Safe and Sound Read online

  “Where are Nikki and Isabelle?” Annie asked.

  “Isabelle was on the phone with a client and about to tell him or her to take a long walk off a short pier when we came out here. From what I heard, the client was disgruntled that she wouldn’t drop everything to have a meeting with him. I think she cut him loose, because the last thing I heard was her saying she thought he would be happier with another architect and to stop by, and his deposit would be refunded. I assume she’s in there lurking somewhere so she can overhear Ben,” Alexis said.

  “And Nikki?” Myra queried.

  “Nikki was on hold with Mrs. Lymen’s lawyer, so I would assume by now she is doing the same thing Isabelle is doing, listening,” Alexis said.

  “How long are we going to stand out here?” Kathryn asked.

  “Until Ben gets off the phone,” Alexis shot back. “He needs as much time as he can get with his grandmother. I never saw a kid so happy as Ben when he realized it was his grandmother who was calling him. If he had wings for arms, he would be soaring overhead, that’s how happy he was.”

  “Why don’t we walk around to the front of the house and go in the front door?” Yoko asked as she, too, crossed her arms over her chest to ward off the cold air.

  “Excellent idea,” Myra said, fishing the keys out of her handbag and leading the parade to the front door. The warm air welcomed them, along with all five dogs, who looked mightily perplexed since no one ever used the front door.

  The small group immediately headed down the hall to the door to the dining room, through which room they could enter the kitchen. They clustered in a tight little group, their ears pressed to the door to the powder room, in time to hear Ben say, “Yes, Granny, I know, ‘be still like a mountain and flow like a river.’ Yes, I remember who said it, Lao Tzu. I didn’t forget. When you get back, can we sit in the kitchen and drink hot chocolate with those little marshmallows and talk? Okay, Granny, I know you have to go. I love you just as much. Tell Irene and Rita I miss them, too, and I love them. Hurry home, Granny. I’ll count the hours on my new watch.”

  Nikki, who had finished speaking to Peter Jr., joined the group by the door and was standing next to Isabelle, who had also finished her phone call, felt her eyes burn at the happiness in the little boy’s voice. She could see that Isabelle was in the same place mentally that she was after hearing Ben describe life in the Ryan household, with Natalie calling the shots.

  “I can’t wait to get my hands on that witch,” Nikki hissed.

  “You might have to fight me for that honor, Nikki,” Isabelle hissed in return, joining the others, who had backed away from the door to the powder room in anticipation of Ben’s exiting any moment.

  The door to the powder room burst open, and Ben emerged, whooping and hollering as he ran across the kitchen to where Nikki and Isabelle were standing. The dogs chose that very moment to barrel into the kitchen from the dining room and cluster around Ben, who was telling the sisters, “That was my grandmother on the phone! Did you fire your client, Izzy?”

  “Huh?”

  “I heard you on the phone. You did that so you could stay here with me, right?”

  Isabelle threw her hands in the air. “How could you hear me all the way across the room and still talk to your grandmother?”

  “I can multitask. I’m a genius, remember?” Ben cackled with glee at the look on Isabelle’s face. “So, did you terminate your client?”

  Isabelle sighed. “As a matter of fact, I did. He was a real thorn in my side, so it’s no great loss to the firm.”

  “Okay, kiddo, let’s finish your haircut. You can all gab later,” Alexis said, and she herded Ben toward the powder room off the kitchen. “We’ll just be another twenty minutes or so,” she called over her shoulder.

  “Guess it’s time for coffee then,” Myra said as she reached for the coffee can. “Annie, check with Avery to see if he’s come up with anything in regard to Ben’s biological father. He should have something by now.”

