And Then There Was One (8 page)

“Go on,” Streeter urged.

Katie explained that her mom had been out of town visiting Katie’s oldest sister, Stacy. She called, got Stacy, and told her the whole story. Stacy left her mother at her house, took the next plane to Detroit, and together, they decided to call the police. It was the toughest decision she’d ever had to make, betraying Keith.

She’d testified at Keith’s trial, her mom and Stacy by her side. But Keith’s mother had been devastated, and Katie had never been able to erase the look Keith gave her as they read the verdict, a look, not of hatred, but deep disappointment.

Katie had been twenty-four, and she hadn’t seen Keith in the intervening twenty-four years. He was sentenced to fifteen years for dealing drugs. His mother stayed in touch with Lucy, but Katie had never seen her since that day in court.

“Did Franklin keep in touch?” Streeter asked.

Katie explained that at first Keith wrote her from jail, begged her to visit him, said he’d forgiven her. In letters she’d tried to explain why she could not. How vehemently she was against drug use. He
promised to turn his life around. That she’d always be the woman for him, and he the man for her. How the thought of her was what got him though each day. She stopped writing back. Shortly thereafter she met Scott and never looked back.

“How did Franklin react to your marriage to Scott?” Streeter asked.

“He sent one ugly letter. I destroyed it, but he used obscene language that was racist in nature.”

“Katie, why —” Scott started to speak, then dropped his head into his hands. “I never knew —”

Katie lifted his head in her hands. Facing him she said, “You’ve always known that I had a long-term boyfriend and that we’d gone our separate ways. I was just too ashamed to tell you the whole story.”

“Secrets — our pledge — Katie, I just don’t know.”

“Baby, after meeting you, it was like my life with Keith had never existed.”

“And now, he’s back. He wants you so bad that he’d take our little girls.
My
daughters, Katie, does he have
my
daughters?”

“I don’t know — I don’t think so.” Katie said. “And Scott, they’re
our
daughters.”

“We have him in custody now,” Streeter said. “He served nine of those fifteen years. And, we know that he attended Monica’s concert Saturday night. Stalking you, Dr. Monroe? Maybe. He went alone, didn’t bring his wife.”

Katie couldn’t help but feel a sliver of relief. If Keith had taken Sammie and Alex in an attempt to get her back, he would keep them safe, wouldn’t he? So many atrocities had been circling through her head that she almost wished that Keith
had
abducted them.

“Katie, I just don’t know.” Scott lowered his head. “I’m so confused, I just don’t know.”

“Let’s take a break,” Streeter said. “Go find Jackie. Get something to eat. Meantime, I’ll check out what we’re learning from Franklin.”

Streeter left the conference room. Katie and Scott made no move to leave.

Fifteen minutes later Streeter returned with Camry, Jackie between them. He hoped that Katie and Scott had used that time alone to mend
any rift in their relationship that Katie’s story might have triggered. It wasn’t so much about what had happened between Katie and Franklin, Streeter knew, but that Katie had never shared that episode in her life with Scott. He and Marianne had gone through something similar. His pregnant wife had gone ballistic when she found out that he’d shared a room at a posh Chicago hotel with an old girlfriend during a surveillance assignment. Not wanting to upset Marianne, he hadn’t told her. Then she read about it in a newspaper story. He blamed her overreaction on hormones, but he worried that she could never really trust him after that. With the intensity of emotions enveloping the Monroes, who could know whether Scott would harbor a grudge?

“Mom?” Jackie headed toward Katie, who was slumped head down on the conference table. “Are you okay?”

Katie raised her head, brushed strands of hair from her face and held her arms out to Jackie. “I’m okay, sweetie. “What about you?” “Agent Camry got me some paper and more crayons,” she said. “And we had a Sprite and cheese crackers. The yellow ones that come in a package.”

“Thanks.” Katie wiped tears from her eyes before lifting Jackie onto her lap.

“Shouldn’t there be a ransom?” Scott’s abrupt query took Streeter by surprise. “Is this normal, I mean, no ransom?”

