The Midnight Hour

by Karen Robards

  “I’m okay,” she said again in a tiny voice. Unbelievable that Rusty Curran was really looking at her like that. Rusty Curran, the hero of her daydreams—and fantasies. He was so cute, and he had the bluest eyes.

  “I can give you a ride home, if you want,” he offered. “That is, if you hurt yourself, and you don’t feel like shopping anymore.”

  Maddie and Allison looked shocked. Rusty’s friends, who had joined them in a cluster, looked surprised. Emily, Tiffany, and Polly were slack-jawed with amazement.

  None of them was any more dumbfounded than Jessica herself.

  Rusty Curran, one of the most popular guys at Hebron and certainly, in her opinion at least, the cutest, was offering to give her a ride home?

  Unbelievable. Such a thing was the stuff of her wildest dreams.

  Her life flashed before her a second time. That is, the most recent weeks of her life. Brandeis Park. Her being grounded. The mirror. The cake.

  She had promised her mom that she would not, for any reason, leave the other girls.

  “I can’t,” she said, feeling her heart break.

  “Whatever.” He shrugged, accepting the news with unimpaired good humor. All the girls, from Allison to Polly, looked even more shocked at Jessica’s refusal. Jessica barely noticed them. Her eyes were all for Rusty as he turned away.

  Of course, she thought, her acceptance or refusal had meant nothing to him. He had only offered to take her home to be polite. Not only was Rusty Curran a total babe, he was also—she could hardly stand it—a gentleman.

  Her heart did a slow revolution in her chest.

  “Oh, by the way,” Rusty said, turning back to her, “there’s a party tonight at Olshaker’s here.” He punched Jason Olshaker in the shoulder. Jason winced and playfully returned the favor. “His folks are outa town, and we’re gonna have a keg. You oughta try to come, if you can.”

  “Thanks,” Jessica managed. “What—what time?”

  “We probably won’t get crankin’ till around ten,” Jason said. “Then we’ll party till dawn.”

  “Yee-haw,” Todd Williams said.

  “I’ll—I’ll try,” Jessica stammered. Oh, God, she was being offered a second chance.

  “You do that.” Rusty’s hand formed a pistol with his first three fingers folded in, his thumb straight up and his index finger pointed at her. “See ya.”

  He and his friends ambled away.

  Jessica, in shock, barely heard Maddie’s and Allison’s catty comments before they, too, walked away.

  Her whole body was warm from head to toe. She was smiling, floating on air, feeling light as a feather and beautiful as a star as she followed her friends around the mall in a daze.

  For her, everything had changed in a single moment.

  Because Rusty Curran had offered to drive her home and invited her to a party, however off-handedly.

  Her mom would never let her go. She knew it as well as she knew her own name.

  But, weird happenings or no weird happenings, she meant to go anyway.

  Rusty Curran. Rusty Curran. Rusty Curran.

  Be still, my heart.

  Chapter

  26

  INSTEAD OF GOING into the kitchen, Grace changed course, heading upstairs. Once in her bedroom, she locked the door behind her—although she usually never did so even when she was alone in the house—and turned on the overhead light, as well as all three lamps, to change into navy-blue sweats. She then turned on the closet light as well, pulled a chair over, stood on it, and rummaged around on the top shelf for the gun she had bought years ago when she and Craig had first separated. At the time, she had been scared to the point of sleeplessness over being alone at nights with only Jessica, who’d been scarcely more than a baby. Burglars, rapists, and murderers who broke in during the wee hours of the morning had routinely populated her nightmares when she did sleep.

  Funny, she had gotten over that fear years ago. Until this.

  The gun was in the very back corner of the top shelf, and she stood on tiptoe straining to reach it. Her fingers touched cold metal and curled around the slender barrel; she pulled it out. It was an old gun, a .22 caliber automatic, with a long, black barrel and a removable clip that could be filled with bullets and then loaded into the handle.

  It had been at least six years since she had held it in her hand. She just barely remembered where the bullets were—tied in a knotted athletic sock in the bottom drawer of her dresser. Getting them out, she loaded the pistol, then checked to make sure that the chamber was empty and the safety on.

