River: A Bad Boy Romance (17 page)

She kisses Javier on the top of the head again, and squeezes him tightly. A little more tightly than usual.

“I love you, Javi”, she says. She's been in love with this man from the moment she set eyes on him, a bright eyed, olive skinned eighteen year old, with a heart of gold, and not a single bad bone in his body, who had the confidence to approach her with a rose and tell her that all he wanted was to see her smile, and if she gave him the opportunity to do so, he would try his best not to fail. That rose she kept and dried, and it now sits in a vase on a shelf in their bedroom, sixteen years after he bought it with the only money he had to his name, to give to the prettiest girl he had ever seen.

“I love you too, baby”, Javier says, and smoothes the slight bump just under his wife's belly button. “You know, I think it's going to be a girl.”

“What makes you say that?” Claudia asks him. She's olive skinned too, from Italian immigrants two generations removed, although American in every way but her blood line. She can't cook pasta to save her life, which would make her grandmother red with embarrassment, and despite her parents desire to pass on her real mother tongue, she remembers very little of that now completely obscure language, having replaced what she might have originally learnt with Javier's native Spanish. She is brown eyed, tall like her mother, delicately postured and incredibly beautiful.

“I've just got a feeling”, Javier says.

“You had a feeling about all of the other's too”, Claudia says and laughs.

“I can't be wrong five times in a row”, Javier says and smiles.

“I wouldn't count on it. Ok, work. I'm going back to bed”, Claudia says, “unless you want to come and join me?” She lifts up the T-Shirt she likes to sleep in to reveal a beautiful little bump and a sexy pair of panties. Turning around, she sticks out her pert little bum just enough to emphasise it, before dropping her T-shirt back down.

“You know where to find me”, she says and smiles at her husband, who looks longingly at her as she walks back out of the door.

“Mommy”, come the shouts of her four year old child, no sooner than she has made it back out to the kitchen. “Mommy”, he shouts again.

“Coming, Connor”, she says, glancing at the clock on the kitchen wall on the way. It's 6:45am, and much earlier than he normally gets up. Claudia quickens her pace, and finds him waiting for her at the top of the stairwell. She rushes past him and into the bedroom, knowing immediately that something serious is happening. Inside the tiny bedroom, Elouise is awake, standing quietly in her cot, watching her older brother Miguel throw up on the floor. Claudia rushes to him, while Connor makes his way back into the room and stands by his mother's side.

“He was sleeping and then all suddenly he sicked up over the floor”, Connor says, all too aware of the frequency of this situation and the importance of reporting it as soon as it happens. “I couldn't find you mommy”, he goes on.

“You found me baby, you did good”, she says to Connor, while rubbing Miguel's back, his ribs showing a little too much through his thin skin for her liking. Connor climbs back up the ladder to the bunk above, careful not to tread in the sick on the way, in the same way he was careful not to tread in it on the way out of the room to find his mother. The vomit, dotted by specks of blood, has managed to find its way neatly into a patch of carpet between several of the boys toys. The only thing that doesn't seem to have escaped unscathed, is a single wooden train compartment - an old toy from when the boys were much younger - that forms part of a much longer chain, long since disassembled or lost.

Miguel is naturally darker skinned than his younger brother, taking on more of his father's genes, but looks much paler due to his illness.

“Sorry, Mommy”, he says. “I didn't mean too. It just came out.”

“That's ok, honey”, Claudia says while she rubs his back, tears running freely down her cheeks. “Do you need to be sick more?”

Miguel shakes his head, and lies back down in his bed. Claudia takes a wet wipe out of the packet she keeps constantly at the side of the bunk bed and cleans his mouth.

“It was a good shot”, Claudia says. “You missed the bed sheets and everything. Do you want some water?”

Miguel shakes his head again.

“I'll get you some more water”, Claudia says, “just in case you change your mind.”

She rolls the blanket up so it covers his chest, and kisses him on the forehead.

“Mommy”, Miguel says, “I don't want to be sick anymore.”

“I know sweetie”, Claudia says. “I promise you'll be better soon. I promise honey.”

