Revenge is Sweet (A Samantha Church Mystery, Book 2)

by Betta Ferrendelli

  “Come on, Morrison,” she said. “Let’s go to bed.”

  Morrison jumped down and followed Sam into the bedroom. Sam dropped all her clothes at the foot of her bed and changed into a nightgown. Within minutes the house was dark and she was in bed.

  With all the lights out in the apartment, the engine in the black sedan purred to life. It rolled slowly beneath Sam’s bedroom window, its shiny exterior gleaming under the amber streetlights.

  Thirteen

  My Dear Sweet April,

  That’s what happens when you sleep the entire evening in the big chair in the living room and then get up and actually try to go to bed. You end up spending the rest of the night tossing and turning in the dark.

  I looked at the clock one more time after going to bed and when it showed 2:51 a.m., ‘what’s the use,’ I thought.

  No use disturbing little Morrison, who had no problem whatsoever when he followed me into the bedroom at midnight, going back to sleep. He was still curled in a fat little ball when I carefully slid out of bed and headed for the kitchen. I made a cup of Howard’s hot cocoa standing under the soft light over the stove. Now I am back in the big chair looking out the living room window when I am not writing to you.

  Amber lights from the parking lot are twinkling in the distance, and everything else seems to have taken on the calm and stillness that this time of night usually brings. The sounds of traffic have dissipated and the sky is clear above and a band of stars spread out across the sky in a thin ribbon of light. I follow the trail until it disappears into the darkness.

  It seems in these moments, my sweet baby, I find the peace that often eludes me the rest of my waking hours.

  There is no use trying to sleep anymore the rest of this night. Your father will only return to me in my dreams. I once welcomed them and him in them, but it has been a long time since I have. A long, long time.

  It occurred to me while sitting here, April, that I have never really told you that much about your father and me. It used to be when we first separated that I could hardly wait to go to sleep at night. I was sure to dream of him. I liked it in the beginning. I missed him terribly and dreaming was the only way I had of being with him. Of walking beside him again.

  But it has been some time since your father has stood beside me in a physical sense. Close enough, that if I wanted to, I could reach out and take his hand in mine. Or as I had so often done, at least earlier on in our lives together, I could run my hands through his hair or rub his neck while we were driving somewhere in the car together. I loved his hair, soft and auburn, short and closely cut. What gray there was collected evenly along the sides. Your dad never did mind the gray, but I can tell you that he hated that his forehead was high. But I loved it and often told him that’s what made him so attractive.

  Your father was slender and tall, almost six-foot three. The thin wire-framed glasses he wore I always thought added a scholarly look to his appearance and the stubble of a day’s beard growth on his face often made him irresistible. In the beginning he wore the beard because he knew how much I loved it, even though he’d tell me often that he didn’t like it because it made his face itch. But I think he must have grown to like it. He kept it when we separated and even after we divorced. I told myself once not long after our divorce was final that he kept it mainly because it tickled you when he gave you a kiss! He always loved the sound of your laughter.

  I am allowing myself to let these faded images of him wash over me. Even after everything that has happened I still find comfort in them. Just the other night I was standing in line behind a man at the grocery store. He was tall and slender and wearing a smooth band of gold on his left finger. I smiled when he turned slightly, allowing me to see the box of diapers he was about to purchase. He looked at me eyeing his purchase. His eyebrows drifted toward the top of his head as he smiled, obviously proud, and said “I have a little one at home now.” He looked to me to be a doting father and a loving husband, though nothing I saw about him specifically made me think in such a way. And what does standing in line for five or ten minutes in the grocery store tell me about a person anyway?

  That’s something your dad was in the very beginning, April, a loving father and husband. I don’t remember how many times he made late-night runs to the grocery store to buy diapers for you, my sweet baby.

  We can’t go back to days gone by, but there are times that I want to, so much so that sometimes the longing inside presses itself against my chest, making it nearly impossible to breathe.

  Perhaps, sweetie, your father, always was loving and doting and it was me who changed. Maybe grandma Church is right. She blames me for everything that happened to your dad after he met me. “Money,” she used to tell me, April, “is not the root of all evil. You are, Samantha.”

  I always wanted to say something back at her in a voice dripping with sarcasm and disrespect like, “Tell me how you really feel, Esther.” Then I wanted to follow that up with something said under my breath like “Bitch.” I just kept my thoughts to myself instead and forgive me now, sweetie, for telling you this, but if I am going to tell you about your father, I am going to tell you everything about him. Your grandmother’s words were like a Blue Northern, the chill of the wind, it seemed, wouldn’t leave me for days after one of her remarks.

  I remember how your father used to tell me after we started dating how his mother thought that police officers and reporters were a poor mix. We used to laugh over it eating greasy burgers and fries and drinking chocolate milkshakes in that old diner off Wadsworth Boulevard. I can still see him holding his hamburger up to his mouth and as the thick gold chain he wore on his right wrist would slide down his forearm.

