by Beverly Long
He’d worn a jogging suit with the hood up. He’d had a towel draped around his neck and a backpack slung over one shoulder. Anybody walking past him wouldn’t have given him a second look—would have just assumed that he’d been working out in the hotel gym. He kept his head down the entire time, never giving the camera a look at his face.
The black-and-white tape supported the theory that today’s intruder was likely the same person who had pushed Meg toward the canal and then run up the stairs. He was the same height, weight and moved with the same fluid grace.
He opened the outer office door with a key.
When Cruz saw that, he spun around to face Sanjoi who was standing in the doorway. “How would he have gotten a key?”
The man shrugged his thin shoulders. “I don’t know. All the executives and their administrative assistants have a key to their own office suite and then there are a few master keys that can unlock any door. But we keep them on a tight string. None of our keys have come up missing lately.”
“That doesn’t mean they couldn’t have been copied.”
The man shook his head. “They’re all clearly marked as a Do Not Duplicate key.”
With the right amount of money, that wouldn’t have been too big a problem to get around. And Tom Looney in Maintenance and Troy Blakely in Security would probably have both had access to master keys. He doubted somebody from Accounts Payable would have had that same access but Mason Hawkins had something better perhaps—the Charlotte connection.
“You have your key?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Okay. We need to ask Charlotte that same question. What’s her address?”
“She lives with her mother. She’s a lovely lady. I don’t want her getting upset.”
He cocked his head.
“Oh, fine.” She grabbed a sheet of paper off Charlotte’s desk and scribbled something down. “Can you not tell her that I know about her and Hawkins? At least until I decide what I should do?”
“I’ll do my best.” He flipped a button and watched the tape again. When the intruder came out, the camera got a good view of the backpack. Cruz assumed that’s where he’d been carrying the blood. It was hard to tell if it looked lighter.
It looked...new. Yes, definitely new.
Cruz studied the intruder. In fact, everything the man had on looked new. His white athletic shoes didn’t have a mark on them. The dark jogging suit wasn’t faded or stretched out.
Cruz drummed his nails on the desk. It was a long shot but he didn’t have much else. “Play that part again,” he said.
Detective Myers hit Rewind and when they got to the part where the backpack was visible, Cruz motioned for him to pause the tape. There was a logo on the bag. “I need this frame blown up,” he said.
Detective Myers stepped forward. He was stroking his chin, looking thoughtful. “We identify the brand, find out where it’s sold locally, and then see if we can trace the purchase.”
Cruz nodded, grateful that Myers was tracking with him. But when Meg stepped forward, a puzzled look on her face, he knew she wasn’t.
“It’s a combination of old-fashioned feet-on-the-street,” he explained, “and using available technology. This guy’s shoes, jogging suit and backpack all look new. So, maybe he bought them at the same time. If it was recent enough, maybe Detective Myers and his team can jog some store clerk’s memories. If that doesn’t work, technology may be our friend. Almost everybody captures their sales records electronically now. The store should be able to tell us if they sold shoes, a jogging suit and this brand of backpack in one transaction. There will be a time stamp on the transaction. So, maybe we can get a better photo of him at the store. Or maybe we get even luckier and we can match the transaction code up with credit card activity. Then we have an address.”
“You make it sound so easy,” Meg said faintly.
Myers shook his head. “Nothing is ever easy. But Cruz is right. We may get lucky, and given that we don’t have much else, I’ll take luck.”
Meg heard a noise. She turned and saw Jana at the door. Before she could react, Cruz had moved. He scooped up the little girl and walked back into the reception area. Meg followed him and saw that Sanjoi was on the phone. He looked up, shrugged and mouthed, “Sorry.”
“Hey, don’t you have some macaroni and cheese calling your name?” Cruz asked the little girl.
She shook her head. “Macaroni and cheese doesn’t talk,” she said.
