the coke. He was right about everything. She wasn’t strong enough to stand up to him. Her only hope was that it would be fast. “Just get it over with.”
Paul laughed again, but it wasn’t the delighted laugh he saved for Claire. It was the kind of laugh you gave when you thought someone was pitiful. “Do you really think I want to rape a fat forty-year-old?”
Lydia hated herself for feeling the sting of his words. “I’m forty-one, you stupid motherfucker.”
She braced herself for another punch or a kick or the spray bottle, but instead, he did something far worse than she could have ever imagined.
He took off the hood.
Lydia closed her eyes against the blinding light. She turned her head away. She hissed fresh air in and out between her teeth.
Paul said, “You can’t keep your eyes closed forever.”
She squinted, trying to get her eyes to adjust to the light. The first thing she saw was her own hands clutching the green vinyl pads on the arms of the chair. Then the concrete floor. Wadded-up fast-food bags. A stained mattress.
Lydia looked up at Paul. He held out his hands like a magician finishing a trick.
She had been tricked.
The ambient sound was coming from a pair of computer speakers. The leaves under her feet were on the floor of the garage. The wall behind her was stained concrete block. They were not in an isolated cabin in the woods.
Paul had brought her back to the Fuller house.
SEVENTEEN
Fred Nolan said, “Tell me about your relationship with your husband.”
Claire looked away from his smug face. They were in a cramped interrogation room inside the downtown FBI field office. She had her legs crossed under a cheap plastic table. Her foot was shaking uncontrollably. There was no clock in the room. Hours had passed. Claire had no idea how many, but she knew her self-imposed deadline for telling Paul how to get back the thumbdrive had long passed.
Nolan asked, “Was he a nice guy? Romantic?”
Claire didn’t answer. She felt sick with fear. Paul wouldn’t be sending pictures of Lydia anymore. There was nothing to keep him in check. Would he be anxious? Angry? Did he know that Claire was talking to the police? Was he taking out his fury on Lydia?
Nolan said, “Me, I try to be romantic, but I always end up doing it wrong. Tulips instead of roses. Tickets to the wrong show.”
Claire tasted bile in her mouth. She had seen the violence that Paul was capable of. With Claire on radio silence, what would he do to her sister?
“Claire?”
Tears filled her eyes. Lydia. She had to help Lydia.
“Come on.” Nolan waited a full minute before letting out a long, disappointed sigh. “You’re just making this harder on yourself.”
Claire stared up at the ceiling so her tears would not fall. The clock on the Tesla had read 6:48 when she’d pulled into the parking deck under the FBI building. How long ago had that been? Claire didn’t even know whether or not it was still Sunday.
Nolan knocked on the table to get her attention. “You were married to the guy for almost nineteen years. Tell me about him.”
Claire blinked away the useless tears. None of this was going to get Lydia back. What could Claire do? Lydia had said it herself: She wasn’t a superhero. Neither of them were. She turned her gaze to the large mirror that took up one side of the wall. Her reflection showed an exhausted woman with a dark circle under her left eye. Paul had punched her in the face. He had knocked her out.
What was he doing to Lydia?
“All right.” Nolan tried again. “How about this: Was he a Falcons guy or a Braves guy? Did he like sugar in his coffee?”
Claire stared down at the table. She had to get herself under control. Panicking was not going to get her out of this room. Nolan was playing nice for now. He hadn’t arrested her for failing to appear at the scheduled meeting. He’d let her voluntarily follow the police officer to the FBI building. Once he had her inside, Nolan had reminded Claire of the terms of her parole, but he hadn’t handcuffed her or threatened her with anything more dangerous than calling her parole officer to drug-test her.
So did this mean that Nolan was clean, or that he was working with Paul?
Claire tried to push down her fear about what might be happening to Lydia and concentrate on what was happening in