Blood Loss - A Magnolia Novel

by Ashley Fontainne

  LiAnn pulled a business card from her purse and handed it to the doctor. “Here’s our contact information. Please let us know the minute we can come see her.”

  “Take good care of my friend,” Ruth whispered. “We’ve lost so much already. I can’t take anymore.”

  “We will. That’s a promise.”

  With that, the doctor turned and left the waiting room. For a full minute, no one moved or spoke, each lost in thought. Finally, Junior broke the silence. “Let’s head back home. Ain’t nothin’ we can do here except sit in uncomfortable chairs and worry. At least at The Magnolia, we’ll be able to worry and pray in comfort.”

  Chapter 5

  Mt. Ida, Arkansas – Thursday, March 2, 2017

  Though the view from the rustic front porch was gorgeous, the air crisp and cool, the coffee hot and strong, Melissa couldn’t seem to get her shoulders to relax. The only sounds were forest creatures zipping around in the underbrush and trees, scavenging for whatever it was they ate. From the moment of arrival at the well-hidden location, she’d been on edge for a variety of reasons. Not knowing what sort of predators roamed the woods of Arkansas added to her stress levels.

  Melissa was a city girl, born and raised around concrete and blacktop with occasional trips to the beach. The congestion of people and cars provided a dull, constant drum of background noise in her ears, yet the sounds were all familiar. She missed the daily grind, the fight to wield the sword of justice. And high-rises—God how she missed her spacious apartment on the sixteenth floor—one with sweeping views of the Los Angeles skyline.

  The things she missed the most were Sunday dinners at her parents’ house, shopping with Reese, the world’s sweetest, funniest little sister, and knowing the man sleeping next to her wasn’t a ruthless bastard.

  Swallowing hard to chase away the lump of tears pressing against her vocal chords, Melissa’s gaze swept over the landscape. The trees were mostly bare. Only a few pines with vibrant, green needles dotted the sprawling landscape. A wry smile curled her lips upward as she took in the Ouachita forest. Compared to the enormous mountains back home in California, the small rises looked more like large molehills.

  The first two months of being trapped inside the sparsely decorated cabin nearly drove her to insanity. For the first time in her life, Melissa felt helpless. She’d bounced between sobbing uncontrollably from the devastating betrayal and then swinging over to fits of fury at her treacherous husband and then at herself for being so blind, so easily swayed by his charming words.

  How in the world did she miss the signs that the marriage was a sham? Oh, she knew—she’d been consumed with the case: The State of California vs. Jubilee Retirement, Inc., et al. Vern Doster slithered his way inside her life like an unseen virus. Like a naïve fool, she’d assumed the Cosmos offered a present for all her hard work and dedication, leading the charge to be the voice for those senior citizens who no longer had one to shout to the world about their mistreatment at the hands of the greedy, bloodsucking corporation. When Vern joined the district attorney’s office as a deputy prosecutor in the sex crimes division, she was so deep inside her own case she barely noticed his addition to the staff.

  All it took was one random meeting in the hallway—two busy people bumping into each other, spilling paperwork and coffee—and one, thousand-watt smile changed her world. Vern Doster was handsome, a head full of mahogany hair and vibrant blue eyes with the ability to bore inside the mind like laser beams. Vern made an off-the-cuff remark about how he’d been following the case against the “deplorable owners and employees” of Jubilee, and how impressed he was with her tenacity to take them down. When he returned the papers to her hands, his smile made her stomach do a little flip-flop when he offered to help with anything from legal research to case preparations.

  Melissa was hooked from that point forward. She couldn’t count the times he’d stay with her until the wee hours of the morning, helping her sort through the mounds of paperwork, assisting her in crafting solid opening and closing arguments. At the time, she appreciated every effort since the wet-behind-the-ears deputy prosecutor, Cheddy Singleton, was worthless. During those few weeks, Melissa felt herself fall hard and heavy for Vern. Their first real date happened three months before the trial began, followed by a whirlwind courtship of four months and poof! Less than a month after the verdict was handed down, they tied the knot. Melissa married a monster disguised as a loving, supportive spouse.