“I know...I meant... Never mind,” Cruz said. He tickled the little girl’s ribs and she giggled. He glanced back at Meg. “Let’s call it a night. Myers and his team will let us know if they find anything.” Once they were through the door, he moved close. “Does it make you nervous that in-house security couldn’t even contain a four-year-old?”
She smiled, grateful that she still could. He hadn’t even needed to tickle her ribs.
Jana poked her head over Cruz’s shoulder and looked at Meg. “What happened to your office?” Jana asked.
“It got messed up,” Meg said.
“Why?”
Because someone hates me. “I’m not sure, Jana.”
“Do you have to clean it up? I always have to clean up my mess. Mommy says.”
Cruz turned his head. “I doubt that you’ll be able to work in there tomorrow. Myers won’t be done with the scene.”
Jana twisted in Cruz’s arms. “Tomorrow Uncle Cruz and I are going to Six Flags and ride the roller coaster. Can Meg come, too, Uncle Cruz? Please?”
“Meg may have other plans,” he said very carefully.
Yes. She definitely should come up with some plans. But right now her head was empty of everything but the absolute horror of seeing her desk covered in dried blood. She wanted to forget it all. “I’ve never been to Six Flags,” she said.
Cruz’s eyes lit up. “There’s a first time for everything.”
Jana seemed to catch the subtle tension that was flowing between the two adults. Her head swiveled from one to the other. “Pretty please,” she said, to no one in particular.
Cruz stopped walking, forcing Meg to also stop. “Someone is intent upon creating havoc in my life,” she said. “I don’t want Jana to be touched by that. The two of you should go.”
Cruz considered her protest. “Don’t tell anybody where we’re going. Don’t tell Slater, Charlotte or anybody else who might be curious. There’s no way anybody will know where we’ll be.”
A whole day without worry over what some crazy person might do next. It sounded like heaven.
“He or she might follow us,” Meg said.
Cruz shook his head. “I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Meg chewed on the corner of her lip. “Okay. I’ll go.”
* * *
CRUZ GOT UP EARLY, checked on both Jana and Meg, who were still sleeping, made sure the bolt lock was secure behind him and left the hotel. Fifteen minutes later, he was waiting at the corner of Charlotte’s street, headed toward her house, when she pulled up to the four-way stop. She was alone. He remembered Meg’s comment that she didn’t want Charlotte’s mother to be upset. Maybe the conversation should occur here.
He stepped out of the car and waved her down. She didn’t wave back but she didn’t take off in her car. He approached the car and she rolled down her window.
“Detective,” she said, looking in her rearview mirror.
There was nobody coming. He didn’t care. If someone happened by, they could just go around. “Morning, Charlotte,” he said.
“This is a little surprising,” she said, irritation evident in her voice.
“Where you headed?” he asked.
She tilted her chin down. “Not that it’s any business of yours but I go to a yoga class on Sunday mornings.”
He’d never been to a yoga class but something didn’t seem right. She was in full makeup and had on a nice shirt and pants. “Yeah, well, I have a couple questions for you,” he said. “About your relationship with Ma
son Hawkins.”
Her upper lip twitched. Once, then again. “He worked in accounting. There were times when he’d need to consult with me on an invoice. Look, I don’t want to be late.”
It was time to cut to the chase. “I saw the two of you yesterday, on the street.”
The way her face colored, he suspected that what he’d seen might have been the more platonic part of the day. He let her wonder.
“I don’t understand what business it is of yours,” she said, obviously deciding the best defense was a whiny offense.
“He’s on a short list of people who might have a grudge against Meg. Definitely my business.”
She shook her head. “I almost took him off the list before I gave it to Meg but I couldn’t take the chance that she’d remember his departure. He isn’t behind any of Meg’s problems. He’s moved on.”
The man was in his boxers in the middle of the afternoon. “Right. How long have the two of you had a thing?”
She shrugged. “We started going out a couple months before he was terminated. So I guess almost a year.” She pulled her lip and got lipstick on her front teeth. “Does Meg know about you being here?”
