on the football field and couldn’t catch his breath. Only Detective Wheeler didn’t look completely stunned, or even slightly surprised. No doubt he was accustomed to people keeping all sorts of secrets.
For the next fifteen minutes, Maggie confessed to everything: the Talkie friend request from Tracy Nuts; her promise in subsequent messages to keep the secret; their phone conversation from a number she had traced to Vermont.
“What did you do to make him run away?” Maggie asked her mother with tears in her eyes. “Dad told me you did something and that’s one of the reasons he had to disappear. What did you do?”
“Nothing,” Nina said. “I did nothing.”
“What exactly did he say? You can tell us; it’s safe to tell us now.”
Wheeler’s relaxed approach seemed to have the intended effect of getting Maggie to open up.
“He told me to get along with Simon better because he wouldn’t have to worry about money and stuff, and then he said … he said he was hiding for a reason, that he had hurt people, but he said Mom did bad things, too, and that she was partly responsible for his situation and he couldn’t let it go unpunished.” Maggie’s speech was rushed as the words came tumbling out. “I didn’t understand any of it.”
Nina stifled a gasp. What had Glen become? She had barely known him to get angry. What could have filled him with such rage? What role could she have possibly played in that transformation? And why viciously attack a perfectly innocent soul to punish her? Was that the punishment he’d told Maggie about? How would he even know she was seeing Dr. Wilcox? None of it made any sense. For whatever reason, Glen had laid the blame squarely on her shoulders. How dare he accuse her of anything? She had been nothing but a loyal and loving wife to him. How could Glen possibly point at her when he had been fired at work, he was lying, he was stealing from his family, he had hooked up with the waitress and perhaps others?
Nina didn’t have many answers, but after piecing together events from the past few days, she understood at least one thing.
“You were talking to your father on the phone when I came to your room the other night, weren’t you?”
Nina sounded incredulous, but not upset. Thinking of her own father, she believed she would have done the same had roles been reversed. She hugged Maggie even tighter, letting her cry, knowing every tear her daughter shed was a little less weight to carry.
“It’s okay, sweetie,” Nina said, rocking Maggie in her arms the way she had when she was younger.
“He told me I couldn’t tell anybody. That I had to keep it a secret, that it would be very bad for him if I told you or Connor, like he might be killed or something if anybody found out.”
“It’s very good of you to be honest with us, Maggie,” Detective Wheeler said. “For the time being, I suggest everyone stay extremely vigilant. Maggie, we’ll need your computer, your phone, to run forensics, see if that can help us pinpoint a location.”
Nina wanted to see those secret messages Glen had exchanged with Maggie, but she’d speak with Detective Wheeler about it in private. She didn’t want her daughter having anything else to worry about.
“Is Glen a threat?” Simon asked the detective. “Could he show up here?”
“Anything is possible now,” he said.
Simon cupped his face in his hands. Nina pulled Maggie into her body, keeping an arm draped around her shoulders, her protective motherly instincts taking hold.
“You need to talk to the bank where Glen worked,” Nina told the detective. “He was fired from his job years before he disappeared, and I think something there set this whole train in motion.”
Wheeler made a note.
“Speaking of jobs—Nina, your job,” Simon said, looking first to Nina and then to Wheeler. “Is it safe for my wife to keep working?”
Nina eyed Simon strangely, and even Maggie had the wherewithal to key in on his miscue. Nina was still Glen’s wife, not Simon’s. Wheeler, none the wiser, answered with authority.
“Well, that’s going to be for you to decide. Obviously, I think whatever steps you can take to minimize your risks, it’s advisable to take them until we get this situation under control.”
Nina knew Simon would interpret Wheeler’s assessment to mean that, at a minimum, she should take a leave of absence. Maybe she would, but not until the Cooper case was officially