The Night Before(34)

Another abrupt shift swept through her. She didn’t want to be right. She wanted Gabe to tell her she was overreacting. Tell her she should have waited. Tell her she was wrong.

Then she remembered the notes Joe had found in Laura’s coat pockets. The threats. Gabe didn’t know about those, either.

“There’s something else…” she started to say. But another call was coming through.

“Rosie?” Gabe was waiting for her to finish.

“Hold on—there’s another call. Maybe it’s that woman.…”

“Go! Pick it up!”

Rosie answered the second call. “Hello?”

“This is Sylvia Emmett.” The woman said it in a whisper. She said it like she didn’t want to be on the other end of the call.



* * *



Rosie took Joe’s car to the west side of town. The streets were quiet, empty. There was nothing there but industrial buildings—warehouses and car dealerships. She passed a furniture outlet and saw the neon lights of a diner. She turned in and parked, walked inside, and sat across from a woman with dark brown hair pulled up in a ponytail. She was young, like Laura. And pretty.

“Are you Sylvia?” Rosie asked.

The woman motioned for her to sit down. “Yeah,” she said.

Rosie slid onto the bench, the table between them. “I’m Rosie. Thank you for calling back. You have no idea—”

“I have a boyfriend,” the woman blurted out. “He can’t know.…”

The waitress was upon them. Sylvia ordered coffee.

“I’ll have the same,” Rosie said. Then, to the woman, “My sister went on a date with a man last night. She never came home.”

Sylvia sat back, wide-eyed. “What does that have to do with me?”

“Her phone was last online near a bar by the harbor. The bartender recognized this man.…” Rosie pulled the picture from her purse and laid it on the table. She pointed at Jonathan Fields and stared at his smug smile.

“My sister went on a date with a man from this site. The profile matches—the age, description. And he was at the bar where her phone was last online.”

Rosie watched the woman process the information, part of her hoping that she was about to say something that sent them on a new course, a course where this man, this player, was not the man her sister met. She couldn’t decide if that would be better or worse.

But it didn’t matter. That hope was quickly dispelled as Sylvia’s face changed from shock to recognition.

“He loved that place. It was always crowded. Easy to get lost.”

“He said his name was Jonathan Fields,” Rosie said.

Sylvia shook her head with disgust. “He lies about his name. I met him at a different bar. Not through any dating site. I was out with some friends and he was there—alone. Trolling, it turns out. He was relentless, but cute. First he told me he was Billy Larson. But on our first actual date—which was at that bar by the harbor—he told me he had lied about that, and that his name was Buck Larkin. He covers his lies with more lies. After he told me he’d lied about his name, I thought that was it—that was the thing he was hiding. He said he didn’t like women looking for him on social media. He said he was worried they might tell his ex-wife and that it would hurt her feelings. Ridiculous, right? I didn’t think it at the time. Not with handsome Billy, or Buck, or whatever his name really is, sitting across from me and two glasses of wine…”

The waitress returned and set down the coffee. Sylvia took hers in both hands, spun the cup around in the saucer. Her mind was on this man, Jonathan Fields. Billy Larson. Buck Larkin. The liar.

Rosie didn’t speak. She didn’t want to interrupt the story for fear that it would end before it could lead her to her sister. And Sylvia seemed anxious to tell it all as quickly as she could.

“We went on three dates in total, if you count the night we met,” Sylvia continued. “The first two times, he was a perfect gentleman. Paid for the drinks. Paid for dinner the second night. Opened doors for me, listened to me. He was the reason I had doubts about my boyfriend—you know? He was everything Dan isn’t. But when I look back on it, I can see how he paid careful attention to everything I said, and, yes, I lied about still being with Dan. But we’re not married. We don’t live together. I don’t know. Maybe I’m just as bad as he is.”

She stopped, took a sip of coffee. It felt like forever.

“So what happened?” Rosie asked finally. “Why did you agree to meet me in the middle of the night?”

Sylvia looked up, suddenly hesitant.

“Please,” Rosie said. “I need to know what might have happened last night.”

“Look, I don’t know if this is going to help you find your sister. It’s hard to talk about it. It’s humiliating.”

“I don’t think any of us get through life without doing something humiliating.”

Sylvia smiled softly. Exhaled. Looked into her coffee.

“I just wanted to be sure, you know? About Dan. Before we got married or had kids. I’d never thought about it until I met Buck at that bar. He was so attentive, you know? And Dan, well … he’s not exactly a talker. It made me wonder if I was rushing into things. I had feelings for this guy instantly. He was emotional and intelligent. He even cried when he told me about his divorce.”