Tell Me Lies (32 page)

The voice rasped again. “You know you’re guilty. Turn yourself in. Do it. Do it now.”

“Listen to me,
”Maddie said, rage making her voice sharp. “If anything happens to my daughter, I will find you and kill you. If there’s a mark on her, I will find you and kill you. If—”

“You’re wasting time.
You only got fifteen minutes to call Henry. Do it or you won’t ever see her again.
Ever!”

“Wait a minute,”
Maddie screamed into the receiver, but all she got in return was a dial tone.

She hung up the phone and shook for a moment, trying to think. She had to find Henry’s number. No, she could do 911. Her fingers fumbled with the phone buttons. Em was somewhere with a maniac. The police switchboard answered and she screamed,
“Get me Sheriff Henley.
”Henry’s voice came on seconds later and said, “What the hell is this?” and Maddie said, “I did it, Henry, I killed my husband, get over and arrest me and make sure you use the siren,
hurry!”

Henry said, “Maddie?” and she said,
“Hurry.
And use the siren, promise you’ll use the siren, and
hurry.”

He used the siren. By the time he was at her front door, the whole street was on their respective front porches, and Maddie didn’t give a damn. All she could think of was Em scared, Em hurt, Em with a kidnapper, and panic made her weak.

“What the hell is going on?” Henry asked when she met him at the door, and Maddie pulled him in and said,
“The kidnapper called.”

“Slow down.” Henry took her arm and marched her into the front room. “Go slow and tell me everything.”

“He said I’d done it, and he wouldn’t give Em back until I confessed,” Maddie said, her voice shaking.

“You sure it’s a man?”

Maddie nodded. “Pretty sure. He was whispering and his voice was raspy, but it was a man.” Some man had Em. “He said I had fifteen minutes to call you and confess.”

“Well, if he missed those sirens, he’s deaf,” Henry said. “You’re doing all right. Did you recognize the voice?”

“No, no,
of course not.”
Maddie couldn’t believe how dumb he was. “If I’d recognized the voice, I’d be after her now. Henry,
somebody, got her.
It might be the murderer. Nobody else would care if I confessed.
Em could be with the murderer.”

“Stop screaming for a minute,” Henry said, and went out to his car. The whole street watched while he talked into his handset, and Maddie prayed he was giving good instructions. Em was lost, Em was kidnapped, she couldn’t get her mind around it, it was so awful,
Em,
her mind screamed, and her arms ached because they were empty instead of holding Em.

Henry came back inside. “I know you’re scared,” he said, sitting beside her again. “But I need you to concentrate. Could it have been somebody from the bank?”

“The bank?” The thought was so incongruous that Maddie blinked at him. “You think Harold Whitehead killed Brent?”

“How about Webster?” Henry said. “The one who went down to the safe-deposit box with you. Did you watch him put the box away?”

“No,” Maddie said. “As soon as I found the passport, I ran.” The impact of that hit her. “Webster? You think Webster took the money? You think Webster’s has Em?”

“It was his little brother that rear-ended you Thursday,” Henry said. “I’m suspicious of coincidences. Could the voice have been Webster’s?”

“Henry, the voice could have been yours,” Maddie said. “What are we going to do? Em—”

“Em needs you not to panic,” Henry said. “Think. Could it have been Stan Sawyer?”

“Oh, God, I don’t know.” Maddie put her head in her hands. “I swear, it was just a raspy voice. I couldn’t tell Stan’s voice or Webster’s voice if they were talking normally. I just don’t know.”

“Howie?” Henry said, and Maddie said, “No.
No.
I’d know Howie’s voice. It wasn’t Howie.”

“Tell me exactly what he said,” Henry said, but then her phone rang. “Let me listen, too,” he said, following her as she ran to answer it, but when she picked it up and held it turned out so they both could hear, it was her mother.

“Maddie, what’s going on? I heard sirens and there are flashing lights down the street. Is that your house? Is it Em? What’s going on?”

