“Uh, just a great day, I guess. I was just driving back from the city and saw your car on the road. After last night, I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“What’s in the city?”
He ignored my question. “You know, I’ve been thinking about what you saw. Maybe it was something else. Maybe you saw an animal or something and thought it was a person. It was terribly dark.”
“No. I saw a woman. I saw her that night, and now you know from my sketchbook I had been seeing her for weeks just like that.”
Ryan’s eyebrows went up. “I’m really trying hard to understand all of this, but I have to admit you’re the first psychic I’ve ever met. It’s pretty hard for me to suspend my disbelief.”
“I never asked you to. It is what it is. To quote Popeye the Sailor Man, ‘I am what I am.’ And for the record, I don’t think of myself as a psychic. I’m more an annoyed recipient of these things.”
“An annoyed recipient. I like that.” He smiled. “Well, if you’re okay, I’ll leave you to it. Don’t stay out here too long. It’s … not as safe as it used to be.”
He started back up the hill. I waited for him to pull out of the driveway, counted to ten and then pulled out a cigarette. As he drove off, I found myself conflicted. He was actually a pretty decent guy, but what had he been doing in the woods that night? Who had he been meeting in the city? This guy had more mysteries than The X-Files.
I jumped as my phone went off in my pocket. I grabbed it and burned my hand on the lit end of my cigarette.
“Did Mitch get home from his yard work?” my mother asked. It was crazy, but I felt like she had caught me smoking. It took everything I had not to put the cigarette out. Last time I checked, she couldn’t see me through the phone.
“Yes. Quite a while ago. Did you wish to speak with him?”
“Oh, no. Does he have any other work lined up?”
“Not that I know of, but he asked me to get him a book on career counseling.”
“Career counseling? I suppose I should be pleased.”
“Mother, I have to go now.”
“Why? You can draw and talk,” she informed me.
“I’m not drawing. I’m … thinking.”
“About what?”
“So much has been going through my mind since last night.”
“Last night? What happened?”
“It’s nothing. I just stumbled on a woman.”
“So?”
“She was dead.” Now that this piece of information was out of the bag, I realized the last thing I wanted to do tonight was sit in the dark woods on a picnic table recreating the scene for my mother.
“You found a woman dead?” she asked.
I made crackling noises with my mouth. “Darn reception in the mountains. I think we have a bad connection.”
I clicked the phone off.
Chapter 17
I was scheduled to work on the book that evening, and Clarence offered to cook a late supper of salmon and vegetables.
“Tell me about Ryan,” I asked as I dove into a perfectly cooked piece of salmon.
“What do you want to know? He helps me to be a better, more organized writer. He makes sure I never miss an appointment, and is a real pain in the ass when it comes to keeping receipts on a business trip. I love my son, but sometimes I think we’ve reversed roles and this time he’s playing the parent.”
“Do you have any idea who he was meeting in Denver?”
“No idea. Like I told you, he’s my business manager. It could be anything. We have to work on getting the next Adventure Kid book in the brick-and-mortar stores, maybe he was working on that.”
That made sense. I felt silly for feeling like it was something mysterious. He was simply doing his job. I had even wondered if he had a girlfriend he was visiting. Did he have anyone in his life? “Is he dating anyone?”
Clarence smiled, “Are you interested?”
“Just curious.”
“Curious. Well, for your information, he did have a girlfriend a couple of years ago. I have to say, he’s changed. I used to worry about Ryan. He was a deep thinker. Always had his head in a book.”
“What do you think caused it?”
“Who knows? When he moved back home, I asked him to take over my management. I believe he blames himself for us losing the traditional publisher, even though I told him they were cutting loose all the deadwood. My adventure books weren’t selling as well as they once had. Who can compete with video games and YouTube? Today’s youth have settled in, and more often than not it’s on the couch.”
“So true.”