  A monster with only one agenda provided by the slimy owner of Jubilee—to kill her before the case was heard in the court of appeals.

  “Random, my ass,” she whispered into the empty cup after downing the last drops of coffee.

  A few tears filled her eyes at the memory of Andrew Crigger’s phone call months ago—the one that destroyed her life and left her cowering in the hills of the Ouachita mountains after faking her death…

  …“Need coffee now. Join me?”

  The words were code for the necessity of a meeting, one Karina Summers used when she’d been undercover and needed to meet and talk in the parking garage. Melissa’s gut immediately burned, sensing something was wrong if the captain of the major crimes division used a code only her and Karina knew.

  As usual when she’d meet Karina, Melissa left her cell phone and purse, only taking her wallet, told her assistant she needed to get some air and coffee and then dashed downstairs to the parking area. The stairwell on the backend was the only place without cameras.

  Andrew Crigger wasn’t alone. Next to him stood Karina’s former business partner and lover, Calvin Benson. Neither man smiled when she stepped inside the stairwell. Melissa sensed the tension as though it was a living entity.

  “Did something happen to LiAnn or Karina?” Melissa asked, immediately assuming they’d been involved in an accident in Arkansas.

  “No. They’re fine. You, however, aren’t. We’re here because of this,” Calvin responded, his husky voice low and almost sinister.

  He handed her a cell phone and clicked play. Melissa had to watch it three times to truly grasp the enormity of the situation. She’d tried not to cry as she listened to the words of Vern, spoken with such casual flippancy with the two other men, as though he was discussing the weather with strangers in an elevator instead of ordering the assassination of his wife. By the third round of viewing Vern hand over a wad of cash to the man wearing the usual ensemble of a biker, hot tears rolled down her cheeks.

  “I don’t…oh, God, what’s going on?”

  Calvin put the phone back in his pocket and looked over at Andrew, who gave him a slight nod. “Vern isn’t who you think he is, Melissa. He’s a plant—sent in by the owners of Jubilee to gather information on all those involved in the prosecution of the case. He was to monitor the case and report back to the defense, giving them an edge at trial. If the verdict was guilty, which it seems they assumed it wouldn’t be since they had a mole in your office, the plan was to take you out and let the appeal fall onto Cheddy’s shoulders and Vern move over to second chair.”

  “How…how do you know that?” Melissa whispered.

  “The other man in the video is an acquaintance of mine,” Calvin responded. “He told me all about their conversations prior to the recording. When a man approached him last week and inquired about doing a ‘job’ for him, Santos was wary. He came to me, afraid he was being set up.”

  “This man, this Santos, that’s the kind of friends you have? Hired killers?” Melissa blurted out.

  “I said he was an acquaintance, not a friend. You know private investigators use all sorts of people to gather information. I told Santos I’d record the entire thing and dig into the man’s background and then take it to my sources, which of course is Crigger. Imagine my surprise when I watched the live feed and recognized Vern.”

  Melissa started to shake. “Imagine yours? Uh, imagine mine! When…when was this recorded?”

  Andrew stepped closer, putting an arm around Melissa’s quaking shoulders.
“Less than five hours ago. We don’t have much time to work a plan.”

  A wave of dizziness made Melissa clutch onto the handrail. “Jesus, this isn’t happening. He…he said it needed to be done in two days! Shit! No wonder he’s attending that stupid conference in San Diego. Vern hates those boring bar meetings!”

  “Which is exactly why we need to hurry and get you somewhere safe,” Andrew responded.

  Pulling from deep reserves to steady her nerves, Melissa nodded in agreement. “Yes, right. Okay, so I’m not safe really anywhere. Going home is out of the question. I guess we need to contact the U.S. Marshall’s office and get me into WITSEC until the appeal is over.”

  The look that passed between Andrew and Calvin made the acid in Melissa’s stomach churn faster.

  “No. We have a better plan,” Calvin responded.

  Melissa gave him a dubious look. “Better than the witness protection program? Doubtful.”

