“Angie?” Cook furrowed his brow. “I’m not sure she’d be willing to help. Jennifer spent two years estranged from her because of the way we hooked up and they just recently started talking again.”
Nick stilled, confused. “You hooked up with your wife’s sister, too?”
“Well, yeah, but not the way you think,” Cook replied. “I dated Angie before I started sleeping with Jennifer. It was a big family brouhaha when Jennifer told everyone we were getting married. Nobody would talk to her for a long time.”
“Wait … .” Nick was dumbfounded. “You were in a relationship with Angie and cheated on her with Jennifer?”
Peter nodded. “Yeah. I definitely traded up with that one.”
“Why didn’t you mention this?”
Peter held his hands up and shrugged. “I didn’t know it was important. Is it?”
“Maybe.” Nick’s brain kicked into overdrive. “I wonder if … .” He let it hang, possibilities coming fast and furious.
JENNIFER FLOATED IN FRONT of Maddie for two full blocks before slowing her pace. Maddie glanced around, noted they were close to the funeral home’s parking lot, and then followed Jennifer across the lawn. The weather wasn’t warm enough that people were out in droves on the street – which Maddie was thankful for – but she remained leery about calling out.
In an effort to close the distance between them, Maddie increased her pace. “Jennifer.”
The ghost didn’t stop moving until she was next to a car. The vehicle itself was non-descript. If Maddie had to guess, it looked like a rental. It had tinted windows, which was odd on a four-door sedan, and it was parked under a tree in the back of the lot.
“Jennifer, what’s going on?”
“I found him.” Jennifer’s voice was barely a whisper.
Maddie looked around, confused. “Did a man kill you? Did you find the man who killed you?”
“I found my baby.”
Maddie was lost. “Where?” The question was barely out of her mouth when she heard a sound from inside of the car and turned, eyes wide. She lifted a weak hand to shield her eyes and pressed her forehead to the backdoor window.
It was hard to see through the tinting, but once Maddie’s eyes adjusted she found herself looking at a small infant. He was alone in his car seat … but he was moving.
“Holy smokes!”
Maddie was dumbfounded as she dug for her cell phone. She’d found P.J. Cook, and he was alive. Of course, she had no idea who took him or what he was doing locked in a car alone, but she’d officially found him.
Things could only get better from here, right?
19
Nineteen
Maddie had her finger on speed dial to call Nick when she changed course. She pocketed her phone, took another look around the parking lot, and then tugged on the door handle. It was locked.
The baby was calm, sleepy. Maddie didn’t like it so she moved to the front of the car and pulled on that door. It wouldn’t open either.
“You’re not supposed to leave a baby in a car,” Jennifer fretted. “He’s not supposed to be alone in the car.”
Maddie made a sympathetic clucking sound as she stared at the baby. She was at a loss.
“What are you doing?”
Maddie jolted at the new voice, swiveling quickly. Instead of finding a murderous kidnapper staring her down, though, she found her father.
“I found the baby.” Maddie pointed for emphasis.
George, dubious, peered in the window. When the baby shifted a bit, he widened his eyes and scanned the parking lot. “Are you sure that’s the right baby?”
Maddie nodded, flicking a gaze to Jennifer, before focusing on her father. “I’m sure.”
“You have to get him out of the car,” Jennifer complained, her voice ratcheting up a notch. “He’s not supposed to be in the car.”
“I get that, Jennifer.” Maddie worked overtime to keep her temper in check. “I’m doing the very best that I can. The doors are locked. Give me a minute.”
“The doors are locked?” George was uncomfortable with the situation, but he was determined to help. “When you didn’t come back right away we got worried. I decided to check on you. I guess now I’m glad I did, huh?”
“Absolutely.” Maddie bobbed her head. “I was getting nervous being out here alone.”
“Did you call Nick?”
“No. I was going to but … we need to get P.J. out of the car.”
“Call Nick,” George prodded. “They’ll be able to get him out of the car.”
