Because of a Girl (10 page)

“Ms. Harper?” he called. “You home?”

She appeared immediately from the former dining room, wearing a snug T-shirt, flip-flops and thin black knit pants that hugged rounded hips and draped over those long, lean legs. Her hair was French-braided. His body stirred. Why couldn't she have on one of her sacky getups? He forced his gaze to her face, bare of makeup. Did she ever wear any?

“Emily, put your pack down.” Her stern tone was new to him, and it startled her daughter. “You and I need to talk.” Then she turned her gaze to him. “Detective.”

“Jack.”

Her lips compressed, but at least she didn't share her daughter's open hostility. She briefly contemplated the black plastic bag he carried. “I think you ought to see this, too.”

This?
His eyebrows climbed. “All right. I have something I'd like to show both of you, too.”

Emily gave him a vitriolic look. “You took stuff from her locker.”

He met her eyes. “I'm not the only one who did. Am I, Emily?”

She backed up a step, crying, “What are you talking about?”

“Oh, I think you know.”

Her panicked gaze swung to her mother, who did not appear sympathetic. “Kitchen,” Meg snapped.

“Fine!” Emily stomped toward the back of the house.

Jack closed the door behind him, then gestured for Meg to precede him. He just had to see the view from behind. Her butt was a fine sight, as he'd expected, taut and well-rounded, shaped for his hands.

A screech came from the kitchen. Shock and fury twisted Emily's face. “You went through my room! How could you?”

The farm table was covered with piles of what looked like schoolwork and handwritten notes. The pages were dog-eared, crumpled and creased.

“I trusted you.” Meg looked almost as distraught as her daughter. “Jack was so sure you must know something, and I've been defending you all along. I really thought I wouldn't find a thing.”

“If you trusted me, you wouldn't have searched my room.”

Meg stared her daughter down. “In agreeing to take Sabra in, I committed myself to protecting her, just as I would you. I believe you're scared for her.
This
—” her hand swept out toward the heap of papers “—suggests you do suspect things you aren't telling me or Detective Moore.”

If he wasn't mistaken, the kid was shell-shocked by the emergence of Fierce Mom.

“I don't!”

Meg's bewilderment showed. “I don't understand. Why would you have hidden anything of Sabra's that might help us?”

Jack nodded toward the table. “Is this what you took out of Sabra's locker, Emily?”

Her panicked gaze swung from one to the other of them. “Why would I—”

“I don't know,” he said. “Why did you?”

“Because I thought I'd find something!” she screamed. “But I didn't! Okay?”

Meg shook her head. “Not okay. You must have realized the detective would be going through Sabra's locker. What is it you didn't want him to see?”

“Nothing!” Angry tears brimmed in her eyes. “She's my friend! She wouldn't want
him
touching all her stuff.”

If she'd been armed, he would have been afraid.

“Emily.” Meg sank onto one of the straight-back chairs as if her legs had failed her. She sounded weary. “If you have even the smallest suspicion about where Sabra went or who she went with, you have to tell us. Whether you like it or not, we're the adults.”

“It's not like you've found her, have you?” she spat. “You don't understand either of us
at all
!”

“I was your age once upon a time.” Apparently, Meg thought she had to try. “Like Sabra, I was pregnant. So what is it I don't understand?”

Tears ran down Emily's cheeks. Seemingly mute, she stood with fists clenched.

Jack had a flash of insight. Maybe he should keep it to himself, but his gut said no.

“We're not what's bothering you at all, are we?” He tried to sound kind. “What upsets you is that you thought you were her best friend, but Sabra kept things from you. Big secrets. As if she thought you wouldn't approve of whatever she'd done.” He paused, frowning. “Or she didn't trust you.”

Her face contorted, and she yelled, “I hate you both!” In what had become a familiar pattern, she tore from the room. This time, though, they both heard the front door open and slam shut.

 

CHAPTER TEN

“S
HOULD
I
GO
after her?” Jack said after a moment. “She'll come home, won't she?”