“No,” he lied. “She’d be pretty surprised, right?”
“I imagine. He wanted to keep it quiet. He didn’t like people knowing his business. He was always asking me if anybody was talking about him.”
Hawkins had been using her, maybe trying to keep one step ahead of anybody who was interested in looking at the financials that didn’t quite add up. For the first time, Cruz felt almost sorry for her. But he still had an uneasy feeling that there was something off here. He decided to take a chance.
“I suppose Hawkins is an okay guy,” he said, “of course, he’s no Scott Slater.”
She narrowed her eyes. “It wasn’t as if I’d have much of a chance there,” she said. “Especially considering that your wife is ahead of me in line.”
Now the claws were coming out. And he felt the pain of the verbal scratch. Was Meg in line? Were the two women competing for Slater’s attention?
If they were, he didn’t think Meg realized it. She seemed genuinely fond of Charlotte.
“If I find out that Hawkins had anything to do with any of this, or that you knew about it, I won’t hesitate to bring you both down,” Cruz said.
“Take your best shot, Detective.”
Chapter Twelve
By twenty after seven, Cruz was back at the hotel. Meg and Jana were both dressed and the four-year-old was leaping around the hotel room, as if she was a reindeer on uppers.
“Sorry,” he mouthed to Meg.
She smiled. “Where were you?”
He didn’t want Charlotte to ruin their day. “I’ll tell you later. Let’s have breakfast.”
They ate in the hotel restaurant. Cruz and Jana both had pancakes and bacon, Meg had oatmeal and fruit. Meg could see a few of the younger, female waitstaff huddled together and thought they were probably speculating on who Cruz was and how Meg came to be eating at his table.
When it came time to leave the hotel, Cruz led them out the back door of the hotel, to a car that was parked in the alley. He reached above the front tire on the driver’s side and snagged a key. “Get in,” he said.
“What happened to your other rental car?” Meg asked.
“It’s still there. I just figured it wouldn’t hurt to drive something different.”
She didn’t know why she was surprised. Cruz always had a plan A, B and C. He’d said that he’d make sure they weren’t followed. This was probably just one of many precautions he’d take to keep that promise.
Once he got Jana buckled in, he slid into the driver’s seat. He wore green cargo shorts, a white T-shirt and sandals. He looked very much like the man she’d married six years ago.
“Need directions?” she asked.
“I think I’ve got it,” Cruz said.
It was the last thing either of them said to one another. It was not silent, however, in the car. Jana kept up a running monologue. Meg learned about the little girl’s favorite colors, her favorite animals, things she would not eat no matter what and why girls were better than boys. When she said, “Girls get to sit to go potty,” Cruz smiled. Other than that, he was hard to read.
Or she might have just been perceptively dull. Because her head was whirling. Why had she agreed to this? It was a huge responsibility to bring a four-year-old to an amusement park. There would be big crowds, lots of geography and lots of temptation.
What if she ate something and got sick?
What if she got too much sun?
Oh, God. What if she got lost?
“Maybe we shouldn’t go,” she said. “You hate crowds.”
Cruz turned to look at her. “I’m turning into the parking lot,” he said. “We’re here.”
“But...”
Jana was scrambling out of her car seat. “Let’s go,” she said.
There was no stopping this train. Maybe she should tie herself to the tracks. It might be less painful. “Okay,” she said, opening her door. “Here goes nothing.”
There was a line to get in. Jana danced around them. Meg never took her eyes off her. Once they were through the gate, Cruz pulled Jana aside. “Hang on,” he said. “We’re going to do it all. Every last thing. And eat all kinds of things that have high sugar content. But you need to stay with us and not go running off. And if we get separated, don’t leave the park with anyone but Meg or me. No matter what. Come to this spot right here, at the entrance, by the big pink umbrellas. We will find you.”
