Touch & Go (16 page)

“Libby got along? Liked everyone, was liked by everyone?”

“Libby is genuine.” James stopped, repeated the word, seemed pleased with the description. “Not much of that going around here these days. And up until a few months ago, I would’ve also said she was happy. Justin’s job didn’t bother her, his absence didn’t bother her. She loved her daughter, had her jewelry. She went out when Justin was away. I know she’d talk about going to the movies with some ladies, various lunch dates, but…” He paused again, hands wrapping around his mug. “Libby was a bit of an island. I don’t know any other way of saying it. Neighbors, organizations, the local pecking order, I never got the impression she cared about any of that or for any of them. Her world was Justin and Ashlyn. As long as they were happy, she was happy. And that worked for them.”

“Until Justin took up a side project. She must have been devastated.”

“Oh, Libby doesn’t do devastated. She does withdrawn. Last few times I saw her…” James sighed heavily. “Trust me, honey, there’s no haircut in the world that can compensate for a shattered heart. She claimed she and Justin were trying to work things out. She claimed she hadn’t given up. But let me tell you, that’s not what her hair and skin were saying about things. Woman was a wreck. And that’s no way to win your cheating husband back.”

“Rumor is, Friday night was date night.”

James merely sniffed. “Really, like going back in time is any way to move forward. A couple like that…you have trust issues, you have insecurity, you have a family business that routinely destroys any hope of true family time. What kind of dinner date can fix all that?”

“Well, when you put it that way,” Tessa murmured. Her tea had
finally cooled to the point where she could take a sip. It was fruity; she liked it.

“What do you think?” Farias asked.

“I can already feel the antioxidants rushing in,” she assured him.

“Hmm, I’d recommend at least two to three cups a day. And no more frowning. Otherwise, in another year or two, it’s Botox for sure.”

“Good to know. So, tell me about Ashlyn.”

“Beautiful girl,” he provided immediately. “Definitely her mother’s daughter.”

“Did you do her hair?”

“Absolutely. Very fine, very silky. Yours is coarse. It doesn’t sound appealing, but trust me, coarse hair is easier to work with. Your hair, I can fix.” He gazed at her pointedly. “Ashlyn’s hair we worked to keep as smooth and well-maintained as possible.”

“What’s she like? Quiet, outgoing, athletic, artistic, what?”

“Quiet. Artistic. Gorgeous smile. Like Mona Lisa. You had to work to get it, and even then, the expression was so fleeting you wondered if you didn’t just imagine it. Sweet child. She’d done some school plays, had an interest in her mother’s jewelry, that kind of thing. She liked to ask me questions about cutting hair, running a salon. Always polite, but curious. I think hair and fashion interested her, but her own style was more…eclectic. Not an in-your-face rebellious child, or a spoiled girl, but then, she was only fifteen. Give her time.”

“Did she know there was trouble in paradise?”

James paused, seemed to consider the issue. “How much they told her, I don’t know. But Ashlyn’s sensitive. There was no way she could be living in that household with her mother looking the way Libby looked and still believe her parents were doing fine.”

“Was Libby protective of her?”

“Ab-so-lute-ly! Libby grew up without a father. Yet another reason
to keep her fickle, rutting husband around. Heaven forbid her own child should suffer the same.”

“Heard Justin was grooming Ashlyn for the family business.”

“Oh yes. Gave the girl pink power tools for her fifteenth birthday. What teenager wouldn’t be impressed?”

Tessa contemplated James’s tight-lipped expression. The man’s words had radiated sarcasm, his face clear disapproval. “Ashlyn didn’t like the tools? Or Libby didn’t approve?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Probably neither one. Just sounded silly to me. I mean, couldn’t the man be a little more subtle? Just because he doesn’t have a son is no reason to stick a penis on his daughter.”

It occurred to Tessa that her witness might have his own daddy issues. For example, a father who’d wanted other things for his son’s life than hair care brilliance.

“Did you cut Justin’s hair?”

“No. Barber shop. Definitely. Or maybe, he and his crew sit around and buzz each other with clippers, right after picking each other over for nits. That’s possible as well.”

“When was the last time you saw Libby or Ashlyn?”

“Three weeks ago. They came in together. Ladies day.”

“How’d they seem?”

