Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Alissa

Two days after my breakup with Alan, I woke up to eleven emails from him and a message from the fundraising site. The emails were the kind of ridiculousness I had expected—how he would only come back if I agreed to stop looking for Michelle and focus on him, how he missed me, how he thought I was an idiot, how he felt like killing himself, how I was a bitch who needed to learn who was boss, and on, and on, and on.

I scrolled through them, feeling barely a twinge of guilt, anger, or sadness. I was cried out. The loneliness still gnawed at me, but next to our lackluster relationship and the violence he’d done to my heart and my trust, it was bearable.

At least he hadn’t landed on my doorstep while in that state. The last thing I needed was for him to turn into a stalker ex. Especially one with cop powers. I wasn’t that scared for myself, I was too exhausted. But if I was gone, who would keep the search for Michelle alive? I was catastrophizing and I had to stop it. Alan was an ass, but he was just a regular ass, he’d slither off into the distance and find some other desperate woman to prey on.

I sighed and went to make tea. I stood at the window in my robe and slippers while the fog in my brain slowly lifted and the smell of Earl Grey filled the room.

I kept scrolling through the mess of Alan’s post-breakup breakdown on my phone, keeping an eye out for any red flags that should send me to court for a protection order. Fortunately, there was nothing threatening beyond his manipulative threat to end himself, which I knew was bullshit. His ego was too big for him to even consider a world that was not graced with his presence.

I finished scrolling through the last one, pinched the bridge of my nose in exasperation, and retrieved my steeping tea to go sit at my tiny dining table. I remembered the notification from the fundraising site and opened it, trying to focus enough to figure out its contents. I had received a donation. Well, that was encouraging. I made a mental note to check the site as soon as I was on my laptop.

I went through my morning routine as mechanically as ever, taking my antidepressant and my vitamins, showering, dressing, then watering the plants and making myself eat breakfast. I didn’t taste the scrambled eggs, toast, or strawberries. I felt their texture with my tongue and teeth, chewed and swallowed, but it was like taking my pills—nourishment without enjoyment.

Finally, I settled in at my desk and booted up my laptop. I ventured onto the fundraising site to see how much my first donor had given.

I stared. The donation, which had dropped very late last night from an unknown donor, was for twenty-five thousand dollars.

I blinked slowly, rubbed my eyes, looked again. The number didn’t change.

I was having trouble breathing suddenly. I struggled to control myself, closing my eyes and focusing, but my heart just kept pounding. That was more than enough for a private investigator.

My vision blurred. I reached up and felt that my cheek was wet.

Who had done this? Some random rich person, moved by my story? Not likely, most rich people didn’t have hearts to break. But clearly it had been someone with money to burn and an eye for good causes.

“Whoever you are, thank you,” I breathed, the shock still running through me like ice water. At least I felt awake now.

Once my vision cleared and I stopped shaking, I opened up my day’s to-do list with a little smile and added ‘hire a private investigator’ to the top of the list. The depression was lifting a little, hope buoying me. I was one step closer to finding my little girl.

***

I got a huge pile of work done, clearing my schedule enough that I could block out time for making phone calls to PIs. Predictably, most of them were away from their desks, so I left a lot of messages.

When my phone rang, it was from an unknown number that didn’t match any of the ones I had left messages at. I hesitated to pick it up, but finally did.

And immediately wished I hadn’t.

“You blocked my phone number!” It was half accusation and half whine, Alan, half drunk, from a new number.

“Of course I did,” I snapped. “We’re through. I don’t want to talk to you. You already took a giant crap in my inbox, I don’t need another in my ear.”

I heard him suck in his breath, but then he said nothing. I guess he was shocked. Our whole relationship, I had never been firm with him. I had been gentle, kind, considerate, and largely soft-spoken. If I got upset, I would weep and plead and struggle to get him to understand.

Not this time. I went on, filling his silence. “You know, I tried very hard to make this work, even though I’m going through the hardest time in my life. My daughter is gone. You cops have completely failed us. I don’t have my baby, and I don’t have justice. And you decided I should just accept all that, be fine with it, and turn into your submissive little fucking homemaker wife instead. Forget my daughter. My little girl, who I miss every day like I’d miss a goddamn limb. You have it in your head that if I just try hard enough, I’ll stop caring about her, forget her, and have your babies instead.”

“Yes!” he finally said. “Yes, that’s what I wanted, because the kid’s dead and you need to accept it. You have to move on, I wanted you to move on with me.”

“You have no proof that she’s dead and not…” bile crept up my throat at just the thought, “…trafficked. There’s been a rash of little girls vanishing in this part of Chicago over the last ten years, no bodies have ever turned up. You dropped the fucking ball on finding my daughter, and then you had the nerve to expect me to forget it. Forget her. You heartless prick.” It was like some deep, primal part of me, stomped down deep inside of me for decades and now enraged, had taken control. My skin was hot. I shook, but not from fear. I wanted to end him.

“Whoa! Jesus, Lissie, it’s not that deep. Kidnapping cases are really hard to clear, and when they do end, it’s usually because we found a body. Nobody has ever found any evidence of that woman who claimed to be your sister. We don’t even have security camera footage of her.”

“Has it ever occurred to you that maybe it’s because she doesn’t exist? The Ivanovs could have lied.” God, the whole case had been like this. Half the time it felt like I had to do the police’s work for them. I didn’t have the power to make them do what was right. I couldn’t force them to be good cops, any more than I could force Alan to be a good boyfriend.

