Set Free

by Anthony Bidulka

  “I shouldn’t do this.”

  We were in a familiar setting. Living room. Lighting too dim. Jenn on the couch, sitting on her feet, laptop on her thigh. Me in the chair next to her. Blinds drawn, just in case some reporter had nothing better to do than swing by for a visit. Phones off.

  “You’re not,” I countered. We’d discussed this. She’d agreed. “All you’re doing is reviewing an old file, out loud. I happen to be in the same room.”

  She ignored my less-than-airtight reasoning. “Jaspar, are you absolutely certain you want to do this?”

  “Are you kidding? After what I found in Hobart? It’s more obvious than ever that there’s more to Katie than meets the eye.”

  “And it’s just as obvious that she’s somebody we have to be very careful of.”

  “She doesn’t scare me.”

  “Well she scares me.”

  “Have you talked to her? I mean since the interview?”

  “No. She’s been texting and calling. I think she thinks she did me a favor.”

  “She thinks she did the world a favor.”

  “Maybe we should just let this go, Jaspar. Move on with our lives.”

  “Haven’t you already done that?” I regretted the comment as soon as I made it. Blame, accusation, hurt, all rolled into one stupid collection of words and petty inflection.

  “You’re the one who’s always saying everyone deals with things in their own way,” she flared. “How dare you act like I don’t care about what’s going on? Or what happened to you? To us! I go to work to make myself feel better. I work to forget.”

  “Jenn, I’m sorry. You know I am. I’m doing the exact same thing. I’m working to forget.”

  “No, you’re not. Your work is writing thoughtful, entertaining, beautiful words that make people feel good. What you’re doing now is mean and ugly and vengeful and…”

  “…and true.”

  “The truth doesn’t always have to be told!” she proclaimed. “Sometimes allowing a lie to exist is the better, smarter choice.”

  I lowered my eyes and considered this. Was she right? She often was, about many things. I’ve always fully admitted that the mind of my wife is substantially more logical and pragmatic than my own. And over the past months, I’d been making mistakes. Huge ones. I used to be a man who trusted his gut instincts. Now I’d grown to doubt them. It didn’t feel good.

  “I don’t know what’s driving me, Jenn, I really don’t. But I just…I have to do this. Something inside of me is making me do this. I don’t know where it’s coming from or where it’s going to lead or what it’ll end up being, but I just know I have to do it. But I can’t without your help.”

  She expelled a deep, troubled sigh. We looked at each other for a full minute. Me, laying bare my need, my fear, my anxiety, my uncertainty. She, considering what to do with it.

  “What do you want to know?” she asked.

  Chapter 51

  Jenn scrolled through several documents on her computer before beginning her report. “The first time I met Katie, she had come into the office looking for a lawyer. It looks like that was in March of last year.” She read a bit further to remind herself of details. “She wanted to know what her options were in forcing an ex-boyfriend to return some items he’d taken when their relationship ended. Most importantly their cat.”

  “Name?”

  “Fluffy.”

  I stared at her. “The boyfriend.”

  “Also Fluffy.”

  We laughed. We actually laughed. It felt strange, but good, like something we hadn’t done in ages and had forgotten how much we liked.

  She searched and came up with a name. “Calvin. No last name. It was a non-starter anyway. There wasn’t much she could do. Not much I could do. You know, come to think of it, that was probably the reason we ended up becoming friends. Within ten seconds I knew there wasn’t a case. But I felt sorry for her. I wanted to help her. She was very friendly, easy to talk to, and funny. Despite the circumstances, we laughed a lot in that first meeting. It felt like we’d known each other forever. So when she called a couple of days later and asked to meet for drinks, I said yes. I remember thinking about the last time I’d had a girlfriend, or spent time with someone who wasn’t from work or you. I couldn’t come up with an answer.”

  “I remember you telling me how guilty you felt the first time you went out with her. Because you weren’t at work or coming home to me and Mikki.”

