CHAPTER SEVEN TINA
CHAPTER SEVEN
T INA
The dull vibration atop Tina’s nightstand pulls her from her restless sleep. She reaches through the darkness for her phone, sitting up when she sees the incoming call from her squad supervisor.
She clears her throat. “This is Tina.”
“Tina, it’s Special Agent Castillo.” There’s a slight echo to his voice, like he’s talking through his Bluetooth in the car. “An infant has gone missing on board a Pacific Air flight currently en route to LaGuardia from Anchorage, and we need you to come in. The kid is only three months old, and we don’t yet know what we’re dealing with.”
“Okay.” Tina draws back her sheet and swings her legs off the side of her bed. How does an infant go missing on a plane? “They’ve searched the aircraft?”
“Yes, and there’s no sign of the child. We’ve advised the flight to check everyone’s luggage. The mother left her baby in the bassinet while she went to the lavatory, and when she came back, he was gone.”
Her earlier phone call with Jason comes flooding back to her, and she remembers Isabel is asleep down the hall—not with her father. “I actually have my daughter this weekend. She was supposed to be with her father but—”
“I need you at our headquarters within the hour. Is that a problem? I hope not, because you’re the only analyst assigned to this task force who’s not on vacation.”
In the last six months, three of their intelligence analysts have retired. With their positions still unfilled, Tina is stretched thin, fulfilling roles on three separate task forces.
She lowers her phone to check the time. It’s 1:25 a.m. If she leaves in the next twelve minutes, she can catch the last train of the night into the city. As long as she can get Felicity to watch Isabel. “It’s not a problem. I’ll get there as fast as I can.”
Tina opens her work laptop as the train pulls out of Newark Penn Station, using the virtual private network provided to her by the FBI to get online. Aside from one other passenger, she’s alone in the train car, her heart still racing from having to run from the parking lot to catch the train before the doors closed. Fortunately, her neighbor Felicity came to the door at Tina’s middle-of-the-night knocking and, although startled, agreed to come over and stay with Isabel until Tina returned from work.
She opens the email from Special Agent Castillo and reads through the demographics of the missing child’s parents. Liam Rossi, the couple’s only child, was born in May. Liam. Tina stares at his name, thinking of the baby being taken on the flight and the reason he hasn’t yet been found.
She swallows, pushing the thoughts from her mind to focus on her task. She runs a criminal record check on both parents, which turns up nothing. Makayla Rossi has had no employment record since 2010, but Jack Rossi works as a senior account manager at Rothman Securities. Tina flags his employment and makes a note to include it in her report. Special Agent Castillo said this could be a targeted kidnapping. How much money does Jack Rossi have access to?
She searches the purchase history for the Rossis’ current address and sees the couple purchased the condo for over $4 million the previous year. She flags this too. It’s more than most investment bankers could afford on a single salary, but most investment bankers aren’t senior account managers at Rothman Securities.
The same month they purchased the condo, the couple’s previous address sold for $1.1 million. She pulls up the Rossis’ joint tax return from last year and sees his gross income was $500,000. After taxes, they were left with roughly $300,000. Even with a hefty down payment, the mortgage—along with the building’s HOA fees—seems like a stretch.
She finds several social media accounts for various Jack Rossis. Pressed for time, she puts that aside to focus on Makayla. On Facebook and Instagram, there’s only one Makayla Rossi with an address in Tribeca. Tina starts with her Instagram and sees Makayla has over one hundred thousand followers. She scrolls through the professional-looking photos of mountainscapes, rivers, and wildlife. In one image, a moose drinks from the edge of a stream.
In another photo, Makayla beams at the start of a trailhead, with Liam in a carrier on her chest. The next photo shows Makayla on the shore of a lake, standing behind a stroller. She’s flanked on one side by an older man, presumably her father. Seeing Liam’s little face in the stroller, Tina’s stomach turns.
She scrolls through older posts, recognizing photos taken along the Hudson River Park. She comes to a video of Makayla and stops. She retrieves a pair of earbuds from her purse and connects them to her laptop’s Bluetooth before pressing play.
Makayla appears to be sitting on a couch, and Tina notes she’s even prettier up close. She turns up the volume as Makayla speaks, her large green eyes staring into the camera.
“Hey, guys. As some of you know, today is the ten-year anniversary of the passing of my mom, Lydia Banks. You might know her from starring in Prom Queen or from the amnesiac episode she suffered on live TV before she died.”
Tina brings a hand to her chin. She’s the daughter of Lydia Banks? Tina read the actress’s memoir several years after her death. It was right after Jason left, and she found comfort in relating to Lydia’s account of how her first marriage ended. After filming Prom Queen , Lydia Banks married her supporting actor, Tommy Brecks, at the age of eighteen. Their divorce was highly publicized a year later, after Tommy’s headlined affair with his supermodel costar was plastered all over the tabloids.
