Don't Look for Me(74)

“What do you mean?” Hannah asks.

“Do they ever get mad at each other? Do they yell sometimes?”

I am desperate to get back to my apples. I need to take out the seeds and grind them. I need to do this before we can bake the muffins.

Time passes. Mick is with my daughter. A bead of sweat rolls down the side of my face.

Hannah finally answers.

“He loves my mommy,” Hannah says finally. “He loves her so much it makes him cry.”

The image of Mick with my daughter leaves for a brief moment as I try to think about what this means. I can’t picture Mick crying.

But then suddenly I can. Suddenly, my perspective shifts. Love can make people crazy. It can make them do crazy, evil things.

“Because she’s so beautiful?” Suzannah asks.

Hannah nods.

“With her real blond hair and her thin body?”

Hannah nods again.

Alice reaches through the bars and takes Suzannah from me. She lays her on the ground, and then lays Hannah down beside her. Alice leans in close and so I lean in close. She doesn’t want Dolly to hear.

“I have to show you something. It has to be a secret.”

Yes. Please. Tell me your secrets.

“I promise,” I say to her. Then she gets up and leaves. I hear her walk softly to her room. A moment passes and she returns.

She sits down casually. Too casually, like she’s acting. And I can feel that her heart is exploding.

She carries a small book of nursery rhymes. She hands it to me through the bars.

“The story on page twenty-three is my favorite,” she says.

I open the book and carefully turn the pages until I find what she wants me to see. On page twenty-three, tucked into the crease, is a picture of a young woman.

A young woman with real blond hair and long, skinny legs.

I stare at the picture, trying to hide the surge of adrenaline as it pulses through my veins, turning my face crimson.

I am looking at a woman who resembles my daughter.

Alice picks up Hannah.

“That’s my mommy,” she says. “Daisy Alice Hollander.”

I look at Alice, then to the picture. Then to Alice again. Her face is transformed from that of a child to a grown, wise woman.

A woman who understands and wants me to understand what’s happening here.

Alice’s mother is dead. The mother that Mick loved so much it made him cry.

And now he’s found a way to bring her back to life. He’s found a woman who has long blond hair and a sleek body and is young.

He’s found my daughter.

I nod slowly to Alice. She reaches through the bars and takes the book from my hands.

Yes, Alice. I try to say with my eyes. I understand.





42


Day sixteen





Nic stopped just beyond the clearing where she could see Veronica Hollander’s house. The trees were thicker here, evergreens mixing in with the pines and oaks, filling up the sky. The house seemed dark inside but smoke billowed from a chimney. She could smell the wood-burning even with the windows closed.

A text broke through the silence. It was Reyes.

At the station with Watkins. Will sort everything out.

Heading back to see you.

Nic stared at it, remembering she had just seen Watkins leaving town—back to the casino. And she had just driven past the police station. Reyes’s car had not been there.

Something about this was all wrong.

She got out of the car and walked to the same door she’d been at the day before, with Kurt Kent.

She knocked, waited. She could hear the creaking of floorboards inside, someone walking. Maybe deciding whether to let her in. She was alone this time. And she’d been asking questions about the past that had made Veronica uncomfortable.

“Hello?” Nic called out. She knocked again.

“It’s Nicole Clarke. From the other day—with Kurt? I just have a few more questions.”

Finally, the turn of a lock, and the door opened.

Veronica was just as she’d been the last time. Long, tangled hair. Loose clothing hanging from her body. She was barefoot this time, and her skin glistened from the heat that was coming from the fireplace.

“It’s hot in here,” she said. But she stepped aside and let Nic enter.

“Damn fire either won’t stay burning and I freeze my ass off, or gets hot as hell.”

Nic smiled. “Thanks for letting me in.”

“At your peril.” V laughed then. “Want some tea?”

Nic wasn’t sure if she was serious. The place had to be eighty degrees. The windows were closed, and Nic wondered why she didn’t just open one, even a sliver, to let in the cool air.

“No thanks,” Nic said after V went to a kettle and poured hot water into a cup with a tea strainer. When she returned, she moved a leather jacket from the back of a chair, then pulled out the chair for Nic to sit. The table was just as cluttered as last time.

“Did you make that?” Nic asked. She motioned to the jacket which now lay on top of a pile of fabric.

V shook her head. “Just doing a repair. Ripped pocket. I’d be rolling in dough if I could make clothes like that.”

“So,” V said quickly after. “Is this about Daisy again?”