The Bad Daughter(31)

Sandi was clearly surprised by the question. “Me? I’m fine. Well, pregnant again. Obviously. My fourth. Jason’s killer sperm strikes again!” She smiled, then frowned, as if realizing a smile might be inappropriate. “What’s happening with your dad? Is he going to make it?”

“I don’t know.” Robin looked around the room uneasily, trying to extricate the errant blueberry from the roof of her mouth with her tongue. Sandi’s voice had attracted the attention of everyone in the place. All eyes were now focused squarely on her.

“The whole thing is so crazy,” Sandi was saying. “I can’t believe Tara’s dead. Do the police have any idea who did it?”

Whispers began swirling around her like a sudden summer breeze.

“Who is she?”

“That must be the other daughter.”

“She’s so thin.”

“I heard little Cassidy’s still critical. Poor sweet thing,” Sandi said as Robin finally succeeded in freeing the stubborn berry. “Do you know when Tara’s funeral will be?”

“No. I…” Out of the corner of her eye, Robin saw cell phones being lifted. She raised her hand to hide her face from the telltale click of prying cameras.

“Are you staying at Melanie’s? She must be reeling. I mean, how much can one person take, what with that boy of hers…Is it true he’s a suspect?”

“One mochaccino,” a voice behind the counter called out.

“Mine!” Robin reached eagerly toward it.

“Are you Robin Davis?” someone asked. “You probably don’t remember me, but…”

“No, sorry.” Robin grabbed her mochaccino and fled the premises without looking back.

“Well, that was rather rude,” she heard Sandi say as the door shut behind her.



* * *



—

There were two people waiting to be served when Robin entered the T-Mobile store at the end of the block. Luckily, she didn’t know either of them. Nor did she know the young male employees assisting them, although she couldn’t help wondering if they knew Landon. She made a concerted effort while she waited to avoid thinking about last night’s incident with her nephew, which of course ensured that it was all she thought about.

“Wow,” the employee, whose name tag identified him as Tony, exclaimed when she presented him with her shattered cell phone. “What happened here?”

“I dropped it.”

“Down a well?”

Robin quickly selected a new phone, bursting into a flood of grateful tears when Tony told her that she’d be able to keep her old number.

“Wow,” he said, “you must really like that number.”

Robin was wiping away her tears when she caught sight of a man’s shadow at the store window. Was it the same man who’d been peering at her through the window at Starbucks?

“Who’s that?” she asked Tony.

Tony looked past her toward the street. “Who’s who?”

“That man,” Robin began, then stopped when she realized no one was there. So, not only are you paranoid, but you’re seeing things as well.

No more Ativan for you, dear, she decided as she left the shop. You’re strong. You’re in control. You don’t need it. With exaggerated resolve, she reached into her purse and impulsively chucked the tiny plastic bottle containing the remaining pills into a trash can at the corner, along with her empty coffee cup. Immediately she regretted her decision. As she was trying to figure out how she could retrieve the bottle, her gaze fell on the bright yellow newspaper box nearby.

MILLIONAIRE DEVELOPER GREG DAVIS FIGHTS FOR HIS LIFE, screamed the headline of the Red Bluff Daily News. Below it was the same photograph of her father, Tara, and Cassidy that had hung on the wall in her father’s office, hiding the safe. Tara Davis succumbs to her wounds; daughter Cassidy remains in critical condition, read the caption accompanying the picture.

Berating herself for jettisoning the pills, Robin hurried down the street to where she’d parked Melanie’s car, anxiety nipping at her heels like an overeager puppy.

“Excuse me, Miss Davis,” a voice called as Robin was unlocking the car door.

Instinctively, Robin turned her head. A man with a camera stood less than ten feet away, furiously snapping one photo after another of her.

The same man who’d been watching her earlier? she wondered as he continued clicking away. “Get away from me!” she yelled. Head down, she quickly climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled away from the curb, eyes barely clearing the top of the steering wheel as she sped down the street. She didn’t stop until she reached the hospital parking lot.

She noted the two police cruisers still occupying their positions and wondered if they’d ever left. She left the engine running as she retrieved her new phone from her purse, quickly punching in the number of Blake’s office. “Okay,” she said to herself, “get a grip.” It was important that she sound in control.

Or, at the very least, sane.

The call was picked up in the middle of the second ring. “Blake Upton’s office. Kelly speaking.”

Robin recognized the plummy tones of Blake’s assistant even before the young woman identified herself. She pictured the California beauty with her sun-kissed hair and bottomless blue eyes, imagined her balancing a legal brief in her hands while balancing her round little bottom on Blake’s lap. “Is Blake there?”