by LS Sygnet
“And that was when your dad got the call?” Dev asked.
“No, Devlin. Her father wasn’t notified, because Marie didn’t check in as a woman in labor. She called Wendell around what, noon, Doc?”
I nodded. “I have the first picture he had of me in my baby book upstairs,” I said. “He believed I was his daughter, Crevan. In fact, he was the only parent I had. Marie wasn’t much of a mother. Dad raised me alone.”
“So she left him? But I thought she was part of the armored car thing.”
“It was her armored car thing,” Johnny said. “And no, she didn’t leave Wendell. But she had picked up enough of Wendell’s own version of justice to use it to blackmail him into helping her rob all those armored cars.”
Devlin frowned. “Is that why you have money, Helen?”
“No,” I said. “My father came from a wealthy family, an inheritance which he wisely placed in a trust. My mother probably would’ve siphoned all of it off if she could’ve. Marie, as far as I could tell, sunk most of what she stole into her personal interests.”
“And what were those exactly?” Crevan asked.
“Her father’s church,” the words ground between my teeth like broken glass. “Basically, it’s how she supported her parents. God knows, the church couldn’t have supported Lyle in the manner in which he was accustomed.”
“Or, he was getting piles of money from his role in the human trafficking ring,” Devlin postulated. “Did Marie grow up in a poor family? And has anybody bothered to ask what happened to Wendell’s baby? You said he took her to his doctor and learned that she was pregnant. If that baby wasn’t you, what happened to it?”
It was a thought I hadn’t entertained too deeply. I suppose in some strange way, even the notion that Dad’s real child was floating around out there somewhere and might possibly replace me was unthinkable.
“It could’ve been stillborn for all we know,” Johnny said. “There are a finite number of people with those answers, and I’m afraid they’re all dead with the exception of Lyle Henderson.”
Crevan grunted. “He’s not likely to cooperate or tell the truth, particularly if he’s in bed with Sanderfield and they’re both up to their eyeballs in human trafficking.”
I shook my head. “Sanderfield probably has knowledge of it, but he’s too smart to be directly involved, particularly with his political aspirations. He wants to be governor. God only knows what he’s got his sights set on after that.”
“Now we don’t think Sanderfield is part of this?” Devlin asked.
“Yes and no. Gillette was pretty convinced that someone with power would make sure that Johnny couldn’t stop them from carrying on with business as usual. If you think about it, even if Sanderfield loses the election, he still managed to get OSI shut down. In that sense, Andy Gillette was right.”
I refocused my attention on Crevan. “Regardless of who did what, I’m still not satisfied with why you kept this from me, Crevan.”
“I suppose I didn’t really say, did I? Then again, neither have you. You weren’t rushing to tell Johnny, let alone me.”
“I didn’t have any proof.”
“But when you got it, you disappeared.” Crevan’s eyebrows suddenly knit together tightly. “Abduction my ass. You left intentionally, didn’t you, Helen? You wanted to slip under the radar and find out how this thing happened.”
Smart one, that brother of mine.
It was Johnny’s turn to curse a blue streak.
“Helen?” Devlin’s concern ratcheted up several notches.
“Fine. I wasn’t abducted, but Martha Henderson wasn’t the only clue that Andy Gillette dropped either,” I huffed. “I’m still in danger, regardless of whether or not someone has actually made another attempt to abduct me!”
“Right,” Crevan drawled.
“Crevan, it’s the truth. Gillette told Helen that this most recent attempt wasn’t the first time she’d been sold. When she begged for mercy on behalf of our children, he,” Johnny paused and ground his teeth, “the son of a bitch flat out said that a pregnancy only increased her value on the market.”
“Jesus,” Devlin chuffed his disgust out in one burst.
“He also indicated that the deal was already done,” I said. “I was sold. My abduction was merely a matter of delivering the merchandise. So somewhere out there, a pervert is pretty damn frustrated that he never got what he paid for.”
