“I already knew about Pantheon, doll. And I figured as much that Calvin was one of the owners. We’re trying to prove it right now, which is harder than it sounds.”
“But what about—”
“Nina, stop.” His rebuke was short and curt. It sliced through my attempt to speak like a machete. “I told you. I have to account for every source of information I have. I probably shouldn’t have even asked you about this Kate character. If I report that you told me this information in confidence, I have to explain the nature of our…relationship…” He looked at me sadly, almost as if that was exactly what he wanted to do. “But if I do that, I’ll almost certainly get tossed off the case, and there is no one else who can pursue it. We literally only just brought my boss in on this, and it’s been almost a year. Do you understand what I’m saying here?”
I did. Of course I did. We had been over it so many times.
I closed my eyes, and for a moment, I was back in that office, so long ago. I was looking at the papers, staring at my signature. Watching the chains of this life wrap around me in an iron cocoon.
Matthew was certain this was the only way for any of us—that meant Olivia and me—to be free of this captor. I’d have to trust him.
I swallowed. “All right. I won’t say anything more.”
Matthew stood there for a moment, rubbing his chin while he thought. “Nina, I—”
“What?” I interrupted.
He looked mournful. Sorrowful. “I know I don’t have a right to ask you this. But can you…if I got you something, is there any way you could access your hus—Calv—Gardner’s cell?” He stumbled over Calvin’s name and title like they put a bad taste in his mouth, practically spitting at the end. “It would be a SIM card, like you put in your phone. Do you think you could manage it?”
I opened my mouth to say no. But the need written clearly across Matthew’s face stopped me.
“Yes,” I said. “I can.”
“And then you’ll get out of town? Unless you want me listening in on you…”
“Won’t they know?” I wondered quietly. “That I’m leaving because of this. Won’t they?”
Matthew’s jaw tightened. “Not if you do it right. I thought you said that you and your husband barely saw each other as it is.”
The defensive note hurt.
“We didn’t,” I reiterated carefully. “Before he was confined to the state, he was barely home.”
“So, maybe your marriage soured a bit with the sudden constant contact,” Matthew volunteered acidly. “You might decide to take Olivia to school and stay for a week or two yourself. I don’t know. Go to a spa or whatever ladies like you do in the mountains.”
I snorted before I could help it. He had no idea how right he was.
“I could go back to school.” I said it before I really thought it. But as soon as it was out, I realized it had been circulating for days. Maybe weeks. Maybe even months.
More, I’d told Jane.
What do you want? she had asked.
It was a question I hadn’t even dared ask myself for ten years—since I had left Wellesley, come back to New York, and walked straight into the clutches of the man who now owned me.
But he wouldn’t for long.
And I needed to reclaim something of myself again. Now…before it was too late.
I looked up. “Do you think that’s ridiculous? I never went back, you know. After I had Olivia.”
Matthew didn’t look surprised.
“I’d be a thirty-year-old junior,” I joked. “Hilarious. They’d all think I was their professor.”
“I think it’s a fuckin’ great idea,” Matthew said softly. “And if it gets you out of New York…”
He didn’t finish the sentence, but I knew what he meant. All the better. Though being four hours from him, from the possibility of him… That sounded like torture.
“Yes,” I said. “Well. We’ll see. How long is it for?”
“Two weeks.”
“And will you continue after that?”
Matthew shrugged. “If needed. I can’t speak for the NYPD side—unofficially, they do all sorts of surveillance, even if they can’t promise everything will be removed; just that it won’t be used in court.”
I ground my teeth. “And you really don’t think it will be suspicious if I suddenly leave?”
Matthew shoved a hand back through his thick, dark hair. “I don’t—fuck, Nina, even if this tips them off, I just—” He shook his head ruefully. “Would you believe me if