“Don’t be so dismissive of your trauma. Your mom dying, and someone vanishing like your dad did, it’s like a death of sorts … and death makes time stop, Mike,” Kennett said. “You don’t really get to move on from that. That’s what the loved ones tell me, anyway, when they ask about their cases. They think they want justice, but really what they want is for time to start moving again. And it never does. Never. Even when the perp is behind bars, that eleven-year-old kid who had his brains blown out in a drive-by, he’s still eleven … and always will be.”
A faraway look seeped into Kennett’s eyes, and for the first time Michael felt a spurt of sympathy for the man. This detective had a hard job to do, one that came with a lot of baggage. But Michael had baggage too, and he doubted Kennett would have much sympathy for any of that. Still, he wanted to know the man’s angle, and frustratingly, he felt no closer to the truth.
“There’s been some death around here, a murder,” Kennett said, as if that wasn’t a jarring segue. “At least according to my cousin.”
“Yeah? I’m not much for the metro section of the news,” said Michael.
“Audrey Adler. That name mean anything to you, Mike?”
A million thoughts rushed through Michael’s head, but he couldn’t articulate any of them. Kennett’s hard stare made Michael shift uneasily on his barstool.
Fuck.
“Audrey,” Michael said, giving his dry lips a lick.
No tells.
“I know that name, sure. She worked with my wife at Dynamic Media. A real tragedy.”
“So you do watch the news.”
“It was a few weeks back, but yeah, that one hit close to home.”
Hopefully, Kennett doesn’t know how close, thought Michael.
“Like you said, a real tragedy,” Kennett replied.
A high-pitched whine rang in Michael’s ears.
“So did you know her personally, Mike? Audrey Adler?”
The sound in his ears became as loud as those bells hanging in the tower at Notre Dame. Michael swallowed hard. The air in the bar tasted stale and oppressive.
“Not personally, no.”
Kennett’s eyes darted over to Michael’s fingers, which he was drumming against the bar’s varnished surface. Michael noticed him looking before he pulled his hands to his lap.
“My cousin is a cop,” said Kennett. “He’s not on the case, but he knows about it. No good leads. No motive. Nobody wanted to do her any harm. Those are the hard cases, Mike. The ones without good answers.” Here, Kennett paused. “Not that the answer will be any good.”
“Well, I hope they catch whoever did it,” Michael said. His vision was obscured. He wasn’t seeing Kennett clearly anymore. Michael shivered, and it wasn’t because of the air-conditioning blasting overhead. He was puzzled. Had this detective put it all together?
Michael had certainly given the detective a few verbal and visual cues to indicate he wasn’t being entirely truthful, but didn’t think he’d given away anything big. It seemed both he and Kennett were holding their cards close to their chests. Michael’s phone buzzed on the bar. He picked it up. It could be about Natalie, so he had to look. The buzz was to let him know that he’d received a text message from his credit card company regarding potentially fraudulent activity on his account. Michael couldn’t take his eyes off the display screen.
“Something interesting, Mike?” Kennett asked.
“Might be Natalie,” he said, showing Kennett the text he just received, thinking there was no harm in showing the detective. As Kennett said back in New York, it’s good to team up when things take a surprising turn.
With a touch of his finger Michael launched the app for his credit card. After entering his username and password into the corresponding fields, Michael waited for the application to load. Kennett kept his focus on Michael the entire time. His eyes held all the warmth of a winter night. Michael read the message asking if he had authorized a charge, and if so to click a button to dismiss the alert. He showed Kennett.
“Fairfield Inn,” Kennett said, reading the alert. “Zanesville, Ohio. So, looks like your wife is in Ohio, Mike.”
Michael put two twenties on the bar. Time to go.
“Where to?” Kennett asked, though the answer had to be obvious to him.
“I’m going to Logan right now,” Michael said. “Catch a flight to Ohio. Find my wife.”
Kennett nodded while taking a leisurely sip of his beer.
“Let me go with you,” he said.
“What?”
“Yeah, I’ll swing by my cousin’s place, grab my stuff, and I’ll go with you.”
“Why would you do that?” Michael asked, feeling an anxious twist in his stomach.
“I took an oath, Mike, to be of service. And to be honest, you seem like a guy who could use some help.”
“I’ll do fine on my own,” Michael said, wishing his heartbeat wasn’t thundering. The way Kennett eyed him told Michael to be wary.
“Ohio is a big state, Mike. You got a lead, but that’s probably not going to be enough. I’ve got contacts in law enforcement I can get a hold of with the push of a few buttons. I think you’ll want my help.”
“Why would you inconvenience yourself like that?”
Kennett brushed the question aside with a wave of his hand like it was crazy to even ask.
“Hell, you’d be doing me a favor,” he said with a laugh. “My cousin can be a real pain in the ass.”
It occurred to Michael that there wasn’t any cousin from Medford, and Kennett had come here specifically because of Audrey Adler. If that were the case, not only was Kennett way out of his jurisdiction, Michael might also be way out of his depth.
Michael mulled it over. Maybe Kennett had an ulterior motive. Maybe this was exactly what it seemed to be—a setup, a trap of sorts, but it was also an offer that could be extremely helpful. As Kennett said, Ohio was a big state, and Michael had no experience with the business of tracking down missing persons. The stakes were too high.
“You can police out of your jurisdiction?” Michael asked.
“No, Mike, but I can vacation wherever I want,” Kennett said.
The dual message Michael read in Kennett’s second wink was easy enough to interpret.
I’m your best hope and your worst nightmare.
CHAPTER 24
NATALIE
BEFORE SHE DISAPPEARED
Somehow, Natalie made it back home in one piece. She didn’t have any real memory of making the trip from Audrey Adler’s condo to Lexington—she thought she may even have blacked out for a time—but before she knew it, she was pulling into her driveway. There was a light on in the kitchen, but all was dark upstairs, meaning the children were fast asleep. She noticed Michael’s car wasn’t in the driveway or garage. Fine. Natalie was done texting him anyway. She knew he’d be home at some point, and that thought now gripped her with fear.
She couldn’t imagine where he’d gone to wash the blood off his hands, change his clothes, get himself cleaned up. Perhaps he’d eventually made it to his office as he’d told her. Or maybe he cleaned up in Audrey’s condo, still near the woman whose life he’d taken.
Natalie pictured Michael drying himself off, then driving to the woods or to some lake to rid himself of the murder weapon. Maybe someone else committed the crime, but Natalie doubted it. Michael was her lover. His shirt was there, and his locker key, too. Something happened between the time he’d left in a rush and when Natalie finally got to Audrey’s place, something violent and unholy. To Natalie, he was now a man capable of anything.