The House Guests Page 31

  On the drive to school that morning, Amber had asked Will how he felt about everything. “I’m staying out of it,” he’d said.

  “Because you think that’s a good idea? Or because Savannah asked you to?”

  “Both.”

  Her son hadn’t been chatty since returning from the field trip. When she’d picked him up on Monday, she explained how worried she and Cassie had been. Had he noticed that Savannah was missing? Will had replied that the groups, divided by gender and class, had been mostly separate, and he hadn’t been looking for her.

  She had hoped for more. “Minh wasn’t there?”

  “Her family’s visiting relatives in Titusville this weekend.”

  In the end she hadn’t discussed the situation any further. Will’s loyalty might be divided, and she didn’t want to make his struggle worse.

  Now, with the house to herself, she went to the dining table, which had become financial records central, and prepared the next stack of documents she planned to look over. At lunchtime she was going to visit a local campground not far from the Sponge Docks. She had a pocketful of change and a telephone date with an old friend, and the campground had a pay phone. Most important, she wanted to be out of the house when Cassie came home from the airport. Her friend deserved a place where she could grieve without witnesses.

  Her cell phone rang just as she sat down to begin. She answered with a smile. “Dining somewhere odd and unusual for lunch?”

  Travis laughed. “If my kitchen counter is odd and unusual. I’m stuck inside all afternoon working on my review for Havana Seafood.”

  The owners would be pleased. Travis really liked the place.

  She told him about Savannah and Cassie leaving for the airport. Travis already knew about Savannah’s disappearance, because, with Cassie’s permission, Amber had asked for his advice. Since they didn’t know for sure Savannah wasn’t on the trip, and since they had not been able to reach the chaperones or either teen at the campground, where cell phone service was nonexistent, he had counseled Cassie to wait until the buses returned before calling the authorities. At fifteen, Savannah wasn’t eligible for what was known as the critical missing persons list, and while the police would take a report, they were not required to begin a search right away. Usually teenagers turned up after a brief absence.

  Worse, if the authorities did locate Savannah, she would be taken to a juvenile detention facility, with all the attendant intervention and paperwork. If she was on her way to California, that state would have to become involved, too.

  “I’m glad she’s safe,” Travis said now. “Does her California mother know everything that transpired?”

  “Cassie said she sounded more resigned than enthusiastic about Savannah moving in with her. It has to be a shock. Single woman with an occasional short-term daughter suddenly becomes a full-time mom.”

  “She has to be at least marginally prepared.”

  “We’ll see, or maybe we won’t. Who knows when Cassie will hear a report from either of them.”

  “This has probably been stressful for you, too. You could come and enjoy a bologna sandwich at my kitchen counter.”

  Amber wondered what else Travis wanted her to enjoy, and the invitation was tempting. He was a surprise and a worry, and she was still mulling over the consequences of getting involved with a man who would be hard to leave. But they had already planned another dinner for the end of the week, and she couldn’t delay her afternoon phone call.

  After she hung up, she tackled the papers. At noon she stacked everything into neat piles, one to discuss with Cassie, another to refile and a third to finish later. Then she changed for work and left the house.

  The RV park near the Sponge Docks was one of the dozen or so places in and around the city that still had pay phones. She’d found a list online and checked each one.

  She tried not to use the same phone twice. She had no reason to suspect that the number she called was being monitored, but she was dealing with a sociopath with both resources and animal cunning.

  To stay safe, Amber rarely called Betsy Garland directly, but every few months it was important to check in. Although she was retired, Betsy still lived in Chaslan and kept her ear to the ground. She was no longer a 4-H leader but she helped with the sewing curriculum when her arthritis wasn’t acting up.

  Betsy’s interest in quilting had helped them create a signal so that Betsy would be waiting by a friend’s phone and ready to take a call when Amber wanted to talk. To alert her, Amber left a message on a quilting bulletin board that Betsy had created, using the name Sue Simpson. Amber always inquired about a project she was working on and asked Betsy if her measurements seemed correct. From those, Betsy could figure out what day and what time in the afternoon Amber would call the following week. Usually Betsy replied, and if necessary, “corrected” her description if the time was inconvenient.

