Through the Darkness, Chapter Nine

CHAPTER 9

August, 2013

In a continual attempt to avoid Dorian, Blair decided to take the boys out for breakfast.  She roused them out of bed and made sure they were dressed.  When they all came down the stairs, Blair opened the door to find Bo Buchanan about to knock.  “Morning, Blair,” he said with a tired voice.  “I need to have a talk with Jack…down at the station.”

“Is Jack in trouble again?” Sam asked.

Jack looked to his mother with wide eyes.  “It’s okay Sam,” he said.

“What is going on?” Dorian asked as she saw the group at the door.

“Nothing, Dorian.  Can you see that Sam has his breakfast?”  Blair asked.  Sam headed into the kitchen and Dorian followed but not before giving her niece a look.

A little while later, Blair and Jack were sitting across from Bo in his office.  “So, Jack, can you tell me your interest in my brother?”

Jack shrugged his shoulders.  “He’s my cousins’ father and I know how upset Aunt Viki is about him.”

“Because, after you left yesterday, Matthew and Natalie told me it was you who mentioned the discrepancies in their memories from the night of the dinner, about what happened at the hospital.”

Again, Jack shrugged.  Blair, doing her best dumb act, asked Bo, “What’s this have to do with my son?”

“Well, we did go take a look at the security feed from the hospital from that night.  I had the tech guys run all kind of traces on it and guess what they found?”  When Jack didn’t answer, Bo provided one.  “They found a line that hacked into their system.  And guess whose IP address that line was connected to?  Yours.”

Internally, Jack winced, but he tried to maintain a neutral expression in front of the police commissioner.  It was Blair who feigned shock.  “Jack?  Why would he want to break into the hospital’s security network?”

“I don’t know.  Why don’t you tell us, Jack?” Bo asked again.

Jack knew he was at a critical juncture.  He could try and lie his way out of this, but that could lead to bigger trouble.  He hated to admit it, but maybe coming clean would be best.  Taking a deep breath, he said, “In the words of my Aunt Dorian, honesty is the best policy.  Yes, I hacked the hospital.”

Blair’s shocked expression melted away into genuine shock.  It was the first time she’d heard a Manning man admit to a crime to the police.  She looked to Bo and noticed he had a similar look.

“Okay, Jack, can you tell me why you did it?  If you had concerns, you should have come to me and I could investigate it,” Bo told him.

“And you would have believed me?  Come on, when was the last time you believed anything coming from my family?” Jack asked, perturbed.  “Shall we go through the list, or just cut to the last person who had a crime committed on them that you didn’t believe?  My father was nearly strangled and you thought he set it up.  What was it Natalie said last night, Manning two, Buchanan zero?”

Blair beamed with pride, not just on Bo getting called out, but by the fact that Jack referred to Todd as his father. 

For his part, Bo looked contrite.  “Well, you got me there,” he admitted.  “Alright, start from the beginning.  Why did you go looking into the security videos?”

“Wait a second, Jack,” Blair interrupted.  “Are there going to be any charges brought against my son?  He has fifth amendment rights.”

“If it’s a plausible reason, than no, no charges will be filed.”  Bo fixed Jack with a hard expression.

Jack took a deep breath and explained how he’d had conversations with Matthew and Natalie and how their stories hadn’t matched up.  He did a little digging and figured his way into the security feeds.  That gave him the proof he needed.  “Then, it wasn’t very difficult to get them talking once they were together.  When Natalie remembered she didn’t remember anything after being taken down to see her dad, we all came to you.”

“Why even go look into this?” Bo asked, slightly baffled.  He’d never known Jack Manning to be very close to his cousins. 

“Todd…my dad, when he left, he was a little worried.  He thinks Dani’s OD wasn’t an accident and someone took a shot at my mother.  He’s a little paranoid and, I guess, it’s affecting me.”

Bo heaved another sigh.  “Well, about Dani…he was right.  I looked at the pills Matthew grabbed off her, on a tip from Todd and they were four times stronger than the normal dose.  And, on top of that, the woman who sold them to her was found dead in her room at the Palace.  Todd, it seems, has a right to be paranoid.”

Jack flashed a look to Blair but she subtly shook her head.  “Is there anything else you need from Jack?”

“Yes, I want to see your computer, Jack, to check those links into the network,” Bo said.  

Blair answered for him.  “I’ll see that he brings it here this afternoon.”  Blair turned to the door but as she moved to open it, Tea burst in.  “Bo, I want to report a kidnapping!”

“Hold on, Tea, who’s been kidnapped?”

“It’s Daniella.  I haven’t heard from her since the night of the dinner.  I know she let with that man, that Arturo Bandini.  You have to find her, Bo!” Tea yelled.

“Tea, are you sure she’s been kidnapped?” Blair asked, her voice cautious. 

Tea turned and at last realized that Blair and Jack were standing there.  “I know she’s with him.  Matthew says she hasn’t been back to the apartment since that night.”  Tea was nearly hyperventilating by now.  “He’s probably hooked her back on drugs!”

“Okay, slow down, Tea,” Bo repeated, trying to rein the other woman in.  “Look, Blair, take Jack home and bring back that computer.”

