by Tijan
Talking to the police at all was considered snitching. It didn’t matter that it had nothing to do with anything illegal that we might’ve done in the last six months. But she was going to come forward, and I worked for the biggest Russian mafia boss on the East Coast. Everything was put in a way that Roman would look like the good guy. Statements were going to be kept to what Ash had to say, which had nothing to do with anything current. She was firm on that.
The police would know about her.
The police already did know about her. This way, they’d know where she was and that she no longer needed to be considered a missing person.
But the police would know about Roman, which was going to happen anyways. Roman wanted to set up legitimate businesses here. There’s no hiding if that’s the case. And myself, I guess they’d learn about who I was if they didn’t already know because I wasn’t leaving her side.
What Roman would be told after the meeting is that Marco decided to work with him after all.
I—I had my own plan to handle that, but we heard footsteps coming down the stairs.
One of Roman’s guys came in. “They’re here.”
Roman nodded. “I want my men gone.” He glanced around the room, and as it’d been talked about before, Abram, Jake, and Cavers all left the room, too. They were here, they had met their boss above their boss, but they didn’t need the detective to see any more faces than what was needed.
We heard footsteps and a woman came in.
She was dressed in a suit. Slim. Sharp face. Sharp eyes, too. And a whole no-nonsense vibe to her.
She lingered on Roman, on me, but she went right to Ash.
“Hello.” She sat on a chair not far from Ash and took out a recorder. “I’m Detective Maronzetti. And your name is Ash…” She paused and glanced at us.
Another detective had come into the room, quieter, but he was there. She looked right at him, letting us know he was there. Not slim, a paunch on his stomach, and dressed in a suit. Balding head with the sides still trying to keep what hair was there. He also, which I found annoying, had smart eyes.
I didn’t know who Roman had asked to come, but these detectives weren’t the ones I’d hoped to get. In my life, you knew who would and who wouldn’t. Neither of these two did.
“No.”
Ash’s voice drew everyone’s attention back to her.
The feeling in the room changed, dipped, grew more somber.
I did not want to hear what she was going to say, but it was because once I heard, then I’d know what happened to her. I couldn’t take it away. I couldn’t kill anyone to make her feel better. The only recourse, literally the only recourse, was this.
“My name isn’t Ash, actually.”
“I don’t want you by me, when I tell them.”
“No.”
“Raize.” She sighed. She sounded so tired. “I have to do this on my own. I have to, for Brooke.” She started crying, but she’d been crying on and off since we left Montana. “I can’t explain it. I just can’t have you by me.”
“I’m in the same room. That’s not negotiable.”
“The police will know you—”
“It’s you, Ash. You!”
That was the conversation we had two days ago. I hated it then. I hated it even more now. But, I was in the room.
I was in the room.
Then she began speaking.
65
Ash
I started at the beginning.
“She was sick, you have to know that first.” My voice was shaky. Dammit. I couldn’t be like that, not for this. I liked the female detective. She was strong. I could feel that, but she was going to be soft with me. I hated that, but I needed that and I swear, she knew that, too.
She told me her name, but I wouldn’t remember it.
I wouldn’t remember anything about anyone in this room after tonight.
I’d only remember what I was about to say, and how it would destroy anything I might’ve had.
“Who was sick, Ash?”
I had a feeling no one else would speak, just her and me. I’m sure it’d been talked about on both sides. That was the precedent here today.
I just had to do this. I had to get it done. Just, fucking say the words. Get it over and done with.
Mom, I’m sorry…
“My mom.” My throat was clogged. “My mom was sick.”
We didn’t open the curtains. Mom never wanted them open.
“She—she took her life when we were in high school. Brooke and I. I—”
I couldn’t.
How could you do this?
How could you do what you did?
“I wanted you to have a friend, my sweet little girl.”
I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.
No words were coming to my throat. I couldn’t speak.
“Ash.” She started to scoot forward. She was going to touch my knee. And that touch would be kind, comforting. I could not have that.
“My name isn’t Ash,” I burst out. I was slowly leaving my body, but this—this had be to very clear. “I don’t know what my real name is.”
Now I had the room’s attention, but it wasn’t what they thought.
The detective frowned, and she started to look at her notes.
“I’m sure there’s a name on my birth certificate, but I have no idea what it says. You don’t understand. She—my mom… She was depressed. She was angry. She was irrational. She… she terrified me. She terrified everyone, but …” She was my mom. How could I explain that? “She wanted me to have a sister and, then one day, I had a sister. I know she wasn’t adopted, but my mom told me she was. She told Brooke she was. She wasn’t. And I know this because I saw her missing poster sitting next to our fireplace. My mom was starting a fire. The doorbell rang. She went to answer it, and I walked through the room. I saw the paper. She was going to burn it. It was Brooke. My sister. My mom—Her real name was Ashley Cruz and my mom kidnapped her.”
“This is your new room, sweetheart.”
