In Seconds

5

Heartbroken, Vivian gaped at the screen.

“Mommy?”

She could hear her daughter calling her but Mia’s voice sounded small and tinny, as if it came through the dark tunnel of a dream. Vivian didn’t react, couldn’t react. She was frozen in time and space. It wasn’t until her daughter came up and tapped her arm that she was able to blink and look away. And then the many years of practice she’d had hiding her fear and disappointment from her children came to her rescue, and she managed to conceal her reaction to what she’d just read. “Yes?”

Mia’s eyebrows knotted. “Why wouldn’t you answer?”

“I was concentrating on something else.” She wondered if Mia was getting old enough to see through her smile. She would at some point, wouldn’t she? Vivian was screaming inside: This isn’t fair! Not again! Not Rex!

“Oh.” With a shrug of her thin shoulders, Mia let it go. Nothing bothered her for long. “Watch me, okay? I’ll show you my new dance.”

Mia was taking ballet lessons and, much to Jake’s chagrin, she often made up her own routines and insisted on performing them, even in public.

Vivian schooled her features into a pleasant expression as Mia leaped and twirled. No music played, but that didn’t diminish Mia’s enthusiasm. She danced just to move and she did it whenever the mood struck her. Costumes were more important to her than music, but this morning she hadn’t bothered to change into the tutu she sometimes wore all day.

Vivian believed her daughter had real talent, but ballet was far from her thoughts right now. The terror that’d begun to advance on her when she heard about Pat’s murder raced up to smack her right in the face as the meaning of what she’d just read went through her mind.

Rex is missing…Rex is missing…Rex is missing…

Where? How? Was he dead?

No, that couldn’t be. She was still in love with him. Maybe. Or maybe she only wished for what could’ve been. Even if her feelings weren’t quite that strong—even if desperation, familiarity and the need for a safe harbor had brought them together in the first place—he’d been a good friend and a talented lover, relief from the loneliness that had plagued her both before and after their breakup.

“Do you like it, Mommy?” Mia sang out.

Vivian’s face ached with the effort of maintaining her smile. “Of course. It’s beautiful.”

Beaming at the compliment, Mia lengthened her performance by stringing other routines together, ones she’d been taught in class that Vivian easily recognized. “Aren’t you going to clap?”

Vivian dutifully brought her hands together.

When, at last exhausted, her daughter finished, Vivian clapped again. “Bravo!” she cheered, but trying to staunch her tears only caused the lump in her throat to swell.

Fortunately, Mia seemed satisfied. She ran off to change and brush her teeth, leaving Vivian alone to deal with Virgil’s news.

Propping her chin on her fist, she returned to the computer. What could’ve happened to Rex? Virgil had given her very little information.

Hey, I hate to tell you this, but Rex is missing. Two weeks ago, he mentioned going to Los Angeles to see a woman he met on the internet. I tried to talk him out of it, but he wouldn’t listen. He took off on his motorcycle.

Vivian didn’t have to wonder how he got off work. From what she’d heard, he was still doing jobs here or there for Virgil but was no longer a partner in their bodyguard company. He’d talked Virgil into buying him out shortly after they moved to Buffalo and had been burning through the money ever since.

I probably wouldn’t be so worried except that every time I call his cell, it goes straight to voice mail. I haven’t been able to reach him since the day after he left. And I know he wasn’t planning on being gone this long. I have a job coming up—told him he could have it. Lord knows he needs the money.

Apparently he wasn’t still burning through the money. He’d already finished it. She’d figured it was just a matter of time.

I’ve reported his absence to the police. They’re doing what they can, but I doubt he’s a priority. They’re searching for him as Wesley Alderman; I couldn’t give away his true identity without adding more risk. I didn’t see how it would help, anyway, to divulge the past. He obviously made arrangements to be gone, so they feel he might merely be delayed. And they have other cases they consider more urgent.

So what did this mean? Now that he was broke, had he returned to The Crew, where he could get an endless supply of the OxyContin he craved?

He’d die before he’d give either of us up. I just don’t know if we can count on him staying off the pills. And that could change the situation. He hasn’t done well since you left. Anyway, I had to warn you.

He’d never done drugs when she was with him. But she’d known they were a big part of his past. Drugs were epidemic to the gang culture he’d embraced at one time. And now he was back at it.

