I’d only been in the DC area for a couple weeks, not long enough to get to know any lawyers, but Ralph had lived here for the last decade.
I speed-dialed him, and he answered after two rings. “Yeah?” His voice was hushed.
“You still at the primate center?”
“Naw. I’m at home. Tony’s in bed.” Tony was Ralph’s eleven-year-old son. A boy Tessa called “a Cheetos-eating, soccer-playing, video-gaming fool.”
“Sorry to call so late.”
“What’s up?”
“I think I need a lawyer.”
A pause. I had the sense that he was repositioning the phone. “What do you need a lawyer for?”
I told him about the letter from Lansing’s law firm. “Here’s the thing: I’m her legal guardian, so I don’t think there should be any prob-”
“This guy is her father, Pat.”
“I know, but he was never in the picture.”
“Did he want to be?”
An uncomfortable memory squirmed through me.
Last month Tessa had found an old letter that Christie had kept in which Paul begged her not to abort her unborn child. He’d promised to help raise the baby, but Christie hadn’t wanted him to be a part of their lives and had moved away, then raised Tessa alone.
“That’s not the point, Ralph.”
“The court always favors blood relatives. You know that. And she’s still a minor.” His voice had softened, and I didn’t sense that his sympathy right now was a good sign. “You will need a lawyer,” he said. “A good one.”
Not what I’d wanted to be hearing. “You know of any?”
“Most of the ones I know don’t do divorces, custody, any of that stuff. It’s all criminal law.” He thought for a moment. “Hang on a sec. Let me talk to Brineesha.” I heard him turn away from the phone and exchange a few indecipherable words with his wife, then he was back on the line with me. “Brineesha says hi.”
“Hi, back.”
“I’ll tell her. Anyway, she might have someone for you. One of her friends from work-Tracy-I guess she just went through a divorce, messy custody battle, the whole thing. Whoever Tracy’s lawyer was seemed to be really sharp. Brin says she’ll ask her for the name first thing in the morning when she gets to the bank.”
At least it was a start. “Tell her thanks.”
“Hey, don’t worry about this thing, okay? It’ll work out.” His assurances seemed to be having the opposite effect on me.
“Yeah.”
“See you at 11:30 tomorrow. My office.”
“All right.”
Astrid led Brad down the steps to the basement.
Where they were keeping the woman.
“How was it for you?” she asked him. “Tonight, I mean? Being able to watch?”
“It was everything I’d hoped it would be.”
She’d been watching things too, from a rather unique vantage point. “The video feed to that store was a great idea,” she said.
“Thank you.”
“You got the footage I asked for? Afterward?”
He held up his phone.
“Good.” She took it from him. Slipped it into her pocket.
She had to admit, Brad’s plan was by far their most devastating and brazen one yet. There were a few holes that she would fill in over the next two days, but overall he’d done a satisfactory, even admirable, job, and she was quite proud of him. Two more people would die, and the FBI would never suspect her or Brad of anything.
“How did you learn to reroute the video like that to the television store?”
“Research.”
“Research?”
“A job I had before my accident.”
He left it at that, and she sensed it was awkward for him to go on. He’d never told her how he got his scars, but ever since the two of them had first met, it’d been evident to her that the memory was painful.
She decided not to press the issue at the moment.
They reached the bottom of the stairs and went to the room Brad had recently remodeled.
Last month, he’d asked her if they could move some of their work to the house. She hadn’t liked the idea at first, but he’d been persistent, and when she realized it would be harder to travel after the baby was born, she’d given him permission.
He’d spent the last few weeks working on the room. She’d allowed him free rein, and in the end had been surprised by how thorough he’d been in designing it so that it could serve an array of troubling purposes. He’d even made the room soundproof and added a drain to the floor to make cleanup easier.
For her, the excitement came from the feeling of control, not from inflicting physical pain. Brad, on the other hand, had recently become more and more fascinated with that secondary aspect of their hobby.
His choices for outfitting the room reflected that.
She opened the door.
Brad stood quietly beside her as she made sure the woman was safely tucked away for the night.
When Astrid was done, she locked the door behind them and took Brad upstairs.
Just knowing that the woman was down there, helpless, captive, afraid, only served to add to the thrill, and when Astrid reached the bedroom door, she slid seductively in front of her man. “Ready?”
“I’ve been looking forward to this all day.” And as their prisoner in the basement cried futilely for help, upstairs in the bedroom, the midnight games began.