The Girl Who Disappeared Twice

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Ashley pulled Edward aside the instant it was feasible without raising any red flags.

“I have to talk to you,” she said in a low, urgent tone.

“Not now,” Edward replied, teeth clenched. “Not after that interrogation.”

“It might throw fuel on the fire of what lies ahead,” Ashley returned, her eyes wide and frightened. “Please, Edward. Give me a minute.”

Edward glanced around. Hope was talking with her mother. Sidney was working with the sketch artist. And Casey Woods was in the middle of a heated debate with Agent Hutchinson.

With a jerk of his head, Edward signaled for Ashley to follow him into the kitchen.

“What is it?” he demanded. “This is definitely not the time.”

“Casey Woods knows about us,” Ashley replied without preliminaries.

“What the hell do you mean she knows about us? That’s impossible. You must have misunderstood.”

“Hardly. She cornered me early today. First, she pressured me to tell her what was going on to make your wife so jumpy. She sensed that I knew something. When I refused to share what I knew, she not-so-subtly reassured me that she didn’t plan on telling Judge Willis that you and I are sleeping together-but that she’d really appreciate if I reconsidered sharing what I knew about Judge Willis’s jittery state. A sort of one hand washes the other. Does that sound to you like I misunderstood?”

“Dammit.” Edward slammed his fist on the counter. “How did she find out?”

“I don’t know. The same way she finds out everything. Does ‘how’ matter? The important thing is she wasn’t fishing. She was stating a fact. Denying it would have been stupid.”

“So you admitted it?” Edward had clearly reached the end of his rope today. “For God’s sake, Ashley, first you keep the ransom call from me, and now you give Casey Woods confirmation that we’re having an affair. Why don’t you just tell her we’re taking Krissy and all my undeclared cash and flying off to the Cayman Islands?”

“Because we’re not.”

“You and I know that. But I’m under a microscope. The FBI might not think I abducted my own daughter, but they do think I’m a criminal. Any way I turn, I’m screwed. You’re in better shape. Ms. Woods thinks you’re supernanny, and, undoubtedly, an innocent young woman who’s been sucked in by a rich, successful older man.”

“Isn’t that exactly what I am?” Ashley wet her lips with the tip of her tongue, visibly reticent about what she was about to say. “And isn’t that exactly what you are? Edward, I realize you don’t share your business dealings with me, but I’m not stupid. I know the kind of clients you represent. Plus, I know that Judge Willis got her hands on a quarter of a million dollars in cash in record time and without tipping off anyone-not the banks or the authorities. To me, that says there’s cash lying around here. Lots of cash.” She waved away Edward’s reply. “I don’t care about that, and I don’t want to discuss it. I just want to give you a heads-up about Casey Woods. If it makes you feel any better, she promised to keep her mouth shut about our secret, not just to your wife, but to the authorities.”

“How comforting.” Sarcasm dripped from Edward’s tone. “As if I trust her. And, even if she does keep quiet, the FBI’s going to be watching me like a hawk. Which reminds me, since the ransom call came in on your cell, they’ll be monitoring it. I’ll have to buy you a throwaway for our conversations.”

A long, painful pause. “That won’t be necessary.”

“Meaning?”

“Edward, you know how much I love you. Just like I know that I’m just a romantic distraction for you. So this is going to hurt me a lot more than it hurts you. But I can’t do this anymore. Not to Judge Willis. And not in light of what’s going on. I’m sick with worry over Krissy, and sick with guilt that Casey Woods has to waste her time on us when the real kidnappers are still out there.”

Edward looked stupefied. “You’re breaking things off?”

“I have to. I can’t stop loving you. But I can start living with myself again.”

“Fine,” Edward snapped, rubbing the back of his neck. “Whatever you want. Frankly, this is an absurd conversation to be having right now. My daughter’s out there somewhere. I have no idea if I’ll ever see her alive again. So whether or not we keep sleeping together is low on my list. So if you’ve said everything you have to say, I’m going back into my living room to see if that son-of-a-bitch father that old man dragged in here can identify Krissy’s kidnappers.”

Casey was still having it out with Hutch when Peg Harrington called the house to say that they’d brought Joe Deale into the North Castle Police Department for questioning.