I’ll let you know if anything changes. Keep your eyes open.

V.

Vivian’s gaze strayed from the screen to the phone on the desk at her elbow. They’d agreed not to communicate by telephone; doing so would establish a traceable link between them. She didn’t see The Crew as being sophisticated enough to find and follow that link, but they could’ve hired a private investigator or someone else to do the tracking. Harold “Horse” Pew and his foot soldiers had certainly found them before. That was why they’d split up, to be cautious. But she had to talk to her brother, even if it meant breaking the rules. She missed him so much, hadn’t seen him in two years.

With equal amounts of trepidation and excitement, she dialed the cell-phone number Virgil had given her to use in case of an emergency.

She had a blocked number. Probably hoping it was Rex, he answered on the first ring with a quick and eager hello.

The tears she’d been holding back sprang to her eyes at the sound of his voice. “It’s me,” she murmured.

“Laurel.” He used her real name, then cursed under his breath. “I was afraid you’d call.”

She understood why he might not be happy to hear from her, knew he was worried about the risk, but his response stung all the same. Emails couldn’t replace personal contact. He had his wife. She had no one. She’d been so happy in D.C. After fourteen years of waiting for Virgil to get out of prison, she’d had family she could both love and trust, only to have him once again ripped away from her. “Don’t…”

He seemed to understand that she couldn’t tolerate being chastised right now. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“That depends on your definition of okay. I was doing great until Pat Stueben was murdered yesterday morning.”

“Who’s Pat Stueben?” Obviously he’d expected her reaction to the news about Rex, not this.

“A friend.”

“I’m sorry.”

The concern in those words made her feel a bit better. “He was more of an acquaintance actually—the man who helped me find this house, my—my Realtor.” Tears streamed down her face; she hadn’t adequately mourned Pat. The possibility that she or one of her children might be next had kept her grief bottled up, along with her fear.

“Hang on a sec.” She heard jostling, then a door closing. When he came back on the line, he spoke more loudly. “Okay, I can talk.”

“Are you at the office?”

“Yeah.”

“How’s business?”

“Not quite what it was in D.C., but building.”

She remembered when he and Rex had started their bodyguard service, how pleased they’d been with their success. After selling out in D.C., Virgil had reincarnated the business under a different name when he moved to upstate New York. He had Peyton’s help now, at least in the office. Although she normally worked in corrections she’d left her job when they moved and didn’t plan to return to her career until the kids were older. Even with Peyton there three days a week, it wasn’t the same for Virgil. He missed Rex as a full-time partner. But once Rex’s mother died and his family blamed him for the grief he’d put her through, he’d gone downhill.

As much as Vivian wished it wasn’t so, she was sure their breakup had added to the problems that’d sent him into a tailspin.

Luckily for her, she hadn’t been around to see the worst of it. She’d heard about the fallout from Virgil, via his weekly emails. Then, during his more sober moments, Rex had begun calling her again, even though, for safety’s sake, he wasn’t supposed to.

“What exactly happened to your friend?” Virgil asked.

“Someone beat him to death.”

“Why?”

“He was robbed, but…this went far beyond robbery.”

“Who did it?”

“No one knows. Not yet. That’s why…why I was already nervous when I received your email.”

“You think there’s some connection between your Realtor’s death and our situation?”

“Maybe. That type of thing doesn’t happen here.”

“Didn’t you tell me you have a friend whose mother went missing?”

“Fifteen years ago, and there’s never been any proof of foul play. Maybe she simply walked off into the sunset.”

“How often does that happen?” he asked drily.

“Often enough.” She’d done it. Twice. She still wondered what the people at her job in Colorado must’ve thought when she left. One day she was there, the next she was gone, without any explanation or contact since. She did the same thing in D.C.

“There’s no rhyme or reason to Pat’s murder,” she told him. “He couldn’t have put up much of a fight. Word has it his wallet didn’t contain a lot. Why would he risk his life over fifty dollars?”

“You’ve lived there for two years. If The Crew had followed you, they would’ve acted by now. Don’t assume too much.”

“It’s not just that there’s been a murder,” she explained, terrible though that was. “It’s the violence involved. If you’d known this man… No one would want to kill him. He was in his sixties, sweet, harmless. Then, on the heels of his death, I get the news that Rex is missing.”

