Chapter 29
Hez leaned back and groaned. Birds sang outside the Justice Chamber’s open trefoil window, and late-May sunshine cast warm
golden bars across the floor and touched the edge of the much-used plywood desk. The scent of sun-warmed grass wafted in on
a gentle breeze. It was a beautiful day, but the bad news on the monitor in front of him cast a pall over it all.
Hez reread Scott Foster’s email. As expected, the probate judge had appointed a guardian ad litem for Simon in advance of
the upcoming custody hearing. The guardian was a veteran social worker and attorney named Janet Henderson. She had already
visited Michael Willard’s home to meet Simon and observe his interactions with the family—without notifying Scott in advance.
When Scott complained, Henderson explained that it was “just an informal visit” because she was stopping by anyway to see
Helen Willard, a friend from church.
Scott planned to ask the judge to appoint a new guardian, but he didn’t have high hopes.
Henderson was qualified, and the judge wasn’t likely to replace her just because she had an undisclosed preliminary interaction with Simon and was friends with a relative of someone connected to the adoption.
Nova Cambridge and Pelican Harbor weren’t big places—the odds of finding a qualified guardian candidate who had no contacts at all with a large local family weren’t great.
Hez stood and paced the small room, drawing creaks from the old floorboards under the thin carpet. The guardian issue was
aggravating, but it wouldn’t matter. Not once Michael was behind bars for extortion, smuggling, and possibly more. Henderson
couldn’t recommend that Michael get custody under those circumstances. Hez and Savannah just needed to make sure she felt
comfortable recommending them. So they needed to be nice and cooperative—despite her actions so far. Just like they needed
to be nice and cooperative with Erik Andersen and find a way to cajole him into consenting to the adoption without giving
him Simon’s trust fund. Hez grimaced at the thought, but he’d find a way to do it for Simon.
His phone buzzed and he pulled it out of his pocket. Hope. His heart rate ticked up. Was she about to tell him Michael had
just been arrested?
He accepted the call. “Hey. What’s up?”
“When was the last time you had any contact with Erik Andersen?”
Hez thought for a moment. “Right before I told you about him.”
“Have you seen him since then?”
He didn’t like the direction of her questions. “No. Why?”
She exhaled. “He didn’t answer the door when we went to interview him, even though we’d scheduled it in advance.
He also didn’t answer his phone, so an officer entered the house and did a welfare check.
Mr. Andersen wasn’t there. His car was missing and indentations in the carpet in a closet indicated that a suitcase was also missing.
Several drawers in his dresser were open, and there were no toiletries on his bathroom sink.
His car was found parked on the street near a bus terminal.
” She paused. “I think he ran, though if he did, he left his phone behind. We found it on the floor.”
The bottom fell out of Hez’s gut. This couldn’t be happening. “Are you sure? He seemed more than willing to talk. Maybe something
happened to him. Why would he leave his phone behind if he was leaving of his own free will?”
“This is the second time he’s disappeared, and the first time seems to have been voluntary. He could have forgotten his phone.
Or he was afraid it would be used to track him.”
“Hold on a minute. I’ll go check his office.” Hez walked down the hall to Andersen’s office. It was empty and the only light
came in through the window. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Hez scanned the desk—and spotted something odd. “TGU is switching
insurance plans, and there’s a half-filled-out form on his desk. If he doesn’t submit it by tomorrow, his premiums will double.
I don’t think he was planning to take a trip.”
“Hmm. Maybe not.”
“Hold on a sec. I’m putting you on speaker.” Hez got on his hands and knees, turned on his phone’s flashlight, and shone it
on the underside of Andersen’s desk and shelves. His heart jittered when he saw a small round object. He got to his feet,
hurried into the hall, and took the phone off speaker. “There’s a bug under his desk.”
The line was silent for a heartbeat. “I’ll submit a missing person report and get an investigator assigned. Have you checked
your office?”
Hez walked back to the Justice Chamber. Thirty seconds later, he found an identical bug on the underside of the room’s table. No wonder Michael always seemed one step ahead of them.