Everyone mobilized ASAP. Hope and Edward grabbed their coats. The remaining members of the task force did the same, including those with Sidney Akerman. The sketch artist was already packing up to move to the police precinct. Sidney was going with him. So was Patrick, who wasn’t about to miss one moment of this opportunity of hearing what Deale had to say.

Casey spoke to Peg on speakerphone. “I want to sit in on this,” she requested. “I think that’s fair, since I gave you the information.”

“Fine. You can sit in-on the other side of the glass,” Peg replied. “The police want Claire Hedgleigh to do the same. You can give us your expert opinions after my agents and I have interviewed him.”

“Fair enough.”

Once everyone dispersed, the only people remaining in the house were Special Agent Jack McHale, who was monitoring the phone, Vera Akerman, who’d gone up to her room to rest, and Ashley Lawrence, who was weeping silently in the kitchen.

Joe Deale was ready to wet his pants by the time the FBI agents walked into the interrogation room two hours later. He’d had plenty of time to think. And he had plenty to hide. No matter how he played this, he was screwed. If he spilled his guts, he’d go to jail. And, if he kept his mouth shut, there was no way the mob would believe he hadn’t talked. So the options were being locked up or being killed.

Locked up seemed like the lesser of two evils.

“Hello, Joe,” Peg Harrington said as she and Ken Barkley finally entered the interrogation room, armed with documents, and took their seats across from him at the table. The North Castle Police Department’s building was small, since crime there was low. And the interrogation room was bare bones.

“Why am I here?” Joe demanded. “I was paving a bridge. Last I heard, that wasn’t illegal.”

“No, but working for organized crime is.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you do,” Ken said. “You’ve done all kinds of ugly little deeds for your mob friends at Bennato. Shakedowns, violent reminders of monies owed, drug deals-I could go on and on.”

Sweat broke out on Joe’s forehead. “You’ve got no proof.”

“Proof is a relative thing,” Ken replied. “For instance, we’ve got a couple of dealers who’d be delighted to identify you as their heroin connection in exchange for a lighter sentence. And one of my associates says he dug up a witness who saw you hanging around a stolen car that ultimately ended up at a Mafia-affiliated chop shop.”

“Their word against mine. Those guys would trade their mothers for a lighter sentence.”

“True.” Peg leaned forward and took over. “But the stacks of cash taped to the underside of your chest of drawers aren’t up for debate. They’re very real, and very incriminating for a man who makes barely more than minimum wage.”

“You were in my house?” Joe gripped the edge of the table, trying to look outraged. But his hands were shaking. “That’s illegal. It’s breaking and entering.”

“Not with a search warrant, it isn’t. The North Castle police got one more than an hour ago. Given the circumstances, the warrant was issued faster than you can say La Cosa Nostra. We’ve got more than enough to hold you.”

“The money is Claudia’s. She asked me to keep it for her.”

“Nice try.” Peg folded her arms across her breasts. “Let’s stop playing games, Mr. Deale. You can sit here all night while we compile the evidence we need to charge you. You can walk out of here and take your chances on the streets. Or you can talk to us now. Because, quite frankly, your two-bit dealings with the mob are a blip on our radar. This, however, is a whole lot more…”

Peg reached for the table, flipping the architectural plans for Krissy’s school faceup. She shoved them across the table and practically into Joe Deale’s face. “What are you doing with this?”

Joe blinked. “It was a job I worked on.”

“For which you have the plans?”

“I was responsible for providing the right number of containers of tar. So the foreman made me a copy of the plans with dimensions, and I brought them to our supplier. I forgot I even had them.”

“So if we questioned your foreman, he’d tell us the same story?”

“If he remembers me being there, yeah. What’s so important about these plans?” Joe stared at the designs, and realization erupted across his face. “This is that school Judge Willis’s little girl was kidnapped from. You still think I had something to do with that?”

“You’ve got to admit, it looks pretty damning. The diagrams, the cash, the connections.”

“Why would Bennato want to kidnap a kid?”

“I tell you what. Why don’t we send you back out there to ask him?”

Joe went sheet-white. “Please. Don’t do that. I’ll be dead by tonight.”

