On the Line (12 page)

Nathan shook his head. He’d gotten over that fairly quickly. At least he thought
he had—he hadn’t had the chance to hash it out with Janelle, so he couldn’t be completely
sure.

“Look, if you’d seen what we witnessed at the funeral, you’d probably understand
a little better why she stayed with him and kept your daughter from you,” Mason said,
all lightness and joviality leaving his voice and face.

“What happened?” Nathan asked.

Mason told him everything.

Nathan wasn’t surprised to hear about Martha’s reaction. She’d always been slightly
less offensive than her big brother, but just as irritating. Gladys assaulting Janelle
so publicly didn’t sit well with Nathan, but he could forgive her a little. She was,
after all, there to bury her only son.

Hearing about Mary’s reaction, however, had Nathan seeing red. He kept his comments
to himself and let Mason wind down his recollection.

“How could she do that to her own daughter?” Mason mused, almost to himself, and
Nathan could imagine him talking to his wife, Charlotte, about it. “I mean, the asshole
kidnapped her grandson, shot and nearly killed her daughter, and she still comes
to his defense over that of her own children.”

“That’s just the way she is,” Nathan replied.

He was just as baffled by Mary as his brother was. He knew that Mary had refused
to have meals at Janelle’s house if she’d known in advance that Nathan would be there.
Christmas dinner had been tense while the children had been at the table; the comments
from Mary had poorly veiled her hostility toward Nathan, and to a lesser degree Kelsey
and Janelle.

Nathan had been confused and asked Janelle about it after Mary and George left shortly
after the kids had gone to bed. Janelle’s explanation was
simply to shrug it off
as normal, as something she and Kelsey tended to ignore.

“So, if it’s not because of your daughter, why are you not speaking to Janelle?”
Mason’s seriousness took Nathan aback.

Nathan looked at his brother, saw the concern in his eyes and tried to smile. “Buy
me lunch, and I’ll tell you all about my meeting with Captain Little.”

Eight

Janelle sat in the hard chair beside her father, waiting for the investigators to
join them, trying not to think about Nathan’s behavior in the hallway. Her heart
had raced ahead when she came around the corner and recognized his dark hair and
broad shoulders. It had taken a control she hadn’t thought she still possessed to
keep her pace slow and deliberate as she approached him and Mason. And then to have
him ignore her attempt at conversation had brought her joy crashing down. It had
been a week since she’d had a conversation with him; she couldn’t really count what
happened in the hall as a conversation. His aloofness had nearly brought her to tears.

He obviously wanted nothing to do with her, not that she could blame him. She had
known what she was doing when she’d denied, repeatedly, that she was pregnant with
his child. Janelle couldn’t blame him for being mad, and she was prepared to suffer
through his anger. What bothered her most was that Zoe might never know her real
father. It was a dream Janelle had held since the day she’d found out she was pregnant.

The door opened and two men walked into the room. They both wore white shirts with
ties, and if she hadn’t recognized them from the hospital, when they’d passed in
the hallway outside of Kelsey’s room, Janelle wouldn’t have been sure they were even
police officers.

“Mrs. Wagoner,” the younger man stated. “Thank you for coming in.” He sat down in
the seat across from her. “I’m Sergeant Hayes, and this is Sergeant Bonner.” He pointed
to his companion, now sitting at the head of the table. “We’re the detectives investigating
your husband’s death.”

Janelle looked at the gruff, older man, and he nodded at her as he folded his arms
across his chest. She returned his nod and turned to the detective. “Why am I here,
exactly?”

Sergeant Hayes gave her a slight smile as he opened the binder in front of him. “We
need to ask you some questions about the night your husband died.”

“I wasn’t in the cabin,” Janelle replied.

“We’re aware of that,” Sergeant Bonner grumbled from the end of the table. “But you
can tell us about events leading up to it.”

Janelle eyed the grizzled veteran and wasn’t completely sure she liked him or the
tenor of his words. He must be the one Kelsey complained about. “Fine,” she quietly
agreed.

“Thank you,” Hayes said as the older sergeant muttered something to himself. “Mrs.
Wagoner, were you and Sergeant Harris having a sexual relationship at the time of
your husband’s death?”

