A Bookmarked Death (19 page)

Ruth turned to the second, smaller screen. “Eastport.”

Eastport? They were flying
east
? I had pictured the helicopter heading in the opposite direction, toward JFK, the Crosleys abandoning it in a nearby lot and, and boarding a commercial flight out of the country. But perhaps
The Beautiful Past
was moored in Southampton and they had been heading there to lie low for a few days. In a week or so, when surveillance had eased up, they could have left the country with forged passports, slipping away forever.

And now?

Frank had already pulled the cruiser away from the curb and into traffic. I could hear the siren he had turned on and imagined the red and blue lights flashing.

I pressed forward. “Can you find out how—bad the crash was?”

Frank’s eyes locked on mine in the rearview mirror. “Do you really want to know?”

“I
have
to know.”

He nodded toward Ruth Carew. A soft sigh, then she spoke to a dispatcher who patched her through to an officer at the crash scene. The officer’s voice crackled as he identified himself.

“Carew here. We’re on our way. How bad is it?” She lowered her voice to where I could barely hear her.

But his answer was clear enough. “No survivors.”

I pressed back against the seat, too stunned to breathe in. Was this how my life would finally end? I knew I would never recover this time.
Thank God Hannah isn’t here
. She would be inconsolable. The thought of her arriving at the scene and seeing Elisa’s body . . . She would never survive that. I doubted that I could.

Hold it together. Don’t scream. Think about what you do now.
Yet I couldn’t stop the thought that knowing Elisa again had been like a visitation from an angel. I had been given the rare chance to find out what my daughter would have been like as an adult, given time to make peace with her, and say a longer good-bye. Thank God I had had a chance to tell her how much I loved her and had missed her all these years.

But it was not a visitation, not a dream. It was a nightmare.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

I
FOUND
I was sitting with my fists clenched, eyes closed and my body rigid as a board with the effort not to think. Not to feel.

In the front seat there was a beeping.

I opened my eyes and saw Carew give her head a shake. “What am I getting here?”

Frank veered onto the median shoulder. We had just entered Sunrise Highway and rush hour traffic was clotted around us. “What? Where is it?”

“Not in Eastport. It’s closer to us, in East Moriches. It could be anything, of course.”

“No. It’s a discrete signal. Key it in.”

I tried to picture the distance between East Moriches and Eastport. They bordered each other, but Moriches came first. So Elisa’s transmitter couldn’t be from the debris. Had they discovered the device on Elisa and tossed it out? Could you open a window on a helicopter? I thought of incidents on commercial airlines where passengers had been sucked out of planes by air pressure. But helicopters weren’t pressurized. Or planes.

What if . . . I thought of something so crazy that I nearly kept quiet. But I could never keep quiet, especially now. “Can you radio and ask how many people there were in the crash?”

“Why?” Carew said, then as she understood it added, “That’s not a bad idea.”

She did something I couldn’t see, then said, “Carew and Marselli, we’re on our way. How many vics and ages?”

The cop on the scene didn’t have to check. “One male, one female, mid-forties.”

“That’s it? No one ejected nearby?”

“We’ve secured the entire area.”

“Okay. Roger.”

I put my hand over my mouth as if I were going to be sick. I had suddenly remembered the movie
The Good Shepherd
, where a young woman had been deliberately thrown out of a small airplane, cartwheeling down to her death.
Dear God, no.

But helicopters didn’t fly that high. She could still be alive, just badly hurt.

If that was even what had happened.

We were moving again, siren screaming. Other cars were veering onto the shoulder, but it was still taking much too long. Maybe she was only hurt. We had to save her! I cursed a silver SUV that blocked our path until Frank pressed on the horn as well. Sitting forward, I craned to see the screens. Our sedan was a blue arrow. Then Ruth zoomed out beyond street names and I could see something round and red throbbing in the distance.

Breathe in. Breathe in.