“It’s not Em.” Maddie fought to keep her voice calm. “We still haven’t found her. It’s just Henry come to help.”

“Well, tell him to turn those lights off. The whole street will be thinking you’re in trouble.”

“Mother, I can’t talk now,” Maddie said, and hung up while her mother was still protesting. “The sirens worked,” she told Henry. “Do you suppose he knows?”

“The whole town knows,” Henry said. “Now, tell me what he said, just the way he said it.”

Maddie closed her eyes and tried to remember. “He said, ‘Mrs. Faraday’ first, and then he said something like ‘You have a really nice little girl,’ something like that, and then he said if I didn’t confess, I wouldn’t see her again.”

“That’s what he said, if you didn’t confess?”

Maddie let her head fall back against the wall. “I can’t remember. He said I had to tell you. He said to call Henry.”

“Henry? Not Sheriff Henley?”

“Henry. I’m pretty sure it was Henry.”

“Try to remember his exact words, Maddie,” Henry said. “There might be something there.”

“He knew about the money,” Maddie said. “He said I had to tell you about the money.”
And the gun.
Maddie went cold. Whoever it had been knew about the gun in the Civic. It was the murderer.

Oh, God, the murderer had Em.

The phone rang again, next to her ear, and she screamed from surprise and fear, and Henry said, “Take a deep breath before you answer it,” and all she could think of was Em.

At that point, Phoebe whined again, and Em gave up and steered her bike off the road and under a tree. She managed to park the bike and scoop Phoebe out of the basket just seconds before the puppy jumped and hung herself on her leash. Em collapsed on the ground under the tree and watched Phoebe sniff the ground in a wide half circle, straining at the end of her leash.

She could turn around and go home, but that would put her back where she’d started. And that was the last place she wanted to be. She’d had a week of school, a week of kids talking in low voices when she went by, which was worse. And Mel wanted to ask questions about it, too. It was the first time in her life she’d ever not wanted to be with Mel.

Not that Em didn’t understand what Mel was doing. She wanted to ask questions, too, but her mother kept lying, and finally she just had to know. So she’d set out for the farm and C.L. They could fish and talk about Phoebe and maybe things wouldn’t be awful for a while. Maybe she’d even get some answers.

If she ever got over being lost. Which she wasn’t going to do if she didn’t get off the ground and get pedaling again. It was an awful thought, but she couldn’t spend the rest of her life under this tree, and sooner or later it was going to get dark and then she would be in trouble.

“Come on, Phoebe,” she called, and when the puppy came trotting over, she put her back in the towel-lined basket. Phoebe sighed and tried to get comfortable, and Em said, “I know, I don’t want to, either, but we have to,” and that’s when she heard the car coming and looked up and saw the bright red Mustang.

“Hey,” C.L. said when he’d pulled up beside them. “Your mom’s having a heart attack.”

“I’m sorry,” Em said, not meaning it. If her mom hadn’t been acting so awful, Em wouldn’t have had to ride her dumb bike a thousand miles.

“Yeah, you sound sorry.” C.L. got out of the car, trying to look mean and blowing it completely. “I’m against you making your mom unhappy.”

“You’re not mad,” Em said, really tired now. “Don’t lie.”

“Hey.” C.L. frowned. “What’s with you?”

“I got lost.” Em got off her bike, and C.L. reached out and steadied it with his hand. “I wanted to come talk to you, but I got lost and couldn’t find Porch Road. I screwed up.”

“You didn’t get lost.” C.L. lifted Phoebe out of the basket and put her on the ground. “You got tired. Your turn’s about a mile up the road. You’d have been fine once you got going again.”

Em eyed him narrowly. “Really?”

“Boy, you don’t trust anybody.” C.L. rolled the bike toward the car. “Get in and I’ll show you.” He lifted Em’s bike into the back and opened the front door so Phoebe could scramble in, and Em felt all her troubles lighten.

They were still there, they were just lighter.

