The Missing Woman: Utterly gripping psychological suspense with heart-thumping twists

by Georgina Cross

  But there’s something else I need to ask Tish.

  “Are you going to tell the police?”

  “I don’t…” She hesitates. “… I don’t think that’s my call right now. Jacob will have to do that.”

  “Have you heard from him again?”

  Another long look at her phone, the screen fading black. “Not since before Amanda left.” She blinks her eyes, tears springing at the corners. “He’s not answering me. That can’t be a good sign.”

  Seven

  We move back inside the house. From Taylor’s bedroom, sounds of a movie playing and I’m thinking Lydia must have found something for the younger kids to watch.

  Behind me, Tish takes a beer out of the fridge—the beer she didn’t want earlier now a necessity. She pops it open and offers one to me, but I wave my hand to say no. After what she’s told me, I can’t stomach it.

  Resuming her spot on the bar stool, she checks her phone for any messages from Jacob but by the way she places it face-down on the counter, he hasn’t responded.

  My phone buzzes. So does Tish’s.

  She instantly flips it over—her eyes bulge—thinking maybe it’s him. I reach for my phone too—it’s Amanda.

  Mark Miller told the police it was Jacob Andrews. Erica, what you heard was right. They think Jacob Andrews tried something the night before.

  Her messages ping one after another. Tish clamps a hand to her mouth and shakes her head with a cry.

  Mark claims he saw Jacob driving in the neighborhood. The cops are talking to him now. This could be it.

  “He’s lying!” Tish slams her phone down so hard I’m afraid she’s cracked it against the counter. But she doesn’t check. A flush of red runs to her forehead.

  My pulse races—erratic, shallow breathing as I watch my best friend respond.

  “He didn’t do anything!” she cries. “It’s impossible! He was at my house, you saw it yourself. Each message places him in my kitchen. Not at the Millers’.”

  I hold her look, hating what I have to say next. The idea we must consider everything.

  “Is there any chance he could have taken those pictures earlier?”

  Tish blazes her eyes at me. “What do you mean?”

  “Could he have taken those pictures and sent them to you later?”

  “Like, made it up? Like, made it seem like he was at my house?”

  I grimace.

  “Don’t say that!” she cries. “Don’t you go thinking he did it too.”

  “I don’t know… I’m not saying… I don’t know anything about him.”

  “I know him. Doesn’t that count?”

  “Yes… yes it should—”

  “It should?”

  “Look, I’m just trying to figure this out. Same as you.” It stings how much I’m hurting her feelings.

  She sets her jaw. “So you think he left my house and sent me those pictures so I would think he was still in my kitchen? And then he went after the Millers?”

  “I don’t know…”

  “Unbelievable.” She picks up her phone. If the screen is cracked, she doesn’t register it—she’s too angry with me, too scared to think about what’s happening to Jacob.

  She pulls up her text messages and points at a picture, her fingernail tapping the screen until her dark nail polish chips. “Then how do you explain it becoming night outside? Huh? The light that’s fading outside my window. See that?” She jabs at the screen again even though I’ve already seen the photo. Jacob Andrews still wearing the mustache I can barely tolerate looking at. “There’s no way he was there,” she tells me.

  “He left and came back?”

  “Oh my God, Erica! Stop!” she shrieks again.

  I cut the air with my hand—a nervous glance toward the kids’ bedrooms. It’s my turn to remind her to keep her voice down.

  But Tish doesn’t quiet herself. “And that part about Mark knowing it was Jacob’s car,” she says. “Another mistake—or another lie. He drives a Tesla, cherry red. The car he drove tonight is a Buick LaCrosse. Black. One of those sedan-looking things.”

  Jacob’s Tesla. I’ve seen that car before—everyone has. Flashy and bright red with Jacob being one of the few people in town who would drive one around in that color. He was parked outside the courthouse several weeks ago when I peeked through the driver’s side window and spotted the matching red leather seats.

  But Tish is telling me he drove something different tonight.