Blair nodded and the two left.  Since they hadn’t had anything to eat, they stopped at the coffee shop, where they were surprised to see Dani with the man Tea had accused of kidnapping her.  They went over to the table.  “Dani, your mother is worried about you.  She says she hasn’t spoken to you in days, that you haven’t been home for a while,” Blair chastised the young woman.  “She’s at the LPD right now filing a missing person’s report.”

Dani looked up, her eyes widening and the rolling into the back of her head.  “She really thinks I’ve been kidnapped?” she said.  “She’s going off the wall!”  Then she turned to her friend.  “Look, I’m going to apologize in advance if you get into trouble.  She can’t handle me having someone in my life while Victor’s gone.”

“No worries, bella,” Arturo said.  “I am sorry, where are my manners?  I am Arturo Bandini, a, ah, friend of Daniella’s.”

Blair didn’t pay much mind to Arturo other than shake his hand.  Her attention was completely on Dani.  “Well Dani, I don’t blame her.  In her situation, I’d be worried sick myself.  I think you better call her or at least Bo and clear this up,” Blair retorted, again, surprised by her tone.

“Dani, look, I have to go back down to the police station.  Why don’t I take you there,” Jack said as he observed the interactions.

“No Jack, I’ll just call Bo,” Dani replied.

Jack grabbed her by the arm.  “I think it would be better,” he insisted, “if you come with me.”  Dani yelped in protest but at last acquiesced.  “Mom, I’ll drop you off at The Sun first.  Then I’ll head home and bring the laptop and my sister to the station.”  He put the emphasis on the last part, to gauge the reaction of the other man.

As they left, Dani assured Arturo that she’d call when she got done.  Jack looked back and didn’t like the look on the man’s face.  Something about him just didn’t sit well with Jack at all.

Blair was dropped off at the Manning Building and Jack pointed the car in the direction of La Boulaie.  After a few minutes of silence, Jack began.  “Your mother was really upset.  She was practically having a panic attack.”

“Well, she tends to do that when she can’t handle things,” Dani replied as she stared out the window.

“Okay, let’s not look at this from her perspective.  Let’s think about how Dad and Victor would react to it.  Arturo’s, what, in his early to mid-forties?” Jack guess.

“‘Dad and Victor’?  When did you start to refer to Todd as Dad?” Dani asked snidely.

“When did you start to refer to Dad as Victor?” Jack retorted.  “Putting that aside, let’s think for a minute.  You’re seeing a guy who’s their age.  How do you think they’ll react to that?”

“If they ever come back,” Dani commented.

“Let’s face it, we’ll never be rid of them,” Jack said.  “Seriously, if they find out, what Victor did to Cole with pale in comparison to what he’ll do to Arturo.  And he’ll have help from Todd.”  By then, Jack had pulled up in the driveway at home.  He sprinted into the house, grabbed the computer and got back to the car.  They arrived at the police station, where Tea nearly tackled Dani when she saw her.  Dani went limp while Tea was in tears. 

Dani disentangled herself from her mother and turned to Bo.  “You can drop any kidnapping charges my mother wanted you to bring.  Yes, I’ve been with Arturo but he didn’t kidnap me.”  She threw her mother a cold stare.

Tea’s face grew red, probably from embarrassment, probably from anger as she began yelling at Dani in two languages.  Bo tried to calm them down but they mercifully walked out together, still in the throes of the argument.

Bo just shook his head and turned to Jack.  “That the computer?”

Jack nodded and handed it over reluctantly.  Bo gave it to a detective and led Jack into his office to wait.  Pouring him a cup of coffee, Bo began, “You seem to have opened up to Todd.  Not long ago, you thought he was faking being nearly strangled.  What changed?”

Jack may have actually been honest with Bo on any criminal acts but there was no way he’d be honest about anything else.  He shrugged his shoulders.  “I don’t know.  I guess it’s just my mom getting to me.”

“Your mom?” Bo asked, almost friendly.

“I had a confrontation with him and she was coming in on it getting dressed.”  He stuck out his tongue trying to say without words what he’d caught the end of.  “I was furious and let loose on them.  But she sat me down later and told me he was her soulmate.  Not that I believe that crap, but then, I saw her crying over him gone and, I guess it started to get to me.”

“Well, Todd and Blair have been through a lot, that I can tell you,” Bo began as there was a knock on the door.  “Commissioner?” the detective asked, as he signaled to Bo.  Bo got up and stepped outside.  After a few minutes, Bo and the detective came in.  “Okay, we found and disconnected the link you set up to the hospital.  You have any suspicions, come to me.  Don’t take after Todd and think you can solve them on your own.  It never works out well.”

“Yes, Commissioner,” Jack replied.

“Also, my detective here found some pretty sophisticated connections to an unknown line.  Now, your hacking of the hospital network was pretty good, but nowhere near as complex as this is.  And, it was set up on the other end.  Care to tell me who it is who you’ve been chatting with and why?”

Jack tried not to show his panic, but he felt himself getting rattled.  He didn’t know what to say and, more importantly, what to reveal.