  The day was expressed in yards. One yard was Monday, two was Tuesday and the time of day was expressed in measurements for cutting. So two yards, with a strip cut four and a half inches wide meant Amber would call on the following Tuesday at four thirty. Last week’s message had followed their usual pattern. Amber hadn’t received a response, but that had happened before, so she wasn’t worried.

  So far Betsy had always been waiting for the calls. Betsy’s friend, Tammy, had no idea why Betsy needed to sit by Tammy’s phone from time to time, but the two women had known each other since sixth grade, and Tammy was sworn to silence. Betsy had promised Tammy that when she could reveal what the calls were about, she would.

  At the RV park, Amber pulled curbside near the recreation pavilion. The park was only ten minutes from the Kouzina, nicer than the one Amber and Will had stayed in before moving to Cassie’s, with waterfront sites complete with docks and surfaced RV sites. Beaches were close by, and the big-city pleasures of Tampa were only a short drive away.

  She found the pay phone with no trouble, smiled at the people taking their children to the playground and then turned her back, checking the posted rates before she slipped in change and waited for her call to go through.

  Betsy always answered after the first ring, but today the phone rang ten times before Amber hung up. Afraid she’d dialed incorrectly or that Betsy hadn’t yet arrived, she waited five minutes, then she reinserted the change that had been returned and tried again. The result was the same.

  When a third try was no more successful, she considered possibilities. Her friend might be sick. Or maybe Betsy hadn’t seen the message on the bulletin board or confused the time and thought Amber was calling on a different day.

  But the worst possibility? Betsy had been ill with a chest cold the previous year, and a routine doctor’s visit had turned up a stage one melanoma. She’d had outpatient surgery and appropriate tests afterward, and she’d been released from any further treatment. But had cancer recurred? Was Betsy in a hospital and Tammy unaware of a planned phone call?

  Or worse?

  Amber had just enough time for a quick stop at the library before her shift began. She settled in at one of the computers and went immediately to the website for the Croville Chronicle and ran a search for Betsy Garland, praying she wouldn’t see an obituary.

  When nothing turned up, she blinked away tears. Her best choice now was to go back to the quilter’s bulletin board and insert another coded message.

  As she walked back to her car, her thoughts turned darker. Was it possible Darryl Hawken was responsible for Betsy’s disappearance? Betsy had a son who lived out of town, and it would be so easy to spread the word she was visiting him and wouldn’t be home for the foreseeable future.

  If somehow Darryl had learned that Amber and Betsy were still in touch, was it possible that he’d gotten her address from Betsy, too? What if he had also learned about Will? Were their lives in danger? And what about Cassie, who had taken them both in? It was too ea
rly to panic, but Amber realized she had to be on a state of high alert in the weeks to come.

  The day had been fraught with drama, and she hoped the rest of it went better. Roxanne was returning to work that afternoon after her trip to Paris. Amber hoped that she and Yiayia would be so happy to see each other that the atmosphere at the Kouzina would be cheerful and carefree.

  Her father had always said that trouble came in threes, and that was just for starters. Optimism had never been Ray Parsons’s strong point. Today she was afraid she might have inherited more from the man who had sired her than her green eyes.

  33

  “YOU MUST BE SAVANNAH.”

  Just past airport security, Savannah stopped searching for her mother and turned toward the older woman standing six feet away. She had close-cropped gray hair and assessing pale blue eyes, and she was offering Savannah her hand.

  “I’m Pauline, your mother’s housekeeper. Your mother sent me. She’s at the office and won’t be home until late afternoon. I’m to get you settled.”

  Savannah shook her hand, although she was sure her own was limp and sweaty. Both flights, with a short layover in Phoenix, had seemed a hundred years long, and she was beyond exhausted. A baby behind her had screamed for the entire first leg, and a man who probably hadn’t bathed that morning had squeezed in beside her for the second.

