If she was pregnant.
Time would tell, he thought, heading uphill. As he passed by the window of an Italian restaurant, he noticed his reflection in a storefront window. He’d finally gotten a haircut and trimmed his beard. He didn’t look so much like a freak any longer, but he still felt uneven and disjointed inside. The pain in his arm and shoulder had finally ceased, and the scars on his chin beneath his beard had almost disappeared, but he was profoundly changed forever.
Not only was he going to be a father, but Megan still hadn’t been found, despite the location of her car coming to light. In Jennifer Korpi’s boyfriend’s garage. What the hell was that all about?
Was Megan even still alive?
Or was she, like two other women in town—Willow Valente and Charity Spritz—dead, murdered?
Would he ever know?
Would he ever stop parking across from the Main Street Hotel to make certain that Rebecca was safe for the night?
It was all so very wrong.
He sidestepped a skateboarder zipping between pedestrians and spotted the sign of the store he was looking for half a block uphill, just past a little café where he and Rebecca had met for coffee. His jaw tightened with the memory, then, with a crowd that had waited at the corner, he crossed the street before heading into a small store where all kinds of electronic devices were on display, the shop that Rowdy had recommended. Once inside, he zeroed in on the surveillance section and found a pimply-faced kid behind the counter who couldn’t have been eighteen but enthusiastically showed him devices he claimed were “state-of-the art, nearly military-grade” equipment.
James didn’t believe that line of bull, but found a tracking device that would do the trick and bought it.
Once on the wet sidewalk again, he hiked three more blocks through the rain to a jewelry store he’d found in a city search on his phone. The window display of necklaces, earrings, bracelets, and rings glittered brightly against the backdrop of the gloomy day. James stared at the diamond rings sparkling beneath the subtly hidden lights of the display.
Could he really do this?
Be such a hypocrite as to buy a tracking device so he could find out where Sophia went—on the same day as he purchased an engagement ring?
* * *
Ten days later, Julia was barely holding it together.
Frantic inside.
She tried to keep her mind on business.
With a smile pinned to her face, she was about to close the little Christmas shop attached to the café, but she was dealing with one last customer, a pudgy woman stuffed into a bright red jacket at least two sizes too small, a Santa hat partially covering her short brown curls. Her chapped lips were pursed as if she’d sucked on a lemon, and she was showing Julia an ornament she’d plucked from the display tree and complaining that it wasn’t available in off-white or ivory. Apparently snow-white “just couldn’t possibly” go on her tree.
“I’m sorry; it’s all we have left,” Julia said, trying to keep her voice light, but she was irritated. For Pete’s sake, it was two days before Christmas, and the woman was decorating her tree now? Just so she could get the fifty percent off the sales price?
“Isn’t there anything you can do?” Pudgy pouted.
“I’m sorry.” Julia wasn’t. “Maybe you can find something else?”
“I’ve looked! Everything’s picked over.”
Well, duh. Again, two days before Christmas!
“Don’t you have some in the back? I swear I saw a bone-colored one just last week. Maybe there are others.”
“Everything we have is out,” Julia assured the old bag.
“Well, this just won’t do.” Pudgy scowled and puffed herself up even more, straining the zipper running down the front of her jacket. “I guess I’ll just have to look somewhere else.”
Good luck with that!
“I’m sorry.” But there wasn’t the least trace of sincerity in Julia’s tone; in fact, she was being sarcastic
And Pudgy knew it. She slapped the delicate ornament into Julia’s hand.
“And Merry Christmas to you too!” But Julia didn’t utter the overused phrase.
Pudgy adjusted her Santa’s hat and walked out in a huff, the door with its little tinkling bell over the threshold slamming behind her.
Good riddance, Julia thought, and wondered how long she would have this job—such as it was. Sophia had indicated that, during their fight, James had suggested Sophia find employment somewhere else but had acquiesced as it was the busy season. However, the holidays would soon be over. She hadn’t dared approach James, as Sophia had also told her that James needed a little time to sort things out.
Whatever their fight had been about, it had been a doozy, nearly ruining everything they’d worked for. Sophia had only confided that it had been about Rebecca, which was a pisser.
So Julia would be patient. She hadn’t come this far, spent all the years plotting and hatching her plan, only to rush things and blow it at the end. If James needed a little breathing room, she’d go along with that. For now, he seemed to be thawing a little, waving to her if they met in the bar. She’d give him some breathing room, even though she hated it.
She’d seen him, of course, usually from a distance, and she had caught his eye, smiling and waving. He’d returned the favor, though his smile hadn’t touched his eyes.
It was all she could do to get through the days.
Everything was falling apart. That damned Phoebe Matrix hadn’t died, had come out of her coma. No telling what she would tell the cops, and beyond that, there was Gus, out of the hospital and supposedly recovering, but he was a powder keg, ready to go off. She’d bought his silence by promising him a hundred grand, but she was willing to up it, and besides, he was the one who had killed Charity, so it was to his advantage to keep