  “You’re the one who made me understand just how badly I needed the diversion, that Katie might actually be good for me.”

  I cracked a weak, apologetic smile. “Sorry ‘bout that.”

  “Oh, you were right about the concept,” she was quick to say. “I was the one who picked the wrong person. Before I knew it, we were seeing each other at least once a week.”

  “What did you talk about?”

  She gave me a look.

  “You can skip the descriptions of my awesome lovemaking skills. What I want to know is what you found out about her. What did you learn about her family, her background? Did she have other friends? Did you meet any of them? Where did she live? That kind of thing.”

  “Jaspar, you know nothing about girl talk.”

  “That should be a good thing in a husband, no?”

  “I have her home address and where she was working at the time in the file, but other than that we weren’t exchanging biographies. We talked sex, shoes, and salad dressing.”

  “That doesn’t sound like you.”

  “Which is why I loved it. It had nothing to do with me being a lawyer or a mom. It was just about being girls.”

  “Really?” I liked it, supported it, hell, I even pushed her into it, but I still found it difficult to picture this puerile side of my wife.

  “Really. And I know this is going to sound crazy,” she read my mind, “but I miss it.”

  I set aside my nearly blank iPad on which I’d meant to take notes.

  I got up, stood before my wife, legs slightly apart, hands at my sides. My eyes languorously roved her body, halting momentarily on her breasts, before moving lower.

  She stared up at me, her beautiful face at first curious, then softening as she understood my intentions.

  I slowly began to unbutton my shirt.

  She pushed aside her laptop, swung her feet to the floor and subtly parted her thighs.

  “I can’t help with shoes and salad,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper, “but I can certainly talk sex.”

  Her deep blue eyes sparkled in the shadowy light. “Is that all you want? Talk?” Her voice had taken on a low, syrupy quality that never failed to entice me.

  “You know me,” I responded, “I talk a lot with my hands.” My shirt slipped to the floor.

  In one fluid motion Jenn repositioned herself, fingers moving to the top snap of my jeans. In seconds I was standing entirely naked in front of her. I can’t remember that happening ever before. Like many couples who’d been together for multiple years, we’d developed a routine: a well-honed sexual ballet that worked for us. In the past, I’d be on her like she was a picnic and I was a big horny ant. My wife is a stunning woman with a gorgeous body. Whenever I saw an opportunity to see it unclothed, I was on the job in an instant. Oftentimes, by the time I’d enter her, she’d be stripped bare and I’d still be fully clothed. She’d have worked me into such a frothing lather, the best I could manage was a quick unzip.

  This time would be different.

  Chapter 52

  My life had become a schlocky detective novel. By day I was an intrepid investigator, ferreting out pieces of the puzzle that was Katie Edwards. By night I sat in surveillance—at her office if she was working late, or outside her home.

  Since first undertaking the scheme to expose Katie, I’d discovered an important distinction: as an author, people generally like your attention; as a detective, people do their best to hide from it. Which makes finding stuff a lot harder. Turns out, I’m a rotten detect
ive. So far, I’d turned up nothing useful. Tonight was no different.

  Most of the people who’d worked alongside Katie on her rise to TV stardom had pretty much the same thing to say: she was driven, worked hard, was single-mindedly career focused, rarely socialized. There were neither warm fuzzies nor cold denunciations. They didn’t outright like her or hate her. They simply didn’t know her very well.

  One thing kept me digging: Katie’s friends. Other than my wife, I couldn’t find a single one. When people would tell me she didn’t socialize, I thought to myself: she doesn’t socialize with you. A lot of people keep their personal and professional lives separate. But that was the problem. If Katie had a personal life, I couldn’t find it. No pals she’d hang out with on weekends. No boyfriends. No bars or restaurants she frequented. From what I could tell, Katie got up every morning, went to work, worked hard—I had to give her that—then, except for regular errand type stuff, she returned home and stayed there until it was time to do it all over again the next day.