Em walked around the car and got in the passenger side, glad not to be pedaling her bike anymore and really glad she was with C.L. Phoebe climbed into her lap and leaned over the edge of the door, and Em held on to the puppy’s stomach so she wouldn’t jump out, hugging the warm little body to her. Really, things were a lot better. She let her shoulders relax a little against the soft seat, tipping her head back to rest her neck.

Necks got really tired when you pedaled on gravel for a thousand miles.

C.L. got in and patted her knee, and then he turned the car around and drove for two minutes before he slowed. “See?” he said, pointing to the sign that said Porch Road. “You’d have been fine.”

It really was there. She’d almost made it. She hadn’t screwed up. C.L, turned down the road, and Em sighed and relaxed completely. “It was too long a way to ride on a bike.”

“That’s true,” C.L. said. “But you didn’t know that. It seems shorter in a car. Stop beating up on yourself. The only thing you did wrong was scare your mom. And me.”

Em looked at him sideways. “You were scared?”

“Yes.” C.L. didn’t take his eyes off the road, but he said it strong enough—a real “Yes,” not a “Yep” or anything—so that she knew he was telling the truth. “You scared the living hell out of me and Henry and Anna and your mom and about a million other people, so don’t do that again.”

Em stuck her chin out. “Did you think I might have been shot?”

C.L. slowed the car so he could look at her. “No. That thought never crossed my mind. I was thinking about being kidnapped or hit by a car.”

“Oh.”

“What’s this all about, Em?” C.L.‘s voice was easy, but he was serious, and Em sighed again and gave up trying to be cool.

“My mom lies to me.” C.L. started to interrupt, but she kept going and he stopped. “She told me my dad died in an accident, and then I found out he was shot, and she said that was an accident, but the kids at school said it wasn’t, that he was . . . killed.” She sank down in her seat, clutching Phoebe tighter. “Most of the kids at school are geeks, but I bet they’re right.” She looked over at C.L., daring him to lie to her. “Aren’t they?”

He pulled off to the side of the road again and parked. He stared straight ahead for a couple of seconds, and then he turned and looked straight in her eyes and said, “Yes. They’re right. He was shot on purpose by somebody who was mad at him.”

“Who?” Em said, sick at heart.

“We don’t know.”

Em snapped her head up, angrier than she’d ever been in her life, but C.L. said louder,
“We don’t know who, Em..”
She took a deep breath, and he said, “That’s the truth. Henry is trying to find out, but we really don’t know who.”

“Is he going to shoot my mom, too?” Em’s voice shook as she finally said the part that had been terrifying her.

“No.” C.L.‘s voice was strong. “If I thought your mom was in danger, I’d be right there. Whoever shot your dad was mad at your dad, not your whole family.”

“Somebody broke into our house,” Em said, and C.L. said, “Yes, but whoever it was took what he wanted and hasn’t been back. He’s not going to hurt your mom.”

He seemed a little uncertain at the end, and Em shot him a sharp look. “Don’t lie,” she said, and he said, “If you don’t quit accusing me of lying, you and I are going to have words. I told you, I don’t lie.”

“That last part about my mom sounded like a lie,” Em said. “You didn’t sound sure.”

“Nobody’s trying to shoot your mom,” C.L. said. “If I thought they were, she’d never get out of my sight. Cross my heart.”

“Don’t treat me like a kid,” Em said.

“You are a kid,” C.L. said. “Stop trying to be an adult and let us take care of you.”

“I just need to know what’s going on,” Em said. “All the whispering, all the kids at school, Mom looking so awful, it’s all awful. I hate it.”

C.L. started the car again. “Tell you what. I was going to take you back to your mom’s after I showed you the road, but I think we should go on out to the farm instead and have your mom come pick you up. And then maybe she’ll stay for supper and you can both relax some. Sound good to you?”

Em nodded. “Yeah. But I still want to know what’s going on.”

“So do I, kid,” C.L. told her. “So do I.”