Because of a Girl (6 page)

Stung, she wouldn't have explained at all if she wasn't painfully aware he was investigating her right along with the girl who'd gone missing under her care.

So she said calmly, “I still do a few of those, but being on the road like that isn't very practical when you're raising a child.” Once upon a time, Emily had loved helping her at summer festivals. “I sell through a number of galleries and gift shops. Increasingly, most of my sales come from my shop on Etsy and my own website. Additionally, I design my own patterns—everything I do is original—and sell kits made from them. I've also licensed a couple of patterns, which means women in China or Bangladesh hook hundreds or thousands of the exact same rug that is then sold through a catalog or in stores. Those are very profitable.” She wasn't about to tell him about the offers she'd declined, when she doubted the quality of the company's products. He could think what he wanted about her. “I'm putting together a proposal for a book right now.”

His expression had become unreadable, another good reason not to trust him too much. His current stare annoyed her. She stared right back, afraid her chin had lifted in a subtle challenge.

If so, he didn't react to that, either. His jaw did tighten. When he finally broke the silence, he managed to take her by surprise.

“Tell me what you know about Sabra's father.”

* * *

J
ACK
WAS
IN
a foul mood by the time he left Meg Harper's house.
Déjà vu.
Mostly he was angry at himself. He'd stayed too long, let the conversation veer into irrelevancies. For minutes at a time, he'd let himself forget why he was there, and he couldn't afford that.

He stalked across her unkempt lawn and swung himself into his department-issue SUV.

The woman was still a cross between a suspect, an informant and a witness. He couldn't yet rule out the possibility that she had a role in Sabra's disappearance. He sure as hell hadn't been able to prove she'd driven the girl to school the way she claimed.

From her glorious hair to eyes that betrayed her every thought to her ripe curves and quick movements, she did it for him physically, big-time; he couldn't deny that. So what? He'd already made his decision. Beyond the purely physical, she was the absolute last kind of woman he'd want to get involved with.

With a snort, he fired up the engine.
An artisan!
And she'd said it with a straight face. What she did was a craft. One with a folk art charm, sure—but to call it work? Glorifying the pretty rugs she made gave her an excuse to play instead of keeping other commitments.

Something like anger roared through him. With a real job, she might be able to buy a decent car or get some work done on her house. Was “hooking” rugs going to pay for her kid's college education? Or was she capable of thinking that far ahead?

She was pretty damned emotional, too, her eyes getting moist because her daughter was acting like every other fifteen-year-old in existence did. Who was she kidding?

Backing out of the driveway, he continued to brood over the woman he'd just left.

Yeah, she'd done a generous thing, taking in a troubled kid just because she was a friend of her daughter. The impulse was good, even if the execution had been as slapdash as he suspected everything else she did. She'd gotten nothing in writing. Letting the authorities know she had the girl? Why would she want to do that?

What annoyed Jack most was how she aroused his protective instincts. He'd had her on his mind all day, worrying about how hard the Child Protective Services worker would come down on her. He had flinched to see the pain in her eyes as her daughter flung angry words.

His fingers tightened on the steering wheel. He would have to step carefully with her. Avoiding her would be best, but that probably wouldn't be possible, if only because he couldn't lean too heavily on Emily without her mother's presence or permission.

And lean he would. Emily was key. If she didn't know what was going on with Sabra, she suspected. Despite her mother's denials, he'd put money on it. And, for no good reason, his gut was telling him that the pregnant girl was in trouble, if not already dead.

During the short drive back to the police station, unease just kept tugging at him, a taut line attached to something unseen. He told himself he was letting other people influence him. It was like an infection, passed first from the principal, with his obvious suspicion of Meg. And then there was Emily. Whatever she knew or didn't, she was scared, just as her mother had said. At her age, she should believe in easy explanations. There were a lot of logical reasons for a teenager to go AWOL. Happened all the time. But Emily had
known
from the minute Sabra disappeared that she was in trouble.

Mulling it over, he decided Emily Harper's fear had been the most contagious of all.

And part of what had him on edge? Teenagers would do a lot to protect a friend, a boyfriend. But despite their natural desire to pull back from parents, that loyalty ran deepest of all. Emily would be most likely to keep her mouth shut if she knew or feared something bad about her mother. She was angry at her mom, no question. Could be normal teenage rebellion. But what if her anger had a different cause?