  “Melissa, the other man in the video who walked in with Vern is Jody Firestone, an employee for the U.S. Marshall’s office. After they left the hotel where we filmed them, I lifted prints from the envelope. One set belonged to Vern, one to Santos, and the other to Jody. Running his print set off alarm bells, I’m sure,” Andrew said.

  Melissa’s mind spun at the news. “Then what do you suggest, Andrew?”

  “We fake your death.”

  Melissa’s mouth gaped open. “Come again?”

  Calvin added, “Car accident to be specific. A fiery crash over the cliff, body washed away in the Pacific. I’ll take care of that end. You leave by the end of the day with Crigger. He’s found a safe place to hide you and be close enough to keep an eye on you until the appeal is heard.”

  “I…can’t do that to my family,” Melissa whispered.

  “Would you rather they suffer for a short period over your fake death or the remainder of their lives over the real one?” Calvin asked.

  Melissa didn’t have a comeback for the question...

  …Shaking the terrible memories away of how she’d ended up in an isolated cabin in the Ouachita Mountains—in freaking Arkansas of all places—she headed back inside. The wind had picked up and brought a damp chill along with it.

  With no internet, television, and an old-school cell phone without GPS or the ability to get online, Melissa’s choices were limited. Crigger stopped by earlier and brought her food and hygiene essentials as usual, yet stayed less than ten minutes. He never stayed more than twenty. Though incredibly thankful he paid for the cabin rental, bought her several sets of clothing from a souvenir shop somewhere in Kansas during the long drive from California to Arkansas, and provided her the phone and means to survive, only having human contact once a week for such a short period was tough to handle.

  Of course, it was certainly better than being dead.

  The memory of the journey across the country made her stomach churn as it surfaced. Melissa hadn’t said much during the full two-day drive. She was too stunned, too hurt, too devastated to get her mind to engage to form a cohesive sentence. Andrew did most of the talking, explaining things would work out, and the irony of timing and how it worked out to their advantage. He told her the minute LiAnn Tuck announced she was retiring and moving to Arkansas, he decided to do the same, knowing he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life without her close. He’d searched out and bought a farm next to LiAnn’s family’s and planned on surprising LiAnn when he showed up, unannounced, and proclaimed his love.

  Those conversations made Melissa’s chest tighten. On one hand, it was the sweetest thing she’d ever heard, yet on the other, it was a painful reminder of Vern’s betrayal.

  Crigger brought her newspapers each week, local and national, to give her something to help pass the hours of boredom. When she read the one with her obituary, Melissa dropped the pages and ran to the bathroom, vomiting so hard she almost fainted. Images of her parents, her sister, and friends thinking, falsely, she’d died, made her feel awful. She envisioned them rallying around Vern, offering support and encouragement, never realizing the man they considered part of the family was behind it all. The thought made anger erupt from her chest. Would her loved ones ever forgive her for hurting them so deeply once the nightmare was over? Could they?

  Would she if the situation was reversed? How can someone wrap their head around such betrayal? Such deception? The thought pattern almost made her forget her upbringing. Taught by two parents with liberal views of the world, eschewing violence and embracing change through the law, Melissa had lived her life determined to do the right thing. When she’d graduated from Stanford Law School, she’d never seen her parents beam with such pride. All during high school and college, Melissa rarely dated, focusing all her attention and energies into making her family proud and an everlasting mark on the world through the legal system.

  Her perception on life took a drastic turn the second she watched the video. Sometimes at night, when the only sounds were the popping and crackling of the fireplace, Melissa’s mind traveled to dark places. She’d never been a violent person before, yet after what happened, she’d dream about all the horrible things, the disgusting, vile ways she’d make Vern pay for his deplorable actions.

  Those nights she’d cry—hard—and not just from Vern’s betrayal or what she’d done to her family and friends. Melissa wept inside the quiet cabin for the woman she’d become.

  Only once had she broached the subject of the pain she felt from faking her death with Crigger on one of his visits. The man who’d saved her life and risked untold heartache and financial stressors looked at her with the kindest gaze she’d ever seen.

