Guarding coltons secrets, p.19
Guarding Colton's Secrets, page 19
It had served Markus well as he reeled her in, preying on that absence every chance he got.
Shaking off thoughts of Markus’s new squeeze, Winston reviewed the files he had on his son. Rick’s address and employment information had been easy to procure, so had his cell phone number. The rest had been harder. His grandson’s preschool was solidly locked down, any information impossible to get at. He hadn’t even bothered trying for hospital records after his granddaughter had been born.
But thanks to a social-media habit, he’d gotten a heck of a lot more once his daughter-in-law, Wendy, had gone full-bore on her posting. Pics of the kids, family pics, even a shot of their SUV in the background of one photo had paid dividends and he’d collected it all.
He quickly flipped through those photos, considering his next steps. It might be worth hacking into his son’s phone records, just to see what the kid was up to.
He could even drive past the house and see if anyone was out playing in the yard in these waning days of warmth.
The odds that his latest problems were tied to Rick were slim. But Winston had believed his computer systems were solid, too, and he’d obviously been wrong.
It was time to turn over every stone and check hard under every rock he could think of.
He was also going to put a trusted minion on Rick for a few days. See what his son was up to and what he’d been doing while Winston dug a bit more through his son’s digital footprint.
And maybe it was time he started convincing Markus that the Ever After Church might have outlived its usefulness.
* * *
Over coffee and a few slices of toast, Sloan reviewed all her files and considered her and Chase’s next move. He hadn’t come back to her apartment the day before and a part of her was relieved.
She was...confused as to how she felt.
Not the attraction part. That was crystal-clear.
But what to do about it? That was an entirely different matter.
A big part of her wanted to throw caution to the wind, take the few precious moments they’d have together and go home to Chicago the better for it.
Yet even as that enticing vision pulled her in, the more practical part of her knew it was a fool’s errand. She wasn’t a love-’em-and-leave-’em type and giving in to her feelings for Chase had disaster written all over it.
Since she’d vacillated between those two options the entire time she’d been investigating the Ever After Church and its leaders, she knew she was in emotional danger.
So she’d taken the time to also get some needed distance from Chase, keeping their communication the day before to text only.
They’d agreed to meet today, go over all she’d discovered and then talk to Rick Kraft.
A big part of her was tempted to simply turn everything over to the feds she’d worked with in the past. But she was equally aware she’d dug into this information illegally and without the protection of a government-issued search warrant.
By choice.
And when Chase had seemed willing to talk to his cousin’s friend, Rick, it felt like the right solution to continuing to pursue the inquiry alone.
They might not find a thing. She hoped they wouldn’t.
Even as she worried she’d ruin the man’s life in the process.
Because whatever else she thought they were sitting on, two things were abundantly clear. The Ever After Church was more of a cult than any sort of real church.
And Winston Kraft was their digital mastermind.
How could they break that to the man’s son?
Oh, sorry, I come bearing bad news?
Do you know what’s been lurking in your family tree?
Talk to your dear old dad lately?
Any way she’d spun it in her mind, nothing felt right. Nor could she erase the subtle sense of dread that even though she and Chase might need to talk to Kraft and share all they’d found, they also risked hurting the man beyond measure.
Nothing in her line of work was worse than a lose-lose situation, but that’s where they found themselves.
She’d also done a bit of hunting on the “church’s” leader, uncomfortable with what she’d found there as well. Markus Acker was Kraft’s apparent partner, but the details were fuzzy and had a quality that made her think whatever information was out there about him online had been tampered with.
It wasn’t impossible to do, but it did take skill. Based on the weird dead ends she kept running into as she tried to look into the man, her experience suggested there was something deliberate in the way Acker’s image had been crafted in the digital world.
One more sign things were not right with this Ever After group.
She’d just finished cleaning up her breakfast dishes when she heard the knock on her front door. Fighting back the sudden excitement that leaped in her chest at the reality that Chase had arrived, she moderated her walk to the door to avoid appearing too eager.
And opened it to find both Chase and his cousin Greg on the other side.
“Oh, hello.”
Greg’s smile was broad and slightly mischievous as he leaned in to press a kiss against her cheek. “Nice to see you again, Sloan.”
Suddenly bemused at the thunderous expression that filled Chase’s face, Sloan put on her brightest smile. “Welcome to my home.”
Both men filed in, and Waffles shot out of the bedroom, making a beeline for Chase to weave around his legs.
“You’ve got a friend there.” Greg pointed to the small feline form currently rubbing fur all over Chase’s dress slacks.
“What can I say, he’s got good taste.”
Greg snorted but avoided saying anything further as Sloan gestured them both toward the kitchen.
“I went to talk to Greg first,” Chase began. “I filled him in on wanting to talk to Rick and share some of our concerns about his father, Winston.”
