not really all that hungry this morning.”
“Why don’t I leave instead?” Susan began to rise, but Lorena put her hand on her shoulder.
“Nonsense. You stay right there. We haven’t thought of half the people you ought to talk to. The truck stop on the interstate like I said. The two mechanics in town, of course. And the drugstore. Maybe he needed something for the baby.”
As he crossed the room, Jeb could hear his aunt pull out the chair he’d just vacated to take her place across the table from her guest. He had had too much experience with the brutal finality of death to play this kind of game, however.
Even as he walked away, he knew he was judging both of them too harshly: a mother who wanted to know what had happened to her baby and an old woman who always wanted to right the wrongs of the world. And if what they were doing helped Susan Chandler deal with the loss of her daughter, who was he to begrudge either of them that comfort?
CHAPTER FIVE
“HELL, LADY, I can’t remember who came in here yesterday, and you’re asking me about something that happened seven years ago?”
In response to her inquiry, one of the waitresses had called the owner of the truck stop out of his office. His impatience to get back to whatever he’d been doing was obvious.
Thankfully his attitude was in contrast to most of the people she’d talked to in Linton. They’d all known who she was and why she was here, one benefit of an effective small-town grapevine. Their willingness to help had made the process of asking questions easier than she’d expected. The downside was that none of them remembered seeing Richard.
“He was driving a black SUV,” she said for at least the tenth time today. “There would have been a toddler in the infant seat in the back.”
It was the same information she had given everyone she’d talked to during the last two days. In actuality, it was all she knew. And the part about Emma being with Richard was speculation, of course.
Since the baby hadn’t been in the car when it was found, but the car seat had been, that was the scenario that seemed to make the most sense. At least to her. If Richard had left Emma with someone on his way down here, then surely he would have left the safety seat as well.
“I already told you. Too many people come through here for me to try to remember ’em. The casino regulars maybe. Anybody else…” The owner shrugged, his eyes deliberately moving beyond her to whatever was going on at the crowded counter where Sunday supper was being served.
“He might have had car trouble. Or maybe he asked about a place to spend the night.”
There had to be some reason Richard had turned off the interstate at this exit. The next one was nearer to Pascagoula. And although the new state highway did eventually go into that city, Richard would have had to turn off that road in order to end up at the bridge in Linton. She couldn’t imagine that had been Richard’s plan when he left Atlanta.
Whatever that plan had been. She knew no more now about where he’d been headed than she had the weekend he’d disappeared.
“If that had been what he was asking, I sure as hell wouldn’t have sent him to Linton, now would I?” Realizing how abrupt that sounded, the owner attempted to modify his tone to something approaching compassion. “Look, I’m sorry about your husband. I really am, but I got a business to run here. And it seems to me you’re about seven years too late in trying to figure out how or why he ended up at that bridge.”
After that, there seemed little point in continuing the conversation. Maybe she should value his bluntness. At least he was being honest about the impossibility of what she was asking him to do. If it hadn’t been for Emma…
“Thank you for your time,” she said, choosing to ignore his advice because she had no choice. “If you remember anything that might be helpful, here’s my number.” She handed him one of her business cards with the number of her cell, knowing it would probably end up in the trash as soon as she walked out the door.
She had thought about talking to the waitresses, but neither of them looked as if they were old enough to have been working anywhere seven years ago. Besides, with the Sunday-night crowd, it was apparent they had no time for conversation. Maybe another day when they weren’t so busy.
As she stepped out the front door and into the halogen-lighted parking lot, she realized that while she’d been inside, the rain that had been falling off and on all day had gotten much heavier. Although the day had been warm, there was a definite chill in the night air.
Holding her purse over her head, she made a run for the car, unlocking the driver’s-side door and slipping quickly behind the wheel. She sat for a moment, listening to the rain beat down on the roof of the Toyota, trying to think if there was anything else she could do tonight.
During the two days she’d spent in Linton, she had talked to everyone Lorena had mentioned who might have seen Richard. Then she had followed up on any other possibilities the people she’d talked to had suggested. The owner of the busy truck stop, farther from town, had been the last name on her list.
Not only had she run out of people to ask about Richard and Emma, she was also tired, damp, cold and hungry. The thought of her hostess’s solicitude and the comforts of the room she’d been given offered more temptation than she could resist. She’d done all she could today. She would start again in the morning.
Maybe with Sheriff Adams, she decided. Surely there was some way he could speed up the coroner’s report. How long could an autopsy take, given what she’d been led to believe about the condition of Richard’s body? She shivered, deliberately destroying that unwanted image.
She turned the key in the ignition and then pulled out of the parking lot and onto the narrow two-lane that led back into Linton. There were no streetlights this far out, of course, and with the rain, visibility was poor. Although she had driven the same route this afternoon, she found it was a very different prospect under these conditions.
She concentrated on the centerline, the only marking on the blacktop. She leaned forward, peering over the steering wheel and through the windshield, which was beginning to fog. Keeping her eyes on the road, she felt for the defrost switch with her right hand. After a couple of attempts she located it, and in a matter of seconds, the windows began to clear.
She tried to relax her shoulders, which had tensed with the effort of following the winding, unfamiliar road. The sign just off the interstate had said it was twenty miles into Linton. This afternoon, she hadn’t been conscious of that distance at all. Tonight it seemed as if she had already been traveling forever.
For the first time since she’d left the truck stop, a vehicle approached in the other lane. Either the driver had his high beams on or the headlights reflecting off the wet asphalt made them seem brighter. She squinted to shield her eyes from the glare as she blinked her own lights from low to high a couple of times. The signal had no effect on the oncoming car.
Pickup, she realized as it flew by with a swish of tires. Judging by the way her car responded to the wind force created by its passage, it had been a big one. And making no concession in speed, despite the conditions.
Idiot, she thought before she put the pickup out of her mind, forcing herself to concentrate again on the centerline.
She had gone perhaps