“Where would she go?” Meg said dully.

“A friend's?” He thought of worse possibilities. “Hitch to a grandparent's or aunt and uncle's place?”

“She has friends.” She sat like stone. “Relatives? We have none of the above.”

“None?” he said, not as surprised as he should be.

Her eyes opened at last, the expression so bleak he flinched. “None she would want to know.”

Jack grabbed the chair closest to hers and sat, too. He took one of her hands in his, and, when he found it icy cold, reached for the other one, too, trying to share his warmth. He wasn't sure Meg was even aware they were now holding hands.

“Did your parents throw you out?” he asked gently.

“And the prize goes to...” she murmured.

He saw things day in and day out that he, as a human being, didn't get. The hollow place in him left by his mother's abandonment made him especially sensitive to stories like Meg's—and Sabra's. He'd known all along that his own history explained some of why he had become obsessed with finding the girl.

He kept his voice soft. “Will you tell me what happened? How you survived?”

She shook her head. “I can't. Even Emily doesn't have any idea how hard it was. I never wanted her to know.”

His brows drew together. “What do you mean, she doesn't know? Does she think you had loving parents who helped you? What did you tell her, that they died?” He paused. “Are they dead, Meg?”

“That's none of your business!”

“Isn't it?”

She went still, staring at him. “I don't...know what you're talking about.”

Or didn't want to admit she felt the connection between them, too. But since he still wasn't so sure he wanted it to go anywhere, he said nothing. Instead, he contented himself with tracing patterns on the backs of both of her hands with his thumbs, feeling the fragility of her bones beneath fine-textured skin.

“I have no reason to think they're dead, but I don't know.” She said it so quietly, he had to lean forward to hear. “I've never looked.”

“I'm sorry, Meg. So sorry.” Damn, his presumptions about her had been turned end over end. He couldn't even be sure when it had happened.

Jack was disturbed to be so convinced no kindly adult had taken Meg in, sheltering her until she was able to support her daughter. Maybe he was wrong, but...the faces of homeless kids he'd seen begging in Seattle slid through his mind. Some hungry, some with eyes so much older than their actual years. Girls turning tricks, boys, too skinny, sliding out of sight behind Dumpsters in dirty alleys. Had Meg Harper been one of them? He almost shuddered at the too-vivid picture. The need to know would eat at him now.

“Meg?”

She looked up at him, eyes wide, searching, painfully vulnerable. Then she began shaking her head and tugged her hands free of his, even scooting her chair back a few inches.

“No. There's no reason for us to be talking about this.”

Punched by awareness of how much he wanted to know and why, Jack sought a back door. “Emily doesn't remember?”

“How much do any of us remember before we're five or so?” she challenged him.

“Consciously? Maybe not a lot. But judging by the research on babies that aren't handled and talked to, we have to assume what happened when we were really young still has a profound impact on the kind of person we become.”

Her laugh was harsh. “I hope you didn't mean that to be reassuring.”

Jack sighed. “No, and I shouldn't have said it at all.”

“You shouldn't.” Pride had her holding her head high. “Can we talk about this?” Meg waved at the papers scattered over the table and the bag he'd let fall to the floor.

“Yeah.” He shouldn't have pushed at all. And he did need to know what she'd found that had upset her. “You start. Where had Emily stashed all this?”

* * *

J
ACK
SOUNDED
RELUCTANT
when he said at last, “I should get out of here. Emily may be waiting until I'm gone to come home.”

Call her pathetic, but Meg wanted to beg him to stay. He gave her the pretense that she wasn't entirely on her own. That he
cared
, even though she kept reminding herself that he might still suspect she'd conked Sabra over the head and buried her body in the backyard. She couldn't exactly say he made her feel safe, because he also alarmed her on a fundamental level. Not so much because he was in law enforcement, although there'd been a time she'd tried to avoid being noticed by any cop in the vicinity. His solidity and strength drew her, though; she couldn't deny it. She liked his size and breadth, too, the lock of hair that sometimes fell over his forehead, the way his big hands engulfed hers. Her belief that he would be infinitely reliable when he offered his support was both seductive and unreal. But a man she hadn't so much as met a week ago?

