“Aunt Linds?”
“Am I being too rough?”
“No, it’s not that.”
I pointed to the coffee table.
“Did you move my insulin kit?”
She looked over, saw a stack of magazines and an empty space where the kit had been. She stood up. I stood with her. We searched the living room, the kitchen, the upstairs and downstairs bathrooms. The kit was gone. We both knew: Sean had taken it.
He must have figured it would work to his advantage once he found me. How could I run from him when he was holding the thing that kept me alive? Or maybe this was his way of flushing me out. There were only so many places I could go looking for insulin. He was probably camped outside my doctor’s office right now.
“I’m so sorry,” Aunt Lindsey said. “It’s gone.”
Then she walked over to me and took my face in her hands.
“Don’t worry, child, we’ll get through this. Together. You hear me? We’re in this together.”
I nodded, knowing full well this was my fight, and mine alone.
Next morning, Aunt Lindsey woke up to find the following note on her kitchen table:
Dear Aunt Lindsey,
I know if I delivered this message in person you’d try to talk me out of it, and I know you’d probably succeed, so I’m writing a note because I can’t afford to be weak. Not now. I love you. There’s no one I’d rather have in my corner, but this is our reality: in order for me to survive, and for you to be happy, I need to disappear. Alone. No forwarding address means no need for you to lie—to the police, or whoever comes calling. I don’t want you on the hook for my mistakes. I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you.
There’s something else. Something far more urgent. I cooked up a batch of buttered grits for you. They’re in the Tupperware on top of the stove. Six stars.
All my heart,
Sarah
PS: As you can see, I’ve left you both my credit cards. Wait a few days and use them to buy anything you need/want. Use them for my sake, to throw the dogs off the scent. Then destroy them, along with this note.
It took me three drafts to get the wording right, then a fourth to make my penmanship legible. The note felt to me like a good-bye. A permanent good-bye. Because somehow I was sure I’d never see Aunt Lindsey again.
Chapter 14Detective Sean Walsh
SíMON QUIT work at five o’clock sharp, spent an hour pushing weights around a boutique gym, then hit a local fast-food chain, where he sat by the window scarfing a three-tier cheeseburger and curly fries. No doubt about it: the man had assimilated.
From the restaurant I followed him to a ritzy wine bar in Sunset Park. Lucky for me, the place had a glass storefront. I parked across the street, watched through binoculars from behind my Jeep’s tinted windows. Símon was halfway through a demicarafe of red when a woman in a sequin dress tapped his shoulder. He hopped up, smiled, gave her a very polite peck on the cheek. For a second I thought it was Serena. Right height and shape, wrong age: Símon’s date was robbing the cradle.
They carried on what looked like a lively conversation for the better part of an hour, then made their way to the movie theater around the corner, an indie house showing two titles, one French and one German. Símon was eager to impress.
I looked at my watch, figured I had a couple of hours to kill before they came back out. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. I grabbed three slices at the pizza parlor across from the theater, then strolled over to Símon’s Honda Civic and opened the driver’s-side door with a slim jim.
I was looking for any sign of Serena: a receipt from a store in Anthony Costello’s zip code, one of the ESL workbooks my wife was always giving her, a piece of Anna’s jewelry. But the interior was spotless. Of course it was: if Símon played his cards right, he’d have company on the ride home.
I checked the glove compartment. Nothing but the vehicle’s registration and an illustrated primer on the flora and fauna of the Everglades. Nothing much in the trunk, either. Just a spare tire, a jack, and a stash of environmentally friendly grocery bags.
Símon was starting to annoy me.
I glanced at my watch. The movie was only a half hour in. Chances were they’d stop for another drink after, maybe even a late meal. Unless Símon’s sister planned on crashing date night, there was no point in my continuing to tag along. It occurred to me that I could break into his apartment just as easily as his car. If Serena was there, camped out on his couch, so much the better. If not, there might be something to indicate where she’d gone. I copied Símon’s current address off the registration, then locked up and walked back to my car.
Símon lived in Ybor City in a funky but upscale building, a nineteenth-century boarding school that had been converted into condominiums in the nineties. I got past the lobby door with a bump key and some elbow grease, took the stairs two at a time up to his third-floor apartment. For a while, I just stood there listening, hoping to hear a television or radio, something to tell me Serena was home. But the only noise came from children fighting in a corner unit.
I rang the bell just to be sure, then slipped on a pair of latex gloves and let myself in. The lights were off, the windows open. I heard sporadic traffic coming from the street below, but otherwise the place was silent. I switched my phone to Flashlight, passed its beam over the living room, then kept going through the rest of the apartment. No doubt about it: Símon had done
