by Joy Fielding
Too busy doing what? Robin wondered.
The living room led into a formal dining room filled with heavy oak furniture, including a long table with more than enough room for the twelve rust-colored leather chairs clustered around it. Next came a huge kitchen full of the latest in stainless-steel appliances. Shiny white cabinets and black granite countertops surrounded an enormous center island with an array of copper pots and pans hanging artfully above it. As with the rest of the house, windows took the place of walls. What walls there were were bare.
Melanie was right. Despite its size and impressive exterior, despite the crystal chandelier and sweeping staircases, despite the grand piano and expensive furniture, despite the stainless-steel appliances and granite countertops—or maybe because of all these things—there was something curiously generic about the house. How had Melanie described it? Grand and bland. It looked more like a hotel than a home.
Of course her father had always been partial to hotels.
But Tara?
Tara had always turned up her nose at gaudy chandeliers. She’d hated chintz. She’d been indifferent to copper pots.
Robin tried picturing Tara tagging along with the decorator—Sheila or Shelley or maybe Susan—to the various designer showrooms, trying to choose among the myriad fabrics and marbles on display. Had she been too overwhelmed to have an opinion? Had she shrugged her lovely broad shoulders and gone along with her husband’s choices? Had she been intimidated by the decorator’s pedigree and expertise?
Except that Tara had never been one to shrug and go along. She wasn’t easily overwhelmed. She was rarely intimidated.
Maybe she’d been distracted. Or she just didn’t care. Maybe decorating bored her. Maybe her heart wasn’t in it.
Maybe her heart was elsewhere.
Were the rumors true?
“This way,” the sheriff said, leading them out of the kitchen through a side door that brought them back to the center hall.
Robin followed Sheriff Prescott into the large empty room on their left. More windows. More blank walls.
“They were having a pool table custom-built. It’s supposed to be ready next month,” Melanie said.
They returned to the hall, proceeding into their father’s home office.
“His computer’s missing,” Melanie said immediately.
“We have it,” the sheriff said. “Our tech guys are going through his files.”
“Can you do that?” Melanie asked. “Without a warrant?”
Sheriff Prescott looked surprised by the question. “Your father’s a victim, Melanie. Not a suspect. We’re trying to find out who’s responsible for what happened. What’s in his computer might be of help.”
“Not if it was a home invasion.”
The sheriff nodded. “We’ll try to have it back to you soon.”
Robin glanced around the wood-paneled den, a pleasant buzz settling comfortably into the nape of her neck. Unlike the other rooms, which appeared to be largely untouched, this one had been ransacked. The drawers of the large walnut desk in the center of the room were open, their contents strewn across the floor. Books that must normally have filled the built-in bookshelves now littered the masculine green-and-brown-checkered carpet that covered the hardwood floor. A large black-and-white photograph of their father, his arms around Tara and Cassidy, stood upended in front of an open and empty wall safe.
“The safe was located behind the picture,” Sheriff Prescott explained unnecessarily.
Not exactly the most original place in the world to hide a safe, Robin thought. Especially when the only thing on any of the walls was this stupid photograph. She glanced at the upside-down smiles of her father and his young family. They look so happy, she thought. Had they been?
“Any idea what was in that safe?” the sheriff asked.
Robin shook her head.
“Cash, probably,” Melanie said. “He liked to have lots on hand.”
“Any clue how much?”
“Five, maybe ten thousand dollars. That’s what he always had lying around at home.”
“Anything else?”
“Jewelry?” Melanie suggested. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
“What about his will?” the sheriff asked.
“What about it?”
“Any idea who the beneficiaries might be?”
“You should probably talk to his lawyer.” Melanie gave Sheriff Prescott the attorney’s name. “But my father’s not dead yet, remember?”
“What about guns?”
“What about them?”
“Did your father have any?”
“A couple. Are they missing?”
Prescott nodded. “Do you know what kind they were?”
“A Smith & Wesson, I think. And…what’s that big one?”
