Redemption Read Free Page B

never have believed Michael would do something like that. I still have trouble believing it. I guess I didn’t know him at all.”
    “Had to be tough.” Jamie sipped on the soda and watched Zink’s reaction wondering if the woman had forgiven herself. Maybe Jamie would learn how to do that someday, too.
    Zink nodded. “But it got even worse. The district attorney asked me to put the final nails in his coffin. Wanted me to get his confession on tape.” Her voice broke. “He was my husband. But I was a police officer. It was my sworn duty.”
    Jamie could imagine the pressure Zink had been under. Stay loyal to her husband, the man she loved, or do the right thing—uphold the law?
    She’d faced the same scenario. Her choice saved thousands of Americans, but not the father of her child. Sabrina would never know her father because of the decisions Jamie had made. And even knowing the outcome, she would do it again. People called her a hero, but if they only knew the sins she’d committed along the way. “So, what did you do?”
    “I told her I had to have some time to think about it. She agreed.”
    Jamie laid her pen on the table. “You know that doesn’t sound right. I can’t believe she would come to you like that. Show you the evidence and then want you to help with a confession. You were his wife. It doesn’t make sense to me.”
    Zink looked up from the fingernail she was picking at. “See, you get that. I was too upset to figure that out. I wasn’t thinking straight. Of course they wouldn’t ask me to entrap my husband nor would they show me the proof. They wouldn’t take the risk that I would tip him off or even ruin the case in court.”
    Jamie nodded.
    “My mind was a jumbled mess or I might have figured it out. They had wiretapped our phones and our house, court-ordered and all legal. She gave me the information in hopes that I would confront him. Then they could get the confession from his own lips and on tape.”
    “Wow. That’s pretty sneaky.”
    “They were only doing their job. He called me at lunch like he always did. I didn’t say anything about the embezzlement, but he must have heard something in my voice that tipped him off. He left work, picked up Andrew at the daycare, and I haven’t heard from him since.”
    “Did they accuse you of telling him?”
    “Turns out the phone at the station recorded our conversation. Then they checked my cell records, computer, and texts. I’d had no contact with him except that one call. So they never blamed me.”
    “He’s never contacted you since then?”
    “Not once.”
    “What about his parents or family? Have they heard from him?”
    “The FBI says no. It’s not common knowledge, but they monitor his parents’ phone calls and mail. They haven’t heard from him either.”
    “The FBI has been known to be wrong.”
    “That may be true, but they’ve worked this case hard because of Andrew, and they haven’t found any reason to think Michael’s parents know where he is. I’ve seen them a few times since it all happened. His mom cries a lot, and his dad doesn’t seem to care one way or the other about it.”
    “Somebody has to know something. People can’t just disappear into thin air without a little help. Any close friends he might confide in?”
    “Even though Michael is from Columbus it might as well have been in another state. He didn’t want to spend time with old high-school friends.”
    “Still, people never cut all their ties. There must be someone he’s close with. Someone who helped him, and someone who could lead us to him.”
    Zink looked up.
    Their gazes met.
    “I hope that’s true, but with the money he stole he could be anyplace in the world with a new identity.”
    “I thought those assets would have been frozen.”
    “Cayman banking laws are not our friend. The money was traced to there, but disappeared after that. Never to be found again—at least, not so far.”
    Jamie nodded. She’d assumed as much.