The ring of the bell, and the doors slid open.
“After you,” he said, holding the door again.
“Thank you.”
She went left and sensed him head in the opposite direction. She waited a half beat and doubled back. Letting one strap of her purse slip off her shoulder, she reached in and felt the knife handle in her palm, squeezing and tilting the blade, tip up, to be ready.
As he stopped at his room, she slowed. The key slid in and out, and the door opened with a heavy click.
He stepped into the room, and she sprinted the short distance, pressing the door open, the knife clutched in her grip. She caught her foot on the threshold of the door, stumbling in behind him.
The imposter faced her, shock in his expression, and only then did she notice a third person in the room.
Before she saw his face, she knew it was him.
Bengal.
19
The frustration of waiting was getting under Hal’s skin. He needed a lead, a clue to follow.
The Crime Scene Unit had taken a cursory look at Aleena’s laptop and found nothing of interest. She’d cleared her browser history recently and her emails held no clues. The machine had to be passed on to the computer team, and Roger told Hal they wouldn’t look at it for at least a few days. “I’ll do my best to get to it faster,” Roger added.
And Hal knew he would.
The computer was the only piece of evidence the Crime Scene Unit had taken from the house. The Laughlins kept a paper-free household—remarkably so. The team had found no paper anywhere—no files, no stacks of correspondence or bills. Likely Aleena Laughlin scheduled her life on her phone, and her recently dialed numbers would have provided a wealth of information, but the phone had never shown up.
Tracking software had come up empty as well. That meant either the phone’s battery had died, or someone had turned the phone off. AT&T would soon issue a report detailing which cell towers the phone had last pinged, but Hal would bet a month’s salary that the last call came from the towers closest to the location in Golden Gate Park where they’d found her body—not the most helpful lead.
Hal had also been unable to locate Aleena’s family. Parveen had recalled that Aleena’s father was Mohammed, but both that first name, as well as their surname—Safar—were common enough that the search came up with twenty in the Bay Area alone. Parveen said the parents might have left the area, and without more information, Hal had no good way to narrow down the list.
He tried to remind himself that this was a common pattern in investigations. He often hit a lag in the case when the leads dried up. And then something broke. Something always broke.
Almost always.
In this case, he had to believe it would be Aleena Laughlin’s husband, Jared. Jared would know something.
But how much light would Jared shed? He had been deployed for more than seven months this time, his third deployment in the last four years. Aleena Laughlin had been living the life of a single parent. Even if she spoke to her husband frequently, few soldiers could contact home more often than once a week. She would have lived much of her life without the ability to consult Jared.
And she hadn’t confided in the Johnsons or Parveen, so who would know why she had gone to the park that night? Whom she had been meeting?
Hal hoped like hell that Jared would have some answers.
But then he had begun to fret over how long it would take to get in touch with Jared. When would his regiment be back on base? How soon after that would the commanders notify him about his wife’s death?
Hal didn’t have days to wait. He needed a lead. He circled back to the idea that Aleena had written something down when she was on the phone that day. Written it down on a piece of paper. He hoped he might find that paper—or perhaps an imprint of it somewhere.
As he made a careful loop of the small apartment, he noted things he hadn’t when the team had been focused on locating evidence that would help them determine what drew Aleena to Golden Gate Park on Tuesday night. The refrigerator was decorated with several pieces of a child’s art—Kaelen’s, he supposed—and a handful of holiday cards. “Merry Christmas,” one said. Another had a blue dreidel. Several others were more religiously neutral, calling for peace and joy. A short stack of children’s books sat on the bed in the smaller bedroom. Others lined a shelf. Hal spotted How the Grinch Stole Christmas among them.
In the larger bedroom, a rolled-up mat—he assumed for the five daily Muslim prayers—sat under the bedroom window. On top of the bureau stood a handful of framed images. In one, Jared wore a blazer and slacks, and Aleena, a white, knee-length dress made of flowing fabric. Her head was covered by a white hijab, her lips the same daring red they’d been at her death. Hal imagined it was their wedding day. Among the others was a picture of Aleena in a hospital bed. Lying beside her with tears in his eyes was Jared, holding a tiny baby with a full head of dark hair, the three of them huddled close.
On the bedside table sat another picture of the four Laughlins. Jared wore his dress uniform, and Aleena and the children were dressed up as well. It must have been taken just before Jared left for his tour. Beneath the framed photo was the Koran and below it, another book. Hal leaned in and read the spine. Islam and Christianity: Where the Two Religions Meet.
Aleena Laughlin had been committed to her religion, but from Ben and Phyllis, Hal also knew that her husband was Christian. As far as the Johnsons were concerned, Aleena and Jared had a successful marriage, and Aleena had done an impressive job teaching the children about both faiths.
Was that what the trip to the park had been about? Why she had Kaelen with her? Because there was some lesson she wanted him to learn? But why did he think that? Other than the missing burqa, nothing about this crime pointed to her religion as a motivation.
Or was being Muslim something that he had to consider, even if no clues pointed in that direction?
