Thread of Betrayal (6 page)

TWELVE

“You aren’t speaking with my daughter,” Lawrence Thompkins said, standing just outside of his home.

After a mountain of paperwork and a few more questions, I was finally set free at the airport. We’d gone back to Castle Rock to try to speak with Morgan Thompkins again, but her father had apparently gotten wind of our earlier visit and was throwing up a roadblock.

He was tall and skinny, dressed in gray slacks and a white button down with a tie loosened at his neck. His hair, more salt than pepper, was thinning and he had the same green eyes as his daughter.

“I have no idea who you are,” he said. He stood in the doorway, blocking our view of the inside of the house. “And I’ve told Morgan to remain inside,” he said. “She informed me of your earlier visit.”

“Then you know we’re looking for our daughter,” Lauren said.

“I don’t know anything,” he said, his eyes narrowed. “The only thing I know is that two strangers showed up unannounced at my house and interrogated my kid.”

“We didn’t interrogate her,” I said.

Lauren shot me a look. She’d instructed me to keep my mouth shut under all circumstances.

She should’ve known better.

“Call it what you want, but you aren’t talking to her again.” He crossed his arms and glared at me. “She’s a minor. You didn’t have my permission to speak to her and you won’t receive it now.”

“She’s a friend of our daughter’s,” Lauren said. “She saw her this morning and loaned her money.”

“I don’t care,” Thompkins said. “I’m asking you to leave now.”

“You have no interest in helping us find our daughter?” Lauren asked.

“I don’t know anything about you or your daughter,” he replied. “The only thing I have an interest in is having you leave.”

“Would you prefer I call the police and ask them to come over so I can let them know your daughter assisted our missing child? Who, by the way, is also a minor?” Lauren said.

“I don’t care who you call,” he said, not budging. “But you aren’t talking to my daughter and I’m asking you to leave. Now.”

Lauren looked about ready to explode.

A flurry of movement behind Thompkins caught my eye. A curtain in the front window.

Morgan.

I watched her for a moment, then nodded.

Neither Lawrence Thompkins nor Lauren saw her, too intent on staring each other down.

I touched her elbow. “Come on.”

She jerked her arm away from me, stared at Thompkins for a long moment, then turned and headed for the car.

He stood in the doorway, still watching us as we got in the car.

“What an asshole,” Lauren barked, glaring at him through the window.

I shoved the key in the ignition and turned over the engine. “And I thought I was the one who lost my temper.”

She made a hissing sound. “Whatever.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Don’t worry about it?” she said, whipping her head in my direction. “Don’t worry about it? Seriously? He won’t let us talk to the one person who we know can communicate with our daughter.”

“We don’t need him to communicate with her,” I said, pulling away from the curb.

Thompkins stood there and watched us go. He was still in my rearview mirror as I turned the corner and headed out of the neighborhood.

“What do you mean we don’t need him?” Lauren asked.

“We don’t need him.”

“What are you talking about, Joe?” Her voice was impatient.

“Morgan’s going to call us,” I said.

“She’s what?”

“She’s going to call us,” I repeated. “She was in the window while you were baring your teeth at her father. She’s going to call us in half an hour.”

THIRTEEN

We were headed west on I-70, just up into the foothills, outside of a city called Genessee. Lauren was getting impatient.

She checked her phone. “It’s been thirty minutes.”

“She’ll call.”

“Maybe her father took her phone away.”

“She said she’d call,” I repeated.

Lauren was doubtful. “Maybe you misunderstood.”

I hadn’t misunderstood. She’d held the phone up in the window. Pointed at it, then at me. Then held up three fingers and a fist. Then disappeared.

I hadn’t misunderstood.

“She’ll call,” I said.

She made a dismissive sound and shifted in the seat.

“What did you talk about with her after I left?” I asked.

Lauren shrugged. “Nothing special. She told me a little about her time with Elizabeth in Minnesota. But she was guarded. She didn’t give up too much.”

“Anything else about L.A.?”

“Just that Elizabeth is supposed to call her at some point when she gets there,” she said. “To let her know she’s okay.”

“Did you get the phone number? Of the cell she has?”

Lauren nodded. “Yeah, but Morgan was adamant that Elizabeth wouldn’t answer. She didn’t discourage me from calling but she was certain that Elizabeth would only answer if the number was Morgan’s.”

The highway twisted as we climbed higher, jagged rock formations jutting out over the highway before giving way to narrow valleys of massive pine trees.

“You should call the rental company,” I said. “Let them know we’re keeping the car for longer and that it will be dropped elsewhere.”

“I’m not getting on this phone until that kid calls us,” Lauren said.

“You don’t have call waiting on your cell?”

“I don’t want to miss the call,” she said. “It can wait.” She gestured at the windshield. “Not like we aren’t going to be driving for the next two days since we can’t even look at an airport.”

“You could’ve flown,” I said. “I’m the one that can’t.”

She rolled her eyes and leaned against the door. “Right. Sure. Just let you drive all the way to California by yourself.”

“I’ve driven further.”

“Oh, yes,” she snapped. “All of your mysterious travels. I’m sure you’ve like driven across the Sahara or something, right? To save some kid in peril? Or was it in Siberia?”

I didn’t say anything, just focused on the road.

After ten minutes, Lauren said, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. Long day.”

She reached out, touching her hand to my forearm. “You didn’t deserve that. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.”

“I just want to find her, Joe,” she said. “I just want to hug her and say hi and tell her I missed her.” Her voice caught and I knew she was fighting back tears.

“Me, too.”

“I feel like I’m riding your coattails,” she said.

“What does that mean?”

She stretched her legs out in front of her. “All this time, you’ve been chasing. Devoted your life to finding her. I grieved, then basically gave up.” She paused. “Maybe not gave up, but I let it go. I didn’t chase. You did. In some ways, I feel like I don’t deserve to be here with you.”