Savannah parked in the lot by Pelican Harbor Beach and got out into the salty breeze. Whitecaps foamed on the sand and retreated
to repeat their hypnotic movement. A tern did a slow roll and dive-bombed to snatch a hapless crab before it could scuttle
to safety in the waves. She hadn’t been sleeping well while Nora was in jail, and she needed this walk along the water. Everything
felt off-kilter.
She spotted Nora tossing pieces of food to a brown pelican and waved, then picked up the pace to reach her. “Looks like Pete
knows a soft touch when he sees one.” Jane had rescued Pelican Harbor’s unofficial mascot when he was a baby, and he loved
people.
Nora wiped her hands on a napkin before she rose from the bench. “I couldn’t eat all my shrimp, but Pete was happy to take
my leftovers.” She enveloped Savannah in a fierce hug. “Thanks for coming to meet me. I still can’t believe you paid for my
bail. I—I didn’t expect you to do that. It was fifteen thousand dollars!”
Savannah squeezed her tightly. “You kept me sane when I was drowning in grief. I know you arranged for me to get that prisoner
file too. Even in jail you tried to help me like you always do. I couldn’t let you rot in a cell. We’ll get it back.”
Nora frowned. “What prisoner file?”
“Martine’s father’s file.”
“That wasn’t me.” Nora released her and stepped back. “Hez was okay with the bail money?”
“We took it out of our wedding fund.” When Nora’s eyes filled with tears, Savannah took her hand. “The wedding’s not in jeopardy,
so don’t assume you wrecked our plans. I realized I trusted Hez enough to believe him. Michael orchestrated the pictures somehow.”
She took off her shoes, dangling them in one hand, and nodded toward the beach. “Let’s walk while we talk. I need to feel
the sea breeze in my hair. Now that you’re out, we have to figure out who used your credentials to steal Ella’s report at
the Birmingham PD. Any ideas?”
Nora walked beside her but said nothing for a long moment. Savannah stopped and studied her downcast gaze. “Nora? You must
have possible suspects in mind.”
Nora pushed her glasses up on her nose and gripped Savannah’s hand. “You don’t know how much I appreciate your loyalty, Savannah,
but I can’t let you get in the middle of this. I—I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Who would hurt me? Your uncle Michael? I’m used to dealing with him now. There’s something you aren’t telling me.”
“There’s nothing you can do about this, Savannah. Let it go.”
“Not until you tell me what’s going on.”
“I can’t talk about it!” Nora walked ahead with a jerky gait and didn’t look back.
Savannah started after her and slipped in the thick sand. She went down on one knee as she lost the fight to keep her balance.
“Nora, wait!”
Nora turned and saw her struggling to get up but didn’t approach. “Please trust me, Savannah. Stay out of it.”
Savannah struggled to her feet and brushed the sand from her hands before walking toward Nora, who had gone pale.
“You can’t ask me to trust you with no information.
This is about Ella. You, of all people, know what I’ve gone through.
You understand. I have to know. You can’t cover for her killers, Nora—you just can’t! ”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” A sob tore from Nora, and she turned to run off down the beach.
Savannah clutched the bracelet circling her wrist, and the beads bit into her skin. Nora couldn’t have been involved in the
theft of Ella’s file—Savannah refused to believe it. There had to be another answer. But no matter which way she examined
the known facts, she couldn’t come up with any other reason Nora’s credentials had been used. No one could have “borrowed”
them without her knowledge.
Hez knew there was a problem the instant Savannah opened her cottage door. Her puffy red eyes told him the meeting with Nora
hadn’t gone well. He stepped in without saying a word and held her tight.
She buried her face in his chest. “I can’t believe Nora would do this.”
He reached back and closed the door behind him to block prying eyes. “I’m sorry, babe.”
“I—I cried my eyes out over Ella again and again during grief group, and Nora held my hand and put her arm around me each
time. She understands. She must understand.”
