CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 21

"Oh, Brooke, no, I'm sorry," Andrea was saying on the other end of the connection, her voice clogged with emotion. "I'm sure she'll be all right."

That was a lie and they both knew it. Andrea wasn't an idiot, and with Allison Carelli missing, the situation looked bleak. "Look, I asked Zuri if she had any idea where Marilee could be and she told me she doesn't have a clue. But I'll keep pushing her, keep seeing if any of their friends know anything."

"Thanks." Heartsick, Brooke slouched onto the kitchen table while Leah fussed with the coffee, muttering under her breath as she waited for the pot to brew.

Neal was gone, off in his Range Rover, searching for their child. He had scoured the park across the street and was now calling the local hospitals and police department while driving around to the places that were Marilee's favorite haunts.

As if she would go to any of them.

Brooke was left calling Marilee's friends. She'd started with Andrea, Zuri's mother, without any luck. Now she called the Paszek residence, or at least she hoped it was. The number she had was old, from a list of volunteers at the elementary school that she'd kept on her phone. Meanwhile Leah, finally satisfied with the coffee, poured a cup and set it on the table in front of Brooke.

"Thanks," Brooke said automatically, but her stomach curdled just looking at it.

A groggy female voice answered the phone after four rings. "Yeah, who is this?"

"Brooke. Brooke Harmon. Your son met my daughter at the dance last night."

"Oh yeah. Marilyn."

"Marilee."

"Right. Right. Sorry. Friend of Tammi's, I know. I guess I'm still half asleep. Holy God, what time is it? Six a.m.? On a Saturday?" Irritation had crawled into the muddled voice. "I need coffee. Strong coffee. Vats of it."

"I know, I know it's early, but listen, Renata, the thing is, Marilee didn't come home last night," Brooke said as Leah poured cream and sugar into a second cup of coffee and stirred, obviously listening. "I mean she came home, but now she's gone."

"What?" the woman said.

"Could you please just talk to Nick—ask him if he knows where she is?"

"Nick? Why would he know anything about it?" Renata asked, suspicion seeping into her words. Brooke heard the sound of a lighter clicking, then a deep inhalation as Renata lit a cigarette.

"Just ask him about it. Please. They—Marilee and Nick—met at the dance. She didn't leave the dance with him, we picked her up, but I thought he might have some idea what happened." Brooke tried to keep the panic out of her voice as she explained about not finding Marilee in her bed in the early morning hours. "She and I had a fight, a mother-daughter thing, you know?"

"I do know. Tammi? My daughter? You've met her, right? Then I don't need to tell you. That girl can give me fits!"

"Yes, so, Neal and I, we're calling all her friends. My husband has checked with the hospitals and—"

"Holy shit! Are you saying she's missing—like Alli Carelli? Oh my fu—oh my God!" Renata was finally getting it. "Wait a sec. Just a sec. I–I'll go see. Nick's still asleep."

Brooke heard footsteps and a door opening, then, though muffled, as if the phone was being held to her chest, Renata's sharp voice, which had elevated an octave, "Nick! Nick! Jesus Christ, for the love of—And what're you doing here—Holy Mother of God. Nick! Get out of bed and you—your mother is worried sick about you!"

"Mom! Get out!" a deep male voice yelled. "What the hell are you doing?"

"Saving your ass, that's what I'm doing. Holy crap, Nick!"

Renata Paszek was back on the line, her voice clear if a bit unsteady. "She's here. With Nick. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! She's here!"

"Thank God," Brooke whispered, her knees buckling as she imagined her little girl sleeping in the boy's bed.... At least she was alive. And safe. And hadn't disappeared. "We'll be over to pick her up right away. Thank you."

She disconnected. "She was with that boyfriend, Nick, right?" Leah asked, taking a long swallow of coffee. "What did I tell you?"

"Fine, fine, you were right." Brooke was already on her feet, picking up her purse and searching for her keys.

"You're driving her away."

"What?" Brooke asked, barely hearing her sister.

"All your rules, and your distractions—like not picking her up from school on time, when you don't even have a job?"

"I'm looking. And—"

"Distracted! If you ask me, you're driving her right into that Nick kid's arms."