Crevan sobered. “Which in turn means that whoever is still out there, whoever was part of this and wasn’t apprehended, could still be after you.”
Johnny nodded. He dropped down beside me on the sofa and wound his arm around me. “They’ll have to come through me first.”
“And me,” Devlin said.
Crevan grinned. “Me too. I’m not about to let someone take my sister away from me again.”
“That’s very sweet, all of you, but it still lets you off the hook, Crevan. I’m not gonna quit until you tell me why you didn’t say something long ago. If nothing else, you should’ve divulged what you knew about my abduction when the Datello baby was taken.”
He shrugged. “I suspected that if you dug the way I thought you would, that you’d figure it out.”
“And how much time was wasted because –”
“Helen, not that I’m agreeing with Crevan, but you weren’t exactly approachable during that investigation,” Devlin reminded me. “I seem to recall an incident where you scared the wits out of Tony Briscoe.”
I grunted. “That doesn’t excuse the fact that we wasted a ton of time because someone had facts that he wasn’t willing to share. Hell, if I’d known the truth about what happened to me, I might’ve been a little more guarded in the first place.”
“I don’t know how that’s possible,” Crevan said. “From where I sit, you’re pretty damn guarded on your best day.”
“Knock it off, Crevan. If you’ve got something you’d like to tell me, just say it. I don’t appreciate all of this passive aggressive sniping.”
“You took my DNA without my knowledge,” he said. “One, I know I don’t like that. Two, don’t get self righteous because I kept a secret from you when you’ve been nothing but secretive since you arrived in Darkwater Bay. Three, I’m not even sure I want to know how you got my DNA for comparison.”
“It was the cigar you smoked after Johnny told everyone that I’m pregnant,” I said. “And I didn’t tell you because I’ve been agonizing over how to convince you that this is true. Christ, since we met you’ve been steeped in denial, Crevan. You denied being gay. You denied that your father lied to you about a stillborn brother.”
He squirmed a bit. “Fair enough. I publicly denied both of those things. Pretty obvious why on the first count, and I think it explains why I wasn’t willing to challenge anything my dad – our dad – told me.”
Johnny beat me to the punch. “Probably not a good idea to refer to Aidan as her father, Crevan. Doc hasn’t said as much, but I don’t think I’m speaking out of turn in saying that I doubt that’s the kind of relationship she ever wants with him.”
Amen to that.
Chapter 33
“Lyle Henderson is the key to all of this,” I said. “Give me five minutes alone with him, and I guarantee, he’ll sing like a canary.”
Johnny chuckled. “No. That’s completely out of the question, Helen.”
Dev and Crevan looked at me like I’d lost my mind.
“What, you think he doesn’t keep tabs on me? These morons have been watching my every move since I got to Darkwater Bay. Hell, for all he knows, I could’ve shown up out here to get them. Maybe it’s a lie that I left the bureau at all.”
“And everything else you did was just what, incidental to your real goal?”
I rolled my eyes at Devlin. “No, everything else was incidental to getting Datello. Lowe was the first card to fall in their little scheme to keep this lucrative slave trade going. Once that happened, it was merely a matter of time before the police beca
me effective and they felt pressure from law enforcement.” I turned to Johnny. “You and David said it at dinner last week. Sanderfield claims that OSI was largely ineffective until I showed up in Darkwater Bay. I did in a couple of months what you hadn’t been able to accomplish in two years.”
“Thanks, sweetheart.”
“You know what I mean. I know I didn’t do it alone, but when Sanderfield made his nasty little insinuation that sounded like a dig at OSI, that wasn’t what it really was at all.”
“He tipped his hand. You were the turning point, the factor that changed their sweet little set up,” Devlin said.
“Yeah,” I nodded. “Johnny, if you hadn’t blown your cover when I got shot, I doubt that Datello would’ve jumped on the Sanderfield bandwagon.”
