Panicked, I said, “I’m in Maryland. It will take at least two and a half hours for me to make it there.”
“You have two. And who knows how she and I will get along until you get here.”
He clicked off, and I stared at the phone for only a second before my legs got moving.
“Ethan,” Mr. Lambert called out, but I was already running down the hall.
fifty-one
The garage seemed like it was several miles away. I was panting when my phone vibrated in my pocket again. I answered without looking because I didn’t want to run into a wall or one of the staff.
“Hello.”
“Ethan, it’s Ed Hunt.”
“Is it true?” I huffed out wanting to throttle the man for not telling me.
“So you’ve heard.”
“In a manner of speaking.” I wasn’t sure if they could help me, but I wouldn’t put Jess at risk.
“I’m sorry. I was in court when a judge signed off on Jeff Miller’s release. I didn’t want to wait until I met with you later to tell you. The defense had an emergency hearing this morning, and a colleague of mine went in my place because I couldn’t get out of my other hearing. It’s not his fault though. They had compelling arguments to get him released. We didn’t want to lose our chance to prosecute him in the future, so we had to let him go while we continue to investigate.”
I’d made it to my car. “I have to go.”
“Ethan—”
I hung up and got in the SUV. I tore out of the garage almost destroying the door, impatient for it to lift. I drove like an insane person with no care about being pulled over. My mind worried over the letter’s glued on paper messages I’d been receiving. If I’d told someone about them, would he be free? I shook my head at my inner thoughts. The letters hadn’t been mailed. Either he had someone send them to me or he hadn’t been involved with that. How then had he known where I lived? He’d only been released sometime that day. Then there was a matter of him getting to Pennsylvania. What could possibly be his motivation and fixation on me? I didn’t get it.
Instead, I worried over Jess. She was with him. How did he get to her? Where was the security I’d paid for? And she was carrying my kid. My kid. I’d almost forgotten about that. I had a kid on the way and what was he going to do with her? I didn’t believe Allie. I think she had that Stockholm syndrome people talked about. Allie was safe, but Jess wasn’t. Would he hurt Jess in ways she couldn’t handle? Would she survive?
All I knew was I would give him whatever he wanted if he let her live, even my life.
I pulled up in front of the flat two hours and fifteen minutes later. It was a good thing I’d gassed up on my way to Maryland. I had enough to make the roundtrip back. I’d almost left the car running. Then I thought better of it. If we had to make a hasty getaway, I would need my car. Leaving the keys invited thieves.
In one fluid movement, I barreled through the door after unlocking it. The scene in front of me had me running towards the crumbled body after I pushed the door to slam closed behind me.
The closer I got, I noticed the pool of blood underneath the still figure. I glanced up to see the man standing as if he’d planned to head in my direction even before I appeared. He shrugged.
“You’re late, and I’m afraid when Lissa heard about the baby, she went a little crazy.”
Lissa? He didn’t mean...
A woman stepped from the shadows. Clarissa, I said to myself as I cradled Jess’s head in my lap. My hand froze mid-stroke down her warm skin when it clicked they’d been working together all this time. Although Jess was unresponsive, she was breathing and at that moment I wanted to stop Clarissa’s breath. I’d already figured out where the blood was coming from, and I didn’t have time to mourn all that Jess and I’d lost.
“You crazy bitch,” I yelled.
Mr. Miller’s hand came into view from behind his back bearing witness to his equalizer. The suit he wore must have been the one he’d worn to the hearing earlier that day.
“I think you aren’t in a position to call anyone names.”
“What do you want from me?” My voice was filled with rage, but an edge of panic laced it. Jess was alive, but she hadn’t yet woken up.
“What do I want little brother?”
I wasn’t even shocked. Stunned maybe, but my shock factor had already bottomed out. I didn’t think there was anything anyone could have said to me at that moment that would have astounded me.
When I didn’t gape, his eyes narrowed. “You knew?” I shook my head. Then, he asked, “It doesn’t bother you?”
“Why should it?” I’d asked a question but wasn’t looking for an answer. “If there is anything I learned today, it's that family isn’t made by blood. No brother of mine would do this to me.”
“Only you can’t deny blood, no one can, except father,” he thundered. His tone bordered on a shrill of words. “He picked you over me. When I went and introduced myself to the man, the arrogant bastard offered me a job.” He laughed like it wasn’t funny. “I got him though.”
“You did,” Clarissa agreed while they shared a laugh conspiratorially. I tried not to focus on her because the urge to kill was strong. She’d hurt Jess, and I wanted to wrap my hand around her throat and squeeze. Unfortunately, she wasn’t the one with the gun. Therefore, she wasn’t the immediate threat.
“Just tell me what you want so we can get this over, and I can get Jess help.”
“I want the number.”
I had no clue what he was talking about. I shook my head. “What number?”
“Don’t play games with me Ethan. I worked for that man. I know he was putting money in an offshore account. I had him willing to give me that money for my silence. You messed everything up by killing him.”
The world tilted when I realized my secret was blown. I went stumbling down a kaleidoscope of life hurling back into the memory as fresh as the day it happened. How Miller known? I didn’t understand.
