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ALEXIS
After showering and eating lunch, I listen to my mother plead for nearly forty-five minutes. She wants me to come home. My father is out of his mind with worry, and me, sleeping in my childhood bed for a few nights, will help.
She lays on the guilt pretty thick, not that it’s necessary. I love my parents dearly. Even though I refuse to take responsibility for his out-of-control behavior, I’m racked with guilt.
No one is in a worse position than my mother, caught between me and my father. Although I didn’t point a finger, part of this mess was created because she placates him much too often. I’m sure it’s exhausting to hold your own, over a lifetime, against a man like him. She’s not a pushover, but over the years, she’s lost some of her fight, especially after her father was killed.
“Life’s too short,” she told me when I asked about it. “I love your father with every cell of my being, and I refuse to spend any more time than absolutely necessary squabbling.”
That might be true, but if I asked, she’d be willing to wage war with him—for me. But I would never ask her to do it—not anymore. It’s different now anyway.
My father is in a particularly bad place. And he doesn’t want help. He can take care of it himself. That means tightening his control over everything—especially me. When it started, I fell into line and did everything he asked, including moving home. It didn’t help. If anything, it made him want even more control over me. I would be willing to sacrifice all my freedom if it would actually unburden him. But that’s not what he needs.
He needs a goddamn intervention—but no one is willing to step in and do it. Will Clarke can do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, make a huge mess, and the sycophants will gush all over it as though it’s a masterpiece. Anyone with a shred of sanity recedes into the shadows, leaving my mother and me to mop up after him.
There is one thing that would change things for him—for us—at least my mother believes it would.
Dad was eleven when he went out to get his father a pack of smokes and pick up the cake his mom ordered from the neighborhood bakery for his baby sister’s fifth birthday. It was one of those standing doll cakes, with a poofy skirt made out of pink and white frosting. The doll had blonde hair, like the little girl. Some of the tragic details were in the yellowed newspaper clipping I found in a box in his office when I was snooping. My father stopped to kick a ball around with his friends, and when he got home, his entire family had been brutally murdered.
The culprits were caught several years later, and they had a grisly end at my father’s hand, but he’s never found the person who put out the hit. When things started to spin out of control and I was stuck at home, I dug deep into the past for information that might help. Like my father, I hit every dead end—at least where my family was concerned. But I did stumble across other devils, and their evil plans.
I take my laptop from the bag that was delivered last night and immerse myself in graphs and charts and lists that I’ve painstakingly created over the last couple of months.
Plotting where the traffickers have been, I add Porto to the graph and assign it a permanent color. Then I cross it off my alphabetical list of European cities. I study the patterns on the graph and stare at the list of cities, trying not to be lulled into any false premise. Oslo has to be next. Then Rimini or Riga.
But what if I’m wrong? What if they change their MO?
They’ve been caught on camera a couple of times—although the photographs have not been released publicly. But last night was a major slipup. What if that causes them to change course? I can’t let that thought alter my direction. Not without evidence that they’re doing something different.
If they stick with what they’ve done in the past, they’ll make a move in exactly thirteen days. That gives me more than a week to plan, and to get there. I have to assume I’ll be on their radar now. These bastards don’t play around, and although the possibilities terrify me, I’m not quitting on this. I’ll just have to be more careful.
I’ll send the Oslo police a message, and Interpol too. Although it’s probably a waste of time. I’ve given Interpol many warnings, but they have never responded to any information I’ve sent. Never returned a call. Refused to meet with me in their London office. I don’t expect them to lift a fucking finger now either. I’m sure they think I’m some sort of crazy person, obsessed with the traffickers—maybe I am.
“Ms. Clarke,” Sabio says, knocking on the door. “There’s someone here to see you.”
Someone to see me? There’s no way that the Intelligence Service or Interpol would just show up. Well, they might, but there’s no way they would be allowed on this floor. My father? That’s a different story. He’d be allowed up, even if he had to call Antonio to make it happen. My mother would have told me if he was in Porto. If she knew. But who else would it be? No one knows I’m here.
I open the door quietly, but Sabio’s already gone.
With a deep breath, I gather the strength to do battle with my father and slip on my shoes.
When I get to the living room, a petite woman with a scarf draped fashionably around her shoulders is waiting. I smile at her cheeky grin.
“I understand you want to interview me,” Judite Furtado says with a conspiratorial wink.
My cheeks burn as I burst out laughing. “I don’t think I need to ask how you know.”
“We have a mutual acquaintance. Charming, but persistent.” She lifts her brow. “He emailed me at five this morning and followed up with a call at seven thirty when I didn’t respond promptly.” She chuckles.
By the time we texted this morning, Rafael had already contacted Judite. It’s too dangerous for me to go to her, so he brought her to me. Oh, Rafa. Please don’t do things like this. It makes it too hard to keep any emotional distance.
“I’m thrilled you’re here, but I’m so sorry about the early phone call.”
“Don’t be. Rafael’s great. I was struggling to find my place in the design world when we met at a friend’s wedding in Lisbon, about three years ago. We were seated next to each other during the formal dinner. By the time the bride and groom said their goodbyes, he’d convinced me to open a shop in Porto. He’s very persuasive.”
Maybe he used that lethal tongue to persuade her.
The taste in my mouth is so sour I have to force my lips from puckering—but not before Judite notices.
