Six Years

I was out of it.

That was what I told myself as I stumbled into the guest cottage. That was what I planned to do as my head hit the pillow and I closed my eyes. That was what I believed when I flipped onto my back and watched the ceiling spin from too much drink. That was what I was sure was the truth up until—according the bedside digital alarm clock—6:18 A.M., when I remembered something that had almost escaped my mind:

Natalie’s father.

I sat up in bed, my entire body suddenly rigid.

I still didn’t know what happened to Professor Aaron Kleiner.

There was, I supposed, the off chance that Julie Pottham was right, that her father ran off with a student and then remarried, but if that was the case, Shanta would have found him with no problem. No, he had vanished.

Just like his daughter Natalie would some twenty years later.

Perhaps there was a simple explanation. Perhaps Fresh Start had helped him too. But, no, Fresh Start had been created twenty years ago. Could Professor Kleiner’s disappearance have been the organization’s precursor? Malcolm Hume knew Natalie’s father. In fact, Natalie’s mother had come to him when Aaron Kleiner first abandoned the family. So maybe my mentor helped him vanish and then, what, years later, formed a group under the guise of a charity to help others like him?

Maybe.

Except twenty years later, his daughter suddenly had to vanish too? Does that make sense?

It didn’t.

And why would the NYPD have shown me a surveillance photograph from six years ago? How could that relate to Natalie’s father? What about Danny Zuker and Otto Devereaux? How could whatever was going on now, with Natalie, be related to her father who vanished twenty-five years ago?

Good questions.

I got out of bed and debated my next move. But what next move? I had promised Benedict that I would stay out of this. Moreover, I now understood in a very real, very concrete way the dangers of continuing this quest, not only for me but for the woman I loved. Natalie had chosen to vanish. Whether it was to protect herself or me or both, I had to not only respect her wishes but her judgment. She had scrutinized her predicament with more knowledge than I had, weighed the pros and cons, and decided that she had to disappear.

Who was I to mess that up?

So once again, I was about to let it go, was about to surrender to living with this horrible albeit necessary frustration, when another thought struck me so hard I almost stumbled. I stayed perfectly still, mulling it over in my mind, looking at it from every conceivable angle. Yes, it was there—something we had all overlooked. Something that changed the very nature of what Benedict had convinced me to do.

Benedict was heading to class when I sprinted outside. When he saw the look on my face, he froze too. “What’s wrong?”

“I can’t let it go.”

He sighed. “We went over this.”

“I know,” I said, “but we were missing something.”

His eyes moved from side to side as though he were afraid someone nearby might be eavesdropping. “Jake, you promised—”

“It didn’t start with me.”

“What?”

“This new danger. The NYPD asking questions. Otto Devereaux and Danny Zuker. Fresh Start under siege. It didn’t start with me. I didn’t kick that all up by trying to find Natalie. That’s not how it started.”

“I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

“Todd’s murder,” I said. “That’s what got me involved. You guys keep thinking that I’m the one who breached your group. I’m not. Someone already knew. Someone found out about Todd and tortured and killed him. That’s how I got involved—when I saw Todd’s obituary.”

“That doesn’t change anything,” Benedict said.

“Of course it does. If Natalie was tucked away safely someplace, okay, I get it. I should leave it alone. But don’t you see? She’s in danger. Someone knows that she didn’t really get married and disappear overseas. Someone went so far as to kill Todd. Someone is after her—and Natalie doesn’t even know it.”

Benedict started rubbing his chin.

“They’re looking for her,” I said. “I can’t just back away. Don’t you see?”

He shook his head. “I don’t see.” His voice was so weary, so broken and exhausted. “I don’t see how you can do anything but get her killed. Listen to me, Jake. I get your point, but we’ve circled the wagons. We’ve protected the group. Everyone has gone underground until this blows over.”

“But Natalie is—”

“Is safe, as long as you leave it alone. If you don’t—if we are all discovered—it could mean death not only to her but to Marie-Anne and me and many, many others. I get what you’re saying, but you’re not seeing straight. You don’t want to accept the truth. You want her so badly that you’re twisting the facts into a call for action. Don’t you see that?”

I shook my head. “I don’t. I really don’t.”

He glanced at his watch. “Look, I have to go to class. Let’s talk about this later. Don’t do anything until then, okay?”

I said nothing.

“Promise me, Jake.”

I promised. This time, however, I kept the promise for closer to six minutes than six years.

Chapter 29

I hit the bank and took out four thousand dollars in cash. The window teller had to get permission from the head teller, who had to find the bank manager. I tried to remember the last time I had used a bank teller rather than the ATM, but I couldn’t dredge up the memory.

I stopped at CVS and bought two disposable phones. Knowing that the cops could trace your phone anytime it was on, I powered down my iPhone and stuck it back in my pocket. If I needed to make calls, I’d use the disposables and keep them off as much as possible. If the cops could trace these phones, so, I figured, might a guy like Danny Zuker. I didn’t know this for a fact, but my paranoia level was justifiably at an all-time high.

I might not be able to stay off the grid long, but if I could for a few days, that would be all I’d need.

First things first. Benedict said that no one involved with Fresh Start knew where Natalie was. I wasn’t so sure. The organization had started at Lanford at the behest, in part anyway, of one Professor Malcolm Hume.

It was time to call my old mentor.

The last time I saw the man whose office I now inhabit was two years ago at a poly-sci seminar on Constitutional abuses. He flew up from Florida looking robust and tan. His teeth were shockingly white. Like many retired Floridians, he appeared rested and happy and very old. We had a nice time, but there was a distance between us now. Malcolm Hume could be like that. I loved the man. Aside from my own father, he was the closest thing I had to a role model. But he had made it clear that retirement was an ending. He had always detested the academic hangers-on, those elderly professors and administrators who stayed on well past their expiration date, like aging ballplayers who won’t face the inevitable. Once he left our hallowed halls, Professor Hume didn’t enjoy returning. He didn’t buy into nostalgia or living off past laurels. Even at the age of eighty, Malcolm Hume was a forward-looking guy. The past was just that to him. The past.