  Funny how the mechanics of it came back to her.

  Unlocking her bedroom door, she headed back downstairs, feeling marginally better now that she had a gun in her hand. At least she was not a sitting duck any longer, she thought. She could defend herself and her daughter, if it became necessary.

  Taking a quick detour through Jessica’s room, she checked to see if Godzilla had succumbed to hunger yet and had crawled back into the cage that Jessica had left, stocked with food and water and his favorite chopped fresh apple, on the floor for him.

  No such luck. The cage was still empty. Grace was beginning to think that Godzilla would never turn up. But where, in a relatively well-cared-for house, could a hamster hide for days on end? Surely they must see some trace of him sooner or later. Droppings, or crumbs where he’d gotten into the pantry, or something.

  Even if he was dead, there should, by now, be a terrible odor. Which, since the house smelled just as usual, was some comfort.

  Grace shrugged, determined not to worry about it, and walked on down the stairs. The stairwell and much of the house—except for the kitchen and her bedroom—were gloomy and dark because of the rain, although it was only about four o’clock. Jessica should be home within the next hour and a half or so, and then it would be time to start supper and . . .

  Her sleeve snagged on something, arresting her in midstep. Surprised, Grace glanced around to see what had caught her. The wall of the stairwell was hung with dozens of family pictures mounted in matching jade-green wooden frames, including yearly ones of Jessica from the time she was a baby and pictures of the two of them together. Her sleeve had caught on a nail where one of the pictures should have been.

  Should have been. Freeing her sleeve, Grace proceeded slowly down the stairs, flipped the light switch at the bottom so that the stairwell was brightly illuminated, and retraced her steps.

  A picture was missing. One of a trio of shots of herself and Jessica together. They were three-by-fives displayed in five-by-seven frames. She had mounted them herself.

  The bottom one—the latest one—taken less than a year ago, was gone. A bare nail sticking out of the wall was the only mark of where it had been.

  How long had the picture been gone? Had someone—one of Jessica’s friends maybe, or Courtney or Paul—accidentally broken it and hidden it somewhere instead of telling her? Had someone—Jessica or Pat, maybe—moved it for some reason?

  She couldn’t remember the last time she had actually seen it. Surely she would have noticed if it had been missing long. But maybe not.

  Whoever had left the cake must have taken the picture. Her blood ran cold.

  Her first instinct was to call Marino.

  Grace took a deep breath to calm herself and walked on down the stairs. Deliberately she went from room to room, turning on all the lights and closing all the curtains, the pistol clutched tightly in one hand. Then she went into the kitchen and made herself a cup of coffee.

  So a picture was missing from her wall, Marino would say with a shrug. A recent picture of herself and Jessica, with no value to anyone but the two of them. Even the appearance of the cake in a locked house was more sinister than that.

  The disappearance of a single framed photograph from a whole wall filled with dozens of similar photographs was not sinister at all.

  She could not call Marino, or anyone else, over that.

  Sitting at the table, Grace sipped her coff
ee and tried without success to concentrate on the newspaper. The missing photograph might mean nothing.

  But she didn’t for one minute believe that.

  Giving up on the paper, she called Jackie, who still was not home. She hid the pistol in a cabinet where she could easily grab it, but Jessica was not likely to find it, and started supper. When Jessica walked in through the kitchen door at five-thirty, Grace was standing at the stove testing the broccoli for doneness. She was still so tense that it was an effort to summon a smile.

  “Hi, sweetie. Did you have a good time?” One look at Jessica’s face as she hung her jacket on the coatrack was enough to answer that. Her child was sparkling-eyed and glowing and looked happier than Grace had seen her in some rime.

  Letting her go had been the right decision after all.

  “It was okay.” Communicative as always, Jessica shrugged, took off her coat, and hung it on the coat-rack. Her hair was only damp, not soaked, leading Grace to assume that the rain had slacked off.

  “What did you buy?”