I’d walked into my father’s office needing to talk about things. He was alone. But there, on his desk, was a gun. I’d heard my parents fighting earlier, and Mom had said some horrible things. I’d gotten a glimpse of Dad with Mom’s back pressed against the wall. His fisted hands were on either side of her tear mottled face. She looked very much afraid.
“I could kill you.” His words sounded very convincing. If he’d made any other move, I would have rushed in.
He’d turned from her and began to walk towards the door. I hurried away not wanting to see him yet. I’d waited an hour for things to calm down before coming to talk to him. He stood with his back to me staring out the window lost in thought. The suit he wore was rumpled like he’d slept in it.
I rushed in straight for his desk and got the gun. It shook in my hands as Dad turned.
“Ethan what are you—”
He caught sight of what I held.
“Son, you need to put that down.”
“You said you would kill her,” I accused. I felt the tears rush to my eyes.
His smile held pity. “You love her.”
In retrospect, I understood his statement. Dad knew Mom hated me. In some strange way, I think he was proud that I loved her in spite of her hate.
“That’s good. I know you want to protect her. However, we should discuss this because things aren’t always what they seem.”
“Like choking her while you have sex,” I’d blurted.
He winced, but I noticed then that he was a lot closer.
“Not exactly the best example. Just give me the gun, and we can talk like men.”
I shook my head intending on leaving the office and hiding the gun. It was a childish thought because Dad could have easily gotten a replacement or stabbed her. My eyes blurred in the way one does when emotions wash over you.
Then, we were grappling for the gun. I wouldn’t let him have it, and he was determined to get it from me. The gun went off, and Dad was gone. The back of his head was blown off
with blood splatter everywhere behind him. I’d run from the room and heard Mom scream when she’d come running. I’d waited in my room, sitting on my bed. I’d waited for them to arrest me, but they never did.
The memory flashed ended without Mr. Miller noticing because he was still taking.
“I decided to teach the old man a lesson. I used my minor in Business to take him up on his job offer. Since I was still teaching, I took a part-time position in the accounting department, which turned out to be perfect for setting him up. While he had his board approved salary and bonuses sent to an offshore account, I had checks cut to dummy companies to make his transfers look suspicious. I used the money from those checks to bankroll my campaign.”
He shrugged as if what he said wasn’t criminal.
“I mean, the checks had to be cashed in order to convince the old man that I’d tampered with his company and set him up to take the fall in a Ponzi scheme. His fear of the SEC coming down on him enabled me to persuade him to write a suicide note as insurance if he didn’t give me the correct account number for the offshore account. I’d told him that if the number wasn’t right, I’d use the note as a prop at his death scene. I also warned him I’d kill you and his stupid wife as well to make it look like a murder-suicide. The plan was for me to meet him that night, get the account number in return for not giving a tip about the activities he directed me do to the SEC. They had already begun their routine annual audit of the books. And what happens? You kill the bastard before I could meet him.”
It unnerved me that he spoke so calmly about his scheme as if it were perfectly normal to set up somebody and threaten to kill that person along with his family. However, his words explained a lot. When I hadn’t been immediately arrested for what I’d done because they’d found a suicide note, it hadn’t fit in my head that Dad planned to kill himself. I’d also never believed that he’d stolen money from his investors and partners.
“Now give me the number or I’ll kill her.” His tone was flat as he pointed the gun at Jess’s prone form.
I searched my brain for something when I remembered the number Dad had drilled me to always remember. It was still a password or two of mine so that I wouldn’t forget.
“I think I know the number that you want. But I need something first.”
“I believe I hold all the power here.”
“You may hold the gun, but if Jess’s dies, I have nothing to live for. I’ll die with the number in my head. And I want her gone.” I pointed at Clarissa.
He scrubbed a hand down his face.
“Stupid bitch,” he said shaking his head. He turned to Clarissa, and I realized the mistake of my words a second too late. He shot her dead center of her forehead.
Clarissa dropped. I couldn’t see her body as she fell to the ground behind the sofa. I should have cared, but I didn’t. He pulled out his phone and made a call.
“I need you to come to this address.” He paused listening to what someone said on the other line before he gave that person our location. “I’ll tell you when you get here.”
He hung up. “You better not be bullshitting me, Ethan. I have no problems killing your girlfriend and you. I’ll get the information, one way or the other. Your mom probably has the number, as well.”
I flinched, although I didn’t think Mom knew about that money. I assumed it had to be a lot considering what Mr. Miller was putting me through to get it. However, she wouldn’t be bitching about being broke and living with Aunt Margaret if she had it. I wanted to hate her, but I didn’t. I pitied her. And I didn’t think she deserved to die for either not having the information or not having the money. If she knew about it, it had been spent. And Mr. Miller would be likely to kill her out of spite.
“Are you going to tell me about how you met Clarissa?” I asked to fill the silence as I stroked Jess’s cheek.
“What do you think this is? A movie? Where I, the bad guy, lay it all out for you?”
I shrugged. “We have time,” I said not refuting his assessment.
He sighed. “Let’s just say she found me.”
That wasn’t a lot to go on, but it wasn’t the most important unanswered question.
