Fear the Worst

by Linwood Barclay

  It didn’t.

  Watching those hundreds of cars and trucks and SUVs racing by, I couldn’t help thinking that if you were in one of those vehicles, in a few short hours you could be anywhere in New England. Boston or Providence, up to Maine. Maybe Vermont or New Hampshire. You could head west and north, be up in Albany in under three hours. Or closer to home, but harder to find, in Manhattan.

  And that would just be the same day you got in one of those cars. By now, weeks later, a person could be almost anywhere.

  If that person was alive.

  I’d been trying very hard, since the moment she’d gone missing, not to let my mind go there. As long as there was no definitive evidence that harm had come to her, I had to believe she was fine. Lost—at least to Susanne and me—but okay.

  The image of that blood on Syd’s Civic, though, was a hard thing to get out of my head.

  And there was an audio loop running through my head. It had been playing for weeks, always below the surface, like a hum, like background noise.

  The loop was made up of questions that I kept asking over and over again.

  Where are you?

  Are you okay?

  What happened?

  Why did you run?

  What scared you?

  Why won’t you get in touch?

  Did you leave because I asked about the sunglasses, and then something happened that kept you from coming back?

  Why can’t you just let me know you’re okay?

  So around nine o’clock, a time of day when, as I’ve gotten older, I’m often ready to nod off, I wasn’t the slightest bit tired.

  I went through the motions anyway. I unzipped the bag I’d taken to Seattle, and there was Milt the stuffed moose looking up at me.

  “Oh shit,” I said, feeling slightly overwhelmed. I took him out and set him on one of the pillows.

  I took my cell phone from my jacket and set it by the bed. I brushed my teeth, stripped down to my boxers, threw back the covers, and got into the bed. I channel-surfed for another ten minutes, then hit the light.

  Stared at the ceiling for half an hour or so.

  Light from Route 1—passing cars and trucks, the neon glow of the commercial strip—was flooding into the room. I thought maybe pulling together the drapes more tightly would block out the light and help me get to sleep.

  I got out of the bed, padded across the industrial carpet, and grabbed one of the drapery wands. But before giving them a pull, I gazed out over this part of Milford. Traffic was thinning, except on the interstate, where it always seemed to be busy. Cars always appeared to be moving so slowly when viewed from some height.

  The view of the nearby businesses from up here was actually pretty good. I could see many of the places I’d visited in the last few weeks. The Howard Johnson’s to the right, the other, small operations to the left.

  I could clearly see the blood-red neon letters of XXX Delights, and half a dozen cars parked out front. I watched men, always alone, go into the store empty-handed, emerge a few minutes later with their evening’s entertainment packaged in plain brown paper.

  A man coming around the corner of the building, where the flower shop was, caught my eye.

  He walked across the lot, pointed a remote, and then the red lights of a van pulsed once. He opened the driver’s door and got in. I wasn’t certain, but it looked like the Toyota van belonging to Shaw Flowers.

  Seemed kind of late for a delivery. Maybe Ian had use of the van any time he wanted. Maybe he had a hot date.

  The van backed out of its spot, then nosed up to the edge of Route 1, waiting for a break in traffic.

  The knock at the door nearly made me jump.

  I turned away from the window, walked across the darkened room, and squinted through the peephole. Veronica Harp, the day manager.

  “Hey!” I shouted through the closed door. “Give me a sec!”

  I flicked one bedside table lamp, found the pants I’d draped over a chair, pulled them on hurriedly, threw on my shirt, and was still buttoning it when I opened the door.

  “How are you?” I said.

  She had traded in her corporate uniform for something more casual. Crisp, tailored jeans, heels, and a royal blue blouse. With her black hair and soulful eyes, you didn’t look at her and immediately think “grandmother.”

  “Oh no,” she said, looking at my bare feet and the buttons I had left to do up. “I caught you at a bad time.”

  “No,” I said, “it’s okay. I couldn’t sleep anyway.”

  “I just popped in and Carter told me you were actually staying in the hotel,” she said. “I was so surprised.”

  “I needed a room,” I said.

  “Did something happen to your house? A fire?”

  “Something like that,” I said. “I’m hoping I’ll be able to go back tomorrow. Get the place cleaned up.”

  “That’s a terrible shame,” Veronica said, still framed in the doorway.

  It seemed rude to make her stand there, so I opened the door wider for her to come inside. She took half a dozen steps in, and I let the door close behind her on its own. She glanced over at the unmade bed.

  “Well, I’m delighted you chose this hotel. There are certainly nicer ones around,” she conceded.

  “I guess, these days, I know this one best,” I said, and offered her a wry smile.

  “I suppose you do,” she said, and smiled back.

  I sidestepped back toward the window, took a quick look outside. It was more difficult to see, what with the room lights reflecting in the glass.

  “Looking for something?” Veronica asked.

  The van was gone.

  “No, just, no, nothing,” I said.

  “You know what?” Veronica said. “I’m intruding. A person should be able to check into a hotel without being pestered by the management.”

