Jennifer Collins refused to leave the rehabilitation facility until someone promised her they were looking for Sophie.
I learned that from Detective Shaw forty-three minutes after the shots.
Jennifer had emerged through a side door with blood on one sleeve, stumbled across frozen grass and collapsed near an unmarked police vehicle.
The blood was not hers.
At least not all of it.
“Whose?” I asked.
“We don’t know yet.”
“Was she shot?”
“No gunshot wound identified.”
“Where is she?”
“Being transported.”
“To this hospital?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Security.”
That single word told me how frightened investigators were of whoever remained connected to Dererick.
“What did Jennifer say?”
“Very little.”
“Did she say Sophie is alive?”
“Yes.”
Relief hit hard.
“Inside?”
“She believes so.”
“Believes?”
“Jennifer was separated from her before she escaped.”
“How?”
“I can’t give you tactical details while officers are still operating.”
I hated the answer.
I accepted it.
“Dererick?”
“Not in custody.”
“Elaine?”
“Not in custody.”
“Thomas?”
“No confirmation he’s inside.”
“What about the gunshots?”
“Still being investigated.”
Shaw sounded exhausted now.
Behind her voice I heard radios and engines.
Then she said, “Jennifer mentioned you.”
My breath stopped.
“Me?”
“Yes.”
“How does she know me?”
“She knows your name.”
“From Dererick?”
“Presumably.”
“What did she say?”
Shaw hesitated.
“She asked whether Anna got out.”
For a moment I could not speak.
Jennifer knew what had been planned for me.
Maybe she had known for months.
“Tell her yes.”
“I will.”
“Tell her I’m safe.”
“I will.”
“And tell her I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
I looked at Clare.
“For living in that house while she was being hurt there.”
“Anna, that is not something—”
“Just tell her.”
Shaw was quiet.
“All right.”
Before she ended the call, I asked one more question.
“Did she say what graduation means?”
Another pause.
“Yes.”
My stomach tightened.
“And?”
“Not what we thought.”
“What does that mean?”
“I need to speak with her properly before I give you an incomplete interpretation.”
“You said she talked.”
“She gave us fragments.”
“Give me the fragments.”
Shaw exhaled.
“Graduation wasn’t simply transfer.”
“What was it?”
“Identity replacement.”
I said nothing.
Clare watched my face.
“What?”
I repeated the words aloud.
“Identity replacement.”
Shaw continued.
“According to Jennifer, victims were not always made to disappear permanently. Some were given new identities, new histories and controlled environments.”
“For what purpose?”
“Different purposes.”
“Customers?”
“Sometimes.”
My skin crawled.
“Explain.”
“Jennifer says Dererick’s network created people who could be placed where clients wanted them.”
I struggled to understand.
“Placed where?”
“Households. Care situations. Employment. Relationships.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“It may when we have more information.”
“What did they do to Jennifer?”
“She says they convinced people she had abandoned her daughter, then isolated her until she no longer believed anyone would trust her account.”
“Drugs?”
“Yes.”
“Threats?”
“Yes.”
“Sophie?”
“Used as leverage.”
“Why didn’t she escape?”
“She tried.”
The answer was immediate.
“How many times?”
“At least twice.”
“What happened?”
“They showed her photographs of Sophie.”
I closed my eyes.
“Recent ones?”
“Yes.”
So my guess had been right.
They had maintained control without chains.
A school entrance.
A bus stop.
A bedroom window.
Any image could become a threat.
“What identity did they give Jennifer?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“Was she working for them?”
“She says they forced her to assist with other victims.”
Clare covered her mouth.
My earlier fear returned.
Graduates becoming participants.
“Did she hurt people?”
“We don’t know the extent of what she was made to do.”
“Does she think she’s guilty?”
Shaw’s voice softened.
“Yes.”
I understood that instantly.
Maybe better than I wanted to.
Dererick had spent weeks making me question whether my own behavior caused my injuries.
Imagine eighteen months of being told that survival made you complicit.
“Why was she at the airport?”
“Dererick ordered her there.”
“From where?”
“A controlled apartment.”
“Whose?”
“Connected to Bellweather.”
“Was Sophie already at the facility?”
“Jennifer believes Sophie was taken this morning.”
“How?”
“We’re working on it.”
