Smolleck was holding a picture frame. Aubrey could make out Ethan’s grinning face, and her first reaction was to grab it out of Smolleck’s big hands. Then she reminded herself that the agent was just doing his job.
The picture was the “Tooth” photo she had taken two weeks before in Manhattan. Aubrey had taken Ethan to a matinee to see The Lion King. Afterward, they went to Ellen’s Stardust Diner where Ethan had lost a front tooth and was proudly displaying it in the photo. It was the first baby tooth he’d lost.
“Detective Gonzalez said you wanted to see me.”
Smolleck glanced over his shoulder, startled, but quickly regained his composure. His face settled into a mask, making it difficult for her to read him, and he put the picture frame on the desk. “Yes, thank you, Ms. Lynd. I’d like to talk to you for a few minutes. Would you mind getting the door?”
She closed it and sat down on a ladder-back chair at the side of the desk, catty-corner to Smolleck. The chair belonged in the kitchen and had probably been brought in here for the interviews. On the desk was an iPad, a yellow legal pad covered with writing, and a machine the size of a cell phone that was likely a recorder.
“You can call me Aubrey,” she said, hoping to dispel some of the formality in the room.
“Aubrey, then.” His voice retained its coolness. He scrolled through his iPad.
Although she’d seen him in the foyer when she’d first arrived, she now had an opportunity to study him, to decide whether he was as self-important as he had initially appeared. He was probably in his early thirties but seemed older because of his rigid manner, which she guessed came from a stint in the military. His reserve was very different from Jackson’s charming and easygoing veneer. And unlike Jackson, who went in for the “grunge” look, the FBI agent was immaculate, from his perfectly knotted tie to his buffed fingernails.
“Okay, then.” Smolleck picked up an expensive-looking pen and leaned back in her mother’s chair, which creaked under his weight. “I would appreciate your help in sorting through a few things.”
“Whatever I can do, if it will help find Ethan more quickly.”
“Great.” He scratched his eyebrow with the push button of the pen. That’s when she noticed the tiny indentation and missing hairs, and realized that at some point in his life he had pierced his eyebrow. “Would you mind if I tape this?” His index finger hovered over the small recorder.
“That’s fine,” she said.
He pressed a button. “Special Agent Tom Smolleck interviewing Aubrey Lynd, aunt of Ethan Lynd. There are no others present in the room.”
She felt surprisingly unsettled. Did the FBI believe the family was somehow involved with Ethan’s disappearance? Of course they would. The family was always suspected first. Dad had said they’d given everyone lie detector tests. They would probably give her one, too. Well, she had nothing to hide.
“Tell me about your relationship with your nephew,” Smolleck said.
“I live in Rhode Island, and Ethan lives with his parents in Manhattan, so I don’t get to see him as often as I’d like.”
“How often do you see him?”
“Several times a year.”
“So you’ve never been estranged from your brother?”
It was a funny word—estranged. She and Kevin seemed like strangers these days, but that was more than she cared to share with Smolleck. She had worked hard to keep communication between them open, but Kevin deserved credit for allowing her in. Perhaps, on some level, he’d never stopped seeing her as his kid sister and childhood ally. Or maybe he hoped that someday she’d be the life raft that would bring him and Mama back together.
“No,” she said. “We’ve never been estranged.”
“Unlike your mother,” Smolleck said.
“That’s right,” she said softly.
Smolleck twirled the pen between his fingers like a baton. “You see, I’m confused by the family dynamics. Maybe you can straighten me out.” He didn’t wait for her to respond. “I understand your mother and brother weren’t speaking to each other until recently. Can you tell me what caused their estrangement?”
He had probably heard Mama’s and Kevin and Kim’s versions of what had happened, so why ask about it again? Unless Smolleck was looking for inconsistencies for some reason?
“My parents decided to get divorced eight years ago, right around the time of Kevin’s wedding. My mother got sick and wasn’t able to attend.”
“Was she seriously ill?”
“Serious enough for her to be hospitalized.” She tried to keep her anger at her father from rising up. His timing for telling Mama he was leaving her for another woman, just days before Kevin’s wedding, had been inexcusable. Mama had been shattered and barely able to function.
“I’m not quite following,” Smolleck said. “Why would your brother be angry about her being ill?”
“He believed she had faked it.”
“Why would he have thought that?”
Her eyes roamed over the photos on the shelves. None of Kevin and Mama.
“Our father told Kevin she was putting on an act. That she wasn’t really sick, but was trying to get sympathy or attention by not going to the wedding.” Aubrey had been stunned when Dad transferred blame away from himself to Mama, and then behaved so damn righteous about it. His self-serving lies had turned Kevin completely against Mama and—whether or not that had been her father’s intention—had been the cruelest part of his betrayal.
“And your brother chose to believe your father?” Smolleck asked. “I’m surprised he didn’t cut your mom some slack.”
Aubrey felt uneasy, as though she were being disloyal to her mother. “It wasn’t just about the wedding,” she said. “My brother had issues with my mom that went back a while.”
“What kind of issues?”
She didn’t like the direction his questions were taking. It was as though he were considering that Mama was behind Ethan’s kidnapping. She needed to make sure he understood that was impossible.