“So, in answer to your question, when he first came home he did see a woman who I would call a bookish type. I think she was an English major in college. She read sci-fi and fantasy stuff. Lord of Rings and that kind of thing. She wasn’t right for him. Ryan’s a plaid shirt kind of guy, you know? Not one to go chasing after hobbits and gnomes. She left him for a Renaissance Fair actor. After that, Ryan became the grumpy bachelor you see today.”
“How about friends? Does he hang out anybody? He seems kind of secretive.” That didn’t seem too obvious.
“I guess so. I mean, I don’t check who his friends are. He’s a grown man, and he can do whatever he pleases. As long as he keeps track of my business affairs.”
A car pulled into the driveway, and Tim came in banging the wooden screen door.
“Excellent, you’re still up. I was just over kissing little Timothy good-night and thought I’d check in with you.”
“Kissing Timothy good-night? Didn’t you used to do that with Darla?” Clarence asked.
“Yes, but to be perfectly honest with you, Darla and I aren’t doing too well. She was kind enough to give me a little space to deal with all of this.” By “all of this” he meant his newfound family and lifelong obligations.
“Would this have to do with the fact you’re spending so much time with Katy and her son?” Clarence inquired.
Tim eyed me and pursed his lips. “Could we talk about this later, Clarence? I’m here to ask Gabby something.”
“Before you ask this one out, you should know she seems to be more interested in my son,” Clarence said.
Tim’s eyebrows shot up.
“Is she now? Why go after that grizzly bear when you could have me?” He pinched at his shirt as if wearing imaginary suspenders and stuck his chest out.
I rolled my eyes, “I think you’re taken. Twice over.”
He ran his hands through his hair and sat on the couch. “Got me there. Too many women, not enough time. And now I have Timmy. I thought I had all I could want, but it’s weird, somehow things are different.”
“Kids will do that to you,” Clarence said picking up the dishes. “You two talk and I’ll work on that chapter.” He smiled at me, “Don’t be too long either. You’re awfully pretty for me to be leaving alone with my Don Juan of a store manager.”
As Clarence left the room, Tim sat next to me at the table. “I wanted to ask you a favor.”
Usually when someone asks an artist to do a favor it means they want artwork done for free. “What did you have in mind?” I asked.
“I would like for you to come to the bookstore tomorrow.”
“Okay.” I started to wonder if he was planning to hit on me for real this time. Pursuing anything with Tim would make me as crazy as Darla was.
“And bring your sketchbook. I’m working on a new campaign for the store. Now that I have little Timothy to support, I need to do better, you know? We’re thinking about putting together a print catalog and a sketch of the store, done by Clarence Bradford’s illustrator. I hope it will help us to capture Clarence’s essence. What do you think?”
I yawned, feeling nothing but relief at his request. He didn’t want me for my body. He wanted me for my sketches. These late nights were starting to get to me. “Sure.”
The next afternoon I pulled into the parking lot of the bookstore and sat in my car sizing up the buildi
ng. If he wanted me to capture the essence of Clarence, a one-story building on a downtown street wouldn’t be enough. I would need to draw more of the inside to capture the uniqueness of the store.
When I entered the store, a man with a navy-blue Dr. Who T-Shirt came forward. He wore a tag with the name “Marley” on it.
“Can I help you?” The burly man asked as he flipped his gray ponytail to the back.
“Yes. Tim told me to come by the store today. Is he here?”
Marley picked up a stack of colorful children’s books off the counter to add to the display shelves. “He’s on the phone. Shouldn’t be too long.”
From the next room, Tim’s voice echoed. “I’m sorry, Darla. I haven’t heard anything. You’ll just have to clean the house yourself.” Tim came out with the phone to his ear. Seeing me, he held up his finger to signal he’d be with me in a minute. “Yes … yes, I know that’s twice. Well, if you want her fired, you’ll have to do it yourself.” Tim hung up the phone and tapped his finger on the display case twice, deep in thought.
“Something wrong?”
