by Julie Miller
“I appreciate that,” said the salesclerk. “I’ll just be a few minutes.”
Without having to ask him, Cal stuffed a fifty-dollar bill into her hand before moving toward the front of the store and taking a spot near the cash register, where he could keep watch on both the store and the parking lot.
She wandered around the store, casually looking at the various dresses. She was on her second cursory lap when she saw a dress that made her stop. It was ivory. A smooth satin. Off the shoulders and fitted through the hips, it gently flared at the knees with a swirl of the skirt. Stunning. There was no other word.
She couldn’t help herself. She lifted the hanger off the rack, walked over to the mirror and held the dress up to her body.
An older woman, knitting while she waited, looked up. “That’s lovely dear. My granddaughter should look at that one.”
She smiled and took another quick glance in the mirror. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Cal was watching her. Embarrassed, she hurriedly stuffed the dress back onto the crowded rack.
It took the salesclerk another five minutes. Finally she came out of the back room holding an invoice. “Found it,” she said. The girl held out a yellow five-by-eight receipt, the kind that gets torn off a book of receipts.
She reached for it and willed her hands not to shake. She realized that Cal had very quickly and quietly come to stand next to her.
Next to customer name, some earnest salesclerk had written Golya Paladis. Next to address was written Moldaire College. The dress had cost fourteen hundred dollars.
“That’s odd,” said the salesclerk.
“What?” she asked. Her head was whirling. Golya Paladis. Did the name mean anything to her?
“We’re supposed to get an address and a contact number,” the girl said. “But maybe because we weren’t ordering the dress that wasn’t necessary.”
She pointed to a small circle with an X inside. “What does this mean?”
The salesclerk smiled. “That he paid cash. The very best kind of sale.”
She pulled out Cal’s cell phone. “May I?” she said at the same time she discreetly pushed the fifty-dollar bill in the salesclerk’s direction.
“I don’t see why not. It’s your dress,” the girl said.
She took the picture, thanked the girl again, and she and Cal left the store. Back in the SUV, neither of them said anything for a minute.
“Golya Paladis,” Cal said. “When we called him G, we were right all along.”
She rolled her eyes.
“Mean anything to you?” Cal asked.
“Not at the moment,” she said. “Maybe you could kick me in the head, knock everything loose and that would all change.”
“That’ll be our backup plan. Let’s see if we can find out a little more about him.” He started punching info into his smartphone. After a few minutes, he frowned and shook his head. “I don’t like this.”
“Now what?” she asked.
“There’s nothing. And I have access to some sites that not everyone would have because of my work as an independent contractor and even those are coming up empty.”
“It’s an alias.”
“Probably. But Golya—”
“Let’s just keep calling him G. I don’t really want to think of him as a real person. He’s shallow, worthy of only an initial.”
“Okay. G bought the dress on Sunday. Two days before the wedding. That was the same day that Lena at the diner said that he contacted Pietro. Remember that she said Pietro was upset and she assumed it was because he had very little notice to get food ready for the reception.”
“So I somehow fell into his hands before that.”
“Yes. And I don’t think too far in advance of that. He seemed to be moving fairly quickly, like his plan was coming together very fast. I think it’s possible that you fell into his hands, that perhaps marrying you was an impulse that wasn’t well thought out. Like you said earlier, what would have made him think that he could keep you once you were no longer drugged?”
“Maybe he’d been stalking me. He had a picture of me. I remember the picture. I remember sitting at the bar at The Blue Mango. I was having fun. It had to be before G. But maybe he was there. Watching.”
She couldn’t control the involuntary shudder.
“Doesn’t matter how he got it. It’s helped us. People remember you and they trust our story,” he added with his usual optimism.
“Half-full?” she said.
“Always.” He pulled out of the lot. “What do you want to do? We could go home or we could try The Blue Mango. Your decision.”
She was exhausted. As Cal had suggested, she suspected that she was still feeling the effects of the drugs in her system. Plus it had already been a day of ups and downs, starting with the visit to Pietro’s, the trip to Moldaire that had left her unsettled but no wiser and now this, a success to find out the full name of one of the Mercedes Men, only to discover that he didn’t really exist.
She had to keep going. “The Blue Mango.”
It took them forty minutes to find the place. It was in a section of Kansas City that had become gentrified within the past twenty years and cute little businesses were springing up in the hundred-year-old shopping district. The Blue Mango was on the corner, a two-story brick building that appeared to be an apartment on top, restaurant/bar on the bottom.
There were no lights on in the building and many empty parking places nearby.
She looked at her watch. It was just before four. “It says on the website that they’re open for lunch and dinner. It doesn’t say anything about them closing in between.”
“There’s a note on the front door,” Cal said. “Wait here while I go read it.”
He was back in the SUV in less than a minute. “It’s handwritten, apologizing for being unexpectedly closed today. They will reopen tomorrow at normal time.”
