’s eyes. She shuffled around the edges, watching without looking. There were rumors, always rumors. Suicide attempt, probation violation, assault while under the influence. None of it mattered; all of it was true.
She was a swan among ducklings. She was a queen. She ruled them all, one bashful Mona Lisa smile at a time.
Hank, understandably, fell hard. She became a project. To win a smile, that’s all he wanted.
He’d always been the friendly sort.
It only took him a few days to make the connection. He told her of his life. His passion for acting. The disappointments he faced. The changes he was going to make.
When she shared her story, Hank was lost. And forever marked by the lonely waif.
When he got out of rehab, he waited for her.
When she got out, three months later, she was changed. There was a hardness in her, a coldness. Armor had been developed. Protections put in place. Gone was the lost girl. In her place was a woman.
A woman with ideas. A woman with a plan.
And Hank, lovesick Hank, bought in.
Five years later, when the police picked him up on the Jersey Turnpike, Trent Duggan’s passport in hand, he denied knowing anyone named Ivy Brookes. Denied being in Paris. Denied killing Rick and Lily. Denied ever having met or slept with a woman named Sutton Montclair.
He stuck to the script, like he’d been told.
It didn’t matter. There was DNA evidence at Sacré-Coeur, his hair on young Lily’s body. The FBI had him dead to rights for a double murder, and this time, he was going away for good. His only chance, they told him, was to make a deal.
They pressed him hard. And in the end, he
caved. The story he told them was beyond anything they could have imagined.
THE TRINITY
Now
Ethan came awake with a groan. His head was splitting. The situation rushed his memory. Ivy. One second he’d been standing, in horror, realizing the woman he’d called friend was betraying him, and the next, it was night, he was on the floor, and he knew for a fact if someone were to observe him at this moment, they’d see small bluebirds circling his head, tweeting and chirping.
Ivy had gotten him good.
Ivy, you betrayed us.
His nose was broken; he could feel the blood running down his chin, thick and warm. He shuffled himself to his elbows, sat up. Ran a hand below his nose, tried to swallow, coughed up blood onto his shirt.
Realized someone was banging on the door, calling his name. It sounded like Officer Graham.
Good. He needed to report the bitch.
He rose to his feet unsteadily, used the edge of the couch for support. Somehow made it to the door. Threw the dead bolt, and pulled it open.
Holly Graham stood on his porch. She was on the phone, and held up a finger so as not to be interrupted.
Ethan started to laugh. All hail modern technology.
“Yes, yes, it’s fine. I’ve got him, he’s alive.” And to Ethan, “Who did that to you?”
“Ivy,” he said, and Graham nodded curtly.
“It’s just like we thought. Send an ambulance, he’s hurt. We’ll get him patched up. He’s lucky to be alive. I’ll check in shortly. Right. Thanks, Jim.”
She put the phone in her pocket and gave Ethan a long look.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” she said finally.
“I don’t need an ambulance. But I do need to sit down. Want to come in and tell me what the bloody hell is happening? My head’s about to explode.”
“Brookes isn’t here?”
“Not that I’m aware of. I’ve only just woken up, you see. I had a run-in with a board or a bat of some kind, been out for a while.”
A police cruiser pulled up in front of the house with two officers in it.
“Stay right here. Don’t move,” she said, then walked back out the kissing gate. All three got in the car. They conferred for a moment, then doors were flung open and people scattered. One started around back, the other took up position on the front porch. Graham hurried Ethan back inside.
“What the hell is going on?” And then it came back to him, the phone call. “Sutton—”
“Mr. Montclair, I have a lot of information to share and not a lot of time to do it. Come and sit down. I’ll get you some ice.”
Ethan didn’t demur. He felt like he’d pulled five Gs straight into a wall, a crash test dummy whiplashed into being. He sat heavily at the kitchen table and accepted a Ziploc bag of ice and a kitchen towel from Graham. He applied these to his face.
“Talk. Please,” he said.
“Sutton is alive.”
“I know. She called me. I heard her voice, thought I might have been dreaming. And then it all went to pot.”
“Your wife is in Paris. Currently in police custody but they’re willing to discuss extradition.”
“Paris? Custody? What did she do?”
“The Paris police thought she killed two people, and arrested her. Sort of like we thought you killed Sutton.”
Ethan tried to wrap his head around these alien words. Sutton. Paris. Murder. It was too much. His head throbbed.
“Terribly sorry, but can you get me some Advil? Cabinet by the fridge.”
She retrieved the bottle, handed him two pills. He swallowed them dry, then said, “We’ve been set up, haven’t we?”
Graham set the bottle on the table, put her hands on her hips. “I think so, Mr. Montclair. Some of it has been proven, some is conjecture. But it looks like your good friend Ivy Brookes is out to get you.”
“She certainly knocked me out. Sutton called and Ivy attacked me. Which makes no sense, as she was in the process of trying to seduce me. I think. I’m a little fuzzy.”
