The Kept Woman (Will Trent 8)

by Karin Slaughter

  ‘There.’ The woman pointed to a seating area.

  Will followed her order, walking across the lobby, which was the same square footage of his entire house. There was a frosted-glass door that led to the offices and one that led to a bathroom, but other than that, the lobby was completely closed off from the rest of the business.

  From the sparse decor, you’d never know that you were standing right outside one of the top sports agencies in the country. Will supposed that was by design. No prospective client wanted to sit in the lobby staring at the smiling face of his on-court rival. Conversely, if your star was fading, you didn’t want to see that some hot Young Turk’s picture had taken your place on the wall.

  Will sank into one of the comfortable chairs beside an expanse of floor-to-ceiling windows. Everything in the lobby was chrome and dark blue leather. The view outside stretched all the way to downtown. The light gray walls had 110% printed over and over again in a glossy clear varnish like wallpaper. There was a sign that hadn’t been here the last time: giant gold-leafed letters mounted on what looked like a nickel-plated quarter-inch sheet of metal that was taller than Will.

  Will studied the letters. There were three lines of text, each at least eighteen inches tall. He watched the letters float around like sea anemones. An M crossed with an A. An E morphed into a Y.

  Will had always had trouble reading. He wasn’t illiterate. He could read, but it took some time, and it helped if the words were printed or neatly written. The problem had plagued him since childhood. He’d barely graduated high school. Most of his teachers assumed he was just lazy or stupid or both. Will was in college when a professor mentioned dyslexia. It was a diagnosis he did not share with anyone else, because people assumed that slow reading meant you had a slow mind.

  Sara was the first person Will had ever met who didn’t treat his disability like a handicap.

  Man.

  Age.

  Ment.

  Will silently read the three words from the sign a second, then a third time.

  He heard the sound of a toilet flushing, then a faucet running, then an air hand dryer. The bathroom door opened. An older, well-dressed African American woman came out. She leaned heavily on a cane as she walked toward the seating area.

  The receptionist turned on a smile. ‘Laslo will come for you in another minute, Mrs Lindsay.’

  Will stood up, because he had been raised by a woman old enough to be his grandmother, and Mrs Flannigan had taught them manners more suited to the Greatest Generation.

  Mrs Lindsay seemed to appreciate the gesture. She smiled sweetly as she sat down on the couch opposite Will.

  She asked, ‘Is it still hot as the dickens outside?’

  He took his seat. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  ‘Lord help us.’ She smiled at him again, then picked up a magazine. Sports Illustrated. Marcus Rippy was on the cover palming a basketball. Will looked out the window because seeing the man’s face made him want to throw his chair across the room.

  Mrs Lindsay tore out a subscription card and started to fan herself.

  Will crossed his leg over his knee. He sat back in the deep chair. His calf was throbbing. There was a dot of blood on the leg of his jeans. He felt like a lifetime had passed since his foot had broken through the rotted floor of the condemned office building. At home, he’d wrapped his bleeding calf in gauze, but apparently that hadn’t solved the problem.

  He looked at his watch. He ignored the dried blood on the back of his hand. He checked his phone, which was packed with threats from Amanda. The only sound in the room was Mrs Lindsay turning an occasional page in her magazine and the sporadic clattering of the receptionist’s long fingernails hitting her keyboard. Tap. Tap. Tap. She was far from proficient. Will couldn’t stop himself from duplicating the mantra from the elevator.

  Angie. Angie. Angie.

  She disappeared all the time. Months would go by, sometimes an entire year, and then one day Will would be eating dinner over the kitchen sink or lying on the couch watching TV and Angie would let herself into the house and act like only a few minutes had passed since the last time she’d seen him.

  She would always say, ‘It’s me, baby. Did you miss me?’

  That’s what she was doing now. She had disappeared, and she would be back, because she always came back eventually.

  Will uncrossed his legs. He leaned forward, hands clasped between his knees. He twisted the cheap wedding ring around his finger. He’d bought the gold band for twenty-five bucks at a pawnshop. He had wanted to look legitimately married for the bank manager. Will could’ve saved the cash. The manager had barely glanced at his ID before giving him access to Angie’s entire financial life.

