All the Little Liars (6 page)

“According to Aubrey, when I took Phillip to church, Liza fell into crush at first sight,” I said. “But I would swear Phillip wasn't the kind of guy to take advantage of a kid like that. And I know he likes girls his own age.” I simply could not believe that Phillip was such a creep as to make a pass at a child. At the same time, as a mystery reader, I knew that no one else ever felt that way about their loved ones. At least not in books. Surely, in real life, you'd have a clue?

“Aurora. Don't even think that. Phillip and I are nowhere close to the same age, but from Phillip's conversation when we're guy-on-guy, I'm sure he's completely oriented to females of the appropriate age.”

“You don't think he was blowing smoke?”

“I don't think so. I'm not a psychologist, but I'm not dumb.”

I nodded. This was not conclusive, but it was comforting. “I don't know what else we can do,” I said. “We've been everywhere we can imagine. It's not like we have the old family cabin in the woods, like they always have in books.”

“Where people always suddenly remember, ‘Oh, yes, as a child he used to go there whenever he was upset,'” Robin said. “Nope, in his case I guess we'd have to go to California.”

“And I don't think he's gotten to pick where he is,” I said. “He'd never just leave town without telling me. And Joss and Josh would hardly go with him! Much less Liza.”

There was a knock at the door. I sat up so suddenly that Moosie was dumped off my lap. She vanished into our bedroom. Robin launched himself at the front door. “Phillip!” he was saying as he pushed it open.

But it was not Phillip. It was the police.

“Have you found him?” I asked, aware for the first time of how accurate the description “my heart was in my throat” was. “Have you found the car?”

“No.” The woman who entered first said, “Roe, do you remember me? I'm Detective Cathy Trumble. We want to ask you some questions.” I did remember the detective. We'd met before. The uniformed patrolman with her was Levon Suit; I'd gone to high school with Levon. We nodded to each other.

“Sure,” I said. “Anything to help find Phillip.”

“When did you notice he was missing?” Trumble, middle-aged and solid, sat down on the couch opposite my chair. Robin sat on the ottoman, holding my hand.

“I knew he was with Josh and Joss, and I expected him home by five or so. They usually drop him off by then, but I figured, the last day of school before Christmas, maybe they did some extra shopping or celebrating. So I wasn't really worried until Beth called me.”

“Bethany Finstermeyer.”

“Right.”

“And what have you done since then?”

“We've tried to call him many times. We've driven around town looking at all the places we imagined he might be.”

“You haven't called his mother or his father?”

“I was so hoping that he would come home and I wouldn't have to,” I confessed. “But I'm going to have to do that soon. They're out in California, you know, and they've separated. So calling them with news like this … if there's any way around it…”

“Mr. Crusoe, what about you?”

“What about me? What do you mean?”

“You just got home? Your car was warm.”

“Yes, I had to leave Roe for a little while to go to a meeting, and as soon as I could leave it, I came home.” Robin's tone had chilled considerably.

“Despite the fact that her brother is missing?” Detective Trumble could not raise one eyebrow, but she could hike them both. And she did.

“I told him to go,” I said, not believing the left turn this conversation was taking. “It was his last meeting before a month's break, he's the leader, and he needed to be there. Plus, I figured it was better than sitting here worrying.”

“Is this the first time your brother has pulled a stunt like this?” Cathy Trumble looked like a pleasant middle-aged woman, but I abandoned any view of her as pleasant the minute the words left her mouth.

“Pulled a stunt? I don't think he's
pulling a stunt.
I think something has happened to him, and it's not going to be anything good!”

“But he ran away from his home in California to come stay with you. How do you know he hasn't run away to somewhere else?”

I took a deep breath, trying to keep levelheaded. “Because he wouldn't take an eleven-year-old girl, and the Finstermeyer twins, with him!”

“But if they weren't involved, you might be thinking he'd left for home?”

