He’d loved her and hoped they could get through it. He’d tried so hard to understand this new woman she was becoming, but he wasn’t ashamed to admit he found it hard and over time he’d started to drift away from her. By the time they were finishing university he was ready to end things with her.
And then she’d found out she was pregnant.
He’d believed for many years that she’d trapped him. Forced the pregnancy on him so that he wouldn’t leave her, and he hated her for that. Michael wasn’t the sort of man that wanted to be controlled. Not by anyone.
It didn’t matter though; he’d turned the situation to his advantage in the end. Delores was easily pliable. He moulded her into his perfect wife. His ‘Stepford’ wife as he liked to call her. And everything was going well. At least for him.
She cooked and cleaned; she became the perfect stay-at-home mom. She didn’t need a career when her life was filled with family commitments.
Michael glanced over at the other officer and considered trying to get her on his side somehow. He was good with women, always had been. If women were gold, then he had the Midas touch for certain. He hadn’t loved Delores for a long time, but he also wasn’t willing to let his perfect image be tainted. Better to be the successful married man with plenty of women on the side than a divorcee.
He looked the female officer up and down, and she glared back at him.
“Officer,” he said, before turning and walking away. Any other day or situation and he would have had her on her knees begging for it, but not since Officer Schiver had gotten his claws into her. The two of them didn’t know what they were getting involved in. Michael Stanton was not someone you wanted to upset. He knew people in high places, his reach was far wider than either of them could know.
He was good with people. His parents had always told him that he was special because of the way he could handle himself, and others. The way that no one ever said no to him. The way they always did what he asked. A little shove in this direction, a little whisper there. And if he couldn’t convince them through charm, he’d make them do what he wanted through threats.
Because Michael Stanton was the sort of man who always got what he wanted.
Until he didn’t.
And then it wasn’t good for anyone.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Elijah
Back in the car, Elijah slipped on his seatbelt and started the engine.
He backed out of his space and turned back towards the highway.
The car was hot, almost stifling, and he turned the air-conditioning on, his thoughts straying momentarily to Delores. He thought of her sat behind the wheel of her car, too hot to focus on the road, her mind a jumbled mess.
“Did she have anything interesting to say?” Annie asked, breaking into his dark thoughts. Her voice held a tinge of annoyance, though she was trying to control it as best she could.
“She did. It seems that Mr. Stanton helped to get her the job.” No surprise there, thought Elijah. From the moment he had seen Christine in the deli he’d known that in some way she was connected to Delores’s disappearance. Her striking resemblance to Delores, in both her personality and her looks, had set off alarm bells and he’d finally been able to kick-start his cop brain.
His only problem now, he thought darkly, was how connected Christine knew she was to this case. Was she aware of her resemblance to Michael’s wife? Had she purposefully helped in some way to get Delores out of the way? On that thought Elijah was still uncertain, but he had a feeling that the altercation he had provoked in the pharmacy would have Christine spilling whatever other secrets she held very soon.
“If I may, Sir, can you cut the crap and tell me what’s really going on here?” Annie bit out, her annoyance finally getting the better of her.
Elijah raised an eyebrow at Annie.
“Sir, I think I should know since this is my case,” Annie cleared her throat, her slender hand going to a strand of her strawberry-blond hair that had slipped out of her hair tie and tucking it behind her ear.
Elijah thought over how to answer the question, or if in fact to answer it at all. Because in truth, he wasn’t sure what was going on himself. At least, not with anything factual that Annie might respect. Because that was Annie’s Achilles’ heel: the facts. As it should be for any good officer. She said she’d learned to trust her gut from working with him, but she only thought she had. She still didn’t trust her gut, not the way Elijah did. Annie still wanted facts, black and white facts, to sort through chaos. Yet right now Elijah was working mostly off his guts and instincts. Annie wouldn’t get it, because the only indisputable fact he really had right now was that he cared deeply about Delores and wouldn’t rest until he knew that she was safe.
“I think it was an inside job,” he said, giving in and letting Annie in on his thoughts. “I think
Christine was involved somehow; I just don’t know how deeply. And I think, and this is just my gut telling me this, I think she has something to do with Delores Stanton’s disappearance.”
“But Christine’s just a kid. What could she possibly have to do with it?” Annie added, watching Elijah carefully. “She does look a hell of a lot like Mrs. Stanton though.”
“I agree. And she seems the sort to be easily manipulated.”
“And Michael Stanton?” Annie asked, trying to read Elijah’s expression. “Do you think he was sleeping with her, with Christine?”
“I think that much is obvious, Miles.”