The only paper Hal found in the apartment was a single piece of junk mail—an offer for a credit card—in the recycling beneath the kitchen sink. He saw no imprint, but he took both the envelope and the marketing materials with him to check under better lighting in the lab.
Hal locked the door and returned the key to Ben Johnson on his way out of the building. As he got into the car, he noticed a text that said Schwartzman had finished with Malik Washington’s autopsy.
Hal drove toward the station, hoping she’d had better luck than he.
20
The phone rang as Spencer stepped out of the shower. He checked the line of burner phones and found the one that was ringing. The slip beneath it read SF.
“Carson,” he answered, pronouncing the word without the r in the nasal voice he’d been perfecting for calls like this.
“Yeah, this is Dave at Bay Lock and Key. You called about an issue with your front lock.”
“My dog sitter can’t get inside, and I’m about to get on a plane.”
People were suckers for animals.
Dave agreed to do it for $900, saying the coded doors could be tough to break.
“But you can do it?” Spencer had asked.
“Oh yeah. I can do it.”
Spencer sent payment via a masked credit card. Dave promised the door would be open before five p.m. “I’ll call and let you know it’s done.”
Spencer ended the call, removed the SIM card, and set the phone back in its place. Once he received the return call, he would destroy the phone.
He was toweling off when the doorbell rang. A glance at the bathroom clock showed the delivery was early. Better than late. He pulled jeans on over his bare, wet skin and walked to the front door. He didn’t open it. He never opened the door without checking anymore. Instead, he peered through the peephole he’d upgraded last year, the one that gave him a wide-angle view outside.
On the front mat lay a manila envelope, eight by ten, unmarked.
Across the street, a black sedan with tinted windows sat at the curb. It was all exactly
as his contact had said it would be.
Spencer opened the door, retrieved the envelope, and carried it inside. He paused at the door, watching the sedan drive away before heading into the kitchen. There, he drew a long carving knife from the block and slid it under the sealed flap.
With a whisper, the blade slit the paper, and he dumped the contents onto the granite counter. Deep-red books—two of them, two folded sheets of paper, and a single ID, the size of a credit card. He laid the knife down and lifted the first small booklet, touched the glossy texture, and flipped it over to stare at the cover. In the center was the two-tailed lion, the symbol of Luxembourg that dated back—in its essence, at least—to Henry V, Count of Luxembourg in the early thirteenth century.
He’d chosen Luxembourg for its small size and the fact that it allowed for dual citizenship, which would enable him the flexibility of emigrating outside the European Union, should the need arise, without adopting another alias.
For now, Greece was the destination.
He had selected one of the poorest areas in Europe, a region called Thessaly, where he’d acquired three kilometers of waterfront for almost nothing. The country was poor enough that the government did not have the resources to interfere in marital affairs. No police would intrude in their private lives. Specifically, no official channels existed for Bella to pursue relief when he punished her. Once they were there, she couldn’t leave him. Thessaly was affordable enough to enable him to buy a palatial home, secure it completely, and hire domestic help without the need for additional income if he was unable to work.
Or if he didn’t want to. Keeping Bella might prove enough to occupy his time. The idea that there would be nothing else demanding his attention was deeply satisfying.
Thessaly’s position on the Aegean Sea meant the climate was mild. He hated cold weather, and the region of Thessaly, with an average annual low of forty-eight degrees Fahrenheit in January, suited him perfectly.
As promised, the passports were slightly worn. He opened his own first. His hair darkened, his eyes small behind the odd, square glasses. The nose had been thinned, his eyes brought slightly closer together in the picture. These changes would prevent a match between his old and new identities. At the same time, they were subtle to the human eye. A rugby accident, he would say if someone mentioned his nose seemed wider.
In the picture, he didn’t look like a powerful man, and for the purposes of their escape, that was a good thing. His appearance was unassuming, forgettable. Regardless of whether he looked like a Luxembourgian, the new appearance differed enough from his current appearance, and that was the goal. His name read “Henry Alexander Meyer.” Meyer was a common enough surname in Luxembourg and easily transferable across borders.
With a stir of excitement, he picked up Bella’s. Held it between his flat palms as though it were a piece of her. And it was. Soon it would be her identity. He squeezed his eyes shut.
How long he had waited. How much he had suffered.
He pressed his palms together until the edge of the passport imprinted its shape into his palms and then slowly released it, letting the book fall into his left hand.
Her signature was on the first page, exactly as he remembered it. Too illegible to read, it worked as well for her new name as it had for her old. His fingers detected the ridges of the pen. A perfect forgery.
He flipped to her photograph and brought the document close to study it. He’d wanted to get her under the knife before they left the country, but he’d finally rejected the idea. Too much paperwork, too much risk.
No, there would be no opportunity for surgery to drastically alter her appearance, not before they made their way to Greece. Perhaps later. Getting her through the international borders would be determined by how different he could make her look without the help of surgery.
In the image, Bella’s long, dark wavy hair had been cropped short to her head, the curl eliminated. A pixie cut. It made her appear young, silly. She would hate it. The idea pleased him. Another set of lessons to add to his preparations.
