Since You've Been Gone (26 page)

“I just wanted to see something,” Rebecca said distractedly.

“You wanted to know if I have a CD like the one you found in the car.” Rebecca looked at her sharply. “I wasn't supposed to know, but Bill told me. He wanted to make sure I didn't have any CDs around here. Good God, do both of you think I'm trying to terrorize my own daughter?”

“We just thought the CD might have come from this house. No one thought you put it in the car.”

“I'm sure it crossed
your
mind.” Suzanne stared at Rebecca sullenly. “Did Frank send you up?”

“Frank left for the office.”

“Typical.”

“You can hardly blame him. You aren't your most congenial self this evening.”

“I'm having a bad day.”

“It seems to me most of your days are bad.”

Suzanne glared. “The expert who has been here since Saturday evening after an eight-year absence. Thank you for your opinion.”

“Oh, Mother, can't we stop fighting and just talk?” Rebecca sat down on the bed. Her mother drew away slightly. “What is wrong?”

Suzanne puffed on her cigarette and gazed into the distance for a moment. “I miss Jonnie.”

“I know that. I miss Jonnie, too, but I don't wallow in my bed drinking myself silly because of it.”

“Oh, you are
so
strong, aren't you? You're not like me. You're like my mother. You two put me to shame with your stalwart spirits!” Suzanne looked at her fiercely. “But don't think you're fooling me, little girl. You're as obsessed with Jonnie as I am. My God, do you think I don't realize that ‘Sean' is the Irish form of John? You named your dog after your brother.”

It was true. Sean, on whom she could bestow so much love and tenderness. Sean, who'd been abused, whom now she could protect as she'd never been able to protect Jonnie. The knife of her mother's accusation plunged deep, but she knew the tactic. Her mother was trying to divert the subject from herself and her own failings.

“Mother, missing Jonnie isn't the point—”

“And I miss your father,” Suzanne plunged on. “If Patrick had been here, Jonnie would never have been taken.”

“We don't know that.”

“I know it. When we got married, he promised he'd never leave me. But he did. He broke his promise. And look what happened.”

Rebecca looked at her mother. Suzanne was a child, she thought bleakly. She was a once-beautiful child who'd been coddled and loved and couldn't understand when her magical
life had fallen apart. What she'd never realized, though, was that the world did not revolve around her. To Suzanne everything was personal. She could acknowledge Rebecca's pain about Patrick and Jonnie but she could not empathize because she could only feel her own devastation. And she felt she had the right to make everyone suffer with her.

“Mother, you may not feel the same about Frank as you did Daddy, but you do love him,” Rebecca said quietly. “He's been so good to you—so good to all of us for so long. Please try to pull yourself together. Otherwise you're going to lose him.”

She expected a sharp retort, but Suzanne only stared stonily at her, then refilled her glass of wine. In a mixture of disgust and hopelessness, Rebecca left the room. As soon as she reached her own, “A Whiter Shade of Pale” began to play once more, louder than ever. She sat down on the bed, slipped her locket off her neck, and looked at the smiling picture of Jonnie inside. “Nothing has ever been the same since you've been gone,” she said. “I wonder if things will ever be right again.”

Sean jumped up on the bed beside her. She slipped on the locket again and stroked his head. “Let's go for a walk and get out of this madhouse, boy.”

The sky had been an unusually pale blue-gray when Rebecca arrived home and now she saw dark gray thunder-heads forming in the distance. Summer humidity was always high in the Ohio Valley, but temperatures had been running about five degrees above normal for late June. The frequent storms didn't surprise Rebecca and she knew farmers welcomed them after last summer's drought. Sean had a different opinion.

He lagged behind her and a couple of times looked at the sky and whined. Rebecca kneeled and rubbed his ears. “Is this any way to act over a few clouds, Brave One?”

They plowed on, veering off Lamplight Lane onto a narrow asphalt road with a simple wooden sign reading Mockingbird Court. Once the lavish home of Carson Dobbs had presided as the lone occupant of the Court, but the house
had burned down shortly after the his suicide. Insurance investigators proved arson, and the family collected nothing. After World War II, a developer planned to start a colony of cheap houses, but Rebecca's grandfather had bought the land to prevent the plethora of what he'd called “tinderboxes” from blooming. He'd willed the land to Patrick, whom he knew would not sell it for a quick profit, and it now belonged to Suzanne.

