CHAPTER 12: WHAT MARTIN DELIVERED

Martin was waiting in an interview room when I arrived.
Ortiz sat beside another officer, and a recorded interview had already begun.
Martin looked smaller beneath the fluorescent lights.
He admitted that he had placed an envelope in my mailbox.
He said Patricia had asked him to do it after receiving a call from someone claiming to represent Laurel.
“Why didn’t she deliver it herself?” Ortiz asked.
“She was afraid Daniel would refuse to take it.”
“What was inside?”
Martin swallowed.
“A demand.”
He explained that the envelope instructed me to contact Claire and persuade Laurel to speak with Patricia.


If I refused, Patricia intended to give a local blogger sensitive information about Owen’s childhood.
“You helped her threaten people?” I asked.
Martin shook his head.
“I thought it was a plea for family contact.”
Ortiz slid a copy of the note toward him.
He had provided it earlier.
The language was unmistakably coercive.
It named Sophie and her elementary school, and it gave me seventy-two hours to arrange a conversation.
“That isn’t a plea,” Ortiz said.
Martin stared at the paper.
“She told me the school was only there so Laurel would understand she was serious.”
“That makes it worse,

” I said.
He covered his face.
The envelope Patricia had tried to retrieve contained proof of the threat she had made.
She had panicked after Martin told her I could involve the police.
“Why send it at all?” Ortiz asked.
Martin admitted he had refused to hand-deliver the note after realizing how dangerous it sounded.
Instead, Patricia insisted he put it in my mailbox before dawn.
They argued afterward.
When Martin threatened to retrieve it and destroy it, Patricia told him she would take care of it herself.
She arrived with a hammer because the mailbox door had jammed, and she feared I would wake before she could remove the letter.


“She destroyed my mailbox over a letter she wrote,” I said.
Martin lowered his eyes.
“She never thought you’d call the police.”
Ortiz leaned forward.
“Where is the original envelope now?”
Martin looked at me with visible dread.
“Patricia has it,” he whispered.
“And she has already called the blogger.”