She held her hand out. “My name is—”
“What’s your name, sweetie?”
“—my name is Ashley. What’s yours?”
I couldn’t look at Raize. I knew he would be tormented. I knew he would want to come over and pick me up, take me away if I asked him to, and I wanted to ask him that. So, because of that, because he gave no fucks who would care, I couldn’t look at him.
Though, God, I wanted to. I wanted so badly.
The detective hadn’t said anything, so I kept going. Might as well get it all out.
“You can check your database, but she’ll be in there.” And now for the hard part. “Brooke—Ashley looked like me. That’s why she was targeted. My mom did that. She targeted her, and she did it because she wanted me to have a sister. She used the word ‘friend’, but it was code for ‘sister.’”
“Sisters. She’s your friend that’ll never leave. You’d like a new friend, wouldn’t you?”
“She always said that loneliness could kill. She didn’t want me to be lonely, and the thing is that I wasn’t. I went to school. I had friends. I had Dad. I had…” My voice cracked. “I had her. But she was lonely, so she was convinced I was lonely. She didn’t want me to be alone.”
“Was your dad involved?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. He was on drugs most of my life, drinking if he wasn’t high. I don’t know.”
“You said your—the girl kidnapped was Ashley Cruz?”
Ashley Cruz. I saw her missing poster once... Doesn’t matter if he’s not the one who got her. Someone got her.
I nodded. “My mom renamed her Brooke.” A tear slipped down my face. This one I could feel. “My first name was Brooke. She took it and gave it to her.”
“Why would she do that?”
I shook my head, my throat threatening to completely close up. “I have no idea.”
And for the rest.
“My mom would lie, like, every day. Sm
all lies. Big lies. Stupid lies. Things about big and major things, but also; she’d lie about what kind of toothpaste she used. Just, stupid things and I grew up in that. I got good, real good, at knowing what was a lie and what wasn’t. But yeah, she lied. About everything.”
What didn’t she lie about?
What didn’t you lie about, Mom?
“Do you have anything else to share with us?”
God.
My throat was so closed up.
“After Mom died, Brooke went off the rails. She was pulled in by a Romeo pimp and you guys have her in the database. She was picked up recently. I don’t know if those charges changed, but you’re going to pull her and you’ll see for yourself. She was a victim of... “ Jesus. I couldn’t even say it all. “It’s not her fault, what she did, what happened to her. None of it was her fault.”
It wasn’t mine.
I closed my eyes, trying to tell myself that.
It wasn’t my fault.
It wasn’t my fault.
I felt like it was my fault.
“Okay.” The air was so thick, but the detective was trying to push forward. “Okay. So, we are going to need you to come down to the station. We’ll need your DNA. We’re going to pull everything. Your mom. Your dad. Ashley. Your file. Everything.”
I wasn’t looking, but her voice sounded far away for a second.
“My partner already sent in the search and you’re correct. Ashley Cruz was reported missing in Colorado when she was six years old.”
Six.
Colorado.
Oh my God.
A ‘neighbor girl.’ How long had my mom planned that?
“I have no doubt that her DNA will match Ashley’s, and we can move forward from there.” Her voice sounded different again. She might’ve stood up. I still wasn’t looking. “Do you, uh— I don’t know how to proceed from here.”
“Gail!”
I didn’t recognize that voice. I was assuming it was her partner’s.
She ignored him. “I’m not a counselor. My God, I’m not a counselor, but I know a little bit and you have—there’s people you can talk to. Counselors. Allies. They don’t need to report anything to the police.”
“Gail,” another groan.
“They are there for you. Only you.”
I felt her hand again. It touched mine and squeezed, so gently.
She added, “I am so very sorry for what you have gone through, but what you did today was—it will help reset any wrong that was done. That’s a good thing. I’ll leave my card with your associates, and we’ll be in touch for any more questions about this situation.”
Another groan, “Detective Maronzetti, a word before you make any more promises.”
“Yeah.” She moved her head, as if sharing her thoughts away. She said under her breath, “I don’t care. Right now, I don’t care.”
I didn’t think those words were meant for me.
She started to pull her hand away, but I turned mine around and caught hers.
I squeezed it. Once. Just briefly.
As I looked up, her eyes were watering and she turned away. Her card was out, and she handed it to Raize. Not Roman. Raize. But she addressed Roman next with a small nod. “An eventful first meeting, Mr. Marakov.”
He grinned. “Yes, it was.”
They left.
Raize took one look at me.
He was across the room the next second.
I was lifted up in his arms, and I gave in.
I, simply, just gave in.
My legs wouldn’t have been able to work anyways. I was done.
Just.
I was done.
He carried me from the room.
“We’re going to be the best sisters ever.”
Brooke was so happy.
“Yeah?” I was trying to smile, but this felt weird. I just didn’t know why it felt weird.
“Yeah! You and me. Sisters forever. Right?” She had her hands in the air. She was that excited, but she paused and frowned. “Wait. What’s your name again?”
