I'll Walk Alone - Mary Higgins Clark [54]
“I didn’t sign that letter,” Zan said, her voice now quiet. “I didn’t write any checks from my personal account. And I am not crazy.” She saw the look of combined disbelief and concern on the face of her associate. “Josh, I accept your resignation. If this is going to turn out to be a scandal with our suppliers suing us, I don’t want you caught in it. They might accuse you of being in some kind of rip-off scheme along with me. So why don’t you get your stuff together and take off?”
As he stared at her, she added, sarcastically, “Admit it. You think I kidnapped my own son and that I’ve lost my mind. Who knows, maybe I’m dangerous? Maybe I’ll clobber you over the head when your back is turned.”
“Zan,” Josh snapped. “I’m not leaving you, and I’m going to find a way to help you.”
The phone rang, a sharp, ominous sound. Josh picked up the receiver, listened, then said, “She’s not here yet. I’ll give her the message.”
Zan watched as Josh scribbled a phone number. When he hung up, he said, “Zan, that was Detective Billy Collins. He wants you to come to the Central Park Precinct with your lawyer today, as soon as possible. I’m going to call Charley Shore right now. It’s early but he told me he always gets to his office by 7:30.”
Yesterday I fainted, Zan thought. I can’t, I won’t, do that again.
During the night, after Willy dropped her off, she lay in bed in quiet, absolute despair, a single light shining on Matthew’s picture again. For some reason, the look of compassion in the eyes of the priest who was Alvirah’s friend kept coming back to her. I was rude to him, she thought, but I could feel that he wanted to help me. He said he’d pray for me, but I told him to pray for Matthew instead. When he took my hands, it felt as though he were blessing me. Maybe what he was doing was helping me to face the truth?
All night long, except for brief periods when she dozed off, Zan had kept her vigil, looking at Matthew’s picture. As dawn was breaking she said quietly, “Little guy, I don’t believe that you’re still alive. I’ve always sworn that I would know if you were dead, but I’ve been fooling myself. You are dead, and it’s over for me, too. I don’t know what’s happening, but I can’t fight anymore. I guess in my soul, all these many months, I’ve really believed that you were grabbed by a predator who abused and then killed you. I wouldn’t have thought I would come to this, but there is a bottle of sleeping pills in this drawer that will bring us back together. It’s time to take them.”
A sense of relief and exhaustion had come over her, and she finally closed her eyes. With Fr. Aiden’s face before her, she had prayed for forgiveness and understanding before she reached for the pills.
It was then that she heard Matthew’s voice calling out to her. “Mommy, Mommy.” She had leapt up from the bed screaming, “Matthew! Matthew!” In that moment, against all rational belief, she knew with absolute certainty that her little boy was still alive.
Matthew is alive, she thought fiercely, as she heard Josh talking to Charley Shore. When he replaced the receiver, Josh said, “Detective Collins wants to question you this morning. Mr. Shore will pick you up at 10:30.”
Zan nodded. “You said that I must have paid any deposits on the furnishings for the model apartments out of my savings account. Pull my bank account up for me on the computer.”
“I don’t have the password for your account.”
“You’ll have it now. It’s ‘Matthew.’ I have a little over twenty-seven thousand dollars in it.”
Josh sat down in front of the computer and began to send his fingers flying across the keyboard.
Zan saw the expression on his face, troubled, but not surprised. “What is my balance?” she asked.
“Two hundred thirty-three dollars and eleven cents.”
“Then there is a computer hacker at work,” she said flatly.
Josh ignored that. “Zan, what are we going to do about all the orders you placed?” he asked.
“You mean, what are we going to do about all the orders I didn’t place,