The land was overgrown although Frank sent out a crew with mowers and heavy equipment to clear the worst of it once a year. Rebecca knew her father had reserved it for fine homes for her, Jonnie, and Molly, imagining the three of them living forever in happy proximity to him and Suzanne.

During her teenage years she could remember Frank trying to talk Suzanne into doing something with the land, but she nixed all ideas, still hanging on to Patrick's dream. Now that Jonnie was gone, that could no longer be her reason for letting the land lie fallow. Perhaps she'd simply lost interest.

Rebecca tilted her head, closed her eyes, and drew a deep breath of air filled with the smell of coming rain. Somehow it made her feel calmer. Then she opened her eyes. A hawk flew over, low, with a mouse wriggling in its claws. The calmness shattered, replaced by repulsion. She knew all creatures had to eat. Still…

From somewhere close by came the sound of a cat crying. She looked to the right and saw a bird sitting on a shrub. It was slate-gray with a black cap. A catbird, named for its mewling call. Many people said Carson Dobbs, who had named Mockingbird Court, had mistaken the catbird for the mockingbird, which is known for a prettier song. Rebecca was no bird expert, but this bird's particular catlike sound made her think of Sonia hearing a cat and Jean Wright letting it into her house shortly before Todd was taken. Sonia seeing Jean, Jean probably seeing Sonia watching her,
knowing
she was home when Jean claimed to be gone.

Rebecca stopped in the middle of the road. A familiar, dreaded pain started beside her right eye. The surrounding shrubs and trees slowly blurred, then disappeared. Instead she saw stacks of books, felt the chill of air conditioning, watched a slender girl with long black hair sit at a table reading a book, then writing in a spiral notebook. Rebecca's vision had become one of a watcher who scanned the room, which was empty except for the girl and one young man who was clearly not with the girl, someone who gave the impression of leaving soon. Rebecca experienced the watcher's feeling of satisfaction. It was all right to wait. Just fine to wait until the girl was alone.

Until Sonia was alone.

The overgrown world of Mockingbird Court came back into focus. Rebecca stood rigid, her hands cold, perspiration popping out on her forehead. Sean looked up at her, whined, then pawed at her leg. “Oh God,” she muttered. “Someone is going to kill Sonia.”

TUESDAY, 8:20 P.M.

Rebecca turned and began running back toward Lamplight Lane. She had dropped Sean's leash, but he raced along next to her, pulling ahead with the natural speed of the Australian shepherd. The image of Sonia in the library had vanished, but Rebecca's panic remained. She'd felt an odd sort of connection with the girl earlier today. Now she sensed that Sonia was in danger, and she didn't for a moment doubt her feeling.

She was panting by the time she burst out of Mockingbird Court onto Lamplight Lane. She had no doubt some neighbor was watching her run like a wild thing through the evening, but she didn't care. Public opinion had already seemed to cast her into the role of oddball. She might as well keep on giving people something to talk about.

Once again the scenery around her seemed to fade. Projected
over it was a pallid reproduction of a long table behind which loomed towering shelves of books. And a gaze through a space in the books at the back of Sonia's head. Rebecca saw through this gaze, watched it move over the sheen of Sonia's black hair, the back of a blue T-shirt, the tight waist of blue jeans, smooth curve of hips, sandals lying beside small bare feet crossed at the ankles as she sat on a plastic chair pulled close to the Formica-topped table. She even saw the band of the girl's watch on her left arm and the pink frosted polish on her fingernails. The gaze noted all this with fondling, obscene detail. Rebecca felt faintly nauseated.

She rushed up the front walk and almost slammed into the locked front doors. Frantically she rang the bell and Betty answered. “Good Lord, honey, what's wrong?”

“I don't have time to explain,” Rebecca called as she raced up the stairs, Sean at her heels. In her room she grabbed the phone and called police headquarters. Bill wasn't in, but a young deputy listened while she poured out her story of a girl in danger at the library. “And how do you know this, ma'am?”