“Could be totally unrelated. Maybe Rex heard from his father, or one of his ‘successful’ brothers, and that sent him over the edge. You know how he is.”

She did know Rex. She knew what he’d done for her and Virgil in the past, what they owed him regardless of his self-destructive tendencies. “Surely The Crew can’t still be after us. It’s been four years since you and Rex quit the gang. Surely they’ve gotten tired of chasing us and turned their attention to other things.” She couldn’t come out of hiding, couldn’t present herself as a target, of course, but did she really have to worry about them searching for her? Still?

“That kind of thinking could get you killed.”

“I’m tired of running.”

“You have no choice.”

She eyed the walls she’d painted herself, remembered how important it was that she get the perfect color. These walls weren’t ordinary walls. They were her walls; she’d planned to look at them for years.

“Why?” she asked, unable to accept his answer. “How long could this grudge of theirs last?”

“After what we did?”

“We did nothing!” Everything Virgil had been through, everything she’d suffered as a result of being related to him, could be blamed on their uncle and mother. Thanks to Ellen’s soliciting her brother’s help, Gary Lawson had killed Martin Crawley, their step father, then let Virgil pay for it. If Virgil hadn’t spent so much time in prison, he wouldn’t have joined The Crew, or had to get out of it, and they wouldn’t have tried to kill her as both warning and retribution.

“That’s not strictly true,” he said. “When they came after you in Colorado, I told the authorities everything I knew about them. Several of those guys went to prison, and two of the ones already inside were dumped into the federal system and moved because of me.”

“You would’ve kept your word and stayed silent if they hadn’t tried to kill me. That’s when you decided you owed them nothing.”

“Doesn’t matter. As far as they’re concerned, Rex and I are both traitors. They’d love nothing more than to make examples out of all of us.”

“But—”

“Listen, I was trusted by those who held power, put above others who’ve remained loyal. It humiliated them when I left. And if they can’t get to me, they’ll go after you again. Especially since they lost some of their own in Colorado. Getting to you would be just as good as getting to me, because they know it would kill me to see you or your children hurt.”

“It’s just so pointless to keep this going! Revenge is…stupid!”

“To you and me. But there’s nothing worse to a gang leader than appearing weak. It’s about street cred, taking care of business. That’s all they have—their pride in being badasses.”

She found it hard not to resent him at this moment, no matter how close they’d always been. If not for him, she wouldn’t be in this predicament. But it wasn’t his fault. In her heart, she knew that. They were both victims of circumstance and had done the best they could to handle what was thrown their way. “They have to make a living, too. Isn’t that hard enough? Doesn’t running prostitution rings and—and smuggling drugs and evading police take time and effort? My business is legitimate, yet it takes every ounce of energy I’ve got.”

“If they need money, they send someone to hold up a liquor store. It doesn’t take much time. They’re profiting off other people’s hard work, not their own. Nothing has a higher priority than nursing a grudge and paying off old debts. Especially a debt as personal as this one. Their lives revolve around planning violence, perpetrating violence or taking credit for violence. They won’t stop looking for us. At Shady’s funeral, Horse swore a blood oath to avenge his death. Rex heard about it while we were living in D.C. Don’t you remember?”

Mia had come downstairs to play with her Barbies, so Vivian lowered her voice. The last thing she needed was for her daughter to repeat something she’d overheard to the sheriff or someone else in Pineview. “Maybe we should’ve stayed in WitSec.” Without the program to fall back on, they were walking a tightrope without a safety net. “Maybe there was no leak.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Rex is the only one who’s contacted anyone from his past,” she said. Because he’d been estranged from his family for years, she and Virgil had never expected him to be the one who’d have trouble forgetting the people he once knew. But the emotional issues he had as a result of those old dysfunctional relationships had kept him in a state of limbo, kept him checking back despite the danger, and once he’d found out about his mother’s death, he hadn’t been able to cope.

Walking away from everything hadn’t been easy for her, either. What she’d just told Virgil wasn’t strictly true. She’d called her mother a few times. The police had never uncovered the proof they needed to prosecute Ellen for her role in Martin’s murder, so she was still in Los Angeles going from man to man. But now that she was getting older and suffering from arthritis and type 2 diabetes, Vivian felt duty-bound to check on her every few months. She’d always used the pay phone outside the bar, however, or a phone other than her own, and been very careful about the information she divulged. After what Ellen had done to Virgil, Vivian couldn’t trust her.

