keeping her voice office-low. “I’m going through some things.”
“With Mitch?”
“I can’t talk about it.”
“Is he being an asshole again?”
“Listen,” Mandy said, “I know you’re worried about me.” Her voice grew curt and now, very final. “I’m not going to talk about this. I need you to back off. OK?”
Then she hung up.
That was the last time they ever spoke about it.
Jenna Kenyon’s cell phone vibrated somewhere in the depths of her purse. She’d been dispatched to the basement bedroom that her stepmother Dani had said was built with her in mind.
“You father wants you to feel you have a home here, too,” Dani Kenyon said as she first revealed the unfinished bedroom, more than a year ago. “I want you to help pick out paint colors and fabrics. I’m thinking of chocolate with mango accents.”
“That sounds yummy,” Jenna said, knowing that Dani wouldn’t get the irony of her pun, nor the literal distaste she had for orange and brown. The colors reminded her of the design scheme used by her junior high.
“Having you happy here is a big, big priority,” Dani said.
The passage of time proved that. The room hadn’t changed a bit, save for a few more items shoved inside the space. Jenna knew where she stood with Dani, and by extension, where she stood with her father.
She found her cell phone and let out an audible sigh.
It was Amber Manley.
She let it go to voice mail and turned on her laptop, waiting for it to whirl into life.
Amber Manley was a sister from the Beta Zeta House at Cascade University, Jenna’s old chapter. Amber had stumbled onto a cache of food and clothes that had been squirreled away by Pepper Raynor. The problem was that while Pepper was a thief—stealing food from the kitchen and ripping off bits of every size two in the house—Amber had become the target of disciplinary action because she opened Pepper’s closet.
Jenna started typing.
Dear Amber,
I know you’ve been trying to reach me. As much as I’d like to help you, I’m afraid I can’t. The chapter rules are very specific. Despite the odor coming from Pepper’s closet, you had no right to open it…
More than a thousand miles away, he stirred as she came online. His computer know-how came in part from the endless loneliness that draws a boy into the insidious depths of a computer screen, searching for connections to people, and for his own place in the world. He liked how the keyboard felt; cool at first, then hot as he pounded the keys to take him to places he thought he’d never go. His screensaver had been an image of the jade-colored waters around the sandy edges of Oahu, a place he thought he’d never see. But he had. He’d been all over the country, and to Europe. No place he visited, however, made him feel better about himself.
Nothing could.
And just when he thought it could be different, it was all snatched from him.
She was to blame, because she’d stolen from him all that mattered.
He’d e-mailed from a dummy e-mail account a seemingly innocuous message that he cleverly outfitted with a Trojan horse—spyware that allowed him to capture every word she typed on her laptop. If he was logged on to his computer at the same time, he’d actually see her words in real time. She wasn’t a stupid girl, he knew. She wasn’t weak. She handled those self-absorbed and dimwitted girls with an impressive toughness and logic. There were things about her he might have admired, had he not blamed her for the darkest tragedy of a life that had been marked by so many.
As he formed his plan, created his list, he learned to loathe her over the others. Of the three, she’d been the one in charge. She could have changed the course of her own destiny. She was responsible for everything that was coming to her. Jenna Kenyon could have kept her name off the list.
The first two had no choice. No voice. They would be the disposable practice dolls that he’d once tossed in a fire pit behind his foster family’s house. They were trash. Not even human.
Jenna would be the prize. He’d save the most-deserving for last.
Chapter Five
The next morning, Emily caught a glimpse of Cherrystone’s least favorite—albeit most successful—car dealer as he slowed his car in front of the copy center on Washington Avenue. She found a spot right behind him and parked the Crown Vic. Running into a “person of interest” is always a good thing.
“Hi, Mitch,” she said, emerging from her vehicle. She could see him tense a little, but his slight smile stayed intact.
“Sheriff Kenyon,” he said, pressing the key button to his automatic door lock. The horn beeped.
She took a breath. “I was going to call you. No need now.”
“How lucky for you,” he said, through taut, angry lips.
“I was thinking that we could get some more traction on Mandy’s case if you stopped by the station.”
Mitch Crawford’s eyes flashed. “Oh, I see. After you’ve treated me like a freak and embarrassed me in front of my own staff, you want me to make nice? That’s just goddamn beautiful. Thanks to you and your careless insinuations, my own mother-in-law asked me what I did with Mandy.”
Emily shook her head. “I’m sorry. Sometimes people forget that you’re a victim here, too.”
Most people would have seen the emptiness of Emily’s words, but there was no risk of that with Mitch Crawford. He only saw the things that fit his overly inflated self-image. Anything that stroked his ego, got him attention, or made him feel that he was the wronged one—it was a safe bet.
“Will you help us?” she asked, this time, her voice a little softer. She wasn’t aiming for sexy, although there was no doubt that she was a beautiful woman with a stunning face and lovely figure. The days of charming a guy with an unbuttoned blouse were long gone, but she still could see the value in suggesting vulnerability.
Because that’s exactly what catches a guy like Mitch Crawford off guard.
“I’m in the middle of some stuff here,” he said, waving a manila envelope in Emily’s direction.
“Oh, I can see that,” she said. “Why don’t you come by later this afternoon?”
“Do I come alone? Or do I get a lawyer?”
“You can always bring a lawyer, Mitch, but I think you’re smart enough to see that we’re only trying to help. I mean, really, why would you need one if you just want to help us find your wife?”
Mitch was probably a decent poker player. If he was worried right then, he didn’t let on.
“All right, Sheriff. If we clear the air, will you get Mandy’s mother off my back? Tell her that I