“Then you think he had nothing to do with the human trafficking business?” he asked.
“I’d bet my life on it. It’s like we said the other day. Datello was a convenient plan B. He was insurance in case anything was ever exposed. Destiny Gerard’s confession before she committed suicide proved that. She tried to pin the whole thing on Danny.”
“So we’re convinced that Wendell Eriksson was innocent,” Crevan frowned.
“Of this? Yes,” Johnny said.
“But how –?”
“Crevan, I said he didn’t have any part of it,” Johnny repeated.
“You’ve suspected his guilt all along.” I shook my head and peeled myself out of the corner of the sofa where Johnny kept me partially restrained with proximity alone. “Crevan, you have to tell me the truth. Have you been trying to build a case against my father since you figured out who I really am?”
“I wouldn’t say I was building a case per se. He was already in prison for life. What more were the authorities going to do to him, even if he was part of this? It means nothing now that he’s dead.”
I towered over Crevan and glared. He rose and met my challenge without flinching.
“Let him rest in peace, Crevan. I said he’s not involved and that’s all there is to it. Do you hear me?” My voice was soft, but the threat was unmistakable.
“And what if in the course of this investigation, we find out that he was part of it, Helen? Are you just going to turn a blind eye again and pretend that he’s this paragon of virtue despite even more facts that he wasn’t?”
Johnny had my left wrist in a tight grip before the open palm could crack against Crevan’s cheek. “Helen, we have to go where the leads take us. And Crevan, I’m as confident as she is that they will not lead us to what Wendell did in his criminal career. Let’s not forget that he was out of the loop for nearly twenty years. He couldn’t have been part of what was going on in Darkwater Bay during that time.”
“And before then?”
I almost twisted free from Johnny’s restraint.
“Before then, he was up to his eyeballs in his own business on the east coast. Have you forgotten that he was a police detective working regularly in New York? How the hell could he have been part of something so far away?”
“You think Henderson was part of it. He was just as far away from Darkwater Bay.”
A low growl rose in the back of my throat.
“Crevan, please stop,” Johnny implored when he felt my muscles tense. “Lyle Henderson had lifelong ties to Darkwater Bay. We already know that. We also know that Wendell Eriksson wanted nothing to do with his wife’s family. He didn’t want Helen around them either.”
Crevan frowned. “You never met them Helen?”
“No,” I said. “Daddy thought they were nuts and wanted no part of them at all.”
“Nuts or criminals?”
“Crevan, he was a good man, a great father. All I have left of him is my memories.”
He crumbled, a little but it was enough. “You’ve got to tell me why he didn’t want you around them.”
“It was the religious crap, okay? He hated that nonsense. He said it was one thing for a person to come to that on their own, but having it forced down people’s throats was how zealots were made, and once you have a zealot, you have a monster that finds justification for all kinds of horror based on a book of delusions.”
“You buy that? He hated religion enough to deny you contact with his wife’s family?”
“Crevan, why are you so skeptical about this?”
He frowned. “Frankly, I think it makes more sense that he wanted the least amount of contact possible with the people who knew you weren’t really Helen Eriksson.”
Dev intervened. “That doesn’t exactly add up either, Crevan. He kicked Marie out of the house because he didn’t want kids.”
“Hmm. So he said. He could’ve told Helen any number of lies to placate her curiosity.”
“Except he wouldn’t have told her that he didn’t want her,” Johnny said. “He wouldn’t have said something so awful to a child unless it was true, unless it was outweighed by how much he loved her the moment he laid eyes on her.”
They were both right. Dad had initially lied to me with a beautiful fiction about why he wasn’t present at the time of my birth. Yet I couldn’t exactly explain how I came to know the real story without explaining that I was Wendell Eriksson’s last visitor at Attica, a felony in its own right, since I impersonated an FBI agent in order to see him privately.
