The sun was setting when Connor arrived at Tampa International Airport. Jessica's return leg was due to land in the next forty-five minutes. He found a spot in the parking garage and walked into the terminal.
Connor had to intercept Jessica before she left the airport. Boone had found the bakery, and Connor assumed he had also found Jessica's apartment. He didn't want her going back there before he had a chance to talk to her. That meant meeting her at the gate when she arrived. To do that, he needed a ticket.
Connor despised airports. He hated throngs of people, and airports were usually packed wall to wall with people in a hurry but not exactly sure where they were going. Tonight was different, though. Tampa International was a bustling airport, but this time of night, things were calm. With only a few flights departing this late, the ticket counters were quiet and lightly staffed. Except for a lanky woman in a navy blue skirt and suit jacket with a tan scarf around her neck, the Trans Air ticketing area was desolate.
The ticket agent had a kind face and a corporate grin, but that didn't translate into conversation. That suited Connor just fine. The last thing he needed was a curious agent questioning his ticket purchase for a flight that same night or why he had no bags, both red flags in commercial aviation. A few minutes and nearly eight hundred dollars later, he pocketed the paper ticket and went to the bright overhead arrival/departure screen to locate Jessica's gate.
From his initial research back in Maine, he knew Jessica would be returning tonight from Memphis. He squinted at the flickering screen and found her arriving flight on the board. Gate C-7. He moved toward security as quickly as he could without drawing attention to himself. He wasn't surprised when he got pulled aside for a security pat down. The ticket agent had likely flagged him as a suspicious passenger. He’d expected that.
After ten minutes in the security line, he made his way through the terminal and joined the group of passengers waiting for their departing flight out of C-7. Before they could go anywhere, they'd need a plane, and that was still en route from Memphis. Connor split his time watching the wall clock and an unruly kid pummeling a computer tablet with his fist. The woman sitting next to the boy seemed content letting him test the effectiveness of the thick green rubber protector encasing the tablet.
Connor had almost nodded off when the voice from the overhead speaker jolted him awake. The woman in the blue vest behind the counter announced the arrival of flight 1262 from Memphis. Connor looked out the window at the 727 rolling to a stop at the gate. He watched as the ground crew attached the jetway to the plane, and shortly after that, the woman in the blue vest tapped the keypad next to the boarding door. The door opened with a buzz, and the awaiting passengers gathered their belongings in anticipation that they'd soon be leaving Tampa.
A few minutes after the gate door opened, a few passengers from the Memphis flight trickled into the terminal. As the flow of passengers picked up, Connor watched as they walked past, eager to get to wherever they were going. After the last passenger deplaned, the crew followed. Two flight attendants emerged from the jetway pulling suitcases behind them. No sign of Jessica.
Could she have traded flights?
Connor waited a few more minutes, but still no Jessica. He pulled his phone from his pocket to call Stephanie. His next play was to get Jessica's cell phone number and call her. He had a bad feeling that Boone was sitting in her apartment parking lot, or maybe the apartment itself, waiting for her.
When he looked up again, he saw Jessica step off the jetway. She passed the waiting passengers, who were already jostling for position in the heaving line, preparing to board the next flight out.
Connor had positioned himself behind a support column so Jessica wouldn't see him when she deplaned. Once she walked past, he stood up and followed her through the terminal.
He moved quickly, but not too quickly. When he caught up with her, he snatched the rolling suitcase out of her hand.
"Hello, again. We need to talk," he said. "It's about your daughter."
It took a moment for her to recognize him. "You?"
"A lot's happened since we talked at your apartment."
"I don't have anything else to say to you." She reached to yank the suitcase back, but she couldn't break Connor's grip.
"Keep your voice down," he said. "We're going to my car."
"The hell we are." She jerked on the suitcase again but found the same result.
"Your ex-husband is looking for the two of you. And he's found Stephanie."
She stopped. "What?"
Connor wanted to grab her wrist and urge her forward, but they were in public, and even though the airport was near empty, there were still eyeballs on them.
"Justin Friedman told me about the postcards." He kept his voice low. "How you asked him to write them out for you. No one is blackmailing you. You're sending them yourself so Freddie will think you're dead."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Cut the shit. Freddie sent someone down here to find you. Someone besides me. And he's already visited your daughter."
"Is she okay?"
"For now. Freddie's man went to her bakery, but she got away. She's at her rental property now. I'll take you there. He's still out there, though, and neither of you are going to be safe until I find out why he's here and what he wants. But first, I need you to tell me what happened twelve years ago."
