Little Girl Gone (An Afton Tangler Thriller #1)(14)

“Waaaaaah!” A shrill cry echoed from down the hallway again. The kid was persistent.

“Baby’s still crying,” Marjorie said. Her thin, penciled brows rose in a mild challenge as she worked on staring down Shake.

Ronnie’s hands smacked down flat and hard on the table, jouncing the dishes and silverware, upending his cup of coffee. “Damn it,” he snarled. “I’ll go.”

He stormed out of the kitchen and down the hallway, into the living room, where the baby was lying in an old plastic bassinette. He placed a hand on the side of the bassinette and shook it, jostling the baby and causing it to cry that much harder.

“Shut up,” Ronnie whispered.

The upturned pink face was turning almost purple now as the baby wailed away, her shrieks piercing the air.

Ronnie stared at it impassively. His mind was beginning to drift, blocking out the squalling noise. He wondered idly what the baby would look like stuffed?

Probably, he decided . . . just like one of Mom’s stupid dolls.


*

FIVE minutes later, Ronnie was out the door and on his way. Shake had pleaded with him to take her along. His mother had yammered after him like some goddamned little ankle biter dog. But Ronnie was on a mission.

When he pulled his car up in front of Judge’s, he was happy to see there were still a couple of newspapers left in the green metal box that sat out front. He dropped in four quarters, grabbed a paper, and went inside, his guts prickling in anticipation.

Ronnie shoved two dollars across the bar and ordered a Leinenkugel draft beer. Then, as all around him music thumped and beer bottles rattled, he pulled out the news section of the Sunday paper. He was starting to feel a little anxious now, hoping he’d be able to find what he was looking for.

The story was right there on page one, just below the fold. The headline said, INFANT KIDNAPPED FROM KENWOOD HOME. He read the story slowly, his lips moving along as he read. When he got to the fourth paragraph, he smiled to himself. Ashley. The hot little babysitter chick’s name was Ashley. And the story said that she’d been taken to a hospital, some place called HCMC.

Setting down the paper, Ronnie took a long sip of beer. He liked that her name was Ashley. It sounded classy and reminded him of a character on one of those teen reality shows. He dug his hand into a bowl of popcorn that sat on the bar. Popped a handful into his mouth, chewed, and hawked the hulls out onto the floor. Hadn’t he and Ashley shared a moment together last night? Hadn’t she stared into his eyes and given him a glimmer of encouragement? Sure, she had. Like most girls, she’d wanted it pretty bad. Needed it. He could tell.

Ronnie took another sip of beer and the liquid slid down his throat, cool and malty. “Ashley,” he murmured. “Ashley baby.”





7


I’M sorry you had to cut your climbing trip short,” Lish said. Not ten seconds earlier, Afton had pushed open the back door of her home and tromped into the kitchen. Lish, Alisha Larkin, was stirring a pot of bubbling spaghetti sauce, steaming up their little kitchen in a nice, homey way. Afton had called her sister earlier in the day and told her about the change in plans. Told her she was back in town and would probably be home for supper.

“Mommy, Mommy!” Two eager voices blended into one as Poppy and Tess, Afton’s two daughters, came careening around a corner to greet her. Poppy was six and serious, dressed in an oversized Sponge Bob sweatshirt. Tess was ten going on fifteen, already into lip gloss and celebrity gossip, lobbying for her very own cell phone.

“I’m glad you came home, Mommy,” Poppy said. She pattered across the kitchen floor and favored Afton with an enormous bear hug. “Even if it was because of that kidnapping.”

Afton’s and Lish’s eyes met and Lish gave a little shrug that said, Who knows?

“How did you hear about the kidnapping, honey?” Afton asked. She made no secret of the fact that she was employed by the Minneapolis Police Department, but had always tried to spare the girls from any grisly details of the cases she worked. It was better, she’d decided, to focus on the positive role she played.

“It was on the five o’clock news,” Poppy told her. “The lady was crying. A lot,” she added with emphasis.

“Is the baby dead?” Tess asked. She sounded blasé but looked a little scared.

“No, of course not,” Afton said. “The police and the FBI are working very hard to find her and bring her home.”

“That’s good,” Tess said. She edged over to the counter, where Lish was busy grating a hunk of Parmesan cheese, and smiled at her impishly through masses of tangled blond hair. “Want me to set the table?”

“More than anything,” Lish said.

“Mommy,” Poppy said as Tess stood on tiptoe to gather plates and glasses from the cupboard. “How come you changed your name? How come you have a different name than Daddy?” It was sweet that she still referred to Mickey as her daddy, even though they’d only been together as a family for little more than a year.

“It’s all about identity, honey,” Afton said. “When you’re a little older, you’ll understand.”

But Poppy wasn’t about to drop the subject. “What if I want to change my name someday?”

“Honey,” Afton said, bending down. “Do you want to change your name?”