The Couple Next Door(40)
He pulls in to a graveled parking area in front of the lake. There is a small, stony beach with some old, weathered picnic tables, which he has rarely seen anyone use. A long dock projects out into the lake, but no one launches boats from here anymore. Marco has been coming here for years. He comes here alone, whenever he needs to think.
He parks the car under the shade of a tree, facing the lake, and gets out. It’s hot and sunny, but there’s a breeze coming off the lake. He sits on the hood of the car and looks out at the water. There is no one else here; the place is deserted.
He tells himself that everything will be all right. Cora is fine; she has to be. Anne’s parents will get the money. His father-in-law would never pass up an opportunity to be a hero or a big shot, even if it cost him a small fortune. Especially if it looks like he’s bailing Marco out. They won’t even miss the money, Marco thinks.
He takes a deep breath of the lake air and expels it, trying to calm himself. He can smell dead fish, but no matter. He has to get air into his lungs. The last few days have been a living hell. Marco isn’t made for this. His nerves are shot.
He has regrets now, but it will all be worth it. When he gets Cora back and he has the money, everything will be okay. They’ll have their daughter. And he’ll have two and a half million dollars to get his business on track again. The thought of taking money from his father-in-law makes Marco smile. He hates the bastard.
With this money he’ll be able to sort out his cash-flow problems and take his business to the next level. It will have to be funneled into the business through a silent, anonymous investor, by way of Bermuda. No one will ever know. His accomplice, Bruce Neeland, will get his half share, go away, and keep his mouth shut.
Marco almost hadn’t gone through with it. When the babysitter canceled at the last minute, he’d panicked. He’d almost called the whole thing off. He knew Katerina always fell asleep with her earbuds in when she was babysitting. Twice they’d come home before midnight and surprised her dead to the world on the living-room sofa. She wasn’t that easy to wake up either. Anne didn’t like it. She thought Katerina wasn’t a very good babysitter, but it was hard to get a sitter at all, since there were so many young children in the neighborhood.
The plan had been for Marco to go out for a smoke at twelve thirty, let himself into the house quietly, grab the sleeping baby, and take her out through the back while Katerina slept. If she’d woken up and seen him come in, he would have told her he’d come to check on the baby, since they were just next door. If she’d woken up and seen him carrying the baby out, he would have told her he was going to take Cora next door for a minute to show her off. In either case he would have aborted the whole thing.
If he’d pulled it off, the story would have been about a child abducted from her bedroom while the babysitter was downstairs.
But then she canceled. Marco was desperate, so he’d had to improvise. He persuaded Anne to leave Cora at home with the proviso that they’d check on her every half hour. It wouldn’t have been possible if the video on the baby monitor had still been working, but with just the audio, he thought it would be all right. He would take Cora out the back to the waiting car when he checked on her. He knew it would make him and Anne look bad, leaving the baby home alone, but he thought it could work.
Had he felt there was any actual risk to Cora at all, he never would have done it. Not for any amount of money.
It’s been brutally hard these last few days, not seeing his daughter. Not being able to hold her, to kiss the top of her head, to smell her skin. Not being able to call and check on her and make sure she’s all right.
Not knowing what the hell is going on.
Marco tells himself again that Cora is fine. He just has to hang on. It will all be over soon. They’ll have Cora back and the money. He especially regrets how hard this is on Anne, but he tells himself that she’ll be so happy to have Cora back that maybe it will give her some perspective. It has been fucking awful the last few months, dealing with his own financial problems and watching his wife slip away from him, lost in her own downward spiral.
It’s all been much more difficult than expected. When Bruce Neeland hadn’t called within the first twelve hours, Marco had been frantic. They’d agreed on no more than twelve hours before first contact. When he hadn’t heard from Bruce by Saturday afternoon, Marco was afraid that Bruce had lost his nerve. The case had received a lot of attention. Even worse—Bruce wasn’t answering the cell phone Marco was to call in an emergency. And Marco had no other way to reach him.
Marco had handed his baby over to a co-conspirator who hadn’t followed the plan and whom he couldn’t get hold of. He was going out of his mind with worry. Surely Bruce wouldn’t harm her?
Marco had toyed with the idea of confessing everything to the police, telling them what he knew about Bruce Neeland, in the hopes that they might be able to track him and Cora down. But he thought the risk to Cora was too great. So he’d bided his time.
And then the onesie had arrived in the mail. The relief he’d felt when they received the onesie had been incredible. He figured Bruce must have lost his nerve about calling the house as planned, even with the untraceable, prepaid cell phone. He must have been worried about the police. So he’d found another way.
Another two days and it will all be over. Marco will take the money to the rendezvous point—one they previously picked out together—and get Cora back. And when it is all over, he’ll call the police and tell them. He’ll give them a false description of Bruce and the car he’ll be driving.