We had just passed the green DOT sign for Mastic Beach and Shirley at William Floyd Parkway when the radio came to life again. A static voice reported, “Crash scene, helicopter crash scene. ME is here. Vics died on impact, but the pilot was shot in the chest first. Could be why the craft went down.”

“Any sign of a weapon?”

“Still checking.”

Ruth and Frank exchanged a rapid look. Not in their playbook.

Not in mine either. But I was in an emotional red zone and couldn’t consider anything else.

We screeched off the highway at Center Moriches and raced north on Old Schoolhouse Road. By looking over Carew’s shoulder, I could track our progress to the pulsing red object.
Hang on, Elisa, hang on
. Carew pressed a button and the screen switched to a satellite view, trees and open farm fields. Could that tiny quarter-sized piece I had pressed on Elisa be this powerful?

“Here. Stop here!”

Frank swerved onto the side of the road, spewing dirt and pebbles into an irrigation ditch he nearly drove into.

“In there.” Ruth pointed at the field. “It’s in there. Somewhere.”

“Okay. We’ll find it.”

I had a moment of panic when I couldn’t open my door. Locked in the backseat like a criminal. Would they make me wait in the car? I wouldn’t, of course. I saw myself climbing into the front seat, freeing myself, and running after them. But Frank came around to pull the door open. He took my arm and helped me out, my legs weak and stiff.

I had hoped that the field would be hard brown earth so that we could see across it, find Elisa faster. Despite no evidence, I was convinced she was here. But as we started in, Ruth holding the screen close to her chest, knee-high cornstalks started blocking our way. They were almost low enough to see over—but not quite.

“Over here!” Ruth was peering at the screen.

The ground kept getting softer, my sandals sinking into mud. We pressed on. Then to the right I saw a large piece of white cloth splayed out and crushing the cornstalks, as if a family of giants had spread a picnic cloth. Was some metal device attached to it that had fooled us into thinking it was Elisa’s?
I can’t bear this.

Then Marselli just ahead of us was kneeling down. “Here!”

Pushing closer, I realized that the cloth was a parachute. There was a body still attached to it, a body that did not move.

“No!” I wailed.

“Easy, it’s okay, she still has a pulse.” Then Frank was on his radio, calling for medical help.

I
WAS
KNEELING
behind her, resting her head and upper shoulders on my knees when she opened her soft blue eyes and stared into mine. Carew had objected, but I had been careful not to disturb Elisa’s back.

“You found me,” she whispered.

I couldn’t help the tears streaking down my face. “I promised—I promised you’d be okay.”

“I need to sit up.” She pressed her hands into the dirt, and I helped her the rest of the way.

Carew gave a cry. “You can’t move yet,” she commanded. “We don’t know about your injuries yet.”

“No, I’m okay, I just landed wrong. My father taught me how, but I’d never jumped out of a helicopter before and I think I banged my head. I was afraid of hitting wires. What—happened to the helicopter?”

“It crashed in the next town,” Marselli said briskly. He was still kneeling at her right side, his khaki chinos ruined.

“It crashed?” She jerked with surprise. I steadied her, my arm around her.

“Can you tell me what happened?”

“Can’t it wait?” I asked. “She’s still in shock.”

“Just a few things. We need to know a few things
now
.” He looked up at Carew. “Why don’t you wait out on the road so you can show them in?”

She looked at him as if he had suggested she lie down and roll around in the mud. “This is
my
case.”

“When I saw the copter on the beach, I thought it was the police,” Elisa started. “Even when I got closer and saw that the letters that said police were just stuck on and were peeling, I got in anyway. Then I saw Youssef and knew it was a trick. I tried to get out, but he wouldn’t let me.” I felt her body sag against me and held her tighter. “As soon as we took off I tried to get to the parachutes.”

“How did you know about the parachutes?” Carew interrupted, skeptical.