  “So a Buick and not the Tesla?” I ask. “Has Mark seen him drive the Buick before? Is it a company car?”

  “No, it’s a rental. He rents a different one when he comes over.”

  I swallow down my dismay. The covering of his tracks is unbelievable.

  Tish, this doesn’t look good…

  “Did he leave it somewhere else?” I ask.

  “The other car?”

  I tread carefully. “Yes, his other car. After leaving your place, did he switch vehicles? And there’s a chance he took off in his Tesla and that’s what Mark saw?”

  She shakes her head. “No, that wouldn’t make sense. He’d need somebody else to drive it over to him, and why? Why would he do that?” She lifts her phone again. “He was there the whole time. Believe me. It’s a big risk for him to be at my house without being spotted. Every time, he pulls right into my garage. He wouldn’t want to take a chance of going out somewhere else and then back to my place. Definitely not to switch cars.” She cuts me a look at what I’ve implied. “Certainly not to try and hurt the Millers.”

  Thoughts race through my head, a nauseous, sinking feeling, and I chew on my fingernails, something I haven’t done in years. Not since the divorce. Not since—

  “I’m scared for you,” I tell her.

  A whoosh of air comes from her lips, her mouth trembling. “I’m scared too.”

  “When this all gets out, the spotlight will be on you also.”

  “I know.”

  “The affair. Your involvement with him. I don’t know what this is going to do…” I don’t finish my sentence.

  Tish sets down her beer and I reach my hand across the counter. I lift the same bottle to my lips, both our minds whirling.

  “He’s a good guy, Erica,” she says after some time.

  I don’t respond.

  “We’re good together.”

  She presses the bottle back to her lips. “This isn’t how it was supposed to come out. Not like this.” She fights to control her tears. “We were going to do it properly. Wait until after the election. Go to dinner with you.” She looks up. “Maybe a double date with you and that guy you’ve been talking to.”

  Terry. Well, that would be an interesting conversation. I think about the man I’ve started getting to know. So… guess who we’re going to dinner with…

  I look at her steadily. “Jacob’s election chances are over, you know that, right, Tish?” She flinches. “There’s no way he can come back from this. This is too…” I hate saying the word but say it anyway. “… scandalous. Even if he didn’t do anything to the Millers.”

  “He didn’t do anything,” she insists.

  “If the police are questioning him right now, then he’s going to have no choice but to show those pictures too. The text thread with you. Everything you showed me. It will come out in the open about you two.”

  Her voice rises to a feverish pitch. “Then help me, Erica!” she says, pleading. “What am I going to do?”

  Eight

  It’s nearing midnight when Amanda calls.

  “I think you’re off the hook,” she says. “With Mark notifying the police about Jacob Andrews, I’m pretty sure that’s their guy. You don’t need to worry about telling the cops too.”

  I make a sound, my breath exhaling in a loud rush of relief. But at the same time, my nerves skyrocket for Tish.

  “They’ve had Jacob at the police station for the last two hours.”

  With my phone pressed to my ear, I turn away from the l
iving room. Tish is on the couch, having switched from beer to a small glass of whiskey she cradles in her hands.

  “Where are you?” I ask.

  “The nature preserve. My search team was sent this way. Somewhere Sabine has been seen walking before.”

  “They think she’d run in that direction without flagging for help first?”

  “They want us covering all ground. No chance in missing something.”

  “Any witnesses?”

  “Not yet.”

  I think of the Ring doorbell app and security cameras Amanda mentioned before. “Any video?”

  “Nothing that’s been posted yet. I think the police are making the neighbors turn in their videos first.”

  I breathe out a sigh, calmed at the idea we won’t have to watch a clip of Sabine running for her life on some Facebook post after all.

  “You know,” Amanda says, “it’s harsh what people are saying about Jacob. But that guy is losing the election, which could make him have motive. There wasn’t evidence before but after what Mark told police, it doesn’t look good.”

  Evidence. I’m stuck on the word.

