Police split into two teams.
One went toward the moving phone.
The other went to the bank.
I remained at the depot because Serrano made it unmistakably clear that I would be physically stopped if I attempted to follow.
For once, I did not argue.
My children needed police focused on finding them.
Not protecting me from my own panic.
I sat beside Denise and watched two dots on a map.
One moved west.
One remained fixed.
At 9:17, the bank team arrived.
At 9:19, officers entered.
At 9:21, Serrano received confirmation.
“Ruth?”
I stood.
He shook his head.
“Marla’s attorney.”
“What?”
“Inside the bank?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He was attempting to freeze the trust.”
I stared.
“Freeze it?”
“Apparently Marla authorized emergency action during her cooperation.”
So the stationary phone was not Ruth moving money.
It had been left deliberately.
A false trail.
“Then the children are with the moving phone.”
“Possibly.”
I hated that word.
The moving signal reached the interstate.
State police coordinated.
A helicopter joined.
Then the phone stopped.
Rest area.
Officers moved in.
Vehicle located.
Empty.
Phone beneath the driver’s seat.
No Ruth.
No children.
No Mrs. Weaver.
Another decoy.
I stood so quickly the chair scraped backward.
“She’s ahead of you.”
Serrano did not react defensively.
“Yes.”
That frightened me more than reassurance would have.
“What aren’t we seeing?”
He looked at the maps.
“The transport ambush.”
“What about it?”
“She knew the route.”
“The destination was confidential.”
“Yes.”
“Then someone told her.”
“Or tracked the vehicle.”
“Could she?”
“We’re checking.”
I remembered the copied key to locker 317.
The photographs of my routes.
The work schedules.
Vaughn’s family solved problems through access.
Not force first.
Access.
“Police vehicle tracker?”
Serrano looked toward a technician.
The technician began checking.
I called Mrs. Weaver’s phone.
It went straight to voicemail.
Again.
Nothing.
Then Emmett’s watch.
He had a cheap children’s smartwatch we used for school pickup.
Vaughn bought it.
My heart stopped.
“Emmett has a watch.”
Serrano turned.
“What kind?”
I told him.
“Tracking enabled?”
“Yes.”
“Account access?”
“Vaughn set it up.”
The technicians moved immediately.
I gave them my login.
The account showed no current location.
Last sync:
8:42 a.m.
Mrs. Weaver’s building.
Then the device went offline.
“Removed,” one technician said.
Or destroyed.
June had no device.
Mrs. Weaver’s phone was missing.
Every ordinary way to locate them had been anticipated.
Then I remembered something embarrassingly small.
June hated wearing coats.
Mrs. Weaver had sewn name tags into both children’s winter jackets because they kept losing them at school.
Not trackers.
Nothing useful.
My mind was grasping.
Think.
What did they have?
Emmett’s backpack.
June’s stuffed rabbit.
Mrs. Weaver’s handbag.
Shoes.
Clothes.
The new backpacks at Ruth’s cabin.
No.
Those were waiting for afterward.
“Where would Ruth take them?”
Denise asked.
I shook my head.
“The cabin is compromised.”
“Her house.”
“Police are there.”
“Marla’s?”
“Watched.”
“Vaughn’s places?”
“Known.”
Serrano said, “We’re checking properties connected to every relative.”
Relative.
I looked at him.
“Elaina.”
“Porter?”
“Mallory’s doctor.”
“She’s being located.”
“Located?”
His expression changed slightly.
“You don’t have her.”
“No.”
“Where was she last seen?”
“Her clinic yesterday.”
“And today?”
“Didn’t report.”
Another missing family member.
“Could she have the children?”
“We don’t know.”
I called Mallory at the hospital.
Police answered first, then allowed her to speak.
“Did Elaina ever mention another property?”
Mallory sounded groggy.
“What?”
“Cabin, office, house, clinic, anything.”
“I don’t know.”
“Think.”
