Scared To Death (Live to Tell #2)(26)

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thank you,” she remembers to say, and glances to Elsa for a nod of approval.

They’ve been working on basic manners from the day Renny came to live with them. She’s come such a long way since then.

As soon as they settle into the booth, the waitress meanders over to take their order—espressos for Elsa and Brett, raspberry gelato for Renny.

When it arrives, she spoons it rhythmically into her mouth, her eyes riveted to the small screen of Brett’s iPad. Elsa explains the situation to Mike, well aware that Brett is leaving the talking to her.

“Spider-Man.” Mike slowly rubs his five o’clock shadow. “This isn’t something that was ever released to the public…unless either of you brought it up to the press during all the commotion last fall?”

“That Jeremy was playing with Spider-Man when he disappeared? Never.”

“And there was no mention in any of the missing person’s reports…” That isn’t a question. Mike is more familiar with those reports, perhaps, than they are.

“No.”

“Where’s the other one? The one you found on the grass when he disappeared? Do you still have it?”

“It’s in the cedar chest in our bedroom,” Brett speaks up at last. “Elsa keeps it there with some of Jeremy’s other things…his blanket, and a couple of his shirts…”

Elsa keeps it there. Not we keep it there.

Elsa feels a familiar flicker of resentment. Brett, the father who rolls over and goes right back to sleep.

“Are you sure it’s still there?” Mike is asking—her, not Brett, she notices. He gets it. Of course he does. He’s been around them for years. He knows that they both might have lost a child, but that she’s the one who clings to the memories.

“Because I’m thinking maybe it’s the same one you found in the parking lot,” Mike goes on, despite her nod. “Maybe Renny came across it and put it into the bag with her toys.”

“No way. I keep that chest locked. She couldn’t have gotten into it. And anyway, this Spider-Man is different.”

“Are you sure?” Brett asks her. “Spider-Man is Spider-Man.”

Elsa doesn’t bother to answer. Of course she’s sure. She spent years clinging to the last thing her son ever touched, even slept with it under her pillow. She knows exactly what it looks like: similar enough to the toy she found on the ground today, but certainly not the same.

“A lot of little boys are into superheroes,” Mike points out.

Elsa bristles. “So you think—”

Mike cuts in, “I don’t know what to think. I’m just trying to gather information. To the best of your knowledge, are there any pictures of Jeremy holding a Spider-Man toy, or wearing a Spider-Man costume…?”

Brett looks at Elsa, who again shakes her head. “He was never interested until that day at Wal-Mart. And anyway, I’ve spent fifteen years going through every photo album we have. There are no pictures anywhere of Jeremy in a Spider-Man costume.”

“What about before he came to you?”

“Before he came to us, there were no toys, and no pictures—other than the ones the foster agency took.” Maybe Elsa is exaggerating, but not all that much.

Jeremy bounced from one foster home to another before he landed in theirs, having been deprived of just about everything—toys, fun, love…particularly love.

“As far as I’m concerned, there’s only one way anyone would link Spider-Man to Jeremy…” She pauses meaningfully before delivering the bombshell: “And that’s by having been there when he disappeared fifteen years ago.”



“What is it, Mom?”

Marin frowns at the text message on her phone. “I don’t know…I just got this text. I guess it was meant for someone else.”

“What does it say?”

“It doesn’t say anything.”

“Is it porn?” Annie asks with interest.

“No, it’s not porn!” Wait—it’s not, is it?

“Can I see?”

Marin shrugs and hands over the phone.

Annie takes a quick glance and announces, “That’s an emoticon, Mom.”

“A what?”

“You know how people type a row of symbols—like, to show that you’re making a joke, you do a sideways smiley face made out of a colon for the eyes and a close parenthesis for the mouth?”

“Yes…so you think this is something like that?”

“Probably. See?”

Marin looks over Annie’s shoulder, trying to see the cryptic text message as an image.

~~(=:>

“What’s it supposed to mean?” she asks her daughter, still stumped.

“I have no idea.” Together, they silently study the symbols.

Annie gasps. “Whoa! I think I know what it is.”

“What?”

“Okay, don’t freak out, Mom…but that totally looks like a rat.”

“A rat?” She squints at the image. “I don’t see—”

The phone cuts her off, buzzing with another message. It’s from the same sender. Marin opens it, and her blood runs cold.