“I knew there had to be some. I’d skydived out of my father’s Cessna before, when Youssef was flying it. But when I started to strap the chute on, my mother pulled a gun out of her bag and pointed it at me. She doesn’t even know how to shoot! But she was close enough to kill me.”

“You’re sure it was your mother?” Carew interrupted again. She was the only one standing, looking down on us.

“Well, not my
mother
.” A flick of her eyes at me
.
“I mean the witch who passed herself off as my mother all those years. Anyway, I grabbed the gun from her and it went off. She fell back and I thought it had hit her, but Youssef cried out so I guess it hit him. I kept the gun pointed at her, but she was all over him anyway. So I strapped in, and opened the door.”

“Where was Dr. Crosley?” Marselli asked.

“Dr. Crosley, my
father
?” Elisa was bewildered. “But I thought you knew—he died in that fire. They burned him to death.” Her eyes filled with tears that ran down her muddy face. “He was the only good one,” she sobbed. “Will said he had done some bad things, but I don’t believe it!”

“Wait a minute. Sheila Crosley killed her husband?” Carew was incredulous. I was just as stunned.

“I didn’t even know it. When she and Youssef came up to Boston to get me, I was so excited that they were still alive. When I asked where Daddy was, she said in Barbados taking care of some stuff. I
believed
her, he was there a lot. She told me that a couple renting the house had died in the fire. I believed that too.” She gave her head a shake, possibly at her own naïveté. They took me to
The Beautiful Past
to wait for a phony passport so we could join Daddy. But then—”

She lowered her head to her arm, which was across her knees. More tears. I held her tightly.

“You were on the yacht,” Frank prodded.

She looked up, her blue eyes large. I reminded myself how young she was. “The next morning I started to open the door to my parents’ cabin. I wanted to tell her that I was still upset that they’d put me through all that. I’d mentioned it before and she’d just laughed. Like thinking they were dead was nothing! Anyway, she and Youssef were in bed, so wrapped up in each other they didn’t even hear me.

“I went up on deck and talked to Craig, he does the computer stuff, he’s worked for my father for years. He didn’t want to tell me, but I kept pushing him and he’s always—liked me. Finally he said that they had started about three years ago. He couldn’t believe I hadn’t suspected anything. But my father had finally guessed and was threatening to turn Youssef over to the Egyptian authorities.

“Then—Sheila came up with the idea about the fire and convinced my father that she would disappear with him, without Youssef. Craig said the FBI was about to arrest him! If they thought he’d died in a fire, they’d leave him alone. But my father never thought he
would.
” I thought she would start crying again, but she said, “Anyway, when Craig told me what had happened to my father, that’s when I ran away. So then they had to find me and get rid of me before I told anyone what they had done.”

“So why didn’t they just go into hiding in another country?” More skepticism from Carew.

Elisa gave me a who-
is
-this-woman? glance. “Because Youssef didn’t want to hide. He wanted to continue the business and live it up on my father’s money. They figured when he introduced Sheila as his wife, no one would connect her with someone who died in a fire in America. They’ve probably moved the money somewhere safe by now.”

“No, we’ve monitored the bank accounts and credit cards for activity.” Carew straightened smugly. “There hasn’t been any.”

Elisa’s look at her was scornful. “Do you think those accounts were the only ones they had? People like that? Those everyday accounts are
nothing
.”

But I could tell she was tiring. “Anyway,” Elisa said more faintly, “my father—Ethan—thought the plan was to use this other couple to die in the fire. But Youssef came up behind him and strangled him. They put him on the bed with the woman and doused them in kerosene. They still had my father’s stand-in there, unconscious, so Craig said they beat him up to make it look a drunken fight, then dumped him in the woods somewhere.”

“The vic in Mecox Woods,” Frank said grimly to Ruth.

“My God!”

“But how did you get away from them?” I asked Elisa.

“That was the easy part. They didn’t know I knew anything. We went on shore that night for dinner near the marina. I went to the restroom and then ran. I called Will, I knew he’d help me. Will!” Her eyes flared open. “I have to let him know I’m okay!”

