Anything for Her(89)

“Nothing is impossible,” Mom declared. Allie had sat down, perching tensely on the edge of the sofa, but Mom paced as though she was so wired she couldn’t stop. “What if there’s someone in the marshal’s office who sells information? You read about things like that.”

“Then moving us wouldn’t help, would it?”

Allie was scared, too, but for a different reason from her mother. Had she jinxed her mother and herself by finally finding a real life?

“Allie.” Her mother stopped in front of the sofa. “When did you tell Nolan about us?”

Allie’s eyes widened. “Are you suggesting...?” She shot to her feet. “What do you think, he made some calls right away, offering us up for a price?”

“I know you don’t want to think it’s a possibility.” Mom’s voice had softened.

“It’s not a possibility.” She didn’t remember ever being angrier. “Anyway, I only told him Wednesday night. There’s no way all this could have happened so fast.”

“Oh.” Her mother’s stiff stance briefly eased, and then she took flight again, resuming her frenetic pacing. “Of course not. I’m sorry, honey, but I had to ask.”

Watching her, Allie had a truly awful thought. The timing was odd. Suggestive. Mom had never liked the idea of Allie’s relationship with Nolan. She wouldn’t have made this whole thing up, would she?

Allie gave her head a slight shake. No, of course not; Mom didn’t have the connections or skills to give them new identities. She couldn’t make up that part.

She could have hired someone to pretend to be searching for them, though. Look at her, a voice seemed to whisper to Allie. Is she really scared? Or is she excited, the way she was the other times?

Feeling sick, Allie saw that her mother did have that same electrified air Allie remembered so well. If this scene were taking place onstage, every eye in the audience would be on her mom. She’s the star again.

Allie actually had to swallow bile. “Mom, I’m going home. You’re overreacting. We should wait and see what happens. What if Dad applied for a loan that triggered a routine background search?”

“Do you think he made up the investigator asking about you?”

“I don’t know. No.” She flung up her hands. “Mom, I’m twenty-eight years old. No one hunting for you would have any reason to assume that finding me would necessarily lead right to you. A lot of people my age live on the other side of the country from their parents. Did Dad ask any questions? Like, ‘Why are you looking for my daughter’? What if whoever knocked at the door had the wrong guy? Did he mention me by name? And if so, what name did he use?”

“I don’t know,” her mother admitted. “I suppose I’m too alarmed to think this all through logically. But you seem to be in denial. And you know if they move us, they’ll do it suddenly.” She spoke sharply. “There won’t be time to pack much or for goodbyes.”

What she meant was that there won’t be time to say goodbye to Nolan.

Allie’s immediate, heartfelt reaction was I can’t. But then, on a wave of cold, she realized the alternative: saying goodbye to her mother. Or discovering suddenly that Mom was gone.

“I’m leaving.” She hurried to the front door. There, her hand on the knob, she turned to face her mother. “I can’t leave Nolan, Mom. I can’t.”

Her mother stared at her in shock.

Allie went out, shut the door and raced for her car. She wanted to drive straight to Nolan’s house, but knew she couldn’t. Not at this time of night. Sean would want to know what was going on and no matter what he couldn’t be told anything. Even a phone call at this time of night would probably wake him up. And that was assuming Nolan kept his phone anywhere he could hear it after he’d gone to bed.

No, tomorrow was soon enough.

This had to all be a mistake. She started the car, backed out of her mother’s driveway into the empty street and was grateful not to have far to go home. She wasn’t in any shape to drive.

* * *

“THEY’RE TALKING ABOUT moving us again.” Allie stood in the middle of Nolan’s workshop, looking as bad as she had the night she’d told him about the destruction of her family. She had called earlier; when he told her Sean had gone to one of his new friends’ houses for the day, she’d come over so they could “talk.”

That had alarmed him enough. He had suspected he wasn’t going to like anything she had to say, but his sinking feeling had become a sense of doom when he saw her sprint from her car to the workshop through the rain without even bothering with a coat.