CHAPTER FOURTEEN JACK
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
J ACK
Jack lowers himself onto his couch in the spot where the FBI agents had sat moments earlier. When they first arrived, Jack was certain Lionel had sent them to arrest him for fraud. He couldn’t have been more wrong. The leather is warm against his bare legs as he drops his phone to his side. Makayla didn’t answer, even though he let it ring for a full two minutes.
His phone rings in his hand. His heart races, but when he checks the screen, it’s not Makayla. It’s her father. He takes a deep breath, remembering the FBI saying that Anchorage authorities had already spoken with his father-in-law.
“Hey, Jason.”
He has few things in common with Makayla’s father, a retired architect and avid outdoorsmen who detests life in the city. With Jack’s long hours and living on the other side of the country, he hasn’t spent much time with Jason, despite Jack and Makayla being married for more than a decade. But Jason has always been warm to him.
It’s been over two years since Jack’s seen him, aside from the occasional video chat on Makayla’s phone when Jack happened to be home. It strikes him how much he’s missed in his family’s lives—not just his relationship with Makayla’s dad—being an investment banker, working around the clock. And for what? Imprisonment for fraud? The time he’s already lost with Liam ... he’ll never get back. And now, he might never see his son again.
“Jack! Have you heard what’s happened?” His father-in-law’s normally cheerful voice is plagued with panic, a sickening reminder that this is really happening. Liam is gone.
“Yes, the FBI was just here.”
Jason breathes into the phone. “So, have they found him?”
“Not yet.”
“I don’t understand how the hell Liam could be lost on that plane.”
Jack leans forward, resting his forehead against his palm. “Neither do I.”
“The FBI agent who came to my house asked about Makayla having memory loss—I’m assuming because of her mother.” Jason scoffs. “I told them that was ridiculous. But I don’t understand how he could go missing on the plane .”
Jack thinks about the FBI asking him if he received a ransom demand. “I agree. Have you spoken to her? I just tried calling, but she didn’t answer.”
“No, I called you first. I assumed Makayla’s phone wouldn’t have service on the flight.”
“Everything was fine when you dropped her off, right?” He feels bad for entertaining that something could be wrong with Makayla, but after the FBI’s allegations about her mother, he has to be sure.
“Yeah.” A pause. “She hit her head on our hike yesterday, but she assured me it was nothing. And—”
Jack straightens, pulling his forehead away from his hand. “Wait. She hit her head? They didn’t tell me that.” His gaze lands on the grand piano Makayla inherited after her mother’s death.
“It was more of a bump. I mean, it scared me when she fell, but she was adamant she was fine. And she seemed to be. Even insisted we finish the hike when I offered to turn back. You don’t think ...” His voice breaks.
The silence that follows fills Jack with an incredible sense of dread. He spoke to Makayla just before she left for the airport, and she seemed a little spacey, but that’s because she was tired. She was fine. Wasn’t she? Of course she was fine. The nonsense the FBI is talking about is just that, nonsense. Jack takes a deep breath and holds it a second, then lets it out. He hasn’t always told Makayla everything. Could she be hiding something from me as well? A condition?
“No, I don’t,” Jack says, his words firm, as if trying to convince himself. Jack forces the doubt from his mind. The FBI questioning Makayla’s coherency only tells Jack one thing: they have no idea what’s happened to Liam. “I’m going to try calling Makayla again.”
“Won’t her phone be on airplane mode?”
“I can call her through an internet messaging app. She used it to call me after Liam went missing. I had a voice message from her when I woke up.”
“Okay. Please call me as soon as they find him.”
The possibility that they might not surfaces in Jack’s mind. He swallows the thought. “I will.”
As soon as he hangs up, Jack tries Makayla. He closes his eyes while her phone rings. And rings.
He places the call on speaker and gets up from the couch, heading straight for his work laptop on the kitchen island. He sets the phone on the marble counter and logs into Rothman Securities, letting the continued ringing drown out the terrifying scenarios that have him paralyzed with horror.
“Jack?”
He swipes his phone off the counter at the sound of Makayla’s voice.
“It’s Liam. He’s gone. He—” Her voice breaks into a sob.
“I know. The FBI were just here.”
From the sound she makes next, he knows she’s broken down into tears.
He thinks of Lionel and how much is at stake—for both of them—if the fraud is exposed.
“We’ll find him. It’s going to be okay,” he says, as much to reassure himself as his wife. Makayla goes quiet. They both know he can’t promise that.