Because of a Girl

by Janice Kay Johnson

  “I should have remembered that. It was one of the things she did after school.”

  “That’s what I hear. I got the name of the kid she was tutoring and plan to talk to him.” He pushed the button on his remote, making the SUV lights flash. “Did you ever talk about what she did after school?”

  Naturally, she felt defensive, but she made herself say honestly, “Yes, but she always made it sound logical. She was going to some friend’s house or watching basketball practice or tutoring. Emily has activities after school half the time, too. She...led me to think the two of them were involved in some of them together.” That was hard to say. “I suspected Sabra felt uncomfortable being here without Emily. I wanted her to feel as if it’s home, but...”

  He nodded, his expression understanding rather than judgmental. “That makes sense.”

  “Is there anyone else left you have to talk to?” she asked.

  Creases formed on his forehead. “I’m running out of ideas,” he admitted. “And justification for pursuing this.”

  “What?” With a stab of alarm, she said, “You won’t quit looking, will you? She’s been gone a week!”

  He rolled his shoulders, as if to ease tension, but didn’t let himself look away. “I won’t quit, but I can’t give this the hours I have been, either. My lieutenant thinks it’s likeliest that Sabra ran away, and I don’t have any evidence to prove he’s wrong. Kids her age do take off all too frequently. With her feeling abandoned by her mother and maybe the father of the baby...” He spread his hands.

  Her vision blurring, Meg whispered, “But it’s so hard to make it on your own. Pregnant, and then with a baby... Doesn’t she understand that? It was safe here. It was!”

  “I know, Meg.” He squeezed her upper arms. “I know, honey.”

  I’m crying, she thought in astonishment. She didn’t cry. Ever. But she had to be, because she could see his expression of helplessness.

  “I’m sorry.” She tried to back away. “It’s okay. You can go.” But she tasted the salty tears because she’d opened her mouth, and still they fell.

  He muttered something she couldn’t make out, and then his arms closed around her and she was sobbing into his white shirt. She gripped the fabric and held on for dear life as she fell apart. One of his big hands moved in soothing circles on her back, and he rubbed his cheek against her head.

  “I know you’re scared,” he murmured. “It’s okay. Let yourself cry. We’ll find her. I won’t give up. I promise I won’t.”

  The storm slowly passed. Meg let the peaceful aftermath settle into her heart. She wasn’t sure she could stand on her own, so she gave herself permission to lean, but only for a minute. No longer, because she was becoming aware of how firm his chest was beneath her cheek, of the strength of his arms and the thighs that pressed against her own. When she thought, He smells good, embarrassment came to her rescue. Alarm followed on its heels. Sniffing, she backed away. “I need to—” She gestured at her face, then fled, taking with her the memory of the worry and dismay darkening his eyes.

  Not until she was in her own bathroom, staring at her blotchy face, did she remember him calling her honey in that deep, soothing voice.

  * * *

  JACK SPENT FRIDAY morning conducting interviews at a local nonprofit that focused on low-income housing and emergency shelter. An audit had revealed missing money: more than $30,000 this year alone.

  He’d silenced his phone twice without looking to see who the callers were. Not until he was alone behind the wheel of his SUV did he go to voice mail. The first message was from his mother; he deleted it without listening. It was Emily Harper’s youthful voice he heard next. After yesterday afternoon’s scene, she was the absolute last person he’d have expected to call him.

  “Um... I know I didn’t want to talk to you yesterday, and you’ll probably tell me this isn’t any of my business, but you’re wrong. I care more about what happened to Sabra than anyone else does. You probably just think she ran away.”

  His eyebrows twitched at that. She thought he’d waste the kind of hours he’d put in on this if he really believed her friend had taken off on her own?

  “The thing is,” Emily continued, sounding as if she’d taken a big breath for courage, “I heard Ms. Guzman told you she’d seen Sabra with Asher out front of school that morning. Supposedly, somebody heard you and Ms. Guzman talking. But I asked him, and he said he wasn’t there and he doesn’t know why she’d claim he was.” Pause. Her voice became more timid. “So, um, is it true? That she saw him?”