“Chase said you’ve found some incriminating stuff,” Greg added as the two men gathered around her as she took a seat in front of her computer. “About Rick’s dad. Possibly about my mom, too?”
Sloan recognized the emotional land mines in the question and stepped carefully. “My focus has been on the Ever After Church. I haven’t found much about your mother beyond the fact that she appears to be a member.”
“That’s hardly a surprise.”
Although they hadn’t shared much more than those few minutes of conversation at the barbecue last Friday evening, it was impossible to miss the man’s pain, Sloan thought.
And the very real proof that no matter how far into adulthood Jessie Colton’s children got, they’d always carry the realities of abandonment inside.
Something about that thought both broke her and solidified all the reasons she was doing this.
The flouting of privacy rules.
Even putting her heart at risk for Chase.
The Colton family deserved some sense of closure, as well as answers. And she had the professional skills to help them.
All of which she’d wrap around herself like a cloak to hide the deeper feelings that swirled inside her.
Although the kitchen wasn’t large, something about having both Colton men in the room and hovering behind her suddenly made it feel quite small.
And made her realize just how big both of them were. Chase might have that attractive, broad-shouldered swimmer’s build, but Greg had the tight, strapping build of a man who spent his life working outdoors and that had a distinct appeal, too.
Her feelings might be increasingly directed toward Chase, but since she still had breath in her body, she could admit his cousin cut an attractive figure. All the Colton men did.
One more aspect of Owl Creek to miss when she went home.
“Rick never did have a good relationship with his dad,” Greg stated. “It was difficult when they were young, his father in and out of his life a lot. And then as he got older, he saw through the old man’s veneer of big smiles and flashy talk.”
“What does that mean?” Sloan asked, curious as it matched her opinions even though all she’d done was sift through a large digital footprint.
“Winston Kraft is always after his next mark, trying to run whatever his latest big con is. He’s a huckster.” Greg frowned, his expression narrowing with a thin layer of barely banked fury. “Or he was. Rick doesn’t talk about it much, but I get the sense that things have turned darker.”
“Darker how?” Chase asked. “A flashy salesman is one thing, but what you’re suggesting sounds far worse.”
“It’s just a sense I get. Rick and I are good friends, but something about his dad’s always been off-limits. So I listen on the rare occasions Rick brings him up and leave it alone the rest of the time.”
Greg’s discomfort at the conversation was clear, but there was something else there, just hovering beneath his words, that Sloan couldn’t ignore. “Do you think Rick’s afraid of his father?”
“He’d likely want to punch me if I said that to him, but yeah, I think so. Maybe he never was before, but now that he’s got a wife and kids? I think he sees his father’s life and choices in a whole new light.”
“One that puts his family at risk?” Chase probed.
“Exactly.”
It would be so easy to dismiss Greg’s light-hearted humor and cocky smile as vapid and uncaring, but in that moment, Sloan saw just how much the man cared. About his friend and the things that had shaped Rick’s life. “Are you okay if we go talk to him?”
“I am. I don’t know how happy he’ll be about it, but he should know about your suspicions. More—” Greg shook his head “—he deserves to know.”
“I appreciate it,” Chase said, putting a hand on his cousin’s shoulder. “I really think we need to understand this group and what they’re up to.”
The joviality Greg had walked in with had vanished, replaced with a grim man carrying a heavy weight. “And how my mother’s involved.”
Neither she nor Chase said anything as Greg pulled his phone from his pocket. “Let me go give Rick a call. Let him know you’re heading his way.”
Sloan waited until Greg was in the living room, engaged in conversation with his friend, before speaking. “I wish there was an easier way.”
“I do, too. One that didn’t involve destroying families. Or at least adding a painful reminder into an otherwise ordinary day.”
“It’s not just Rick Kraft,” Sloan said. “Your cousins are facing a hard road here, too.”
“I know.” Chase dropped his head before looking back up at her, a bleakness in his eyes she hadn’t seen since they’d started working together. “I know we need to see this through, but it’s really hard to feel we’re making the right decision.”
Since his comment so closely mirrored her earlier thoughts, she could only agree. “I know.”
“And then I remind myself that the elder generation functioned with secrets and lies, and we need to get every last one of them out in the open.”
“Do you think this Ever After group is going to harm your family?”
Although she should have questioned that before, it was the first time Sloan actually felt a genuine shot of fear.
Was the Colton family at risk?
Was Chase?
“I don’t know what to think, but it’s not a big leap to see the awareness and press my father’s death has received and make a connection with my aunt. She hasn’t exhibited the most rational decision making. Now she’s a part of that group?” The question seemingly hung there as Chase obviously weighed his words. “I think it’s entirely possible she’s at risk simply by being a member.”
“And the family?”
“If we’re not in danger, by extension we’re at least at risk.”
“Of what?”
“Having a very large target on every Colton back.”