Boone arrived at the Indian Rocks Beach public parking lot. He looked at his phone and traced the red line on the GPS map with his finger, following the route from the highway to the destination several hundred feet away. He stepped out of the car and walked down the sidewalk until he arrived at a small blue-and-white cottage. He checked the phone again to confirm it was the right place.
Moving around to the side of the house, he peered through the window to find Stephanie watching a small television propped on a stack of moving boxes. He walked around to the front door and directly into a short man carrying a white plastic bag. Startled, the delivery man jumped back and nearly dropped the sack on the sandy ground.
"You scared me," he said in broken English.
"Sorry about that," said Boone. "Must have sensed you were coming."
The deliveryman handed him the bag. Whatever was inside was hot. It smelled like Chinese dumplings.
"Did my wife pay for it already?"
The deliveryman nodded and walked away.
"Thank you."
Knocking on the door, he turned his back and stepped to the side, making sure the plastic bag and little else was visible through the peephole.
When the door opened, he turned around and pushed his way into the cottage, knocking Stephanie backward.
"Hi, Sydney." He handed her the bag. "Your father says hello."
"What do you want?"
"We're going to have a little chat later. But for now, just sit down and be quiet." He opened his suit jacket and flashed the holstered pistol. "Or I'll put a bullet in your head."
Boone locked the front door, pushed several moving boxes in front of it to prevent a quick exit, then pulled the window shades down. When he returned to the kitchen, he sat on a small stool and placed his 9mm on the counter next to him. Then he took out his cell and dialed.
When Connor and Jessica arrived at his rental on the third floor of the parking garage, Connor tossed her suitcase into the trunk and walked toward the driver's door. An airport security vehicle idled with its headlights on in the adjacent aisle. Connor glanced at it and then back to Jessica. She saw it too. Had she made a run for it, he wouldn't be able to catch her. He wouldn't be able to protect her either.
"Go ahead and flag him down," said Connor. "But if you do, you and Stephanie will never be safe."
"How do I know I can trust you?"
"Your daughter trusts me. Plus, I'm all you got."
She stole another glance at the idling security vehicle and then opened the passenger door.
Connor fired the engine, eager to put the forty-minute drive to Stephanie's cottage behind them.
"So, here's how this works," said Connor. "I know you're Debra Blasko. I know you were married to Little Freddie, and I know you tried to fake your death to disappear with your daughter. What I don't know is whether he really thinks you're dead or not."
She let out a long sigh and dropped her head. "Of course he does. I was careful."
"But without bodies, how could you be confident he bought it?"
"What else was I supposed to do? I knew if I just ran off he'd come looking for us, so I had to use what I had, which wasn't much. Fred was mixed up with some bad people. I didn't know how bad until I overheard one of his phone conversations. He was talking about a murder he committed in Cleveland. Then I started snooping around and found a second cell phone in the garage. I scrolled through the text messages, and it was clear Fred wasn't who I thought he was."
"Why didn't you go to the police?"
"If I’d gone to the police, I'd be dead. One of the text messages I read was from someone threatening him. Threatening the entire family. Whoever sent the message said they'd been watching him and knew about Sydney and me. They threatened to kill us both and bury us somewhere Fred would never find us. That's when I knew I had to get out of there. So, I decided to disappear and figured maybe Fred would think whoever sent that text message was behind it. That we actually were buried somewhere he'd never find us." She turned to Connor. "How did you figure it out?"
"When I talked to your daughter, I told her about the postcards, and I fed her the same line you gave me about someone blackmailing you. She was worried about you. I asked her if there was anyone she knew who could have gotten you wrapped up in this, and she told me about Justin Friedman."
"Shit."
"I tracked him down. It took him a while, but he remembered writing the postcards all those years ago. I got lucky because it seems his brain is pretty fried. A few more years under him, and he'll likely drink that memory away completely. Why did you send me to Steph—Sydney anyway? And risk blowing your cover?"
"Because she didn't know anything about it. I knew I had to give you something, and I figured since she didn't know anything, she wouldn't be of any help. I guess I was wrong. And fuck you for bringing this shit to Tampa."
"You brought this shit to Tampa the moment you decided to run. Not me. Fred hired me to find the person he thought killed you. That's it."
"So, he does think we're dead."
"I'm not sure anymore. He sent someone else down here with me. Someone who tailed me to Sydney's bakery, and God knows where else."
"Who is he?"
Connor pulled onto the airport terminal parkway. "He's the guy who does the stuff Fred used to do."
"Why is he here?"
"The way I see it, there are two options. Once Fred realized I was onto something, he sent his man down here to take out the person responsible for the murders."
