Robards, Karen (2 page)

it hurt to acknowledge that Jessica was lying to her. It hurt then, and it hurt now, But then, she’d let her ff chance that she daughter get away w1th 1t, on the o

was telling the truth-e that she would not repeatBig mistake, and on

No more Mr. Nice MOMMY for Miss Jess. This lower the boom.

time, Grace meant to air and worry until But she could do nothing but w I

Jessica came home-eyes. From her second-floor vanGrace opened her see half a dozen darkened houses tage point, she could and west along their street, Spring stretching to the east two-story, deceptively unpretenHill Lane. All were

THE MIDNIGHT HOUR 9

tious residences built in the ‘20s and ‘30s, nestled cozily into tree-dotted grounds of half an acre or more per house. Their own house was of narrow white claipboards, with ten-foot-tal] ceilings inside and greenpainted shutters outside. It blended with its neighbors harmoniously, though none of them was in precisely the same style. A suburb of Columbus, Ohio, Bexley was an old neighborhood, well established, moneyed, safe. Which was why she had chosen it as the ideal place to bring up her daughter.

The tall oaks and elms standing sentinel in her own front yard swayed as a gust of wind caught their branches. A flurry of dislodged leaves swirled through the air, then drifted ghostlike toward the ground. Long shadows cast by a high-flying moon shifted and blended into the line of blackness that was the fourfoot-tall privet hedge bordering the street. It was September, and the wind would be warm. Moonlight washed the landscape.

Behind her came the continuous whir of Godzifla on his exercise wheel. The sound was oddly comforting now. At least she was not totally alone in the house.

jess was okay. She had to keep telling herself that. After all, Jessica was not out in the cold or the rain. She was not lost, and she probably was not alone.

It was Jessica’s mother who was alone. And lost. And scared.

Out on the lawn, the shadows danced with the wind. One separated itself from the others, moving with seeming purpose toward a far corner of the yard, Grace blinked with surprise, then realized that she was

10 KAREN ROBARDS

away from her house toward watching someone walk gate in the hedge—

the sniall, wrought-‘ron. I ime ne of her friends. it had to be-This t Jess, or 0 of coming in—

she had caught her daughter in the act

or going Out. s finished, Grace whirled and Before the thought wa feet moved soundlessly over ran for the stairs. Her bare red the upstairs the thick, moss-green carpet that cove

elves, and made scarcely more hall and the steps thems . ntal runner and noise as they encountered the orie center entrance highly polished hardwood floor of the e discovered as front door was unlocked, sh I

hall. The s would never go out and leave she turned the knob-3es two females living alone, they the house unlocked-As

were both extra careful about that-rch, Had she been no farther away than her own po

or yard, all this time? the door and burst through the Grace yanked open the covered front porch-The unlatched screen onto ch floor felt cold to concrete slabs that made up the por

her feet. The wicker swing suspended from chains at by the wind. The the far end creaked as it was caught as if pushed gently matching white rockers moved too, A lightning glance back and forth by unseen occupants.

around told Grace that her daughter was not there. She half-dozen brick stairs that led ran to the top of the

down to the yard-d curled around the cool wrought “Jessica!” Her han at the prospect Of iron of the banister. Embarrassment

waking the neighbors moderated her volume to some in . t the degree. Though it was hard to be certa* anuds obscuring shadows, Grace thought the figure heading

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11

toward the gate paused at the sound of her voice. Certainly it glanced back. Moonlight glinted briefly on a pale oval face.

“Jessica Hart, you come back here this instarit!” If there was a cross between a hiss and a shout, that was the voice Grace used as she descended the front steps, beckoning imperiously to her daughter.

Jessica heard, and saw. The stillness of her, and the fact that she continued to look back, told Grace that. Grace was thankful that she didn’t need to scream at the top of her lungs to get her message across.

Although she would have, if necessary.