“It’s Amelia. She’s usually so prompt, but she pulled a no-show for our housecleaning again. Maybe I should call Wilma? She’d know.”
“Must be nice to have a housekeeper. Especially one as beautiful as Amelia.”
Tim’s eyes slowly met mine.
“I’ll admit it’s been pretty convenient. Even though Darla hates to clean and has always had a maid service, having Amelia around, well, she …” he cleared his throat, “didn’t approve. Let me call Wilma, just to make sure she’s all right.”
He spoke to Wilma quietly, this time taking heed of his voice carrying to the front of the store. He came out from behind the curtain and set the phone back into the charger.
“Is Amelia okay?”
“Wilma’s pretty freaked out. She said she hadn’t heard from her either. She said Amelia had been really messed up this last week. Skipped all of her appointments. She thought she might have gone back east to see her family and just not told anyone.”
Tim picked up the phone again. “Maybe I should call Sheriff Bennett.” That said something about this small community. Don’t show up for your job and they call the police on you. I made a mental note to myself: Don’t be late.
As I watched him punch in the number, I noticed the knuckles on his right hand were scraped as if he had hit something recently. Once he connected to the police department, he changed hands, turning the injured one away from me. Tim then turned his whole body as he described his concern for Amelia. What did he think I would see? When he hung up, he turned back to me.
“So?” I asked.
“He’s checking into it. He said Amelia is an adult. Who knows, maybe she’s got a new boyfriend or something,” Tim said, not knowing how close he was to the truth.
“What happened to your hand?” I tried to sound casual. If I had to guess, he’d hit something or someone.
He stared at his fingers as if he were seeing the scratches himself for the first time. “Oh. I … uh … kind of hit a wall. Like I told you last night, Darla and I are having some problems.”
Now I began to wonder if those problems were over his newfound family or Amelia.
Chapter 18
Once our discussion about Amelia had ended, Tim asked if I would sketch the exterior of the building. I took a chair outside and started making some sketches of the exterior of the bookstore. After a while, Tim came out and stood behind me, watching me work.
“I like that,” he said, pointing to the sign I was attempting to get right. “But we want this to look like a friendly place. Kids out front, potted plants, rocking horses …”
“But there are no children, plants, or rocking horses,” I said.
“Of course not. The minute one of those kids fell off of something, we’d get sued. We’re promoting a feeling of family. Does that make sense to you? It’s all about the appearance of wholesome family reading.”
“Kind of like Disney-does-a-bookstore.”
“That’s the idea!” he said, snapping his fingers.
Sheriff Bennett pulled up in his squad car and pulled his large frame out from behind the seat. Tim left me to my drawing and joined the sheriff.
“So, did you find out anything?” Tim asked as the sheriff made himself at home on the hood of his cruiser.
“I did. It’s probably nothing. She’s probably off visiting family, sitting on a front porch drinking tea right now. Let me ask you, did you know any men Amelia might have been seeing? Could she have run off with some guy?”
I glanced up but kept my pencil sketching so no one would notice how closely I was listening in on the conversation. Jane pulled up in her van and parked in the handicapped spot in front of the gallery. Through the car window, I could see her eyes were on Sheriff Bennett, and she spoke to Gigi, who was in the back.
Tim swallowed. “I don’t think so, with it being so soon after Billy’s death. She was at the Chamber of Commerce party, if that helps. Amelia was a beautiful, quiet woman. The most she ever said to me was how to make a sink shine.”
If only I believed that. I wondered if the sheriff knew about who she had danced with at that party.
“Sounds like my dream woman,” Sheriff Bennett joked. He took off his hat and ran his hand over his forehead, displaying a white section of skin. “Well, she’s a grown woman, so we need to assume first that she left of her own free will and is not in danger.”
“Sheriff, what about the girl I saw in the lake?” I asked, no longer pretending I wasn’t listening.
“Good point, but there’s only one problem. There was no actual woman in the lake when we tried to find her,” he reminded me.
