Someone's Watching

by Sharon Potts

  “This is her in the photo, right?” Kate pointed at the family portrait.

  “That’s right.”

  “She’s very pretty.”

  “Just like you.”

  “Thank you, but—” Kate looked down at the dog.

  Mr. Weiss cleared his throat. “Well, I think I’ll go make some nice hot chocolate for everyone.”

  “We’re good, Grandpa,” Jeremy said. “Why don’t you sit down and we’ll fill you in.”

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “Actually, it is,” Jeremy said. “We need to borrow your car.”

  “I see. This should be interesting.” Mr. Weiss arranged himself on a club chair and Jeremy sat down facing him on the ottoman.

  His grandfather’s car. Robbie’s abdomen contracted as she sat back down next to Kate. What was Jeremy planning?

  “Grandpa, did you read about the two high school girls who disappeared on Miami Beach during spring break?”

  “Yes, of course,” Mr. Weiss said. “One of them—oh dear.”

  “That was Kate’s friend Joanne they found in the creek,” Jeremy said.

  “I’m so sorry,” Mr. Weiss said to Kate. “What a tragedy to lose someone close to you.”

  Kate nodded, but was unable to look him in the eye.

  “And the other girl?” Mr. Weiss asked. “Was she also a friend? Have they found her? I’m not always able to keep up with the news.”

  “Kate’s the other girl,” Robbie said.

  He blinked several times behind his thick lenses. “But you’re safe now.” He took in Kate’s lowered head, trembling shoulders, withdrawn manner, then he leaned forward on his chair and spoke softly. “I’m sure you’ve had a terrible time of it.”

  “Kate was kidnapped,” Jeremy said. “They changed her hair and face so she wouldn’t be recognized. She managed to escape, but we’re still sorting out what happened and who’s behind everything.”

  “I understand,” Mr. Weiss said. “But I’m sure the police will pick up the pieces and take care of whoever did this terrible thing to Kate and her friend.” He looked from Robbie to Jeremy, then shook his head. “Please don’t tell me the police don’t know Kate’s here.”

  “It’s a long story,” Jeremy said.

  Mr. Weiss’s face reddened. “I don’t know what’s going on here, Jeremy, but I sense that you and Robbie have decided to take matters into your own hands.” He inhaled deeply. “Please. Don’t try to play the hero again. Call the police. Talk to that nice detective Lieber. This poor child shouldn’t be left in limbo like this. She needs to go home, to be with her family.”

  “No,” Kate said, so abruptly that Robbie jumped.

  Geezer sat up, alert.

  “No police. Please, no police.” Kate began to cry.

  Mr. Weiss looked distraught. He cocked his head toward Jeremy.

  “It’s complicated, Grandpa.”

  “It’s always complicated.”

  Jeremy picked up one of the photos from the coffee table. Would he tell his grandfather about Brett’s murder? Tyra’s? How the police were probably looking for him? That Mike might be after Robbie?

  “Please, Mr. Weiss,” Kate said, “don’t be angry with Jeremy. I asked them not to call the police or my father.”

  “But why not, dear?” Mr. Weiss’s voice was gentle.

  “I’m afraid the police will think it was my fault. That Joanne died because of me.”

  “I’m sure the police—”

  “We need to check something out before we go to the police.” Jeremy put the photo back down on the coffee table. Robbie could now see it was his mother’s picture. His grandfather could see it, too. “Please, Grandpa. We have to borrow your car so we can show the police who’s behind all this.”

  Mr. Weiss had his eye on the photo. “I’ve always had a sense that your mother never left us. That she’s watching over you, Jeremy.” He took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. Then he put his glasses back on and sighed. “I pray to God I’m right.”

  “So we can have the car?”

  His grandfather nodded, barely perceptibly. “But I ask you one thing. Let Kate stay here with me and Elise. She’s been through enough.”

  “Of course,” Jeremy said.

  “Please, Mr. Weiss,” Kate said, “I must go with them.”

  “Must go where?” said a familiar voice. Elise came into the room and flew into her brother’s arms. She was small and delicate despite her ungainly school uniform—a navy polo shirt and knee-length khaki shorts. She looked more like her mother than ever with her green eyes and shiny dark hair pulled into a high ponytail.

