The Body of David Hayes by Ridley Pearson Page B

said in a tight whisper, her eyes locked in a stare as she relived events. “Stayed with us all night. Tony was supposed to do something at the bank for them. They said they were staying with us until it was done. Then, later, one of them got a call on his cell phone, and they just up and left. In a hurry. Told me not to leave the house, not to use the phone until Tony came home.”
    Liz asked, “What was Tony asked to do for them,
    Beth?”
    She shook her head back and forth, a child not supposed to reveal a secret. “They gave him a phone and a disk. That’s all I know about it.”
    Boldt wrote on the pad, faster than Beth was supplying answers, and then tore the piece of notepaper loose and, leaning across toward Liz, left a laundry list of questions sitting in front of her.
    Descriptions? Timing?
Exactly what happened?
Demands?
Two cell phones?
    Liz thought there might be something to the order he’d written them in. She felt privileged to be included and wanted to do this right. She and Beth could not be considered best friends, but Beth had, on several occasions, unloaded onto her about her fertility problems, talkingextremely personally and graphically. Every relationship was viewed differently by those involved. Lou took her affair with David much more seriously than she ever had; Beth might believe them far closer friends than she did, so Liz proceeded, combining sympathy with a forced intimacy.
    She asked Beth what “they” looked like, and when Beth stammered and began sliding back toward emotion rather than reason, Liz salvaged her by prodding with descriptions of her own: tall, fat, loud, dark?
    “There were two of them,” Beth repeated, her eyes darting between Lou and Liz.
    Lou said softly, “We know they told you to say nothing about it, Beth. Tony’s going to get better, and when he does, he could be in some trouble here, and no one wants to see that happen.”
    “They
made
him do it!” Beth shouted loudly. One of the patrolmen poked his head out from the kitchen and then retreated. “They told him they’d hurt the twins if they didn’t get a call within the hour. Then, when they did get the call, I don’t think it was what they expected. They panicked and took off. They must have heard he’d collapsed.” She added cautiously: “I’m afraid to leave. They told me not to leave.”
    Liz asked again if Beth could describe them.
    Beth explained once again that there were two of them, both wearing nice suits. Good-looking men whom she’d initially taken to be FBI agents or cops. They’d arrived at the back door the night before, just after dinner. “Tony was careful. Wouldn’t let them into the house. But then when they mentioned the embezzlement investigation and that they’d rather talk in private, he let them in.”
    Liz repeated, “Two men. Dark suits. Good-looking.”
    “The man who spoke…the one on the left… didn’t have much of an accent. But the other one… once they were inside the door…I knew something was wrong.”
    “What kind of accent?” Liz asked.
    “Thick. I don’t know. Italian? Russian? Not French, not Spanish.”
    She glanced at Lou’s list. Description and timing taken care of, she moved on, asking Beth what happened.
    Beth wormed her fingers as she spoke. “They were polite at first. I had no idea…” She was interrupted by a muted peal of joy from the upstairs. The twins were clearly enjoying themselves, oblivious to their mother’s contained terror a floor below. Beth looked up toward them, her face bunching as tears threatened.
    Lou asked, “What did they say they were doing here?”
    “All I remember is that all at once they were pushing Tony. The other one pulled me, turned me, and covered my mouth. It happened so quickly.” She rubbed her wrists where Liz could see thin but deep red bruises. “They had the twins then. I don’t remember how, exactly. Tony and I …we did exactly as they asked. I stayed with the children in the living room.