Absolution
By Midnight Caller
Disclaimer, notes in chapter one. We're almost at the end here, and I just want to thank Eolivet again for her beta-ing, and to everyone for their kind words and support. :)
**
Chapter 9
32 Hours Missing
Karen sat in the interview room across from Jack while Danny stood near the wall, arms crossed.
Dark circles underlined Karen's eyes, and it was clear she hadn't slept in a while. One hand kept running nervously through her hair.
"Late night?" Jack asked sardonically.
Karen glared at him.
He tried a different approach. "Why'd you lie to us?" When she didn't answer, Jack prodded her with, "We know you saw your sister recently. You went to the doctor's with her, right?" He still got no response. "Come on, Karen, Andrea's life is at stake here – you have to tell us what you know."
The hand in her hair ran across her mouth, and then Karen licked her lips. "I hadn't heard from her in almost four months," she said quietly. "Then she calls me up, all panicked. Went and got herself pregnant." She took a breath. "Tommy wouldn't go with her to the doctor's... so I said I would." Shaking her head, she lamented, "Out of all the things I wanted to help bring us back together..."
"Didn't you think it was odd that her doctor wanted so much money to perform the procedure?"
"How am I supposed to know how much those things cost?"
Jack paused briefly before asking, "What happened when she came to your apartment two nights ago?"
Karen nodded. "We fought. Then she left. Around six, I guess."
"What'd you fight about?"
She sighed. "I told her I couldn't give her the money. A big client of mine had just signed with another photographer, and I just wasn't going to be able to help her out. I was tired of helping her out of her messes. But… then I felt bad, so I offered to give her some of it -- a few hundred bucks. She wouldn't take it, though."
Jack glanced at Danny before asking, "Then what happened?"
"I told her she should ask our parents for it. That really set her off. She said they'd never give it to her. I told her to ask anyway, but... she wouldn't listen." Karen swallowed and licked her lips again. "I told her about the stash – the one my dad keeps in the house. But I wanted her to let me talk to them first. She didn't want me to... and she was getting really upset. So I just gave her my keys. She took my car and left. Said she was going to meet Tommy. That was the last time I saw her..." Her voice drifted off at this last sentence, her eyes closing against the memory.
"And you didn't do anything after that..."
Karen looked at him, confused.
"…Like call your parents, for instance?" Jack asked, eyebrows raised. "Because according to your phone records, you did."
"I..." she stuttered before regaining attempting to regain her composure. "I just wanted them to know she was coming..."
"But they were out of town, right, Karen?" Danny finally stepped in.
Karen looked at the table, ready to cry. "Yes."
For a moment, Jack pitied her, but it quickly vanished. "She scratched the door up pretty badly. I guess your keys didn't work."
Karen blinked, furrowing her brow. "What?"
He leaned forward. "Your keys – they didn't work. And when she couldn't get in, she panicked, drove off, and that was the last time anyone saw her."
Danny winced slightly at Jack's tone, but he remained quiet.
Karen's jaw was slack with astonishment. "Are you saying this is my fault?"
"I'm saying that you gave your sister a false set of keys."
Tears started to form in Karen's eyes, her mouth pulled taut by anger. "I didn't know they wouldn't work!" she told him, her voice desperate as her eyes darted back and forth between Danny and Jack.
As Jack prepared his next attack, the door suddenly opened, and Samantha's head appeared. "Jack," she said, waving him toward her.
Still staring at Karen, he rose and walked out the door.
Out in the hallway, Samantha explained, "The parents are here."
Jack looked at her and then took a deep breath.
**
"I want to know why you've brought our daughter in as a suspect at five o'clock in the morning!" Patricia Feldman screamed, her husband's arm around her shoulders.
Jack raised his hands and tried to remain calm. "Mrs. Feldman, I know you're upset, but Karen's statement was inconsistent with other witnesses, and we needed to interview her in—"
"I just can't believe you think she'd have something to do with Andrea's disappearance!" Patricia interrupted. She was on the brink of tears, shaking from the stress.
"She isn't a suspect," Samantha explained, emerging from the back of the interview room. "We just needed to find out what she knew."
Patricia looked at her, nonplussed. David sighed angrily, growling, "This is ridiculous."
Jack regarded him for a moment. "Mr. Feldman... Karen called you the day Andrea disappeared, right?"
David thought for a moment. "Yes. On our cell phone while we were out of town. I guess it was around dinnertime. She told us Andrea was coming over to the house, and of course, we were concerned."
"What did you do?"
David glanced at his wife, "We did what we always do – we called Joe."
Jack frowned, glancing at Sam. "Who's Joe?"
Patricia chimed in, "He's our neighbor. Lives a few doors down. Does favors for us now and then because Karen shoots his family portraits for a discount every year."
"Favors?" Samantha asked warily.
"Yes. He owns his own business, Oceanside Lock and Key, and since we'd had so many problems with Tommy and Andrea before, he offered to help us again..."
Jack sat back in disbelief, the breath leaving his body in a quiet sigh. "You changed the locks," he said almost inaudibly.
David looked at Jack, then to Sam, and then to his wife. "Well, yes. Joe just gives us the new keys when we get home... I don't understand—"
"Your daughter desperately needed your help that night," Jack cut him off, angrily. "She was scared, she was frightened, and she was looking for someone to help her. She was looking for you."
The Feldmans looked at him, confused. "She knows she can always come to us for help," David explained.
Narrowing his eyes, Jack sat forward. "Andrea is six weeks pregnant." He watched the shock pass over them. "Her doctor scammed her and told her she'd need 800 dollars to get an abortion."
Patricia was almost too in shock to move, her mouth frozen open in horror and realization. David wrapped his arm around her again, his eyes searching the room as he tried to figure it all out.
"So... so she wanted to get into our house... for the money?" he asked, still unsure how to feel.
"Maybe," Jack replied, his voice calmer. "Or maybe she just really wanted to see her parents."
He let that last thought sink in as Patricia clutched her husband's shirt even tighter.
There was a knock at the door, and Vivian poked her head in. She caught Jack's eye and motioned with her head for him to come out into the hall. Samantha followed him outside.
Out in the hallway, Vivian sighed, "Rockland county police just called. They found Karen's car at the bottom of a ditch on Highway 17. The sheriff said it probably went off the road during the ice storm two nights ago. A woman matching Andrea's description was taken to a local hospital in critical condition. They said she'd been trapped in the car for a while..."
Jack glanced at Vivian before his eyes traveled back through the glass of the interview room. Patricia's shoulders were shaking even harder as she started to cry.
Letting out a deep breath, he said, "Thanks, Viv."
Vivian walked away as Jack went back into the room, quietly shutting the door.
Sam stepped up to the window, watching as Jack slowly sat down, and then started to gesture with his hands.
After a moment, David looked stricken, turning white as his wife's crying turned to sobbing, her whole body heaving with each breath as she collapsed against her husband.
Eventually, Jack rose from his chair and left them alone. He paused out in the hall, where he caught Sam's eyes for a few seconds before walking away.
**
tbc…