  “And why do you only come here at moments of grand drama?” Elise drew her head back and studied her brother. Her iridescent skin glowed beneath a dusting of freckles across the bridge of her upturned nose. “Damn, Jeremy. Your face is a mess.”

  “One of my clients missed the punching bag,” he lied.

  Robbie wondered how long Elise had been standing in the hallway, how much she had overheard.

  “Here we thought you’d stay out of trouble as a personal trainer.” Elise gave Jeremy another squeeze, then crossed the room to embrace Robbie. “Hey, girl,” Elise said, “I’ve missed you.”

  “I’ve missed you, too,” Robbie said. She sensed Kate fidgeting on the sofa.

  Elise smiled at Kate. How much more confident Elise had become in the last year. “I’m Elise, Jeremy’s sister.”

  “I’m Kate. I’m—” She hesitated as though not sure.

  “Kate’s my sister,” Robbie said. “We just found out about each other.”

  “I can sort of see a resemblance.”

  “My hair.” Kate ran her fingers through her white blonde hair. “My eyes. This isn’t what I look like.”

  “I overheard you talking,” Elise said. “I can change you back, if you’d like.”

  Kate was still holding a strand of pale hair, looking at it. They called me Angel,” she said. “Me. An angel.”

  She let the hair fall and began to cry. Geezer licked her hand.

  “Change me back,” Kate said. “Please change me back. I don’t want to be an angel anymore.”

  Chapter 40

  The old Honda smelled like heat, tired upholstery, and faded memories. Robbie leaned back against the passenger seat of Jeremy’s grandfather’s car, thrumming her fingers against the dashboard. She was feeling an odd energy. So many competing emotions.

  Kate, her sister. So real, and yet the connection reminded Robbie of a thread of fresh glue—still fluid and delicate. The sisters hardly had had time to speak to each other over the last few hours, let alone get to know each other. They’d hugged goodbye at Jeremy’s grandfather’s. “We’ll talk later,” Robbie had said.

  But Kate had just nodded, the corners of her mouth tugging downward. A child left behind on her first day of school, not quite certain her mother was really coming back for her. Robbie certainly knew that feeling.

  And then there was Jeremy. He was driving, eyes on the bumper-to-bumper traffic heading south on U.S. 1. Shaved now, hair short, jaw set. So different from their ride down to Key Largo in the Corvair. She had an image from then of Jeremy’s hair blowing in the wind through the open windows. Together once again on a mission.

  When was that? Just yesterday?

  “Rush hour,” Jeremy said. “We probably won’t get down to Key Largo before dark.”

  A mission. How tired Robbie was becoming of missions. “I suppose it’s better for us if it’s dark.”

  “You know we don’t really have a choice,” Jeremy said.

  Robbie looked out at the gas stations and fast-food restaurants that went slowly by.

  “I want to know exactly where that bastard is and what he’s planning next.” Jeremy shook his head. “I can’t believe it. Breaking into your apartment, waiting to do God knows what.”

  “We don’t know for sure it was he at my apartment.”

  “Jesus, Robbie. We still have
enough to tie Mike to everything that’s gone down. Kate’s shoe on the pebbles near a jumping red dragon? For chrissake—how many houses have jumping red dragons in their front yard? Then, Brett’s body being found there. And when Kate talked about the creepy old guy that reminded her of Michael Jackson, that had to be Mike.”

  “But I don’t see how he could have pulled off the murders,” Robbie said. “He was still in the house when you went outside with Brett. And even if he sneaked out later, I just don’t see Mike overpowering Brett.”

  A large truck was stopped in front of them, making it impossible to see what was going on up ahead. “That’s a good point,” Jeremy said.

  The truck began to move and they ground forward. “And if Mike was the one who’d attacked Tyra,” Robbie said, “Tyra and Kate would have recognized him in the elevator.”

  “That’s true,” Jeremy said. “I saw the guy with the floppy hat lying on a lounge chair. It wasn’t Mike.”

  “You saw his face?”