  “Oh—nothing.” Jessica looked and sounded blank, as though the notion of buying something had only just occurred to her. “We just basically window-shopped.”

  “You didn’t buy anything?” Jessica had never been to the mall in her life without buying something.

  “I don’t always have to buy something.” Jessica’s tone was defensive.

  So Jessica had bought nothing, but come home starry-eyed. In Grace’s experience, that could mean only one thing: a boy.

  “Did anything interesting happen?” Grace probed delicately, knowing that too-pointed questions would ruin any chance of getting her daughter to open up. Not that there was much chance of that anyway. Over the past year, Jessica had guarded details of her personal life as closely as if they were precious gems, allowing Grace only an occasional glimpse at the treasure.

  “Not much.” Jessica came into the kitchen, sniffing the aromas emanating from the stove. “Why aren’t you getting dressed, by the way?”

  “For what?”

  “Weren’t you going to some fund-raiser tonight?” Steam rose around her as Jessica lifted a lid from a pot, peering down with evident satisfaction at the bubbling stew within.

  “Oh, my God!” There was a clatter as Grace dropped the spoon she’d been holding and stared at her daughter with horror. “I completely forgot!”

  “Linda’s supposed to come at six.” Jessica glanced at the clock. “You’ve got twenty-five minutes.”

  “I can’t go.” Grace bent to retrieve the spoon and tossed it into the sink. She glanced at the clock, too. “I’m not going. It’s too late to catch Linda. I’ll pay her and send her home when she gets here. I have to call John. . ..”

  “Is that who you’re going with?” Jessica asked interestedly, leaning against the counter and munching a carrot stick, which she had grabbed from the raw veggie platter Grace had already prepared and left sitting beside the stove. “John who? Is he cute?”

  “John Parson. And not particularly. He’s a judge I work with, and it’s no big deal that I’m going out with him, so you can just get that look off your face, miss. We’re both supporting George Loew for the Senate and this is his first fund-raiser, so . . .”

  “You have to go,” Jessica said positively.

  “I’m not going.” Grace was already headed toward the phone.

  “Why? Linda will be here. I won’t be all alone.”

  “I’m just not going.” Grace thought of the cake and the picture, and shuddered. She started to ask Jessica if she knew anything about the picture, then stopped. Jessica looked so happy—there was no sense in frightening her more than was necessary. Picking up the phone book, she turned to the P’s and began running a finger down the columns, looking for John’s name.

  “He must have an unlisted number,” she said as she drew a blank.

  “See? You have to go. Sheesh, Mom, I’ll be all right. Linda will be here, and anyway you can’t stand guard over me for the rest of my life.”

  Grace looked at her daughter. She hated to stand John up at the last minute—he was a friend as well as a colleague and this was an important event for someone with political ambitions, which he had. On the other hand, Jessica was her life.

  “Have you ever heard the word over-protective?” Jessica asked impatiently. “Nothing’s going to happen. And if Linda and I get scared, we can always call the police.”

  The police. Tony Marino. Grace thought of him, and her decision to stay home wavered. Being attracted to him was bad enough. But she was starting to rely on him, she realized, and that was worse. He was just a cop who came when she called because that was his job.

  What she needed was a new man in her life to focus on. John could, possibly, fill the bill. He was good-looking enough, recently divorced, intelligent, funny, had a prestigious job. . ..

  If he was not as sexy as Tony Marino, well, then, sexy was not what a thirty-six-year-old mother of a teenager should be looking for in a man, and it would behoove her to keep that in mind.

  “Mom, give it up and go get dressed. I’ll be fine.” Jessica sounded impatient. In fact, she sounded like a mother trying to talk sense into a recalcitrant daughter. Like Grace herself, in fact.

  Grace had to smile.

  “Sure you’ll be all right?” Still she hesitated.

  Jessica rolled her eyes. “Mother . . .”

  “All right. I’ll be home early. Supper just needs to be dished out, so you go ahead and eat. If you get scared, or anything seems wrong . . .”