Claudia pulls away from him, to clear the room up and get the children ready for breakfast and school. Elouise has been quietly watching them, but soon enough she'll be screaming for a cuddle. If she doesn't clear up the vomit now, it'll only get harder to do so as it sinks into the carpet, but Miguel won't let her go.

“Please, Mommy, don't go”, he says.

“I'll be right back, darling”, she says. “I'll be just over there in the bathroom. I'll leave the door open so you can see the light.”

“Don't go, Mommy”, he says again. “Stay for just a bit longer, I'm scared.”

“Hey, Champ”, Javier says from the door. “You had a rough night again?”

Miguel nods gravely. Claudia turns around to her husband, more pleased than ever to see him standing there. “He's been sick again”, she says, wiping the tears away from her eyes. “Can you help me clear it up?”

“Of course”, Javier says. “Stay there, I'll be right back.”

By now, the day has already begun, and so much light has filtered through the makeshift curtains they've put up in the children's bedroom, that there'll be no chance of any of them going back to bed. Connor peers down from above, lying flat on his bed with his feet pressed against the wall. From here the vomit looks like a pizza to him. As predicted, Elouise begins to cry. She holds her arms out in the air and screws her face up and lets out a bawl loud enough to let everyone know where she is. Javier hurries back into the room with a bucket full of hot soapy water, a dustpan and brush, a spray cleaner and an industrial size roll of paper tissue, which he puts on the ground next to the pile of sick, before ruffling Connor's hair, and lifting Elouise out of her crib. He cuddles her a little, rains kisses all over her cute little body, and passes the still unsettled bundle of unhappiness across to Claudia. Elouise settles a little more in her mother's arms, but she's still not placated. It's more than attention she needs, and she won't stop crying until she gets it.

“She's hungry”, Claudia says, passing her from one arm to the next. “Can you make her bottle?”

“Already on my way”, Javier says. “Are you ok, Miguel?” he asks him, running his hand through the boy's hair.

“I'm okay, Daddy”, he says. “I'm tired, that's all. I didn't mean too.”

“Hey”, he says, “don't talk crazy. We know you can't help it.”

He kisses his wife, her tears already dried on her cheek but still salty enough for him to taste them, and lifts Connor out of his bed, the boy clinging to his father like a chimpanzee, ecstatic to be by his side.

“I'll get this one ready for school”, he says, “while the milk's heating up.”

“Ok”, Claudia says. “Remember, brush teeth after breakfast.”

“After breakfast, you got that you little monkey?” Javier says to Connor and tickles him in the side below his ribs. Connor can't help but laugh, showing off an already missing front tooth. Elouise has settled down a little, clinging onto her mother as tightly as she can, while Claudia holds Miguel's hand and looks at him with a huge amount of concern. Whatever it is her husband has planned, she hopes for her son's sake that it works. She's seen him pass almost every day of his life with some kind of issue, and she's had enough of him suffering.

The ransom note, crudely crafted at the break of dawn that morning, from letters lifted from old magazines and newspapers, a copy of which still sits in the scanner bed in Javier and Claudia's office/laundry room, arrives to Maddy's father's email address. Having not received a response yet to the original email, Javier has taken it upon himself to up the threat. He has also included, to make his claim seem all that more legitimate, sensitive information that only Maddy would know, which he took from the computer in Madeleine's office the night before, when everyone else, including the cleaners and the security staff, had already gone home. Maddy is a woman who usually insists on keeping her office locked at night time, but due to circumstances beyond her control, was unable to do so yesterday. Javier took the opportunity, waiting until he was the last person left, with the excuse to colleagues that he wanted to leave something for Maddy to think about, if she ever returned.

Getting into her office was the easy bit, but getting some piece of information only Maddy knew about was harder than he initially thought it would be. He went through her drawers, the ones she'd left open at least, but found nothing of use there amongst the squeeze stress balls and broken pencils. It took the best part of an hour, after he'd tried to guess her password a number of times without success, for the entry code hacker he had downloaded to break into the computer system and give him access to her personal files. He trawled through them for another hour, reading business emails, and opening high level account files, losing hope he'd find anything at all, until he finally stumbled on something so perfect, had he been able to invent it himself, he wouldn't have come anywhere close.