Maddie wasn’t sure how to explain why she didn’t think that was a good idea. How do you explain a feeling, after all? “We need to get him out first.”
“Maddie, we’re not police officers.” George adopted a pragmatic tone. He sensed her getting manic and had no idea why. “I can’t magically snap my fingers and open this car door.”
Maddie’s heart rate increased and she rolled her neck as she stared at the building. Something was about to happen. She could feel it. “He has to come out now.”
“Maddie … .”
“Fine. You call Nick.” Maddie slapped her phone in George’s hand and circled the car, frustration growing with every step. “We need to get him out.”
“That’s what the cops are for.”
Maddie cast a long look over shoulder, focusing on the funeral home a second time. “They won’t get here in time.”
George cocked his head. “How do you know that?”
“I feel it.” Maddie searched the ground until she found a large rock. It was one of the over-sized ones used for landscaping purposes and it was heavy in her hands. She carried the rock to the opposite side of the vehicle from where P.J. rested and then positioned herself at the front passenger side door. She didn’t bother covering her face, there was no time, and instead raised the rock over her head with both hands.
George realized what Maddie was about to do and balked. “Don’t!”
It was too late. Maddie smashed the rock against the window as hard as she could. The glass shattered but didn’t fragment and fly in the back of the car. Instead it dropped on the passenger seat, disintegrating into a million little pieces.
Maddie tossed the rock on the ground and reached through the window until she found the door mechanism. She unlocked the front door and then reached behind to unlock the back. It was an awkward position – and she scratched up her arm when she leaned over the passenger seat – but Maddie managed to unlock the door closest to P.J. before exiting the vehicle and racing to the other side.
“You didn’t hit him with glass, did you?” Jennifer was crabby and worked up. Maddie couldn’t say that she blamed her. Still, she wasn’t in the mood to get a dressing down from a ghost.
“He’s fine.” Maddie used her hip to nudge her father out of the way before practically ripping the back door open. P.J. opened his eyes at the noise, his face remaining placid despite the upheaval. “Hi, baby,” Maddie cooed, smiling.
“That’s his ‘I’m going to start crying’ face,” Jennifer warned. “He’s going to wail in about five seconds.”
Maddie didn’t doubt Jennifer’s motherly observations but that didn’t mean she had time to work herself into a lather. “He can cry if he wants.” She knelt to mess with the seatbelt so she could disengage the car seat and carry the entire thing, but it looked complicated and she didn’t get very far before another figure joined the fray.
“You have to move now, Sunshine,” Olivia Graves barked, popping into existence next to Maddie. Olivia’s face was drawn and grim. “She knows. She’s coming.”
“Who knows?” Maddie asked, frustrated. “And where have you been? I’ve been trying to have a discussion with you since Dad came back and you’ve been hiding.”
“Well, if you already know what I’ve been doing, why even ask?” Olivia challenged, her eyes shifting to the funeral home. “Now, Maddie. You have to get that baby and run now.”
“What do you think I�
�m trying to do?”
“Who are you talking to?” George asked. “Is the mother here?”
“Two mothers,” Maddie gritted out, fruitlessly tugging on the seatbelt. Finally she gave up and unsnapped the belt around the baby’s legs, making an exaggerated face as she lifted him out of the seat.
“Watch his head,” Jennifer and Olivia ordered in unison.
Maddie made a face as she cradled P.J. to her chest. “Hey, little man. Everyone has been looking for you.”
“Maddie, how can you be sure that’s the right baby?” George challenged.
“Because I’ve seen photographs of him,” Maddie replied calmly. “Oh, yeah, and I’ve seen him in my dreams.”
“Your dreams?” George was out of his depth, but he sensed they were in a precarious position. “What if you’re wrong? You could be arrested for vandalism.”
“First of all, Nicky would never arrest me,” Maddie argued. “Dale wouldn’t either. Second, I’m well within my rights to break out a window to save a baby from dying in a hot car.”
