“A lead?” He shook his head. “Forget that. I was rambling. This is all so stressful. I’m becoming paranoid about everything and everyone.” He glanced back at the door to the command past. “I’d better go. I want to make sure Star’s okay.”
He hurried away, leaving Aubrey with the same confused feeling she had at that soccer game when she’d gone running in the wrong direction, mixed up about who was on her team . . . and who wasn’t.
CHAPTER 25
Diana sat on the white sofa in Jonathan’s living room. Beyond the sliding glass doors, the sky was the same shade of blue as the suitcase she’d brought to college when she was a freshman. The suitcase she kept in her closet filled with mementos.
The past was everywhere, but she didn’t know if or how it might help her figure out who had taken Ethan so she could get him back.
She heard the clink of glassware and glanced over at Jonathan, who was hunched over the bar. They had come here straight from the luncheonette and hadn’t spoken on the short drive. She’d been thinking about Gertrude and how much Jonathan had said he loved her. Was it possible he blamed Diana for her death? Could he have kidnapped Ethan as an act of revenge? Vengeance was a powerful motive that led people to do unthinkable things, but this theory made sense only if Jonathan knew what really happened on April Fool.
“It’s just after noon,” Jonathan said, his soft voice breaking into her thoughts. “I think it’s acceptable to start drinking.” He handed her a snifter, then sat down beside her with his own.
She took a swallow of brandy. “After you and Gertrude had the fight, did you ever see each other again?”
“You still want to talk about her?” He sounded exasperated.
“Yes.”
He shook his head and released a puff of air. “Okay. We’ll talk about Gertrude.” He set his brandy down on the coffee table and picked up the crimson paperweight that encased a butterfly.
Gertrude had been a butterfly. Free and beautiful. But there had always been something hard surrounding her. Diana wondered if that was the person Jonathan had known, or whether he had seen a different side of her.
“We split up a week or so before the April Fool explosion,” he said. “I never saw her again.” He cradled the paperweight in his hands. “I keep thinking back to our last fight. It was just after the news came out that the army was bringing charges against several officers involved with the My Lai Massacre.” He carefully set the paperweight back down on the coffee table. “Gertrude was enraged that there hadn’t been a full-blown investigation. She said the government was covering up the truth, that the slaughter of innocent villagers in My Lai wasn’t an isolated incident but rather the norm. She swore she would avenge them somehow.”
Diana remembered Gertrude’s fury, too. Then, a few days before April Fool, something changed. Her roommate seemed calmer—happy, even.
Gertrude’s lighter mood would have been right around when Jonathan said he and Gertrude had had their big fight. So why would she have been happy?
A buried memory came to her. Gertrude dancing around the dorm room in a brightly colored scarf, singing, La cucaracha, la cucaracha. Then she laughed. I think I’ll brush up on my Spanish, Pollyanna. Might come in handy.
As though she was planning to go away. Was she? With whom? Jonathan, Jeffrey Schwartz, or with someone else?
A couple of days later, Gertrude was dead.
Diana drank the rest of the brandy and put her glass down too hard on the table. The sudden sound made Jonathan jump.
“How did you feel when you learned Gertrude had died in the explosion?” Diana asked.
His reddish-gray eyebrows came together. “I was devastated, of course. Why are you asking?”
“Were you angry?”
“Angry?” He looked genuinely perplexed. “Well, after I got over my grief, I was angry with her, of course. Angry that she’d put herself in that situation.”
“And you didn’t blame Stormdrain?”
“No more than I blamed the government or the university for their pigheaded policies.” He rubbed his cheek. “What is it, Diana? I don’t understand where you’re going with these questions.”
She wasn’t sure where she was going, either. Jonathan didn’t seem to know anything about her own connection with Stormdrain, which meant it was unlikely he had anything to do with Ethan’s kidnapping.
But there was still Jeffrey. If he knew the truth about April Fool and blamed her for Gertrude’s death, might he have been further enraged by Diana’s relationship with Jonathan, the man who had competed with Jeffrey for Gertrude’s attention forty-five years ago?
Could Jeffrey have kidnapped Ethan and presented the ultimatum, which would both punish Diana and eliminate his former adversary? Or had Gertrude had other secret lovers and confidants? The truth was, Diana didn’t know who was behind the death demand. She only knew she had to do something to get Ethan back.
“Diana?” Jonathan’s tone was gentle.
She didn’t like the way he was studying her, like she was a mental patient.
He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it.
“What?” she asked.
He shook his head, then released a heavy sigh. “Please don’t get angry, but I have to say this. You must tell the FBI about the note. It’s the only reasonable thing to do.”
“No.”
“Diana, the FBI is trained to handle this kind of situation.”
“I said no.” Her voice came out louder than she’d intended. Jonathan looked like she’d slapped him. “I’m sorry, but I won’t put Ethan at risk.”
She stared out at the railing, focusing on one point to keep the room from spinning. She felt trapped. Calm down. Think. There might be no connection between Jonathan, Jeffrey, or someone else from those days, and the ultimatum. It was her own guilt that had her believing April Fool was involved. What if she were wrong, and there was a much simpler solution? A solution where no one had to die.
She turned back to her fiancé. “There are things we can try before turning this over to the FBI.”