She rubbed her head. “Do you think that their being closed has anything to do with me?”
“I don’t know. It’s a nice place. Doesn’t look like the type that posts a handwritten note on the door.”
“I’m going to call them,” she said. “It doesn’t look like anyone is inside but maybe the number is to someone’s cell phone. Maybe we can get some information.” She needed to keep pushing. She felt it.
He handed her his phone. She found the website and dialed the number. It rang and rang. Finally, she hung up.
“Now what?” she asked.
“Let’s go home,” he said. They were sixty miles down the road when he turned to her. “I’m going to get gas. I think you better get out of view. There’s no telling how many resources they have and how many places they’re watching. Once I fill the tank, I’ll go into the grocery mart inside. I can probably get milk, bread and eggs. The basics.”
She understood what he wasn’t saying. There were probably a number of grocery stores in the small towns surrounding the Interstate but he wasn’t taking a chance that the Mercedes Men hadn’t effectively spread the word in the small communities to look for someone like her. “I should cut my hair. Dye it blond.”
He shook his head. “Not yet,” he said, his eyes amused. “I like your hair. It feels like silk.”
That was nice. A little flustered, she hurried to unbuckle her seat belt and get on the floor so that her head would not show above the windows.
She felt him slow, then turn, then slow some more. She sensed that he was probably driving around the gas station before pulling into one of the bays. “How’s it look?” she said.
“Nothing unusual,” he said. He stopped the car, got out, and soon she could hear the sounds of fuel pouring into the vehicle. She would need to add gas to the list of items to reimburse him for.
The mileage reimbursement rate was 57.5 cen
ts a mile.
She jerked up, almost forgetting that she was supposed to hide. She could remember having a conversation about the mileage rate recently. She’d been laughing. She could see herself. Sitting in a chair, in front of a plain table, a laptop computer in front of her. She was pointing at a screen. “Just use the form,” she said. “It’s online.”
She’d been talking to someone. With someone.
Who?
She heard the door open and barely stifled her squeak. Cal swung into the seat. He put the sack of groceries he was carrying on the floor of the backseat. “Everything okay?” he asked, already pulling away.
She waited until he told her she could safely get up before telling him everything. When she finished, she added, “I was kidding before but maybe I really am an accountant.”
“You’ll be handy to have around at tax time,” he said easily. “Tell me about the chair.”
The chair. He wanted to hear about the chair. But she realized that he was asking about exactly what she’d been trying to work through in her head—the details.
“Blond wood. With arms. Padded seat. Some kind of mauve print.”
“Hotel issue?” he asked.
She nodded. “Maybe.”
“What were you wearing?”
The very same thing that she’d been wearing in the one other brief vision that she’d had. But she’d never mentioned that one to him and didn’t think it was prudent to do so now. She didn’t want him to think she was hiding things. “Blue button-down shirt. Tucked in. Blue pants. Not blue jeans. Maybe khaki.” She hadn’t been able to see her shoes. But the other time, she’d distinctly seen that she was wearing tennis shoes. “White tennis shoes. I had my hair in a ponytail. That seems weird. I feel like it was unusual for me to have my hair like that.”
“Anything else about your appearance?”
“No. But there was something next to the laptop. A blue lanyard, attached to a plastic badge. You know the kind. You would use it to clock in or open a door.”
“Yours?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. It was turned over. Maybe the person’s I’m talking to.”
“Maybe. Any idea who that might be? Man or woman, even?”
She shook her head. “This is going to sound weird but it makes me sad to think of that person. I don’t even know who it is. How can I be sad?”
“You know the person. You just can’t remember him or her right now. But there’s emotion connected to that knowing. Are you sure it’s sadness? Could you be mad? Disappointed?”
“Sad. And maybe angry. Those don’t seem to go together.”
“Tell me about the laptop?”
She closed her eyes. “A big one. Maybe a seventeen-inch screen.”
“What was on the screen?”
“I don’t know. Information. I don’t know what. I was pointing at something. Telling somebody to go online for the mileage form.”
They were both quiet for several more miles. She turned to him. “What do you think it means?”
“It means that things are coming back. It’s only a matter of time.”
“It’s hard to be patient when I feel so anxious. When I feel that I’m fighting time.”
* * *
STORMY WAS PROBABLY right to feel as if she was fighting time. With every hour that went by, the Mercedes Men had more of an opportunity to track him to Ravesville. He wondered if he should move Stormy now. Take her a couple thousand miles away, where he didn’t have to worry about pulling into a damn gas station and the potential of somebody seeing her.
The idea was certainly attractive. But he suspected maybe counterproductive. Her memory was coming back. And it was impossible to know what sight or sound might break the logjam in her head. But he was fairly confident that the stimuli weren’t a thousand miles away.
What he was more confident of was her reaction if he mentioned getting away from it all. She’d refuse. She dealt with things head-on. From that first night in the hotel, when she’d casually walked past him with shampoo in her hands, ready to disable him the first chance she got, she’d shown her considerable backbone.
