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“I can’t explain it now. Just trust me, Allison.”
“I need you to explain things. Peter, I’m scared. I don’t know what to do. Why won’t you be honest with me?”
“The calls are recorded.” He sounded frustrated and unhappy. “I have to be careful.”
But if he was innocent, why would he care about them recording the call?
She shook off the question. “What should I do?”
“Live your life. I’ll stay in touch. This will all blow over, you’ll see. I love you, Allison. I’ll always take care of you.”
Right now he wasn’t taking care of anything, she thought bitterly.
“I need you to do a couple of things for me.”
She brushed away tears she hadn’t felt fall. “Like what?”
“I have dry cleaning. The receipt is in my blue blazer. Can you pick that up?”
He wanted her to get his dry cleaning? “You’re in jail and you’re worried about your clothes?”
Her voice was a shriek. Jackson stared at her. She faked a laugh and a big smile.
“It’s okay,” she said quickly. “Look at that pink pig. Oink.”
Jackson giggled, then returned his attention back to his play. She drew in a couple of breaths.
“I’ll get your dry cleaning.”
“Thank you. I also need you to go by the office. I’m sure they served a search warrant, so it’s probably a mess. I want to know how bad it is and if anyone is still working.”
She resisted the need to curl up in a ball. His business. She hadn’t thought about what was happening there. Peter was the person in charge. He ran everything. Without him, she wasn’t sure it could survive.
“Why wouldn’t they be?” she asked. “Won’t Gail handle things?” Gail was his office manager and had been with Peter practically since he opened the business.
“I hope so,” he said cautiously. “But I need to be sure. Can you go in the morning? You know where the spare keys are.”
“I’ll go. Peter, none of this makes sense. Why is it happening?”
“I wish I knew. I have to go. I’ll call you tomorrow. In a few days, you can come see me and we’ll be able to speak more freely.”
Of course she had to go see him, she thought, stunned that the possibility hadn’t occurred to her before. Visitors were allowed, weren’t they? She knew where he was being held—she would have to look up the rules.
“Peter, wait!” She paused, not sure what to say. “I miss you.”
“I miss you, too. More than I can say. I’ll call tomorrow.”
The call disconnected.
She sat there for a few seconds, telling herself she would give in to the fear and dread later, when Jackson was asleep. She didn’t want her breakdown to upset him and she didn’t want to trigger a panic attack, so she sucked in a couple of breaths, then plastered on a smile.
“What about the chicken?” she asked, picking up the white plastic piece.
He pointed to the front of the barn. “Here.”
“That’s a good spot for our chicken.”
They played until dinnertime. She put together an easy meal of chicken over pasta with a few cut-up vegetables for him and ate one of the enchiladas with salad. She’d just put Jackson to bed when she remembered Peter’s request that she get his dry cleaning.