“I fail to see how this is relevant,” her father argued beside her, tilting forward
in his seat.

“I think it’s very relevant,” Sergeant Bonner stated. “Given the recent revelations
your son-in-law made regarding your daughter, I think it raises the question of motive.”

“Whose motive? Neither my daughter nor Sergeant Harris were present in the house
when Richard shot himself,” George rose to his feet. “Unless you are accusing her
of something, I don’t think her personal life is any of your business.”

“Dad, it’s okay. Let’s just see where this goes.” Janelle laid her hand on her father’s
arm as she narrowed her eye on the sergeant. “No, we weren’t,” she answered as she
looked at Sergeant Hayes.

“How long had it been over?” he asked quietly, staring at the papers on the table.

“Since just after our daughter was conceived.” Janelle’s heart sped up a little.
She’d never thought of Zoe as Richard’s child, always Nathan’s. It had always given
her a bit of comfort to know a part of him was always with her. “Over three years
ago,” she added around the lump in her throat.

“Did Mr. Wagoner ever mention to you his suspicions about the child?” the younger
detective asked as he wrote something on the paper in his binder.

“No.” Janelle shook her head.

“Did he ever give you reason to think he might know?” Sergeant Bonner asked.

“No,” Janelle repeated. Wasn’t that the same question?

“Mrs. Wagoner, do you recognize this?” Sergeant Hayes slid a plastic bag toward her.
Inside the bag was an envelope with smudges around the outside. Janelle tentatively
reached for it. “You can pick the bag up,” he encouraged.

Janelle did and studied the envelope. It looked like any other business envelope
that she’d seen in her lifetime. It was addressed to Richard, and she didn’t recognize
the return address in the corner. “Am I supposed to?” she asked innocently.

“Your fingerprints were all over it,” said the gravelly voice at the end of the table.

“But it’s addressed to Richard. I don’t recognize who it’s from, so why is this important?”
Janelle refused to look at the older detective, and she stared at Sergeant Hayes
as she slid the bag back toward him.

“It’s the report from the DNA lab.” He picked the bag up and slid it into the back
of his binder.

“Okay,” Janelle said slowly.

“The letter was postmarked six months ago, and your fingerprints were found underneath
his, meaning you picked it up first,” Sergeant Bonner said. From the corner of her
eye, Janelle watched him stand and approach his partner. “So, if you were the first
to handle the letter, then how do you not know the contents?”

Was he really serious with this question? “I never opened the letter,” she responded
and looked directly at the older man. His jaw tightened and his eyes bulged slightly.
“Did you find the letter that was in that envelope?”

“Yes ma’am, we did,” the younger man answered.

“Were my prints on that as well?” Janelle laid her forearms on the table and looked
from one officer to the other.

“No ma’am,” Hayes replied again.

“I didn’t think so,” she muttered.

“What were you doing at his house six months ago?” Bonner laid his palms on the table
and leaned over them as he stared at her. “You had moved out and were living in your
sister’s house.”

“I was, but the holidays were approaching and I realized that, in my haste to leave,
I’d forgotten some of the traditional holiday items and decorations,” Janelle answered.
“I went to his house to retrieve them and quickly scanned
the mail to see if anything
addressed to me had gone there instead. I left it all right where I found it, got
the things I’d come for, and left the house.”

She watched Detective Hayes nod as he flipped through some of the papers in his binder.
After a few pages, he looked at her with sadness in his blue eyes. “Can you tell
us about the night of the incident?”

The
incident
? Her son was kidnapped, her sister was shot, and her estranged husband
died, and they so neatly wrap it all together as an “incident.” Janelle’s stomach
turned.

“What would you like to know?” she reluctantly asked.

“Where were you when your son was kidnapped?” the fresh-faced detective asked.

“I was in bed,” Janelle answered, then looked at the grizzled sergeant and added,
“alone.” She looked back at Hayes.

His cheeks pinkened as he looked at the table and cleared his throat. “And you didn’t
hear your husband enter the house or come up the stairs?”

“No, I was asleep.” Janelle sat back in her chair and clasped her hands in her lap.