Chapter 15
Rick Kraft and his wife, Wendy, sat opposite Chase and Sloan at their kitchen table, a visible sense of nervousness arcing between them. They held hands on top of the scarred oak, an obvious unit as Sloan laid out for them all she’d learned in her digging into the Ever After Church.
“I am sorry to have to share this with you,” Sloan added after walking through each piece of data she’d uncovered. “But we feel you should know and, if you’re willing to talk to us, wanted to see if you can shed any light on the church.”
“First and foremost, don’t call it a church. Ever.” Rick’s tone was low, but it quivered with a barely leashed fury that Chase could practically feel beneath his skin.
Wendy’s hand tightened over her husband’s, clear support and strength in their hold. “Churches aren’t meant to manipulate their people.”
“The Ever After group does that?” Chase asked.
“All that and more,” Rick said. “My father has been hooked up with Markus Acker for years. They’re men of death. To suggest what they do is a church intimates something holy and I can assure you God has no play in any of it.”
“Have you been in contact with your father?”
Sloan was compassionate and while he knew she was as determined as he was to get answers, Chase was again impressed by her deep well of kindness as she spoke with the couple.
Yes, she wanted those answers.
But even more, she obviously wanted to provide as much kindness and support as she could to Rick and Wendy.
It was one more facet of her that both impressed and humbled him, all at the same time. She put others first and she did it so naturally—so intuitively—that it was a part of her.
Although he was obviously shaken by the need for the conversation, Rick had agreed and had answered every question they’d posed to him. He didn’t shirk away from giving a response, even with such a direct question.
“I avoid my father at all costs and have for more than a decade now. He and I never saw eye to eye on anything, and if it were a simple matter of differences, I could find a way past it.”
“But it isn’t?” Chase asked, aware now more than ever before in his life how challenging and potentially tenuous father-and-son relationships could be.
And at the same time, he recognized a strange sort of grace as well.
For the past months, his memories of his father had all become clouded and warped by the realities of Robert Colton’s decisions around his family and his secret life. Yet as awful as it had been, he’d never seen his father as a monster.
A misguided man, yes.
But one he feared? No.
“I don’t want my father anywhere near my life and I most especially don’t want him anywhere near my family.”
“We have two children,” Wendy added. “Justin is four and Jane is fourteen months.”
“How sweet,” Sloan murmured. “Do you have photos?”
It was the right question and Wendy’s obvious pride in her children was evident as she pulled up a photo on her cell phone.
The firm line of Rick’s mouth never softened but Chase could clearly see the pride in his gaze as he stared down at his children.
“Nothing is more important than them. Then Wendy.” Rick shifted, wrapping an arm around his wife’s shoulders. “And I’d like nothing more than to see you put an end to this once and for all. My father and his crony, Markus Acker, have been getting away with this for years. Creating these fake church groups, bilking people for money and doing far worse. They’ve always been able to outrun the law and I have nothing I can definitely pin on them, but I can promise you they’re guilty.”
“Thank you for agreeing to talk to us. We’re committed to seeing this through,” Sloan assured the man.
“Greg was clear on that point, and I know that now. It’s why I agreed to talk to you.”
“We’re going to uncover what they’re doing. I’m not letting this go,” Chase said.
And as the words left his mouth, Chase not only recognized them for truth, but also as something even deeper.
He knew them for the vow they were.
* * *
“Rick’s scared, just like Greg said.”
Sloan spoke as they drove away from the Kraft’s home, their conversation with the couple filling her thoughts. She’d recognized Greg’s frustration for his friend that morning, but even she hadn’t fully prepared herself for the deep anger and terrible fear that Rick Kraft obviously carried about his father.
It sat on his shoulders, as clearly as a physical weight.
“What’s clear is that this has changed for him. At some point it shifted from anger and disgust with his father’s choices to genuine worry for his family,” she added, thinking through all the man had shared with them.
“It must be a terrible weight.”
“The person who should care for you the most is seen as your greatest threat? It’s nearly impossible to fathom.”
She’d seen difficult things throughout her career. The work she took on—and the ways she used her talents—had ensured she was regularly exposed to some of the worst sorts of humans.
But this?
A man who preyed on people, weaponizing their faith? And doing it in a way that scared his own son?
“Are you okay?” Chase asked as they drove the increasingly familiar streets through Owl Creek.
“I wish I could say yes, but no, I’m not. I keep thinking I can’t be surprised by the choices people make, yet once again, I’m shocked at the darkness that lives inside of some.”
“Rick’s father is bad news.”
“Everything about that Ever After group is bad news. I can’t help but think your aunt is in danger.”
Sloan recognized it was quite a departure from her negative thoughts up to now about Chase’s Aunt Jessie. But after all Rick had shared, she had to believe that the woman was in trouble. Jessie Colton might not know it, but how could she possibly be a part of that group and not be at risk?