  She said the only thing that came to mind. “I didn’t know Gen had a housekeeper.”

  “I’ve always worked part-time for your mother, so I agreed to work longer hours now that you’re here. I assume you have baggage on the carousel?” Without waiting for an answer, Pauline started toward baggage claim, which was housed in the north wing. Savannah barely managed to keep up with her.

  The Palm Springs Airport was airy and attractive, with open spaces and tall windows that faced Mount San Jacinto. Desert mountains were made entirely of folds and shadows, and the way the sun illuminated them fascinated Savannah. But there was no time for sightseeing.

  At the carousel Pauline checked her phone. “Have you texted your stepmother to tell her you arrived?”

  Savannah wondered exactly how she could have texted anyone while they sprinted across the airport. “Not yet.”

  “I’m sure she’ll want to know.” Pauline went back to her phone.

  Instead, Savannah texted Will.

  Tell Cassie I made it to Palm Springs.

  She debated, then added:

  Hope you told Helia and Minh I said goodbye.

  She slipped her phone back in the pocket of her jeans. By the time they were in Pauline’s little Mazda heading toward Gen’s condo, she was struggling to keep her eyes open.

  “Gen said to tell you that she’ll move her desk out of the study this weekend and put in a real bed. For now you’ll have to sleep on the sofa.”

  The news wasn’t surprising. Savannah always slept on the pullout sofa bed when she visited Gen. The study did have a small closet, but Gen had added shelves and stored her books and a wireless printer there. She wondered if she would also remove the shelves so she could hang up a few clothes.

  For a while now she’d wondered why Gen had chosen such a small condo when she knew Savannah would be visiting. But, of course, Gen was frequently out of the country, and until now, Savannah’s visits to Palm Springs had been short. Gen must have assumed that would never change.

  “Are you hungry?” Pauline asked.

  “Starving.” Savannah hoped the question meant they were going to stop for tacos or a burger.

  “I made salads for dinner. There’s enough for you to have a serving when we get to Gen’s.”

  “I think I’ll need more than a salad. I haven’t eaten anything but snacks since I left Florida.”

  “There are plenty of crackers and cheese to go with it.”

  Savannah could hardly wait.

  The drive was blessedly short. The condo complex was small, overlooking mountains and desert dotted by palm trees. The view was its best selling point. The buildings themselves were rectangular stucco with flat roofs and limestone walls that surrounded entryways and what passed for yards. Gen’s unit had a tiny bisected pool with one narrow lane for laps and the rest for splashing. The complex had a larger pool with a handful of shaded cabanas, but Savannah had never seen anyone there who was close to her age.

  “We’ll take in your bags and then get your lunch.”

  Pauline was too old to have teenagers herself but too young to have teenage grandchildren, so it was no surprise that she didn’t understand that a salad, after a day of pretzels and peanuts, was a bad idea. Savannah wondered how often she would be around. Her father had always told her to follow her instincts about the people she met, but not to make a final judgment too early. So she was trying not to go with her initial impression, that Pauline got an A on details and a D on empathy.

  They parked in the utilitarian garage with a washer and dryer shoved against one wall, and entered through the condo kitchen. Most of the condo was laid out on one floor, a stone floor at that, and the kitchen was a smattering of additional hard surfaces. One flight of stairs led to the study upstairs and a small bathroom.

  The downstairs had been newly painted a peachy beige, and the wall that surrounded the fireplace in the great room was the same color but many shades darker. New leather couches flanked the fireplace, and a flat-screen television loomed on the wall above it.

  Pauline uttered one of her rare sentences. “Your mother has done a fair bit of decorating since you were here, I suspect.”

  Savannah took in the African masks on the wall and the brightly patterned pillows. A three-paneled photo of an elephant stared at her from the wall opposite the fireplace. She felt more like a stranger. “I like it.”

  “She redecorated the study, too, where you’ll be sleeping now.”