  “Turns out it could be something after all,” she adds.

  I move further away from the couch, shielding my face from Tish. “What if it’s not him?”

  “Why would Mark Miller say he saw Jacob driving in the neighborhood? At about the same time he was going home to check on Sabine? The timing of it.”

  “Yes, but maybe he was visiting someone…” I squeeze my eyes shut with each word, not wanting to give myself, or Tish, away just yet.

  “I suppose so. I mean, I guess he could have been. But the odds are slim. He lives out in Madison. His wife wasn’t with him. What would he be doing in Green Cove?”

  “Fireworks?”

  On the other end of the line, Amanda snorts. “I seriously doubt it.”

  I cringe again and wonder how long it’s going to be before Amanda hears about the text messages with Tish. How soon before that kind of information will get out about our best friend’s affair. Proof of Jacob Andrews being at Tish’s house while he’s being questioned by the police. He’ll need an alibi, she told us.

  Amanda is bound to hear about it from someone in the sheriff’s department or a city official and she’ll hear about it soon. She’s always had her finger on the pulse of everything, including tonight. Every update.

  I cast a worried glance at Tish. She’s still on the couch, staring into space with one hand wrapped around her phone waiting for an update from Jacob. Waiting for the moment he will tell her their secret has been kicked wide open.

  Or worse—and what I can’t get out of my head—that he’s lied to her and knows something about Sabine.

  It’s past midnight when Tish asks to spend the night. She’s stayed over numerous times before and with everything that’s happened, especially with the numbing effects of whiskey and Charlie having fallen asleep next to Taylor, she doesn’t want to leave. Her eyes, heavy and red-rimmed with fatigue, stare at her lap. Anxiety prickles her cheeks too.

  She cries a few times as we sit together, silent tears that fall down her face. She wipes the tears away. All I can do is pull a blanket over our laps, the two of us sitting side by side on the couch, my hand clutching hers.

  Through her tears, she asks, “What are people going to say about me? What are they going to think?”

  All I can do is hush her. “Don’t worry about that right now.”

  “How can I not? The talk. There will be so much of it.” She grapples with her words, her breath raspy. “Our neighbors. Amanda. It’s a secret I’ve kept from both of you, and now look.” She searches my face frantically. “This is not how I wanted to tell you, Erica. Trust me.”

  “I know.”

  “I never liked that we were going behind everyone’s backs.”

  “I know,” I say again.

  “The media. Won’t they be all over this too?”

  An idea comes to me suddenly. “Maybe he’ll be able to keep your identity hidden. They won’t have to release the name of who he was with.”

  She seizes on this. “You really think so?”

  “Maybe.” Although I don’t have the faintest clue as to how this kind of thing works.

  She presses a thumb and forefinger to the bridge of her nose and pushes hard. “God, I hope so… It will be awful for him but at least for me…” She can’t finish her sentence.

  “The affair, it’s not good,” I tell her, and she whimpers softly. “But If Jacob is innocent, then him being at your house will be his saving grace. If he didn’t leave and come back like you said, if those pictures are confirmed as being sent from your kitchen while Sabine went missing, then everything will be fine.”

  She nods and closes her eyes, her fingers rubbing her forehead.

  But soon, the tears return and trickle down her cheek, a wet streak coursing its way to her chin.

  “But it won’t be fine,” she says. “Something like this will cost him the election, you said so yourself. People were so quick to judge him about Sabine and now this”— she throws her head back on the sofa — “having an affair. His career will be ruined.”

  My heart breaks for Tish. I squeeze her hand again, grasping her fingers between mine.

  In her lap, her phone lights up. Mine too. But it’s not Jacob, and another shattered look stretches across her face. It’s a group text from the search.

  Eric Nichols: New team forming on Tammerack.

  Carolyn Castillo: Golf course front nine is cleared.

  Scott Wooley: Boats and divers seen on Mallard’s Pond.

  Paul Tomlinson: Group 4, turn back. Honors Row is shut down. Police door-to-door.