Silence.
Then:
“She has a farm.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know exactly.”
“What farm?”
“She talked about horses. Vaughn said we could take the baby there someday.”
“Name?”
“No.”
“Town?”
“I think near DeKalb.”
Serrano heard.
Officers began searching property records.
Elaina Porter owned no farm.
Her husband did.
Daniel Porter.
Twenty-eight acres outside Sycamore.
Police moved.
Forty-five minutes away.
Too far.
Every minute became physical.
I paced until my legs hurt.
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number again.
Serrano signaled.
Record.
I answered.
“Ruth.”
The woman laughed.
Something about the laugh bothered me.
Too light.
Ruth’s voice from the recordings had been deeper.
Older.
“Where are my children?”
“They’re comfortable.”
Not Ruth.
I looked at Serrano and mouthed:
Different woman.
He nodded.
Technicians began tracing.
“Let me hear Emmett.”
“No.”
“June.”
“No.”
“Mrs. Weaver.”
“You’re not in charge.”
I recognized something.
Not the voice.
The phrasing.
You’re not in charge.
I had heard it before.
Where?
Then the woman said, “Vaughn always said you needed everything explained twice.”
My skin prickled.
Someone who knew how Vaughn talked about me.
“Who are you?”
Silence.
Then:
“You really don’t recognize me?”
The voice changed.
Not dramatically.
Just enough.
The artificial roughness disappeared.
My stomach dropped.
I knew her.
Not family.
Not friend.
Someone I had seen hundreds of times.
“Janice?”
Denise stared at me.
The woman laughed again.
My workplace supervisor’s assistant.
Janice Bell.
She managed night access.
Employee badges.
Lockers.
Schedules.
She had worked in the building for seven years.
Longer than I had.
She knew when I arrived.
When I left.
Which route I took when construction changed.
Which locker was mine.
“Why?”
Janice sighed.
“You always ask why after everything is already happening.”
That was Vaughn’s language too.
“How long have you known him?”
“Longer than you.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
“How long?”
“Since high school.”
Another invisible person.
Another connection.
“You helped him.”
“I helped Ruth.”
“Where are my children?”
“Safe if you cooperate.”
“Put them on.”
“You already heard June.”
I remembered the earlier call.
The woman claiming to be Ruth.
It had been Janice.
The voice distorted.
Prepared.
Meaning Ruth might never have been near my children.
“Where is Ruth?”
Janice went quiet.
“You think Ruth is the one you should worry about?”
“Where is she?”
“Gone.”
“Gone where?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to police.”
“They’ll find out.”
Something in her tone changed.
Not fear.
Resentment.
I pushed.
“Ruth left you.”
Silence.
“She left everybody.”
“Stop talking.”
“She used Marla. Vaughn used Brielle. Vaughn used Mallory. What did Ruth use you for?”
Janice breathed harder.
“You don’t know anything.”
“I know you’re the one holding children while she disappears.”
“Shut up.”
“She got the money?”
“No.”
The answer came too fast.
Serrano looked sharply toward me.
Good.
Keep going.
“She tried.”
“Marla ruined it.”
“So Ruth left.”
Janice swore.
“And you’re still doing her work.”
“You think you’re clever now?”
“No.”
I looked at Vaughn’s notebook.
“I think all of you depended on me believing I wasn’t.”
The line went silent.
Then I heard something faint.
A train horn.
Technicians reacted.
One typed rapidly.
Another pulled up maps.
Janice continued.
“Bring the notebooks.”
“I can’t.”
“Then your children stay with me.”
“Where?”
“You’ll get instructions.”
Another train horn.
Closer.
Serrano pointed toward several rail crossings on the map.
I needed more.
“Mrs. Weaver needs her medication.”
A gamble.
She did take blood-pressure pills, but she could miss a dose without immediate catastrophe.
Janice answered, “She has it.”
“How do you know?”
“I checked her purse.”