“Probably. Which makes jail a much safer choice. Tell us where Krissy Willis is, and we’ll put a guard outside your cell.”

“I don’t know!” Joe hollered. “I didn’t take that kid! Neither did Claudia. She resented the hell out of Judge Willis for firing her. But she’d never hurt a child. And even if I did do all the other things you just said-which I’m not admitting I did-I never touched a kid. Never. I swear it!”

“He’s telling the truth,” Casey murmured on the opposite side of the glass. “His entire body language is screaming it. Direct eye contact. Offensive posture. Whole body aligned with his words. He’s not clever enough to fake all that.”

“I agree.” Claire was eyeing Joe intently. “I’m picking up a fair amount of negative energy, so my guess is that the FBI is right about his ties to the mob. But I’m not sensing any real evil. He’s not a sociopath. And he didn’t kidnap Krissy.”

“Then who did?” Casey ran her fingers through her hair in frustration. “I feel like we’re speeding down streets that look promising, but coming up against one dead end after another. We know the main road is close by, but we just can’t reach it. The past and the present are related. I know it-I just can’t get at how.”

Claire angled her head slowly until she faced Casey. “I don’t know what it means, or if it’s related to anything you just said. But I had the oddest dream the other night. It was about Krissy’s stuffed panda.”

The house is always packed with FBI agents, and the driveway is packed with cars.

Now there’s only one.

There’s never going to be a better time for what I have to do.

Another assignment I can’t refuse. It’s for Krissy. It’s necessary to fill the void until the feelings alone are enough.

Selfishly, it’s for me, as well. I’m afraid of the fate I’ll suffer if I change my mind and turn away.

Check the driveway one more time. Still just the one. It belongs to the agent inside monitoring the phones. Everyone else has left, except for the old woman and the nanny. Both their bedroom lights are off, which means they’ve gone to bed.

I’m taking a huge risk, I know. But to see Krissy’s face light up-it’ll be worth it. She’s still so traumatized.

This close, even through the window, I can hear snippets of the agent’s conversation. It sounds pretty heated. Probably an argument with his superior, or a wife. Good. It’s the perfect distraction.

Back door. There’s nothing but wooded acreage back there, and nothing but a short hall to the backstairs inside. I can do this. I have to do this.

My hands have to stop shaking. Stop it. Stop it.

Key in the lock. A quiet click. No burglar alarm screaming through the halls. Good. Although I came prepared.

The agent’s still on the phone, he sounds more intense. Nonetheless, my time is limited.

Silently. Carefully. One carpeted step up at a time.

Safe. And I know just where to find what I came for. Krissy talks about it all the time. It makes her feel less scared. But she hurts so for Oreo.

This will fix the problem.

Top shelf beside her bed. Nestled in a makeshift nest of straw. Ruby the Robin and her nest. Oreo’s best friend.

Step one complete.

Down the hall to the master bedroom suite. The makeup table. In a simple, classy bottle. Joy. A lovely perfume, a memorable scent.

Now, something else. It will add to the mirage.

The jewelry box-on the dresser. The heart-shaped locket. Inside, a picture of Krissy on one side, and a picture of the woman who’d been her mother on the other. Nothing could be more perfect.

Everything back in place. Nothing looks disturbed.

Ashley was sure she’d heard a noise. A creaking sound. Footsteps? She was probably imagining things, but, after what had happened to Krissy, she wasn’t in the mood of letting anything slide.

She belted her bathrobe and left her room. First, she poked her nose into Krissy’s room, scanned the area. All was silent, dark and deserted. She flicked on the light. Nobody was there. She shut the door behind her, and headed down the hall, glancing into each upstairs guest room and study. Nothing. Mrs. Akerman’s door was shut. Ashley pressed her ear to the door. Silent. And no light shone from underneath. Not a surprise, given that the poor woman had retired hours ago.

Completing her tour, Ashley headed down to the other end of the hall and the master bedroom suite.

The door was ajar, the way Judge Willis often left it. Pushing it open, she stepped inside and glanced around.

There was no warning, nor any chance to turn around.

A heavy object crashed down on her head, sending blinding pain vibrating through her skull, and knocking her to the ground.

She made a faint moaning sound and lost consciousness.