Page 7 of The Perfect Escape
Curtis scooted forward in his chair, his elbows resting on his knees. He seemed relaxed as he began. “As you probably already know, I worked for Rui Salko. He considered me his right-hand man. I pretty much did all the dirty work for him.” Curtis emphasized the word “dirty” by using his fingers to create quotation marks.
“Your relationship with Rui Salko is no secret, Curtis,” I said. “What I want to know is how the hell Louise Braxton is sitting here instead of inside an unclaimed container on a shelf somewhere?”
“I’m getting to that.” Curtis glared in annoyance as he ran his hand along his bald head. A sign of nervousness becoming more evident.
Before he could continue, Louise placed her hand on his knee and said, “Rui and I were married. I’m not sure if it was even legal.”
“It’s okay, Lou. I’ll take it from here.” Curtis chimed in as Louise’s emotions kicked in. “I knew what kind of man Rui Salko was and how badly he treated her. I couldn’t stand it. I hated what he did to her. It had to stop, and I had to stop it.” Curtis stood, and I swore I could see the steam rolling off his bald head. Gathering his composure, he took a seat next to Louise and gave her a sympathetic smile. “To this day, I’m not sure how it happened, but Lou and I fell in love. I had to get her away from him. So, when the time was right, I did just that.”
“So, you faked her death.” I was on my feet, pacing the length of the small living room. Dropping my gaze to Curtis, I met his eyes. “Who was in the car?”
“I’ll get to that. We hadn’t planned on a fake death, not at first, but eventually, I had to. Rui found out where she was. And in order to keep our secret, faking her death was the only way out. If he found out that I had anything to do with her disappearance, he would have killed me. I continued to work for that motherfucker so he would never question her death or my relationship with Lou. I’ve waited sixteen years to be out from under his bullshit. Just waiting until we could finally be together again. You could say it was a way out for both of us.”
It was a nice story, but still left unanswered questions. “You still haven’t answered my question about who was in the car. And how was the body identified as Louise Braxton’s?”
“I used my connections and got my hands on a cadaver from the university. Anyone can be bought with the right amount of money.” Curtis’s jaw set in a hard line when he looked at me. “As you might have guessed, time was something we didn’t have much of.”
“How does your sister fit into all of this?” My mind was still digesting the fact that Louise was still alive, and Reyna lived her childhood without her mother. They all knew, even Margaret knew.
“She was our eyes and ears until the McCalls stepped in. We hadn’t planned on Reyna being adopted, but not even my sister could stop it. All we have ever wanted was to keep Reyna safe. We thought if Reyna was moved from foster house to foster house, it would be harder for Rui to find her. Disappearing without a word five years ago was a mistake, and I can’t take it back, but being without Lou would have been even worse.”
The pieces were falling into place. I had a hand in Reyna’s adoption. Just like Curtis, we knew Salko would eventually come out of the woodwork. All this time, Salko knew Reyna wasn’t his daughter. But how? He took her for one reason, which was to draw out Curtis. Funny how things worked. We were using Reyna for the same reason, to fish out Salko. But the minute I laid eyes on Reyna I couldn’t exchange her life for his. All I wanted was to protect her. I failed. Just like I failed Gwen.
I considered what Curtis just confessed, and no matter the facts, I wanted Salko dead. Something still bothered me. Call it intuition or logic. Either way, I had to hear it from Curtis. “Are you Reyna’s father, or is Salko?”
Looking at Louise, Curtis smiled, and I knew. “Reyna is our daughter.”
“Then tell me one thing. How you did it? We proved through DNA testing Salko was Reyna’s father. We had a sample of his blood.”
The room became deathly quiet. We were all looking at each other for answers, but the only person who knew the truth was Curtis. “I switched the blood samples,” he blurted. “I knew something was up when the new guy took a sample of Rui’s blood. There was a reason he wanted his blood, and I couldn’t chance Rui blaming me for whatever the hell that sample was going to be used for. I needed him to trust me. Underneath my disgust for the man, he was my boss, and my loyalty had to remain with him.” Curtis paused for a moment with a chuckle. “It’s a funny thing. Soon after the altercation that got Rui shot, the new guy disappeared.” His eyes opened wide as though a light went on that was turned off for five years. Shaking his head back and forth, he looked over to me. “He was one of yours?”
“How could you be loyal to a man like that? After what he did to Louise. You, of all people, knew what kind of man he was and still is. For God’s sake, you took his wife.” I looked at him, repulsed, avoiding the obvious.
“As I said, I had to remain loyal to him. As far as he knew, Louise was dead, and I wanted to keep it that way until I could break my ties with him. And for the record, Lou’s marriage to Salko wasn’t legal.”
There was some truth in what Curtis said. He took Louise from Salko to save her. Faking her death was the only way they could ensure that Salko wouldn’t look for her. If Salko found out that Louise was still alive, he wouldn’t hesitate to kill her. If he ever found them, I was certain Louise would die a slow death, and Salko would make sure Curtis watched her suffer before the same slow death was bestowed on him.
Even though the pieces were falling into place, there was the issue concerning the letter found in Louise’s safe deposit box. “What about the letter?”
Curtis and Louise either didn’t know about it or were surprised that we had found it. Curtis’s expression was off when he met my gaze. “It’s fake.”
He was lying. Patton and I knew it. Guilt was plastered all over his face. “I don’t believe you, Curtis. There is something else to this story you aren’t telling us.”
“I don’t care what you believe. All I know is that Salko has our daughter, and we will not stop looking for her. I’ve had to wait sixteen years to be with Louise. I’m not waiting for another sixteen to be with my daughter. It would be better for us to work together on this instead of against each other. Either you’re with me or you’re not.”
I was ready to ask him about his men camped out in front of The Regency, but decided to save that question for another time. It was clear he was concerned about Reyna’s safety as much as I was. Maybe he could help us. It was better to keep him close. Curtis might not be my enemy, but I didn’t trust him.
When we left the house, Patton and I headed out to Suches Loop, where the staged accident happened. It was probably it was a waste of time, but I still wanted to check it out. As we drove further up the loop, we saw that just like the reviews on the road indicated, it was treacherous. Personally, I would think twice about driving this road at night. While Patton drove, I got the chance to look around. An accident that happened sixteen years ago wouldn’t leave much behind, but we got lucky. The stretch of road where the car went through the guardrail was still visible, but only because the repaired section was less weathered. I was certain we were at the right place since there were no other spots along the road that stuck out. I wished I had asked Curtis exactly where it was Louise supposedly went over the edge.
Patton slowed down and pulled over to the side of the road to avoid getting hit by oncoming traffic. When I opened my door, I realized just how close he had parked to the railing. I carefully got out of the SUV, accidentally hitting the door against the guardrail. The SUV was dangerously close to the edge of the cliff. As I looked over the railing, I knew no one would have survived a fall over the edge. The drop-off was steep with rugged terrain. Not even the trees or vegetation would have helped break the fall.
Sixteen years was a long time, and any evidence of Louise’s car flying over the edge was long gone. Searching for clues here was a mistake and a waste of time, like my father said. Curtis admitted staging Louise’s death to keep her safe. And to think, all this time I blamed Salko for her death. Still, my gut told me something was still missing. What caused Curtis to leave Salko’s employment, other than how he treated women, and what was he hiding beside Louise?
~5~
Reyna
As the days passed, I saw very little of Helga. Rui had remained at home, never leaving his study except to have his breakfast, which he continued to enjoy in the garden with me by his side. I still hadn’t been able to retrieve the cell phone from the accent table. The longer I waited, the more I risked getting caught.