She’d hung on to the side of a damn truck, in the middle of the snowstorm, no coat, no shoes, probably still partially drugged up. She was a fighter.
And he’d yet to hear her whine or complain about why me? Sure, she’d expressed frustration over her inability to remember but there’d been no prolonged pity parties. She was handling this about as well as anybody might hope.
By the time he pulled into his driveway, the sun had set. Still, with a full moon, it was a light night. Everything looked the same. No fresh tracks in the snow from someone else approaching the house. He backed into the garage and they got out. Just to be sure, he carried the groceries in one hand and his gun in the other.
They were shutting the front door behind them when he heard the sound of an approaching vehicle.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Go,” he told her. “Upstairs. Not your room. Use the first bedroom. It has a deeper closet. Get all the way in the back. Don’t come out, no matter what you hear.”
There was no time to argue. The engine was closer. The vehicle was turning into the driveway.
She was halfway up the stairs before she made the decision that she wasn’t going to let him fight the battle alone. He was in danger because of her. She glanced over her shoulder and he was watching her, making sure she got to safety before he opened the door.
She wasn’t going to screw with his concentration but she also wasn’t going to hide like some scared third grader. She opened the first door. It smelled of fresh paint. She closed it behind her just as she heard a car door slam.
She glanced at the windows across the room. They did her no good. They faced the backyard, giving her no view of the driveway and who might have come to the house.
She waited for a second slam, thinking that was the pattern of the Mercedes Men. Two approached. Two waited behind in backup. But there was only one car door.
She heard a knock at the front door, then the quiet rustle of Cal moving toward it. Just as he opened the front door, she quietly opened the bedroom door and slipped down the hall.
Hidden crouched behind the half wall, she now could hear everything that was being said. Of course, if they came up the stairs, she was a sitting duck. There was no place to run.
“Hi,” she heard a feminine voice say. “I...uh...was looking for Chase.”
“He’s not here,” Cal said. His voice was polite, but not friendly.
“Where is he?” she asked. Her tone had a little more edge.
There was a pause. “Who wants to know?” Cal asked.
She risked a look around the edge of the wall. From her angle, she could see the woman who still stood in the doorway. She was beautiful. Tall. Slender. And she had the most amazing red hair. It flowed to her waist. She was staring intently at Cal.
“Oh my gosh,” the woman said. “You’re Calvin, aren’t you? I haven’t seen you for almost ten years.”
“Trish?” he said, his voice warmer. “Trish Wright?”
“Wright-Roper,” she said. “What are you doing here?”
Cal stepped back, enough that Trish could step into the house and close the door behind her. The flow of cold air that had been making its way up the stairs was cut off.
She had no idea who Trish Wright-Roper was but clearly, Cal didn’t think this woman was a threat. She started to breathe a little easier.
“Just got out of the navy,” he said. “Came home for Thanksgiving. How’s your sister?” he asked.
“Summer is good. Divorced recently. But she’s got two great kids that I spoil rotten.”
“And you’re married?” he said.
“Widowed,” she replied
softly. “Listen, I don’t want you to think I’m crazy since we’re just reconnecting after a really long time but Summer and I own the Wright Here, Wright Now Café in Ravesville. Just a little while ago, some men came in, asking for directions to the Hollister house.”
That wasn’t good.
“There was something about them. Summer and I both had the same feel. They said they were looking for their cousin and asked if we’d seen a dark-haired woman. Now, that certainly didn’t sound like Raney but still, it was an odd exchange. We’ve gotten to know Raney and wouldn’t want anything to happen to her. So when I gave them the directions, I gave them good ones, but the long way around. The minute they left, I tried the house phone but there was no answer. I realized I didn’t know Chase’s cell phone. I jumped in the car and came here to warn him. You’ve probably only got about fifteen minutes before they show up.”
“How many men?” Cal asked, his voice even.
“Two. I saw two.”
“Okay,” Cal said. “Thank you. This is very helpful. But you need to get out of here.”
“Do you want me to go to the police? Of course, my ex-brother-in-law is probably on duty and he’s not likely to be helpful.”
“Nope. I’ve got this,” Cal said. “But you’re right. These men aren’t friends of the Hollister family. But you and Summer need to be careful around them. Don’t give them any reason to believe that you’d side with us.”
She heard the door open, felt the cold air whoosh in.
“Be careful, Cal. Men like you, men like my Rafe, you think you can handle anything but sometimes it’s just too much.” Her voice was full of emotion.
“Don’t worry,” Cal assured her. “I got this covered. I’ll be in for breakfast soon. Be careful driving in the dark.”
“Good to see you again, Cal,” the woman said, her voice fading away.
“You, too, Trish. And thanks again.” Cal shut the door.
She was debating how best to get back to the closet when she heard Cal’s boot on the first step.
“You can come out from behind the wall now,” he said.