“It’s not even fifty degrees out,” George argued.
“Well, it felt warmer to me.” Maddie kept making faces at the baby to calm him. “Grab that blanket out of there, Dad.”
George did as instructed, although he wasn’t thrilled with Maddie’s bossy attitude. “Now what do we do?”
Maddie lifted her eyes to the funeral home door, as if sensing someone watching her, and locked gazes with Angie Martindale. “We go back to the hotel right now … and we go fast.”
George followed her gaze, swallowing hard. “Is that the kidnapper?”
“And murderer,” Maddie replied. “Go. Go now!”
“I NEED YOU TO run me through this from the beginning.”
Nick didn’t consider himself a judgmental person. He was pretty much a “live and let live” type of guy. He didn’t care how people lived their lives as long as they didn’t hurt others. Peter Cook’s admission, though, made Nick feel sick … and a little bit angry.
“I don’t know what you want me to say.” Peter was blasé. “Before I married Jennifer, I dated her sister.”
“For how long?”
Cook pursed his lips as he did the math. “I guess it was about a year or so. It might’ve been longer. It all melds together in my head.”
“How serious was the relationship?”
“I don’t ever really consider any of my relationships serious, for the record, but I’m pretty sure she thought it was serious,” Peter said. “We moved in together about two months after we started dating and she was making noises about me proposing when I broke up with her.”
“I see.” Nick did see. He saw that Peter Cook was the sort of man who gave their entire gender a bad name. “How did you and Angie meet?”
“Oh, I was having a dinner with clients and she happened to be with the clients, a sort of liaison or something,” Peter replied. “She seemed nice enough. She caught my attention because she was tall … like ridiculously tall. Most women aren’t that tall.”
Nick thought of Maddie and disagreed. “So she was tall and you decided to get involved?”
“She was friendly and nice and understood I had to travel for work,” Cook clarified. “That’s not easy to find in a woman. I knew she wasn’t a soulmate or anything – but I don’t really believe in soulmates so that’s hardly newsworthy – but she was easy on the eyes and she did whatever I wanted in bed.”
Nick couldn’t hold back his disdain. “You’re a pig.”
“Hey, I’ve seen your girlfriend,” Cook said. “She’s smoking hot, which means that she can afford to have expectations when it comes to men. I date pretty women who aren’t gorgeous. That was your first mistake. That blonde looks like a model. She can get anyone, so if you want to keep her, you have to cater to her needs.
“I pick women who aren’t ugly but don’t get a lot of attention,” he continued. “Those women are grateful when you tell them they’re beautiful. They fall all over themselves when you bring them a rose. They think it’s romantic – not cheap at all – when you suggest a walk instead of spending money on them.
“That woman you have, she’s absolutely beautiful,” he said. “You’re constantly working to make her happy, though, aren’t you? See, that’s the tradeoff. I’ll take a passable face over a smoking one any day of the week because I’m inherently lazy.”
“I never would’ve guessed that,” Nick drawled, his agitation evident. “By the way, don’t talk about Maddie.”
“Why? Do you think I’m a threat?” Cook brightened at the prospect.
“No. I don’t like it and you make me want to punch you as an apology to every woman you’ve ever screwed over,” Nick replied. “Go back to Angie Martindale. You dated her for a year and then … what? You just decided you wanted her sister one day and that was that, huh?”
“That’s not how it worked,” Cook protested. “Angie and I were happy. Er, well, as happy as I get. I was bored a couple of months in, though. I started looking around for someone new – even dated a couple of the interns to keep me from wandering too far – and then one day Jennifer and I were talking at a family barbecue and it struck me that she would be easier to mold than Angie.
“You see, Angie liked to please me in the bedroom – she once cleaned the house naked while serving me mixed drinks because it was a particular fantasy of mine and it was awesome – but she was also career oriented,” he continued. “She cared a great deal about her job and she didn’t always put me ahead of it.”
