The Girl With No Name

Chapter Sixty-Two

SUNDAY

In the back of the Denton police cruiser that Josie had commandeered, Kim Conway shifted in her seat. Josie heard the clink of her handcuffs and the rustle of her jumpsuit. Glancing in the rearview mirror, Josie could see her craning her neck to get a good look at the patch over her left breast where her inmate number was stitched. “Are you sure this thing is going to work? It’s the smallest microphone I’ve ever seen.”

Josie turned back to the road. “It works. The sheriff’s guys tested it before we left. Don’t mess with it, it’s expensive.”

“Where did you even get it?”

“We borrowed it from the FBI. I’ve still got a contact there. Apparently, it’s the best small wireless communication system on the market. Rowland’s own company developed it.”

“Are you serious?”

“Ironic, isn’t it?”

Both Kim and Josie had been fitted with wireless microphones that could fit on a pencil eraser. Kim’s had been sewn in beneath her inmate number patch and Josie’s was on the lapel of her jacket. Josie also had a small, clear receiver in her right ear, covered well by her hair, that allowed her to hear other members of the team. Noah was at a mobile command post, listening and recording their every move so he could give directions to the teams on the ground at the three meeting sites Josie had chosen. She just hoped she was right about where Rowland would choose to intercept them.

“We’re coming up on Red Hawk Lookout,” Josie said, more for the benefit of the teams than for Kim. “It’s around the next bend.”

Noah’s voice came back in her ear. “We’ve got eyes on,” he said. “He’s already there.”

As she took the curve in the mountain road slowly, the lookout came into view. Josie saw Rowland’s Mercedes-Benz and let out a long breath of relief. The butterflies in her stomach took flight as she saw Rowland leaning against the driver’s side door. The hood of the car was propped open. To anyone passing by, he would look like a man whose car had broken down. Josie panned the area but didn’t see anyone with him. She pulled up behind his car and got out. His hair blew in the wind, and he took his sunglasses off and smiled tightly. As Josie got closer, she could see how stiffly he held himself. Gone was his signature poise; he was nervous, she realized. Because his muscle was missing? she wondered. Or because he had already disposed of Luke and the baby?

“Where are they?” Josie asked.

“Did you bring Miss Conway?”

“She’s in the car. Where are Luke and Victor?”

Rowland didn’t respond. Shit. She needed him talking. “You have them?” she asked, trying to get a verbal response. Nothing. Instead, he said, “Can I speak with Miss Conway first?”

Josie went back to the car and got Kim out. Although she didn’t entirely trust Kim, she didn’t want her hampered by handcuffs in case things went to hell, so she took them off. Grabbing her upper arm, Josie pulled Kim over toward Rowland. He extended a hand toward Kim. “I’m Peter Rowland,” he said as she shook it.

“So I’m told,” Kim said, shooting a sideways look at Josie. “What is it that you want from me?”

Rowland moved to the front of his car and closed the hood. He opened the passenger’s side door. “I’m hopeful we can discuss that in private.”

“No,” Josie said. “That wasn’t the deal. You wanted a meeting, here she is. Whatever you need to discuss with her, do it here.”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Chief. It’s a personal matter.”

“I don’t have any personal business with you,” Kim said. “I don’t even know you.”

“She’s a prisoner in police custody,” Josie insisted. “I can’t just let you take her.”

This time, Rowland’s smile looked almost menacing and, for the first time, Josie could see a definite resemblance between him and Eric Dunn. Kim must have seen it too because she shrunk away from him, pressing herself against Josie’s side. “Did you really think this was just a meeting, Chief? This is a trade. That means I take her with me. I’m sure you’ll think of something to tell your colleagues.”

Josie didn’t bother to address the absurdity of what he was asking. Instead she said, “If this is a trade, then where are Victor and Luke?”

“You’ll have them once I take Miss Conway, and once I know that Trinity Payne has been convinced to keep quiet about what she’s found.”

Noah’s voice sounded in her ear. “That’s enough for a warrant. I’m sending a team over to Rowland’s house now to search for them. Stand by.”

“Well, we have a problem then, don’t we?” Josie said to Rowland, trying to stay focused. “Because a trade isn’t a trade if I get nothing in return for Kim, and I need time to talk to Trinity Payne. She found out a lot more, and it’s going to be hard to convince her to walk away from a story this big.”

A look of uncertainty flickered across his face. “What are you talking about?”