  He picked at the ring. The gold was chipping off. It was nicer than the one Angie had given him.

  Will dropped his hands. He wanted to stand up and pace, but he felt instinctively that the receptionist would not like that. Neither, he imagined, would Mrs Lindsay. Nothing was worse than watching someone else pace back and forth, plus it was a giant tip-off that you were nervous about something, and he didn’t want Kip Kilpatrick to know that he was nervous.

  Should he be nervous? Will had the upper hand. At least he thought he did, but Kilpatrick had blindsided him before.

  Will picked up a magazine. He recognized the Robb Report logo. There was a Bentley Bentayga SUV on the cover. Will paged to the article. Numbers had never been a problem for him. He found the car’s specs and traced his finger under the text. The words were easier to make out because they were familiar from other specs in other magazines, because he loved cars. Twin turbo 6.0 liter W12. 600 h.p. and 664 lb-ft of torque. Top speed of 187 m.p.h. The interior photographs showed hand-embroidered leather seats and delicate reeding around the chrome gauges.

  Will drove a thirty-seven-year-old Porsche 911, but the car was no classic. His first mode of transportation had been a Kawasaki dirtbike, a sweet ride if you could show up for work covered in sweat or soaked in rain. One day Will had spotted a burned-out chassis abandoned in a field near his house. He’d paid some homeless guys to help him carry what was left of the Porsche back to his garage. The car was drivable after six months, but lack of money and a daunting technical schematic meant that it took Will almost ten years to fully restore it.

  Sara had taken him to test-drive a brand-new 911 at Christmas. The trip to the dealership had been a surprise. Will had felt like an imposter standing in the showroom, but Sara had been right at home. She was used to being around money. Her apartment was a penthouse loft that cost north of a million bucks. Her BMW X5 had every bell and whistle. Sara had that confidence that came from knowing she could afford to buy what she wanted. Like the way she had stood in those open houses yesterday, looking around the large open spaces, silently thinking about the things she would change to make it more suited for her tastes, completely missing the fact that Will’s hands were shaking as he held the flier and counted the number of zeroes in front of the decimal.

  Will’s Social Security number had been stolen by a foster parent when he was six years old. He didn’t find this out until he was twenty and tried to open his first bank account. His credit was in the toilet. He’d had to pay cash for everything until he was twenty-eight, and then the only credit card he could use was the one attached to his ATM. Even his house had been paid for with cash. He’d bought it at a tax foreclosure auction on the courthouse steps. For the first three years, he’d slept with a shotgun beside his bed because crack addicts kept showing up expecting to score some rocks from the gang that used to squat there.

  Will still couldn’t get a credit card. Because of his cash-only policy, he had gone from bad credit to no credit. He literally did not show up with any of the ratings agencies. If Sara thought they were going to be able to buy a house together, she’d better be prepared to exchange her million-dollar penthouse loft for a shoebox. After ignoring Amanda all day, Will probably didn’t have a job anymore.

  ‘Are you a ball play
er?’

  Will looked up from the magazine. Mrs Lindsay was talking to him.

  ‘No, ma’am,’ he told her, and then because as far as he knew, it was still technically true, he said, ‘I’m a special agent with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.’

  ‘Isn’t that interesting?’ She played with the pearls around her neck. ‘Now, the GBI is the state police?’

  ‘No, ma’am. We’re a statewide agency that provides assistance with criminal investigations, forensic laboratory services and computerized criminal justice information.’

  ‘Sort of like the FBI, but to the state?’

  She had picked it up quicker than most. ‘Yes, ma’am, exactly.’

  ‘All kinds of cases?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am. Every kind.’

  ‘How interesting.’ She started to rummage inside her purse. ‘Are you here for your job? I hope no one is in trouble?’

  Will shook his head. ‘No, ma’am. Just some routine questions.’

  ‘What’s your full name?’

  ‘Will Trent.’

  ‘Will Trent. A man with two first names.’ She took out a small notebook with a church glass pattern on the vinyl cover. She picked at the pen inside the spiral.

