She checked the nightstands, but both drawers had been dumped, their contents not holding any clues. She pawed through some of the personal things and paused when she saw a package of condoms.
Unopened.
Reminding her.
Her lips twisted, and she pushed aside a forbidden memory.
Of James Cahill.
And how she had once imagined she loved him.
Stupid, stupid woman.
She straightened and told herself this was nothing more than a wild goose chase. Glancing through the window, she noticed sudden headlights, twin conical beams lighting up the lane as a vehicle pulled into the lot.
What? No!
She shot into the upper hallway, intent on hurrying down the stairs, when she heard a voice on the porch. Then the door rattled and suddenly opened.
Oh, no!
“Ralph! Slow down.” James’s voice over the frantic, scattering rustle of toenails on the floor.
The dog?
With a click, the lower level was cast in light, fingers of illumination crawling up the stairs. At the base, she made out a pair of jeans-clad legs.
“Jesus H. Christ, it’s cold out there.” Another man’s voice as the front door slammed shut, and noiselessly, her heart beating frantically, she backed into James’s room and closed the door so that it was open just a hair, wide enough that if she pressed her face to it, she could get a narrow view of the darkened upper hallway.
Now what?
She let out her breath slowly. Silently.
Think, Rebecca, think. How in the world are you going to get out of here without getting yourself caught?
CHAPTER 11
“What a mess,” James muttered as he strode through his kitchen, where he could find a path in the debris. He kicked a box of cornflakes out of his way, and the box burst open, half the contents, hundreds of flakes, adding to the disaster.
Drawers hung open, cupboards had been emptied, pots and pans were scattered across the floor, plates and silverware covered the counters. Wearing the clothes Bobby had brought to the hospital, his head still swathed in a bandage, his arm in a sling, he felt his jaw tighten as he moved into the dining area. His head was pounding, and the house was destroyed. Everything that hadn’t been taken by the police had been shuffled through, left, and was covered in a fine black powder of fingerprint dust. “Fuck.” His laptop and computer were gone, his vehicles as well, and the house . . . He shook his head and felt the headache beginning to pound again.
“I told ya,” Bobby reminded him. He’d picked James up at the hospital, even bringing Ralph, who was now jetting through the rooms and barking wildly, just as he had when James had climbed with effort into Bobby’s truck. The shepherd had been beside himself, all over James, licking and whining and wiggling before settling down in the truck. The good news was that Bobby had brought him fresh clothes and the hospital had returned his wallet. The blood-stained shirt and jeans he’d been wearing on the night Megan disappeared were with the police.
Now, the dog was going nuts again, whining and barking, running through the rooms and up the stairs.
“Guess he missed you,” Bobby said. He was carrying a plastic bag holding James’s meager belongings that he had had with him at the hospital.
Upstairs, Ralph was barking up a storm, as if he’d treed a squirrel. “Ralph! Enough!” James yelled and whistled to the dog. “Come.”
Whining, Ralph clambered back to the first floor, where James stood in what had once been his living room and stared at the chaos.
“This is—”
“Pretty damned bad.”
“—an effin’ nightmare.”
“Fuckin’ nightmare,” Bobby corrected, eyeing the disaster.
James grunted his agreement.
His recliner had been tipped over, the side pockets emptied, the old leather covered in the gritty dark film. Books and magazines were strewn over the floor, the shelves of the bookcase empty, the mantel swept clean, his lantern and lighter that had been upon it now on the floor, along with everything else.
He felt a surge of anger run through his blood.
“It’s like they were looking for drugs,” he said, and Bobby shook his head. “Then what?”
“A weapon.”
“What? My . . . gun?”
“It’s missing.”
He walked into the dining room and saw the drawer where he’d always stashed his pistol. It was hanging open, the Glock not inside.
They think you killed her.
For the first time, he realized that until Megan was found, he would be a primary target of an investigation looking into her disappearance.
“I told ya, you shouldn’t have left the hospital,” Bobby reminded him. “I don’t know why that doctor let you out.”
“And I told you, it was my decision.”
“A piss-poor one, if you ask me.”
“No one did.”
“Look, if you want, you can bunk with me,” he said. “The missus won’t mind.”
James wasn’t so sure of that. “The missus” was Bobby’s third wife, Cynthia—“Just call me Cyn”—a buxom brunette who had always viewed James with a calculating eye, forever, he thought, measuring him up, her eyes thinning behind the smoke of one of her imported cigarettes. He didn’t doubt that “Cyn” had googled him many times.
“You and Ralph can bunk in the second bedroom. Now that Cyn’s kid is gone, it’s free, and Ralph, I think he likes The Princess.”
James didn’t believe it. The Princess, Cyn’s long-haired cat, whose entire name seemed to be Princess-Baby, wasn’t all that likable.
“Thanks, but I’ll stay here,” he said, feeling his lips twist. “Home sweet home, and all that, y’know.”
“More like ‘Home sweet disaster,’ if ya ask me, but hell, it’s your life.” He scowled at the stairs. “You able to get up to your room?”
“If I have to.” But not