“She knows about all of your donor children and how they were murdered. She wants to air the story. It’s going to take a lot for me to convince her not to, and I’m not sure I should bother if you’re not going to hold up your end of the bargain.”

“But we’re already here. You said yourself it was extremely difficult to get Ms. Conway out of custody. There’s no sense in your taking her back now,” he said. He beckoned Kim toward him. “Come, Miss Conway, we have much to discuss.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Kim said. “Chief Quinn is right. A trade is a trade. Why would I go anywhere with you when I already know you’re a liar?”

“Because the alternative is prison, isn’t it?”

“At least in prison I’ll be alive,” Kim said pointedly. “Leonard Nance—Leo—he worked for you, didn’t he? You think I don’t know what you hired him for? I’ve been around men like you before. I know how you operate.”

“Men like me? Are you comparing me to Eric Dunn? I’m nothing like him,” Rowland insisted.

“Sure you’re not. Let’s just forget about this. I’m not going with you if you’re not going to hand over the baby and Luke to the chief.”

Rowland motioned toward the open car door. “Fine, the chief can come too. I’ll take you both to Luke and the baby.”

Josie stared at him skeptically. “I’ll take Miss Conway and we’ll follow you.”

“I’m afraid I can’t agree to that,” Rowland said. “Look.” He took off his suit jacket and turned in front of them. “I’m not armed. I’m sure that you are though—right, Chief? You’ve got the advantage. You both come in my car. I’ll take you to Luke and the baby.”

“Tell me where they are,” Josie said. “I can call and have a team sent there while we wait.”

“I’d rather not involve your team,” Rowland said. “Please, let me take you to them. Then I’ll take Miss Conway, you can talk to Trinity, and we can put this matter to rest.”

“Hey, did you even hear me? What if I don’t want to be part of this trade?” Kim asked, just as Josie had instructed her. She didn’t want Kim to seem too eager. “I’m not going anywhere with you.” To Josie she said, “Take me back to the jail.”

She turned and walked back toward the cruiser. Rowland said, “You’re my daughter.”

Kim froze, then turned slowly and stared at him. “What?” she said.

Josie said, “She wasn’t on the donor list. She’s not a donor baby.”

“No,” Rowland said. “She’s not a donor baby. But she is my child.” He looked at Kim. “Your mother and I had an affair when we were very young. We met in New York and bonded over the fact that we had both come from Denton. Things progressed between us, but she loved her husband and wanted to make a go of it with him. I didn’t find out until much later that she had had a baby—you.”

“That’s not—that’s impossible,” Kim blurted.

“No, not impossible,” Rowland said. “I had deep feelings for Zora.”

At the mention of her mother’s name, Kim’s eyes widened. “When I found out you might be mine, I had just started having some success in my business. I went to her. I wanted to get married and have a life together, but she refused. Her husband was dead by then, but she couldn’t move on. She refused to give anyone in Denton the satisfaction of knowing they’d been right about her—that she had gone off and gotten pregnant by another man and tried to pass the baby off as her husband’s. She clung to her secrets, my dear.”

Revulsion stretched across Kim’s face. “But Eric… the chief told me that he was your son as well.”

Rowland grimaced. “I know. I’m sorry. That was an unfortunate coincidence.”

Kim leaned over. “I’m going to be sick.”

“I’m so sorry, my dear. Truly I am. But you couldn’t have known.”

“You’re lying,” Kim spat.

“No, I’m not. Kim, you are the only true heir to my fortune.”

“You had all your donor children killed,” Josie said. “Why should we believe that your intentions toward Kim—assuming she really is your daughter—are good?”

“Because my donor children were not good people,” Rowland blurted out.

“What?” Kim and Josie said in unison.

Josie hoped to God they were getting this on the wireless comm. As if reading her mind, Noah’s voice crackled through. “We’re hearing this. Keep going.”

“What do you mean?” Josie coaxed.

Rowland sighed. “My donor children. They were… horrible, terrible people. Aaron King? That’s when I first knew something was wrong. I hadn’t given much thought to what happened to my donation until he was caught, and I saw footage of him on the national news going back and forth from court. He looked just like me. In fact, I got calls all day long from friends and work colleagues joking about the resemblance. ‘Hey, Peter, did you know you had a serial-killer son in Pennsylvania.’ It was all a big joke, except it wasn’t. I knew he actually might be my son. So I had someone hack into the sperm bank records and then the records of various fertility clinics. I tracked down one after another to find that they were all bad, bad people. You’ve seen the news—you’ve probably heard it directly from Trinity. King is believed to be responsible for over thirty deaths in Pennsylvania.”