  Maggie took that moment to walk through the door, two bulging shopping bags in her hands. “No, I didn’t buy out the store. I left a few things,” she said, laughing. “They make such cute kids’ clothes these days. I even bought Ben a baseball cap. I hope he likes the Atlanta Braves. It was the only one they had left. And then I spotted a pet store and bought a few things for Hero. Here I am. Boy, I sure could use a good cup of coffee. Oh, I almost forgot, I stopped at Krispy Kreme and bought two dozen donuts. So, ladies, let’s dig in here, because I am starving.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Ben appeared in the doorway and stood still until they noticed him. All the sisters ooohed and aaahed and said how handsome he was. They made room for him at the table. He eyed the donuts Annie had piled on a colorful autumn-leaf-patterned platter. Myra poured Ben a large glass of milk. He dug in and ate just as much as Maggie, to her absolute delight. Between bites of the donuts, she told him what was in the shopping bags and that he needed to go upstairs and try everything on to make sure she had bought the right sizes.

  Ben bounced off the chair like he was spring-loaded. He dragged the shopping bags to the back staircase, with Lady helping by pushing him along.

  “Now, that’s a happy kid!” Alexis said. “It’s like he won the lottery today. He talked for half an hour with his beloved granny, he got new clothes, and he had four donuts. Who could top that? Plus, he is allowing me to donate his hair to one of my pet charities.”

  “That’s all well and good, but we’re still at a standstill. What are we going to do about the Ryans? We need a plan!” Whatever else Annie was about to say stopped when her cell phone chirped. “Avery,” she mouthed. The room went silent. The sisters listened, but Annie was mute and not saying anything. Avery, it appeared, was doing all the talking.

  Ten minutes later, the sisters sighed when they saw Annie smile, say thank you, then end the call. “What?” they chorused as one.

  “He’s faxing us the documents he found about Ben’s biological father. He can’t help us anymore because he was getting ready to board a flight for some, I guess, secret mission on the other side of the Atlantic. I guess ‘you know who’ must have something urgent that he has to attend to. Oh, well. We can’t get upset over his failure to give us additional help because, as he put it, he contracted for this particular mission he’s about to embark on weeks ago. He also volunteered that he had to turn down Charles’s last request for help.”

  “I think we can navigate this on our own. We’ve done it before, so there’s no reason to think we can’t do it again. With Pearl’s help, of course. We might have to put her on the payroll one of these days,” Yoko said.

  “Why?” Kathryn snapped. Everyone in the room knew and understood Kathryn and Pearl’s fraught relationship, despite the fact that the former Supreme Court justice had proven herself an invaluable ally via her underground network used to funnel abused women and children to safety. “If she balks, we simply blackmail her. It won’t come to that, as we all know. When it’s time for the exfil, I’ll call her. No worries there.”

  “I’ll go to the war room and wait for Avery’s fax,” Nikki said. “I assume we’re keeping this on the down low where Ben is concerned, right?” All the sisters nodded.

  Nikki left the room just as Ben bounded down the steps, the dogs yipping and yapping at the speed with which he moved. In the kitchen, he did a whirly twirl, showing off his new jeans and a bright red striped rugby shirt. Perched on top of his curls was the Atlanta Braves baseball cap. He was grinning from ear to ear. “I really like the underwear, Maggie. Who is Ralph Lauren? I’d like to write him a thank-you note for making such comfortable underwear.”

  Isabelle smiled. She reveled at the moment that he was suddenly all little boy and not the Institute’s star genius and a soon-to-be college graduate at the age of eight.

  “Should I go off with the dogs, so you ladies can talk in private? I can take the dogs out for a run. They love it when I throw a stick, and they all chase after it.”<
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  Annie pondered the boy’s question for a moment. “We’re going to try and decide what our next move should be in regard to . . . to your . . . to Connor and Natalie. So, yes, taking the dogs for a nice run would work for us.”

  “Grandma always told me that action without thought is impulsiveness, and thought without action is procrastination. I think that makes sense.”

  Isabelle looked around at the others, who seemed to be having the same thought she was. “Go!” Ben didn’t need to be told twice. He beelined for the door, the dogs crowding him so they could all squeeze through at the same time. The little boy’s rich laughter was contagious.

  “Let’s do the dining-room table,” Myra said.

  “I’ll bring the coffee,” Yoko said.

  “Where is Nikki? What’s taking her so long?” Annie grumbled.