“Rex hasn’t been disloyal, Vivian. That’s crazy. They want him as badly as they want us.”

“He hasn’t been the same since he heard the news about his mother. He could’ve made a deal with them, a trade.” She didn’t really believe this, but she didn’t want to believe the alternative, either, and arguing with Virgil helped blow off some steam.

“Stop it.”

“He’s the only link we have left to The Crew!” Unless their mother had revealed that Vivian had been in contact with her. But that was just too horrible to contemplate. They’d been through enough because of Ellen. Surely, after taking her brother’s side all those years ago instead of defending her son, instead of believing in Virgil, Ellen wouldn’t let them down again…?.

“Then how’d they find you in Colorado?” Virgil was saying. “Rex was still with the gang then. He’s told us someone provided insider information. It took time, but they found us in D.C., and they would’ve found us again if we’d continued relying on law enforcement to hide us.”

He was right, of course, but she wasn’t ready to stop playing devil’s advocate. “No one in the Federal Bureau of Prisons even knows where we are. That’s why I think it has to be Rex.”

“It’s not! I trust Rex with my life.” He trusted him more than their mother—with good reason. Virgil hadn’t spoken to Ellen since he went to prison. At least that he’d admit. It wasn’t as if Vivian had told him she’d been calling, either.

Problem was, she trusted Rex, too. So what was she saying? That if someone had to betray them, she’d rather it was Rex than Ellen? She didn’t want it to be either one, but she couldn’t withstand that kind of rejection from her mother. Better to attribute this betrayal—if betrayal it was—to the drugs Rex used and mitigate his responsibility that way. “You mean you trust him when he’s sober, right?”

Virgil didn’t respond to that comment, probably because it pained him to doubt Rex. Rex had been his cell mate for nearly a decade. Including their years on the outside, they’d been looking out for each other half their lives. But Virgil was obviously nervous about Rex’s state of mind and his difficulty navigating a world that didn’t include gang affiliations.

“Horse blames us as the reason Shady and the others are dead and Ink is in prison,” he said.

Horse. Shady. Ink. Just the names of The Crew members who’d come after them sent a shiver of revulsion through Vivian. Horse had taken Shady’s spot as gang leader, but it was Ink who’d appeared in Colorado. Covered from head to toe in tattoos—even his eyebrows were tattooed into lightning bolts—he was a frightening specter of gang life. His flat, dark eyes added to the unnerving effect he had on her.

She wondered what he was like now, if he’d changed. After months of physical therapy, he’d recuperated enough from what had happened in Colorado that he was no longer confined to a wheelchair. But according to the U.S. marshal who’d helped them get situated in D.C., he was still crippled. Vivian wasn’t sure how crippled, but it didn’t matter. He was serving a lengthy prison term and wasn’t likely to get out before he died of old age. That was what mattered. “Then you believe Rex is…dead?”

“I don’t know what to believe!” he snapped, and that was when she understood just how worried he was. He talked as if he had faith in his best friend but he was as scared as she was. Rex could be heroic; he could also be unpredictable, especially when he was using.

“Except that we’re not safe from The Crew,” she said. “You’re convinced of that.”

“Completely.”

Vivian remembered all the calls she and Rex had exchanged when she first came to Pineview. Their breakup had been so rough that they’d contacted each other numerous times, despite Virgil’s edict. And she hadn’t gone to a pay phone. During her weaker moments, she’d almost taken Rex back, almost had him come to live in Montana. She would have if he hadn’t started using.

Had The Crew found him and exacted their revenge for his part in the deaths of two of their own? Tortured her and Virgil’s addresses out of Rex, then killed him? Or had he gone to Mexico with some woman?

More likely he was on a drug binge, holed up in a fleabag motel or lying helpless in a gutter.

The thought of that upset her nearly as much as all the rest of it. If she’d given him one more chance, maybe he could’ve made it. There were so many times he’d seemed close. But he’d pushed her away as often as she had him.

Bottom line, they weren’t good for each other. She’d been caught in a painful cycle of breakup and reunion for eighteen months before she came here, but she was free now and didn’t want the past to encroach on her new life.

The question was…would she be able to stop it?