“Isn’t your bedroom right next to the stairs?” Sergeant Bonner asked.

Janelle scowled at him then looked at her hands.

“What happened when you woke up?” Hayes questioned.

“I went to Zach’s room to get him up for school and found the note.”

“This note?” Another bag was pushed toward her. She looked at its contents, nodded,
and slid it back.

“Then, like he asked, I called Kelsey in LA and told her what he’d said,” Janelle
said, tears filling her eyes.

“Why didn’t you call the police?” Bonner asked.

“Didn’t you read the note?” Janelle snapped, her eyes shooting daggers at the balding
man. “He said he would kill my son if I called anyone but my sister. I was married
to him long enough to know that you don’t cross him when he’s in a bad mood, and
he obviously was if he would kidnap our child from my home. So I called her and waited
for her to get home.”

“What happened while you waited?” Hayes’ voice was soft and soothing so she focused
on him.

“Richard called a couple of times, mostly to check on Kelsey’s progress and to make
sure I was doing as he’d asked. He would occasionally drop
clues about where he was
or I’d hear something in the background, water rippling or a boat, things like that.
When Kelsey finally landed, she called me and instead of waiting for him to tell
us where he was, we worked it out for ourselves.” Janelle paused to catch her breath
and slow her heart rate. Detective Hayes waved his hand for her to continue. “She
asked me to give her half an hour with Richard before I called Nathan.”

“Did you?” Hayes questioned.

“No, I don’t think so.” Janelle shook her head and tried to organize the events of
that night in her mind. “I think Patrick, Grayson, and Veronica all arrived before
her thirty minutes were up. After I informed them she wasn’t there, Patrick began
to panic and asked where she was. I told him, and he asked me to call Nathan right
away as he walked out of the house.” She closed her eyes as tears quietly rolled
down her cheek. Her father put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her closer
to him. “I left Veronica with Zoe and followed Patrick and Grayson out the door,
dialing Nathan’s number on my cell phone. I told him what had happened, and he told
me to hang up and call 911, so I did.”

The room was quiet as Janelle tried to force the images out of her mind. The dark
house, the raised voices she heard coming from inside, the icy fear that gripped
her heart when she realized she’d made a mistake that could cost her sister her life.
They’d all heard the first shot as Patrick carried Zach toward her. He’d visibly
paled and broken into a trot as she’d rushed to meet him halfway and take her child
from his arms. She’d watched him run back to the house, praying that her sister wasn’t
already dead or dying.

“What happened when you arrived at the lake house?” Hayes’s voice broke through her
thoughts, and she described everything she’d just been trying to forget. “When did
Sergeant Harris arrive on the scene?”

Janelle’s brow came together as she looked at the young man. “I honestly don’t know.
It’s all a blur,” she began and tried harder to recall. “I was standing beside Grayson.
I think we’d just watched Patrick disappear into the house again, through the window
in the bedroom. Nathan was suddenly,” she paused to remember how the calm of his
presence had started to soothe the turmoil she’d been feeling all day, “there.”

“Then what?” Bonner asked as Hayes furiously wrote in his notebook.

“The fighting, a few more gunshots, then everything went silent until,”
Janelle shuddered,
“Kelsey screamed.” Hayes stopped writing and looked at her as she continued, “More
police officers showed up, and Nathan led them into the house as the ambulances parked
beside us. They tried to take Zach from me so they could examine him, but he wouldn’t
let go, so I carried him to the back of one of the ambulances. When they’d finished
and decided he needed to go to the hospital, I saw Patrick carrying Kelsey out.”

“Where was Sergeant Harris?” Detective Hayes questioned.

“He was with them and started organizing everything around us. He joined some of
the other officers and talked to them. Next thing I knew, they were bundling Zach
and me into the ambulance and preparing to leave.” Janelle exhaled slowly, feeling
suddenly tired and weighed down.

After a few minutes of listening to their shallow respirations and the ticking second
hand on the clock, the only noises in the room, Janelle caught a motion in her peripheral
vision and looked at the bag that was sliding toward her. Sergeant Bonner looked
at her as he asked, “Do you recognize this?”