“Well, here’s what we know—”
He jerked upright, then grabbed his head with a muffled curse. “The front door...it was bolted. I threw the bolt to let you in. She must still be in the house somewhere.”
Graham shook her head. “No one’s here. She has keys to the house. She has access to everything of yours. She probably locked the door behind her to slow us down, or mislead us. But we’re on to her now. We’ll find her, quickly. There’s a BOLO for her car, and her description has been sent to all the law enforcement in the region, plus transit. She won’t elude us for long.”
Ethan sat back, dumbfounded. “Tell me everything.”
“We don’t know everything.” Graham sat now, opposite him, the ever-present notebook out. He thought she’d make a good writer, the way she diligently recorded everything.
“Right now, a man named Hank Tomkins is in custody in New Jersey, and he claims he’s been working with Brookes for the better part of a year trying to make your lives—you and Mrs. Montclair—a living hell.”
“Let me guess. He has something to do with Colin Wilde?”
“Colin Wilde is Hank Tomkins, on orders from Brookes. Apparently she’s the one who’s been driving the online train against Sutton. She’s very good. She fooled me entirely. She’s been working both of you, hard. Trying to turn you against one another. Even Dashiell, your child—”
Ethan shut his eyes at the familiar spike of Dashiell’s name. This time, the spike was poisoned. “Did Ivy hurt our son?”
“There were traces of diphenhydramine in his tissue samples. It takes forever for those tests to be run, they’ve only just come back. When we revisited the case, the lab pushed them to the front of the queue. I’m so sorry.”
“He was murdered.”
“Without a confession, it can still be ruled accidental, but I’ll tell you this, Brookes handed over a bottle of medicine she claims Sutton brought to her and accused you of killing your son. She laid the blame at your feet like a cat with a dead snake, eyes brimming with tears the whole time. Meanwhile, she was filling Sutton’s mind with the idea that you killed Dashiell and were planning to kill her, too. That’s why Sutton ran. Brookes helped her plan the whole thing, even procured false documents for her. She convinced Sutton you were a monster.”
“And the woman in the field? Are we to assume Ivy actually murdered this person and made it look like Sutton to help along this charade?”
“We may have a tentative ID. We’ll need dental or DNA to be sure. She looks like an innocent bystander, lured into Brookes’s web for the sole purpose of filling the temporary role of your dead wife.”
“Dear God. But surely, if Ivy is this smart, she’d have to know you’d figure out it wasn’t Sutton posthaste.”
“I think she was planning a grand escape once your lives were ruined. You say she was trying to seduce you? Perhaps she wanted you to run away with her. Either way, Sutton was lucky. If they hadn’t caught Tomkins—”
“Who is this Tomkins bloke, and how does Sutton know him?”
“I don’t know all the details,” she said, but he could tell she was lying, and a small burn began in the pit of his stomach. “She met him in Paris, and he insinuated himself into her world very quickly. He murdered two students at Sacré-Coeur and framed Sutton for it. She can give you all the details.”
“I suppose I deserve that. Tit for tat.”
“Sir?”
“‘Insinuated himself’ is code for fucked my wife. And I suppose I do deserve payback from her. For the affair I had. The alleged affair. The woman at the hotel at the conference? It was Ivy.”
“It was?”
“I woke up in her bed at the hotel. She was wearing expensive lingerie, lounging in the be
d, so thrilled when I woke. She kissed me, and took a picture of us together in the bed. A selfie. I was too much in shock to think straight. I had a wicked hangover, my head was fit to burst, and I didn’t remember anything past the drink at the bar the night before. Running into her felt odd at the time, but I’d had a few pops, and was surrounded by strangers and sycophants. I was relieved when she sidled up to me, all surprised, what a coincidence, we’re at the same hotel, and we chatted for a few. I hit the loo, came back, and that’s the last I recall until I woke up and she showed me the pictures.”
“Sounds to me like she may have dropped a little something in your drink, something to make you compliant.”
Ethan set the ice pack on the table. “You’re being kind. I don’t remember, but even if she slipped me the Mickey, it’s no excuse. Sutton and I were having trouble. Ivy had been hanging around a lot. I was happy to see her, I remember that. Happy to have a friendly face. She may have tricked me, might even have drugged me, but I’ll bet I went willingly. I am such a complete arse.”
“That’s your conscience speaking, not mine.”
“She’s had that hanging over me for over a year. Every time I saw her, I was filled with shame and revulsion. And Sutton, I couldn’t tell her the truth. I admitted screwing around, but I swore it was a nobody. That’s what Wilde had on me. He was threatening to tell Sutton the woman was Ivy, not some inconsequential barmaid.”
“It’s solid blackmail material, for sure.”
“It would have killed her. She would have left me without a backward glance. Everything I’ve done has been to prevent that from happening. I love my wife, Officer Graham.”
“I don’t doubt that for a moment, Mr. Montclair.”
“Where is Ivy now? What’s her next play?”
“I have no idea. Like I said, we’re looking for her. And we’re going to have protection here around the clock until we find her. I get the sense she’s not done yet.”
Lie to Me Page 30