“It’s Denise,” he said, “hang on.” He tapped the screen. “Hey honey, I’m just finishing up—”
And that’s when his face turned to ash. His mouth dropped open, then pressed into a tight, thin frown covering gritted teeth. My body went weak and my bowels turned to liquid. I checked on Erica but she hadn’t moved, other than closing her book and absently swiping through something on her phone. The small food court crowd looked no different than it had before. The two of us were safe. But we weren’t the ones I was concerned about.
“If you touch them, I swear to Christ—” Robert said, his voice coarse and straining to maintain control over the anger that covered the fear beneath, but the person on the other end of the phone cut him off again. He listened for a minute then looked at me. It wasn’t a kind look. “Yeah,” he said. “He’s here.”
I hung my head and clenched my fists. Robert put the phone on speaker and set it on the table between us, the volume loud enough for us to hear but not so loud as to attract unwanted attention.
“Hello, Rick,” the voice said. A male voice with a Chinese accent.
“Leave them alone,” I said, knowing how pathetic and futile it sounded. “They’ve got nothing to do with this.”
“You’re right, they don’t,” Ghost said.
I’d placed him on twenty-three contracts, including this one. Over the years, I’d spoken with him directly less and less, preferring to conduct our business mostly via text. Part of the reason was for security purposes. As Ghost’s reputation grew, so too did the number of people who wanted to track him down, for a variety of reasons. Secure chat rooms provided more cover than an open phone line. But that wasn’t the real reason we stopped talking.
Even when he was a nobody, a young gun for hire trying to carve out some space in a highly competitive industry, his voice was as calm and emotionless as it was now. No inflection. No tone. It landed on your ears flat, almost metallic. It was an experience I loathed, so I phased it out. Quite frankly, talking to him terrified me.
And now he had Denise.
And Maggie.
And Ethan.
He didn’t mention their names, but he didn’t have to. They were with him. I thought of Ethan, not as the pre-teen he’d become, but as the child that I’d left behind. The sweet little boy who was scared whenever we lost power in a storm and told me all about what Donald Duck did on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse every night while we brushed our teeth before bed.
I thought of Maggie, my Peanut, and how I used to lay on her floor when she was getting used to sleeping in her big-girl bed. We’d listen to a CD I made of lullaby songs to help her fall asleep, often times putting me out as well. I’d wake up at midnight with a stiff back but one content little angel, her arm curled around the bedraggled teddy bear Denise and I swore would follow her to college.
I thought of Denise.
“What do you want?” I asked.
“You and Robert, back here at the house within thirty minutes. No police or they die.”
“How do we know you haven’t done anything to them already?” Robert asked. Ghost didn’t answer. Instead, there was the sound of the phone being jostled, then Denise’s scream burst from the speakers, causing them to vibrate and hum. Even with the volume lowered, people around us looked to see where it came from. That was followed by two voices, Ethan and Maggie, crying out one word in unison:
“Mom!”
Then Ghost was back. “Thirty minutes,” he said. The line went dead. Robert picked up the phone, took it off speaker and pressed it to his ear.
“You motherfucker!” he shouted. His hand was shaking almost as much as his voice. But Ghost was gone.
He took the phone away from his ear and stared at it for a moment, then turned his gaze toward me. And I got the full force of all that rage covering all that fear. It needed to go somewhere, and I was the best target available. I also deserved it.
Before I could react, he grabbed me by the front of my shirt and lifted me out of the chair. My legs banged against the table, knocking over my half-full cup of Diet Coke. The lid popped off and it spilled over the edge into a puddle on the floor. One lonely ice cube drifted in the tiny Cola rivulet, never quite reaching the drop.
“Was he telling the truth?” he hissed into my face. “Did you hire him? Did you do this?” Our scene had attracted a small crowd, but I heard one distinct set of footsteps approaching from the Salad Works that I needed to keep away. They were more deliberate than the others, approaching not to observe but to intervene. I let go of Robert’s wrist with one hand and motioned behind me for Erica to hold back, hoping she saw it. Her footsteps slowed but didn’t stop.
“I recruited him,” I said, knowing he wouldn’t care about the semantics. “I didn’t hire him.”
“If they die, it’s because of you.”
“Then let’s make sure that doesn’t happen,” I said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
If they die, it’s because of you.
The words echoed in my head as I drove down Delaware Street, past the turn-of-the-century homes that Denise and I admired but could never afford. Past the courthouse and the little hole-in-the-wall delicatessen where lawyers congregated every weekday at noon.
If they die, it’s because of you.
He was right, of course. I did this.
By running away ten years ago, I thought I’d been protecting them. Like a fool, I thought I could continue on with the new life I’d created for myself while shielding them from all of its inherent dangers. Turns out, all I did was destroy our marriage and rob my children of their father for ten years. In the end, they were still in danger. Because of me.
If they die, it’s my fault.
I checked my rearview and saw the minivan’s headlights behind me. The glare obscured Erica’s face, but she was at the wheel. My ace in the hole. The only card I had to play. Robert was in front of me, and I couldn’t imagine the thoughts racing around his head.
Once he’d collected himself—to say he’d calmed down would be a stretch—I told him everything, as quickly as I could. Trish, the task force, my involvement, Ian, Erica and Joey. Everything. By the end, he wanted to shove his gun down my throat and pull the trigger until it clicked dry, but the rational part of him knew that wouldn’t solve anything. He needed us. That didn’t mean I wouldn’t wind up eating his gun at some point, just not until I’d outlived my usefulness. It wasn’t an ideal way to start a rescue mission, but nothing about any of this was ideal.
Things got even less ideal when I tried calling Joey but he didn’t answer. Maybe he’d turned his phone off, or was in the process of making his own move on Ghost, but that was wishful thinking. I added him to the growing list of bodies on my résumé. Joey Walls, who was a pig and a drug dealer and an attempted murderer, but who also had my back whenever I needed him. Who was excited that he got to do something good for a change.
So it was just the three of us, then. Our plan was a simple one, because simple was the only option we had. Robert and I would pull up to the house and walk inside. Erica would park at the end of the street and approach on foot, staying out of sight. She’d try to find a vantage point that offered her a clean shot. Once she had it, she’d take it. If she didn’t, she’d improvise. If Ghost was alone, our chances were slim but at least had a pulse. If he had just one other person keeping a lookout, however, we were fucked.
“Guess what Donald Duck did today, Dad?” Ethan said.
The memory was crystal clear, hi-def. I could hear his little voice as if it was sitting right next to me.
