Epilogue
SATURDAY, ONE WEEK AND TWO DAYS LATER…
Sandra entered the coffee shop and took a seat near the window.
Her stomach was anxious, and she’d wait for her company to show up before she placed an order at the counter.
Her gaze was split between watching the door and the news on the TV mounted on the wall.
The volume was off, but the closed captioning was on. It was all about the Hanson scandal.
The news became public after the arrests were made for the orchestration of Susan Crawford’s crash. While there was no tangible evidence to tie Kramer to the murder of Roger Simms, his confession did that for itself.
Eric confirmed after speaking with Todd Levine, Simms’s murder was the further unspeakable thing he couldn’t put on paper. Though the recording he’d made covered that transgression.
Edward Hanson came through surgery and was expected to make a full recovery.
While he was lucky from one angle, he and his legacy company took a huge financial hit.
With the Hanson name ruined, stock values plummeted.
Edward never admitted to knowing about the survival clause on his parents’ prenup, though why would he?
And his knowledge, or lack thereof, had no bearing on the outcome.
The Carmichael family was about to be one hundred and fifty million dollars richer.
Rhonda Stein, Timothy’s secretary before Susan, and Sabrina Brown both stepped forward armed with the courage to break their NDAs.
Timothy had raped Stein and paid her to keep quiet afterward.
Brown admitted Timothy had made sexual advances and touched her inappropriately.
Both women’s stories went viral, and in true MeToo fashion of a few years ago, more women who worked with Timothy Hanson came forward.
This led to a law firm stepping up and starting a class-action lawsuit against Hanson Property Development Inc.
Despite their billions, the Hansons were going to feel the blowback from this too.
Eric told Sandra that he’d offered to mentor Cindy Moore, and the brass approved.
As Eric told her last night at dinner, the young officer had already passed the detective’s exam.
The advancement really came down to her hard work and dedication to resolving a thirty-three-year-old case.
Sandra was happy for Moore because shooting right to the Homicide Branch rarely happened.
It really was unbelievable that if Ryan hadn’t demanded answers about his mother’s crash, there never would have been justice.
Her crash would have remained buried, and Ryan wouldn’t have received closure.
As a side note, the detective who had questioned Ryan found out why he’d requested her.
He said that anyone who kept ERT from storming into the hospital for twelve hours was a negotiator he wanted to work with.
It was nice that he thought to give the lead negotiator credit for that, but it took the whole team.
Sandra tapped her foot, unable to keep still.
After the eventful days of two weeks ago, it would seem nothing much good came from dwelling on the past. It brought a lot of heartbreak.
But was that all? It had led Ryan Crawford to take desperate action, but the truth that emerged was healing for him, Levine, Finley, and Kramer.
They could all put that day behind them with cleared consciences.
It was witnessing the benefits to looking back that had Sandra deciding to come today.
The truth was that most people will find pain in their past if they look hard enough.
Some don’t even need to look that hard. And while she thought facing someone from her past might bring more pain than healing, she wanted to count herself brave enough to try.
The door dinged, and a woman with long blond hair walked in. She looked right at Sandra, and her face lit with a smile.
“I’m so happy you agreed to meet up. Shall we?” She pointed toward the counter.
Sandra returned April’s smile, the girl she once shared a foster home with, and her stomach calmed down. “We shall.”
Once they returned to the table with their coffees, they did some quick catching up, and Sandra was happy they reconnected. Then April’s face became serious.
“I confess there’s a personal reason I reached out to you.”
Sandra stiffened. “All right…”
“I’m going to assume that you looked me up and saw what I do before agreeing to come here today.”
“I did.” Sandra wasn’t even apologetic for this. “You work at the DC Child and Family Services Agency. Is that how you found me? Through my adoption record?”
“What? Absolutely not. I’d never violate the system, and there are protocols.
I knew who adopted you from when Sam died.
The obit.” April shied away, awkwardly spinning her coffee cup.
“I wanted to catch up, but the real reason I wanted to see you was to ask for your help. I found out what you do. That you’re FBI.
Well, you see, one of the girls I placed a month ago went missing two weeks ago.
It has nothing to do with the foster parents.
They’re great people, who I’ve used before.
This kid, you must understand, has a heart of gold, but she’s been dealt a bad hand in life.
Like myself both her mother and father are alcoholics and drug addicts.
But the mother is honestly trying to get clean.
She’s left the father. This girl has hope. ”
A moment ago April confided in Sandra that she hadn’t seen her mother since the day Child Services took her away.
As an adult, April had looked her up, found out she lived in Iowa, but she never reached out.
“Well, you and I both know how hard it is to adjust. How alien everything feels. Maybe she ran away.” Sandra had given it serious thought, but Sam refused to come with her, and she wasn’t leaving without him.
“I assume her disappearance has been reported to the police?”
“Of course, and they say they’re looking into it, but…” April bit her bottom lip. “Arianna Grayson is only sixteen, and she’s not the only one to go missing.”
Sandra inched forward on her chair. “What do you mean?”
“There have been five foster teens from DC that have gone missing in the last two years. Kids that don’t fit the stereotype for running away.”
But all of them would be a bit broken… “Did you point this out to the police?”
“I did, but they still don’t seem to be taking it seriously.”
“How could they not? Once or twice, I could understand. They run away, live on the streets, aren’t heard from again.
” Sandra closed out other horrid possibilities such as sex-trafficking rings.
There was one operating in the DMV area headed up by a DC congressman that was shut down the better part of five years ago.
But Sandra wasn’t naive to think another hadn’t risen in its place.
Then there was the new rising threat of sextortion where predators coerced children to share graphic photographs of themselves. The world was a sick and scary place.
“You tell me. That’s why I was wondering if you could somehow get the FBI on this. I’m telling you, this girl…” Tears beaded in April’s eyes.
“I can’t tell you if the FBI would take this on.
My thing is manhunts and negotiations, as I told you.
” It was part of their catch-up. “But I’m friends with a brilliant detective at MPD.
He’s in Homicide, but I can promise you he’ll take this seriously.
He might be able to light some fires.” Along with his rookie detective…
April’s hand shook as she raised her cup to her lips. “Homicide. That’s my fear, even more than Arianna living on the streets.” A tear hit April’s cheek, and she swiped it away. “If she was alive, I’m sure she would have found a way to reach out and tell me she’s okay.”
Sandra reached across the table and put a hand over April’s. “Leave this with me.”
* * *