I struggled with that one. I wanted to categorically deny it, but I would have been less than honest. “I don't think he'd hitchhike back to California,” I said. “He had a scary thing happen on his trip here, and I think he'd be very leery of repeating that experience. And he's happy here, already making friends and looking forward to going to public high school next semester. A little concerned about changing classes and teachers, sure. But Phillip is smart, and I don't think he was anywhere close to scared about it.”

At least Cathy Trumble was listening to me. She nodded, and wrote something on a little tablet, which she'd pulled out of a pocket.

“Can I look in his room?” she asked, out of the blue as far as I was concerned.

“You mean search it? If Robin is in there with you,” I said.

Robin glanced at me, startled, but then he nodded. We'd been together long enough for him to understand that I'd chosen him for a reason.

“All right,” Trumble said, and Robin led the way to show her to Phillip's room. Levon went along to help.

The minute they were out of earshot, I called Bryan Pascoe.

“Aurora,” he said, sounding a little startled. “I'm glad to hear from you, of course, but very curious.”

Of course he was. I'd met him when my sister-in-law Poppy had been murdered, and he'd been pretty frank about being interested in me personally.

“I guess you read my marriage announcement,” I said.

“I did, and of course I'm very happy for you,” he said smoothly. “To what do I owe the honor of this call?”

“Bryan, it's about Phillip,” I said.

“Phillip. Oh, your brother. He answered the phone the last time I called.”

“My half brother,” I said. I filled him in very concisely on Phillip and the current situation.

“How can I be of service?” Bryan asked, which was really polite of him considering I was calling him at night and I was not a regular client of his.

“I hope you will agree to be Phillip's attorney,” I said. “Because this isn't looking good, right now. And even if we find him, and he's okay…” And here I had to speak very fast to leap over the abyss. “It's clear that the police are way more concerned about Liza, and the fact that Aubrey's certainly told them about her infatuation with Phillip. Which I understand, okay?
I get it.
But Phillip is a good kid. No saint. But a good kid. And smart.”

“Do you have a power of attorney giving you the say in what happens to Phillip?”

“Yes, in case of emergency. My dad did give me power of attorney. Medical and legal.” Robin had thought of that when we'd agreed Phillip could live with us, God bless him.

“Then I'm hired,” Bryan said. “Call me when I'm needed.”

“You'll be in town for the holidays?”

“At least for another week and a half,” he said. “And longer if I need to be.”

“Thank you so much,” I said. I couldn't think of any other way to express my gratitude.

“Thank me after I've done something for you,” he said. “Good-bye.”

I felt better, as if I'd really accomplished something. That was hardly the case, but at least I'd been … proactive.

When Robin and Cathy Trumble came back into the living room, Cathy looked dissatisfied (yay!) and Robin looked relaxed (also yay). Levon Suit, trailing behind, shook his head at me. They hadn't found anything incriminating in Phillip's room.

Okay, that was one tiny step forward. Robin looked relieved.

I asked Cathy Trumble to please let me know the minute they heard something, and she assured me she would.

Robin walked her to the door. The second she was outside, I texted Phillip with Bryan Pascoe's phone number. I told Phillip that this was his lawyer and he must call Bryan as soon as he could. I had no idea where my brother was or what had happened to him, but that was essential information.

I really didn't have a good grasp on what I was doing or what I imagined might happen, by that time.

I sank down on the couch. I was comforted when Robin put his arm around me.
This is my husband,
I said to myself, and the idea still seemed a little odd.

“Let's think,” Robin suggested.

“I wish I could quit thinking,” I said. “But I know we have to try to figure something out.”

“Okay, the first thing Trumble asked me when we were out of your earshot is if Phillip had been acting any different lately.”

“I don't think so. But—maybe I don't know Phillip well enough to be certain, especially since I've been caught up in the pregnancy excitement.”

“Me, too. But I'll tell you, I had a thought. While we were gone on our honeymoon? We left Phillip with your mom and John.”

“Which he didn't want to do, but the Finstermeyers were out of town.”

“And he also went to church with your mom and John.”

“So he did.”

