Chapter 1: Susan

The huge, old house was a Victorian monstrosity - but it was home.

Only a month after my divorce, my parents had been killed in one of those stupid, freaky things that shouldn't happen, but do. They'd been crossing the highway, at a light, in the crosswalk, when the air failed on a semi, which proceeded to flatten them both. The driver was a nice guy and wasn't sleepy or using any controlled substances. His equipment had failed. He was as sorry as I was.

Since I was the only family they had, I inherited the house, some insurance policies and dad's business.

My suburban ranch house had a big mortgage on it and Susan wanted cash anyway, so I sold it, gave Susan half the proceeds and moved the kids to 'grandpa's house'. The three of us rattled around in the place. We loved it.

My folks had moved there when I was about eight. It was always the place we called 'home'. Mom and dad never even thought about moving again. Dad did extensive work on the place, modernizing it. After he retired, he'd really fixed it up. It retained all its ugly, Victorian charm, but had good insulation, top quality thermal windows, excellent plumbing and the best central heating he could fit into it. In spite of its size and strange shapes, it cost less to heat than my conventional ranch house. He even installed a sauna in the basement and a big hot tub on a deck he'd built off the master bedroom.

It was on a hillside, just north of Portland, Oregon, with a great view over farms, river, port, and mountains in the distance. (Twenty-some years ago, when Mt. St. Helens erupted, we sat in the parlor and watched the awesome spectacle in comfort.)

After 18 years of—I'd thought—a mostly contented marriage, Susan decided she could do better and announced one evening, to my complete shock and deep hurt, that she was moving out. She'd decide if she wanted a divorce and her lawyer would let me know.

She didn't take the twins with her—and I'd have fought her if she'd tried.

When I recovered from my shock and talked it over with the twins, Sara and Sam, I decided, 'Why wait?' So I filed for divorce and custody. Susan, surprisingly, fought it. She wanted me to continue to support her, while she lived on her own, 'doing her own thing.' We had a nasty and expensive court battle, which I eventually won. Susan ended up with her car, clothes, all the cash we had at the time and half the equity in the house. I got what I wanted—freedom and my children.

So when I inherited dad's house, there wasn't much discussion. We decided, without dissent, to move.

Settled in, I looked into dad's business. He'd hired a competent General Manager when he decided to retire, but he'd retained control and had made the strategic decisions. The manager was OK for routine stuff, but to make the business grow to its potential, I knew I could do a lot better. Quitting my job, I worked out an arrangement where the GM continued pretty much like he had with dad, except I took a more active role and explored ways to expand and improve.

After two years, the business was doing better than ever. The twins would soon finish their sophomore year in high school and were starting to think about college and leaving the nest. We'd established a routine that worked for us and were a happy family.

Then Susan struck.

Somehow, in her warped way, she decided I hadn't 'shared' properly with her and she should have a portion of dad's business too. The fact that I didn't have any of it, myself, until after we were divorced didn't make any difference.

She felt the best way to get what she wanted was through the kids. Her family—especially her mother, who had gone through at least four different husbands—encouraged her in this, with constant references to how much better I was living than she was and how 'little Sara' really needed her mother's influence and guidance during these 'crucial years' of her life.

That attitude amazed me.

Susan never paid much attention to the kids; especially Sara, whom we'd adopted when her mother, a very close friend, had died soon after Sara's first birthday. We called the kids 'the twins' because their birthdays are only a day apart, because they look an awful lot alike, and most of all because they are always together. We'd raised them as brother and sister. Sara is the daughter of my heart, if not my body.

When I went to Vancouver, where Susan was living, to pick up the kids after a visit, I found the twins weren't there. But a process server slapped me with a summons to 'show cause' why their mother shouldn't have custody and why I shouldn't pay $1250 per week in child support. I was not told where they were, or when I'd see them again.

First thing in the morning, I called my lawyer, who shared my indignation and got a kidnapping complaint issued. He went into court to successfully squash the motion my wife had filed, using the kidnapping as the primary reason. I was custodial parent, after all. I suppose she thought that by suing in a Washington court, she could overturn the Oregon decree.

Tuesday's mail brought a really bizarre letter. Susan wrote that, unless I turned over half of dad's business to her—like she 'deserved'—it would be a cold day in hell before I'd see the twins again, no matter what some court said.

With her letter as evidence, we went to the U.S. Attorney, and asked that Susan be arrested for kidnapping, and that she be held until she told us where the twins were, and helped us arrange their safe return home. The F.B.I. arrested Susan that day.

Susan wasn't prepared to spend time in jail. Nor was she prepared for the additional jail time and fines the judge levied on her when she refused to tell us where the children were. The judge was coldly contemptuous. "Mrs. Jenkins, this is one of the most callous uses of one's own children I've seen in 30 years on the bench. It's not even as if you were afraid for their safety—like protecting them from an abusive father. Rather, this is extortion, pure and simple. You have no legal claim against your former husband's business, so you are trying to extort it from him using your own children as the lever to do so.

"I don't know, Mrs. Jenkins, just how many years you are prepared to spend in the federal penitentiary on the kidnapping charge. You'd better hope the children are returned safely. Because if they are not, you also face state criminal charges for anything that happens to them—including assault, rape, or even murder, should they be harmed. Are you now prepared to tell us where your children are?" Susan was not. "Very well. Thirty days for contempt. This will be extended if the children are not returned before the sentence expires. Bailiff, take this... person ... out of my court. She turns my stomach! And counselor, before you ask, there will be no discussion of bail until the children are safely returned to their father!"