  On nights when Jenn was working late, and some when she wasn’t, I’d taken to grabbing a sandwich or takeout sushi and having dinner in my car outside of Katie’s apartment. Once again, I found myself having no clear idea of what it was I was looking for, other than some sign that she had a life outside of work.

  Katie was nothing if not consistent. If the people of Boston knew her history, they’d be wise to be concerned about her spending all her time alone doing nothing but concentrating on work. The last time she’d done that, she’d gutted me on national television, and the time before she’d destroyed an entire town. A frightening resume. The big question: was she preparing to do it again?

  By nine o’clock, food gone, iPhone and iPad batteries dying, and absolutely nothing happening, I was fighting the temptation to nod off. It was time to go home. And maybe, I was beginning to seriously consider, it was time to stop this altogether.

  I was about to reach for the key and start the engine when the passenger side door opened.

  She got in.

  “H-hi,” I stuttered, stunned.

  “Hi, daddy.”

  Chapter 53

  Eleven Months Earlier

  “Hi, who’s this?”

  “Mikki, it’s Gail Dolan. I’m Melissa’s mom.”

  “Oh…hi.” Mikki frowned, surprised. How had Melissa’s mom gotten her number? She and Melissa Dolan hadn’t hung out since grade three.

  “Listen, Mikki, this is so last minute, but I know you girls are always looking for extra money to buy make-up and stuff and I’m in a real bind. I’ve got a slight emergency and I need someone to look after Gavin, Melissa’s little brother. It’s just for a couple of hours, right after school today. You get off at three, right?”

  Mikki checked her watch. It was nearing two o’clock and she was walking to her last class of the day. “Yeah. But I usually go right home after school.”

  “Of course. I know where you live. I could pick you up in front of your house at four. If you give me your mom or dad’s number, I’ll call and ask them if it’s okay. I can have you back no later than six-thirty. That sound alright?”

  “Can’t Melissa do it?”

  “She’s got some kind of student meeting thing after school. I’m really desperate, Mikki. I’ll pay you double because it’s so last minute. It would really help me out.”

  “Uh, sure.” Mrs. Dolan was right. The extra cash would come in handy to supplement her unfairly austere allowance. Mikki knew both her parents would be home late that evening, so she could probably get away with the babysitting gig without either of them knowing about it. But, they’d just had the “trust talk.” Her parents had agreed to loosen the reigns a bit on things like allowing her to stay in the house alone. She didn’t want to screw that up. So she gave the woman her dad’s cell phone number—he was more likely to pick up—and agreed to the job.

  At four o’clock on the nose, a small brown car pulled up on the street outside the Wills’ house. Mikki waved from where she’d been waiting on the front steps. She’d had to rush after last period. The walk home from school was only a few minutes, but she needed extra time to drop off homework for her best friend who’d been sick and missed school that day. Grabbing her things, she dashed down the path and into the back seat of the waiting vehicle.

  “Hi Mikki,” Mrs. Dolan said, turning in her seat to fix her young passenger with a wide, sunny smile.

  Mikki noticed the ridiculously big, way-out-of-fashion sunglasses and oversized, floppy hat. She wondered why one of the woman’s friends didn’t suggest a make-over.

  “I got you this. I hope you like Reece’s Pieces.”

  Mikki accepted the DQ Blizzard with a nod. It was her favorite. She’d never actually met Melissa’s mother before, but she was pretty sure her mom had, at some parent-teacher thing ages ago. “Thanks, Mrs. Dolan. Did you talk to my dad?”

  “Yes I did,” she said with a musical lilt, turning to face the road and slip the car into drive. “Don’t forget to put on your seatbelt, sweetie.”

  By the time the car pulled into the carport attached to a small house in an older, rundown, East Boston neighborhood, Mikki was fast asleep. The drugs in the ice cream treat had done their job.