  “Where is your patience today, Annie?” Myra asked. “I would imagine she is making copies of Avery’s report, so we can all follow along at the same time. In the meantime, we need to come up with some kind of plan in regard to the Ryans. Let’s all put our heads together and see what we can come up with.”

  “I think we need to give some serious thought to the possibility that the Ryans will pack up and leave,” Maggie said. “That would mean time is of the essence.”

  “I don’t see that happening,” Annie said. “If everything Ben told us is true, and there is no reason to believe it isn’t, Natalie Ryan is not going to give up all that money as long as she thinks there is some way she can finagle to keep it. Remember, Connor Ryan legally adopted the boy.”

  “That’s right up there with the courts going with the letter of the law. If the biological father claims Ben, that means there will be a lengthy court fight. We’ve all seen stories about children being ripped away from one family to be given to another family. The biological father may claim he didn’t know about Ben. That’s a whole other can of worms. Who is to say if that’s true or not,” Alexis said, the lawyer in her coming out full force. “In the end, DNA will be the deciding factor. But, having said that, I’ve seen and heard of many judges ignoring that little fact and allowing the child to stay with the adoptive parents instead of disrupting his life.”

  “Ben will have a voice this time. That little boy is not your normal eight-year-old. He’s about to become a college graduate. This time, the judge will have to listen and not be swayed by Natalie’s honeyed drivel. We have to find a way to get her cell phone. Ben said she recorded Ryan asking her to participate in his scam. And we have to get those bills Ben said are in Ryan’s desk, the ones that show how much of Ben’s money they spent on themselves. The only way we can do that is to get into the house,” Myra said.

  “Okay, ladies, read it and weep,” Nikki said from the doorway as she slapped down a stack of stapled papers in the middle of the table.

  “Are we going to like this?” Annie asked.

  “Oh, yeah,” Nikki drawled. “Avery earned his money this time around for sure.”

  “Okay, everyone, get your copy, and I’ll read aloud. Not much here, Nikki,” she muttered.

  “Might not be a lot, but it tells us all we want to know. Have at it, Annie.” Nikki smiled as she slipped her reading glasses on.

  Annie perched her own reading glasses on the bridge of her nose, cleared her throat, and started to read.

  “Jonathan Philbran of the Boston Philbrans. That means he is a pureblood. Very wealthy family who made their fortunes back in the days of whalers. Basically fish to all of us.

  “Avery has noted here that their fortune is more than robust. Jonathan’s parents, and even as far back as his grandparents, are what Avery calls ‘do-gooders.’ Jonathan’s parents travel the world preaching the gospel.

  “Jonathan is an only child with what Avery describes as unlimited money in a trust set up for him at his birth. He was born in Boston, attended an ultra-elite academy, went on to Harvard, graduated, then decided he wanted to be a doctor. He is a full medical doctor and considered a general practitioner. He didn’t specialize in any particular part of the body. He’s thirty-seven years old.

  “When he finished medical school, he took off a year to decide if that was really what he wanted to do. His degree from Harvard, by the way, is in astrophysics. A bit of a brainiac himself.

  “Jonathan met Diana Lymen at a political rally. Avery’s source, a close personal friend of Jonathan’s from his days at Harvard, who Avery refused to name in this report, is impeccable.

  “Here’s where it gets interesting. Jonathan never legally changed his last name, but he would introduce himself as Jonathan Holland. He did this so people wouldn’t know he came from money and would accept him for who he was, not for the name he carried.

  “Diana Lymen, as well as her mother, never knew his real last name. Avery indicates that his source told him Diana and Eleanor Lymen did not even know he was a doctor. It seems that after the breakup, Jonathan went to Boston and stayed with Avery’s source to lick his wounds.”

  Annie raised her head and looked around the table at the sisters, who were paying rapt attention. She continued. “Now it gets even dicier. Eleanor Lymen went to see him wherever he was living at the time he and Diana were in a relationship, and told him to get out of her daughter’s life and gave him a check for a million dollars to do just that. According to the source, Jonathan never cashed the check and still has it as proof of her meddling. And it was made out to Jonathan Holland, not Jonathan Philbran. Jonathan has way more money than Eleanor Lymen, but she never knew that when she sent him away.