Johnny must’ve read my mind. Sadly, he wasn’t the only one capable of divining that I knew more than I said.
“There’s something you’re holding back,” Crevan said. His eyes narrowed as he peered at me. “What is it, Helen? Is it something you don’t want me to know because it makes Wendell Eriksson look guiltier than he already appears to me?”
“He did not do this!” My eyes burned. Why couldn’t he accept it? Why couldn’t he see that my father isn’t as horrible as his?
“Crevan, I met Wendell. He would’ve never done anything to harm Helen. Do you think for one second that he would’ve knowingly taken her from a loving family able to provide for her the way Aidan and Kathleen provided for you? It’s ridiculous. He’s as much a victim in all of this as you, your parents, Helen.”
“I am not a victim!”
“Darling, you know what I meant.”
I turned back to Crevan. “If you continue to pursue this, pinning these horrible crimes on my father, I don’t want to see you again, Crevan.”
“Helen, you don’t mean that,” Johnny said.
“She means it,” Crevan said as he met my steely gaze with his own. “And really, what difference does it make at this point, right Helen? We’re adults. We’ve survived childhood with baggage we’re willing or unwilling to acknowledge. What’s the harm in cloaking one more parental sin? But I can’t see it that way. I see children, lots of lost, vulnerable children. And Wendell’s death hasn’t done anything to put a damper on what’s going on in Darkwater Bay. Somebody is still pulling the strings. I intend to keep looking for who that person is. Maybe it’s Sanderfield. Maybe it’s Melissa Sherman and that’s why she’s had so many people willing to die to protect her. If in the course of learning the truth I find that your father was involved in this, I won’t look the other way. I won’t shield his memory for your sake or anyone else’s. I’ll protect you, and my nephews whether you like it or not. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
I swallowed the knot in my throat, lifted a trembling finger and pointed in the general direction of the door. “Get out of my house. If that’s what family really means to you, Crevan, than I really am an only child.”
“Doc, don’t say something in anger that you’ll regret later.”
“If you agree with him, you know where the door is too, Johnny.” I glanced at Devlin. “With me or against me. That’s the only option you have.”
He rose from the sofa. “I guess I should take Crevan back to his car.”
My heart cracked. It was hardly an answer. I nodded curtly. “Good luck to all three of you then. I guess we’ll see who solves this and who looks like a fool in the end.”
“Helen, I’m not leaving you.”
“And I’m not caving in to her ridiculous ultimatum,” Crevan snarled. “You want me out? Fine. I’m gone. But know this, Helen. I will get to the bottom of this, no matter where it takes me. Come on, Dev. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
I grabbed the phone and finished dialing before the front door made it’s final shudder.
“Briscoe.”
“It’s Helen. Where are you?”
“On my way out the back door at division. Why? What’s up?”
“I need to see you right away. Can you come to the house?”
I heard hesitation in his voice for a beat. “Uh…”
“Oh for heaven’s sake, Tony. You haven’t done anything wrong. We need to talk. Now. It’s about Crevan.”
“Ah hell. What’s that Pup gone and got himself into this time?”
“A big fat lie, that’s what. How soon can you get here?”
“Gimme thirty. You got any food over there?”
“Johnny will be cooking when you arrive.” I hung up the phone without further explanation.
“Helen, are you really angry with me for trying to mediate between the two of you? Christ, you’re both so stubborn!”
I laughed bitterly. “That wasn’t an answer to the question I asked you before. Are you with me or against me?”
His arms curled around my waist from behind. One hand rubbed slowly over my belly. “Of course I’m with you. Helen, I believe you. If you say Wendell didn’t know, he didn’t know. It’s enough for me.”
“But you’re worried that he lied to me.”
“Is that even a possibility?”
I didn’t want to believe it was. A slow burn started in my brain and throbbed down my spine, reaching every nerve, every cell, awakening fear and doubt.
“Honey, he still loves you. You’ve gotta know that.”