“So we need to know if anything happened then that might have a bearing on this.”

We'd just been gone a week. But that was the only time something could have happened to Phillip that we didn't know about. Of course, he could always have gotten a phone call, or a text … but I found it very hard to imagine that someone would pursue Phillip from California because he'd dissed a girlfriend or something like that. Something I would think was trivial.

So I called my mother. She answered on the second ring. “Hi, honey!” she said, the smile in her voice very evident. I hated to bring her down.

“Mom, the pregnancy is fine, and everything is all right with me,” I said. “But Phillip is missing.”

“You mean he's late?” She must have known it was worse than that, but she was hoping.

“No, it's more serious. The Finstermeyer twins are gone, too, and Liza Scott.”

“Father Aubrey's daughter? Oh, Roe … that's
horrible.
”

“Yes, it is. Of course, the police are asking all kinds of questions, and we're trying to fill in all the blanks we can. Did anything happen while he was staying with you, anything out of the ordinary that you can recall?” My mother had never been completely comfortable around Phillip, since he was the product of my father's unfaithfulness to her, as she saw it. But she was fair enough and well-balanced enough to see that wasn't Phillip's fault, and she'd offered to give him a berth while Robin and I were gone. John, her second husband, was the soul of hospitality, and he'd raised two boys of his own during his first marriage. He was really pleased to have Phillip in their house.

“Let me think about it and call you back,” my mother said. “I'll ask John, too.”

“Thanks, Mom,” I said.

So that was that. Another “wait and see.”

In thirty minutes Mother called back. “John and I have racked our brains,” she said. “Neither of us can come up with anything. I'm so sorry, Aurora. Please keep us posted.”

So that was that.

It was a miserable night.

 

Chapter Five

The next morning was cold and raining, as dreary as you could imagine.

No one had had any news about anything.

The Finstermeyers called us to commiserate, and I asked them if the police had searched the twins' rooms. “Yes,” Beth said. “And they didn't find anything that would indicate where the kids were.”

She wished they had, I could tell. “Did they look on the kids' laptops, or whatever they have?” I asked. “Phillip's is still here.”

“No, not yet,” she said. “But I'm sure they will.”

We really had nothing to talk about, and after a few more minutes, we gave up on the conversation to go be miserable by ourselves.

“We could try to check Phillip's laptop ourselves,” Robin said.

It was a new one, since the one he'd had in his old backpack had been left in a truck on his hitchhiking trip across the U.S. to reach Georgia.

I agreed to invade Phillip's privacy without a moment's hesitation.

The laptop was password-protected, but I happened to know the origin of his password, because we'd talked about it. Phillip was a huge
Walking Dead
fan, and we'd been watching a recording of the show when he'd told me how cool he thought Carol was. “Carol's what I think my mom would be like if she went through the zombie uprising,” he'd said, and I'd laughed. I'd only seen Phillip's mom once or twice in the past few years, but the idea of Betty Jo as the originally downtrodden Carol, who'd turned into a ruthless survivor, was kind of funny.

I typed in “Carol,” and that didn't work. So I tried “Carolscookies” and that didn't work either. “CarolsCool” did not open the laptop. But “Carolkills” did. I was in.

Robin was quicker with computers than I was, so I ceded the laptop to him. He opened the e-mail program. “He's heard from friends in California,” Robin said. “He's gotten a few e-mails from that girl who gave him a ride when he was hitchhiking from Memphis to here. I can tell you that ‘ride' was not just in a car.” Robin scrolled down. “His father e-mailed him.”

“He did? Phillip didn't say anything to me.” On the other hand, why wouldn't my dad be e-mailing his son? “What about?” I asked, out of sheer curiosity.

“Mostly asking if Phillip's heard from his mother. Phillip always says no. He tells Phil that he enjoys living here,” Robin summarized. “Phil says a few uncomplimentary things about Betty Jo. Way to go, Phil. Phil goes on to say that he's not totally happy that Phillip's with you, but he's also glad that Phillip's not with his mom.”