  “No. It was covered with the hat. But he wasn’t old and skinny—I could tell that much.”

  “Then Mike probably has someone doing his dirty work.” Robbie thought for a minute. “Remember at the party when Brett was angry with Mike? There was this other guy—brown hair, nicelooking, messed-up lip.”

  “I remember.”

  “Well, after you and Brett left the party, I noticed he was missing. I wonder if he followed you, then killed Brett after you left.”

  Jeremy was tapping on the steering wheel with his thumbs.

  “Do you think he could have been the guy in the floppy hat that killed Tyra?” Robbie asked.

  “It’s possible.”

  “I’d seen him before,” Robbie said. “He was at BURN Friday night, hovering over Mike like his watchman or something.”

  Robbie remembered the way the guy had looked at her that night. Almost like he recognized her—probably because of her resemblance to Kate before they had altered her appearance. So very likely he was the one who’d broken into Robbie’s house yesterday afternoon. She wondered if he had also slashed her bike tires, perhaps as a warning. That had happened a couple of days after Mike had seen Robbie’s number on Kate’s flyer.

  “Okay,” Jeremy said, “so assuming he’s Mike’s personal goon and he killed Brett and Tyra, once we get to Mike’s house, what are we looking for? And the place could still be crawling with cops. Brett’s body was only just found early this morning.”

  Early this morning? It seemed to Robbie a lot more time had gone by with all that had happened. Jeremy under suspicion for Brett’s murder, Robbie’s fight with her father, Tyra getting killed, Kate’s escape. And, of course, Kate’s and Robbie’s discovery that they were sisters.

  “We don’t really have a choice,” Robbie said. “We need something tangible to connect Mike with the two murders or you’re the primary suspect.”

  “And Mike might still be figuring out how to shut you up.”

  They stopped at a traffic light. Cars were streaming into a strip mall with a store selling lottery tickets, a florist, a liquor store, a video rental.

  “We need to find the DVDs,” Robbie said.

  But what would DVDs prove?” Jeremy asked. “Just that Mike’s in the blackmailing business.”

  “But think about the stuff going on at BURN, which happens to be Mike’s favorite hangout,” Robbie said. “That’s where the congressman went last Friday, then left withTyra and Kate. What if after the congressman killed himself, the cops and FBI turned up the heat? And then, what if the people who worked for Mike started double-crossing him? Or if Mike was afraid they would? We both saw that Brett was losing it. And according to Kate, Tyra threatened to expose him. If Mike believed those two might topple his blackmailing operation, that’s a pretty good motive for him to want Brett and Tyra dead.”

  “And you, if he believes you’re onto him.”

  Robbie ignored Jeremy’s remark. It was easier to think clearly if she wasn’t worried about herself being a target. “So,” she continued, “if we find blackmail DVDs at Mike’s house then there’s a logical link between Mike and the murders.”

  “Right,” Jeremy said. “The house. Even if the cops aren’t there, how the hell are we going to get in?”

  “I think there’s a way.”

  “Really?” Jeremy glanced over at her.

  The truck had stopped again, blocking the road ahead. “Maybe.”

  “And what if Mike or his henchman is home? Or what if there’s a caretaker?”

  “Then we have a problem.”

  Even after the rush hour congestion should have subsided, it was still slow going as they continued down U.S. 1. “I don’t get how there can be so much traffic on a Tuesday night,” Jeremy said.

  Just south of Florida City, the sound of a siren grew behind them. “Shit,” Jeremy said. “They couldn’t be chasing us.” He glanced in the rearview mirror. “They don’t know my grandfather’s car. Unless Lieber figured out where we went.”

  Robbie turned and looked at the traffic clogging the road. Could the police back at the SOBE Grande have connected Tyra’s murder to Jeremy? Or maybe the DA had finally put together enough evidence to arrest Jeremy for Brett’s death.

  The siren got louder. Cars were pulling over to the shoulder.

  An ambulance drove through.

  “Not the police.” Jeremy let out a breath of relief.

  “It looks like there’s an accident ahead,” Robbie said.