  The stairs leading to the study were open, with a metal railing and empty space between treads, a style Gen had referred to as floating stairs. The openings always made Savannah dizzy as she climbed, even if she knew she wasn’t going to slip through them. Now she followed Pauline to the top, carrying her backpack and the suitcase she had brought along. She wished she had a hand for the railing.

  The room was smaller than she remembered. She tried to imagine it without the desk and sofa. There would be room for a double bed, but only just, and perhaps a small dresser.

  “Gen thinks we can fit this desk in the hallway by the door.” Pauline parked the larger rolling suitcase beside the sofa. “You can freshen up. I’ll have everything ready when you come down.”

  The designer hadn’t worked any magic here. There was some unfamiliar abstract art on the glistening white walls—blotches and stripes and what looked like people peeking out of shadows—and the desk was new, contemporary in style with no pulls on the drawers and a glass top. On the back edge against the wall Savannah saw a framed photo of herself, the last school picture she’d posed for at Pfeiffer Grant. She wondered if Gen had added it as an afterthought, and she immediately felt disloyal. She took a clean shirt from her suitcase, washed up in the bathroom and then slipped on sandals to go downstairs to eat.

  In the kitchen she watched as Pauline carefully folded a cloth napkin beside a small bowl filled with something green. “When will Gen be back?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll stay until she gets here.”

  “It’s okay if you need to leave. I’ll be fine.”

  “No, I’ll stay.”

  Arguing with Pauline wasn’t going to get her anywhere. She sat and looked at the salad, thinly sliced cabbage, wontons, a few cherry tomatoes. She’d hoped for chicken at the very least, but the white cubes scattered here and there looked like tofu.

  “Your mom’s a vegetarian now,” Pauline said. “But I’m sure she’ll let you eat meat now and then if that’s your choice.”

  Savannah wanted to start immediately with
a burger and maybe some fries, or better yet, one of Yiayia’s gyros. “It’s very pretty the way you arranged everything.” She picked up her fork and took a mouthful. There was a faint hint of peanuts in the minimal dressing.

  “We have herbal tea and sparkling water.”

  “Water, thanks.” Savannah took it and thanked her again. Obviously the offer of cheese and crackers had been forgotten.

  “I’ll be out sweeping the patio.” Pauline retreated without another word.

  Savannah told herself to eat the salad whether she liked it or not, because it was clear nothing else was forthcoming. Cassie always said gather the harvest while you can because it won’t always be summer. It was one of Yiayia’s expressions. Savannah wondered how long it would be before Cassie and all her Greek relatives were out of her head.

  So she didn’t really like Pauline, and the study was going to take some getting used to. At least she would be with her real mother.

  After she finished the salad, she went upstairs to investigate how comfortable the sofa was. The next thing she knew the door to the study swung open, and Gen was staring down at her.

  “Vanna!” Gen dropped to the edge of the sofa. “Poor baby. You look tired. That’s some trip, isn’t it?”

  Savannah sat up and stretched. “Hey, Gen. I guess I fell asleep. When did you get home?” She could see through the lone window that the sky was already growing dark outside.

  “Not soon enough.” Gen reached over and stroked her hair. “I got stuck in a meeting. But Pauline took good care of you?”

  Savannah wasn’t sure what to say. “She gave me some of tonight’s salad and helped me get settled up here.”

  “She’s a treasure. She’s going to be staying here in the afternoons while I’m at work, so you’ll have company. And whenever I’m out of town, too.”

  Savannah drank in the sight of the woman who had given birth to her. Gen’s eyes were more brown than hazel, and her hair was a lighter brown than Savannah’s. These days she wore it in a glistening chin-length bob pushed back over ears sporting delicate gold hoops. Savannah’s features were tidy and symmetrical like her father’s, while her mother’s nose was narrow but her lips were full, sheltering large perfect teeth. Gen didn’t look like a sixties high school cheerleader. She looked like everyone’s favorite teacher, the one who staged high school musicals, who smoked in the teacher’s lounge when nobody was looking and encouraged, prompted and scolded—but only if absolutely necessary.