  “Moving right along here, the source told Avery that Jonathan, because of his medical background, was ready to break off whatever kind of relationship he had with Diana. Jonathan told him that Diana lived in a world of unicorns, pixie dust, and fairies. In other words, she was mentally challenged, something Eleanor absolutely refused to believe.

  “Avery’s source confirmed that Jonathan confided in him that the turning point arrived when he asked Diana to marry him, and she said to him, ‘Who are you again?’ He said she would go in and out like that, as if the two of them were meeting each other for the first time. He said that up to then, Jonathan, like Eleanor, was in serious denial about Diana’s mental health. The source said Jonathan loved Diana, truly loved her. They had a sexual relationship that Jonathan described as fantastic. Jonathan, as far as our source knows, does not know he has a son. He never married or had children of his own. The source said that Jonathan didn’t find out about Diana’s death until six months after it happened. The source didn’t know how he found out, but after he learned about it, he ended up back with the source to recover after another meltdown. Apparently however he learned about Diana’s death, he did not learn that she had a son. And even if he did, there is no particular reason to think he would have cottoned on to the fact that he was the boy’s father.

  “With the source’s help, Jonathan recovered his equilibrium and started this medical unit to make use of his degree. He bought two big yellow buses and a camper. He outfitted them as clinics. He keeps them both stocked with water, medicine, food, blankets, and clothing. He has his own lab in the second bus and a technician. He had a Facebook page, where he had one post saying what he was doing. It went viral, and people were waiting for him to arrive at a location from the route he posted. He’s known as the traveling doctor. He drives around the country to poor and rural areas and ministers to the sick. If he comes across patients whose needs are beyond his capabilities, he makes sure they get what they need, and he pays for everything. When they arrive at a destination, they set up a tent and stay usually three days before they move on. Almost like Doctors Without Borders.”

  “What a wonderful thing for that man to do,” Myra said, tears in her eyes. The sisters sniffed and swiped at their eyes in agreement. “But how did Avery even find out Jonathan’s real name, much less about Harvard University?”

  “Right now, as I read this, Dr. Jonathan Philbran, and he is using his birth name, is
somewhere in Mississippi. Town and county were unknown to Avery’s source. And that’s it, ladies.”

  “Can you just try to picture his face when he finds out he has a son,” Nikki said quietly.

  “For whatever it’s worth, Avery did not tell his source anything and definitely did not mention Ben. Avery told his source that he had a client who wanted to donate some kind of new X-ray machine and needed to know how to reach Jonathan for delivery. We are on the hook for that, my dears, which is immaterial at this point, but we will donate it at the proper time. Avery spoke for us, so we will honor that promise,” Annie said. “But to answer your question, Myra, read the note at the bottom of the report, where he says one of the professors at the Institute went to school with him at Harvard and recognized him when he was in a relationship with Diana. Jonathan swore him to secrecy, and college brothers that they are, he agreed.”

  “I am so happy for that little boy. He’s going to have a real dad now. Well, maybe not right this second, but as soon as we take care of Natalie and Connor, he will,” Isabelle said.

  “So that’s why Eleanor and her friends left, to find Jonathan and for her to make it right for Ben. I wonder how she found out and when she found out about Jonathan’s alias. I have to wonder, if she’d won custody of Ben, would she have ever told that child about his father?” Alexis said.

  “No!” was the explosive response from Isabelle. “I know her; she would have taken that secret to her grave. Like Alexis, I have to wonder how she found out who he was and what he does. In the end, though, we have to give her credit for what she’s doing, which is to make the right decisions for Ben. Ben is all she has left of what was once her family. I also have to wonder how generous Jonathan will be in regard to Ben. The boy does love his grandmother, that’s for sure.”

  “She probably hired a private detective to search him out. There are smart investigators out there other than Avery Snowden, even though he has an extensive staff.” Myra sniffed.