  There were flashing lights as they approached the dangerous section of U.S. 1 they’d driven through the day before. The northbound lane on the two-lane highway was closed and a cop was directing traffic. A couple of cars looking like crushed soda cans were off to the side of the road, surrounded by fire rescue, an ambulance, and several police cars.

  Jeremy strained to see. “This doesn’t surprise me. Remember how that asshole cut us off and almost caused an accident yesterday?”

  Traffic eased up beyond the collision. Robbie gazed at the mangroves reflected in the dark, swampy water. The possibility that the police were looking for them was very real. It was just a matter of time. If she and Jeremy were unable to find a connection between Mike and the murders, Jeremy would very likely be arrested. But going to Mike’s house presented risks, too. Someone might see them, figure out what they were doing, and try to stop them.

  Either scenario potentially ended with an outcome that terrified Robbie—losing Jeremy.

  They reached Key Largo at a little after eight, but the sky was still light. Jeremy pulled the car into a McDonald’s drive-through.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Getting something to eat. I haven’t had anything all day. And by the time we’re done, it should be dark.”

  Robbie didn’t argue. Any delay was welcome.

  They ordered Big Macs and fries and ate in the car with the windows down. The fishy ocean air mingled with the smell of cooking oil as cars streamed by on the two-lane highway. Jeremy ate like he was ravenous, but Robbie felt her stomach convulse each time she tried to swallow.

  “My grandparents used to take me and Elise to McDonald’s when we were kids,” Jeremy said, his mouth full. “In this car, as a matter of fact. It’s amazing this clunker still runs.”

  Did he not realize what was at stake?

  “Jeremy,” Robbie said, “there’s something I want to talk to you about.”

  “Sounds serious.”

  “I don’t know how to say this. Everything’s been so messed up the last couple of weeks. I thought I knew what I wanted, but now I’m not so sure.”

  He looked at her. His dark, serious eyes, beautiful mouth, cleft chin raw and exposed without the beard. “Talk to me.”

  Robbie ran her thumb and forefinger up and down her feather earring. “When I said I didn’t think we should live together, I twisted things and made it seem like you were the one with the problem. That you were restless for fun and other girls. But that wasn’t it at all.�
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  He put his half-eaten hamburger down on the wrapper on the console.

  “I had the problem,” Robbie said. “I was afraid if we stayed together, eventually you’d leave me.”

  “Like your father did.”

  “That’s right.” Was what she was discovering about herself so obvious to him?

  “And you’re not afraid anymore?”

  “I’m still afraid. But it isn’t fear of you leaving me by choice. I’m worried about losing you because of other people—police, bad guys.”

  He reached for her hand. “Nothing’s going to happen to me.”

  “Oh Jeremy. You’ve always believed you were invincible. But you aren’t.”

  “I told you, nothing’s going to happen to me.”

  “I want you to know how I feel about you. How even when we’re apart, you’re the one I’m always thinking about.”

  “Stop it, Robbie. You sound like the police are going to lock me up, or worse.”

  “I just don’t want it to go unsaid.”

  He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it. “And you’re the one I’m always thinking about.”

  Cars went by on the roadway, whirring wheels the only sound. The half-eaten burgers and fries sat on their wrappers on the console between them. So much to say, but she didn’t have the words. She reached into her handbag for a tin of mints. She offered it to Jeremy and took one for herself. The sky was darkening. Jeremy reached for another mint.

  “Keep it,” she said.

  He slipped the tin into his pocket, then got out of the car and threw their trash away. When he got back, he leaned across the console and kissed Robbie hard on the mouth.

  She wondered if someday the taste of peppermint would bring back painful memories.

  Chapter 41

  It was dark. Only their headlights illuminated the narrow, tree-lined road. They drove slowly. The brightness increased. A car behind them. Robbie held her breath. The car passed and continued on.

  “There are other people who live on this street, you know,” Jeremy said.

  “I just wasn’t expecting to see anyone.”

  Jeremy stopped the car at the edge of Mike’s property. No sign of people or cars. The entrance to the long pebbled driveway was wide open. Beyond the trees and hedges, the house was barely visible, a rectangular outline with no interior lights on.