  Will leaned up so he could get his wallet. He fished out one of his business cards. ‘This is me.’

  She studied the card. ‘Will Trent, Special Agent, Georgia Bureau of Investigation.’ She smiled at him as she tucked the card into her notebook and returned it to her purse. ‘I like to remember people I meet. How long have you been married?’

  Will glanced down at the pawnshop ring on his finger. Was he a widower? What did you call yourself if your wife died when you no longer wanted to be married to her?

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Mrs Lindsay apologized. ‘I’m being nosey. My daughter is always telling me I’m too curious for my own good.’

  ‘No, ma’am. That’s all right. I’m kind of nosey, too.’

  ‘I should hope so, considering your job.’ She laughed, so Will laughed too. She told him, ‘I was married for fifty-one years to a wonderful man.’

  ‘You were a child bride?’

  She laughed again. ‘You’re very kind, Special Agent Trent, but no. My husband passed away three years ago.’

  Will felt a lump come into his throat. ‘And you have a daughter?’

  ‘Yes.’ That was all she said. She clutched her purse in her lap. She kept smiling at him. He smiled back.

  And then he saw her bottom lip start to quiver.

  Her eyes were moist.

  Will glanced at the receptionist, who was still typing on her computer.

  He lowered his voice, ‘Is everything all right?’

  ‘Oh yes.’ Her teeth showed in a wide smile, but the lip would not stop its tremble. ‘Everything is wonderful.’

  Will noticed that the receptionist had stopped typing. She had the phone to her ear. Mrs Lindsay’s lip had not stopped quivering. She was obviously upset about something.

  He tried to sound conversational. ‘Do you live around here?’

  ‘Just up the street.’

  ‘Buckhead,’ Will said. ‘My boss lives down the road in those town homes near Peachtree Battle.’

  ‘That’s a nice area. I’m in the older building at the curve across from the churches.’

  ‘Jesus Junction,’ Will supplied.

  ‘The Lord is everywhere.’

  Will wasn’t religious, but he said, ‘It’s good to have somebody looking out for you.’

  ‘You’re so right. I am truly blessed.’

  Will felt like he was trapped inside a plasma globe with little sparks of electricity arcing back and forth between him and Mrs Lindsay. They kept staring at each other for at least another ten seconds before the door behind the receptionist’s desk opened.

  ‘Miss Lindsay?’ A bullet-headed thug wearing a tight-fitting black shirt and even tighter black pants stood in the open doorway. His Boston accent was as thick as his neck. ‘Let’s bring you back, sweetheart.’

  Mrs Lindsay gripped her cane and stood, so Will stood too. ‘It was nice meeting you.’

  ‘You too.’ She offered her hand. He shook it. Her skin was clammy. She bit her lip to stop the tremble. She leaned on her cane to get herself started, then walked through the open door without turning back around.

  The thug eyeballed Will a fuck-you before shutting the door behind him. Will took a wild shot in the dark and guessed this was Laslo, and that Laslo worked for Kip Kilpatrick. Behind every fixer was a sleazeball eager to get his hands dirty. Laslo struck Will as the type who came pre-dirtied.

  The receptionist said, ‘Mr Kilpatrick should be about five or ten minutes.’

  ‘More.’ She looked confused, so Will explained, ‘Because you said five to ten minutes before, so now it’s—’

  She started pecking on her computer again.

  Will stuck his hands into his pockets. He looked at the couch, feeling like Mrs Lindsay might have left something for him. A breadcrumb, maybe.

  Nothing.

  He walked toward the bathroom door, turned around, and walked back toward the drink sign. He’d been right about the pacing. The receptionist kept giving him annoyed looks as she picked away at her computer keyboard. He wondered if she was updating her Facebook page. What exactly was required of a receptionist if she wasn’t in charge of answering phones? Will considered this as he paced, because the other things he had to consider were too much to bear. He was on his sixth revolution when a loud ding pierced the air.

  The elevator doors slid open. Amanda stepped out.