“A .357?”
“Sounds about right. Was it the murder weapon?”
“It’s a possibility. Shall we go upstairs?”
“Why not? Any particular staircase you’d prefer?” Melanie asked, returning to the hall.
“Why don’t we start with the one on the right?”
“Good choice.”
“Wow,” Robin said when they reached the master suite. She stepped inside the first of three huge rooms, her feet sinking into the plush ivory-colored broadloom covering the floor and feeling it tickle her bare toes inside her sandals. Three small blue velvet sofas were grouped around a large blue leather ottoman. An enormous flat-screen TV was mounted on the wall. Heavy blue drapes framed the picture window overlooking the backyard.
“I believe they referred to this as their ‘bed-sitting room,’ ” Melanie said, moving into the bedroom itself.
“Double wow,” Robin whispered when she saw the giant four-poster, complete with canopy and white chiffon curtains, that stood in the center of the cavernous room. A blue velvet divan was positioned in front of the bed, complementing the chairs of yet another sitting area in front of another long window. “Holy shit,” she said, her startled eyes coming to rest on a large nude portrait of Tara.
She was sitting on a swing, her right hand gripping one of the flower-festooned ropes that held it in place, her left strategically folded in her lap, her full breasts prominently and proudly on display.
As was the pronounced gash that ripped through the canvas on a diagonal from top to bottom.
“Looks as if at least one person has good taste in art,” Melanie remarked.
“Why would someone do this?” Robin asked, approaching the picture.
“We’ve been wondering the same thing,” Sheriff Prescott said, coming up behind her. “It looks personal, doesn’t it?”
“Not necessarily,” Melanie said. “I mean, you read about vandals doing stuff like this all the time. Wrecking things, defecating on carpets, slashing paintings…”
The sheriff nodded. “Yup. Could be.” He opened the door to the enormous walk-in closet, which was more like a room full of closets, all of them open, clothes pulled from their hangers, dozens of shoes flung across the floor. An island dresser, full of open drawers that had clearly been rummaged through, occupied the middle of the room. A jewelry box sat empty on the dresser’s hand-painted surface. “You know what jewelry might be missing?”
“Looks like all of it,” Melanie said with a shrug.
“Could you be more specific?”
“Tara had a necklace with a diamond heart, and a pair of diamond studs that my father gave her for her birthday. A few gold chains and earrings that used to belong to my mother, an emerald-and-ruby butterfly pin that was also my mother’s.”
Robin’s hand played absently with the amethyst ring on the chain around her neck, as she pictured the butterfly brooch her father had bought her mother for their twentieth anniversary. Her mother wore it only rarely, not wanting to appear ostentatious. Tara had had no such qualms.
“Maybe also some costume stuff,” Melanie said. “Tara didn’t have the best taste.”
“You said at the hospita
l that it looked as if someone took her wedding and engagement rings,” Robin said to the sheriff, not wanting to contradict her sister. She’d always admired Tara’s sense of style, although it was admittedly unique.
Which was exactly what was missing from this house, Robin realized.
Tara.
In spite of her nude likeness, Tara was missing.
“It appears that way from the bruising on her fingers, yes,” the sheriff said, answering the question she’d already forgotten she’d asked. “This way,” he said, leading them out of the closet into the marble-and-glass master bathroom. “Not much to see in here.”
There was an elaborate Jacuzzi in front of a large window overlooking the side of the house, a glassed-in shower for two, a beige marble floor with matching countertops, double sinks on either side of the room, a separate stall for the toilet, a bidet, gold-plated faucets. “A bidet? Gold-plated faucets? Are you kidding me?” Robin could almost hear Tara squeal with disdain.
She followed her sister across the upstairs hall to the other wing.
“How are you holding up?” Sheriff Prescott asked as they approached Cassidy’s room.
“I’ve been better,” Robin told him, although in truth, she wasn’t feeling as bad as she’d feared. The Ativan was doing its job.
