An Offer You Can't Refuse, Sal Bianchi [free ebook reader .TXT] 📗

head no. Instead, it was replaced by a wide-eyed wonder as the sheet of plain paper magically transformed into an airplane before his eyes.

Once I finished it, I sent it soaring across the living room with a flick of my wrist. I almost laughed at the look of unhindered joy that flashed across his features. It was nice to see how something so simple could bring so much happiness to a kid.

“I can teach you how to make one,” I offered. “Then you can show your sister how to make them, too.”

I could practically hear the gears turning in his head as he considered what he should do. After a few moments of thoughtful hesitation, he relented with a nod and turned around to hand his sister to Linda. She smiled warmly as she took the baby from him.

He checked to make sure that Linda had a good grip on her before coming to sit in front of me.

“How do you fold it?” he asked eagerly.

“Well, first, you fold it in half like a hot dog,” I explained as I took two more sheets of paper and went through the motions slowly so that he’d be able to follow along. I waited until he seemed more at ease before I started asking him about the attack. “Josh, do you think you could tell me about what happened last night?”

His hands froze for just a moment at my question before he continued with his airplane.

“I was playing on my tablet,” he replied guiltily, as though he thought he might get in trouble for it. “Nana told me to go to sleep, but I waited until she was gone and started using it again.”

“Nana?” I asked. “Is that what you call the woman who takes care of you?”

“Yeah.” Josh nodded as he fidgeted with the paper in his hands. Flint had said that the senator’s body was found the next morning by the kid’s nanny, and that Josh had been sitting by her when she was found.

“When did you go downstairs?” I asked. I figured it would be best to let him go at his pace in explaining instead of asking him directly what he’d seen.

“I could hear the TV,” he explained. “I was listening so I would know when mommy was coming upstairs so I could close my eyes and pretend to be asleep.”

“Is that right?” I chuckled. “That’s pretty clever of you, Josh.”

He gave me a small smile before he continued to speak.

“I heard something weird,” he frowned. “Like something heavy fell over. It reminded me of--”

He closed his mouth abruptly, and his eyes were hard and fierce. His hands were clenched into tiny fists, and I could see that he’d crushed part of the paper airplane inside his hand.

“It reminded you of what?” I prompted gently. I felt bad, because this was obviously something he didn’t want to talk about, but I had a feeling it was something important.

“Daddy hit mommy,” he mumbled quietly. “He hit her so hard one time that she fell down. After that, we didn’t see him anymore. When I heard that sound, I thought maybe he came back and hit her again.”

I could see Linda on the couch behind him. The expression on her face was filled with grief, and I could tell she was straining not to cry as she listened to Josh speak.

“So what happened after you went downstairs?” I asked. It was killing me to have to continue when Josh was clearly in distress, but whatever he saw could be vital to the case.

“I saw mommy on the floor,” he replied. “She was in the kitchen, and there was a lady looking at her.”

“A lady?” I asked. “Did you see what she looked like?”

“She was pretty,” Josh answered. “She was wearing red lipstick.”

“What about her eyes?” I prompted. “Or maybe her hair? Did you see what color they were?”

“No,” Josh shook his head. “The lights were off, I’m sorry.”

He sniffled, and I realized that he must think that I was disappointed with him for not being able to recall more.

“It’s okay,” I assured him quickly. “You’re being a really big help to me.”

“Really?” he asked me tearfully.

“Of course,” I forced myself to smile at him. Even if I was a little disappointed, it wasn’t his fault. “What happened after that?”

“She got scared,” Josh replied.

“What do you mean?” I asked. “Who was scared?”

“The lady,” Josh clarified. “When she saw me, she started saying bad words and walking back and forth like mommy does when she’s nervous.”

“Is that right?” I asked, not sure how else to respond. This was bizarre. Why was the killer afraid? Was it just because there was a witness?

“She told me to go back to sleep,” Josh continued. “She said that my daddy would be here soon to get me, then she put the alarm on and left.”

“She put the alarm on?” I asked, puzzled by that detail.

“Yeah,” Josh nodded. “Our door has a special password. If you open it without using the password, the alarm will go off, and the police will come. Mommy and Daddy put the password on it so that bad guys wouldn’t come into the house.”

“So Daddy knew the password?” I clarified.

“Yeah,” Josh nodded. “After she left, I stayed with Mommy until Nana came.”

I lapsed into silence as he finished his explanation. The silence in the room was overbearing, and I knew that Jase and Linda must be processing what they’d just heard as well.

“Well, let me see your plane,” I smiled cheerfully, unable to take the suffocating silence for a second longer.

“Look!” he beamed as he held the misshapen and tattered plane out in front of me. As expected, his first attempt was a bit of a mess, but he seemed proud of it, so I pretended to be amazed.

“Let’s see who can throw it the furthest,” I suggested. I made a big show of putting a lot of force behind the throw before letting the plane fall weakly to the ground just