Hidden (Nicole Jones #1)(66)

He stares at me. ‘How do you know that?’

I chuckle. ‘Oh, come on, Ian. The DMV was a piece of cake. So how did you get the car?’

‘That’s not something you need to worry about.’

‘I’m not worried about it, Ian. I just want to know. I think you owe it to me to tell me what happened. I mean, how did you see the postcard I sent my father? You couldn’t have just walked into my father’s hospital room in a federal prison. You’re dead, Ian. What would everyone have said?’

‘You have been busy on that computer, haven’t you?’

‘You gave it to me. You knew what I could do. Do you really think I’d forgotten? You came here so I could do a job and get you back all that money that you think I’m responsible for taking from you, so you must have figured I was still hacking. But that job was the last one I ever did, and I wish like hell I’d never gone along with it.’

‘Don’t get a conscience on me here. You didn’t have one before.’

‘We stole from people we didn’t know. Well, not everyone. We knew Tony, and of course, there’s Paul Michaels.’

I see panic in his eyes.

‘That’s right, Ian. You made such a big deal about coming up with your fake name, but you knew Paul Michaels was one of the account owners we were stealing from. Who is he?’ I pause, waiting for an answer, but he doesn’t say anything, so I continue. ‘And what about Amelie Renaud. Who is she, Ian?’ I ask him in such a way that he knows, knows that I know she’s real.

He sighs and sticks the gun in his waistband. I don’t think anyone outside of the movies ever does that, but maybe that’s where he’s gotten the idea. I wait as he mulls over how to answer.

Finally, he tells me.

‘She’s my wife.’





THIRTY-TWO


His wife. It throws me off center, mentally and physically, and I slump against the back of the pen. His wife? But I cannot ask the question. I cannot speak. The words are caught in my throat, strangling me. I hear myself make a sound that is merely garble.

‘I should have told you,’ he says, but not as contritely as I’d expect.

I swallow hard, several times. My head is spinning. Finally, I find my voice.

‘How long?’ I am thinking back to that day in Miami, the day we fell in love. ‘How long have you been married?’

‘Fourteen years.’

After. But just.

He does not give me a chance to even formulate another question. ‘I didn’t know it would be the same. You know, between us.’ He takes my silence as permission to continue. ‘But when I saw you, that day at the spa, I couldn’t stop thinking about you. How I still—’

I put my hand up to stop him from saying anything more. ‘You gave me her name. She’s on the list. The list of account owners. You knew her, didn’t you, before?’ I ask. I want to hear him admit it.

‘Yes.’

‘How?’

‘I met her in France. My semester abroad.’

Before we met. Right before we met.

‘Did you see her when we were in Paris?’

‘You left me.’ Anger laces his words.

‘I’m surprised you could even touch me at all,’ I say bitterly. ‘You must really want me to do this job. What is so important about it? Is it just because you think I owe you for what happened back then, or is there more to it?’ I don’t give him a chance to answer, though, because I have another thought. ‘What about how you’re dead? Who did Amelie Renaud marry? She couldn’t marry Ian Cartwright, because he committed suicide in a houseboat in Paris. Who are you these days? Are you Paul Michaels?’

He shakes his head, staring at the hay next to him. I wait. I’m good at waiting. I’ve been waiting for fifteen years.

‘Does she know? Does she know anything?’ I ask when it’s clear he won’t tell me.

Ian looks at me then, with an expression full of hate and anger. ‘You think you’re so smart. But you didn’t find out everything, did you, with that precious computer of yours? You haven’t been looking in the right place.’

He is talking in riddles.

‘What do you mean?’

‘You found Amelie, but you didn’t find out everything, did you?’

I am beginning to wonder what I have missed, something so critical that he is smiling so wickedly, as if he has something over me. He does have something over me, but I cannot for the life of me figure out what it is. I decide to drop it. For now.

‘Tell me about the FBI agents, Ian. The ones who showed up at the Painted Rock instead of you.’

His smile softens and a tinge of respect comes into his eyes. ‘I figured you were there somewhere. They said you weren’t. But you know every inch of this goddamned island, don’t you? I told them that, but they seem to think they’re smarter than you.’

He is not answering my questions. I am ready to scream.

He moves suddenly, grabbing me, his fingers digging into my arms so hard I know I will have bruises. ‘You asked me if they caught me.’

‘You said they didn’t.’

His face is so close to mine I can feel his breath. ‘I lied.’

‘You cut a deal with the Feds, didn’t you?’ I ask, my voice louder than it should be because I am angry. I want to hear him admit it.