  Dead air told him she was gone. She hadn’t called back. He glanced at his watch. She’d had an earlier lunch. Both lunch periods at the high school finished well before noon, logical since the first bell rang so obscenely early. She presumably had her ringer off in class.

  Leave her a message, or text?

  He decided on texting.

  Ms. Guzman did NOT tell me she saw Sabra. I’ll verify. Who said they heard this?

  Jack hadn’t gotten two blocks when his phone buzzed. He pulled to the curb and read Emily’s response.

  Some girl said she heard. I can ask her who told her.

  Crap, he thought. The last thing he wanted was a fifteen-year-old kid putting herself out there by investigating. He had no solid reason to think she’d be in danger if word got around that she was asking questions, but he was paranoid enough to be made uneasy by the idea.

  Okay, high school, he decided.

  With the halls mostly empty, he went straight to the art teacher’s classroom, then leaned one shoulder against the wall right outside, waiting for the next bell. He occupied himself listening to voice mail again. If he answered half the calls that came in, he wouldn’t get anything else done.

  Even though he expected the bell, it was loud enough to make him jump. Within seconds, doors opened and students poured out into the hall. Unless he wanted to imitate a salmon struggling upriver, he had to wait until the room had emptied.

  Then he stuck his head in. “Ms. Guzman?”

  Wiry and energetic, the teacher was setting some kind of blobs onto the long tables that filled the room in lieu of desks. Clay, he realized. Looking surprised, she said, “Detective Moore! What can I do for you?”

  When he explained, she shook her head in perplexity. “My windows do look out on the front of the school—” she waved toward them “—but I don’t recall so much as glancing out that morning. I rarely do. I certainly didn’t see Sabra or Asher. Most often I’m busy before class preparing materials, like I am now.”

  “Ceramics, huh?”

  She chuckled. “Well, undirected sculpting. Actually, Emily is in this class.” Her expression sobered. “Sabra’s class already did this earlier in the semester. She created a quite astonishing gargoyle. Some of the pieces weren’t worth firing and glazing, but hers could have sold in a local gallery. I worry about her.”

  “You’re not alone,” he said. “I’ll try to trace this rumor to its source, but I’m not optimistic. Please call if you hear anything about it.”

  “Of course I will,” she said warmly.

  He nodded and reached the door just as the first students arrived. The pair of boys looked to be about twelve, so presumably were freshmen. Jack smiled a little ruefully, remembering what Meg said about why girls this age were prone to crushes on their teachers instead of classmates. He’d been skinny going into high school and was battling acne that made him painfully shy. A romantic figure, he wasn’t.

  Could he waylay Emily after school again to find out what, if anything, she’d learned? Or was that just another excuse to see her mother? Now that he knew how Meg felt in his arms, getting her off his mind was even harder.

  Reluctantly, he decided he’d text again.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  FOR ONCE, MEG almost dreaded Emily’s
arrival home from school. The scene between them last night had been awful. Emily had said really hurtful things, the worst being her accusation that Meg was glad Sabra was gone. Meg had been too stunned to respond.

  Fortunately, once she’d traced her pattern on the monk’s cloth she was using for this particular rug, hooking was something she could do without thought. A lap frame held the fabric taut, and she plied the hook with her right hand while her left hand manipulated the wool beneath the stretched cloth. The pattern was one she’d been excited about when she imagined it: deep purple wine grapes, ready for harvesting, the vines forming a pattern she could see in her mind’s eye. She had cut the strips of wool narrower than usual to allow for finer detail. If the rug came out the way she imagined, she knew it would sell for a substantial price in the gallery downtown. Wine tourism had transformed Frenchman Lake.

  The roar of the school bus’s diesel engine and the squeal of brakes gave her advance warning. Her hands went still as she waited. Emily had darn well better be on that bus.