And did it matter anyway? The harsh truth was that nothing in her life gave her the ability to love and trust anyone but Emily.

“She feels betrayed.” The words rushed out. “And I didn't even find anything very helpful.”

“It's interesting that Sabra seemed to have a crush on Bouchard.”

Meg pulled herself together. Despite the temptation, she didn't want Jack to guess how vulnerable she felt right now. “All girls have a crush on a teacher at some point. Emily blushes every time she mentions Mr. Fuentes. She scribbled his first name on the margins of one of her papers, and snatched it out of my hands when she remembered. And the truth is, Mr. Bouchard
is
an attractive man.”

Jack's mouth tightened, as if he didn't like her thinking that. “He's married. Has two kids.”

“I know that. And so does Sabra. Which makes him safe as a fantasy figure.”

“Huh.” He appeared bemused. “I didn't have a single woman teacher I'd have wanted to imagine naked.”

Despite herself, she laughed, her mood easing. “Were any of them in their twenties?”

His grin was wicked and charming both. “No, they were all at least as old as my dad.”

His dad? Why wouldn't he have said his mom, considering they were talking about women?

He must have seen her speculative expression, because he said shortly, “My parents split when I was ten. I stayed with my father.”

“Oh.” Were her cheeks heating, as if she were fifteen again? What an awful thought. The last thing in the world she would want was to go back to that year, of all others.

“I'd like to take this pile with me,” he said.

She'd already guessed that's what he had in mind, as he'd set aside various notes Sabra had written. A couple had been in Spanish, which seemed to interest him.

“But you're leaving the dirty clothes for me?”

He laughed. “Afraid so. I've got to tell you—her locker reeked. I always thought schools smell musty because they're old, or the lunches are so bad. Now I know the truth. It's the filthy PE clothes and shoes at the bottom of half the lockers.”

She heard herself giggle. “There are worse things. Surely you've found drugs in school lockers?”

“Yeah, when I was still in uniform, we took a drug-sniffing dog to the local high school. I worked in Bellevue at the time,” he added as a clear aside. “The dog was interested in a lot of lockers.”

Meg shook her head. “And you'd think all the decomposing PE clothes would have kept them from smelling anything else.”

Jack chuckled. “You would.” He considered her for a moment that stretched and made her pulse pick up speed, then pushed back his chair, stood and stretched. “Shall I take this garbage on my way out?”

“Oh, that's okay. I'll carry it out.”

He shook his head and picked up the bag anyway. Meg could hardly argue. She walked with him, showing him where the bins were around the side of the house.

“Why were you interested in the notes that were in Spanish?” she asked suddenly. “You're not thinking Mr. Fuentes?”

His glance was sharp. “I'm not ruling anyone out yet. Emily told me Sabra was tutoring a boy whose first language is Spanish. Fuentes is adviser to the program, but he didn't think to tell me Sabra was involved. I can't help wondering why.”

“I should have remembered that. It was one of the things she did after school.”

“That's what I hear. I got the name of the kid she was tutoring and plan to talk to him.” He pushed the button on his remote, making the SUV lights flash. “Did you ever talk about what she did after school?”

Naturally, she felt defensive, but she made herself say honestly, “Yes, but she always made it sound logical. She was going to some friend's house or watching basketball practice or tutoring. Emily has activities after school half the time, too. She...led me to think the two of them were involved in some of them together.” That was hard to say. “I suspected Sabra felt uncomfortable being here without Emily. I wanted her to feel as if it's home, but...”

He nodded, his expression understanding rather than judgmental. “That makes sense.”

“Is there anyone else left you have to talk to?” she asked.