Two yards over, the Welch’s dog began to bark. It was a Scottie with an unmistakable, high-pitched yip. Someone must have forgotten to let it in for the night, as they sometimes did, to the consternation of all the neighbors.

just as Grace reached the brick sidewalk at the base of the steps, Jessica moved. She turned, leaped like a deer over the remaining few feet of lawn, snatched open the gate, and ran headlong down the street.

jaw dropping at this blatant act of defiance, Grace needed only the space of a pa’r of heartbeats to respond. Unconcerned with her bare feet or the fact that she was wearing only her nightgown, Grace pounded across the yard in hot pursuit.

“Jessica!” The grass was firm and faintly prickly underfoot, the ground damp but not overly cold. The scattering of fallen leaves was slippery when stepped on, like magazine pages on carpet. Wood smoke from an afternoon of leaf burning lingered in the balmy night air. She trod

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on a sharp stick and yelped, but didn’t stop. Unbellievably, Jessica was running away from her, fleeing down the road.

“Jessica!” Grace reached the -ate at the corner of the yard, r

jerked it open, and bounded through it. Her right foot came down squarely on something soft and squishy and round and furry. Something that didn’t belong in a grassy yard. Something that rolled as she stepped on it.

“at … Grace thought even as she lost her balance and fell, landing heavily on the asphalt road. The impact to her knees and palms was instantaneous, jarring, and painful. She cried out.

At the sound, Jessica glanced back, but didn’t stop. She had almost reached the bend in the road that would hide her fi7oin her mother’s sight. Gasping with exertion and pain, Grace could do nothing but gaze furiously after her.

The fleeing figure ran through a bright patch of moonlight that spilled in a narrow swath across the road. At last it was clearly illuminated.

With a thrill of disbelief, Grace realized that the person she had been pursuing so desperately was someone she did not know.

The hip-length dark coat and dark knit watch cap did not belong to Jessica. Jessica was not that tall, or that bulky. Jessica did not move like that. It was not Jessica.

Whoever it was ran on around the bend, and out of sight.

It was a long moment before Grace was able to glance away fi-orn the spot where the figure had disap—

THE MIDNIGHT HOUR 13

peared-The next object that registered with her confused senses was the soft, squishy, furry thing she had stepped on to cause her fall, which now Jay just a few inches from her right hand.

It was a teddy bear.

Jessica’s teddy bear, to be precise, the one she had owned since she was a tiny girl. The one she loved. The one that, up until at least tonight’s bedtime when Grace had seen it there as she bade her daughter good night, had been perched onjessica’s bedside table ready to watch overjess as she slept.

Now it was lying in the grass beside the road, button eyes staring Sightlessly up into the dark night sky.

HAT TIME DID YOU LAST see your daugh/L)ter, judge Hart?” The gray-haired, sixty-ish patrolman-J. D. Gelinsky, according to the name badge on the breast pocket of his blue uniforrri—was polite, even deferential, as befitted Grace’s status as a member of the local judiciary. She didn’t know him, although he looked vaguely familiar, and she guessed that she had seen him around the courthouse once or twice. Bexley had its own police force to tend to traffic matters and the other petty crimes that occasionaRy occurred in the small city, and she doubted that its officers made many appearances m juvenile and Doniestic Court. At any rate, he seemed to know who she was, which was both good and bad. A stickler for paper-work and punctuality, she had a reputation as a tough, no-nonsense jurist. Not all cops appreciated that. Especially if they had a tendency to be late, or ill prepared, when they came to court.

Licking her dry lips, striving to present a calm, professional demeanor, Grace thought that, at the moTHE MIDNIGHT HOUR

15

ruent, she didn’t feel much like a judge. What she felt like was a mother, an increasingly frightened niother whose beloved only child was missing. A mother who had awakened in the middle of the night to find her claughter gone and a stranger fleeing her house.

It was possible that the two circumstances were not connected.

She shivered, icy with the acute sense of foreboding that had caused her to call the police.

Had Jessica merely snuck out again-or had something far more sinister befallen her, The former was still possible, but her mother’s intuition was on red alert.

She felt thatJessica was in danger.