  “Go take a shower, Mom.” Jessica shook her head in disgust, pulled on an oven mitt, and started lifting pots from the stove.

  Grace went upstairs. The doorbell rang while she was in the shower, announcing, she assumed, Linda’s arrival. She blow-dried her hair—thank God for short cuts and hair gel!—and was applying makeup when the doorbell rang again.

  John.

  Hurrying into the bedroom, she shimmied into control-top pantyhose—was it just her or were they starting to feel more like girdles every year?—and a bra, then pulled from her closet the white satin shell and oyster silk dinner suit that was her answer to big nights and put it on. Thrusting her feet into a pair of taupe pumps, she snatched up the matching taupe purse from her closet shelf, dumped the contents of her everyday purse into it, and headed downstairs.

  Dressed in the male jurist’s eternal dark suit, white shirt, and silk tie—this one was red—John was in the living room seated on the couch. He put down the drink he was holding and rose when he saw her, giving her an exaggerated once-over accompanied by a wolf-whistle under his breath. He was forty-five years old, about five-ten, stockily built with short reddish hair and a cocky grin.

  The thing she liked best about him was that grin.

  “I’ll be right with you,” she promised with a smile. “Just let me say good night to Jessica.”

  “Sure.” He shrugged and sat back down again. “You look beautiful, by the way.”

  “Thanks.”

  Smiling, she turned and went into the kitchen. Jessica and Linda were seated at the kitchen table, eating and talking a mile a minute. Grace thought about reminding Jessica that, for politeness sake, she should have made an effort to talk to their guest until her mother appeared, but then gave a mental shrug and let it pass. At least she, or Linda, had provided John with a drink—orange juice from the look of it. Anyway, life was too short to lecture all the time.

  “You look great, Mom,” Jessica said as Grace walked over to the table.

  “You really do, Judge Hart,” Linda echoed.

  “Thank you, both of you. Linda, I have my cell phone with me. If you need me, the number’s written down under the phone. Jess knows it. The next-door neighbor’s number is written down, too, the Allen’s. Bob Allen could get over here fast if necessary. Jessica, you guys stay inside and keep the doors locked. If anything should . . .”

  “Go, Mom. I know the drill.” Jessica took a bite of stew. “
We’ll call the cops if we need to, don’t worry.”

  “I’ll be home early,” Grace promised, and left.

  As dates went, this one was pretty tame. She and John ate dinner side by side at one of the big tables, talked about nothing really, and then separated when dinner was over as he schmoozed his way around the room and she chatted with friends and acquaintances. By ten-thirty, Grace was ready to call it a night. Detaching John from potential future backers was tricky, however, and it was eleven o’clock before they were in the car headed home.

  “Do you always leave parties this early?” he asked her with a teasing smile as he pulled into Spring Hill Lane.

  “I’m sorry to drag you away,” Grace said, “But there’s something going on with my daughter and I really need to get home.”

  “How old is she? Sixteen? Seventeen?”

  “Fifteen.”

  “I imagine kids that age are a lot of trouble,” John said, commiserating. He was childless, Grace had learned over the course of the evening, and she realized from his manner when Jessica came up as a topic of conversation that he had no real interest in hearing about other people’s children.

  Scratch John from her list of potential men-friends, she thought.

  “Sometimes,” Grace admitted. They reached her driveway, pulling through the gates and past the hedge and stopping behind Linda’s car, which was illuminated by the light in the black iron lamppost at the end of the walkway. When John reached for his door handle, Grace got out without waiting for him to come around and open her door.

  The rain had stopped, but puddles on the pavement shone in the lamplight and the air was cool and damp. Rolling clouds hid the moon and stars from view, and made the world seem very dark beyond the yellow circle of light cast by the lamp. Grace walked around the car, braced for the awkward moment that always came at the end of dates.

  “There’s no need to escort me to the door,” she said with a little laugh. Ending a date on the sidewalk was the most tactful means she had found to break it gently to a man that the evening was over. Though how any man could expect more, when they knew she had a teenage daughter in the house, was beyond her. Still, most if not all of them seemed to.