In her memoir, Lydia described learning about Tommy’s affair on the cover of a magazine in an LA grocery store while he was away filming in New York. Tina’s marriage ended differently: she came home from work to a half-empty closet and Jason’s wedding ring on the kitchen counter. Later that night, she got an email from him explaining he needed a change and was starting a new life in Florida with someone else. But she remembers understanding the devastation Lydia described after being abandoned by the person she set out to build a life with. Different circumstances, but both felt shitty.
Tina also related to Lydia’s account of early motherhood, how the actress worried when she was pregnant that she might not be cut out for that kind of life, but then it came so naturally, taking her by surprise.
She remembers the actress’s famous TV interview in which—right in the middle of a talk show appearance—she forgot where she was. After she died in a car accident later that same day, the clip of her suddenly appearing dazed and confused was all over the news. There was even a Netflix documentary made about it a couple of years after it happened.
“To me, she was the best mom I could ever ask for,” Makayla says in her Instagram video, smiling to reveal vividly white teeth. “And I wanted to take this opportunity to help raise awareness about transient global amnesia. It’s been a while since I’ve shared this, and you can click the link in my bio to learn more. I hope that by raising awareness about the disorder, you can help keep someone safe if they ever experience this.”
Makayla blows a kiss into the camera as the video ends.
Tina clicks the link in Makayla’s profile, which takes her to a video from a major news station. When the video starts to play, Tina recognizes the blond reporter who stands in front of a green-screen image of the Manhattan skyline.
“Tonight on True Investigations , we will hear from the daughter of actress Lydia Banks, whose rare disorder led to her fatal car accident, and explain how you can be aware of the signs of someone experiencing transient global amnesia—and how to help keep them safe. But first, a look at what a woman in Texas caught on her video doorbell, and why you should have one.”
Tina fast-forwards until she spots Makayla sitting in an overstuffed chair across from the same reporter. A fireplace flickers between them. Tina hits play, but the video remains frozen.
Tina looks out the window and sees the reason she’s lost service. They’ve gone under the Hudson. When they emerge under Manhattan, the video resumes playing. Tina moves her finger to the bottom of the video to rewind to the beginning of the interview.
The blond newscaster crosses her legs. “Had your mother experienced an amnesiac episode before?”
Tina stops, her fingertip hovering an inch away from her laptop screen.
Makayla shakes her head. Her hair is longer, blond with no trace of red, and she wears less makeup than in the more recent video on her social media page. “No. We believe that talk show interview was the first time it happened. She’d been having migraines for a few years, which increases your risk of developing transient global amnesia. She’d also just gotten the news that her sister had cancer. Emotional stress can be a trigger for the memory disorder.”
The TV host’s eyes widen. “Wow. Okay.”
Tina pauses the video and types Lydia Banks amnesia interview into her internet search bar. She clicks on the video at the top of the results, recognizing the auburn-haired actress as the video plays.
Across from Lydia Banks, a brunette talk show host leans forward on a blue couch. “So, what kept you from saying anything after you learned of your father’s affair?”
Lydia’s brows knit together in horrified confusion. “How did you know that?”
The TV host glances to the side before plastering a smile on her face. “Your memoir, remember?”
Lydia stares blankly at the woman.
The brunette shoots the camera a look before letting out an uncomfortable laugh. “Okay, let’s move on to another question. When you said that working with Hayden Graham was one of the best and worst experiences of your life, what did you mean?”
Keeping her eyes on the screen, Tina reaches into her purse and finds a pack of gum. Hayden Graham went on to become an A-list actor after costarring with Lydia Banks in Prom Queen . They were like the John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John of the eighties.
Tina folds her gum into her mouth as she watches Lydia furrow her brows without responding.
The TV host offers a forced smile. “Okay, let’s move on to my next question. On screen, the two of you were very believably in love. But you say that off camera, the chemistry between you and Hayden Graham was very different. Tell us about that.”
Lydia stands up. “I never told you that. How do you know this?” She looks around the room, her petrified stare settling on the camera. “Where am I?”
The train brakes to a stop. Tina looks up to see they’ve arrived at Moynihan Train Hall. She stops the video, staring at the still image of Lydia Banks looking dazed. Tucking her laptop into her bag, Tina opens her recent-call log on her phone. She puts her phone to her ear as she steps onto the platform, and the call connects after the second ring.
“Special Agent Castillo.”
“It’s Tina. I’m almost to the office. And I think I’ve found something.”