66
Just Me
They charged my father. Child endangerment, neglect of a child. It was why he never reported me missing, or Ashley. On the day they charged him, Raize took me to see her. She wasn’t Brooke anymore.
We were told she was going by the name of Ashley again.
She was happy.
She had decent weight on her. She didn’t look gaunt in the face, which she had been before she left and she was smiling now.
I’d also gotten pictures from the guy Raize had watching her.
One was her leaving a counseling office.
Another of her at the grocery store.
A third where she was having coffee with an older lady. And others. They looked like her. There was a family resemblance. A man. A woman. A brother. A sister. Could’ve been a couple aunts, too.
She seemed happy, but how could that be? After everything? But she was smiling. They were smiling.
None of that made sense to me, but they were.
We were currently watching Brooke cooking dinner with a woman. Both were in their kitchen.
Raize stepped up behind me. His chest grazed my back. “Do you want to talk to her?”
I shook my head, my stomach dropping, but my chest lightening at the same time. It was a bittersweet feeling. “No.”
“She knows what you did. That you were the one who came forward. She knows that.” His hand moved to my front, resting against my stomach.
A bittersweet feeling twisted inside of my gut. “Maybe one day, but not today.”
A whole new wave of emotion surged up inside of me, this one making me bite my lip because I didn’t want to cry.
But damn. I wanted to cry.
He moved to stand in front of me, and he touched under my chin, tilting my head up. A soft expression came over him, one that was loving and it took my breath away. I was blinking back tears for a whole different reason. Seeing them, he got even softer. He reached up, a finger tracing down a strand of my hair and sliding behind my ear and then moving to the back of my head. He took a breath and moved even closer, his body brushing mine. His forehead lowered, not completely touching mine, but he was that close.
I felt everything from him. His heartbeat. His heat. His breathing.
I felt a slight tremor course through his body, too.
“You need to know something. Your sister’s case is getting a lot of attention, too much. Roman called today. He’s ready to offer you a proposition. He said you can be free. You don’t need to work for him. You can walk across the street and knock on that door. Ashley told the police that she’d like to see you, have a relationship with you. You could join that life. It’s as simple as that.”
I didn’t react. I couldn’t, and I think a part of me knew the other side. “What’s the other offer?”
“You continue working for him, with me, and we disappear right now. But, you could be free. You joined this world to find your sister—”
I touched his chest, stopping him. “I joined this life because Brooke Ashley was taken again. The first time was my fault. The second time was my chance at redemption. Save her, and maybe I could save myself.”
Oh man.
Oh boy.
I had no idea that’s what was going to come out of me.
No. Clue!
But, whoa. Wow.
Redemption.
And all the ‘lines.’
It made sense now.
But then I felt who was holding me.
I looked up.
Give up Raize for freedom. I knew that was the fine print for the first offer. It only made sense.
Roman wanted me to leave to help the spotlight fade away a bit, so it wouldn’t get connected to him, but he wasn’t going to give up Raize. There was no way.
That meant, freedom meant me giving up Raize.
I already knew my choice.
67
Unknown At The Moment
With me. Not for me.
This guy was good.
When I first met Roman Marakov, I hadn’t known what to expect, but going in and meeting this guy—he was in a whole other league. There’d been extraneous factors with the first meeting, so I was using this one as the official introduction. He wasn’t like Raize.
No one was like Raize.
Roman Marakov was a thinker. That’s what I meant.
He was the type of guy who not only played chess, won at chess, he was the guy who invented the board. That’s who Raize’s boss was and after the first three minutes, he started talking about Raize and I knew this guy also knew he was lucky to have who he had working for him. The admiration and respect wasn’t to be faked.
That helped affirm my decision.
We were shaking hands and I released his, just going to lay out my cards. “I have a problem with killing. And Brook—Ashley was trafficked. I have a problem with that, too.”
His eyes flared and the corner of his mouth twitched. “So I’m told.”
“Is that a problem?”
More deep amusement shone from him, but he kept a clear face. Nothing was twitching now. “It’ll be good to have someone like you in the room. I didn’t choose this life, but I’m going forth the best I can.”
“I did.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Hmm?”
“I chose this life.” Twice now. “Just so you know.”
There was a switch in his gaze, something deeper, darker shone there, but he only nodded. “I see.”
Well, I didn’t.
I had no clue why I wanted him to know that, but I did and he knew he did and now I felt an awkwardness between us, but it was also one that I wanted to be there. And again, I had no clue what was going on.
But he only grinned faintly before extending a hand toward the bar in his office. “I’m glad that everything is settling for Ashley, but I’m also glad that you’ve decided to stay on with us. Should we celebrate?”
I inclined my head, and as he made me a drink, he asked, “So, Ash. I have to ask, should I have killed Marco Estrada instead of deciding to enter into a business relationship with him? What’s that magical gut of yours saying?”