“No, I’m not.” He looked up and met Olivia’s eyes briefly. His focus shifted to the large expanse of the city visible behind her, the office and everything in it disappearing.
Helplessness washed over him as he stared at the large buildings and multitude of maze-like streets. His daughter could be anywhere, and he didn’t even have so much as a small lead as to her whereabouts. He had scratched out a list of about a dozen people who he believed had the motive, means, and wherewithal to carry out such a crime, digging into their records to see if anything popped up. He had Simpson looking into whether he could track where Martin’s log in to the system came from last night, but it would take some time. Other than that, he was at the mercy of Agent Moretti and the CARD team’s investigation. If Moretti had made any progress, he wasn’t sharing the information with Alexander. Based on their conversation earlier in the day, he figured he was probably the last person Moretti would call.
“Can you at least turn the ringer off then?” Olivia huffed. “It’s driving me crazy.”
Reaching for the phone on his desk, he slid the ringer off, silence falling over the room once more.
“Thank you.” She let out a breath, crossing her arms over her stomach. She rubbed her biceps, warming herself, despite the fact his office felt like a sauna. Roaming the large space, she stopped and peered at framed photos hanging on the wall of Alexander and various diplomats as if she had never seen them before. It was clear she was trying to think of anything other than their missing daughter. Alexander doubted that was possible.
Sighing, he returned his tired eyes to the file in front of him, scanning the dossier of a former drug lord the DEA had contracted his company to track down and dispose of by any means necessary. A local liaison, who ended up being dirty, gave the drug lord a heads-up, but not before Alexander’s agents destroyed all his cocaine processing houses and coca plants. Millions and millions of dollars of product had been incinerated in the Colombian night air. The man was eventually put on trial and imprisoned, but had recently been granted parole, the circumstances behind it still vague. Even so, he was no more or less capable of pulling this off than every other person on Alexander’s list of suspects. Sure, he had the motive and means to do this, particularly because kidnapping seemed to be this cartel’s specialty, but it didn’t fit. Alexander’s gut told him he didn’t do it. Granted, he had lost what most people would consider a small fortune, but he had taken a page out of Pablo Escobar’s playbook and had buried the equivalent of the operating budget of a small country all over the place. Losing a hundred million dollars was just a drop in the bucket to this guy.
“What’s all this?” Olivia interrupted.
“What’s all what?” Alexander replied, not even looking up. He couldn’t afford to waste a second of time.
“All these papers,” she answered in an even tone, masking any trepidation or unease she felt about Melanie’s disappearance.
Alexander raised his head to see her flipping through the folder containing all the information he had been going through yesterday.
“Background checks on Mischa,” he answered through the pang of guilt in his chest.
“You never did invite her to Christmas, did you?” Olivia inquired in a non-accusatory tone, but he couldn’t help but hear the unspoken allegation in her voice.
“I meant to, but…”
“I know. Life got busy.” She cast her eyes back to the papers, the rustling the only sound in the too-quiet room. “One holiday goes by. Then another. Then it’s been a year. At that point, it’ll just seem strange to call out of the blue. I’m guilty of it, too.” Her voice grew soft as she ran her fingers across the photo of Mischa, then Rayne. “Not anymore, though,” she added in a whisper.
“Not anymore,” Alexander repeated, then hesitated, feeling as if he needed to be completely honest with his wife regarding the past twenty-four hours. “Olivia…,” he began.
“Yes?” She looked up.
“You remember Landon’s fiancée, right?”
“The redhead. Rayne. This woman, correct?” She held up the photo, pointing to a beautiful, exuberant woman who appeared to not have a care in the world.
He paused briefly as he stared into those haunting lilac eyes. “I saw her yesterday.”
Olivia scrunched her eyebrows. “Where?”
“Here,” he answered. “Except I didn’t realize it. I walked right past her as I headed into the building, but I didn’t recognize her.” He closed his eyes, warding off the guilt eating away at him. Lately, he had been carrying too much responsibility on his shoulders for what happened to Landon, and now Mischa. Was it his fault Rayne had spiraled downward, too? “She’s thin, pale, almost looks like she came from a homeless shelter, which would probably be a step up from the squalor she now lives in.”
“You’ve been to her house?” Olivia stepped toward him, glued to his every word.
Alexander nodded slightly. “When I finally realized who she was, I tracked down her address to the slums of Dorchester. As if losing her fiancé wasn’t bad enough, she lost everything else, too.” Shaking his head, he let out a slow breath. He closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. “When did I become like this?” He looked at Olivia, pain in his eyes. “When did I become my father? How did I let that happen?”
“What do you mean, Alex?” She walked toward him. “Where is this coming from?”
“Just something I’ve been thinking about the past few days,” he admitted with a sigh. He rubbed his temples, then met her eyes. “Until Dave called me down to that fishing warehouse in Southie, it had been months since I’d even thought of Landon or Mischa…or Rayne.”
“You’re extremely busy, Alex,” Olivia offered in sympathy.
He let out a humorless laugh. “That’s the same thing my mother used to tell me when I asked why Dad was never home. He let his work consume him. Looking at everything that’s happened the past few days, all I can think is I’ve done the same thing. If I had been more involved, maybe Mischa would still be alive and Rayne wouldn’t be living—”
“You can’t beat yourself up over this.” Olivia grabbed his hands, kneeling in front of him. “You are not your father. Do you work a lot? Yes, but I know it’s because you care about what you do. You work hard so all your employees can provide for their families.”
“But I couldn’t even take the time to make sure Landon’s fiancée was provided for?” He raised his eyebrows.
“Alex, you did everything you could to make sure she’d be okay. You said so yourself. For weeks after the funeral, she wouldn’t allow you in to even check on her.”
“I could have pushed harder. I could have forced her to let me in. I guess I thought since I paid all that money for the bakery, she’d be okay.”