  The front door opened. Once upon a time, her daughter would have called, “Mom, I’m home!” and come looking for Meg. No more. These days, she was more likely to hurry straight upstairs and close herself into her bedroom until dinnertime.

  But today momentary silence was followed by a tentative, “Mom?”

  “I’m in my studio.”

  Emily appeared in the arched opening. Her face looked pinched. When Meg didn’t say anything, Emily bit her lip. “Are you mad at me?”

  Meg tried for a smile. “How many times in your life have you known me to get mad?”

  “Um... I guess just after the party.” Emily chewed on her bottom lip. “But...you don’t sound like you want to talk to me.”

  Meg hated hearing her usually confident daughter timid. She produced a half smile. “You haven’t been very interested in talking to me lately. And, yes, you hurt my feelings last night. There are consequences to that, you know.”

  Emily eyed her mother warily. “You mean, like, I’ll be on restriction?”

  “Don’t be silly.” Meg held out an arm. “Will you give me a hug?”

  The teenager dropped her pack to the floor and all but flung herself into Meg’s arms. “I’m sorry!” she wailed. “I didn’t mean it. Most moms wouldn’t have let Sabra stay here. I know that. I just... I’m scared!”

  Meg held her close, relishing what had become a rare occurrence, but couldn’t help letting some tartness slip into her voice. “So you had to take it out on me?”

  Her daughter lifted a tear-dampened face. “I don’t know why I did. I get all tangled up sometimes.”

  With a chuckle, Meg gave her another squeeze. “Hormones.”

  Emily retreated, snuffling and wiping her wet cheeks. “Did you? I mean, when you were my age?”

  Meg hesitated. Maybe she should have been more open with Emily about her own childhood. Talking to Jack had made her wonder. She had an opportunity here that might not come again soon.

  “I felt rebellious,” she said slowly, “but I was too intimidated to come right out with it.” She nodded at a chair. “Sit down.”

  Emily did, her forehead crinkling. “You never want to say anything about your family. Did your dad hit you or something?”

  “No, nothing like that. My parents were just...unemotional. They didn’t hug or kiss, me or each other. The worst was when my father froze me out.” She felt a chill even remembering. “If I annoyed him, he might not look at me or speak to me for days. I was required to come to the dinner table, but when I was in trouble, we’d eat in absolute silence. I’d shrivel inside.” She’d felt as she imagined a prisoner held in isolation did, utterly alone. The fact that she had been alone when she was with the two people who should love her most had made it worse.

  Emily’s brown eyes were fixed on her mother’s face. “What did you do? I mean, to get in trouble.”

  “Be too loud. Beg for permission to do something I’d already been told I couldn’t do. Forget to do a chore. Not be respectful enough. Bring home a grade he didn’t deem adequate. Break a dish when I was drying them.” She laughed without humor. “Almost anything. And Mom always went along. My parents should never have had children. I think I was more a nuisance to them than anything. They did what they saw as their duty, but it never occurred to them to give more.” She shook her head. “Jack—Detective Moore—asked me if they’re alive. I told him the truth. I have no idea. I have no desire to see either, ever again.”

  “Did you get pregnant to, I don’t know, make them mad or something?”

  The question struck Meg as surprisingly perceptive, coming from someone Emily’s age. She actually had to think about her answer for a minute.

  “The pregnancy wasn’t planned, if that’s what you’re asking. But I’d started sneaking out of the house after my parents had gone to bed. I went wild. I gave myself permission to feel. I suppose my choice of boyfriend was a form of rebellion. They would have hated him.” But not for the reasons they should have. Protecting her from hurt or disappointment would never have entered their minds.

  Shock widened Emily’s eyes. “Didn’t they ever meet him?”

  “They weren’t interested. They didn’t encourage me to bring friends home from school, and they were never available to pick me up if I did after-school activities. As a result, I didn’t have close friends. I didn’t want to tell anyone that my parents weren’t like theirs.”

  “How could they be like that?” Emily sounded genuinely perplexed, which made Meg warm inside.

