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“Good on ya, mate,” she says in a passable Aussie drawl. They took a trip to Oz shortly after their double retirement, rented a camper and crossed the continent from Sydney to Perth. That was a trip to remember.
“He was a good one,” Roddy says. “Wasn’t he?”
She doesn’t need to ask who he’s talking about. “He was.”
Although how long the effects will last, neither of them know. He is the youngest they’ve ever taken, barely into puberty. There’s a great deal about what they’ve been doing that they don’t know, but Roddy says he’s learning more each time. Also—and to state the obvious—survival is the prime directive.
Em agrees. There will be no more trips to Australia, probably not even to New York for their once-every-two-years Broadway binge, but life is still worth living, especially when every step isn’t an exercise in agony. “Anything in the paper, dear?”
He slips an arm around her thin shoulders. “Nothing since the first item, and that was barely more than a squib. Just another runaway or a stranger who came upon a target of opportunity. What do you think about the Christmas party, dear one? Keep or cancel?”
She stretches on her toes to kiss him. No pain.
“Keep,” she says.
July 23, 2021
1
Holly crosses Red Bank Avenue to the defunct auto repair shop, slips into the driver’s seat of her Prius, and slams the door. It’s been sitting in the sun and is hotter than a sauna, but even though sweat pops on her forehead and the back of her neck almost at once, Holly doesn’t start the car to get the AC working. She only stares out through the windshield, trying to get her mind around what she’s just found out. I’d put your inheritance at just over six million dollars, Emerson said. Plus another three when Uncle Henry dies.
She tries to think of herself as a millionaire, but it doesn’t work. Doesn’t come close to working. All she can see is Uncle Pennybags, the mustachioed and top-hatted avatar of the Monopoly game. She tries to think of what she might do with her new-found riches. Buy clothes? She has enough. Buy a new car? Her Prius is very reliable, and besides, it’s still under warranty. There’s no need to help with Jerome’s education, he’s all set, although she supposes she might help with Barbara’s. Travel? She’s sometimes daydreamed about going on a cruise, but with Covid running rampant…
“Oough,” she mutters. “No.”
The idea of a new apartment comes to her, but she loves the place she has now. Like Baby Bear’s chair and Baby Bear’s bed, it’s just right. Put more money into the business? Why? Just last year she fielded a $250,000 offer from Midwest Investigative Services to make them an affiliate. With Pete’s agreement, she had turned them down. The idea of moving out of the Frederick Building, with its balky elevator and lazy super, has slightly more appeal, but the downtown location is good, and the rent is right.
Not that I have to worry about that anymore, she thinks, and gives a wild little laugh.
Holly finally realizes she’s roasting and turns on the engine. She rolls down the windows until the air conditioning gets some traction and looks at her list of the people she wants to interview. That gives her some focus, because the important thing is the case. The money is just pie in the sky, and as for the more troubling implication of David Emerson’s bombshell (she remembers her mother calling in tears after Daniel Hailey supposedly robbed the three of them and ran off to St. Croix or St. Thomas or St. Wherever), she won’t think about that now. Later she won’t be able to help herself, but in the here and now there’s a missing woman to find.
Part of her insists she’s hiding from an ugly truth. The rest of her refuses that idea. She’s not hiding, she’s finding. At least trying to.
“Cherchez la femme,” Holly says, and takes out her phone. She thinks about calling Marvin Brown, who took Bonnie’s bike to the Reynolds Library, then has a better idea. Instead of Brown, she reaches out to George Rafferty, the real estate man. Holly explains that Bonnie Dahl’s mother has hired her to try and find her daughter, then asks about the day he and Mr. Brown found Bonnie’s bike.
“Oh my God, I hope she’s all right,” Rafferty says. “Hasn’t been in touch with her mom or dad?”
“I hope she is, too,” Holly says, dodging his question. “Who saw the bike first, you or Mr. Brown?”
“Me. I always get to my properties early so I can take a fresh look. That shop, used to be Bill’s Automotive and Small Engine Repair, looks like a teardown to me, but the lifts still work and the location—”
“Yes, sir. I’m sure the location is fine.” Holly thinks no such thing; since the turnpike extension was opened in 2010, traffic on Red Bank Avenue has thinned considerably. “Did you read the note taped to the seat?”
“I sure did. ‘I’ve had enough.’ If I were the girl’s parents, something like that would scare me to death. It could mean she was leaving, or it could mean, you know, something worse. Mr. Brown and I discussed what to do with the bike, and after we looked at the shop, he put it in his pickup and took it to the library.”
“Because of the sticker on the package carrier.”
“Right. That was a nice bike. I can’t remember the brand, but it was nice. All different gears and such. It’s a wonder nobody stole it. Kids hang around that part of the park, you know. The part they call the Thickets.”
“Yes, sir, I’m aware.”
“And that ice cream place down the way? Kids there, too. All the time. They play the video games inside and ride their skateboards outside. Have you been a private eye for long?”
It’s a term that always makes Holly want to grind her teeth. She’s a lot more than an eye. “Quite awhile, yes sir. Just to confirm, you saw the bike first.”
“Right, right.”
“And how long before Mr. Brown showed up?”
