Chapter Fourteen
Reese knew Brantley was getting antsy. He didn’t like to sit still when they were in the middle of a case.
Unfortunately, at this point in the investigation, they were pretty much starting over at square one each day.
Until they had a strong line to pull on, they were sifting through the fibers one at a time, building something from nothing.
At least that was how it felt.
Which sucked.
However, the information he was searching for could quite possibly help explain a whole lot of things. If it was what Reese thought it was.
Reaching for his phone, he pulled up the contacts, found Holly’s number, and dialed.
“Hey. How’s Dallas?” she greeted, sounding far happier than he expected anyone to be on a Sunday morning when they had to work.
“Peachy,” he said absently. “Sorry. No time for chit chat. I need you to do somethin’ for me.”
“Sure. What’s up?”
“In your notes on Martin Calloway, you’ve referenced a sealed adoption. I need you to reach out to JJ and see if she can get the information for me.”
“Your faith in me is humbling, Reese.”
Frowning, he looked up, stared out into the bright morning sun as Brantley drove down the highway. “I’m sorry. I just figured you hit a wall since you left it like that.”
He could hear the smile in her voice. “When have you known me to hit a wall?”
“Umm…”
“It was rhetorical. I did actually hit a wall, but I went down another path, not wanting to bother JJ or Luca yet. I wanted to give it the ol’ college try before I threw in the towel.”
“And...?”
“And I came across a dark web forum that—”
“Hold that thought,” he interrupted. “Let me put you on speaker.” He tapped the button to shift the call to speaker. “Okay, Holly. Go ahead.”
“Hey, boss,” she greeted Brantley. “Anyway. I came across a dark web forum. It’s packed full of people lookin’ to find the identity of their birth parents. Some lookin’ for the child they gave up. For a price—sometimes hefty—someone’ll do the work for you.”
“Why would someone do that? Why not just have the record unsealed?” Reese inquired. “Or isn’t there some form you fill out that notifies the other party that you’re lookin’?”
“Maybe you go here when you don’t want to tip off the parent or the kid?
I don’t know. Whatever the reason, I was able to chat up a couple of people, and they pointed me in the right direction.
From what I can tell, Martin Calloway had a child with a prostitute named Shawna, no last name.
She gave birth to a girl on April 6, 1995, in Kent, Louisiana.
According to notes from a social worker …
I managed to sweet-talk my way into gettin’ those …
neither Martin nor Shawna wanted the baby.
She was given up for adoption and placed with her new parents when she was three days old. ”
“Do you have the parents’ names?” Brantley asked.
“I do.”
Reese ground his molars together, hoping against hope that she did not say—
“Fred and Tracey Aronda.”
Brantley’s gaze snapped over so fast, Reese was sure the guy was dizzy.
“Did she say what I think she just said?”
Reese nodded.
“I take it those names mean somethin’ to you?” Holly asked.
“Fred and Tracey Aronda are Juliet Prince’s parents.”
He was met with silence for a few seconds before Holly said, “Holy schnauzers. Are you sayin’ that Martin Calloway is the biological father of Juliet Prince?”
“That’s what you’re sayin’,” Brantley corrected. “Are you sure that information’s correct?”
“Yes. But I’ll gladly reach out to JJ with what I know. I’m sure she can backdoor her way into the adoption record to confirm.”
“Do that,” Reese said. “Please. We need to be solid on this.”
“Does it make that much of a difference?” Holly asked. “I mean, Juliet Prince is dead.”
“Yeah. And there’s a better than good chance that Calloway’s aware of that.”
“I’m sorry. I’m lost. How does that change things?”
“Well, it’s rather simple, Holly,” Brantley said slowly. “If Kylie—”
Reese reached over and smacked his palm against Brantley’s chest, cutting him off. He shook his head, warning him. They hadn’t clued the team into the information they had on Kylie.
“Are you there?” Holly asked, sounding confused. “Did I lose you?”
“We’re here,” Reese said. “Sorry. There’s an accident on the highway. Brantley needs to focus.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“Send that over to JJ. Have her confirm it.”
“Will do. I’ll let you know what we find out.”
“Later,” he said, then disconnected the call.
Before Brantley could instruct him to do so, Reese dialed JJ’s number.
It went to voicemail, so he left a message regarding the information Holly had relayed to them.
He informed her to do the search, but to keep the information from Holly for now.
He hated to do that, but until they had some sort of confirmation that Kylie Walker was alive, he didn’t want to get anyone else’s hopes up.
“I think it’s safe to say this isn’t a coincidence,” Reese told Brantley.
“No. It’s not. It’s motive.”