Creases formed on his forehead. “I'm running out of ideas,” he admitted. “And justification for pursuing this.”

“What?” With a stab of alarm, she said, “You won't quit looking, will you? She's been gone a week!”

He rolled his shoulders, as if to ease tension, but didn't let himself look away. “I won't quit, but I can't give this the hours I have been, either. My lieutenant thinks it's likeliest that Sabra ran away, and I don't have any evidence to prove he's wrong. Kids her age do take off all too frequently. With her feeling abandoned by her mother and maybe the father of the baby...” He spread his hands.

Her vision blurring, Meg whispered, “But it's so hard to make it on your own. Pregnant, and then with a baby... Doesn't she understand that? It was safe here. It was!”

“I know, Meg.” He squeezed her upper arms. “I know, honey.”

I'm crying
, she thought in astonishment. She didn't cry. Ever. But she had to be, because she could see his expression of helplessness.

“I'm sorry.” She tried to back away. “It's okay. You can go.” But she tasted the salty tears because she'd opened her mouth, and still they fell.

He muttered something she couldn't make out, and then his arms closed around her and she was sobbing into his white shirt. She gripped the fabric and held on for dear life as she fell apart. One of his big hands moved in soothing circles on her back, and he rubbed his cheek against her head.

“I know you're scared,” he murmured. “It's okay. Let yourself cry. We'll find her. I won't give up. I promise I won't.”

The storm slowly passed. Meg let the peaceful aftermath settle into her heart. She wasn't sure she could stand on her own, so she gave herself permission to lean, but only for a minute. No longer, because she was becoming aware of how firm his chest was beneath her cheek, of the strength of his arms and the thighs that pressed against her own. When she thought,
He smells good
, embarrassment came to her rescue. Alarm followed on its heels. Sniffing, she backed away. “I need to—” She gestured at her face, then fled, taking with her the memory of the worry and dismay darkening his eyes.

Not until she was in her own bathroom, staring at her blotchy face, did she remember him calling her
honey
in that deep, soothing voice.

* * *

J
ACK
SPENT
F
RIDAY
morning conducting interviews at a local nonprofit that focused on low-income housing and emergency shelter. An audit had revealed missing money: more than $30,000 this year alone.

He'd silenced his phone twice without looking to see who the callers were. Not until he was alone behind the wheel of his SUV did he go to voice mail. The first message was from his mother; he deleted it without listening. It was Emily Harper's youthful voice he heard next. After yesterday afternoon's scene, she was the absolute last person he'd have expected to call him.

“Um... I know I didn't want to talk to you yesterday, and you'll probably tell me this isn't any of my business, but you're wrong. I care more about what happened to Sabra than anyone else does.
You
probably just think she ran away.”

His eyebrows twitched at that. She thought he'd waste the kind of hours he'd put in on this if he really believed her friend had taken off on her own?

“The thing is,” Emily continued, sounding as if she'd taken a big breath for courage, “I heard Ms. Guzman told you she'd seen Sabra with Asher out front of school that morning. Supposedly, somebody heard you and Ms. Guzman talking. But I asked him, and he said he wasn't there and he doesn't know why she'd claim he was.” Pause. Her voice became more timid. “So, um, is it true? That she saw him?”

Dead air told him she was gone. She hadn't called back. He glanced at his watch. She'd had an earlier lunch. Both lunch periods at the high school finished well before noon, logical since the first bell rang so obscenely early. She presumably had her ringer off in class.

Leave her a message, or text?

He decided on texting.

Ms. Guzman did NOT tell me she saw Sabra. I'll verify. Who said they heard this?

Jack hadn't gotten two blocks when his phone buzzed. He pulled to the curb and read Emily's response.

Some girl said she heard. I can ask her who told her.

Crap
, he thought. The last thing he wanted was a fifteen-year-old kid putting herself out there by investigating. He had no solid reason to think she'd be in danger if word got around that she was asking questions, but he was paranoid enough to be made uneasy by the idea.