Hez guided her to a sofa, sat, and pulled her onto his lap. “Did she confess to stealing the file?”
“No, but she asked me not to investigate. She said I might get hurt.” Savannah inhaled. “She said I needed to trust her.”
Trust me—the motto of every untrustworthy person in the world. Including him. He’d asked her to trust him over the pictures, and she’d
done it. He wished he was wrong about Nora, but he didn’t think so. “Her betrayal must be really hard, especially after Jess.”
Savannah stiffened and went silent for a moment. “No, Hez, you’re wrong. Hearing you say the word betrayal brought it all into focus, and the one thing I know is that she’s never let me down. Besides, this is about Ella.” She fidgeted
with her bracelet. “I don’t believe she would cover for Ella’s killers. She’s hiding something, but I’m sure she would be
the first to accuse the murderer. I—I trust her.”
Just like Savannah trusted Jess—right up until the moment she stuck a knife in her back. Savannah didn’t have a great track
record when it came to trusting Willard women, but now wasn’t the time to bring that up.
Hez sighed and mentally said goodbye to the fifteen thousand Savannah blew on Nora’s bail—and bit his tongue about that too.
The last thing he wanted was to start a fight, especially when he had his own bad news to deliver.
“Ella’s killers may have struck again.” He told her about his conversation with Hope and the bugs he discovered in Andersen’s
office and the Justice Chamber.
She gasped. “You think Michael was listening when you persuaded Erik to talk to Hope? And then murdered him before he could
testify?”
Hez nodded. “I can’t believe I never thought to search for bugs earlier.
I knew Michael and the Willard kids had been in Connor Hall and in the Justice Chamber itself, but it somehow never occurred to me that they might have left something behind.
” He tapped his left temple. “Some people never completely recover after a craniotomy. Maybe I’ve permanently lost a step. ”
She gave him a tender kiss and stroked his hair. “I didn’t fall in love with you because you’re the smartest man I know—even
though you are.”
“I’m not smarter than Michael Willard. Without Andersen’s testimony, Hope doesn’t have a basis for an arrest warrant. And
if Andersen doesn’t revoke his consent to Michael’s adoption of Simon, we’ll have a hard time stopping it. A really hard time.”
Her fingers stilled in his hair. “What are our chances?”
“Close to zero,” he admitted. “I let you down. Worse, I let Simon down.”
“I’m scared for our boy. What will Michael do to him?”
Fear gripped Hez’s heart with iron talons. “He’s a cold-blooded killer, and I think he murdered Simon’s birth father. And
that PI we hired for the first hearing reported that Michael was physically abusive to family members. If he hurts Simon . . .”
Savannah shivered. “I’m not just worried about him physically harming Simon. Michael corrupts everyone around him. Look at
Jess, his brother David, his nephews Deke and Tommy and Little Joe, the other Willards who are dead or behind bars after those
smuggling raids. And those are only the ones we know about. I’ll bet there are more.”
“And he’s hard at work on the next generation.
Simon gushes about how much fun he has with his cousins at ‘Pawpaw’s place.
’ He idolizes that sociopath. I so much want to go over there and get Simon and take him someplace safe—to protect him.
But I know I’d be doing the opposite. Michael’s court case would get even stronger, and there could even be bloodshed.
” Hez closed his eyes. “This is like those nightmares I have about Ella. I know she’s drowning, but there’s nothing I can do to save her. ”
Savannah took his hand in both of hers. “You’re wrong.”
“What do you mean?”
“There is something we can do: Pray for Simon. We don’t have the power to protect Simon, but God does, and he works through
our prayers. Especially when we pray together.” She squeezed his hand. “Let’s pray for our boy right now.” She bowed her head.
Hez blinked. She was right. God could protect Simon despite Hez’s repeated failings. This wasn’t all on him. A weight lifted
from his heart as he inclined his head. He cleared his throat and began, “Lord, we thank you that you love Simon and hold
him in the palm of your hand. He faces great danger, but not too great for you. Keep him safe, Lord, please.”