If that was the case, breaking down her resistance wouldn't be easy. Even abused kids wouldn't speak out against a parent. The fear of the unknown was too great. In Emily's case...he didn't know if she had anyone else. Was her father in the picture? Aunts, uncles, grandparents? He'd have to find out.

Jack pulled into the lot behind the police station, parked and then sat there for a long time, frustrated and confused, uncomfortably aware he was stumbling over his own preconceptions when it came to Meg Harper—when he wasn't imagining her naked instead. And he liked that even less, given the root of those preconceptions.

Groaning, he bumped his head a couple of times against the headrest.

So, okay.
He knew what was eating at him. That meant he could adjust accordingly. Starting now.

Jack got out, locked his vehicle and, as he hunched his shoulders against a chill that did not feel like spring, tried to figure out what came next.

 

CHAPTER SIX

I
T
TURNED
OUT
to be way easier to get people to talk than Emily had expected. Instead of dodging everyone at school on Wednesday, she threw herself into conversations whenever she heard Sabra's name.

“I'm really freaked,” she'd say. “You were her friend, too. What do
you
think?” After a while, she would slip in, “You hung out with her after school sometimes, didn't you?”

A few kids said they did but claimed it wasn't very often. The last guy she'd talked to, Kent Roker, who was really a geek, looked flattered at the idea anyone thought he might be friends with Sabra Lee.

At the front, Mr. Fuentes was writing on the blackboard. At the top, underlined, was “Gritar. To shout or yell.” Below, he began a list.

Yo gritaré

Tú gritarás

Emily stared for a minute. Oh, joy. They were starting future tense.

Kent leaned toward her and lowered his voice. “Sabra's locker is right near mine. So we talk sometimes. You know.”

He wished. He was, like, six foot three or four and probably weighed less than Emily did. She'd never seen anyone so skinny in her life. He claimed the basketball coach had tried to get him to go out for the team, but no one believed him. He fell over his own feet. Speaking of tenses, at least he hadn't said, “We talked.” People were doing that automatically, as if Sabra was gone forever.

“I bet she didn't like to hurry to catch the bus, did she?” Emily said. “Sabra never hurried
any
where.”

He frowned. “I don't think she ever took the bus. She'd still be poking around in her locker when I left, and since I walk, I take my time.”

“Poking around? For what?”

Kent shrugged. “I don't know.” Then he sort of made this face. “It was really messy. I mean, her locker. Like, piled high with stuff. I don't know how she found anything.”

Movement out of the corner of her eye had Emily jerking to attention. Without her noticing, Mr. Fuentes had strolled down the side of the classroom and was looming over her, making her want to scrunch down in her chair.

“Kent. Emily. If you have something to say in Spanish, we'd all be interested.”

Titters erupted. Emily flushed and stared down at her desktop. She hated drawing attention. It was worse because Mr. Fuentes wasn't that much older than his students, and all the girls thought he was hot. His full name was Joaquin Fuentes, which she really liked. She'd never told even Sabra how much she liked him, or that sometimes she thought of him as Joaquin.

Satisfied to have silenced her and Kent, he wound through the room, talking. Usually she paid attention in this class, trying to soak up the Spanish accent that gave her goose bumps. For once, she tuned him out, her thoughts reverting to Sabra.

It was true she was a slob. Emily hadn't told Mom, but most of what she had to pick up the other night was Sabra's. She'd take a clean pile of clothes from Mom, go to the room and just drop them. Eventually, they'd get kicked apart and mixed with dirty clothes. She got dressed right off the floor and never worried about whether a shirt might be wrinkled.

Because
she
was confident, unlike Emily, who always worried about whether she was wearing the right clothes, or looked too skinny, or had put on too much makeup. Of course, no matter what she did, boys noticed Sabra instead.

Well, maybe not so much lately, except her boobs had gotten even bigger, and boys did stare at them.

It was girls
like
Sabra that boys noticed. Blonde. Really curvy, instead of flat-chested and boyish. Maybe most of all, confident. Emily kept thinking that confidence might spread to her, but it hadn't happened. Maybe it was pheromones. Sabra's shouted,
Look at me!

