Keep No Secrets (53 page)

The clerk stares at Jack, and Jack sees he’s scared.

"You have nothing to worry about as long as you stick to your hotel role. If you see it’s a guy alone with a girl, just stall, okay? Whatever you do, don’t let him close the door on you."

"Is she still here?" Michael asks, panting.

"We’re about to find out."

The clerk looks down at the master key card in his hand. "If you don’t want them to know you're here, maybe you should stay on the steps until I’m in the room.

He may come out."

Jack nods. "Just hurry." He pulls Michael back with him. "I told you to stay in the car." When Michael doesn’t respond, he adds, "Stay behind me, and
do
not
leave this landing unless I give you explicit instructions to. Okay?" Michael nods. "And keep an eye out for the cops."

"I called them."

"What?"

"I called the cops and told them what was happening. I overheard what you said to Mom about guns blazing, so I told them to try to arrive without anyone knowing about it."

As soon as the words are out of his mouth, Jack hears the clerk’s knock on Room 224 and his yell, "Maintenance!

Anyone in here?" He puts his fingers at his lips again to remind Michael not to speak anymore, but with the hand closest to his son, squeezes his arm to tell him he’s proud of him for what he just revealed.

Jack grows more nervous when the

clerk repeats his call, which is followed by the sound of the door opening but then abruptly stopped by the security chain.

He can’t hear if anyone speaks on the other side of the door, but someone must have finally shown himself because the clerk says, "Sorry, dude. The computer showed you checked out already."

"Yeah, we did." The voice Jack assumes belongs to Torpedo has the low rasp of someone who smokes two packs a day.

"But that was before I got hit by a migraine. We’ll be leaving as soon as my wife gets back with some medicine and I get some relief. You’re gonna have to come back later. We have ‘til noon, right?"

Michael’s frantic eyes go wide, and Jack raises a hand.
Just hold on
.

"Sure, but I first gotta get in there to check on some pipes. We had a report of a gas leak and we think the problem’s originating from this room. I need you to wait on the balcony."

"I haven’t smelled anything. Look, I’m in massive pain here." The fake friendliness has given way to a more threatening tone. "I need to lie down and close my eyes."

Jack hears a voice from inside the room that he thinks is Celeste, but he can’t make out what was said.

"She’s right, it may be the gas causing your migraine," the clerk says. "Sorry, man, I don’t have a choice. State law."

Jack suddenly loves the guy for how well he’s playing the part.

"Come on, Cee," Torpedo says angrily.

To the clerk, "We’ll be out in a second."

He must try to shut the door because Jack hears a thud—the clerk’s palm hitting the door?—followed by, "Sorry, dude, you gotta keep the door open."

Michael taps Jack on the shoulder to point out two police officers quietly making their way along the wall near the front office to the stairwell.
Perfect timing
.

Jack repositions himself so he can see the balcony outside the door. He watches as Celeste comes out first, Torpedo right on her heel. She wears purple pajama pants and a white thermal shirt with long sleeves, an odd choice for the warm, muggy weather. Her hair is frizzy from the humidity, and tangled from what Jack hopes is just sleep. She's tall like Jenny, but she looks tiny next to Torpedo, who towers over her with the wide, bare-chested muscles of a body-builder. A barbed wire tattoo circles his large left bicep; a snake design curls around the other. His stringy brown hair is pulled back in a ponytail, revealing a

pockmarked but incongruently boyish face.

As soon as the clerk disappears into the room, Torpedo leans against the railing with his arm around Celeste. She visibly tenses when he pulls her close, and her reaction alone convinces Jack that everything she told Michael is true.

Torpedo bends close to her ear, his lips touching her hair, and whispers

something as he casually brushes his free hand against her breast. Celeste lowers her eyes, her mouth screws up in fear and revulsion, but otherwise she doesn’t move.

"What’s happening?" Michael whispers.

The first cop reaches the landing just as Jack turns to shush Michael.