“What did Dererick show Jennifer on his phone?”
“A live image of Sophie.”
I gripped the chair.
There it was.
The moment on the airport footage.
One screen.
One threat.
Jennifer followed.
“Why bring Jennifer to the rehab building?”
“She says Dererick needed her to help with tonight’s transfer.”
“Mine?”
“Yes.”
The word struck harder than I expected.
Jennifer had been scheduled to participate in my graduation.
Not willingly.
But physically present.
“What was she supposed to do?”
“Help convince you that what happened after you woke was voluntary.”
I stared at the wall.
“How?”
“Jennifer would present herself as someone who had been through the same transition and was safe.”
A manufactured witness.
Someone saying I had chosen to leave.
Someone telling me the confusion would pass.
Someone Dererick could point to as proof that resistance was irrational.
“What identity did they plan for me?”
“Unknown.”
“Did they plan to tell Clare I disappeared?”
“Likely.”
“Police?”
“Possibly.”
“My clients?”
“I don’t know.”
I imagined my laptop abandoned.
My car somewhere deliberate.
A message written in my voice.
Maybe an argument staged with Dererick.
Maybe evidence that I had run away.
The possibilities were endless because he knew everything about me.
Passwords.
Habits.
Friends.
The phrases I used in texts.
“Did Jennifer know where they were going to send me?”
“No.”
“Did she know who requested me?”
Shaw became silent.
“What?”
“She mentioned a client code.”
My pulse quickened.
“What code?”
“A17.”
“Was that on the laptop?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Does it mean anything?”
“Not yet.”
“Did Jennifer know the client?”
“She says she never met them.”
“Them?”
“That was her wording.”
More than one person.
“What did they want?”
“She doesn’t know.”
That answer frightened me almost more than knowing.
The phone call ended when Shaw was pulled away.
Clare sat beside me.
For several minutes we stared at nothing.
Then she said, “Identity replacement.”
“I know.”
“They were going to make you disappear while keeping you alive.”
“Maybe.”
“Anna.”
“I don’t know what’s worse.”
Clare took my hand.
I thought of Jennifer’s missing-person article.
Her mother telling reporters she would never abandon Sophie.
For eighteen months, strangers had debated whether Jennifer left voluntarily while Dererick’s network used that doubt against her.
They did not need to erase a body.
They erased credibility.
That was cleaner.
More sustainable.
Crueler.
Around noon, Detective Brooks brought another update.
Sophie had been found.
Alive.
I stood so quickly the chair struck the wall.
“Where?”
“Inside the facility.”
“Injured?”
“Being evaluated.”
“Jennifer knows?”
“Yes.”
I covered my face.
For the first time since 2:17 that morning, relief lasted longer than a few seconds.
Then I remembered Dererick.
“Did you get him?”
Brooks’s silence answered.
“He escaped?”
“We have not located him.”
“How?”
“There are service tunnels beneath part of the facility.”
“Of course there are.”
“Officers are searching.”
“Elaine?”
“Missing.”
“Thomas?”
“Also unaccounted for.”
“So all three could be together.”
“Possible.”
“Vehicles?”
“The SUV remains.”
“Then they have another.”
“Likely.”
I paced once across the room.
“Where would Dererick go?”
“That’s something we hoped you could help with.”
I laughed bitterly.
“I apparently don’t know my husband.”
“You know his habits.”
“His fake habits?”
“Both matter.”
I stopped.
Where would Dererick go when plans failed?
He hated improvising.
Even vacations had itineraries.
He kept duplicate chargers in every suitcase.
He carried cash folded by denomination.
He stored spare keys.
Prepared explanations before injuries appeared.
Prepared alternate identities before victims vanished.
“He has contingencies.”
Brooks nodded.
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Think about places he insisted on controlling.”
The question changed something.
Places.
Not people.
I thought of storage units.
Hotels.
His office.
Then a memory surfaced.
A cabin.
Dererick had mentioned it several times during our marriage.
Not ours.
A colleague’s.
He claimed he occasionally used it during hunting season, though I had never known him to hunt.
“Pine Lake.”
Brooks’s pen moved.
“What about it?”
“There’s a cabin.”
“Address?”
“I don’t know.”
“Owner?”
“He said a work friend named Tom.”
