17 & Gone(57)

I met her eyes. “Yes,” I said.

At this, my gaze was pulled away from her to the window over the kitchen sink, the small one that looked in the direction of the grand old Burke house next door. The view was of the side of the house near the laundry room, where the fire had burned all those years ago. I knew there was snow outside, and the temperature hovered near freezing, but the window didn’t have a pattern of frost on it like the others in the kitchen.

The window was fogged in the center into a round, warm shape, almost like a pair of lips. Like someone had pressed her glossed mouth to the window glass.

And breathed.

My mom was taking out her cell phone and dialing the number for the Pinecliff Police Department, the one that was listed on Abby’s Missing notice.

She was making the call for me, like she said she would. She believed me enough to make this call.

When someone answered, she said she wanted to find out more about a missing-persons case in the area. It involved an underage girl named Abigail Sinclair. She wanted to know if there was an active investigation, because she had information that led her to believe the girl didn’t run away, as suspected.

After a few questions, and discovering she should call back in the morning when the day shift was on, she asked if she could leave a message for a specific officer, one who had more knowledge of the case. Officer Heaney, she said.

A pause.

“Yes,” she said. “Heaney. H-E-A-N-E-Y, I think, or maybe H-E-E-N-Y? You don’t have a large department; surely you know who I mean.”

Then she got quiet. She was completely silent as someone on the other end of the line spoke, and I wasn’t close enough to make out what they were saying.

“What’s going on?” I said. She waved at me to give her a second. “Did he come to the phone? Is he there?”

“No,” she said into the phone. “No, I’m afraid not, no.”

“Can’t you leave him a message?” I asked. She didn’t respond.

“I understand,” she said at last. “All right. Okay. Yes, thank you.” She left her name and her number. She was in this now, too.

When she ended the call, she took a long moment before meeting my eyes.

She’d spoken to the police on the phone as if she absolutely believed me, had not a single doubt, and would go to bat for me if she had to. But now she was full of doubts. They flew and flapped all over her, making grim shadows darker than the tattooed birds that lined her neck.

“How tipsy are you right now?” she asked.

“Only a little,” I said. “I know where I am. I know what’s happening. I know who I’m talking to. What’d they say?

Tell me.”

“Besides tonight,” she said. “Besides whatever you had to drink tonight. How have you been feeling lately, Lauren?”

“Fine,” I said, in growing confusion.

“Are you sure?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

The question hung in the air, unanswered.

“All right,” my mom said. “Just making sure. I’ll tell you what they said.

They’re opening an investigation.”

I breathed a sigh of relief.

“Not because I called,” she was quick to add. “Not because of us. Turns out the case was just reopened, actually. Just this morning. Because her legal guardian called. Her grandfather, they said. From what I understand, he called out of the blue and said the family had reason to believe she didn’t run away and they wanted her case recategorized.”

There was a warmth inside me, and it wasn’t the pendant heating up; it was knowing Abby’s grandfather had heard me. He did what I’d asked him to do.

And, because of that, someone would be searching for her now. They hadn’t given up.

“But,” my mom said, and lingered there like she didn’t know how to finish.

“But?”

“But there’s no Officer Heaney at the Pinecliff Police Department, Lauren. I don’t know who you met that night, but no one by that name or any name like it works at the station. Are you sure he was from the Pinecliff station?”

“Yes,” I said.

“And you’re sure you got his name right?”

I nodded. “He said. Heaney, he said.

Pinecliff police, he said. I think. I’m pretty sure. He was going to arrest us for trespassing on private property. He said.”

She shrugged. Then said what she really meant. “Are you sure you talked to someone that night? Are you sure you’re not . . . confused?” There they were again. The shadows on her face that showed she doubted me. Now she thought

I

was

having

imaginary

conversations with authority figures and lying to make my story more convincing.

“Jamie was there with me. He met the guy. He talked to him. Officer Heaney.

He had on a uniform. He . . . I think he had on a uniform; it was dark.”

“It’s okay,” she said. “It doesn’t matter. They’ve opened an investigation, so if she’s out there and needs help, they’ll find her, okay?”

I didn’t feel okay.

Not anything close to okay.

Yes, I wanted them to be looking for Abby, but there was more to this. There was the fact that I didn’t know if I could trust my own mother.