“Yo desagradaré,”
Mr. Fuentes said.

Wait.
That wasn't
shout
.
Degrade...?
No, dislike.

“Tú...?”
He waited, his dark eyes moving from face to face.

Kent raised a hand. Didn't it figure.
“Tú desagradarás.”

Mr. Fuentes smiled.
“Sí.”

Emily suddenly knew she had to get into Sabra's locker. And, wow, she should have thought of it sooner. Sabra showed her texts, and Emily had even seen her call log as Sabra was scrolling down it. So...if her boyfriend didn't call or text, maybe he'd given her presents or written her notes or something. Where else could she keep stuff she didn't want anybody to see? Emily was pretty sure she remembered the locker combination. She'd skip newspaper today but still stay after school.

The bell rang at last. She stuffed her binder into her backpack, zipped it up and rose to her feet, joining the shuffle toward the door. But, behind her, Mr. Fuentes said, “Emily, may I speak with you for a moment?”

“Um...sure.” She turned reluctantly to where he half sat on his desk. The heat in her cheeks told her she was blushing. “I'm sorry I wasn't paying attention,” she said, fast, before he could say anything.

He shook his head. “I understand you're distracted. I actually just wanted to find out how you're holding up, and whether you've learned anything at all about what happened to Sabra.”

She gave one of those shrugs that probably looked stupid. “I'm okay. But... I don't know where Sabra is. The police are searching for her, you know.”

He nodded, expression sympathetic. “So I understand. I guessed you might know more than anyone else.”

“I don't.”

“I'd have thought she would have told you, if anyone, who the father of that baby is.”

She really looked at him. Why was he so interested?

“She is one of my best students, you know.”

“She doesn't even have to
work
at it.” Emily cringed, knowing that sounded whiny. But it was true! Sabra never even studied, and she remembered vocabulary and could conjugate and put together sentences with an accent that sounded like Mr. Fuentes. When Emily asked how, she just shrugged and said, “It's easy. The way math is easy for you.”

When Mr. Fuentes smiled, Emily's cheeks got even hotter.

“You'd better hustle or you'll be late for your next class,” he said kindly.

She backed right into a desk in the front row, scraping it across the floor. She was such a klutz. Not wanting to see if he was laughing at her, she rushed for the door, only to find at the last second that it was blocked.

Detective Moore filled it, one shoulder propped against the doorjamb, like he'd been standing there for a while.
Listening?

“Emily.” He nodded and stepped aside.

She kept her head down, mumbled something and hurried past, even more embarrassed because the way his eyes lingered on her meant he'd noticed that her face was red.

She barely made it through the door to her next class before the bell rang.

* * *

T
HE
S
PANISH
TEACHER
looked interested rather than uncomfortable at Jack's appearance. “Detective Moore? I heard you were making the rounds.”

Jack shook hands with him, curious to see what teenage girls thought was “hot.” There were at least three young male teachers he'd overheard girls talking about as he wandered the halls of Frenchman Lake High School. One taught upper-level math and coached boy's football and baseball, so mostly the girls caught glimpses from afar. That left Joaquin Fuentes, Spanish, and Remy Bouchard, computer science.

Fuentes looked about twenty-two but was probably older than that. He had the glossy black hair and dark eyes that went with his name. Jack guessed he was handsome enough, but he probably wouldn't draw a lot of attention from anyone but hormone-ridden teenage girls.

He wondered if Emily's mother knew she had a crush on her Spanish teacher.

He also wondered whether Sabra Lee might have a crush on him, too—and whether there was the slightest chance it was reciprocated. Wouldn't be the first time a high school teacher got involved with a student.

The teachers were all present and accounted for, however. When the thought had crossed his mind, he'd checked. The only absence this week was the French teacher, female and midfifties, who had had her gallbladder surgically removed and was expected back Monday. To Fuentes, Jack said, “Then you know I'm grasping at straws. Hoping one of Sabra Lee's teachers overheard or saw something that might help provide answers.”

“There's been enough talk—any of us would have come to you.” He sat down behind the desk at the front of the room. “Have a seat,” he added.

