Alex Cross, Run

“I’m fine,” I said. “Are you okay?”

She clearly wasn’t. “I was going to try and get you home first, but—you have to know, Alex. They’re removing Ava from the house. Today.”

“What? Who’s taking her?” I said.

“Child and Family Services. Stephanie called first thing this morning. Given that Ava’s been using lately, and now these drug charges against you—”

I went straight from disbelief to anger. “This is bullshit,” I said. “I’ve barely even been charged, much less convicted.”

But it was just the anger talking. I knew better, and so did Bree.

“They don’t have a choice. They have to err on the side of caution,” she said. “And they’re not waiting, either. Stephanie’s coming at five o’clock to get her.”

In other words, the whole guilty until proven i

“Where’s she going?” I said.

“For now? Into a group home, up in Northeast. They’re moving her in tonight.”

It just got worse and worse. DC’s group homes are a random mix of kids who have nowhere else to go—orphans, thugs, bangers, all of it. Other than actually living on the street, a group home was the last place I’d want Ava to land.

Bree told me we had an eleven o’clock appointment with our family attorney, Juliet Freeman. That was good. We’d already consulted with Juliet on some preliminary adoption issues for Ava, and Bree had gotten her up to speed on the current situation. Now I just wanted to get home so we could turn around and start doing something about this.

The morning traffic was still aggravatingly thick. It took way too long to crawl up Constitution Avenue, past the white dome of the Capitol and into Southeast. By the time we were passing Seward Square, where we’d first found Ava, Bree and I had both fallen into a depressed silence.

Nana wasn’t in any better shape, either. When I came into the house, she was tearing around the kitchen as fast as a ninety-year-old woman can do. She likes to keep busy when she’s upset, and it looked to me like she’d been cooking all morning. I could smell fresh bread baking in the oven.

When she saw me, she stopped, and her arms dropped to her sides. I went over and hugged her tight.

“We were just getting somewhere with her,” Nana said. “Just starting to crack that little shell of hers. And now—”

“Now, we’re going to get Alex some breakfast,” Bree said. “We’re going to meet Juliet at eleven. And we’re going to fight this.”

She’s a cop, all right. She knows how to shake off the stress and take charge of a situation when she has to. That included the eggs she’d already started whisking in a bowl.

“What are you doing?” I said. “Don’t worry about that.”

“You need a decent meal, after the night you just had,” Bree said. “What did they give you this morning, a doughnut? And I’m guessing you didn’t eat that, either.”

“She’s right.” Nana patted my hand. “Go get cleaned up, and come back down here ready to eat.”

“Yeah.” Bree’s whisk was going about a hundred angry miles a minute by now. “And ready to fight,” she said.

CHAPTER

64

“COME IN, COME IN. PLEASE.”

Juliet Freeman isn’t the kind of person you might tag as an attorney if you saw her walking down the street. She’s almost as short as Nana, is fairly big around the middle, and she doesn’t exactly dress to impress when she’s not in court.

Likewise, the inside of her Pe

Juliet doesn’t just know family law—she understands family, and what it takes to keep one together. As far as I’m concerned, she’s impressive in all the right ways.

I got right to it, even as we were sitting down.

“I have three questions,” I told her. “How do we get Ava back? What do we do in the meantime? And how does all of this play with the other charges I have hanging over my head?”

Juliet poured tea from an old ornate samovar on her sideboard as she answered. “In a way, that’s really just one big question,” she said. “But a complicated one. I assume you want me to be blunt.”

“Of course,” Nana Mama said, accepting a cup. “I’m an old lady, Juliet. I don’t have time for a lot of false hopes.”

“Okay, then. The fact that Ava’s been using drugs, combined with these charges against Alex, makes this an uphill battle. And even without that, you still don’t have any superior rights to her, or any foster child.”

“No, but we have a relationship with her,” Nana Mama said. “That has to be worth something, for a girl who has nobody else in the world. Ava’s part of our family now.”

Juliet nodded, but only to acknowledge what Nana said, not to agree with her.

“Legally speaking, she’s not. If they end up placing her with another family, and it sticks, then that’s it. She won’t be coming back to you.”

That news settled heavily over all of us. Bree squeezed my hand in the silence. “What do you suggest?” I asked.

“You need to make it clear to your social worker that whatever drugs Ava has been using, she hasn’t been getting them from you,” Juliet said.

“I’ve been over that with her already,” Bree said.

“She needs to hear it from Ava. If you can make that conversation happen, it’s a good first step.”

I wasn’t so sure. “Couldn’t that be taken as some kind of tacit admission about my own drug use?” I said.

“One thing at a time,” Juliet told me. “First and foremost, address Ava’s situation, and then your own charges. When’s your court date?”

“A week from today.”

She went to her desk and scribbled a note. “See what you can do. In the meantime, I understand you’ve got a restraining order against you?”

“Yes, but I was set up,” I told her. “I can’t prove anything—not yet. I’ll countersue, if I have to. Whatever it takes.”

Juliet leaned forward and caught my eye over the top of her red-framed glasses. “Alex, listen to me. If you’ve ever had a reason to stay above board, this is it. Whatever you do, don’t start bending the rules, or God forbid, breaking the law to expose this guy.” She knew me, maybe a little too well. It was good advice. Still, somewhere in the back of my mind, I was resolved to keeping my options open.

That fact that Ron Guidice had injected me with the same class of drugs Ava had been taking was no coincidence. That much I knew. I had no idea how he’d found out about her—maybe by bribing someone for lab results, or chatting up the cop who had dropped her off at our house that day. In any case, it wasn’t the first time he’d dug up confidential information. Maybe Guidice was more of a reporter than I’d given him credit for.

A reporter, and a vindictive son of a bitch.

Now I just had to prove it. One way or another.

CHAPTER

65

WHEN THE KIDS GOT HOME FROM SCHOOL, WE SAT THEM ALL DOWN FOR THE hardest talk I’ve ever had as a parent. We had to explain to Ava that she needed to pack her things, and we had to explain to all of them why.

I didn’t go into details about the hot water I was in. I just told them that there had been some legal complications, and that we had to get those worked out before Ava could come back to live with us again.

Stephanie held off for as long as she could, but they had to check Ava into the group home by six. When she showed up at five, Ava’s suitcase was next to the door, and our house was quiet as a morgue. We’d all settled into the living room, waiting for the inevitable.