Great Exploitations(9)

That was what was on my mind as I sped toward the Meet with Mrs. Tucker, my Client. The address I was heading for was a private residence . . . as in the Tucker’s home private residence. That was a first. I’d never met a Client at their home. It was too personal, for them and for me. They didn’t want me to see pictures of their smiling family any more than I did.

Mrs. Tucker, however, had requested we meet at her home because she didn’t drive. No, Mrs. Tucker wasn’t crippled or temporarily incapacitated or had her license revoked. Mrs. Tucker didn’t drive for a far more tragic reason: she was a victim of domestic violence. At its origin, domestic violence was about asserting control. It might start out as him occasionally checking his girlfriend’s or wife’s call list on her cell phone. Then casually checking turns into routinely, turns into taking away the phone, so on and so forth.

Domestic violence is about control, whether that manifests physically or mentally. That Mrs. Tucker didn’t drive any longer was a ginormous red flag that Mr. Tucker had some serious steel hooks deep into her.

When I stopped in front of 415 Brambleberry Drive, one thing stood out: it was immaculate. The house was only a couple rooms shy of being a mansion. The windows sparkled in the late afternoon sun. The flowers lining the walkway were so perfect they could have been silk, and if there was a speck of dirt out of place in the rest of the landscape, I was about to be elected the president of the local P.T.A.

The place gave off the vibe of being ideal in every way, which meant that was exactly what wasn’t happening on the other side of those glimmering windows. Plus, the eight-foot, wrought-iron fence around the perimeter didn’t exactly give off a friendly, welcoming vibe.

I was about to pull up to the gate and page Mrs. Tucker when a woman in the shadows of the ivy stepped out of her hiding spot. I didn’t need to have seen the photo in her file to know the woman was her. That vacantness in her eyes, paired with the way she moved like a feral cat, screamed that she was a woman who’d seen more fists than open arms in her marriage.

My blood heated.

My passenger-side window was rolled down before she took another step in my direction. “Mrs. Tucker, are we still on for the Meet?” I tried making eye contact with her, but her eyes went nowhere but the sidewalk.

She nodded. “Yes, but just in case my husband shows up earlier than expected, I thought we could meet across the street at the park. You know . . . if that’s all right with you, of course.”

I smiled sadly. Like her home, Mrs. Tucker was immaculate. There wasn’t a wrinkle in her linen pant suit, nor a hair out of place on her head. She was beautiful in an understated, unaware kind of way, and her few touches of makeup couldn’t hide the grapefruit-sized bruise mottling her cheek. “Of course it’s all right.” And probably a good idea.

While I wasn’t worried about what would happen to me if Mr. Tucker arrived home early to find a strange woman in the house, I was concerned for what might happen to Mrs. Tucker. The job was a balance of every shade of discreet, for every kind of reason imaginable.

“Do you want to hop in and I’ll drive you over?” I asked. The park was literally across the road, but it felt odd to just drive off and leave the woman alone.

“No, I’ll walk. Just in case any of my neighbors are watching.” As if being reminded of them, she scanned the block. “I’ll meet you at the bench in front of the duck pond.” Without another word, Mrs. Tucker gave one more frantic scan of the block before hustling across the street and disappearing into the park.

I sighed before easing the car into a parking spot. That Errand would be tough—not because of the Target, but because of the Client. Whether I saw a sliver of myself in Mrs. Tucker or she’d already found my heartstrings and started tugging, or whether I was just one woman standing up for another woman who’d forgotten how to hold her shoulders high long ago, let alone her head . . . the Errand was already too personal. And I had yet to make it through the Meet.

Despite whatever I was feeling, I couldn’t lose sight of one thing: I had to wrap the Errand up within the week. It was either wrap it up in a week and get back to California or I’d have to abandon it. I didn’t need G screaming through the phone at me that we wouldn’t allow a Seven to get in the way of our coveted Ten.

I wouldn’t abandon the Errand for my own pride, and I sure wouldn’t do that to Mrs. Tucker. It didn’t take an expert to assess that she was at the end of her rope.

After parking, I grabbed my briefcase and followed the path that I hoped would lead to the duck pond. I hadn’t thought to ask just how far in the pond was—given Mrs. Tucker’s paranoia, it could have been a state away—but once I crested the first hill, I saw it. The park wasn’t large, and it was surprisingly quiet for a mild day. I suppose when every house surrounding the park had its own park-like landscape, it wasn’t anything special.