Two Can Keep a Secret(46)
“’Kay,” Mia says, scrolling through her phone like she’s barely listening. But as soon as the door closes behind Daisy, Mia’s head snaps up. “Let’s follow her,” she says in a loud whisper, springing to her feet.
Ezra and Ellery lift their brows in almost comical unison. “We already know where she goes,” I object, my face getting hot as the twins exchange surprised glances. Great. Nothing like outing yourself as a stalker in front of your only friends.
“But we don’t know why,” Mia says, peering through the blinds of the window next to the door. “Daisy’s seeing a psychologist and she never told me,” she adds over her shoulder to the twins. “It’s all very mysterious and I, for one, am sick of mysteries around here. At least we can do something about this one if we’re quick enough. Okay, she just pulled out. Let’s go.”
“Mia, this is ridiculous,” I protest, but to my surprise Ellery’s already halfway to the door, with Ezra right behind her. Neither of them seems concerned about the fact that Mia’s spying on her own sister with my help. So we pile into my mother’s Volvo, and head down the same road Daisy took last Thursday. We catch up to her pretty quickly, and keep a few car lengths behind her.
“Don’t lose her,” Mia says, her eyes on the road. “We need answers.”
“What are you going to do? Try to listen in on her session?” Ezra sounds both confused and disturbed. I’m with him; even if that wasn’t a massive violation of Daisy’s privacy and probably illegal, I don’t see how you could do it.
“I don’t know,” Mia says with a shrug. Typical Mia: all action, no planning. “She’s going twice in one week. That seems like a lot, doesn’t it?”
“Beats me,” I say, getting into the left lane in preparation for a turn that Daisy should be making at the next intersection. Except she doesn’t. I swerve to stay straight and the car behind me blares its horn as I run a yellow light.
“Smooth,” Ezra notes. “This is going well. Very stealthy.”
Mia frowns. “Now where’s she going?”
“Gym?” I guess, starting to feel foolish. “Shopping?”
But Daisy doesn’t head downtown, or toward the highway that would take us to the nearest mall. She sticks to back roads until we pass Bukowski’s Tavern and enter Solsbury, the next town over. The houses are smaller and closer together here than they are in Echo Ridge, and the lawns look like they get mowed a lot less. Daisy’s blinker comes on after we pass a liquor store, and she turns in front of a sign that reads “Pine Crest Estates.”
That’s an optimistic name, I think. It’s an apartment complex, full of the kind of cheap, boxy places you can’t find in Echo Ridge but that are all over Solsbury. Mom and I checked out someplace similar right before she and Peter got together. If they hadn’t, we weren’t going to be able to hang on to our house for much longer. Even if it was the smallest, crappiest house in all of Echo Ridge.
“Is she moving out?” Mia wonders. Daisy inches through the parking lot, angling the gray Nissan in front of number 9. There’s a blue car to her right, and I pull into an empty spot next to that. We all scrunch down in our seats as she gets out of the car, like that’ll keep us incognito. All Daisy would have to do is turn her head to catch sight of my mother’s Volvo. But she doesn’t look around as she gets out, just strides forward and knocks on the door.
Once, twice, and then a third time.
Daisy pulls off her sunglasses, stuffs them into her bag, and knocks again. “Maybe we should leave before she gives up. I don’t think they’re ho—” I start, but then the door to number 9 opens. Somebody wraps his arms around Daisy and swings her halfway around, kissing her so deeply that Mia lets out a gasp beside me.
“Oh my God, Daisy has a boyfriend,” she says, scrambling out of her seat belt and leaning so far left that she’s practically in my lap. “And here she’s been so Mopey McMoperson since she moved home! I did not see that coming.” We’re all craning our necks for a better view, but it’s not until Daisy breaks away that I catch sight of whom she’s with—along with something I haven’t seen in years.
My brother grinning like his face is about to break, before he pulls Daisy inside and shuts the door behind her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Ellery
Monday, September 30
“So,” Malcolm says, plugging tokens into one end of a foosball table. “That was interesting.”
After leaving Declan’s apartment, we stopped at the first place we came to that we were pretty sure he and Daisy wouldn’t show up on a date. It happened to be a Chuck E. Cheese’s. I haven’t been to one in years, so I’ve forgotten what a sensory assault they are: flashing lights, beeping games, tinny music, and screaming children.
The guy letting people in at the door wasn’t sure about us at first. “You’re supposed to come with kids,” he said, glancing behind us at the empty hallway.
“We are kids,” Mia pointed out, holding out her hand for a stamp.
Turns out, Chuck E. Cheese’s is the perfect location for a clandestine debrief. Every adult in the place is too busy either chasing after or hiding from their children to pay us any attention. I feel weirdly calm after our trip to Pine Crest Estates, the dread that came over me at Mia’s house almost entirely gone. There’s something satisfying about unlocking another piece of the Echo Ridge puzzle, even if I’m not yet sure where it fits.