  “No, that’s okay,” I said, stepping away from the window and doing up the last of my buttons. I felt a bit self-conscious about my bare feet, but thought it would be silly to pull my socks on at this point.

  “So how’s that grandson of yours?” I asked.

  Veronica brightened. “Oh, he’s wonderful. He’s always watching everything going on around him. I think he’s going to grow up to be an engineer or architect. He has these oversized building blocks in his crib and he’s playing with them all the time.”

  “That’s great,” I said. Then, “Why did Carter tell you I was here?”

  Veronica smiled. “He knows you and I’ve spoken a few times, and he knows how hard you’ve been working to find your daughter.”

  “Maybe he’s tired of seeing me hanging around the parking lot,” I said.

  “Well,” she said, and her voice trailed off. “No one could blame you. Anyone else in your position would be doing everything he could. So this fire? How bad was it?”

  “It wasn’t a fire,” I said. “There was a break-in.”

  Her hand went to her mouth. “Oh my. Did they take a lot?”

  I shook my head slowly. “No. A bit of cash.”

  “That’s an awful thing. You feel so violated.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Can I ask you a weird question?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Would the hotel have a pair of binoculars?”

  “Binoculars? What are you doing? Spying on someone?”

  “No, never mind, forget it.”

  “Why would you want binoculars?”

  “Just passing the time, watching the cars go by. Looking at the trucks on the interstate.”

  Veronica Harp’s eyebrows popped up briefly in puzzlement, but she didn’t pursue it. “Is there anything else I could get you? We don’t have room service here, but if you wanted a pizza or something I could arrange to have it delivered and we could add it to your room bill.”

  “No, I’m good.”

  She walked farther into the room, ran her hand across the top of the rumpled bedclothes, then asked, “Is your room okay?”

  �
�Of course. It’s fine.”

  She turned and faced me head-on, very little space between us.

  “I feel that you’re such a sad man,” she said.

  “I’m kind of going through a rough patch,” I said.

  “I can see it in your eyes. Even before your daughter disappeared, were you sad?”

  I wanted to change the subject. “Are you… What does your husband do?”

  “He passed away two years ago,” she said, and pointed to her chest. “Heart.”

  “He must have been young for a heart attack.”

  “He was twenty years older,” she said. “I miss him very much.”

  “I’m sure you do,” I said.

  “If you didn’t know I had a grandchild, would you have guessed it?”

  “No,” I said, honestly. “Not in a million years.”

  She leaned in, tilted her head up. Before she could kiss me, I turned my head slightly and rested it on her shoulder, held her lightly for several seconds before gently moving her away and creating some distance between us.

  “Veronica…”

  “It’s okay,” she said. “You think it would be wrong, with your daughter…”

  “I…”

  “I know about sadness. I do. My life has been one sadness after another. But if you wait for all of them to be over before you allow yourself any pleasure, you’ll never have any.”

  Part of me would have been happy to forget my problems. To put them aside, however briefly, for some human contact, sex without strings. But nothing about this felt right.

  When I didn’t say anything, she understood we were done. She went to the bedside table and wrote a number on a pad bearing the hotel logo. She tore off the sheet and handed it to me.

  “If you want to talk, or need anything, you call me. Anytime.”

  “Thank you,” I said, and held the door for her as she slipped into the hall.

  I leaned my back against the door for a second, let out a breath, then killed the lights and returned to the window.

  There was something about Ian I couldn’t get out of my head. Something was off about the guy.

  I wanted to know more about him. And for now, that meant watching the flower shop from my perch up in this hotel room.

  But Ian had just left in the van. He could be gone for hours. What was I going to do? Just sit here all night and stare out the window?

  I grabbed the remote, turned the TV to CNN for background noise. I heard Anderson Cooper’s voice, but didn’t listen to anything he had to say.

  There was one cushy chair in the room—the one I’d used to hang my clothes on—and I dragged it over by the window so I could sit comfortably while I conducted my amateur surveillance. I leaned my head up against the glass, frosted it with my breath. I turned the TV so the screen didn’t reflect in the window.

  This was dumb. What the hell was I doing, staring out the window, waiting for some flower delivery guy to return to his apartment? Maybe I was doing it because I couldn’t think of anything.

  I got up, grabbed a pillow, sending Milt on a tumble, and put it between my head and the glass. As awkward as I must have looked, I was actually pretty comfortable.

  So comfortable that I drifted off to sleep.

  I woke myself up with my own snoring, the TV still blaring. I lifted my head away from the window and the pillow fell to the floor.

  I was groggy and disoriented. For several seconds I didn’t know where I was. But quickly things started to make sense. The clock radio by the bed read 12:04.

  I’m at the Just Inn Time. I’m staying here because my house has been trashed.

  It was all coming back to me.

  And I was watching the florist shop.

  I blinked a couple of times and looked out the window. There were fewer cars on the road now. Only a couple of pickups were at the porn shop, which was still open.

  The Toyota van was back. How long it had been there, I had no idea. But clearly Ian was back home and tucked in his—

  Hang on.

  Someone was coming around the back of the van and up the passenger side. The van must have just returned, and Ian had just gotten out the driver’s door.

