Джеффри Дивер - Captivated

“Then I asked some friends from the Commons to invite you to come talk to us.”

Shaw frowned. “They’re artists ?”

The young men who had grabbed him were huge, with grips so tight that Shaw didn’t bother to resist, worried about dislocating an arm.

“Sculptors,” Jason Barnes said, by way of explanation.

Ah. Of course. “And my tire?”

“I’m sorry, Colter.” They were on a first-name basis now. “We didn’t want you flying out of town without us having a conversation.”

The twin Michelangelos were gone, since Fontaine’s initial concern was dispelled: that Shaw was a thug hired by Ron Matthews to beat her bloody or even kill her. Shaw had explained about the reward and she’d researched it — and Shaw himself. She’d concluded all was legit.

He now explained his decision to set up a meeting in public, to avoid any altercations.

“No! You can’t say a word!” Fontaine said, eyes widening. “You can’t let him know I’m even in the state.”

“The man is a sociopath,” Barnes said.

Fontaine continued. “He seems normal on the surface. But he’s a sadist.”

Barnes asked, “Did he try his tricks with you? Did he cry? Did he say he’d never hurt her? Did he tell you how he was going to change?”

Yes, yes and yes.

Barnes was handsome, with long dark hair and a faint accent. His complexion too suggested Latino heritage, despite the Irish-inflected name. His age was around thirty-five, Shaw estimated, but he could pass for younger. Five-nine or — ten, with a slim build. His pleated black slacks and shirt of rich gray were stylish: SoHo or Michigan Avenue, not the J. C. Penney’s couture otherwise evident at Java Joe’s.

A lover of means...

Shaw sipped his coffee and then cupped the mug. “I ran a background check on Ron. Nothing turned up. No convictions or arrests.” He looked Evelyn Fontaine over closely. “What you’re telling me now, you could be saying it just because you don’t want the hassle of being confronted by a man you left for someone else.”

“What?” Her smooth brow tightened with confusion. But only momentarily. “Oh, no, Colter, we’re not together.”

“Somebody told me he’s your boyfriend.”

Barnes laughed. “Oh, Jesus, we’re just friends... I’m gay... She needed help escaping from him. I’m a huge fan of her work. I wanted to help.”

“I left Ron to save my life,” Fontaine said. “Not for another man.” She rested her hands on the black-laminated table between them. While every other physical aspect of the artist was smooth and elegant, her fingers were blunt, her nails clipped short to the quick, the skin stained with paint. “I don’t know how many times I almost called the police. But I couldn’t. He said if I did, if I told anyone , he’d break my fingers.” She closed her eyes briefly. “My painting hand.” In a whisper: “Once, he even said he’d blind me.”

Fontaine fled for her own safety because Matthews was a closet domestic abuser: ten percent .

The percentage strategy often requires real-time readjustment.

Shaw said, “He’s a convincing liar.”

A bitter laugh from her. “No one knows that better than me. But that’s how sociopaths are. They believe in their own delusions.”

Shaw asked, “Divorce?”

She answered in a determined voice. “As soon as humanly possible. I’m talking to a lawyer but I have to be careful. I’ll need someplace to live that’s safe before I file. Next time” — she cocked an eyebrow — “I don’t want anybody finding me.”

Evelyn Fontaine now placed her hand on Shaw’s forearm and closed her trembling fingers around it. “Don’t tell him you found me. Please, you have to help me.”

Shaw thought of Matthews’s parting prayer:

Please. Help me, if you can...

Barnes said, “The reward he’s offered — ten thousand? — we’ll pay you that. Plus, a thousand extra.”

“No,” Shaw said. “If I walk away, I’ll walk because I choose to.”

She gave a wan smile. “Just our luck to find a bounty hunter with a conscience.”

“I won’t say anything to him until I check out what you told me.”

“I’ve got proof. I took selfies of my black eyes and cut lips. And he whipped me once with a lamp cord. And medical reports.” Her hand hadn’t left his arm, and now more pressure was applied. “Come back to the retreat, Colter, I’ll show you. It’s all on my computer... And I’ll give you a tour. You ever been to an artists’ retreat?”

“No.”

She smiled again. “It’s a magical place, really. You into art?”

“Only Abstract Expressionism,” Shaw said.

She slipped a glance his way, one of broad disbelief.

“I live for it,” he said.

Her visage morphed into a smile. “Don’t have a clue, do you?”

Ten minutes later they were in Fontaine’s Jeep Cherokee. She was behind the wheel.

It was just the two of them; Jason Barnes had agreed to remain behind and find the two sculptor thugs; together they’d changes the rental car’s tire.

Shaw was watching the scenery move from urban to burb to rural. This happened quickly.

Fontaine asked, “You must have some interest in art? What’s hanging on the walls of your house? Prints from Pottery Barn? A street fair watercolor?” A glance toward him. “Maybe your kids’ finger paintings?”

He gave no response to the last question, which he assessed to be about something other than art, and said, “Maps, mostly nineteenth-century and earlier. I collect them.”

They passed an idyllic scene: a farmhouse surrounded by six-foot-high stalks of Jubilee sweet corn. The image might have been right out of the nineteenth century, if not for the satellite dish and the Prius.

Fontaine mused, “You know, there’s a place in town where you can make your own pizza. I mean, you really make it, not just order it the way you want it. There’s a big oven and you have the spatula. You want, they give you a chef’s hat. A bunch of us from the retreat went there the other day... Pizza and beer. You like pizza?”

“Who doesn’t?”

“We’re artists, Colter. You’d think we’d sit around eating charcuterie and crusty bread and drinking absinthe. But don’t we bleed like everyone else?”

Then the smile vanished and her hand went to her eyes, wiping moisture. “Goddammit... I loved him. I did. He was so different in the beginning. Then the bad stuff poked through. And I told myself it was just a fluke — he was upset about work, he’d had a fight with a creditor — but the only fluke was him being nice. Didn’t take long to find his real nature.”

She sniffed, wiped her nose with her sleeve.

They drove in silence for about ten minutes or so. Route 83 hardly lived up to the designation “route.” It was an uneven road, the asphalt more cracked and potholed than not, with no shoulder to speak of.

Her eyes swung his way briefly. “How’d you find me?”

“Legwork. I put together a list of people who knew you. David Goodwin was on it.”

“Oh, Dave, sure.” She scoffed. “Me and my big mouth. I told him I had some retreats planned. That was my mistake... So, you just go out and find rewards and get them?”

“Or don’t get them. But, yes, that’s the program in theory.”

“You’re kind of the cowboy, aren’t you? You know Frederic Remington?”

On living room wall of the cabin Shaw’s father had mounted a print of Remington’s arresting painting Friends or Foes? (The Scout) . The canvas depicted a lone Blackfoot on horseback peering through a cold winter evening at a distant settlement. It was one of Shaw’s favorite paintings. He told Fontaine only that he was aware of the artist. After a moment: “Good of Jason to help you out.”