Yeah. And that meant Kylie—provided she really was alive—could’ve been taken for reasons far more sinister than to take down the Southern Boy Mafia. If Martin Calloway took her for that purpose, then that meant he’d been aware of what was going on when they were attempting to find Juliet.
“What if Calloway took Kylie to cover up Juliet’s crime?” Reese mused aloud.
“Makes sense. He could’ve done it to keep her from bein’ prosecuted. His attempt to protect her.”
Reese nodded, seeing how that could be possible. “And if he found out that Max had a hand in Juliet’s death…”
He didn’t need to finish that sentence. Based on Brantley’s expression, he was on the same page. Which would mean that Calloway could’ve suspected that Travis had a hand in it, too. They were friends, right? Which meant there was a damn good chance Calloway had kept Kylie as payback.
And wouldn’t that be a bitch?
Brantley focused on the road as his mind raced, tossing around this new information in an attempt to make sense of it all.
He didn’t believe in coincidence. There was no fucking way that any of this shit simply fell into place. Hell no. Not this.
“Back to our initial assumption… Let’s say Calloway jumped on the opportunity to lure Meredith out by fakin’ Kylie’s death,” he mused, tapping his finger on the steering wheel. “He took her, intending to give her back if and when he strong-armed Meredith into testifying against Max.”
“I’m with you,” Reese said.
“Considering her injuries—” His phone rang, cutting him off. “It’s JJ.” Brantley tapped the navigation screen to answer the call. “Yeah?”
“Hey,” she greeted, sounding like JJ: no-nonsense with a hint of a smile in her voice. “I’ve got some info on the good doc.”
“What is it?” he prompted, trying not to sound too urgent.
“Well, let’s just say he’s a man who lives above his means. Way above. Probably has to do with the fact he’s got two ex-wives and six kids. Pays a pretty penny in child support and alimony. Add to that a couple of mortgages and an affinity for fast cars…”
Brantley waited, knowing she would eventually get to the point.
“What’s interesting is that on January 9, 2021, the day Kylie died, Dr. Timothy Weaver got a quick fix to his money woes in the amount of five hundred thousand dollars.
It came from an offshore account that’s listed under a shell company that’s tied to half a dozen more.
I’ll get to the root, but it’s gonna take me some time. ”
“Does he still work at the hospital?”
“Oh, yeah. Like nothin’ ever happened. Baz is on his way to talk to him now. He told me I had to sit this one out when I threatened to put him in a box until he agreed to tell me everything.”
“A box, huh?” Reese chuckled.
“A small one. With only a teeny hole for air.”
Brantley shook his head, smiled. Leave it to JJ to add some levity to the situation.
“What are you two up to?” she asked.
“We’re headin’ to the FBI headquarters to see if we can get eyes on Calloway.”
“On a Sunday?”
“It’s a long shot, but it’s all we’ve got right now. If we get lucky, we’ll follow him for a bit, see if he takes us anywhere interesting.”
“Like directly to Kylie?”
“We don’t know that he actually took her,” Brantley reminded her. Or that she is alive.
“Then I guess it’s one giant coincidence that Dr. Weaver got a boatload of money on the day she died. Maybe he got it from the estate of his long-lost friend, the Nigerian prince who was so indebted for his friendship that he left him everything.”
“What Nigerian prince?”
Reese snorted. “She’s bein’ facetious. It’s an email scam.”
Brantley frowned. “Or maybe it’s a legit inheritance.”
“I was joking, B.”
“No. I’m not talkin’ the Nigerian prince.” He waved a hand. “I’m talkin’ a legit inheritance. You might check to see if his mother or father passed away.”
“I did and they didn’t,” JJ insisted. “Trust me when I tell you that money did not come from anything legal.”
“Doesn’t mean he’ll cop to it,” Reese noted.
“Baz can be persuasive,” JJ said, a smile in her voice.
Brantley let Reese take over the conversation.
“Did you get my message about Juliet Prince’s adoption records?”
“What adoption records?”
Clearly she hadn’t listened to her messages.
“Holly uncovered some information that shows Martin Calloway had a baby with a prostitute, and Fred and Tracey Aronda adopted that child.”
“Holy shit. I guess I should listen to the message.”
“Do that,” Brantley instructed. “And then find out if it’s legit.”
“If it is, that makes it even more likely that Kylie’s alive,” JJ surmised aloud. “Calloway might be holdin’ her as payback.”
“What’s he gettin’ out of it by keepin’ her?” Brantley asked, genuinely curious. “At this point, he should’ve used her as leverage.”
“Maybe he’s waitin’ for somethin’,” JJ answered. “If he’s banked everything on Meredith testifying—which he’d have to be really stupid or really desperate to do that—then maybe he’s got her stashed away somewhere.”