  “I can’t be sure. Mom had grown up in foster homes, which might explain her, but Dad’s parents were alive. They lived back east, but we never went to see them or anything. I think he talked to them on the phone once in a while. Now I have to wonder if they were abusive, or maybe just cold, like him.”

  “What did your parents do? I mean, for work?”

  “My father was a pathologist.” Seeing Emily’s puzzlement, she explained, “They’re doctors who do autopsies to find the cause of death. I feel sure he went that route so he didn’t have to deal with many people.”

  Emily wrinkled her nose. “People who were alive.”

  This laugh felt more natural. “Right. My mother was an administrator for a nursing home. I’m sure she was efficient.”

  Emily stared at her, unblinking, for a moment. “How come you’re not like them?”

  Another good question. She grinned at her daughter. “I rebelled. Whenever I have to make a decision, I ask myself what they’d have done.”

  “And you do the opposite.” Emily sounded awed. “That’s kind of cool.”

  Meg smiled. “Thank you. And that’s enough about them. How was your day?”

  “Well, I didn’t tell you what I heard.” The story burst out. Emily said she’d thought about asking Ms. Guzman herself if it was true, but instead she’d told Detective Moore about it, and he’d said what Emily heard wasn’t true at all. “I thought he was going to talk to Ms. Guzman today,” she concluded, “but I don’t know.”

  The doorbell rang. Emily jumped to her feet. “I bet that’s him!”

  Watching her race for the front door, Meg shook her head in bemusement. Go figure. Last night Emily had hated them both; today she was remorseful and now eager to greet Jack.

  The rumble of a deep male voice played counterpoint to her daughter’s high, excited one. A fluttering in Meg’s chest made her feel about as grown-up as her daughter. Taking a deep breath, she composed herself.

  A moment later, both appeared in the doorway.

  As he’d been every time she saw him, Jack Moore appeared the quintessential detective. Today he wore khaki chinos instead of dark slacks, a brown, long-sleeve crewneck pullover replacing the white dress shirt and tie. But the weapon and badge at his waist were what drew attention.

&nb
sp; Along with his height, broad shoulders, athletic build and craggy face, Meg admitted wryly. Yes, and the intensity that seemed to be part of him.

  Right now his brown eyes were friendly instead of guarded. “Sorry to keep popping in like this,” he said. “I should have just texted Emily, but I wanted to find out what she’d learned today.”

  “Did you talk to Ms. Guzman?” Emily asked eagerly.

  “I did,” he said. “She says she never so much as looked out the window that morning, and saw neither Sabra nor Asher.”

  “So...who started this rumor?” Meg asked, worry twisting in her stomach. Was it just talk, exaggerated as it spread, or had the misinformation been deliberately planted?

  Jack’s expression told her he shared her concern. “That’s the question, isn’t it?” He focused on Emily. “Who said what?”

  Before Emily could start, Meg suggested, “Why don’t we adjourn to the kitchen? I’m sure Emily could use a snack, and if you don’t expect gourmet, I can offer you a cup of coffee.”

  His grin stole her breath. “Thank you. I’m an Americano kind of guy. I like my coffee plain.”

  Meg smiled back until she became aware that Emily was watching suspiciously.

  In the kitchen, while she put water on to boil, Emily got out the milk and sliced some pumpkin bread Meg had made the day before. Eventually, they were all seated at the farm table. Jack inhaled steam from his coffee, then eyed the pumpkin bread. If he hadn’t been here, Meg would have had milk with Emily, but she didn’t mind a jolt of caffeine.

  He devoured a piece of bread, then took a second slice at Meg’s encouragement before once again looking straight at Emily. “Okay.”

  “Well, first I heard this girl, Courtney Vanduren. You remember her, Mom.”

  Meg nodded. Courtney had attended a theater camp with Emily the summer between eighth and ninth grades. “She said Jenn told her. So I asked her later, because I know a bunch of girls named Jenn. She says it was Jenn Carmichael.”