Brooks looked up.
“Tom?”
My skin prickled.
“Thomas.”
“Vale?”
“I never knew his last name.”
“Did you ever meet him?”
“No.”
“When was Dererick last there?”
“He said he went six weeks ago.”
“For how long?”
“One night.”
“Did he take anything?”
I remembered him loading the SUV.
A cooler.
A duffel.
His personal laptop?
Maybe.
“I don’t know.”
Brooks was already calling someone.
Pine Lake was forty miles north of the rehabilitation facility.
A perfect contingency location.
Isolated.
Seasonal houses.
Few neighbors in September.
While he spoke, another memory surfaced.
“Wait.”
Brooks covered the phone.
“What?”
“He came home with mud on his shoes.”
“That’s not unusual for a cabin.”
“No. He also had a blue plastic wristband.”
“What kind?”
“I asked if he’d gone somewhere.”
“What did he say?”
“Private shooting range.”
“Did you believe him?”
“Yes.”
“Why does the wristband matter?”
“I saw one in the photographs.”
“Which photographs?”
“Jennifer.”
My pulse accelerated.
“One of the later pictures. There was something blue around her wrist.”
Brooks stared at me.
“You’re certain?”
“No.”
“Could it have been a hospital band?”
“Maybe.”
He returned to his call.
His voice sharpened.
“Add Pine Lake. Search property records connected to Thomas Vale, Bellweather, Northstar and known associates.”
Minutes later, an answer came back.
Thomas Vale owned no cabin.
But Bellweather Recovery Holdings did.
A property on the eastern shore.
Shaw called shortly afterward.
Teams were heading there.
Then she told me something else.
Police had recovered a laptop from the rehabilitation facility.
Not Dererick’s.
A network computer.
Inside was a directory containing upcoming graduations.
Mine was first.
Two more women followed.
One scheduled in six days.
Another in eleven.
“Who?”
“We’re locating them now.”
“Do they know?”
“Not yet.”
“Are their husbands involved?”
“We don’t know.”
The scale widened again.
Dererick might not be an aberration.
He might be one recruiter among several.
One spouse among several.
One person who turned intimacy into access.
Then Shaw said, “There’s another file.”
“What?”
“A contingency document.”
My stomach tightened.
“About me?”
“About active candidates.”
“What does it say?”
“If an operation is compromised before graduation, the responsible handler is instructed to either recover the candidate or trigger a discredit protocol.”
“What is that?”
“Evidence designed to make the victim appear unstable, dishonest or criminally involved.”
I thought of sleepwalking.
Confusion.
Calls I did not remember.
Dererick had already begun laying groundwork.
“What evidence?”
“Could be fabricated communications, financial activity, medical history, allegations against other people.”
“Against Clare?”
“Potentially.”
I looked at my sister.
“What does my file say?”
Shaw hesitated.
“Your discredit package is already prepared.”
My mouth went dry.
“What’s in it?”
“A series of messages appearing to come from you.”
“To whom?”
“Several people.”
“What do they say?”
“That you planned to leave Dererick.”
I almost laughed.
“That’s predictable.”
“There’s more.”
“What?”
“They suggest you were having an affair.”
“Who with?”
“Mr. Peterson’s son.”
I stared.
“I’ve met him twice.”
“We know.”
“Anything else?”
“Yes.”
Shaw’s next words came carefully.
“There are fabricated messages in which you discuss poisoning Dererick.”
For a moment I could not speak.
“He was going to make me look like the dangerous one.”
“Yes.”
“And if I accused him of drugging me…”
“He could claim you reversed the accusation after planning to harm him.”
The elegance of it sickened me.
Every truth already had a counterfeit version waiting.
Then Shaw’s voice changed.
“We have movement at Pine Lake.”
I gripped the phone.
“Dererick?”
“A vehicle just left the Bellweather cabin.”
“Police?”
“Units are following at distance.”
“Who’s driving?”
“Can’t confirm.”
“Where are they going?”
“South.”
Toward town.
Toward me.
Click here to continue reading: PART 12: Dererick Came Back Toward Town With His Escape Plan Collapsing, and the Person Beside Him Was Someone I Trusted
The Night I Poured Out My Husband’s Tea and Waited to Learn What He Expected Me Never to See
Part 11 of 24