  He opened the passenger door, but no one stepped out. He leaned in, like he was undoing the seat belt for someone. But he stayed in that position for several seconds, like he was trying to get hold of something.

  Then Ian eased slowly back out of the van, very carefully. He was carrying something large and cumbersome. It looked as though he had something slung over his shoulder, like a sack.

  He backed up far enough to clear the door, slammed it shut. A streetlight was casting a soft glow in his direction. There was just enough light to see that Ian was carrying someone over his shoulder. Someone smaller than himself.

  Someone with long, possibly blonde hair.

  A girl.

  And she wasn’t moving a muscle.

  SEVENTEEN

  I STARTED RUNNING FOR THE DOOR IN MY BARE FEET, stopped, grabbed my shoes, figuring I could slip them on and lace them up in the elevator.

  “Phone,” I said, jerking myself to a stop a second time in as many seconds. I bolted over to the bedside table, reached for the phone, and ended up knocking it down between the bed and the table.

  There wasn’t time to look for it.

  I threw open the door and ran down the hall and hit the down button between the two elevators. I glanced up, saw they were both down in the lobby. Quickly, I slipped my shoes over sockless feet, hopping on one foot, then the other, then, almost as quickly, did up the laces.

  Neither of the elevators had budged from the lobby.

  I realized I’d hit the button—the kind that doesn’t actually depress but senses your finger there—so quickly, it hadn’t registered.

  “Fuck it,” I said and ran to the end of the hall for the stairs. I took them two steps at a time, leaping down them like I was in some new sort of Olympic event. I came through the fire door on the first floor so hard it flew back and hit the wall. I sprinted down the hall and shouted to Carter as I passed him at the front desk: “Call the police!”

  The motion-sensitive doors leading out of the hotel weren’t fast enough for me and I almost crashed through them. I hit the brakes just in time, then slipped through the opening the moment it was wide enough.

  I realized then I didn’t have my keys, but even if I had I don’t know that I would have taken the time to get into my car and start it up. I was running flat out now and I didn’t want anything slowing me down.

  I crossed Route 1 on an angle, only having to slow to let a taxi get by. There wasn’t much traffic at this hour. The small plaza with XXX Delights, Shaw Flowers, and a couple of other businesses was about a hundred yards ahead. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest, and even as I ran I tried to remember the last time I’d run like this. I prayed I didn’t have a heart attack before I reached Ian’s apartment.

  It’s Syd, I told myself. It’s her. He’s got her. He’s had her all along.

  But what the hell was he doing with her in the van? Moving her from one location to another? Actually, maybe that made some sense. He could hardly keep someone hidden in an apartment right behind the shop. Mrs. Shaw would hear something, notice something, wouldn’t she?

  I’d reached the van and ran right past it.

  It was dark around the back of the shop, but there was a single door with a light over it and a small curtained window to the side. There were lights on in the apartment.

  I didn’t bother to knock.

  I tried the door, but it was locked. I put my shoulder into it, tried to force it open, but it held.

  From inside, a man, his voice filled with panic, shouted, “Who is it?”

  “Open up!” I shouted. “Open the door!”

  Again, he shouted, “Who is it!”

  “Open the goddamn door!”

  “I’m not opening the door till you tell me who it is!”

  I reared back, lifted my le
g, and hit the door with the heel of my shoe with all I had. The door gave way a couple of inches, held now only by a chain.

  In the crack, I could see Ian standing in what appeared to be a small kitchen, dressed only in red boxers, his skin pale and freckly.

  He was screaming.

  I gave the door another kick and the chain ripped off. I came through the door and shouted at Ian, “Where is she?”

  “Get out of here!” he shouted. “Get the fuck out of here!”

  The kitchen area was part of a larger room that included a couch and a TV with a DVD player and a game console. It wasn’t much of a place, but for a young guy living alone, it was amazingly neat and tidy. No dirty dishes in the sink, no empty beer cans or pizza containers. A small collection of video game magazines was stacked perfectly on the coffee table.

  “Where is she?” I asked.

  “What?”

  “Where is she?” I was shouting at the top of my lungs.

  “Get out!” Ian shouted.

  There were two doors on the far side of the room. I shoved Ian out of the way and went to the first one, flung it open, expecting a bedroom or closet or bathroom. But it was an entrance into the back of the florist shop.

  I turned to the other door, and as I was putting my hand on the knob Ian pounced on me from behind like a cat. He wrapped his hands around my head, digging his fingers into my eyes and cheeks.

  He was slight, which gave him the edge when it came to speed and nimbleness. I tried to get my fingers under his and pry him off, but he was hanging on. So I propelled myself backwards and into the wall, crushing the wind out of Ian. He let go and fell to the floor. He was up again in an instant, but this time I was ready for him. I put my fist into his face, catching him below his left eye.

  That knocked him back a second time, giving me enough time to throw open the door and enter what turned out to be the bedroom.

  It wasn’t much larger than a walk-in closet. A small dresser along one wall, a narrow door that must have been a closet, and a second door at the other end that was open and showed a sink and toilet.