The sun had gone in and darkness was creeping across the green field. It was getting colder as well. I didn’t want to think about Will.

Frank pushed up from the ground. “Just one more thing. Was Craig on the helicopter?”

“No. He must be in Southampton with the boat.”

“What is it called again?”

Elisa sighed. “
The Beautiful Past
.”

Chapter Thirty-Eight

I
STAYED
SILENT
on the ride back to Patchogue to retrieve my van, terrified of what we would find in the parking lot. In my rush of feeling at finding Elisa alive, I had forgotten Will. I’d watched enough police procedurals to know if they had found his body in the adjoining woods there would be flashing lights, a white canopy erected, everyone milling around. Elisa would see Will’s abandoned car and
know.
Would his death, on top of Ethan’s, push her beyond the point of recovery?

As we passed Bellport and were moving into East Patchogue, I tried to think of a way to have Frank take me to pick up the van alone. But my mind was a jittery adolescent, too overwhelmed by everything that had happened to focus on any one thing. I had been right about Sheila, but wrong about Ethan. As soon as I’d heard about Kathleen I’d felt she was the victim, but had never been able to explain why the man’s body matched Ethan’s so perfectly, down to the two stents. Poor Kathleen! Her American odyssey had ended in being sacrificed. For nothing. What was not surprising was that Sheila, given Ethan’s lack of sexual ability, had fallen into an affair with a man as handsome as Youssef. I doubted that he was her first.

If Ethan traveled a lot, just indulging themselves might have been enough. But Youssef no doubt had had ambitions beyond taking orders. When the opportunity to have it all came up, he and Sheila had seized it.

I held my breath as Frank turned down West Street and then into the parking lot. There was a spotlight on the long narrow photograph of Fire Island on the front of the rustic building, but the area lay otherwise in darkness, No activity of any kind.

Will’s car was gone. Had it been towed away as evidence? I waited for Elisa to wonder where he was, but she didn’t seem to notice.

And then we were finally home and I was in the kitchen making the pasta I fell back on when we needed comfort: linguini with onions, capers, anchovies, garlic, red pepper flakes. Colin and the twins were in the living room, wine easing their sometimes incoherent conversation. When we’d come into the house, after the twins had grabbed each other tightly and finally let go, Elisa and Colin had looked at each other. There was so much they needed to say. Then Colin opened his arms the way he had with Hannah on the dock, and Elisa moved into them. I saw she was crying again.

There was a conversation Elisa and I needed to have before the police interviewed her again. I’d wanted to give her a chance to decompress, to be with Hannah and let the wine relax her, but suddenly it seemed urgent. What if Frank or Carew decided to stop by now?

I went to the living room doorway. “Elisa, could you help me with something?”

Surprised, she pushed up from the striped couch. There was a momentarily silence, then the murmur of Colin and Hannah talking again.

In the kitchen I pointed to a chair at the oak table and Elisa sat down opposite me.

“I know you’ve been through hell. But I have to know what really happened before you talk to the police again.”

“But I told you.”

“No, you didn’t. Not about what happened on the helicopter.”

I could see her teetering on the edge of trusting me. On the drive back to Port Lewis from Patchogue, she had told me a few things. She’d known she was going to die when Sheila boarded the helicopter and started screaming at her. “She told me I would fall out trying to escape. She said—she told me, ‘Now I’ll be free of all of you, my pathetic attempt at a ‘normal’ life. I should have given it up years ago!’ Then we took off and it was too noisy to talk.”

“It was Will’s gun, wasn’t it?” I said now, keeping my voice low. “Not one that your mother pulled out of her bag. You had it with you the whole time. That’s what Will didn’t want you to forget.”

She nodded. “He wanted me to be able to protect myself. He was
right
not to trust them. But I wasn’t going to shoot her, I just wanted to get away. She tried to grab me, she clawed at my arm with her nails, then Youssef turned around with a knife in his hand. He wasn’t close enough, but he tried to make my mother take it and she started to reach for it. So I shot him.”