“Neither one has any kind of criminal record. Not even parking tickets. Besides, why would they take the risk? We looked into the owners and found nothing to suggest anything untoward was happening.”

“They’ve lost three children in their care this way, Alan, open your damn eyes!” When I got myself a private investigator, I vowed the first thing I would have them do was investigate the Ivanovs.

“One child—with the other two, one mother admitted she’d collected her, and the other hadn’t actually been to the daycare that morning.” I glared at the phone angrily, he hadn’t told me this.

“Look,” he continued in a soothing tone, “I told you we’d checked out all the leads. The daycare center owners were cleared, but you know how the papers love a good story. You’ve got to let her go, you have to. She’s gone, sweetie. I’m sorry you got upset at what I said, but it doesn’t change the truth. Now, you want me to come over? Patch things up?”

Post-breakup clarity hit me hard suddenly—or maybe the adrenaline had just finished waking me up. I thought about what he had just said, of things he had been saying. The backhandedness of that apology.

“No,” I said firmly. “I can understand your point of view, and maybe I’ll forgive you someday, but we’re done. We’re not even right for each other.” Always striving to be the reasonable one, I chided myself. But my incandescent fury had settled down enough that I remembered to be cautious. The righteousness of my anger didn’t make him any less volatile. “Besides, you left me. I’m just agreeing with you.”

I waited, bracing myself for an explosion. I wanted to just hang up, but I knew that if I did, he would be more likely to bring his tirade to me in person.

“Well, of course I left you,” he snapped after a few seconds. “Because you’re a crazy fucking bitch. You’re frigid and you blame me for it—”

I held the phone away from my ear, exasperated and disgusted. His laundry list of how much he thought I sucked went on and on, trying to pick away at my self-esteem, my self-respect, my boundaries, and my belief in my own memory and sanity. Everything in our relationship had actually been my fault, and I was gaslighting him, not the other way around. Two days ago, I had loved him at least a little, and it had hurt unbelievably that he’d left. Now? Everything he said told me more about him, and the way he saw me, women, himself, and the world. And all of it was heavily tainted with both his big ego and a huge load of bullshit.

Finally, he seemed to wear himself out, and I put the phone back to my ear. “So, what now?” he was asking. “You gonna unload some more garbage on me about how I’m a bad cop because I’m not wasting my time on the job looking for your dead brat? Who the fuck do you think you are? There are way more important people in Chicago than you, sweetheart, and it’s time you figured that out.”

That hit home hard, but it only stoked my anger. “Thanks for saying the quiet part out loud,” I said tightly. “I’m sure if I was rich and famous, you cops would have taken this a lot more seriously.”

He scoffed. “It’s the way of the world, honey, get used to it.”

“Fortunately for me, I now have enough money that I don’t have to,” I snapped before I could stop myself.

That stopped him dead. “What?”

“I’ve come into a windfall.” I went back to my laptop and reopened the donation page so I could look at the number. Not that I planned to give it to him.

My eyes widened. There had been more donations. Nine in all, and every last one was more than I had ever expected. Three thousand dollars here. Fifteen thousand dollars there. The total was rising. It had just passed a total of eighty-five thousand dollars, over six times what I had been asking for.

Alan was saying something, but I didn’t hear it. My heart was pounding too hard in my ears.

I could stop working altogether and do nothing but help in the search for my baby. I could wipe out my student loan debt, cover my rent and still have plenty left for the investigation.

“Are you even listening to me? What fucking windfall?”

“You want to explain how you think my finances are your business?” I snapped back. “The point isn’t how I got it. The point is what I’m doing with it.”

“Okay. So, what are you gonna do with it?”

“I can afford to hire my own investigators now, and that’s what I’m going to do. And when I find my daughter, and I will—”

“Hey, look, I hope you do. And I hope it doesn’t break you too bad when you find her body. I’ll even send flowers to the funeral.” His tone was completely dismissive.

“Well, that’s generous of you,” I replied flatly.

“Look, are we done?” he sounded exaggeratedly bored now.

“You called me, Alan.” Dumbass. “I already said we’re done. Are you done?”

“I’m still deciding.” He sniffed. “Don’t block this number. I’ll just use another one if you do.”

“Oh, that’s not being a goddamn stalker or anything,” I said.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” he said so hastily that I rolled my eyes. “The case—”

“If you actually have an update on my daughter’s kidnapping case, you can contact me. But we’re done, Alan. And if you try, or even just threaten, any more stalker shit, I go straight to your superiors. Don’t fucking test me. I have nothing left to lose.” And thanks to the complete strangers who were now my heroes, I had the power to push back if he tried anything.

“Don’t threaten me, bitch. I’ve got no reason to follow you around like a lost puppy. I already have another date on tap for tonight.”

“Then why are you still bothering me?” I demanded.

“God, you’re a cunt,” he grumbled,sounding like a twelve-year-old edgelord who just got his butt beaten in Call of Duty.

“So, again, why are you still trying to talk to me? Go live your fucking life. Go date women dumb enough to fall for your crap, wife up the dumbest one, have your eight babies or whatever. Just remember to pick someone who has no family, so you don’t ever have to actually empathize when they lose a loved one.”

“Fuck you!”

“No, thanks.”

He hung up.

I flopped back in my chair, letting out a huge sigh. My gut said this wasn’t quite over, but my heart was soaring. I had finally and fully stood up to that son of a bitch. And now, thanks to those strangers, I had the power to get someone competent on my daughter’s trail.

I’m going to find you, sweetheart. You’re coming home. Soon. And there will be a better life waiting for you when you get here.