Fear The Worst

She nodded. “I wanted to do it myself. Syd got a job up here, and I went there to find her, but she was gone. I was kind of screening my calls. I didn’t feel like talking to anybody.”

“You left Syd a note,” I said.

“Yeah, but I guess she didn’t get it.”

“You left it at the wrong cabin.”

“Shit.”

“How long have you been on this bridge?”

“Off and on, for hours,” she said.

“Sydney got scared off,” I told her. “She ran away from the inn. I think she saw one of them, looking for her.”

Patty looked scared.

I took hold of her by the shoulders. “This is something you can’t do alone, Patty. These people, the ones who’ve been looking for Syd, they’re very dangerous. They’re killers, Patty. And I think they’re up here right now. There’s been a car following us around.”

“Us?”

“I’m here with Bob. We started driving up when we learned Sydney was here in Stowe.”

“How did you know that?”

“I found out from one of them. Patty, I shot a man tonight. I shot him to find out what he knew. And he told me Sydney was up here.”

Something Jennings had told me shortly after Bob and I started heading up from Milford came into my head.

“Patty,” I said. “This call you got from Sydney. Telling you she was up here. You got that when?”

“Yesterday,” she said.

“Was that the first call?”

“Huh?”

“Was that the first time she called you? Yesterday?”

“Yeah, of course,” she said.

“Because the police, they’ve been looking for you for the last couple of days, and they were checking your cell records.”

“Yeah…”

“And they said there were other calls from Stowe. Much earlier ones.”

“That’s crazy,” she said. “They must have that wrong.”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” she insisted.

“Did Sydney call you before? Has she been keeping in touch with you? You haven’t known all along where she’s been, have you?”

She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Not for a second, anyway. “What?” she said. “Are you crazy?”

“I’m just trying to figure it all out,” I said. “And I can’t figure out why Sydney would call you to come and get her. Why wouldn’t she have called me, or her mother?”

“I don’t know!” she shouted. “I don’t know! Shit!”

“Patty, what’s going on? I need you to be honest with me. I need you to tell me what’s going on.”

“Honest?” she said. “You want honest? I’ll give you honest. My whole life has been one long fucking joke. It’s been shit, that’s what it’s been.”

“Patty.”

“And you know why? You know whose fault it is?”

“Patty, this isn’t the time. We have to find out where-”

“It’s my fucking parents’ fault, for sure, but you know who else? Huh? You know who else? You. That’s who. That’s who’s fucked up my entire life. You.”

“Patty,” I said again.

“Because you’re the reason I’m here,” she said. “You’re the reason I exist.”

I let that one hang out there a minute before I said, “I know.”

“What?”

“I know. I saw your mother. I know about the file. You found the file, didn’t you? The detective’s report.”

She stared at me, stone-faced. “Yeah. I saw it.”

“You’re my daughter,” I said.

“Yeah,” she repeated. “Big whoop.”

“You should have told me. When you met Sydney, when you came to our house, you must have figured it out.”

“I knew before,” she whispered. “That’s why I got to know her, kind of snuck into that math class. Because I wanted to get to know you. I wanted to know who my real father was. And now I know. I found out the other night. I saw the real you. When you told me you had one daughter and that was enough.”

“Patty, I didn’t know. If I’d known-”

“If you’d known, what? What would you have done? You’d have freaked out, that’s what you would have done. And listen, don’t even worry yourself about it. Because I really don’t have any father, okay? All you are is just some guy who had it off with a cup.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “You make decisions when you’re young, you never think about the ramifications of-”

“Oh, fuck off,” she said. But while she sounded angry, I could see, in the limited light, that she was crying.

“Patty,” I said, “when did Sydney first call you?”

She wouldn’t look at me.

“How long have you known she was up here? What did you tell her? Why have you been keeping-”

My cell phone rang.

“Yeah?”

“Tim? It’s Bob. I’ve got her. I’ve got Syd.”

FORTY-FIVE

I HEARD THE PHONE BEING RUSTLED. “Daddy?” Sydney said. “Daddy?”

“Syd!” I said while Patty watched me. “Oh my God, Syd, I can’t believe it’s you! Are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m okay!”

“How did Bob find you?”

“I found him!”

“What?”

“I’ve been hiding out all over town for hours after I got spotted at the inn. So I saw this car drive by, and the window was down, and I was sure it was Bob, so I phoned him!”

“That’s great, honey! That’s fantastic!” I brought my voice down a touch. “They’re still around. There’s some car prowling around with its headlights off.”

“I know, I know,” she said. “Did you find Patty? Bob said Patty left me a note?”