“Carly?”
He laughed, and I wanted to hurt him.
“Want to free your mind?”
I didn’t answer not sure if I did he would continue.
“Little brother, you sure do know how to break the hearts of women. I bet that’s what they called you as a child, a future heartbreaker.”
I continued to remain mute although my jaw hurt with all the clenching. He sucked in a breath and nervously rubbed at the bottom of his nose with the back of his hand. It was slightly red. I took a leap and guessed he was a cocaine user. His nose irritation was a reminder of my sordid past.
“Carly, like the rest, had Ethan problems. Although she was stronger, or rather she pretended to be. Maybe that’s because she had that thing with her Uncle. The girl was twisted, maybe even more than me.”
He chuckled again as if remembering something.
“She called that night you crashed the car. She said she was afraid, that you’d flipped out. I knew she exaggerated because I’d been watching you. You had been the perfect son despite your evil adoptive mother. That was until you accidently killed Daddy and decided to take partying to the next level. And yes, I met the bitch once. But back to Carly. A plan formed in my mind the more she spoke. She was alone in the woods walking away from where you’d left her. It was perfect. Everyone would suspect you if she went missing because you’d been the last person to see her.”
He smiled, and guilt weighed on me. I’d walked away from her hateful words that night. Even though I hadn’t been the one to kill her, it had been my fault. Everything had been. I deserved to be locked up.
He went on. “I picked her up about a mile away from where the accident was. Someone had already called the police, as an ambulance passed me on the road before I stopped and let her in. I turned the car around and took her somewhere we could be alone.”
I ached to force him to finish the story as he grinned to himself at the memory. However, I knew if he caught wind of my anxiousness to know, he might not continue out of spite. He wiped at his nose again, and I caught the wildness in his eyes.
“Carly wanted to play. She told me she needed me. Crazy bitch wanted me to choke her while we did it. I can’t tell you the weird thrill it brought me, as she turned red in the face. I got carried away and held on a little too long.” He said the last part as if deep in thought. “Shame really. I would have liked to do her again.”
I couldn’t even process that Carly was dead as he continued with his revelations.
“It had only been our first time. Of course, Allie eventually made it to my door, another heart broken by Ethan. To my surprise, she liked Carly’s game as well. And I got better at not killing, timing things just right.”
I felt sick realizing how twisted everything was. Dad had done it to Mom. Carly and Allie had asked me to do it. But I didn’t like it. I’d barely put my hands on their neck. I’d done it because they asked me to when I was too drunk or strung out to talk myself out of it. And Carly had died because of it.
My revulsion and shame shifted when a knock came at the door. Instead, I was grateful help had arrived for Jess as it had to be the person Mr. Miller had called. I wasn’t expecting anyone else. As he beckoned in a woman I’d never seen before, I instantly knew who she was. The resemblance between us was uncanny. No wonder Mom hated me. I had to be a constant reminder of the other woman in Dad’s life.
fifty-two
The resemblance between she and I was uncanny. Shocked, I faced Mr. Miller again and studied him carefully. There wasn’t a resemblance between us. Okay, we both had dark hair, and if I had to admit, he would be appealing to a lot of women. There was nothing else to suggest we were siblings. Before I could ponder it more, she spoke.
Her voice was light like the sound of tinkling bells. Yet, her words came
out agonized and miserable. “Jeff, what have you done?”
She appeared wrecked and immediately I believed she was as innocent as Charlene.
“Mother, please check the girl and stop blathering.”
Slowly, she faced me. She drank me in as if I were the answer to all her prayers.
Softly, she said, “Ethan.” There was so much anguish in her voice I felt it reverberate through my body.
She stumbled to a stop before us and knelt. Her eyes locked on mine and gently she asked, “May I?” She indicated Jess’s lower half.
I nodded. “I don’t want him to see.”
Mr. Miller chuckled. The woman that was more than likely my birth mom moved and positioned herself to hide Jess from the maniacal man claiming to be my brother.
The way she carefully pushed Jess’s dress up to reveal whatever was going on below, I guessed she was in the medical profession. I didn’t know if she was a doctor, nurse, or EMT technician, but I would bet she was one or the other. She didn’t make a noise. She just pulled Jess's dress back down and then placed the back of her hand on Jess’s forehead. Satisfied, she then took her wrist and what I gathered she was checking her pulse.
To me, she said, “She’s not bleeding right now, at least not heavily. Her heart rate is strong. My only concern would be how long she’s been out. If she has a head injury, the longer she’s out isn’t a good sign. It doesn’t mean anything other than we like to have our concussion patients be conscious.”
“Thanks,” I said.
Her brows knit in a frown that caused fine lines to crease her forehead. “I wish we met under better circumstances.”
I nodded waiting for her to speak the truth of who she was to me.
“I’m your—” She changed her mind midway and amended her words. “I’m Kathleen.”
She didn’t offer a handshake, which would have been awkward given the situation. She stood and faced off with her son. “Jeff, what did you do to this girl?”
He appeared nonplused. “I didn’t do anything.” He held out his hand towards where his accomplice had stood. “Clarissa is responsible.”
Broken Lens Page 26