  Her expression quickly changed from surprise to fury to her usual mask of indifference. ‘You’re early,’ she said, as if the fact that he was standing in the lobby hadn’t shocked the hell out of her. She turned to the receptionist, ‘Can you find out how much longer Mr Kilpatrick will be?’

  The girl picked up the phone. Her fingernails spiked the keypad.

  ‘Thank you.’ Amanda’s tone was polite, but her shoes gave her away. The heels stabbed into the marble floor like knives. She sat in the chair Will had abandoned. Her feet didn’t reach the ground. She teetered a bit as she tried to keep her balance. Will had never seen Amanda sit all the way back in a chair, but the problem was that this particular chair had been built for someone with a basketball player’s long legs. No wonder Will had been so comfortable.

  He told her, ‘Sorry I was early.’

  She picked up the Robb Report. ‘I think I prefer you without testicles.’

  The receptionist hung up the phone with a clatter. ‘Mr Kilpatrick said he’ll be five or ten minutes.’ For Will’s sake, she added, ‘More.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Amanda stared at the magazine with a sudden interest in luxury watches.

  Will figured he couldn’t piss off Amanda any more than he already had. He resumed his pacing back and forth between the bathroom and the sign. He thought about the second envelope he had found in Angie’s post office box. White, nondescript, more shocking than the first. There was no stamp. Angie had left it for him, and Will had left it locked inside his car. The Kilpatrick envelope was evidence. The second was nobody’s business.

  He asked Amanda, ‘Did you find anything?’ She stared at him blankly. ‘At the crime scene?’

  Amanda turned to the receptionist. ‘Excuse me?’ She waited for the girl to look up. ‘The last time I was here, I was served a lovely mint tea. Do you mind making some for me again? With honey?’

  The receptionist forced a smile. She slammed her hands on the desk and rolled back her chair so she could stand. She opened the door to the offices and closed it hard behind her.

  Amanda told Will, ‘Sit down.’

  He sat on the couch.

  She said, ‘You’ve got until the girl comes back to explain to me why I shouldn’t fire you on the spot.’

  Will couldn’t think of a good reason, so he settled on coming clean. He pulled the 110 envelope out of his back pocket. He tossed it onto the glass c
offee table.

  Amanda didn’t touch it. She read the return address, which was for the office they were sitting in. Like the wallpaper in the lobby, the 110% was repeated in clear ink across the front and back. Instead of asking what was inside the envelope, she said, ‘How did you get Angie’s PO box number?’

  ‘I went to the bank. I’m on her checking account. The PO box is inside a UPS store off—’

  ‘Spring Street.’ She gave him a withering look. ‘Your phone belongs to the GBI, Will. I could track you to the bathroom if I wanted to.’ She motioned for him to continue. ‘So, you went to the store and?’

  Will let the information about the tracking sink in. ‘I showed the manager the bank statement with our names on it and my driver’s license and he gave me access to the post office box.’ He left out the hundred dollars cash that had exchanged hands, and the veiled threats he had made to the store owner about the GBI’s fraud investigation division, but something about the look Amanda gave him said that she knew.

  She studied the envelope again, still not touching it. ‘Who did you hit?’

  He looked at the broken skin on the back of his hand. ‘Somebody who probably didn’t deserve it.’

  ‘Are they going to be a problem?’

  Will didn’t think Collier was the type. ‘No.’

  ‘You need to take off that wedding ring before you see Sara. And I wouldn’t tell her you’re still listed on Angie’s bank account, because she might wonder how you can find that post office box in two hours when you haven’t been able to find one single viable lead off Angie in the last year and a half.’

  Will didn’t hear a question, so he didn’t give an answer.

  ‘Why are you still on her account?’

  ‘Because she needs money sometimes.’ He looked out the window. The truth was, he didn’t know why he hadn’t tried to track down Angie through the bank statement before. ‘She’ll text me sometimes that she needs help.’

  ‘Which means you have her phone number?’

  ‘The last time she texted me was thirteen months ago for a couple hundred dollars.’ It was actually five hundred, but Will didn’t want to overshare. ‘The phone number that Charlie found is the same number she texted from. It’s been disconnected.’ He added, ‘And it’s the same number on her bank account.’