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“If that’s the case, Gus, where is she? Murdoch is dead, and you need her. What would keep her away, unless she still has cause to be scared?”
“Of course, she’s scared. There’s a murderer on the loose, and the only thing the police can seem to do about it is to shoot me!”
“And Jacob Curtis?”
“Is a liar. Put him on the stand if you want—I’ll rip him to fuckin’ shreds.”
For some weeks Gus assumed that Theo was with Mac Etheridge, as both seemed to have disappeared, and so he did not panic. Mac knew what he was doing. That they’d chosen to become fugitives was probably not ideal, but it would all be sorted out when the real killer was caught. In the meantime, he rested easy knowing she was safe.
It was only when it came out that Mac Etheridge’s disappearance had been orchestrated by Homeland Security and that he had been, since the night of the shooting, held in a high-security facility, that Gus understood that his sister was really missing.
When George Mendes came to see him again, he was on his feet, using a walker. It had taken him twenty minutes to get upright, and so he was reluctant when Mendes asked him to sit down.
“Look, Gus, I really think you should sit down.”
“Don’t I have to be standing when you arrest me?”
“Gus, please.”
There was something in Mendes’s tone that scared Gus. And so he refused.
Mendes sighed. He glanced at Jacqui, who had also caught the gravity in the detective’s manner and moved to stand beside Gus.
Mendes held out a piece of paper. A copy of a letter in Theodosia Benton’s handwriting. Jacqui took it and held it for Gus. He read it quickly. He was a little relieved that she’d been found, though he showed none of that, responding hotly from the first. “What the hell did you do to her?” he demanded. “You’ve coerced her into confessing everything but the bloody Kennedy assassination. Have you had her all this time? There isn’t a court in the country that won’t throw this out!”
“We don’t have her, Gus.”
“Of course, you do… How else would you get her to write this trumped-up confession?”
“This arrived by mail.” Mendes looked at him. “Gus, we haven’t seen her since the day after you were shot, and we can’t find her.”
“What do you mean?” Gus’s knuckles were white on the walker.
“Read the letter again, Gus. It’s written by someone who was distraught, very troubled, and remorseful. Three murders—you on death’s door… Do you think she might try to hurt herself?”
“No.”
“She talks about feeling numb, like she’s not here. Our psychologist believes she could be thinking about harming herself.”
Fleetingly, Gus remembered Theo telling him she felt numb, like it was not happening to her. “No.”
“Look, Gus, I’m sorry, I really am. I believe her when she says you didn’t know, but we are really worried about her state of mind. For her sake, do you have any idea where she might—”
“Might what? Off herself? No, I don’t, because Theo wouldn’t. And she wouldn’t…didn’t kill anybody.”
“She came to visit you just before she absconded.” It was a statement not a question.
“Or was abducted,” Gus said slowly.
“What did she say?”
“Not much—she cried mostly.”
“She gave you a book?”
Gus nodded. Theo had slipped a copy of Jack Chase’s Airborne under his pillow. “I gave it to her years ago… She uses it as a kind of good luck charm. I guess she figured I needed it more.”
“People intent on doing themselves harm often give away their most precious possessions,” Mendes pointed out. “If you were about to be charged for a capital crime for which she was responsible, she may well have been that desperate.” Mendes moved closer so that Gus could not avoid his gaze. “It explains how the knife and keys ended up at your house. Come on, man, I know she’s your kid sister, but sometimes we know the least about the people closest to us… Sometimes we don’t want to see—”