Instead of squeezing into a student desk, Jack leaned against the radiator that ran beneath the windows. “I couldn't help overhearing some of your conversation with Emily. I'd give a lot to know who fathered Sabra's baby.”

The Spanish teacher nodded, looking serious and concerned. He did the expression well. “That's why I asked Emily. I thought she might be more likely to talk to me than to a police officer or her mother. You know how it is with kids.”

“Especially ones who blush when their teacher talks to them.”

Some color rose in his cheeks, too. “I can't deny I get some of that,” he admitted. “I figure I'll age out pretty quick, though. I'm not so sure Emily is one of those girls anyway. She was embarrassed because she didn't pay attention in class and I called her on it.”

That's not what he thought at all, but Jack didn't say a word.

“I'm engaged,” Fuentes added. “I make a point of mentioning Charlotte often.”

A lot of nubile young women in and out of his classroom all day, though. Some men would find that pretty tempting. Jack didn't get that vibe from this guy, but he'd been mistaken before.

“Tell me about Sabra,” he said abruptly.

Fuentes spread his hands. “In this subject, she's a natural. I asked once if she had someone in her life who was a native speaker, because she's picked up the language so easily, but she says not. There are people like that. I had a roommate in college who could learn another language in a matter of weeks. It's a gift.”

“I hear the more languages you speak, the quicker you can pick up a new one,” Jack commented. “But this was presumably only Sabra's second language.”

“That's true, but I'm not saying she's fluent. This is only second year, remember. She's ahead of the game enough, though, I was thinking of suggesting she skip third year and sign up for fourth. If she was interested in continuing after that, we could create individualized, AP-level work for her.”

“She's quite an artist, too, you know.”

He smiled. “Mrs. Guzman brags about her. Unfortunately, Sabra struggles some in classes that require serious effort from her.”

“You had her last year, too.”

He looked cautious. “I did.”

“Did she work harder last year than she has been this year, do you think?”

Fuentes pondered that. He finally said, “I'm not the person to ask. I doubt she's ever needed to study for my class. Are you suggesting she's taking school less seriously this year?”

“Something like that. She has hinted at a plan that might involve her dropping out.”

Fuentes frowned, appearing disturbed by the idea. “She has so much potential! Surely she's too smart not to stay in school.”

“I'm not sure she's thinking very clearly these days.” If kids that age ever did.

Shaking his head, the Spanish teacher said, “I wish I could tell you more, but I start class the minute students sit down and don't tolerate whispering or texting. I'm only vaguely aware who is friends with whom, and I only have an idea about some of the romances because I can't help noticing the PDA in the halls.”

Jack grimaced. He'd had to avert his face a few times since he'd started haunting the high school. It was probably a sign he was aging that he was almost shocked to see a kid who barely shaved stick his tongue down a girl's throat. He'd done the same, although not as publicly. Now the students just looked too young.

He handed over his card, thanked Fuentes and asked him to call if he heard or remembered anything helpful.

Jack's plan now was to cut out and put in some time on one of his other investigations, which had already intruded on his day. He'd intended to be here third period to talk to Sabra's computer science teacher, whose name, oddly enough, was French, while the French teacher at the high school was Pamela Murray, the gallstone victim. If he kept an eye on his watch, though, he could make it back to talk to the English teacher, whose planning period was at the end of the day.

Right
, he thought glumly. To put it another way, he'd burn some more hours without learning a damn thing. High school teachers were probably a little more tuned in to kids than most adults were, but
all
adults stood on the outside of a wall that might be invisible but was very real. At best, he could hope a teacher had overheard something, the significance of which hadn't occurred to him or her yet.

Although, he hadn't known about Sabra's facility with the Spanish language. Maybe it did just come easily to her, as Fuentes suggested. But what if she was spending time with a Spanish speaker? The high school had quite a few; this was an agricultural county, and most of the farm and vineyard laborers were Hispanic.

So...what if the current daddy-to-be was Hispanic? Jack wouldn't blame his parents for flipping out at the idea of their son taking on a pregnant wife who didn't even share their culture, quitting school to work the fields to support a family instead of getting the education that could give him opportunities they'd never had. It might be even trickier if the parents—and possibly the boy, too—were in this country illegally.