  “Melissa, they all love you. Once they realize you’re alive, they’ll be so excited and overcome with joy, they won’t care about all the sorrow and grief they felt when they thought you were dead. Other than joy and love, the only other emotions they’ll feel are rage and anger at the monsters who forced you to take this route.”

  The short conversation did make her feel somewhat better and gave her the extra push needed to stay the course and finish what she’d started, which was take down a corporation that preyed on unsuspecting senior citizens.

  To keep from going crazy, Melissa started talking to herself, sometimes playing the role of the defense out loud, poking and prodding, searching for any hole or crack to break the prosecution’s case and overturn the lower court’s ruling. Returning to the dinette table, Melissa did what she’d been doing for months—going over every bit of trial testimony, every pleading, every motion, and every deposition of the Jubilee case.

  Staring at the laptop and the blinking flash drive, Melissa’s heart clenched. They were the only items she took with her after the heartbreaking conversation with Calvin and Andrew. She’d retreated back to her office, doing her best to hide the pain of Vern’s betrayal from her face from the staff. With shaky fingers, she copied all the documents from the server to a flash drive.

  She’d be ready when the time came to argue in front of the stunned courtroom of the Second District Court of Appeals why the verdict handed down by the lower court against Jubilee should stand. In less than two months, she’d stroll into the courtroom packed with stunned onlookers and make sure the verdict she’d given so many hours of her life to achieve was stayed.

  Then, once the nightmare was over and her safety, as well as Karina’s and LiAnn’s secured, and the owner of Jubilee rotting in jail, she’d destroy the man whose last name she’d taken at the altar.

  The cold wind seeped through the small cracks in the cabin, making Melissa shiver. Before she started her research, she decided to stoke the fire. Gathering up some old newspapers, the one on the top caught her attention. She smiled at the picture of Karina. It had been taken the day she gave an interview about what happened in Hot Springs. The headline read, “Lucky to Be Alive: The Incredible Story of One Family’s Triumph over Organized Crime.”

  Crinkling the pages into a ball, Melissa stuffed them under a log and watched the fla
mes devour them. The irony of fire didn’t escape her. The tragedy of one home destroyed in a giant explosion was tempered by the three bodies burnt to crisp inside a funeral home. The initial worries Calvin and Andrew had about the women they loved were a waste of time. No two women on the planet were tougher than LiAnn Tuck and Karina Summers.

  “Sixty more days of freedom is all that remains for you, Vern. Tick tock, tick tock.”

  Chapter 6

  Hot Springs, Arkansas – Thursday, March 2, 2017

  It took several minutes of cajoling, yet Karina finally convinced Cecil to retire to his room and rest. He agreed but only after she promised to return after checking on the food. Once he reentered his apartment, Karina finished cleaning up the mess of food and dishes in Betty’s room, doing her best to keep from gathering all the papers strewn around. The private investigative juices were flowing, and it was struggle to keep her nose out of Betty’s business. She did glance once at the yellowed paper closest to her position on the floor, memorizing the name of the newspaper so she could look it up online later.

  Bounding down the stairs to the kitchen, she winced at the thought of Gram’s delicious food wasted and the fact she’d be the one responsible to prepare lunch. She doubted sandwiches and soup would suffice the taste buds of the residents. Of course, wasting or preparing food were the least of her worries at the moment. Betty’s near-death experience and Cecil’s shocking reaction to the newspaper articles about the disappearance of two women over sixty years ago were top priority. The events of the morning made an odd, ominous vibe settle over Karina’s mind.

  She sensed there was an underlying reason behind Betty’s obsession with the articles though what it was she had no idea. Once things settled down, Karina planned on investigating.

  Bursting inside the kitchen, she let out a sigh of relief. Cheryl Kingston stood in front of the stove stirring the giant pot of gumbo. Karina smiled. Cheryl had worked at The Magnolia ever since it opened and was one of a handful of employees who opted to remain after the big shake-up in ownership. Three weeks ago, when her daughter gave birth to an adorable little boy, Cheryl asked to cut her hours back to part-time so she could help out her overwhelmed and sleep-deprived daughter.