“So far, nothing,” Streeter said. “We’re monitoring your phone at home, your two offices, your parents’ homes.”

“Whoever took them must know that Katie and I could get the money. Everybody knows that Monica is my sister, and that she’s a multimillionaire. She could have a billion, for all I know. She’d part with all of it to get Sammie and Alex back.”

“She wants to put out a reward, but we’ve asked her to hold back for now,” Streeter said.

“This is about me,” Katie said, squeezing Jackie so tight that the little girl started to squirm. “Even after talking about Keith, I think it’s Maxwell Cutty. He’d do anything to stay out of jail. With me sidelined —”

“Then arrest him,” Scott said, pounding a fist on the table, glaring
at Streeter. “If there’s even the slightest chance that he knows where my daughters are, this is bullshit.”

“Scott’s right.” Katie shifted Jackie so she could focus her glare on Streeter. “What are you doing to find them! We’re not living one more day without them! Find them! Sammie and Alex are out there. Find them!”

“We’re doing everything we can.” Helpless words, he knew, but as he said them, Streeter observed the Monroe parents closely. He wished that he could totally dismiss them as complicit. He wished that Jackie had not had to endure such emotional torture. He wished mostly that he could find Alex and Sammie.

During Katie’s outburst, Jackie had squeezed out of her mother’s grasp and gone to stand by Scott, tugging at his shirt. “Daddy, can’t we find them? Ever?”

Scott drew Jackie into his arms. “We will find your sisters. I promise.”

“You two need a break,” Streeter said. And he needed a break from them. “You can go back to Mrs. Jones’s or stay here in another room.”

Katie stood, smoothing her dress, calmer now. “What about an appeal? Didn’t you suggest another one? This time with Jackie? Agent Streeter, we have to do
something
.”

Streeter rubbed his eyes. Too many balls in the air. He’d almost forgotten. “We have the television studio scheduled for two o’clock. So why don’t you go out for some lunch?”

“We can eat here,” Katie said, getting up, reaching for Jackie.

“Jackie might like the food outside better,” Streeter tried. They had to give the kid some slack here.

“The cafeteria in the basement is okay.” Katie took Jackie by the hand and Scott followed. As the Monroes left the conference room, Streeter’s agents filed back in. “Give me everything you’ve got on Cutty,” he demanded. “Tell me all about what he did in that Tampa bank and where he’s been so far today? Cutty’s our first priority. Then tell me what we know about Keith Franklin.”

Why was Ellen Camry’s face an ashen shade of gray as she approached? “We have a new suspect,” she announced. “Come with me.”

Norman Watkins sat ramrod straight in the metal chair, trying for an innocent look of calm acceptance. Seven days out of the joint. A hefty man, no longer the skinny shit he’d been ten years ago. His wife joked that he looked like a professor with horn-rimmed glasses and hair trimmed to just below the ears. He’d picked up decent slacks and a sports jacket with patches on the elbows at the Goodwill Store. Except for the worn sneakers, he felt like he looked the part of a decent middle-class citizen. And it wasn’t just the upscale threads. He had changed in so many ways. Clean, born-again, determined never to go back inside, no matter what. But right now, the most important thing was to keep his cool.

“I told you before, officer,” he was saying as the woman officer walked in with the boss officer named Streeter. “I got the call in the middle of the night.” Respectful like, the way he’d counseled his former prison mates. “My sister called. Told me my mother had a massive stroke. Like she didn’t expect her to make it. You can check that all out, man. Henry Ford Hospital.”

“We’re checking.” Camry, the woman officer working on him wore a sour, mean-spirited sneer when she spoke, but so far nobody had shoved him around. Must not want to mess up their pricey suits. The government paid those assholes way too much. Wary, expecting a sudden assault, Norman concentrated on his breathing.

Norman explained everything to the head agent, Streeter, who now sat fidgeting with his shoulder holster, as he’d listened, almost politely, to Norman’s sincere-sounding answers as to his whereabouts yesterday. But Norman knew this was just good-cop bad-cop. Ten years in the pen, you hear lots of stories.