  We met while I was working for the Denver Post. I had covered an arson that had occurred at a warehouse in Grandview. Your father was the lead detective on the case. I met him once at the scene and then we talked back and forth by phone for over a week whenever something new happened or I needed an update on the story. I knew I was instantly attracted to him, but I was certain that the feeling wasn’t mutual, so I didn’t allow my hopes or feelings to build. Until I met your father, baby, dating just wasn’t something I did on a regular basis.

  My own father, whose memory I still can’t seem to erase, said my looks were as plain as a farm girl’s in every sense of the word.

  “Ha, ha, ha,” I used to say when his back was turned, “looks aren’t everything.”

  Well, they solved the arson, and I filed the final in the series of stories thinking that would be the last I’d hear of Jonathan Church.

  Several weeks passed before one night, when I was working late and he showed up at the Post. I tried not to act too startled that he had slipped past security and found his way to my desk, or too pleased since the rest of the newsroom was empty that it was me he had come to see. He asked, apparently knowing my full-blooded Italian heritage, if I knew a good place in town for a smooth glass of merlot and a dish of homemade pasta.

  “What makes you think I’m Italian?” I asked, unable to help the smile that was stretching across my face like the Grand Canyon.

  “With a name like Marino?” he said. “Who’s kiddin’ who?”

  I, in fact, knew of a small cozy little place on 38th Avenue, for the merlot and fresh pasta he was hungry for. It was the only place in Denver where Nona would eat. If she ate there, it was Italian enough for me. We ate and then went to his place. I woke up in his arms the next morning, late for work. But I didn’t mind.

  We dated ten months before your dad asked me to marry him. We enjoyed a year of married life before I learned I was pregnant with you.

  I drank a little in the beginning, but not too much. Or maybe it was more than I realized and it was overlooked, the way couples do with certain things early on in their relationship still fragile with newness. I don’t know now. Too much time has passed and too many things have happened for me to remember much anymore.

  Maybe I am the one, the reason, April, that you
r father did what he did. The reason he is no longer part of this earth. Maybe I am the reason. Maybe grandma Church is right. I am the root of all evil.

  I never drank when I was pregnant with you, baby, I promise. Not a single drop. When I was carrying you, I thought that for sure I had overcome the problem. I was thrilled, but not long after you were born, the cravings, the urge for just one drink came back. Who is there to blame, but me?

  Your father was so supportive in the beginning. That changed after we had you. He didn’t like that I drank around you. In fact, he hated it and always told me so. I couldn’t seem to help myself. I can’t touch the stuff again if I ever hope to get you back, but still the urge for just one drink is always there. And I can never seem to get that feeling to leave. I wear it as if it were my own skin. Not as if it is my skin, it simply is my skin.

  When we separated, sweetie, I know you wanted nothing to do with me. You’d only come with me, if we went to Nona’s ranch for the weekend.

  Though your father’s feelings changed toward me, he is one of the first, if not the first, thought I have when I wake in the morning. Still, honey. I expect it to be that way now, because he is still so much a part of me, not in a physical way, but he is alive in my thoughts. Still.

  Dreams were something I used to look forward to, but not anymore. Now it only seems that when I dream of him I am running as fast as I can in the other direction. And every time I look back over my shoulder your father has gained another step. I try running faster, but it is no use. I don’t run as fast as I used to run. It’s these forty or so extra pounds that I’ve gained since all of this began to happen.

  Now when I see a man wearing a smooth band of gold on his left ring finger, like the young man in the grocery store the other night, how could I not remember what it was like when your father wore his?

  He took it off months before we separated and put it in my jewelry box. When we divorced and I moved into the apartment I have now, I remember I was packing to leave and my jewelry box was one of the last things I took with me.

  I can still see myself standing over it and getting ready to open the lid, thinking that I would see his ring, sitting there on top, where he had placed it. I opened the lid, but the ring was gone. I looked through everything in my box, but his ring was gone.

  I remember I asked him what had become of it. He shrugged a reply. “I removed it,” he said simply. And offered nothing more. To this day, I do not know what became of that ring. He’s gone now. So I guess I will never know.

  But, April, my wedding rings are still in my jewelry box.

  And every so often I put them on.

  Goodnight, sweetie, Mommie loves you now and always.

  Fourteen

  The week passed agonizingly slowly for Sam Church. It was Friday and she felt completely spent. Waiting for word on Wilson was about to drive her to take a drink, something, until now, she had been resisting. More than a week had passed, adding to her two weeks, three days and almost eleven-hour total since she had taken her last drink. She was another small step closer to bringing April home to Colorado.

  It was a close call on Tuesday, but somehow she managed to get through the day without drinking. She had stopped at the liquor store near her apartment. She got out of the car, turned her coat collar up and rushed into the store as if she was afraid that someone might recognize her. She walked up and down the aisles knowing she should not be there. She could feel the guilt layer itself upon her each time she went down a new aisle. She wondered what Wilson would think if he knew she were there, but she couldn’t help it. It was almost as if she was operating under someone else’s control.

  Just one drink. Just one little drink. How much can it hurt?

  She brought several bottles of wines to the counter and was fumbling through her purse for her wallet when the clerk came to the register.

  The clerk called her by name. “Hey Sam, haven’t seen you in here for awhile,” he said in a bright husky voice. “Where you been?!”