“Just because you didn’t see a body doesn’t mean she wasn’t there,” I said.
“Miss Wolfe, if there is no body, I have to move on.”
“Yes, I’m sure this town is overrun with bigger crimes like parking tickets and loose dogs.” I probably shouldn’t have popped off like that, especially when I wanted him to listen to me. “I’m sorry, it’s just hard seeing such a horrible thing and then not having anyone believe me.”
Jane unloaded Gigi from her lift van and rolled her onto the sidewalk to join our conversation.
“Hello, everyone. Is something going on?”
I smiled at Gigi, whose green eyes were taking it all in. “Uh, Amelia Jones is missing. I was just asking the sheriff if they would now drag the lake after I saw a body there. I was telling him I didn’t think he believed me.”
“I never said I didn’t believe you, but we deal in facts. That’s all. No body, no investigation.”
Tim stepped forward. “Now that Amelia is missing, maybe it would be a good idea to drag the lake? Maybe she’s still there.”
“Drag the lake? That’s a pretty big county operation, Tim, besides the fact there’s probably a ton of old garbage at the bottom. I’ll bet there’s sixty years’ worth of six packs and fishing lures.”
“You should drag the lake,” Gigi said through her Tobii, surprising Sheriff Bennett. He shook his head in exasperation.
The sheriff’s radio crackled from the squad car. “Sheriff Bennett? I have Amelia’s sister-in-law on the line.”
“Tell her I’m in an interview and will give her a call shortly,” he responded.
He turned to face me and then Gigi. “Okay, I’ll admit, this is rather odd for Amelia. I thought maybe she was just taking some time away after what happened with Billy. Not that you in any way convinced me that I’m wrong, but now that we officially have a missing person, we might just take a look at the lake.”
As Sheriff Bennett pulled away, Tim’s cell phone rang. He read the screen and then looked back at us. “Excuse me, ladies, the love of my life is calling.” As soon as he stepped into the store, Gigi rapidly typed out a message with her eye gaze.
“New picture.”
“You had a new vision?”
“Yes. The dark one. Have more.”
Jane looked side to side and then said in a soft voice. “Gigi’s mother said she had a nightmare about this. Woke up the whole house.”
“Was it about Amelia?”
“No. About you. Scary. You’re next.”
I didn’t scare easily. When we were kids and Mitch would run at me with a worm, I’d laugh and throw it back at him. Gigi’s nightmare, though, had me rattled.
“How did you know it was me? You couldn’t tell it was Amelia. We still don’t even know it is Amelia who is in the lake. I mean, seriously, Gigi, what is your accuracy rate?”
Gigi bristled at my accusation. She began her response. “One hundred percent. I know it was you.”
“You saw my face? What was I doing?”
“Looking.”
“At what?”
“Don’t know.”
“Gabby,” Jane said. “Gigi’s right. She rarely has a vision that doesn’t come true, and I would ask you not to share this with Sheriff Bennett. If they knew how spot on she was about things around here, her family would never hear the end of it. Gigi doesn’t even want to be able to see these things, but she does. Just take what she’s saying for truth and be on your guard. That’s all we ask. She made me drive here this morning hoping to find you at the art studio. We were surprised to see you outside talking to the sheriff.”
I suddenly felt guilty for doubting Gigi. I was guilty of committing a crime others had committed against me. What she was seeing was real and frightening. “Okay. I’m sorry. I think I’m still pretty shaken up from living out our visions. Now you’re having another one about me. Why am I not seeing this or even drawing this?”
Gigi responded. “Because it’s about you.”
She was right. It didn’t work that way. I had never once had any psychic visions about myself. It always had to do with somebody else. It was inconvenient, to say the least.
I reached over and touched her hand. Her gaze had drifted to the right, far away from me as she attempted to control her muscles. “Okay, thank you for coming to find me, and for looking out for me.” The person I had looking out for me couldn’t move out of the prison of her body. Still, she found me anyway.
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