"No one did ask and you don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't I?" She glared at Brooke. "I remember being young. Being in love. Thinking that the boy who paid attention to me was the ‘one,' my Prince Charming. And then, of course, I found out differently," she added bitterly. Her jaw was set and there were deep-seated recriminations in her eyes.

Brooke grabbed her jacket from the back of a chair and ignored Leah's unspoken accusations. Right now she didn't have time for any of her sister's histrionics. She headed down to the garage.

Shep, on alert with all the activity, tried to follow her. "Not this time, buddy." She left him in the laundry room, then made her way down the final half-flight to her Explorer.

The damaged SUV that had been fitted with a tracking device, she reminded herself as she climbed behind the wheel. She opened the garage door, backed out, and tore out of the driveway. On the way to the Paszeks' home, she called Neal, who answered on the second ring.

"Tell me you found her," he said desperately.

"I did." Heart hammering, she maneuvered through the still-dark city streets and gave him an update as she slowed for a light that shimmered blood-red on the wet pavement. A truck pulled up behind her, headlights glowing as the Explorer idled and she waited for a pack of early morning joggers to run through the crosswalk, barely noticing them as she was ranting to Neal. ". . . in his bedroom and his bed, from the sounds of it. My God, she's only fourteen and . . . and . . ."

"And it could be statutory rape."

"Don't even say it!" she cried as a car horn behind her blasted and she finally noticed the light had changed. She hit the gas and thought she heard the sound of a motorcycle.

"I'm on my way!" Neal said.

"No, no . . . just meet me back at the house. I'll bring her there."

"I want to talk to that horny son of a bitch!"

"I know, me too, but maybe we should let his folks handle him for the time being. We can talk to them or him later. Let's just get her home safe!"

He argued with her and she understood it. She wanted to throttle Nick Paszek too. He was older, should know better, but Marilee wasn't a complete innocent. They'd had "the talk." Make that many talks. And two other sets of parents weren't as lucky as they were this morning. The Carellis and the Williamses would be jumping for joy just to have their daughters back regardless of where they'd been. "Look, Neal," she said, trying to calm him down, calm them both down. "Just meet us at home, okay? Then, once you've talked to Marilee, if you still feel compelled to confront Nick? Have at it."

Was that the sound of a motorbike's engine? Or was she just stressed and imagining it?

"Fine," Neal said, disconnecting, and she could tell he wasn't fine. Not at all. Well, neither was she. "‘Fine'" would be a long time coming.

She turned off the main street and the truck behind her went straight. Only then did she notice the headlight glowing behind her, a single lamp bearing down on her.

A motorcycle!

Her heart dropped.

Gideon!

"No," she whispered, her heart nearly stopping until she realized it was an older car with a single headlamp because the other had died.

Thank God.

The last thing she needed this morning was to deal with Gideon.

Just concentrate on Marilee. That's all that matters.

She had to get control of her runaway emotions, pull herself together, and deal with her daughter.

Grinding her teeth and telling herself over and over that she could handle this, she took in several deep breaths and forced her hands to relax on the steering wheel. She couldn't handle this. But she had to.

At the Paszeks' house, she pulled into the leaf-strewn drive of the split-entry home. A porch light was glowing in the still dark morning. The second Brooke made her way to the brick steps, the front door opened, and Renata, Nick's mother, stepped outside, a glowing half-smoked cigarette in one hand. Disheveled, her dark hair mussed, she was wearing a once-aqua-colored bathrobe that had paled with time. "Come in," she said with a final puff before poking the remainder of her cigarette into the soil of a potted, untrimmed boxwood and motioning Brooke inside. No reason for introductions; they knew each other, if only as acquaintances, mothers of girls who ran in the same circle. "They're in the family room," she said "and Nick's in trouble. Big trouble."

She guided Brooke down the half flight to the basement, where she found Marilee seated on the opposite end of a worn leather couch from Nick.

Nick's father was leaning against the bar at the far end of the long room. Scowling and unshaven, he nodded at Brooke. "Bruno," he said by way of introduction. "We've met?"