  Gail took a minute to observe the activity level on the street. It was typically quiet during the day, and thankfully today was no different. She knew her landlord, old Mrs. Wazlowski, would be out, attending her weekly bridge game at the community center. Not that any of that mattered. The distance between the car and the private entrance to Gail’s basement suite apartment was less than five feet, and at this time of day, all in shadow. No one would see her helping the droopy girl inside.

  Gail had Craigslist to thank for her new home. She’d been renting a perfectly respectable apartment closer to downtown. It was small but cute and she was sorry to have to give it up. But the tenancy agreement precluded having a pet, never mind a thirteen-year-old girl held hostage for a few weeks. And Gail needed extra space for that second person. A person who needed to be kept quiet, or more accurately, couldn’t be heard. She’d searched the online classifieds website and found exactly what she needed.

  The house wasn’t in her favorite part of town, and now her commute to work was longer, but in all other ways she couldn’t have asked for a better set up. Mrs. Wazlowski was an elderly widow. Her son, long moved on and disgracefully neglectful of his mother, had been one of those kids who was always in a band or practicing to be in one. She and her husband, being the type of parents who did whatever they could to encourage their child’s developing talent, had refitted a room in their basement to make it soundproof. It was a place where little Wazlowski junior could drum, or strum, or screech his head off, without disturbing the rest of the family or eliciting complaints from the neighbors. Once the son moved on and her husband died, Mrs. Wazlowski wisely decided to convert the basement into a rental property, from which she could make a few extra dollars.

  Mikki Wills was pretty, popular, and purposeless. Exactly the kind of girl Gail Dolan detested. Even so, she’d sacrificed her own lifestyle and committed a significant chunk of her savings to setting the girl up in teenybopper heaven. Except for the part about being kept under lock and key.

  The room in the Wazlowski basement had been repainted bubblegum pink, the single bed outfitted with matching sheets and covered with stuffed animals. There was a flat screen TV, Blue Ray player, and large stack of movies Gail believed any thirteen-year-old girl would enjoy. There was even a small selection of makeup, lotions, perfumes, and hair care products. If that wasn’t enough to keep her busy, Gail stocked the room with books, and a selection of magazines she planned to refresh every week. Most young girls like Mikki were happy as clams, so long as they could keep up to date on every piece of breaking news in the world of celebrity gossip and fashion.

  Gail was quite certain the one thing Mikki would not be happy about was having to give up her phone. Before destroying it, Gail would check the roster
of calls registered the day of the abduction. Most would be to and from her school chums. There would be at least one call from an unknown number. Not so unusual. But even if investigators did follow it up, all they’d learn is that the call originated from a disposable phone, now swimming with the fishes at the bottom of the Charles. Yes, Mikki Wills would be upset at being completely cut off from the cyber world. But there was no reason the child shouldn’t have to make a few sacrifices of her own. It’s not like she was staying in the apartment as a paying guest. Well, not exactly. If all went to plan, Gail certainly expected to benefit greatly from the girl’s presence.

  The room had its own bathroom. And Gail had hired a handyman to build a swinging flap at the bottom of the door—like a pet door—through which meals, magazines, and whatever else the girl might need could be delivered. Although she’d made some effort to disguise her look and voice, Gail did not want her new “roommate” having any more opportunity to look at her face than was absolutely necessary.

  Even before the teen arrived, Gail had prepared the first note. It had been strangely enjoyable. Planning for and creating the ransom letter, cutting out letters and phrases from newspapers and magazines, fashioning the message: it was kidnapping-arts-and-crafts.

  By the time Mikki Wills woke up that first day, dazed, confused, and scared out of her mind, she was fully ensconced in Junior Wazlowski’s former music room. Neither she nor her captor knew it at the time, but it would become her home for considerably longer than either ever imagined.

  Chapter 54

  After Katie Edwards revealed the lie, my lie—about being held prisoner in the Atlas Mountains—everything I’d written in Set Free was tainted, soundly derided, discounted, then promptly forgotten.