  Sam examined the clerk, a stocky, broad-shouldered man with curly hair, mustache and glasses. He was wearing jeans and a plaid flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. She did not recognize him, but he was smiling at her. She felt her face flush with embarrassment. She felt ashamed, ashamed to be a professional-looking woman in a liquor store buying booze. She stared a moment more at the clerk and then to the bottles of wines she had placed on the counter. It was as if his words had slapped her back to reality. She glanced around the store and was relieved to see that it was empty of other customers. She stuffed her wallet back in her purse, turned and left without saying a word. The man watched her leave, shaking his head in amazement as she hurried out the door.

  Back in the Accord, Sam gripped the steering wheel hard with both hands and squeezed until her knuckles turned white. She rested her forehead on her hands and could feel tears beginning to work their way to the surface. That was close. Too close! What the hell was I thinking?!

  She stayed silent in the car for several minutes trying to collect her emotions. Unless she heard from the kidnappers soon, she didn’t know how much longer she could keep it together. Nothing had come from them regarding Wilson’s whereabouts or demands. Nothing by e-mail at work and nothing by phone at home in the evening. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. All week nothing.

  She came to the conclusion talking to Nick late Thursday afternoon that this is obviously what the kidnappers wanted. To drive her insane while waiting and wondering if and when they would send another message. Forcing her to wait and wonder where Wilson was and even if he was still alive and what was coming next for her. The wait alone could easily kill her.

  Waiting at work was somewhat tolerable. Given the other usual distractions during the day it was easier for Sam not to focus so much on waiting for word from them. But each time she clicked on her e-mail or Anne would buzz her with a call, Sam held her breath, willing it to be from the kidnappers.

  Evenings, however, were unbearable. Every night she had gone home and done nothing, it seemed, except wait for the phone to ring. Sam usually welcomed quiet evenings at home sitting in front of the fireplace, reading or writing in her journal, but every night waiting to hear from Wilson’s kidnappers made time seem to stretch out like taffy.

  In fact, the phone had only rung twice all week. Nona and Howard called both times, wanting to know how she was getting along, if she needed help packing. Sam talked to her grandmother half an hour each time and her spirits were remarkably better and her fear less after each conversation. The sound of her grandmother’s voice always did that for her, even though Nona knew no more about Wilson than Sam. They talked of her coming to the ranch to live with them soon. That gave Sam a sense of hope that she carried with her throughout the week.

  There was nothing she could do but wait. She hated the helpless, empty feelings that came with the uncertainty of how the events would play out. She had wandered aimlessly through the week as though she were on autopilot just trying to get through.

  Sam checked her e-mail first thing when she arrived in the morning. Each day brought the same. Nothing. Every morning Nick would stop at her desk before going to his office. Each day she would give him the same news. He would check with her often during the day. Occasionally he would stick his head out of his office and look in her direction. She could see him raising his eyebrows over the tops of his glasses as if to say ‘any news?’ She would shake her head.

  Sam had a strong suspicion that someone was watching her again. She had said nothing to Nick about her hunch, but she did it mention it to Nona. “It was just like the night they grabbed us, Nona, and it’s giving me the creeps,” Sam said to her grandmother on the phone. “I kept telling Wilson that it felt like we were being watched, but you know how men can be.” Sam rolled her eyes. “He thought I was imagining things. Look where that got us.”

  Nona had asked if she was going to call the police.

  “Not yet,” Sam said. “Not until I hear fro
m them. I don’t want to do anything to screw this up. Wilson’s been so good to me, Nona. Without him, I don’t know how I would’ve gotten through all that’s happened.”

  “You be careful, dear,” her grandmother had said.

  Last night Sam woke with an uneasy feeling. She had gotten up to go to the bathroom without turning on a light. Before going back to bed, she looked out her bedroom window. The mini blinds were positioned so that Sam could easily see the parking lot below without having to move them.

  There she saw the sleek black sedan idling in the parking lot. It was parked two stalls away from Wilson’s Accord. The headlights were positioned directly in front of her unit. The car did not have its parking lights on, but it was running, exhaust from the tailpipe rising in a constant stream into the cold night air. The windows were heavily tinted, preventing her from seeing inside.

  She was certain of one thing; whoever it was had come to watch her.

  She stood at the window, barefoot and in a nightgown, watching the car for almost an hour. Morrison was meowing and she could feel him walking in and around her ankles. At least he was keeping her feet warm. Finally, the car began to move slowly from its parking space. Before it left, the black sedan stopped in front of the Accord. Sam leaned closer to the window and stood as straight as she could, hoping that someone would get out of the car. But the sedan stopped only a few moments before leaving the parking lot. She wondered if the vehicle had been out there every night and she just happened to notice tonight.

  Sam stared in the direction she last saw the car, her frustration mounting. She wondered if it was the same sedan that had been used to kidnap them. She could clearly remember the first moments on the night they had been abducted, the men rushing toward them in the driving snow, coming out of the darkness surrounding the parking lot like Special Ops forces, quick, effortless and unseen until the very last moment.