  We fall silent, scrolling as one message comes in after another. And as we should have anticipated, more gossip. The conjecture we knew that was coming even as members of the search team poke and prod in the grass, possibly even more irritated and wanting to throw out their theories since they’re the ones stumbling around in the middle of the night in the dark.

  Scott Wooley: He did it. I’m sure he did.

  Lamar Jackson: Did anyone else see Jacob Andrews’ car?

  Alice Chin: Mark Miller said he did and that’s all the police need to hear.

  Carolyn Castillo: Did he have Sabine with him?

  Scott Wooley: I bet she’s inside Jacob’s trunk.

  Anthony Castillo: Hope so. Then we can get this over with and go home.

  Carolyn Castillo: I’m knee-high in mud and there’s a chance she’s inside his trunk?!

  Anthony Castillo: Word is Monica and Carol think Jacob is behind this too.

  Eric Nichols: Keep looking. Don’t give up. We don’t know where she is.

  Scott Wooley: Pop open Jacob’s trunk already.

  Tish lets out a sharp cry.

  Dropping her phone, she lets it slide from her lap to the cushion.

  Nine

  Tish and I fell asleep. I have no idea what time it was but with our bodies curled on the couch, we must have stopped speaking, our thoughts drifting, the pair of us exhausted as Tish gave up on any chance she’d hear from Jacob that night.

  We wake up in the morning to Taylor and Charlie begging us for pancakes.

  It’s Sunday and I’m reminded of how we usually cook a big breakfast on Sunday mornings, a special treat so the girls can throw chocolate chips into the batter while I sizzle bacon in the pan. It’s something my granddad did for me every weekend, coming over to the house early in the morning while my parents left for work. He’s the one who taught me to cook, even if it was the most basic of recipes. And once we added chocolate chips, we felt as if we were eating like kings.

  Tish presses a hand to her head. Managing a smile to her son, he leaps with excitement at finding his mom on the couch and jumps toward her in a wide-open hug that nearly knocks the air from her chest. With his legs kicked out, he nearly tips over the whiskey glass too and it teeters on the coffee table before rattling into place.


  “Pancakes!” Taylor squeals.

  I sit up cautiously, a crick in my neck that I rub gently with my fingers. The blanket Tish and I shared has fallen to the floor.

  One look at my friend’s face and her eyelids are puffy from both crying and battered sleep. The bun that was hiked on top of her head has come loose, her blonde hair hanging in several long strands down her back.

  I run my hands across my face too, knowing I can’t look much better. My hair, not as blonde as Tish’s but honey-gold when I remember to keep up my highlights, is still tied in a knot, but it’s come loose too. Tugging at the hairband, I re-tie the knot and then pat at my eyelids, feeling the creases of the sofa cushion embedded against my cheek.

  Tish gives Charlie a squeeze and he cries, “Mommy!” while she clings to him, landing big kisses on his forehead as they hug and rock together. She grins too, trying her hardest to blink away the fear—the memory of what’s happening shooting back to her, of what we’re going through. She’s doing her best to assure herself that all will be right in this world. She has her son. She has me. We will get through this together.

  I smile at her and she raises her eyes to smile back.

  I stand from the sofa. “Did someone say pancakes?”

  “Hurray!” Taylor cheers as she and Charlie rush to the kitchen. Taylor has always liked mixing the batter and with Charlie’s help, they’ll count out the chocolate chips, each one organized into separate piles before sprinkling them into the mixture.

  Tish checks her phone but frowns. She looks around for something until I realize she’s searching for a charger. Her phone has gone dead.

  “By the window,” I tell her and nudge in the direction of the kitchen table.

  She hurries to plug in her phone while I put on a pot of coffee, thinking we’re going to need about a gallon, and set about grabbing the flour and baking soda, the salt and sugar and a carton of eggs.

  The kids climb on the bar stools and watch as I pour out each ingredient and crack an egg, mixing in the milk and butter. Taylor begins counting out each chocolate chip.