“I just know,” Rebecca said, hearing the futility in her voice. “Please go there. The girl's name is Sonia Ellis. She has long black hair—”

“And what did you say your name is?”

“Rebecca Ryan. As I said, she has black hair—”

“Oh, Rebecca
Ryan
. With the ESP?”

Rebecca fell silent for a moment. “Go to the library. If you don't, you'll regret it.”

“Is that a threat, ma'am?”

“Oh for God's sake,” Rebecca snarled and hung up. She called Bill's home. Just the machine. In three minutes she had the car keys in hand and was heading for the Thunderbird. “Honey, what in the world's wrong with you?” Betty demanded, trundling along behind her to the car. “Where are you goin'?”

“Just take care of Sean for me. I'll be fine.”

Rebecca roared out of the driveway with Betty desperately
holding on to an agitated Sean's leash. It would take her at least ten minutes to get to the library even if she hit every green light and didn't get stopped for speeding. That was too long. Her mind raced, trying to come up with a solution. If only that damned deputy had listened to her. If only Bill had been home. Maybe he was at Molly's. She grabbed her cell phone and dialed Molly's number. Someone answered but so much static cut in, Rebecca couldn't make out a word. She shouted her name and an order for Bill or a deputy to go to the library, not knowing whether or not she'd been heard.

“Damn, damn,
damn!
” she muttered, throwing a murderous glance at a stop sign. At this rate she'd never get to the library in time to help Sonia.

If Sonia
was
at the library. What had Frank said? That Mrs. Ellis didn't want her seeing Randy Messer and that she probably wasn't going to the library at all but to a secret meeting place. In that case, Rebecca's vision would be completely wrong. That had never happened. Sometimes her visions were vague, but never imaginary, like dreams.

She fished in her purse for the card Sonia had given her at The Jewelry Box bearing her home phone number. She called and a slightly nasal male adolescent voice greeted her charmingly with, “Yeah?”

“Is this Sonia Ellis's residence?”

“Yeah.”

“May I speak with her?” More static. Rebecca groaned, then repeated the question.

“I told you she's not home.”

“Could you tell me where she is?”

“You a reporter? That Kelly Keene chick?”

“No, I'm Rebecca Ryan. I met Sonia today at the jewelry store. It's extremely important that I speak with her. May I ask who you are?”

“Cory.”

“Hello, Cory.” Static. Rebecca wanted to scream at the noise and the inarticulate kid, but she forced herself to sound polite when the static died. “I know this is an odd
call, but Sonia gave me her number.” She started to say something about her being in danger, but Rebecca had a feeling the boy might hang up on her. “I was thinking of buying a ring. I couldn't make up my mind, so Sonia asked me to call if I decided I wanted it so she could put it away for me until I can get to the store tomorrow afternoon.”

“Oh. So you want the ring?”

“
Yes
. That's why I must speak with Sonia tonight. She said she might go to the library. Would she be there now?”

“She could be.” Rebecca was on the verge of losing patience when Cory suddenly turned into a geyser of information. “I'm her brother. She said somethin' at dinner about a woman bein' in the store and tryin' on a ring. Guess that was you. Said you were flirtin' it up with some hot doctor.” Oh wonderful, Rebecca thought.
Flirting
. “Anyway, she told Mom she was goin' to the library. She's prob'ly there, but she goes to meet Randy Messer sometimes. She's not s'posed to be seein' him, but she is. I keep quiet ‘bout that, she keeps quiet… well, ‘bout some things I do. Anyway, she said you were cool, so I guess I can tell you she's at the library, only if you go there to tell her you want the ring and she's with Randy, don't tell my mom.” He added darkly, “That would be
major
uncool.”

Cory's tone implied being uncool was tantamount to complete personal downfall. “Don't worry—I won't. Do you have any idea where in the library she might be?”

“Hey, I never go there.” Cory sounded appalled at the thought. “Shouldn't be too hard to find her, though,” he added helpfully. “It's not like it's the New York Public Library. Hey, you ever see
Beneath the Planet of the Apes
where that guy finds the ruins of the New York library underground and it like freaks him out?”