“Usual. Libby was pale, still looked to me like she wasn’t sleeping well at night. I advised more fish oil in her diet; her hair seemed very brittle. But she kept a brave face on, shared some laughs with her daughter. To most people, I’m sure they looked like they were having a very nice time. You had to know them better to read the signs.”

“Such as?”

“The circles under Libby’s eyes. And Ashlyn was glued to her iPod. She kept putting in her earbuds, Libby kept pulling them back out. Talk, she would say. Share. That’s what this day is supposed to be about. I’d never seen Ashlyn quite like that, so…purposefully withdrawn from a situation.”

“Libby disclose anything more about her marriage?”

“No, but of course, she had her daughter sitting right there. They had some shopping bags, though, including Victoria’s Secret. Nothing says wife of a cheating husband quite like new lingerie.” Abruptly, Farias reached across the table, fingering her hair where it was gathered at the nape of her neck. “You know, I could at least tend to the ends.”

“Sorry.” She set down her mug. “Calendar’s a little full today, finding a missing family and all. But I’ll come back.” She made a move to stand.

Farias regarded her steadily. “No, you won’t.”

“Yes, I will. May twentieth, two thirty. I have the little reminder card and everything.”

“No, you won’t. You’ll work too hard, micromanage your child, obsess over your career. Then one day, you’ll wonder why you are not the beautiful, proud woman you remembered yourself to be.” His voice softened. “A good haircut is not about the hair, darling. It’s about the woman beneath. Shortchange her now, and you can’t really blame others for doing so later.”

Tessa had to smile. Because she would’ve thrown away the reminder card and blown off the appointment. Not immediately, but within a week or two or three, when, yes, Sophie needed her for something, or a new assignment was heating up…

She started to understand why Libby came here, and brought her own daughter. In his own way, James Farias ran a side business in nurturing lost souls.

“I’ll return,” she promised.

Farias merely
hmmph
ed.

“Find my Libby,” he said abruptly. “Whatever happened, wherever they’ve gone… She’s a good person. And there aren’t nearly enough of them left these days.”

“The dinner parties,” Tessa asked. “Who else were among the attendants?”

James sighed, then wrote up a list.

Tessa took it with her. Four P.M. Nearly sundown this late in November. Temperature definitely dropping. As she walked down the street toward her car, she hunched her shoulders reflexively against the chill.

She thought about the Denbes. Couldn’t help but wonder where they were, how they were faring, as day transitioned to another bitterly cold night. Did they have food, shelter, adequate clothes and blankets for warmth? She supposed it depended on how much incentive their captors had to keep them safe and sound.

Personal or professional, that’s what this case would boil down to in the end.

Had the Denbes’ abduction been motivated by vengeance? Maybe a business rival who’d felt personally slighted when Denbe Construction had been awarded a significant building contract? Or perhaps related to Justin’s affair. The jilted ex-lover, having lost her man to his family, striking back? Or, the most sinister and interesting theory, that Justin had staged the abduction of his whole family as an elaborate ruse to disguise the murder of his estranged wife. Because given the threat divorce would pose to his personal wealth, not to mention the family business, Justin would clearly be the prime suspect if anything happened to Libby. Unless, of course, the whole family was attacked, and he and his daughter miraculously happened to be the sole survivors…

Except, why now? Six months later, when the Denbes seemed to have survived the immediate aftermath of Justin’s betrayal? Libby was definitely trying to save her marriage, according to her hair stylist. Maybe not succeeding yet, given her fragile emotional state, but still trying.

Tessa shook her head. For the Denbes’ sake, she hoped this was a professionally motivated crime. Because a team of kidnappers looking for a ransom payout had incentive to keep the Denbes as comfortable
as possible. Whereas the people the Denbes thought they knew and held most dear…

Tessa couldn’t help herself: She flashed back two years ago, to her kitchen, the look on her husband’s face. The shock of the exploding Sig Sauer. The feel of the white, white snow against her frozen fingertips. Her daughter’s empty bedroom.

It wasn’t that strangers couldn’t hurt you. It was simply that the people you loved could do it so much better.

Just ask Libby Denbe.

Chapter 16

THE CRAZY BLUE-EYED COMMANDO wanted Ashlyn to step out of the cell first.

“No,” Justin said.

