Abandoned

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

AD Jones regards the ceiling of his office, pondering everything I’ve just told him.

“So you think he was telling the truth?” he asks. “You think he has more victims stashed?”

“I think it’s likely, sir, if we operate on the theory that it’s a financial model. No victims, no money.”

“Probably not a shitload, though,” he muses. “He wouldn’t want to risk drawing too much attention.”

“Perhaps,” I agree. “Then again, there’s kind of a mutual code of silence. He probably records and keeps copies of everything that goes on between him and his ‘clients’ in case something goes wrong.”

“A dead man’s switch.”

“Sure. That and the whole I’ll-ruin-your-life-if-you-renege thing. Douglas Hollister tried to screw our perp, so he got buried. That’s a pretty convincing deterrent.”

“How’s Heather Hollister?”

“Not good. Some part of me wants to say she’s better off than Dana, or Jeremy Abbott, but I don’t know.”

“She’s better off.” He says it flatly. “You should know that better than most. If she’s tough enough, she’ll pull back from the edge. If she’s not, she won’t. At least she’s got the chance.”

“You’re right,” I say, “I guess it just creeps me out. My two biggest fears as a kid were getting locked in the dark forever and going crazy but not knowing I’d gone crazy.”

He smiles. “Maybe you’re already crazy now, and you just don’t know it.” He indicates his office with a sweep of his hand. “Maybe none of this exists, and you’re sitting in a padded room somewhere in a straitjacket, imagining it all.”

I give him a withering glare. “Not funny, sir.”

His grin tells me he feels otherwise. “And the other boy?”

“He’s alive. He’ll probably be turned over to social services, until and if Heather comes out of her funk enough to claim him.”

“So what’s the plan of attack?” he asks.

“Maybe Earl Cooper will help, but at the moment I think our best leads are the Internet aspect and the car crashes.”

“I assume you’re planning a sting on the Internet end of things?”

“I’m considering it, sir. I’ll know better when Leo gets back.”

“And the crashes?”

“If James is right and it’s a sexual need, he probably won’t have been able to limit himself to feeding it only when he’s performing an abduction. There should be other instances. I think it’s important. In most ways this offender appears to be incredibly disciplined and careful. The paraphilia is a deviation from that. It could be one of the places where he makes mistakes.” I shrug. “It’s a stretch, but it’s what we have.”

He thinks about it. “Good,” he agrees. “You should also look into Internet communities on the car-crash angle.”

“What do you mean?”

“Every fetish and weirdo perversion out there probably has a community of some kind connected to it. Pedos do. Places to share photos and experiences. If Cooper is right and he records his exploits, maybe he shares them too.”

I blink, surprised. “That’s a good idea.”

“I still have a few. Your current plan of attack sounds good. I agree with assuming that his motivation is money. It might not be the only reason, but Hollister’s testimony and everything else we know supports the concept. Proceed as planned.” He leans back in his chair and laces his fingers over his stomach, gazing at me. “Now, tell me why you’re really here.”

“Sorry?” He’s right, but I resist being readable as a reflex action.

“Come on, Smoky. I know you. I can tell when you’re distracted. You had something else on your mind the whole time you were briefing me.”

I meet his gaze with a miniature defiance, then I look away and sigh. “I told Director Rathbun I’d take the job.”

“I know. I think it was a good decision.”

I still am not looking at him. “I think so too. But there’s a complication. Well, I don’t know if complication is the right word. Let’s call it a variable. I need your help. Your advice on what to do about it in context.”

“If I can help, I will. What kind of variable?”

I feel myself shiver inside, a mix of nervousness and fear along with a yearning. It’s a secret. I’ve felt that way about it from the first. I’m not sure why I felt that way, but it was too visceral an emotion to ignore.

I force myself to meet his gaze again, and then I force myself to say the words, the words I haven’t said to anyone yet, not even Tommy.

“I’m about two months pregnant, sir.”

He stares at me. He says nothing for almost a half minute. I can’t tell if he’s shocked or just thinking. His fingers remain laced on his chest, his hands still relaxed, unmoving.

“Well,” he finally says. “Are congratulations in order?”

There’s a cautiousness to the question that I appreciate. Maybe this is one of the reasons I wanted to talk to AD Jones about this first, because I knew he’d have the exact kind of empathy that I needed.

It’s the question I’ve been asking myself since the middle-of-the-night pee test and have continued to ask since the blood test confirmed it.

Is this a good thing? Am I happy about it?

“They should be,” I say. “But I don’t know.”

“Why?”

I study my mentor and wonder about answering that question. AD Jones has known me longer than anyone in the FBI world. He watched me come up, and he was there when my life burned down and blew away. He’s seen a lot, but there are things he hasn’t seen, because of the type of relationship we have.

AD Jones has never seen me cry. He hasn’t had to hold me while I screamed. His support has been absolute, but it has been either silent or spoken gruffly. And I’ve been grateful for it.

“I was pregnant,” I tell him. “Before Matt and Alexa were killed.”

“Okay,” he says.

Not Really? or Oh my God! Just Okay, and then waiting. It encourages me.

“No one knew. I was still turning it over in my mind, you know? Trying to decide how I felt about it before telling Matt. Then … what happened, happened. When I was lying in that hospital bed, I decided I was going to go home, get my affairs in order, and kill myself. The thing is, I knew I couldn’t pull the trigger if I still had that baby in my stomach. Twisted, I know.” I swallow, ashamed. “So I ended up aborting the baby.” I sneak a look at him, afraid of what I’ll see, but all I see is patience. “Later, when I decided I was going to live, I had so much regret about that decision. So much … I can’t …” I shrug, defeated in my search for an adequate phrase to encompass that feeling of self-loathing and despair. “I pushed it down, kept it secret, and life moved on.”