"I thought that was your job."
"No. He hired me to find whoever was sending the postcards. I wasn't about to kill anyone for him."
"You said there were two options. What's the second one?"
"Fred doesn't think you're dead, and he sent his man down to either bring you back or—" Connor stopped.
"Or kill us?"
Connor checked his mirrors. "How did you change your identity? That takes some skill. Did you have help?"
"If you call the government help, then yes."
"You cut a deal? To turn over evidence on Freddie?"
"God, no. I wouldn't survive that. I found some information online about getting a new identity. Changing my name, getting a new driver's license and all that."
"None of that is easy," said Connor. "Trust me, I know. You'd need a new social security number to do any of that, and you can't just walk into the Social Security Administration and ask for a new one."
"You can if you're a battered wife."
Connor didn't answer.
"A friend of mine was in an abusive marriage. She was able to get a new social security number by proving her life was in danger. She had to provide police reports she filed against her husband and hospital records from the two times he put her in the ER. All that, along with a few testimonials from a cop and a nurse, and she got a new social. Changed her name and got the hell out of there. I called her, explained my situation and she told me exactly how to do it."
"But you didn't have those police reports or medical records."
"No, but I had a very sympathetic ear at the social security office, someone who had escaped a bad marriage and was willing to look the other way. With new numbers for Sydney and me, I became Jessica Winslow. She became Stephanie. We moved to Tampa, and here we are."
Debra looked over her shoulder as Connor pulled on the entrance ramp to I-275 South.
"Here's the thing that bothers me," he said. "Why now? If Little Freddie thought you might be alive, why wait twelve years to come looking for you? Seems he'd want to find you from the start."
"I don't know."
"Did you contact him or do anything else recently that might get him thinking you're still alive?"
"No," she said. "I haven't had any contact with him. Aside from the postcards."
"And there's no chance Sydney could have done something? Reached out to him?"
"Why would she do that?"
"I don't know, but something must have happened to get him looking for you after all this time."
"I told Sydney her father was dead and that he was a piece-of-shit criminal with friends who might come looking for us. I explained how we had to change our names and make a new life in Florida. Even at eleven, she understood that."
Connor squinted as an onslaught of headlights beamed through the windshield.
"So, what's your plan?" asked Debra.
"Once I know you two are together and safe, I'll get to the bottom of this."
Debra glanced over her shoulder again. "Why are you doing this?"
"You're in trouble, and I'm in the business of getting people out of trouble."
Connor was about thirty miles from Indian Rocks Beach when his phone rang. It was on the third ring when Connor realized it wasn't his personal cell, but the one Little Freddie had given him.
"Connor?" said the man on the other end of the line.
He recognized the voice.
"I'm at the beach house, and I've got your baker. I don't want her, though, only Debra. Bring her to the beach house, and you and Sydney can walk away."
"I don't know where she is," said Connor.
"Bullshit. The girl says you went to the airport to get her. You've got an hour. Bring Debra here, or I kill this one. Slowly." The line went dead.
"They've got Sydney?" Debra smacked the phone out of his hand. "You said she was safe."
Connor realized his miscalculation as the phone bounced off the console and fell to his feet. Little Freddie hadn't given him the phone for updates. He'd been tracking him.
That's how he found the bakery and the beach house.
"We need to go to the police," said Debra.
"That's a bad idea."
"But Sydney—"
"I'll get her."
"How? What are you going to do?"
"I have experience fixing things when they go sideways. I'll get your daughter."
Connor exited the highway, doubled back a few miles, and stopped at a stoplight next to a convertible. He reached for Little Freddie's cell phone on the floor and flicked it into the back seat of the convertible as the light turned green. A few minutes later, they arrived at Debra's apartment.
"Do you have a weapon in there?"
"No. I hate guns."
"Me too, but sometimes they come in handy." He handed her his personal cell phone. "Put your number in there, and I'll call when this is over."
"If my daughter's there, I'm coming with you."
"No way in hell. You're staying right here until this is over."
"I heard him say he'd kill her if I didn't come."
"He came to Tampa to kill you and likely me too. You show up at that beach house, and you're dead. He'll kill you regardless."
"I can't just sit up there and wait for a telephone call."
"Look, we don't have a lot of time, and the longer we spend arguing, the less time I have to get over there."
Debra closed her eyes tight, thought for a moment, then typed her number into Connor's cell phone. She handed the phone to Connor, unlocked the passenger door and stepped out.
"Get her back," she said.
"I'll get her."
He kicked the rental into gear and tore out of the parking lot.