Ashlyn was awake, sitting up on the lower bunk. Her bleary gaze shot from her father to the steel door to her father again. I had my body positioned in front of her, as if by blocking her from view, I could keep the man from remembering she was there.

“Girl steps up,” Mick repeated. “Girl presents wrists through the slot. I secure girl’s hands, she exits cell. Those are the instructions.”

“No,” Justin said. His shoulders were set, his hands fisted by his side. “I’ll go first. Then my daughter. Then my wife.”

Mick raised his black Taser till it was visible through the narrow strip of window.

“Girl steps up,” he repeated, and this time there was a load of menace behind each word.

I gazed from my husband to the commando, still feeling confused, then I got it. The scenario Justin was trying to avoid: If Ashlyn exited the cell, Mick could simply slam the door shut behind her. Trapping us inside the cell. Leaving Ashlyn alone and vulnerable on the other side of it.

I stepped forward, standing beside Justin with our shoulders
touching. I wanted to feel brave, resolute. My stomach was cramping. I could feel fresh beads of sweat across my forehead, and I dug my nails into my palms, calling upon the pain to ground me.

Mick lowered a metal plate, opening the slot in the middle of the cell door. His eyes were flat, his face expressionless as he lined up the Taser in the opening, aiming for Justin’s torso.

“The girl—” Mick started harshly.

“Fuck you!” Justin bellowed back.

“I’ll go.”

Both men paused, blinked, looked at Ashlyn, who’d risen from the lower bunk.

“Stop it.” She wasn’t talking to Mick; she was talking to her father. “What are you gonna do, Dad? Protect me? Pretend everything’s all right? Nothing bad’s ever gonna happen to your precious little princess? Kind of late for that, don’t you think?”

The bitterness in her voice caught me off guard. I looked down, embarrassed for my daughter, hurting for my husband, who I knew had to be shocked by such an outburst.

“Ashlyn…”

“Stop it. Just stop it. You should’ve left us, you know. Moved in with your new girlfriend, built a new life. We could’ve handled that. But, no, you have to hang around the house, pretending you still love us, pretending you still care. You made a mistake, but now you’re sorry. If we’d just give you a second chance, boo hoo hoo. You’re the one who’s trying to have his cake and eat it, too.”

Ashlyn pushed past her father, thrusting her hands through the open slot. Justin made no move to stop her, just stared at her back, openly stunned.

On the other side of the cell door, Mick laughed.

“Feisty one!” he declared, reaching for a zip tie.

“Fuck you,” our daughter told him, and my eyes widened for a
second time. I’d never heard Ashlyn use such language. And I definitely hadn’t known…hadn’t even begun to suspect that she’d resented the past few months so much.

Mick laughed again.

Our family needed to hold together. Instead, barely an hour into prison life, we were tearing apart.

The commando secured Ashlyn’s wrists. There was a short buzzing sound, then the door swung open. Mick stood in the opening, Taser pointed at Justin’s chest.

I should rush him, I thought. He was so focused on Justin, I could run forward, throw all hundred and ten pounds of my body at the commando’s massive two-hundred-pound frame. If I hit him around the knees, he’d go down. Then Justin would charge forward and then…

Then there would be six more electronically controlled doors between us and freedom. We would’ve exchanged our cell for the prison dayroom. And we would’ve pissed off three armed men, one of them sporting a fang-baring cobra tattoo.

I shuddered. Another buzz. The heavy steel door closed and our daughter stood on the other side, next to the psycho commando. She didn’t look scared. She just stared at her father as if she’d never hated him so much.

“I am such an asshole,” Justin whispered.

I didn’t argue. I stepped up and presented my wrists through the slot.

MICK LINED US UP IN FRONT OF HIM. Still no sign of the other two commandos, so it was up to him to shepherd three bound prisoners out of the dayroom into the corridors of the abandoned prison. He didn’t seem nervous about his prospects. More like tense. He had the Taser held at his waist, pointing forward. The first time one of us flinched, he’d pull the trigger.

The moment we started walking, I knew I’d be the first one down. My legs shook uncontrollably, each step requiring more effort than the one before. It felt as if the atmosphere had taken on weight, until just getting my knee off the ground, my foot in the air, demanded a tremendous amount of energy. I was like a character in slow motion, barely churning my leg up, forward, down.