"Mr. Hilliard?" the cop asks. "Jack Hilliard?" Jack nods and moves toward him. He silently signals with one hand as he reaches for his credentials with the other, but the cop stuns Jack when he grabs his wrist and executes a maneuver that spins him so quickly he doesn’t have time to object. He advises Jack that he's under arrest for contempt of court and begins to recite Miranda as the second cop grabs hold of the other arm and together the two men cuff him. Jack doesn’t try to verbalize their mistake for fear of being overheard by Torpedo, but Michael, whether lacking the same restraint or perhaps foresight, cries, "He's not the one! He's trying to help her!" Jack hears Celeste cry, "Mike?" just as the first cop pushes Michael against the wall and shouts, "You need to stay quiet, son, until we tell you to speak!" The second cop abandons Jack and starts in the direction of Celeste's voice while Jack starts talking at the first cop, just tries to get as much of the story out so the man will move to assist his partner. His prayers are answered when the second cop issues an order—"Step away from her"—and then shouts, "Morris, I need back-up!"

Michael, hearing
Step away from her
, assumes the worst and takes off to follow Officer Morris. Jack yells "
Michael, stop!
"

in a tone he’s heard come out of his own mouth only one other time, when a four-year-old Jamie came within seconds of propelling himself off an icy hill of plowed snow into the path of an

approaching SUV. It works. Michael halts, and Jack exhales his relief.

He hears Celeste crying as the second cop again orders Torpedo to step away from her.

"Whoa, officers, slow down there,"

Torpedo says. "You're scaring her. I'm just a guy trying to get some rest before driving my family home to Florida."

With his arms still trapped behind him, Jack edges back to his former viewing spot and sees Celeste is now standing slightly in front of Torpedo as insurance against the cops, who both have their guns trained on him. He grips her shoulders in a casual, fatherly stance. The frightened clerk stands with his back pressed against the doorframe. Jack hears helicopter rotors in the distance and knows the media is about to descend upon them. Morris knows it, too; he glances at the sky and mutters, "Damn it!"

When a curious guest opens the door to the room at the end of the balcony, he orders her back into her room. To Torpedo, he says, "Step away from her and then we'll sort this out."

"I will, I will. Just lower the guns, will ya? You got the wrong guy." Torpedo spots Jack. "There he is, Cee." He squeezes her shoulders. "Tell ‘em, cupcake. Tell them who really hurt you."

Celeste keeps her eyes aimed at the ground.

"Cee?" the second cops says gently, using the name he heard Torpedo use, "is this man your father?"

She shakes her head. Torpedo says,

"I'm her mom's boyfriend. She's known me for years. Her mom will be back any minute and she'll tell you. She just went to find some medicine for my migraine."

"Is that right, Cee?"

This time she nods, still refusing to look at anyone. Jack can't stand it anymore. "Celeste, tell them what you told Mike. Tell them what he's done to you." But she pretends not to hear. "He raped her," he tells the cops.

"Repeatedly."

Torpedo laughs and say, "Hey, man,
I'm
not wearing the cuffs," just as the clerk says to the cops, "Dudes, I think you should listen to the lawyer." He nods at Jack in case they don't realize who he means. "There's something in this room you might want to see."

His last comment cracks Torpedo's shell. "You have no fuckin' right to search our room."

Officer Morris starts to speak but Jack quickly cuts him off. "What did you see?"

he asks the clerk. Jack knows he might say something to convince the cops that a crime, if not already occurring, was about to be committed. If so, they'll have no obstacles to a warrantless search.

The clerk looks from Jack to the cops, his mouth open in doubt, as if afraid to answer anyone except them. "
What'd you
see?
" Jack asks again, insistently. Torpedo snickers and pivots Celeste to face the door. "Go on in, cupcake. These officers can come back when they get a warrant."

His hands still resting nonchalantly on her shoulders, he tries to push her forward.

A helicopter appears from over the top of the hotel, and as the bird's spotlight sweeps the balcony, the officers order Torpedo to stop, but the noise drowns out their commands. In the chaos created by the noise and wind, Celeste ducks and slips free of Torpedo's unsuspecting grip.

He shouts her name, but she ignores him and sprints down the balcony past the cops, who immediately descend upon a resistant Torpedo and within seconds have him Tasered and on the ground.

Celeste crashes into Jack and sinks against his chest, sobbing, her arms flung around his waist. Without the use of his own arms, he loses his balance and stumbles against the stair rail behind him.