“Around ten. I went into her room to say good night.” The careful evenness of her voice was belled by the nervous movements of her fingers digging deeply into the nappy brown fur of the teddy bear, which she held on her lap. Her palins, scratched In her fall, burned; her skinned knees stung. Wearing hastily donned khaki slacks, a black turtleneck, and black flats, Grace sat on the gold damask couch in the formal living room, perched on it, reafly, on the very edge, as if she would spring up at any moment. Officer Gelinsky sat solidly in the armchair opposite her, pen in hand, pad on knees, his gaze on her face. His stolidness was driving her insane. He behaved as ifJessica being missing was of no greater importance than a report of a burglary, or one more stolen car.

Grace felt as if the cold were sinking clear through to her bones. The house had seemed warm earlier, she

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remembered. Before she had discovered Jessica was gone. Now it felt like the inside of a refrigerator.

Perhaps, she thought, striving to maintain selfcontrol, the chill in the room had something to do with it’, coot color scheme: the walls were painted a deep Wedgwood blue, the heavy silk curtains were blueand-gold striped, and the carpet was an Aubusson that

d the rug was was predominantly blue. The floor aroun

highly polished dark wood, and the fireplace mantel was of carved white marble. Everything was well polished, immaculate, and looked cold to the touch. The only warm note in the room was the painting above the fireplace.

It was a pastel likeness of Jessica at six. Jessica with her light brown hair in two braids, wearing a white pinafore over a yellow gingham dress, her blue eyesso like Grace’s-huge and solenin.

Grace could not stop glancing at that portrait. The tightness in her chest intensified another degree every time she did.

Where was Jessica?

“And she was in bed at that time?”

They had gone over this once already, when Officer Gelinsky and his partner had first arrived, Now the partner, a blond woman in perhaps her mid-thirties whom Grace was sure she did not know, was upstairs checking out Jessica’s room, while Officer Gelinsky led Grace through the events of the night for a second time.

“Yes. She was in bed.”

“What made you decide to check on her when you did?”

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17

“I don’t know. I … woke up. I don’t know why. Arid I went in to check on Jessica. And she wasn’t there.” Grace clutched the stuffed bear on her lap tighter, oblivious to the tingling In her sore palms. Mr. Bear, that was what Jess had always called him. She stole a sidelong glance at the portrait, and felt her throat constrict. “Jessica-this is her teddy bear. It sat on the night table by her bed. It was lying outside, near the road. I stepped on it. Whoever I was chasing must have dropped it. He must have been in her room. I’m qfraid he may have done something tojessica.”

Burgeoning fear added urgency to her words. “Don’t worry, judge Hart. If she’s out there, we’ll find her. I’ve already called it in, and by now the whole force should be aware that your daughter’s missing, She’ll be priority number one until she’s found.” His gaze dropped back to his pad, and he cleared his throat. “You say that the man you chased-it was a man?- was alone, is that right?”

Grace took a deep breath, fighting to remain calm. Hideous visions ofJon-Benet Ramsey were starting to da .ncie in her head. A tale of a predawn intruder, a missing child, then later, a body …

You’re being ridiculous, she told herself sterry. It was just this mother-sense she had that something was wrong.

“Whoever I chased was alone, I think it was a man. I … can’t be one hundred percent sure. It looked like a man. But I can’t be sure.”

“But you are certain your daughter was not with him?”

“Yes, I am certain of that.”

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“And you say your daughter has left the house at night before without telling you?”

The admission was just as humiliating the second time as it had been the first.

“Yes. She’s snuck out at night twice in the last few months. She Is a freshman in high school this year, and …”

Her voice trailed off as the blond officer came back into the room, shaking her head significantly at Officer Gelinsky. Grace closed her month and felt her muscles tense. nund if I take a look through the rest of “Do you

the house?” the woman asked her. Sarah Ayres, read her name tag.

The Ramsey child’s body had been found in the basement… .

stop it, Grace told herself fiercely. Jessica was all right. Of course she was all right. She had to be all right. Grace swallowed, fighting to keep her voice steady. “No. I mean, please do. Do you-shall I show you around?”

Officer Ayres exchanged looks with her partner. “No, thanks, I can find my way,” she said, and left the room.

Grace felt cold sweat break out on her forehead. “When you went out the front door-you said you went out the front door, didn’t you?-was it locked?” Officer Gelinsky glanced down at his notes again as he spoke.