Inside.
Close enough to see Mrs. Weaver.
“Is she conscious?”
A pause.
“Yes.”
“Let me speak to her.”
“No.”
Then I heard Mrs. Weaver anyway.
“You tell that woman she drives like a blind raccoon!”
I almost laughed and cried at once.
Janice shouted away from the phone.
“Be quiet!”
Mrs. Weaver answered louder.
“I taught seventh grade for thirty-two years. You think you scare me?”
The phone shifted.
A door slammed.
But before Janice disconnected, I heard one more sound.
Church bells.
Six strikes.
Not the hour.
Too early.
A scheduled bell sequence.
The technicians searched.
Train crossing.
Church nearby.
Industrial road.
One match.
An abandoned printing plant outside Cicero.
Police units converged.
I waited.
Ten minutes.
Fifteen.
Twenty-three.
Then Serrano’s radio exploded with voices.
Vehicle located.
Rear entrance.
Movement inside.
I stopped breathing.
Officers entered.
One suspect.
Female.
Children located.
Adult female located.
My knees gave way.
Denise caught me.
“Alive?”
Serrano listened.
Then nodded.
“Alive.”
I covered my face.
For several seconds I could not speak.
Emmett.
June.
Mrs. Weaver.
Alive.
Janice was arrested without firing the handgun found beside her.
The children were frightened but physically unharmed.
Mrs. Weaver had a bruised shoulder and apparently had spent most of captivity insulting Janice’s driving, intelligence, and choice of shoes.
When police finally allowed me to speak to Emmett, his first words were:
“Mom, June bit her.”
In the background June yelled, “She grabbed my rabbit!”
I laughed so hard it became crying.
“I’m coming.”
Serrano drove.
Denise came with me.
When we reached the ambulance staging area, June ran before anyone could stop her.
I dropped to my knees.
She hit me hard enough to hurt.
Emmett came next.
I held both children until my arms ached.
Mrs. Weaver stood nearby with a blanket around her shoulders.
“You all right?” I asked.
“I’m furious.”
“Good.”
“That woman put duct tape on my mouth.”
I stared.
Mrs. Weaver lifted her chin.
“Lasted four minutes.”
Even Serrano smiled.
Then Emmett tugged my sleeve.
“Mom.”
“What?”
“I heard them talking.”
“Who?”
“The lady and another lady on the phone.”
My relief tightened into attention.
“What did they say?”
“About Grandma.”
I froze.
“My mother?”
He shook his head.
“Dad’s mom.”
Ruth.
“What about her?”
Emmett looked toward Serrano.
“She said Ruth got away.”
That was expected.
Then he continued.
“She said she took the last file.”
“What file?”
“I don’t know.”
“What exactly did she say?”
Emmett concentrated.
“She said, ‘Ruth has the original Mercer file. If she reaches him, we’re finished.’”
“Him?”
Serrano crouched.
“Did she say a name?”
Emmett nodded.
“Grandpa.”
My skin went cold.
Vaughn’s father.
The man Vaughn told me had died before we ever met.
I looked at Serrano.
“He told me his father died when he was seventeen.”
Emmett continued.
“The lady said Ruth was going to find him.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Anything else?”
Emmett thought again.
“She said he was the only person who knew what Vaughn really was.”
Serrano stood.
I held my children closer.
All this time, we had been digging backward through Vaughn’s lies looking for where the scheme began.
The trust.
Ruth.
Marla.
The dead policyholders.
But somewhere beyond all of them was another person Vaughn had erased from his biography.
His father.
And Ruth was running toward him with the original file bearing our family name.
Click here to continue reading: PART 13: Vaughn’s Supposedly Dead Father Kept a File on Every Scheme Ruth Built, Including the First One That Used Vaughn’s Name
My Husband Handed Me an Eighty-Dollar Grocery Limit, but the Numbers in Our Account Told a Much Stranger Story
Part 12 of 28