"A time or two." Brooke nodded, her focus on her daughter.

Marilee, wearing a sweatshirt with the hood pulled up over her hair, looked upward and at least had the grace to seem embarrassed. Nick too glanced at Brooke, then looked quickly away.

"What's going on?" Brooke asked.

Silence.

To her daughter she said, "You snuck out and . . . came here?"

When Marilee didn't respond, Renata said, "We had no idea. I mean, we didn't hear Nick go out again after the dance, and we didn't hear them come in."

Marilee looked up. "Can we just go now?" Before Brooke could answer, she shot to her feet and was out of the room and up the stairs.

"I guess we're out of here," Brooke said. "I'm sorry for all of this mess."

Renata was nodding, reaching into the deep pocket of her robe and coming up with a crumpled pack of cigarettes. "Me too. Nick here is grounded."

Nick's head jerked up. "That's not fair."

"For life," Renata added, shaking out a cigarette. "Longer, if I can arrange it with God."

"Oh Mom!"

"Apologize to Mrs. Harmon."

"For what?"

"Sneaking her daughter out of the house. For God's sake, she's only fifteen!"

"Fourteen," he corrected.

Renata's face fell. "Fourteen? A frickin' baby? Well, that's worse! Jesus H. Christ, Nicholas, what in heaven's name were you thinking?"

"He wasn't," Bruno said. "At least not with his head."

Nick sputtered. "Oh Dad, gross!"

"Yeah, maybe." Bruno hitched his thumb toward the stairs. "Let's go to your room right now. We'll go over the facts of life and the facts of the law again."

"Fuck, Dad, we didn't do anything!" Nick growled and ran stiff fingers through his dark curls. "Why don't you believe me?"

"Because I was nineteen once and I remember."

Brooke said, "Look, I'm sorry for all of this, all of the trouble. I'm going to have a talk with Marilee too."

"Teenagers," Renata muttered under her breath, as if that single word said it all. Then she added a world-weary, "Whaddaya gonna do?" and lit up.

Brooke let herself out and found Marilee slumped in the Explorer, already strapped in, her arms crossed belligerently over her chest. As Brooke slid inside, Marilee said, "We didn't do anything, okay? I know what you're thinking, but we were just together. That's all."

"In bed."

"With our clothes on. It's not like we were—you know!"

"Having sex?"

Marilee had the decency to look aghast. "It's not like that!"

It's always like that, Brooke thought but held her tongue. She cast her a glance as she started the car and tried a gentler approach. "Marilee—"

"Don't, Mom! Just don't!" Marilee turned to face her, and in the darkness the girl's skin was white as death. "I don't need a lecture. I know you're ‘disappointed' and all that, and that you're going to ground me or whatever, but nothing happened."

Brooke's jaw slid to the side. She wanted to believe her daughter but couldn't.

She started the Explorer and backed onto the street. Traffic was picking up, the sky turning to a deep gray, the mist having turned to rain, the silence in the car thick and deafening.

Marilee turned on the radio.

Brooke switched it off.

"Maybe we should talk before we get home and have to deal with your dad." She switched on the wipers, but they didn't move. Damn. She tried again. Nothing. Just the click of the switch.

"He knows about this?" Marilee was doodling in the condensation on the passenger window.

"Of course he does."

"Ugh."

"You thought he wouldn't know?" She tried the wipers again; the windshield was difficult to see through. Once more they failed.

"I hoped he was asleep." She was doodling on the fogged passenger window, writing Nick's name with a finger.

"Marilee, what were you thinking?" Brooke demanded.

"That I love him!"

"For the love of God! You're fourteen!"

"You keep saying!" She drew a heart around Nick's name.

Sooo frustrating!

"Look, this is serious. I was worried sick. So was your dad!"

She was squinting, trying the damned wipers and cursing under her breath as the rain distorted everything in her path. Obviously the wipers had been damaged in the stupid accident she'd had days earlier. They were barely working.

"What do you mean?" Marilee grumbled.

"I mean, what were you thinking when you were sneaking out behind our backs and meeting Nick?"

"You wouldn't let me see him."

"Wrong! I wouldn't let you drive with him."