He kept his voice calm but she could tell that Jana was listening. “I know the rules, Uncle Cruz,” she said.
It was a sad world that four-year-olds understood so much.
He smiled. “Good. I hope your aunt Meg does. What’s the number one rule, Meg?”
“Have fun?” she asked.
He shook his head. “That’s rule number two. Rule number one is, don’t sit behind me on the roller coaster if you’re going to throw up.”
“Hurl,” Jana corrected. She bent at the waist and made an exaggerated sound of vomiting. She was smiling when she straightened up. “That’s what my mom calls it. Hurling. And when you do it, you have to bend way over.” She demonstrated the move again.
Cruz narrowed his eyes. “Your mother could benefit from charm school.”
Jana shook her head. “She’s way too old for school. You try it, Uncle Cruz.”
Shaking his head, he bent at the waist and made the obligatory gagging sounds. Jana clapped her hands in approval. “Now you,” she said, pointing to Meg.
“Meg doesn’t have to—” Cruz said.
“I’ll do it.” She bent at the waist and gave it her best shot.
“That was pretty good,” Jana said. “But you got to be fast.” She whipped the trunk of her small body forward, almost bending double at the waist. Then she did it again, just in case the adults were too dumb to get it the first time.
“Enough,” Cruz said. “Let’s go.”
* * *
MEG DIDN’T HURL. Got a little motion-sick once or twice but managed to hold it together. Nothing seemed to bother Jana, except there was one tense moment when it appeared that she might not be tall enough for a ride.
“How tall are you?” Cruz asked, staring at the notice.
She edged up to Cruz, ran a hand across the top of her head and hit him at the waist. “This tall,” Jana said.
Cruz looked at Meg. “There you have it,” he said.
Fortunately, this tall was exactly a half inch more than what she needed. Their next stop was the Ferris wheel and Meg didn’t complain when Jana wanted to ride it three times in a row. She loved it just as much. Then it was time for lunch. Meg led the way and they found hot dogs, chips and icy cold slushes. Perfection.
“I want to do the water rides,” Jana proclaimed.
Cruz shrugged. “It’s a hundred in the shade. Best idea I’ve heard all day.”
T
en minutes later, they were in a small rubber boat, enjoying a perfectly nice gentle water ride, when, out of nowhere, they dropped what had to be fifty feet into a pool of water. Jana squealed and laughed and Meg hoped that her stomach would catch up soon.
She lifted the hem of her soaked blouse.
“Hey,” Cruz said, looking around at the crowd.
“It’s okay,” she said. She pulled off the shirt.
Cruz smiled. “You wore your suit?”
“I knew there were a lot of water rides. And everybody has a cell phone these days,” she added.
“And you didn’t want to win the wet T-shirt contest,” he teased.
She wrinkled her nose and shook her head.
“Always the Girl Scout,” he said.
Yeah, well Girl Scouts were supposed to be always prepared and she was totally unprepared three minutes later for the feeling of Cruz’s arms around her and Jana as the three of them crowded into another small boat.
It felt so darn good.
And she felt some of the tension in her body ease up.
“Rapids ahead,” he warned, his mouth close to her ear. “Hold on.”
Maybe he realized her heart was about to flutter right out of her chest.
By late afternoon, Jana was so tired she was starting to trip over her own feet. But she pointed to a sign, advertising that last year’s winner of American Idol was appearing that night. “I want to go,” she said. “I saw her on television.”
Cruz shook his head and Jana, who likely wasn’t told no very often, started to cry.
“It’s okay, sweetie,” Meg assured her. “Maybe you can come back again sometime and see her sing. Or maybe see someone else you like. They have all kinds of famous people here. You might get a chance to see someone you like even more.”
It wasn’t a great explanation but it seemed to calm the child down. “Maybe the Jonas Brothers?” she asked.
“Maybe,” Meg said.
Cruz hoisted Jana up onto his shoulders. “Let’s go home,” he said. He started walking toward the gate.
