Girls Like Us(31)

I remove the photo from the board and hold it up to the light. I can’t shake the feeling I’ve seen Adriana before. Why? My memories are beginning to blur, like film strips shuffled together. Have I seen her before, or is it just my mother I’m remembering? Now that I’m home, I see my mother everywhere. Crossing the street in town. Walking along the beach. I dream about her, too, more than I have in years.

“She was pretty,” Lee says from behind, startling me. “It’s sad, isn’t it?”

“It would be sad if she wasn’t.” My words come out sharper than I intended.

“I know. I didn’t mean—”

“I know what you meant.” I turn back to the board. When Lee isn’t looking, I tuck the photo in my pocket. My heart is racing. Why did my father come here? Had he linked this case to Pine Barrens before he died? And if he had, then how? I need to know what he knew. I want to be able to see what he saw. Did he have the same feeling I did? That there was something familiar about Adriana, something that drew him to her on instinct?

A business card is tacked at the very bottom of the corkboard. It is a small black square. In the corner, printed in silver, it reads “GC Limo Services.” A cell phone number is listed in small print. I reach into my pocket, withdraw my gloves. As carefully as I can, I remove the card. The silver lettering catches the light as I slip it inside an evidence bag.

Lee is standing in front of the closet. He turns, a small white handbag dangling from one finger. It has a gold chain, a quilted front. “Hey. Look at this. Chanel. How much do you think this thing costs?”

“A couple thousand? Maybe more.”

Lee raises his eyebrows. “I will never understand women.”

“That makes two of us.”

I walk over to the closet. It looks as though two people live here. Half the clothes are what you’d expect from a teenager. Jeans and T-shirts are piled on the floor in loosely folded stacks. Sneakers are pushed toward the back; a single, fur-lined Ugg boot lies abandoned in the corner. A row of teetering heels are arranged in front of the sneakers. Some are still in boxes. I bend down, open a box. Out of the tissue paper, I pick up a red-soled stiletto. The bottoms are still smooth. The heel is dagger-sharp, as long as my hand from my wrist to the tip of my fingers.

“Never worn.”

“A gift?”

“Maybe.” I stand and page through the dresses. “A lot of expensive clothes in here. There’s no way she could afford this kind of stuff.”

“She had rich clients.”

“I’d say so.”

I pull out a hanging bag from Bergdorf Goodman. I unzip it. Inside is a white cocktail dress, size 2. It’s a demure dress, with capped sleeves and a flared skirt. The kind of thing you see on women in the society pages. It still has a price tag dangling from the sleeve: “$2,200.”

Lee whistles.

“Rich clients with expensive taste. I bet someone picked this out for her. I can’t see this girl going into the city for a day of shopping at Bergdorf Goodman. And even if she did, she wouldn’t pick out this dress.” I hold up a pair of well-worn Converse sneakers. “This is what she wears on her own time.”

“We can talk to the store and find out who bought it.”

I nod. “I wonder if she was going somewhere.”

“Going where?”

“Look.” I point to the label. “It’s mostly resort collection.”

“What the hell is that?”

“What rich women wear on vacation. You know. Bright colors. Tropical prints. Strappy sandals.”

“How do you know that?”

“I read.”

Lee snorts. “What, Vogue? Didn’t take you for such a fashion plate, Flynn.”

I ignore him. I pull a pair of white silk pants out of the closet. I hold them up for Lee’s inspection. “This. This is resort. It’s like someone went to Bergdorf’s and bought a whole wardrobe. Not just evening clothes. Daywear, too. I’m telling you. She was going somewhere. Somewhere expensive. With someone who wanted her to look the part.”

“Or maybe she was just going to parties in the Hamptons.”

“Maybe,” I concede. “Ria Sandoval used a driver named Giovanni Calabrese, right? The night she disappeared?”

“Yeah.”

“Adriana used him, too. Not the night she went missing, but before that. Her sister said she was picked up by a bald guy in a white Escalade. That can’t be a coincidence, right? I think we should pay him a visit.”

“We should, but it’ll have to wait.” Lee holds up his phone. “Dorsey said as soon as we were done here, we should meet him down at the ME’s. The press is all over this case already. He needs to give a statement.”

“Okay. Let’s bag everything up. Clothes, too.”

Lee nods. As I move to help him, I reach into the pocket of my jacket, my fingers curling around the photograph.

Then it hits me. I have seen Adriana before. It’s not just that she looks like my mother. She is one of the two girls in the Polaroid picture I found in the desk at 97 Main Street.





10.



The drive from Riverhead to Hauppauge is thirty-five minutes, give or take. At this time of day, most of the traffic is headed away from the city, not toward it. As we get in the car, I decide I’m better off going it alone. I want to speak to Grace Bishop again. She clammed up the moment Lee appeared. She doesn’t trust any member of the SCPD, and I’m starting to understand why. I’d also like to collect my father’s bike and search through his office without Lee hovering over my shoulder.