Officer Garland is sleeping when the call comes through. He has never got used to early mornings, although he's had his fair share, and this morning is no different. If Garland didn't have to get up, to get into work at a particular time every day, he'd stay in bed until noon, take a hearty brunch, sleep again for a couple of hours until four or five and only then when he felt rested enough and able to turn his mind to it, he'd head into work, stay there until dinner time, and then continue again afterwards until the early hours. He worked better after food and coffee, preferably lots of it, and best when the sun had finally gone down. If his wife didn't complain she never got to see him, and the police force didn't require a morning appearance, he'd have chosen that schedule for himself a long time ago.

“I've got to go to work”, Garland says to his wife, who Garland knows is as awake as he is, even though she's trying her hardest to pretend to be asleep.

She turns around to him. “Honey, it's barely gone seven”, she says.

“I know”, Garland says, a yawn swallowing most of the words and making them barely comprehensible. “It's Maddy Parker. There's been a development.”

“A development”, Garland's wife says. “Is she dead?”

“No, she's not dead, honey”, Garland says, stumbling to the en-suite bathroom. “Thankfully they don't all die.”

“Well I guess her father won't be cracking out the champagne just yet then”, his wife says.

“You have a cruel streak. Did I ever tell you that?” Garland says, washing his face and spreading toothpaste onto a brush. “That was him on the phone actually.”

“Oh”, Garland's wife says, getting excited. A big fan of conspiracy, crime and mystery books, Garland's wife Hetty, has been more excited by this case than her husband, having spent all day watching it break on TV, phoning Garland at every available opportunity, and insisting on regular updates. “Another ransom note”, she says, sitting up in bed and clutching her pillow to her chest. “What does it say?”

“That's what I'm about to find out”, Garland says, his mouth full of toothpaste.

Waiting for him in his police issue email account, is a copy of the email Javier sent to Maddy Parker's father, which contains a copy of the ransom note he mocked up that morning, the original of which still sits in his scanner bed. When he arrives to work a little after 7:30am, not the first person in that morning, but definitely not the last, he puts his large coffee down on his desk - double shot of espresso mixed with a generous pour of hot water - and opens up his emails. The creatively crafted note that stares back at him from the screen reads as follows:

$1 million dollars. 5pm today.

505 - 768 - 2030

This is not a joke.

Maddy will die if you do not respond.

She says: “Dad. Please help me.

Do you remember when you found me after I

tried to kill myself, and all I needed you

to tell me was that you loved me, but you couldn't?

Please don't let me die again, Daddy.

I'm scared and I need you.”

Officer Garland leans back in his seat, slowly sips his still steaming coffee and studies the ransom note closely. When he feels like he's looked at it enough, he clicks print, gets up and waits by the archaic photo copier for the hard copy to come out.

W
hen she wakes, there is a moment when she doesn't know where she is. All she knows is that she's in a bed somewhere, in a room somewhere, that she's comfortable, and safe, and nothing else matters. It could be the bedroom she grew up in, only the bed is a lot larger. It could be her own bed, only that there is someone else in it with her.

For a confusing moment, she wonders whether she is Madeleine Parker at all, or whether she's woken in the body of a complete stranger instead, and that both the bed that she's lying in, and the man she's lying in it with, are theirs not hers. Suddenly, as though she might be a computer booting up, the details of the last twenty four hours come rushing back to her. This is a motel room in a city she's never been in before, the bed is definitely not hers, but nor does it belong to the man who lies alongside her, and he, who is still sleeping deeply, has converted himself in the course of a day, from her captor into her lover. Her head feels fuzzy from the incomprehensible, craziness of the situation, and she is hungry too, which is perhaps what has woken her.

Maddy is careful not to wake River, as she slides out of bed and towards the bathroom. When she splashes water on her face to open her pores, and bring life back to her tired eyes, her plan is already beginning to form. There is enough natural light spilling in from outside, to allow her to dress without turning on the bare bulb above them, and she does so as quietly as a whisper, pulling on her new jeans, and another brand new top, this time with the print of a rocket on the back. River sleeps, unaware of what's happening around him. He's exhausted from yesterday's events, and the dream that woke him in the night.