"You treat me like a baby."

"And so you act like one. Your father and I were worried sick." Futilely, she worked the switch, but once more the stupid wipers hardly moved. They couldn't keep up with the rain. Still, she tried to drive, splitting her concentration between the road ahead and the conversation.

"I don't want to talk about it," Marilee said.

"We're talking now." Brooke was beyond irritated with her daughter's petulance and demands. "We were scared to death. We didn't know what had happened to you. There are girls missing, you know! Girls from your school."

"I know, Mom, but I'm not!" Marilee said angrily.

Brooke was trying to keep her tone even but was failing. "With Penelope and Allison missing—"

Marilee gave a little snort.

What?

"Don't you care?" Brooke almost screamed. "No one knows what happened to two of your classmates and you're not concerned?" She was almost screaming now.

"God, Mom . . ." Marilee rolled her big eyes.

Brooke wanted to strangle her.

Marilee looked away quickly and added a shaky arrow to the heart she'd drawn in the condensation.

And then Brooke felt the hairs on the back of her neck lift. There was something going on here. Something Marilee wasn't telling her. "You know where they are?" she asked, dumbstruck.

"No . . ."

But it wasn't sincere.

"Marilee, if you know anything, and I mean anything about where Penelope or Allison are, you have to tell me."

"I don't."

"You don't know?"

"I don't have to tell you," she said petulantly, her eyes sparking in defiance.

"That does it!" Brooke yanked on the wheel, pulled over to the curb, and put the car into Park. "What the hell do you know?" She faced her daughter, who was shriveling against the door.

"I'm not sure—"

"And we're not moving until you tell me what it is." She cut the engine. Then she laid a hand on her daughter's shoulder. Marilee shrank from her touch. "I mean it," Brooke said, trying to keep her tone even. "Tell me everything you know about Allison right now or, I promise you, I'll make sure you never see Nick again."

Marilee gasped and reached for the handle of the door, but Brooke anticipated the move and hit the automatic door lock. "Tell me!"

"I can't."

"You damned well can and you will!" For the love of God, what did her daughter know? What kind of secret was she keeping?

Marilee burst into sobs. "I hate you!"

Brooke let the painful barb slide.

"You're awful!"

She waited, the engine ticking. "I'm serious."

Marilee cast her a look of pure loathing, tears and mascara running down her cheeks. She sniffed loudly, then wiped her nose with her hand. Brooke didn't move, just stared at her daughter as the rain pounded on the hood and roof and the beams of her headlights caught the slanting drops. "I can stay here forever. In fact," Brooke said, "I'll call your dad and he can bring me coffee—"

"No!" Marilee screamed as Brooke fished in her purse for a pack of tissues and handed the entire package to her daughter.

"Then talk."

"Okay," Marilee finally said angrily. She plucked out a Kleenex, dabbed at her eyes, and blew her nose. "Alli's okay."

"Where is she?"

Silence.

"Marilee, where is she?" Brooke demanded. "And how do you know?"

Her daughter looked up at the ceiling of the car. "She's hiding," she whispered, sniffing and fighting back more tears. "Somewhere. Swore us all to secrecy, okay? I don't know where, so don't ask me. But her father . . ." She sniffed again. "He was trying to get custody, and her mom was saying all sorts of things about him. Lies. That he like . . . touched her or whatever, and it's not true, but she didn't know what to do and so she's hiding."

"Where?"

"I—I don't know."

"Where?" she said again.

"I said I don't know! She's—she's with a cousin, I think." Some of the fire had left her and her shoulders slumped, as if she were totally defeated.

"And Penelope?"

"Don't know. No one does." She slid her mother a glance. She looked frail and scared and oh so young. "It's the truth. No one that I know has any idea."

"Okay. I'm calling Elyse. Right now. She'll want to talk to you." As a bicycle whizzed by, she found Elyse Carelli's number and punched it in. The phone was answered after one ring.

"Hello?" Elyse answered breathlessly.

"Hey, Elyse, this is Brooke Harmon, Marilee's mother," Brooke said, her gaze pinned on her daughter. "Marilee thinks she may know where Allison is."