He would have to learn to cut hair.
He’d mastered German and French, and he’d started into Greek with gusto, though learning a brand-new alphabet made for much slower progress. No one would expect an expat to know the language, but he wanted to—at least enough to understand the people around him, particularly those who would be in his home.
He practiced his French and German constantly. Using burner phones, he parked on various streets in downtown Greenville and made calls. He phoned hotels in the cities, phoned businesses in smaller towns, and made calls to government offices. Never twice to one place, never to anywhere he might visit.
Testing the language. Testing his skill.
He was nearly there.
In the photograph, Bella’s blue eyes had become brown, and she, too, wore a pair of glasses. Hers were round, fitting for her narrow face. Isabelle Eleanor Meyer, she was called. So she would still be called Bella.
She would always be Bella.
He flipped the page and saw the stamps. He had paid extra for passports that weren’t brand-new. He found a stamp from Australia dated from last Christmas. A beautiful time to go, when it was balmy down under. He compared it to the stamp in his own book. A different page, the same date. Canada this past summer. As requested, the passports showed only a single entry into the United States, just one week ago. His own passport showed several other trips—Japan and India, something in a foreign script he couldn’t make out. Work trips, of course. He would be someone who traveled for work. A multilingual financier.
Still standing at the counter, he checked each of the two documents page by page, twice through. Satisfied that they were what he had paid for, he turned his attention to the single card—a driver’s license, his. In the picture, he wore the same square glasses, showed the same changed nose, but his hair had been tinted slightly darker. His name read the same as the passport, his birthdate identical as well, making him five years older and reversing the day and months of his birthdays to make them easy to remember. Instead of April 9, his birthday was documented as September 4.
He had done the same for Bella, but because her birthday was January 18, he had dropped the 1 from 18 and changed it to August 1. She, too, was five years older.
He unfolded the two pages and read their birth certificates, hers from Brazil and his from Luxembourg. He had chosen her country of birth carefully. She did not look Brazilian. Far from it. But Brazil was a calculated choice. A country with a large number of expats, Brazil was also a country without a stable government and a fractured justice system. If someone wanted to check on Bella’s birth certificate, navigating the Brazilian bureaucracy would buy him months, if not years.
He folded the pages and stacked the documents.
Forty thousand dollars these had cost him. Forty thousand dollars to be able to live freely with his wife as his servant, his slave.
It was a small price to pay.
His phone chirped a reminder. Time to go. A smile spread on his lips, the white of his teeth reflecting in the brushed steel of the refrigerator door. On his knees, he slid out the oven drawer and removed the fireproof box that lived in the wall behind the drawer. He punched in his five-digit code and added the documents to the stash of cash he kept there, only a small portion of the total he was amassing.
With the drawer back in place, he wiped his hands and went to his bedroom to change for his date, dropping the manila envelope in the trash as he left the kitchen. Tomorrow he would finish scanning the last of his files and shred the hard copies.
He had listed the last of his collections on eBay—the Mont Blanc pens he kept in his den. He was squeezing every last dollar out of his current life. He didn’t know how much he would need, how long he’d be gone, or if he’d be back. He’d gone through most of the clothes, whittled the closets down to only the items he would take and a few things to get him through the next few months.
So close.
When he was done, he would leave behind only the furniture and the house to be sold. And his bank account number to collect the sales proceeds.
She opened the door in a yellow floral dress—one of the three he had given her from Bella’s closet. She filled it out beautifully. Perhaps a little too well. She was not as lean as Bella. Bustier.
Not everything was perfect.
As was their established pattern, they said nothing. Silence made it easier to build the fantasy, because her voice was too high, too Southern. The years in Seattle and San Francisco had leached the accent from Bella’s voice. He’d noticed the change when they were together last year. He’d had a recording of her. He’d had her voice. It had been taken away. Evidence.
Despite all his planning, he’d been careless. Careless in setting up that room in his own home, in outfitting it with the video of her in her aunt’s garage. Careless in keeping the necklace he’d taken from her aunt’s house, the one she’d told him about when they were dating.
That he’d remembered the necklace spoke to an earlier part of their relationship, back when he’d listened to the inane details of her childhood. In those days, he hadn’t understood the draw Bella had for him, his need for her so consuming, so complete. Later, he’d realized his desire for her had been born the first time he’d seen her with her father. The two of them had emerged from her father’s office at the firm, and he’d thought she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. But it wasn’t her face, which was attractive but not ideal, or her body, which was a little thin for his tastes.
It was her expression—the way she looked at Sam Schwartzman.
Spencer wanted that.
He wanted her to love him that completely. He wanted to take her father’s place. No, he wanted more than that. He wanted to be the only person she looked at. He wanted to be her obsession, to own her.
And in working to make himself the center of her world, he, too, had become obsessed. As a result, he’d been unable to hold back on their first date, unable to control himself.
Expose (Dr. Schwartzman Series Book 3) Page 12