That is, it was doing its job until she saw the blood covering Cassidy’s bed and pictured the little girl sprawled across it, her phone in her hand. A burst of anxiety exploded like gunfire inside her chest. “Oh, God.”
It was only later, after they’d finished the tour of the upstairs rooms—a guest bedroom, a home gym, a media room—and they were saying their goodbyes at the front door, that Robin realized how different Cassidy’s new room was from her old one. The soft pinks and snow globes were gone, replaced by bold primary colors and shelves lined with video games. Posters of snarling hip-hop artists and half-naked models had usurped Beyoncé and Taylor Swift. Cassidy was growing up, she realized, becoming a teenager, moving inexorably from girl to woman.
Someone had tried to stop that from happening.
What kind of monster shoots a twelve-year-old girl?
“Goodbye, Sheriff,” Melanie was saying when his cell phone rang.
He motioned for them to hold on a moment, then turned away, listening. “That was the hospital,” he said when he turned back.
Oh, God, Robin thought. Their father was dead.
“Cassidy is awake,” the sheriff told them instead. “She’s talking.”
“She’s talking?” Melanie repeated. “What did she say?”
“Apparently she asked for Robin.”
CHAPTER TEN
Fifteen minutes later, they were at the hospital.
“I don’t get it,” Melanie muttered as the sisters exited the backseat of Sheriff Prescott’s patrol car. “Why would she ask to speak to you? I’m the one she lived with for the past six years, the one who listened to her bitch about her mother whenever they had a fight, the one who took her to buy tampons when she got her period last year. She hasn’t seen you since she was a little girl. She barely knows you, for God’s sake.”
Robin shook her head, as confused as her sister. “You never really liked Cassidy,” she offered, remembering Melanie’s initial antipathy toward Tara’s child. “Maybe she sensed that.”
“I just don’t trust kids with better vocabularies than mine.”
It was true that Cassidy had always sounded more mature than her years. Tara had believed in treating Cassidy as an equal, disdaining baby talk and encouraging the toddler to speak in complete sentences. Robin smiled, recalling the look of astonishment on their father’s face after spending several minutes with Cassidy when she was barely two years old. “It’s like talking to an adult,” he’d marveled. To which Melanie had responded, “It’s spooky, if you ask me.” To which their father had replied, “Nobody did.”
“You haven’t been in touch at all over the years?” the sheriff asked, interrupting her thoughts as they entered the hospital’s main lobby. “You haven’t emailed or spoken on the phone?”
“There’s been no contact whatsoever,” Robin assured both the sheriff and her sister.
“It just doesn’t make any sense,” Melanie said as they headed toward the east wing.
Nothing about this makes any sense, Robin thought as they neared Cassidy’s room.
“Hey,” a voice called from down the hall.
They turned in unison to see a young man shuffling toward them, hands in the pockets of his tight black jeans.
“Kenny,” Melanie said, her voice registering her surprise as he came to a stop in front of them. “What are you doing here?”
“I was hoping to see Cassidy.” His eyes shifted between Robin and her sister while carefully avoiding the sheriff. “But they won’t let me in.” He nodded toward the uniformed guard at the door.
“And you are?” Sheriff Prescott asked.
“Kenny Stapleton?” the boy said, as if he weren’t sure. He pushed some dark hairs away from his forehead, still refusing to meet the sheriff’s eyes.
“And your connection to Cassidy?”
The boy shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “She’s a friend.”
The sheriff’s eyes narrowed, his eyebrows forming their now-familiar straight line across the bridge of his nose. “A little young to be your friend, isn’t she?”
“Well, she’s not a friend exactly.”
“What is she exactly?”
“I know her through Landon.”
“Landon,” the sheriff repeated, his eyes darting toward Melanie.
Kenny’s hands sank deeper into his pockets, pulling his jeans down even lower on his slim hips. “Landon’s just real concerned about her. Asked me to check on her.”
“When was this?”