“That must have been rough for you.” Nick’s sarcasm was on full display. “I mean … a woman not doing everything for you even though you do nothing for her? That’s just horrific.”
“I know, right?” Cook clearly missed Nick’s tone. “I don’t understand it either. I tried to talk to her about it. I wasn’t really in the mood to settle down, but the partners at my firm suggested it might look better at meetings and whatnot if I had a wife.”
“Oh, well, as long as you were looking to get married for the right reason,” Nick drawled.
“What reason is there, other than a proper business arrangement, I mean?”
Nick thought of Maddie. He thought of her face when he presented her with the engagement ring. He thought of his life before she came back, before he was happy. “I don’t think it’s worth explaining to you because you’ll never get it.”
“And I don’t want to get it,” Cook said. “Women are called the lesser sex for a reason.”
“I’ve never heard them called that and if you say it again I’m going to twist your head off your neck,” Nick warned, extending a finger.
“I see you two are getting along well,” Kreskin said as he approached, his eyes busy as they bounced between faces. “What’s going on?”
“Mr. Cook was just telling me about the year he spent dating his sister-in-law,” Nick gritted out.
Kreskin’s eyes flashed. “Are you kidding?”
“Does it seem like I’m in a joking mood?”
“Holy … .” Kreskin made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat. “Why wouldn’t you tell us that?”
“Why would I tell you that?” Cook challenged. “We broke up ages ago.”
“How long ago was that in real time?” Nick asked.
“Three or four years. Who keeps count?”
“So you started flirting with Jennifer while you were still dating Angie,” Nick prodded. “I’m guessing you started sleeping together before you broke up with Angie, too. Am I right?”
“Of course. You need to test the goods before you give up the merchandise you’re currently using.”
Nick didn’t realize he’d formed a fist until Kreskin shot him a quelling look.
“Don’t punch him until he’s done telling the story,” Kreskin ordered.
“There’s not much to tell,” Cook said. “I found that Jennifer and I were extremely compatible and she wasn’t focused on a career. She was perfectly happy to be
a housewife – which is what I wanted. We knew that Angie wouldn’t take it well, but Jennifer was so eager to get away from her family she really didn’t care.”
“So you broke up with a woman who loved you, ran off with her sister, married the sister, and then had a baby with the sister?” Nick queried. “Do I have that right?”
Cook smiled. “You left out a bunch of stuff, but you pretty much have it right.”
“So, given all that, why didn’t you think to tell us that Angie might want to hurt your wife?” Nick asked.
“What?” Cook made an incredulous face, although it slipped after considering the situation for more than a few seconds. “Oh. Well … huh.”
“She wasn’t far away,” Nick said. “We didn’t consider her a suspect because we didn’t know the history. Had we known the history, we would’ve questioned her. As it stands now, she’s only in town for another day and she has plans to move to Florida.”
Something clicked into place for Nick and he swiveled to stare at Kreskin.
“She has plans to move to Florida,” Kreskin echoed. “Where no one knows her or will be suspicious if she turns up with a baby.”
“Son of a … .” Nick swore viciously under his breath when his phone rang. He considered ignoring it, but when he saw Maddie’s name pop up on the screen he changed his mind. “We’re not done here, Mr. Cook. We need to get a few details from you before moving on.”
“Whatever,” Cook said, his skin waxy and white. “Do you really think Angie killed her own sister?”
“I think it’s a distinct possibility.”
“HERE!”
Maddie shoved P.J. into Christy’s arms the second they hit the dining room. Christy, her fork halfway to her mouth, scrambled to keep hold of the baby as Maddie stared at the hotel’s glass front doors.
“Is this who I think it is?” Christy asked, instinctively making a face in an attempt to make the baby smile.
“Yes, and the woman who took him is on her way and she looks absolutely furious,” Maddie said. “I need you to get him to the police station.”
Grave Paths (A Maddie Graves Mystery Book 11) Page 18