“Stop.” She was being ridiculous. “You’re her mother.”

“But I gave up,” she said. “I let her go. Let you go. You were the one who pursued, the one who actually thought we’d get to this moment.” She shook her head. “I didn’t. I just didn’t.”

I wasn’t sure what she wanted me to say. We’d long ago come to terms that we’d needed to handle Elizabeth’s disappearance in different ways. It had broken our marriage, but we had made peace with the idea that we needed to deal with it differently. But I didn’t begrudge Lauren that at all. And I certainly didn’t begrudge the fact that she was with me. I was glad. I’d been alone for a long time.

I needed her.

Before I could say anything, Lauren’s phone chimed and she answered it before the chime finished playing. “Morgan. I’m putting you on speaker.” She touched the screen and then held it between us. “Can you hear me?”

“Yeah, I can hear you,” Morgan said. “I don’t have much time, though.”

“Why not?” Lauren asked.

“My dad’s in the shower,” she said. “He won’t be long and he hasn’t let me out of his sight. I’m sorry about how he acted earlier. He’s just like that.”

I didn’t care what her father was like. “Have you heard from Elizabeth?”

“No,” she said. “That’s why I’m late calling. I was hoping I’d hear from her. But she hasn’t called. I’ve tried her a couple of times, but she hasn’t answered.”

I shifted lanes to let a fast-moving semi-truck pass.

“She should’ve been down awhile ago if the flight left at one thirty,” she said, concerned. “I made her promise to call me. She always keeps her promises.”

Lauren glanced at me, her eyebrows furrowed with worry.

“Okay,” I said. “We’re in the car and we’ll be driving for awhile.”

“Why aren’t you flying to California?”

“Long story,” I said. “But we’re going to be driving. Lauren said she gave you both of our numbers. You have them both, yes?”

“Uh huh.”

“Call us as soon as you hear from her,” I said. “If we need to call you, Lauren will text you first. If you can’t call back right away, that’s okay. But let us know. Text her back.”

“Alright. My dad goes to bed early so nighttime won’t be a problem.”

“And we don’t want to get you in trouble, Morgan,” I said. “We really don’t. But we appreciate your help.”

The line buzzed for a moment.

“She’d do the same for me,” Morgan finally said. “She’s always been a good friend to me. She’d help me if I needed help.” She paused. “Is she gonna be okay?”

“She’ll be okay,” I said. She had to be. We were so close. “Just call us when you hear from her.”

She said goodbye and hung up.

We drove for a few minutes, the snow packs growing heavier on the mountainsides as we entered ski country. The sun had shifted low in the western sky, its intensity muted by a thin blanket of clouds.

“What happens if she doesn’t call Morgan?” Lauren asked.

I didn’t answer because I wasn’t sure.

FOURTEEN

We were in Utah and my eyes were getting heavy. The taillights of the cars in front of us glowed a blurry red.

“Lauren,” I said. “Hey.”

She started in the passenger seat and jerked herself up. “What?”

“I gotta pull over and rest for a bit,” I said. “It’s after midnight and I’m tired.”

“I can drive,” she said, trying to straighten herself in her seat.

“You’ve been out cold for an hour,” I said. “We’re both wiped. I’m gonna find a motel. We both need to rest.”

She started to protest but I stopped her. “Just for a little bit. Then we’ll jump back in the car.”

She didn’t argue, just nodded, yawning. “Phone didn’t ring?” she asked, grabbing it from the middle console.

I shook my head. “I texted Morgan half an hour ago. She still hadn’t heard anything.”

My gut tightened even as I said the words. I could come up with several plausible excuses as to why she hadn’t called—lost her phone, delayed flight, just forgot—but none of them felt right. Judging by Lauren’s silence, I wasn’t alone in my thinking that something was wrong.

“Should be something here in just a minute,” I said, scanning the road in front of us. “I just need a couple hours. And so do you.”

She nodded silently.

The next exit lit up the darkness like a Christmas tree, several hotels, gas stations and fast-food restaurants rising up out of the night. I pulled into the first chain motel, parked the car and ten minutes later we were in a small but clean motel room.

I dropped on to the bed closest to the window, flat on my back. Lauren went to the bathroom and I could hear the water running. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to sleep because I was worried that we hadn’t heard anything, but I knew I needed the rest. Neither of us would be any good if we were exhausted, and we still had a lot of driving in front of us.

The water shut off and the bathroom door opened. Lauren’s hair was pulled back and her face freshly washed. She shed her coat and sat down on the edge of the other bed. She folded her hands in her lap and looked around the room.

“What?” I asked.

“What what?” she said.

“What’s wrong?”

She rubbed her eyes. “Just worried.”

“Me, too. But nothing we can do. We need sleep and then we’ll get back on the road.”

She nodded, staring at her hands. Then she turned to me. “I don’t wanna sleep by myself.”

I scooted over on the bed and motioned for her to come over. She sank down on the bed and curled up against me, my arm beneath her and her head on my shoulder. It wasn’t strange or awkward or uncomfortable.

It was familiar.

She put her hand on my chest. “I hope she’s okay.”

I pulled her tighter to me. “Me, too.”

“I don’t think I can lose her again, Joe.”

I reached up and flipped off the light switch, the darkness drifting over us like a blanket.

I knew she wanted to hear something comforting from me, something that would put her mind at ease, something that would assure her that Elizabeth was, indeed, okay. She wanted to be able to close her eyes and know that she could wake up with the knowledge that our daughter was safe, wherever she was.

But I didn’t have that to offer. It wasn’t a promise I could make. There wasn’t anything I could say.

So instead, we laid there quietly, until we both drifted off to sleep.