“And you left the gun on the helicopter?”

“Why not? Will had it when he worked for my father, he just kept it when he left. It’s registered in my father’s name. That’s what they’ll find out. That’s what I
want
them to find out.”

What they would never find out was how extraordinary my daughter was.

T
HERE
W
OULD
BE
rocky days ahead. The case against Colin was withdrawn in court, but Elisa deeply mourned Ethan and there was no way we could console her. After the police returned the Patek Philippe watch to her, she had it cleaned, sized to fit her, then wore it constantly. It had survived the fire only by chance. According to Craig, Youssef had removed the watch from Ethan’s wrist, intending to sell it, but Sheila pointed out that it was engraved on the back from his father and could raise red flags. There had been an argument, but after the bodies were burned the watch was replaced. It suffered only minor damage in the second fire.

Once, when I asked Elisa if she was going to return the stolen archeological artifacts to their countries, she flared like a gasoline fire. “My father never stole anything. He didn’t need to. He paid for everything he owned!”

Yet Fire Island and its aftermath brought us together in the way no amount of polite visits could. It had allowed me to tell her how much I loved her and had missed her, and let her know that this time I
would
put my life on the line to keep her safe. Perhaps it had also let her know what a mother loving her felt like.

According to Frank, Craig had been captured while he waited on
The Beautiful Past
for the others to return the leased helicopter and take a taxi back to Southampton. Although he had been the one who had handled the negotiations with me, he insisted that he never would have hurt Hannah. He had actually been in the parking lot and had watched Elisa and me board the ferry. He had been instructed by Sheila to kill Will Crosley if he brought Elisa there. But he couldn’t.

“I mean, I
knew
Will,” he’d told them earnestly. “We’d worked together for Ethan, I couldn’t just shoot him. I’m a computer geek, not a killer! He said he wouldn’t tell the police what Youssef and Sheila had done. I gave him the money I had with me to seal the deal. It was plenty because we were leaving the country that night. We left his car open to make it look like someone had ambushed him and shot him. I even took his wallet as proof to show Sheila.”

Craig also detailed the antiquities theft empire that Ethan had commanded. “The countries never missed the stuff because they didn’t even know about most of it. The stuff left the sites immediately. Collectors paid a lot because there was no record of it being stolen. And he had Will forge some of the easier stuff. Ethan was a weird guy, that’s for sure. It was like he was trying to get revenge on the whole world.”

Elisa tried calling Will and leaving messages. He finally called her back several days later. But he was lying low, afraid he could still be charged in the antiquities scam. Their evening of cervezas and fried chicken would have to wait for a while.

I even had a call from Micah Clancy after the whole story was reported in the
Times
and
Newsday
—by Louis Benat. Micah’s TV series,
Jamaica Blues
, was set to air in September, and he said he was loving New York.

“I’ve already brought the wife and kid over; maybe we’ll stay. We should get together, I’d like to meet your daughter
now
.”

I said I’d call him.

Meanwhile, we were feeling our way. Hannah’s graduation was a watershed, a way to be together as a family that seemed a manual for the future. Everything has been a watershed. I had dinner with Frank after we got back, an evening that ended in an intense kiss but nothing more. We made plans for the next weekend.

I also admitted to myself the ways I had fictionalized Colin, first by my hero worship, then by playing him for laughs, making him sound more outrageous than he was. Now I can see him as gifted in many ways, but still a man. I didn’t explain that part of it to him, but I let him know that I was not the girl he married. I thought he would be relieved that I had finally realized what he had been trying to tell me, but he is not quietly fading away Perhaps, now that we are complete again, he is ready to be a family man.

I’m not sure about that. We’ll always have the children, of course, and the sunsets we shared over the places I dreamed about as a girl. New Mexico, Machu Picchu, Morocco.

The Beautiful Past.