I look down at my belly and touch it. I imagine it growing, as it did with Alexa. I remember what it felt like, those stirrings of life. Amazing and crazy and frightening and humbling. “So here I am again. I get another chance. There’s no way I’m getting another abortion, that much I know. But it would be a lie to say I’m not scared, sir.”

“I understand, Smoky,” he says. “I really do. You’ve lost a lot. Fear’s natural.” He cracks a crooked grin. “What’s the old saying about paranoia?”

“You’re not paranoid if they’re really out to get you?”

“Yeah.” He gets serious. “People are out to get us. Every day. Maybe they’re not actively pursuing us, but somewhere in this great nation of ours, at this very moment, someone is at the very least turning the idea over in their head. Pregnancy makes you vulnerable, that’s a fact. Then, a baby …” He shakes his head. “I envy those who are courageous enough to have children. At the same time, I’m relieved I don’t have to worry about my children, if I had any, being used as a weapon against me.”

“That’s part of it.”

“Have you discussed this with Tommy?” he asks, then catches himself. To my great surprise, he blushes a little and clears his throat. “Sorry, that’s an assumption on my part. Is Tommy the father?” My mouth drops open. “Sir!”

He looks embarrassed again. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

“Jeez. What kind of hussy do you think I am?”

“So?”

I sink back into my chair. I feel like a kid in the principal’s office. “He doesn’t know. I haven’t told him yet.”

He squints at this answer and scratches a forearm. “Well,” he says, “I guess it’s really your business. You’re not married, after all.”

In for a penny, I think. I blurt it out before I have time to stop myself.

“Actually, we are married, sir.”

Now his mouth does drop open, to be replaced soon after by a genuinely happy smile. “No shit?”

“Really and truly. Hawaii wasn’t just a vacation, it was a honeymoon.”

“Congratulations! Why didn’t you tell me?” Time to sink back into the chair again.

“Well, I haven’t told anyone, sir. You’re the first. To be honest, Tommy and I have been fighting about it a little.”

“He wants to spill the beans and you don’t?”

“Something like that.”

He seems about to say something but closes his mouth. “I can understand your reluctance, I guess. I kept my second marriage a secret for almost three months. I didn’t want to jinx it.”

“Exactly! You understand where I’m coming from.”

The quality of his next smile is full of affection but a little bit sad. “But that’s all bullshit, Smoky. That second marriage failed like the others, and it wasn’t because I did or didn’t tell anyone about it. Don’t get superstitious about it. Bottom line, I wasn’t willing to give my marriage the same priority I gave my work. You and Tommy are a good match in that regard.”

I feel the great reluctance again, the push and pull of trying to decide what to reveal.

“It’s not just that, sir,” I say, my voice quiet. “I’m afraid if I say it, if the world knows, that he’ll be taken away from me.”

“Maybe he will,” he replies without hesitation. “That part’s not up to you. I’m not talking about religion and higher powers, just truth. One of you will eventually die, and barring a plane crash or something similar, one will die before the other. That’s life, Smoky. We live and then we die, and the only uncertainty is how much time goes in between.”

I’ve heard these words before, of course. Inside my own head. I know the truth of them, and I can even feel it, a little. But my heart has its own legs, and it wants to run in the other direction.

Fearful hope, that’s my phrase for it. Up to now everything has been organic. Tommy and I came together naturally, windblown, like people who tripped and fell into each other’s arms; Bonnie came to me via Annie; but—and here is the linchpin of it all—I didn’t ask for any of it. Tommy chose me. Bonnie was left on my metaphorical doorstep. They were given; I didn’t take.

Marriage is different. It’s a choice, a stand, an act of defiance against a life of loneliness. I took that stand once without fear, but the water of life has run far and deep since then.

“What can I say, sir? I’m terrified all the good stuff is going to come crashing down again. I took it for granted once. It was an invulnerable life. Alexa would grow up and make me a grandmother. Matt and I would watch each other’s hair turn white. That all changed in an instant.”

“You want my advice?”

“Kind of.”

He laughs at that, something just south of a chuckle. It pulls a reluctant smile to my own lips. “My advice is to go down fighting. Life kicked your ass once, and almost for good. You survived; now you have a husband again and not just one child but the possibility of another. So shout it out. Be proud of it. Challenge fate and flip a bird toward heaven. Hold what you got tight, and tell the world it’s yours. Whatever you decide, stop shying away. It’s just not your style, and it’s boring as shit.”

I grin at my mentor, at my quasi-friend. “Pretty good pep talk, sir.”

“I have my moments. Now, I’m sure you’re wondering how this will go over with the director.”

“A little, sure. I don’t think a big, fat pregnant agent is what he had in mind for the poster.”

“Probably not. My advice is not to tell him, for now. He’s going to be out there selling his idea to the President and various budget committees. He’s going to use you as a key selling point. Hopefully, by the time he finds out you’re pregnant, it’ll all be too far along for him to switch horses.”

“Pretty devious.”

“That’s the world at this level. Better get used to it. Anything else you need to talk about?”

“I don’t think so.”

He waves me away, his voice gruff again, impatient again, not as an insult to me but as a way of showing that nothing’s changed between us, that I revealed what I revealed and am regarded as I was before. “Then get going. Catch this loony.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“My pleasure, Smoky. And that carries forward into the future, even when I’m not your boss anymore. Maybe especially then.”

I get on the elevator to head back to the office, feeling cleansed. The things inside me had built up pressure. I was unaware of just how much until I let fly with AD Jones, a lobbing of emotional hand grenades that he’d taken with assurance and aplomb.

Maybe we’ll be real friends when he’s not my boss.

I touch my belly. I like that idea.

I like it a lot.