“What do we do?” she asked. “How do we stay safe?”

“The smartest thing would be to move.”

“I can’t,” she said, and realized it was true. She couldn’t sacrifice everything she’d established here, couldn’t drag her children away from the happiness they’d found. Not again. This was her house, the first possession she’d ever really owned. Leaving it behind would be letting The Crew win even if they didn’t find her.

“I feel the same way,” he admitted. “It was hard starting over when we moved to New York. The idea of doing it again…” He paused. “And I don’t know if Rex is stable enough to go with us. The last move hit him hard.”

Because of the timing. That move had come soon after he’d heard about his mother and started using again; that was when they’d broken up for the last time. “What’s the alternative?”

He seemed to consider the question. “We’ll have to be prepared, I guess. Do you have the gun I gave you?”

“No.” She’d been terrified one of the children would get hold of it and there’d be an accident.

“Where is it?”

“At the bank. In a safe-deposit box.”

“I suggest you get it out.”

She cringed at the thought of having to use it, even though he’d insisted on showing her how and making her practice. “Can this really be happening?”

“As much as I wish I could say no…”

He couldn’t. She understood. “I’ll get it.”

“Great. Let me know what you hear about your Realtor’s murder. And I’ll do the same if there’s anything new on Rex.”

She could tell he was about to hang up, but she wasn’t ready to let him go. “How’s Peyton?”

“Fine.”

He would’ve mentioned in his emails if anything was wrong, but it felt better hearing this assurance from his own lips. “How does she like staying home with Brady?”

“She misses corrections, but she’ll go back when the kids are in school. In the meantime, she’s enjoying a period of less stress. She’s still handling the books at the office, the advertising and some of the scheduling.”

“Are you guys ready for the new baby?”

“As ready as we can be. I just hope it doesn’t go like last time.”

Last time, Peyton had miscarried at seven months, and losing the baby had devastated her, devastated them both. Because of endometriosis, she’d had difficulty getting pregnant at all. And Vivian hadn’t been there for any of it. She could hardly believe so much had happened in the past two years. It seemed like only yesterday that she was living in Colorado, a scant five miles from the prison, hoping and praying her brother would survive until he could be exonerated. “It won’t,” she said. “This little girl will make it.”

“I keep imagining her just like Mia.” Then he asked about the kids, Pineview, her love life, and she pretended to have one. When the conversation wound down, she said, “Do you ever miss Mom?”

Their mother was a subject they usually avoided. But Vivian felt guilty for secretly keeping in touch with “the enemy.” And she couldn’t help wondering how Virgil felt about their mother these days. Was he softening at all? Should they soften? In a situation like this, was there ever a point when the past should be left in the past?

“No.” His clipped tone indicated that he didn’t want anything to do with Ellen, and she couldn’t blame him. Ellen had ruined his life when she went after her then-husband’s life-insurance policy, which she’d received. Whether or not she’d really instigated his murder had never been firmly established, but the fact that she hadn’t done more to help police uncover the true culprit, that she’d allow her son to go to prison instead, was unbelievable, unforgivable.

And yet, Vivian sometimes missed Ellen terribly. It wasn’t as if she had a father she could turn to. Cole Skinner had gone on his merry way shortly after she was born. She’d heard from him a total of three times in her entire life.

“I don’t miss her, either,” she lied. Then she told him she loved him and hung up.

“Who was that?”

Mia stood a few feet away. Vivian wanted to admit it was her brother, but that would only spark more questions. “A friend.”

A sad expression appeared on Mia’s face. “Why are you crying?”

Dashing a hand across her cheeks, Vivian struggled to contain her emotions. What was wrong with her? She was usually stronger than this. “I miss him.”

Sidling close, Mia lowered her voice. “Was it Rex?”

She remembered him. Vivian managed to smile through her tears as she hugged her daughter. The Crew had cost her the life she’d built in Colorado and Washington, D.C. She wouldn’t let it cost her what she’d created here. She’d go to the bank as soon as she dropped Mia off at ballet and get the gun Virgil had purchased for her—and then she’d defend herself and her children against anyone who threatened them. They had to stop running sometime. “That wasn’t Rex, honey, but I miss him, too,” she murmured into her daughter’s hair.

Mia cupped her face in both hands. “Maybe he’ll come for a visit.”

And maybe he couldn’t…?.