“Tell me again when the call came through,” Streeter said.

“One in the morning.”

“That’d be Saturday morning. What were you doing?”

“Sleeping with my wife, just like I told you before.” Norman poured out thanks to God that Connie had stuck with him. All through those ten years. And she’d raised Tina just fine. Never put the bitterness in her about how her old man beat the shit out of her when she was just a baby. Now was his time to make it up to Tina.

“So?” The bitch agent sat back like she was bored. Shit, Norman had told this story six times already. He’d have to be extra careful not to screw it up.

“Me and her talked it out. We agreed that we’d drive to Michigan. Connie’s got a sister livin’ in Detroit. Ain’t seen her since we moved to Florida twelve years ago. Did I tell you we was both from Michigan? The wife was born in Livonia. Me, in Hamtramck even though I don’t got a Polish name.”
Feed ’em the bullshit
, Norman thought, then he stopped himself. Now that he had religion, did that mean he’d have to give it to them straight? Here’s where the rubber hit the road. Inside, he’d preached trust in the Lord.

“Your wife’s sister, that’s the address where we picked you up?” Agent Camry asked, diddling with the tape recorder.

“Yeah, the girls were out shoppin’. Then we was gonna head for home. Did you know that my wife is the assistant manager of health and beauty aids at the Winn Dixie? She’s already used a vacation day and we was gonna drive all night. Just like we did comin’ in. That way we don’t have to pay for no motel.”

Agent Camry put down the tape recorder to inspect her fingernails. “Your probation?”

“It’s not like I could call my parole officer in the middle of the night.” Norman sat up, deciding to look this cold-faced bitch right in the eye. “Officer, I knew it was a violation. But I hadn’t seen my mother in twelve years and she was dyin’.” “Fuckin’ dyin’” almost came out, but Norman caught it. Stick with the new image he hastily reminded himself. “So I took a chance. I’d seen my P.O. earlier that day so I didn’t think he’d be lookin’ for me ’til the middle of the week. I wasn’t gonna be stayin’, just long enough to just check. You know, say good-bye if she was dyin’. Let my wife catch up with her sister. My little girl ain’t never even seen her aunt. Now that ain’t right.”

“So how’s your mother?” she asked.

Norman smirked. The bitch — Agent Camry — kept asking him the same shit over and over again. They both knew damn well that his mother was just fine. No stroke as it turned out. Hadn’t even got admitted to the hospital. When he went to see the old lady at her place, she refused to let him in. So he had wasted the whole trip. And worse, the feds were fucking with him. Big deal, he skipped the state, a parole
violation. He’d had a damn good excuse. So why were they feeding him all this shit?

“Turned out to be a false alarm,” Norman said, not caring if he sounded sheepish. Sounding sheepish would be natural, wouldn’t it?

“So you get a call. You figure you have to be in Detroit. You spend the night in your car?” Now tell me again why you would sleep in that ratty station wagon when you could have stayed at your mother’s place?”

Norman resented the sarcastic tone. What right did she have to call Connie’s car “ratty”? The Ford wagon was rusty inside and out. There was a hole in the front floorboard big enough for Tina to fall through. He’d fix it up as soon as the money came though. Norman sat rigidly upright and repeated his mantra. The same one he’d taught his fellow inmates: Don’t let them get inside your head. Stay calm. Look innocent.

“That’s pretty much it. I was embarrassed that my own mother wouldn’t let me in. Old lady said she was ashamed of me for having a criminal record. So I just hung out in the wagon. You know, to keep up appearances.”

“Appearances? Give me a break. What am I missing here?”

“It’s the truth,” Norman said lowering his eyes modestly. He figured that the feds would have his prison file. They’d know he’d been a model prisoner. That he was like a religious leader in the joint. Almost as good as a chaplain. The cons even called him “Reverend.”

“How old is your daughter?” Agent Camry leaned into Norman’s face. He was particular not to let anyone in “his space” but this time he’d have to suck it up.

“She just turned eleven, ma’am.”

“Eleven years old. Do you remember what she looked like when she was nine months old?”