"Hey, hey, it's okay. It's okay. It's over,"

he whispers to the top of Celeste's head, but either she can't hear him over the commotion or she's simply hiding from it. He catches Michael's eye and motions him over with a tilt of the head. Michael approaches hesitantly, as if uncertain whether this wild-haired creature hugging his dad is the same girl he last saw in St.

Louis. "Celeste," Jack hollers to get her attention. She lifts her head, emerging from behind the veil of black hairs clinging to her wet cheek, and spots Michael. With nothing more than an impulsive "Oh!" she releases Jack and falls uninhibited into Michael's welcome arms.

They learn later from the clerk—whose name, they also learn, is Danny—that he began to believe Jack as soon as he cracked open the door to Room 224 and glimpsed Torpedo working furiously to untie a rope from Celeste's wrist. Once he got inside, he found two separate, short pieces of rope kicked behind the dresser and a bottle of lubricant on top of it. "I mean, it wasn't much. I see kinky stuff all the time, you know? But she didn't look like a willing participant to me." His dry manner of reporting what he saw belied the malice behind the scene he stumbled upon.

The cops found even more—a gun and eight grams of cocaine. No Rohypnol, though.

Celeste insisted nothing happened, that Torpedo didn't get far in his plans, and the rape kit, which this time she consented to, backed her up. She claimed it was the first time he had tried to restrain her; she also claimed it was only the second time she physically resisted, the first being the first time he assaulted her. After that, she knew better than to fight. Jack wasn't sure he believed either claim, he felt sure she downplayed what had happened to her, but he knew the full truth would come when she was ready.

He only hoped she'd be ready by the time the Florida authorities interviewed her.

His own situation wasn't so

straightforward. Despite a full report from the Tennessee authorities to Judge Simmons, Walker and Chief Matthews, the judge refused to dismiss the rape charges against him until both Jack and Celeste could appear before him in person. He did, however, agree to look the other way with respect to Jack violating both the bond and the

restraining order. This favor allowed Jack to drive home in his own car instead of in the back of a cruiser. After a nap in a back room of the Clarksville police department and permission from

Celeste's father, Jack pulled back onto Interstate 24 toward St. Louis at half past six that evening, Michael and Celeste curled together like newborn pups in the back seat.

News trucks followed them the whole way.

EARLY FALL

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

WHEN EARL FIRST called Jenny on a Thursday afternoon in early September and asked her to meet for breakfast the next morning, she assumed he had good news about his discussions with Alan Sterling, the DA from Franklin County who had handled the murder case against her. Earl had met with Sterling months ago to present the new evidence

supporting Jenny's innocence and to seek assurances that he no longer considered her a person of interest. The new evidence included the PI's report and Brian's affidavit that Jenny didn't know Maxine Shepard had been their father's mistress until after her arrest. To strengthen the affidavit, Jack located the ancient injunction order Brian had mentioned. The existence of the

injunction furthered bolstered Earl's argument that Jenny wouldn't have ever discovered, absent Brian telling her, the identity of their father's mistress.

But what gave Jenny the most hope was Alex's decision to accept a plea bargain. Jeff McCarthy, the prosecutor from Jack's office who had handled the case against Alex, turned over a copy of the PI report to Alex's attorney along with an offer of life without parole in exchange for a guilty plea. To everyone's delight, he took it. Jenny hoped to reap the benefit of the general consensus that no man accepts a life sentence unless he's guilty.

But justice moves slowly, and Jenny and Earl had been waiting patiently for Sterling to review the information and get back to Earl with his decision.

Now, as Earl takes a seat across from her, it occurs to her that he could have easily shared good news over the phone.

She braces herself for the worst. She calculates her next step, whether to stay in St. Louis despite the cloud over her head, or sell her house, return to Chicago for good, and hope they file her away as a question that will never be answered. Earl surprises her when, first thing, he slides an envelope across the table.

"What's this?" she asks.

"Your retainer. Congratulations.

You're officially off the hook." He says it with such little fanfare that it takes a moment for her nerves to believe the announcement. "Sterling is confident the right man is already in jail."