Josie pointed a finger in his direction. “Are you telling me that you tracked down your donor children and had them all killed because they’re bad people?”

“Not just bad people,” Rowland explained. “Criminals. Murderers. Thieves. Liars. I had to set things straight.”

Josie barely believed what she was hearing. “Set things straight? By killing them all?”

“It was my fault they were even in existence. Without my sperm donation, none of them would be here. Look at the havoc Dunn and King alone have wreaked on so many innocent people. I had a son in Newark who worked at a community center. He had charges pending against him for physically abusing one of the children in his care. They had it on video. There was a boy in Philadelphia who was charged with armed robbery. A girl in Pennsylvania who routinely started fires and had charges pending for arson. She was not a good person and the path she was on… she wasn’t going to reform. Don’t you see, none of them reform. It’s in their DNA.”

“If it’s in the DNA, why should we believe that you won’t try to kill Kim?”

Kim stared at him, waiting for the answer. He looked from Josie to Kim and back again. He spread his hands in a pleading gesture. “She wasn’t a donor child. She was born out of love. The right way. I loved her mother. Just like I loved my Polly’s mother. Don’t you see, she’s like my Polly. Innocent. They are pure. Please. Kim is all I have left. That bastard took my Polly. Kim, please. You’re all there is of my legacy. You’re all that’s left that’s good.”

Josie wished she could tell him that Kim wasn’t pure at all. She would claim self-defense, but she still had no issues pulling the trigger. She also lied as easily as she breathed. But that wasn’t important. They were getting what they needed from him to put him away.

“You knew about me my entire life,” Kim said. “And you didn’t care about contacting me until all your other kids were dead? Until your precious Polly was gone?”

“I’m sorry, but your mother made me promise. You can ask her. She made me swear that I would never approach you.”

“Why did you have that Leo guy tell me you were interested in what I knew about the building collapse?”

“He thought it was the only way you would feel safe going with him,” Rowland explained. “Kimberly, please, I’m sorry for all the subterfuge, but we’re here now. Please come with me.”

Kim stood up straight, her dry heaves having subsided. She gave Rowland a calculating stare—and it was in that expression that Josie could see the resemblance between the two. “Fine,” she relented. “I’ll go with you, but you have to tell the chief where Luke and the baby are.”

“Okay,” Rowland replied.

“And we will call my mother to confirm all this,” Kim added.

“Of course.”

“And I want it out in the public. I’m your heir. You’re going to put me in your will and everything.”

“Done,” Rowland said.

“What is the official story?” Josie asked. “If I let you take her from my custody?”

“As I suggested, she got so ill that you pulled over. She overpowered you and ran away. I found her wandering around in the woods and turned her back in. I’ll arrange for her to have the best lawyer money can buy. She won’t spend any time in prison.”

At this, Kim nodded.

Noah’s voice came through again in Josie’s ear. “Rowland’s house is clear. No sign of Luke or the baby.”

“Where are they?” Josie asked for what felt like the hundredth time.

Rowland gestured toward the open door to his Mercedes once more and, with a look at Josie, Kim walked over and folded herself inside. Josie knew they wouldn’t get very far. The moment they pulled away, one of her teams would be in pursuit.

“Behind my home, in the woods, is a cottage. You can’t get there by car but there is a walking path. It’s a half mile back. They’re there.”

Noah’s voice crackled. “We’re on it.”

“Once I have eyes on them,” Josie told Rowland, “I will speak with Trinity. Maybe I can convince her that a better story is you being reunited with your long-lost daughter.”

“This town needs some good news,” Rowland agreed. “Thank you, Chief.”

“See you soon,” Josie said. She watched them pull away.

Noah said, “We’ve got eyes on Rowland and Conway. We’re in pursuit. Stand by.”

“What about the cottage?” Josie said, feeling a little strange talking into the open air.

“The team is almost there.”

Josie got into her car. As she turned the keys in the ignition, her hands shook. She had to remind herself to breathe. She was trying to figure out how long it would take for her to get to Rowland’s house when Noah’s voice came back. “Boss, they’re not here. The cottage is empty. Team one is already in pursuit of Rowland.”

Josie gunned her engine. “I’m going after him,” she said.