“Last night.” Kenny looked to Robin and Melanie for confirmation. “When I was at your house.”
“Neither of you thought to mention his visit to me?” the sheriff asked the women.
“It’s been a rather busy morning,” Melanie said, speaking for both of them. “Guess it slipped our minds.”
“Hmm.” Sheriff Prescott turned his attention back to the boy. “Why don’t you have a seat down the hall,” he told him. “There’s a waiting area—”
“Yeah, I know. That’s where I’ve been waiting, but…”
“But?”
“Maybe I should go. Come back another time.”
“Maybe you should stay,” the sheriff said, leaving no doubt that this wasn’t a request. “I have a few questions I’d like to ask you.”
“Sure thing.” Kenny managed a weak smile. “Will you tell Cassidy I stopped by?”
“Sure thing,” the sheriff repeated.
Robin watched the young man retreat down the hall.
“Anything else I should know about that might have ‘slipped your minds’?” the sheriff asked the women pointedly.
“Not a thing,” Melanie said, again speaking for the two of them.
“And from now on, let me decide what’s relevant or not.” He jotted Kenny’s name in the notepad he pulled out of his shirt pocket as they continued toward Cassidy’s room.
“Of course,” Robin said.
“Bastard,” Melanie muttered under her breath, her eyes shooting daggers at the sheriff’s back.
They stopped in front of the closed door to Cassidy’s room. Robin took a deep breath.
“Ladies,” the sheriff said as he pushed the door open.
* * *
—
Cassidy was lying in bed, her eyes closed to the midday sun sliding through the slats of the blinds covering the side window. Her hair had been pulled away from her thin, pale face and secured with a bobby pin, making her appear even more vulnerable than she had the day before. Robin felt the air constrict in her chest like a closed fist.
“Cassidy?” the sheriff said gently, approaching her bed.
“She’s asleep,” Robin whispered, standing back, fightin
g the urge to flee. “Maybe we shouldn’t disturb her.”
“Cassidy,” the sheriff repeated, touching her exposed arm above the IV protruding from the vein on the underside of her elbow.
The girl’s gold-flecked brown eyes opened wide. A startled cry escaped her lips.
“I’m Sheriff Prescott,” the sheriff said quickly. “You don’t have to be afraid, Cassidy. You’re safe now.”
“Robin?” the girl asked, her gaze shooting around the room.
“She’s right here,” the sheriff said. He glanced over his shoulder at Robin, silently beckoning her forward.
“I’m here.” Robin set one recalcitrant foot in front of the other until she was standing beside him.
“I’m here, too,” Melanie said, approaching on the other side of the bed.
“Robin?” Cassidy said again, ignoring both Melanie and the sheriff.
“Right here, sweetheart,” Robin said, finding her therapist’s voice and taking the girl’s hand as the sheriff stepped back a bit.
“Robin,” the girl repeated, squeezing Robin’s fingers. “I knew you’d come.”
“You did?”
“My mother said she could always count on you.”
“She said that?” Tears filled Robin’s eyes.
“She was always talking about you, said she missed you so much.”
“I missed her, too.” Robin realized it was true. Her natural shyness had always made it difficult for her to make friends, and her trust issues had made it all but impossible to keep them. The truth was that she hadn’t had a real friend since leaving Red Bluff. “What else did she tell you?”
“That I should call you if anything ever happened to her.”
“Why would she say that?” the sheriff interjected, reasserting his presence. “Was she worried about anything in particular?”
The girl stared up at the ceiling for several long seconds, then closed her eyes. For a minute, Robin thought she might have drifted back into unconsciousness.
“Can you tell us what happened the night you were shot?” the sheriff prodded.
Cassidy’s eyes remained shut, but she squeezed Robin’s fingers so tightly that Robin had to fight to keep from crying out.
“It’s okay, sweetheart. I’m right here. Can you tell us what happened that night?” Robin asked, repeating the sheriff’s question. “Do you know who shot you?”